I learned this today. How does fly spray work? By blocking the insect from using its nerves to move its muscles. There are two kinds of fly spray. There are repellents, which are sprays you apply to your body to stop insects landing on you and biting. Then there are insecticide fly sprays that kill […]
#280 How does fly spray work? Read More »
I learned this today. How does a desalination plant work? A desalination plant makes freshwater from seawater by using reverse osmosis. Humans and animals obviously cannot drink salt water. Fish have adapted to be able to do it, but we have not. There is about 35g of salt in every liter of sea water. If
#278 How does a desalination plant work? Read More »
I learned this today. High energy radiation or long exposure to radiation can damage the DNA in cells and cause radiation sickness. What is radiation? Radiation is energy that radiates from a source and travels through space at the speed of light. It travels as a wave or as particles and has an electric field
#275 How does radiation sickness happen? Read More »
I learned this today. A superfluid is a point where matter behaves like a fluid but has zero viscosity.A superfluid has no viscosity. That means it doesn’t have any friction and doesn’t lose energy. It appears to go against the laws of thermodynamics. If you stir a cup of coffee with a spoon and step
#265 What is a superfluid? Read More »
I learned this today. The aurora borealis are green, purple, pink, and blue because those are the colors given off when the different elements in the atmosphere are heated up. The aurora borealis is caused by electrically charged particles from space hitting the magnetic field in the upper atmosphere at a very high speed. The
#264 Why are the aurora borealis those colors? Read More »
I learned this today. A hand grenade works because the removal of the lever starts a series of steps that ends with an explosion. There are many different types of grenade. I am going to look at the fragmentation grenade. Most of us imagine the Mk 2 grenade when we think of a hand grenade.
#259 How does a hand grenade work? Read More »
I learned this today. The energy from the photons in a laser beam can be used to propel a very light sail into space. A laser powered solar sail could let us look at the planets around the closest star to us. Laser propulsion has been suggested as the best way we have of reaching
#258 How can a laser power a solar sail? Read More »
I learned this today. The Richter scale is a way of measuring the strength of an earthquake by looking at the height of its seismic wave. The Richter scale was developed in 1935 by Charles Francis Richter. He was an American physicist who was very interested in seismology. He came up with his system because
#256 What is the Richter scale? Read More »
I learned this today. The surface tension of water is higher than almost all other liquids because it contains so much hydrogen. Surface tension is what allows droplets to form on leaves, like the picture with this post, and for you to keep adding drops of water to a glass without it spilling over the
#255 Why is the surface tension of water so high? Read More »
I learned this today. Sustained G-force of 6 G are generally considered to be fatal because they squash our organs and starve our brains of oxygen. Gs is the shortened form of G-force, which is in itself a shortened form of the gravitational force equivalent. G-force can be caused by rapid acceleration or rapid deacceleration.
#253 How does G-force kill people? Read More »
