Mind-Blowing Facts You Didn’t Learn About in Science Class
These quirky science facts will spark your sense of wonder.
There are more trees on Earth than stars in our galaxy
NASA experts believe there could be anywhere from 100 billion to 400 billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy. However, a 2015 paper published in the journal Nature estimated that the number of trees around the world is much higher: 3.04 trillion.
Oxygen has a colour
As a gas, oxygen is odourless and colourless. In its liquid and solid forms, however, it looks pale blue.
Only one letter doesn’t appear in the periodic table
It’s the letter J. Go ahead and double check. We’ll wait.
Can you pass this quiz of 4th grade science questions?
Bananas are radioactive
File this under “strange but true”: bananas contain potassium, and since potassium decays, that makes them slightly radioactive. But it’s nothing you need to worry about. You’d need to eat 10,000,000 bananas at once to die of radiation poisoning, Forbes reports.
Find out how to keep bananas fresh for as long as possible.
Hot water freezes faster than cold water
This fact seems counterintuitive, but it’s called the Mpemba effect, after a Tanzanian student named Erasto Mpemba who told his teacher than a hot mixture of ice cream froze faster than a cold one. Scientists now believe this is because the velocities of water particles have a specific disposition while they’re hot that allows them to freeze more readily. If proven correct, this finding could also have implications in daily life, like cooling down electronic devices.
Cold water heats up faster than hot water
The researchers who investigated the cause of the Mpemba effect made this discovery as well. They unsurprisingly named the phenomenon the inverse Mpemba effect.
Read up on the fascinating science behind the smell of rain.
Humans are related to fungi
A 2015 study from the University of Cambridge suggests that mankind may have evolved with genes that came from plants. Because of those findings, researchers accept that about one per cent of the human genome could have been acquired from plants, The Telegraph reports. So all those times your corny uncle called himself a “fungi”? He was actually sort of right.
Here are more bad dad jokes that’ll make you groan (and grin).
But don’t worry—we have a lot of DNA
Scientists predict that there are over three billion base pairs of DNA in human genes and over 25,000 genes in the human genome. An entire copy of that genome exists in each of the 10 trillion cells in the human body. If all of that DNA were lined up, it would cover the distance between Earth and the sun 100 times.
Read up on the fascinating breakthroughs being made in Canadian stem cell therapies.
It can rain diamonds on other planets
Diamonds are definitely the Milky Way galaxy’s best friends. Studies have examined the potential that Neptune, Uranus, Jupiter and Saturn have to produce diamonds. The atmospheres in all four planets have such extreme pressure that they can crystalize carbon atoms and turn them into diamonds. Scientists were able to create the correct conditions in a lab to prove this occurs on Neptune and Uranus. Separately, a different group of researchers speculates that it may rain as much as 2.2 million pounds of diamonds on parts of Saturn every year—definitely the richest of our science facts!
Fascinated by the heavens? Check out the best places in Canada for stargazing.
You can make balls fly
If you spin a ball when you drop it, it will fly through the air as it falls. This is called the Magnus effect, and it makes playing tennis and soccer a whole lot easier.
You don’t have to be a science whiz to find these physics jokes funny, but it may help.
Water can exist in three states at once
This is called the Triple Boil, and at that temperature, water exists as a gas, a liquid and a solid simultaneously. It requires very specific conditions to achieve, so don’t even think about trying it at home.
Don’t miss these mind-blowing facts about Canadian geography.
Only one type of mammal has wings
Those mammals would be bats. While flying squirrels can jump from trees and glide, they can’t truly fly like bats can.
Consider yourself a word nerd? Put your vocabulary to the test with our Word Power challenge.
Helium can also work against gravity
When helium is cooled to extreme temperatures, just a few degrees away from absolute zero (-460˚F or -273˚C), it turns into a superfluid, meaning it can flow without friction. It can climb up and over the sides of a glass, and leak through molecule-think cracks in a container. If it starts flowing like a fountain, it will never stop.
Solar flares are scarily powerful
The energy they release is the equivalent of 100-megaton atomic bombs exploding at once. It’s a good thing the Earth’s atmosphere protects us from their radiation.
Can you pass this quiz of 4th grade spelling words?
It’s impossible to burp in space
When you burp on Earth, gravity keeps down the solids and liquid from the food you just ate, so only the gas escapes from your mouth. In the absence of gravity, the gas cannot separate from the liquids and solids, so burping essentially turns into puking.
Psst—here’s what your burps can reveal about your health.
About half of your body is bacteria
That’s right. A 2014 study estimates that the human body consists of 39 trillion bacteria and 30 trillion human cells. In the past, researchers thought we were more bacteria than human with a ratio of 10:1. While this new calculation is probably closer to the true numbers, it’s not a hard fact.
Surprised by those science facts? Believe it or not, there are even a few body parts you didn’t know you had.
Men are more likely to be colourblind than women
The genes responsible for the most common type of colourblindness are found on the X chromosome, the National Eye Institute explains. Even if women have the genes on one of their two X chromosomes, a properly functioning gene on the other one makes up for that loss. If men inherit the gene on their only X chromosome, they’ll become colourblind.
Can you pass this brainteasing colour quiz?
We have no idea what most of the universe looks like
About 96 per cent of the universe is made up of dark matter and dark energy, which are undetectable to humans. Scientists believe this is because the particles that make up these substances don’t interact with regular matter or light. Even though scientific discoveries are constantly being made about the stars, planets, and other galaxies we can see, it’s impossible to make conclusions about things that are invisible to our eyes.
Now that you’ve got these quirky science facts under your belt, read up on Canada’s contributions to the exploration of space.
