TheNocturnalEgyptian
8th January 2012, 11:36 AM
You know, I often complain that science is at a relative standstill compared to the exponential progress we should be making. Here is a small list of some factoids we now know that we didn't know last year.
Here's a bundle of fresh discoveries that were revealed during 2011. Sources for each claim are located at the link, clickthrough - I'm not formatting all 50, haha!
http://www2.tbo.com/lifestyles/flavor/2011/dec/30/50-things-we-know-now-that-we-didnt-know-last-year-ar-341501/
2. Some arctic seals can find the exact spot where they were born even after spending five years out at sea.
3. A 70-million-year-old nest filled with the remains of 15 baby protoceratops dinosaurs was found in Mongolia.
4. Hummingbirds shake themselves dry in the rain, similar to the motion a dog uses to do the same with its fur. The birds shake using 30 times the force of gravity to complete the drying.
5. Two sunken islands about the size of West Virginia were discovered in the Indian Ocean, almost a mile under water. The islands were once above water and formed part of the last link between India and Australia.
6. Sodium alginate, a compound used to secure pimento strips inside olives, could be a treatment for an extreme form of acid reflux.
7. Female copperhead snakes have the ability to reproduce without sex.
8. Piranhas use sounds made with vibrations of their swim bladders to intimidate their rivals and keep them from attacking.
9. The largest virus in the world was found in the ocean off the coast of Chile. The Megavirus Chilensis is up to 20 times the length of the average virus and infects single-cell marine amoebas that float around in the ocean.
10. To Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies, the smell of ripe and rotting fruit is an aphrodisiac. The discovery may explain why humans and other creatures often associate food with sex.
11. The presence of harassing male Trinidadian guppies can disrupt female social networks, causing female-against-female aggression.
12. Teens who go to bed later tend to be less physically fit and fatter than early-to-bed, early-to-rise counterparts who get the same amount of sleep, Those who regularly kept earlier hours did almost 30 minutes more exercise each day.
13. Penguins use a highly-developed sense of smell to identify kin and avoid interbreeding with relatives.
14. Kepler-16b, a planet more than 200 light years from our universe, is said to be made up of rock and gas and is believed to be as big as Saturn.
15. Laccognathus embryi, a 6-foot-long predatory fish with large sharp teeth, a wide head and small eyes swam off North America around 375 million years ago.
16. Bombardment by micrometeorites will wipe away footprints and other traces of man's Apollo exploration on the planet's surface, possibly as soon as 10 million years from now.
17. Homo sapiens ancestors may have bred with now-extinct species Neanderthals or Denisovans before migrating from Africa to Eurasia 65,000 years ago. The mating may have given modern humans genetic mutations that protected their immune systems as they began expanding around the globe.
18. A microbe named TU-103 can convert cellulose used in newspapers into fuel for cars.
19. The longest underground river, running for almost 3,800 miles at a depth of nearly 2.5 miles, was discovered beneath Brazil, flowing west-to-east from the Andean foothills to the Atlantic coast.
20. Sad people are better at recognizing faces.
21. Juramaia sinensis, a small, shrew-like animal that lived 160 million years ago, was unearthed in China's northeast Liaoning Province. It appears to be our oldest mammalian ancestor.
22. People with asymmetric faces tended to have more deprived childhoods than those with symmetrical faces.
23. A primitive eel lives in an underwater cave off the Republic of Palau in the Pacific Ocean. Protoanguilla palau has anatomical features dating back 200 million years unknown in all other living eels.
24. The tsunami that struck Japan in March also caused an iceberg the size of Manhattan Island to calve into the Ross Sea off Antarctica. It is the first time a tsunami's direct impact has been detected on an ice shelf.
25. Smokers who have their first cigarette 30 to 60 minutes after waking up slightly increase their chances of getting cancer than people who wait longer.
26. People who eat any kind of snack before lunch increase their chances of gaining weight, even if they eat a healthy breakfast.
27. Women who sit for extended amounts of time every day have at least double the risk of developing a dangerous blood clot.
28. The human body may send signals of an impending panic attack as much as an hour before its onset.
29. Using larger utensils leads to eating less in a restaurant setting because it gives the eater a sense of being full more quickly.
30. Campaigns to reduce prejudice have the opposite effect if a bossy approach is used in the message.
31. Fatty foods affect the brain in a way that's similar to marijuana, activating chemicals that produce a drug-like feeling. This feeling – like marijuana! – then encourages you to eat more fatty foods. Of course.
32. A region in the front of the brain triggers when we experience beauty in art or music. The medial orbitofrontal cortex has been linked to appreciation of beauty, but this is the first time scientists have shown that the same area is activated for both visual and auditory beauty in the same people.
