How do throat lozenges work? They lubricate the throat, suppressing the irritation. Why do we get sore throats? The most common cause of sore throats is viral infections. The second most common is a bacterial infection. The common cold is a good example of a viral infection and strep throat is a good example of […]
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How do fish breathe underwater? Fish use their gills to take oxygen out of the water. Why do we need oxygen? Most living beings need oxygen to create energy. All animals need to respire, which is the process of releasing energy by breaking down glucose. There are two ways to respire: aerobic and anaerobic. Aerobic
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Why don’t cats knock things over? It turns out that cats have whiskers on their legs as well as their faces. When I’m making a line of dominos with my daughter, it is inevitable that either she or I will knock them all over. We both seem to have no sensory perception. And yet, my
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How do sparklers work? They burn a combination of metal particles that combust in different colors. Sparklers are coated in a mixture of metal powders and a type of sugar called dextrin. They also contain nitrates and sulfur or charcoal. Each of these ingredients has a different purpose. You must have held a sparkler at
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Why is the Dead Sea so salty? Because the sea evaporates very quickly and there is only one source of freshwater coming in. The Dead Sea is not actually a sea. A sea is defined as “a body of water that is partly surrounded by land”. There are about fifty seas in the world, but
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How thick are Saturn’s rings? The rings of Saturn are incredibly thin. They are only about 10 meters thick. Saturn is a massive planet. It is the second largest planet in the solar system and is 95 times larger than Earth. It is a gas giant, but it could have a solid cure. It has
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How do scales work? There are four different types of scales and they work in different ways. They are balances, steelyard balances, spring scales, and digital scales. Balance scales are the easiest to explain and they were the first scales used to measure the weights of objects. The first balance scales were used in the
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Who invented the skateboard? The skateboard was invented so that surfers could keep surfing when the sea was flat and there were no waves. So, who invented surfing? Surfing has been around for thousands of years. Fishermen in ancient Peru fished in kayaks made of reeds and they surfed them back to shore when they
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Do ants need to sleep? Ants do actually sleep, but not all at once. There are very few living organisms that don’t need to sleep. However, they all do it in different ways and there are many different definitions of what sleep is. Bacteria don’t sleep. Although they are tied to a circadian rhythm and
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How does the heating element in a toaster work? It is made of a metal that has a high electrical resistance so it heats up very quickly. The heating element in a toaster is made of nichrome. Nichrome is an alloy made from (usually) 80% nickel and 20% chromium. Hence its name: nickel+ chrom(e)ium. There are four
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