What are solar prominences? Solar prominence is a large, bright structure of plasma that follows magnetic fields and loops out from the surface of the sun. You may have seen images of solar prominence when you look at pictures of the sun. They are long twisting swirls that loop out from the sun and usually […]
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Why is tooth enamel so hard? Tooth enamel is so hard because it is made of about 96% minerals, which is more than anything else in the human body. Enamel is the thin layer that sits on top of our teeth. A tooth is made up of layers, and the job of enamel is to
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Why did Britain start the Opium Wars with China? Britain started the Opium Wars with China to force China into a trading and diplomatic system that was favorable with British interests. There are two basic causes of the First Opium War, which started in 1839 and lasted until 1842, but its causes go back at
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What is Botox? Botox is a drug made from the toxin produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum. Its name comes from botulium toxin. We have most likely heard of Botox thanks to its role in plastic surgery, but there are several other uses for it as well. In plastic surgery, it is primarily used to
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Who discovered that the Milky Way isn’t the only galaxy? Edwin Hubble was the first person to discover that there were other galaxies in space. When we are at school we learn that our Milky Way Galaxy is one galaxy in a possible infinite number of galaxies. We learn that the closest large galaxy to
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What is the largest diamond in the world? It turns out that this simple sounding question is slightly more complex. There are three different diamonds that vie for the title of largest cut diamond in the world, but each one of them is recognized for a different reason. The largest cut colorless diamond is called
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How long can a nuclear submarine stay underwater? A nuclear submarine can stay underwater for 25 years or longer. The people on the submarine cannot. The submarine can produce all of the water and oxygen they need, but people need more than just to drink and breathe. A nuclear submarine can stay underwater for up
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Why don’t humans have whiskers? We probably lost our whiskers because, as our primate ancestors became increasingly reliant on vision and sensitive, manipulative hands, whiskers became less useful. Whiskers are found in most groups of mammals, although in some species they have become greatly reduced or disappeared completely. Humans are one of the mammals that
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How did astronomers discover dark matter? Strong evidence for dark matter first appeared in 1933, when Swiss astronomer Fritz Zwicky found that galaxies in the Coma Cluster were moving too fast for the gravity of the visible matter to hold them together. The universe appears to be full of something that we cannot measure and
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What was railway time? Railway time was the standardized time introduced by railway companies in several countries to synchronize train times across a country. The steam engine was invented in the eighteenth century and the first steam railway train made its first journey in 1804. 21 years later, the Stockton and Darlington Railway was the
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