33. Children who receive antibiotics before their first birthday are significantly more likely to develop asthma by age 7.
34. The way a gift is wrapped could provide insights into the relationship between the giver and receiver.
35. Women who take fish oil supplements during pregnancy give birth to babies who have fewer cold symptoms and shorter illnesses.
36. Gentle probing of a wound with a dry cotton swab after surgery dramatically reduces infections and pain in post-operative incision sites.
37. Tree frogs have specially adapted self-cleaning pads on their toes with properties that could help in designing self-cleaning surfaces.
38. Routine weather events, such as rain and cooler-than-average days, have an annual economic impact of as much as $485 billion that reaches to every state.
39. A new species of fruity smelling mushroom discovered in the humid forests of Borneo was named, Spongiforma squarepantsii, because its sponge-like appearance reminded researchers of the cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants.
40. As Florida alligators move between fresh water and salt water, their bodies transport nutrients between the two ecosystems in Florida's Everglades that otherwise would not intermingle.
41. Just one lazy employee can quickly affect the performance or an entire workplace.
42. Bengalese finch songbirds use their own form of grammar when chirping.
43. Fossils of the oldest-ever extinct species of tiger were found northwestern China. The Panthera zdanskyi lived more than 2 million years ago, was the size of a modern jaguar, lived on eating deer and pigs and reached up to 13 feet in length.
44. Shifting sand dunes and ripples were discovered all over Mars, a finding that suggests strong winds keep the sandy surface of the red planet much more active than previously known.
45. Siblings born at least two years apart perform better at math and reading than children born closer together.
46. Zebrafish use the retinoic acid in vitamin A to regenerate amputated limbs or damaged organs. The acid also is produced by the human body.
47. A 17th century ship with looted treasure bound for Sweden was discovered at the bottom of the Vistula River. The ship dates to the Swedish-Polish war of 1655-60.
48. A blind shrimp with an infrared "third eye" was found in a deep-sea mineral-rich volcanic field in the northern Atlantic Ocean.
49. Polar bears are genetic descendents of Irish brown bears that lived during the last ice age more than 11.000 years ago.
50. Vampire bats use infrared sensors on their lips to locate blood vessels in their prey. The nerve cells are similar to the pain-sensing cells in the human tongue, skin and eyes.
1. Men think about sex about 19 times each day. The amount for women is about 10 times.
Here's a bundle of fresh discoveries that were revealed during 2011. Sources for each claim are located at the link, clickthrough - I'm not formatting all 50, haha!
http://www2.tbo.com/lifestyles/flavor/2011/dec/30/50-things-we-know-now-that-we-didnt-know-last-year-ar-341501/
2. Some arctic seals can find the exact spot where they were born even after spending five years out at sea.
3. A 70-million-year-old nest filled with the remains of 15 baby protoceratops dinosaurs was found in Mongolia.
4. Hummingbirds shake themselves dry in the rain, similar to the motion a dog uses to do the same with its fur. The birds shake using 30 times the force of gravity to complete the drying.
5. Two sunken islands about the size of West Virginia were discovered in the Indian Ocean, almost a mile under water. The islands were once above water and formed part of the last link between India and Australia.
6. Sodium alginate, a compound used to secure pimento strips inside olives, could be a treatment for an extreme form of acid reflux.
7. Female copperhead snakes have the ability to reproduce without sex.
8. Piranhas use sounds made with vibrations of their swim bladders to intimidate their rivals and keep them from attacking.
9. The largest virus in the world was found in the ocean off the coast of Chile. The Megavirus Chilensis is up to 20 times the length of the average virus and infects single-cell marine amoebas that float around in the ocean.
10. To Drosophila melanogaster fruit flies, the smell of ripe and rotting fruit is an aphrodisiac. The discovery may explain why humans and other creatures often associate food with sex.
11. The presence of harassing male Trinidadian guppies can disrupt female social networks, causing female-against-female aggression.
12. Teens who go to bed later tend to be less physically fit and fatter than early-to-bed, early-to-rise counterparts who get the same amount of sleep, Those who regularly kept earlier hours did almost 30 minutes more exercise each day.
13. Penguins use a highly-developed sense of smell to identify kin and avoid interbreeding with relatives.
14. Kepler-16b, a planet more than 200 light years from our universe, is said to be made up of rock and gas and is believed to be as big as Saturn.
15. Laccognathus embryi, a 6-foot-long predatory fish with large sharp teeth, a wide head and small eyes swam off North America around 375 million years ago.
16. Bombardment by micrometeorites will wipe away footprints and other traces of man's Apollo exploration on the planet's surface, possibly as soon as 10 million years from now.
17. Homo sapiens ancestors may have bred with now-extinct species Neanderthals or Denisovans before migrating from Africa to Eurasia 65,000 years ago. The mating may have given modern humans genetic mutations that protected their immune systems as they began expanding around the globe.
18. A microbe named TU-103 can convert cellulose used in newspapers into fuel for cars.
19. The longest underground river, running for almost 3,800 miles at a depth of nearly 2.5 miles, was discovered beneath Brazil, flowing west-to-east from the Andean foothills to the Atlantic coast.
20. Sad people are better at recognizing faces.
21. Juramaia sinensis, a small, shrew-like animal that lived 160 million years ago, was unearthed in China's northeast Liaoning Province. It appears to be our oldest mammalian ancestor.
22. People with asymmetric faces tended to have more deprived childhoods than those with symmetrical faces.
23. A primitive eel lives in an underwater cave off the Republic of Palau in the Pacific Ocean. Protoanguilla palau has anatomical features dating back 200 million years unknown in all other living eels.
24. The tsunami that struck Japan in March also caused an iceberg the size of Manhattan Island to calve into the Ross Sea off Antarctica. It is the first time a tsunami's direct impact has been detected on an ice shelf.
25. Smokers who have their first cigarette 30 to 60 minutes after waking up slightly increase their chances of getting cancer than people who wait longer.
26. People who eat any kind of snack before lunch increase their chances of gaining weight, even if they eat a healthy breakfast.
27. Women who sit for extended amounts of time every day have at least double the risk of developing a dangerous blood clot.
28. The human body may send signals of an impending panic attack as much as an hour before its onset.
29. Using larger utensils leads to eating less in a restaurant setting because it gives the eater a sense of being full more quickly.
30. Campaigns to reduce prejudice have the opposite effect if a bossy approach is used in the message.
31. Fatty foods affect the brain in a way that's similar to marijuana, activating chemicals that produce a drug-like feeling. This feeling – like marijuana! – then encourages you to eat more fatty foods. Of course.
32. A region in the front of the brain triggers when we experience beauty in art or music. The medial orbitofrontal cortex has been linked to appreciation of beauty, but this is the first time scientists have shown that the same area is activated for both visual and auditory beauty in the same people.
33. Children who receive antibiotics before their first birthday are significantly more likely to develop asthma by age 7.
34. The way a gift is wrapped could provide insights into the relationship between the giver and receiver.
35. Women who take fish oil supplements during pregnancy give birth to babies who have fewer cold symptoms and shorter illnesses.
36. Gentle probing of a wound with a dry cotton swab after surgery dramatically reduces infections and pain in post-operative incision sites.
37. Tree frogs have specially adapted self-cleaning pads on their toes with properties that could help in designing self-cleaning surfaces.
38. Routine weather events, such as rain and cooler-than-average days, have an annual economic impact of as much as $485 billion that reaches to every state.
39. A new species of fruity smelling mushroom discovered in the humid forests of Borneo was named, Spongiforma squarepantsii, because its sponge-like appearance reminded researchers of the cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants.
40. As Florida alligators move between fresh water and salt water, their bodies transport nutrients between the two ecosystems in Florida's Everglades that otherwise would not intermingle.
41. Just one lazy employee can quickly affect the performance or an entire workplace.
42. Bengalese finch songbirds use their own form of grammar when chirping.
43. Fossils of the oldest-ever extinct species of tiger were found northwestern China. The Panthera zdanskyi lived more than 2 million years ago, was the size of a modern jaguar, lived on eating deer and pigs and reached up to 13 feet in length.
44. Shifting sand dunes and ripples were discovered all over Mars, a finding that suggests strong winds keep the sandy surface of the red planet much more active than previously known.
45. Siblings born at least two years apart perform better at math and reading than children born closer together.
46. Zebrafish use the retinoic acid in vitamin A to regenerate amputated limbs or damaged organs. The acid also is produced by the human body.
47. A 17th century ship with looted treasure bound for Sweden was discovered at the bottom of the Vistula River. The ship dates to the Swedish-Polish war of 1655-60.
48. A blind shrimp with an infrared "third eye" was found in a deep-sea mineral-rich volcanic field in the northern Atlantic Ocean.
49. Polar bears are genetic descendents of Irish brown bears that lived during the last ice age more than 11.000 years ago.
50. Vampire bats use infrared sensors on their lips to locate blood vessels in their prey. The nerve cells are similar to the pain-sensing cells in the human tongue, skin and eyes.
1. Men think about sex about 19 times each day. The amount for women is about 10 times.