20 cool facts

02/16/2024

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20 cool facts

02/16/2024

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20 cool facts

05/10/2023

These amazing penguin facts will take you closer to the world's best-dressed birds. Find out their biology and other unique behavior here.

05/10/2023

Love birds represent undying devotion in the animal kingdom. Learn more about their origins, diet, biology, and other unique behavior here.

05/09/2023

About 99 percent of all wasabi sold in the U.S. is fake.

Plenty of people like to enjoy a little wasabi with their sushi—or a lot, depending on their tolerance for the stuff. But it turns out that real wasabi is pretty pricey (around $160 per kilogram), which is why 99 percent of what's called wasabi in the U.S. is actually a mix of horseradish and hot Chinese mustard, plus green dye to give it the right color, according to a report published in The Atlantic.

05/09/2023

One Norwegian town wants to become the world's first "time-free zone."

Between May 18 and July 26, the sun doesn't set at all in Sommarøy, Norway. That's why this village, which is located north of the Arctic Circle, wants to eliminate the concept of time so that they can get the most out of their 24 hours.

"There's constant daylight, and we act accordingly," said resident Kjell Ove Hveding in a statement. "In the middle of the night, which city folk might call '2 a.m.,' you can spot children playing soccer, people painting their houses or mowing their lawns, and teens going for a swim."

The residents went so far as to host a town hall about the proposed change in June 2019, although some critics asked how a lack of time would change what these folks already do.

05/08/2023

The moon is getting farther away from the Earth.

It's common knowledge that the moon travels around the Earth, but not everyone is aware of the fact that the distance between the moon and the Earth is increasing. As the relatively small spacial body continues its celestial spinning, it moves 1.48 inches away from our planet each year, which is around the same speed that human fingernails grow, according to the BBC.
This also means that the moon was likely much closer in the past. Scientists believe that when the moon was first formed, it was around 14,000 miles away. Nowadays, it's about 250,000 miles from us.

05/08/2023

The sun makes up around 99.9 percent of the mass in the entire solar system.

Earth doesn't feel so enormous once you learn that the sun alone makes up somewhere between 99.8 and 99.9 percent of all the mass in the entire solar system, according to the experts at University of California, San Diego. The rest is split between the planets and their satellites, as well as the comets, asteroids, dust, and gas.

05/08/2023

These purrfect cat facts will take you closer to your favorite felines. Find out more about their biology, origins, and unique behavior here.

05/08/2023

Quaker parrots are bright and quirky birds with a lot of character. Find out why they’re so intriguing with these quaker parrot facts.

05/08/2023

A museum displayed cheese made from the bacteria of celebrities.

The Food: Bigger Than the Plate exhibit at the Victoria & Albert Museum in London proudly displayed five types of cheese made from microbes collected from the armpits, ears, noses, and bellybuttons of British celebrities. "Suggs, the singer for the ska band Madness, best known in the U.S. for its 1982 hit 'Our House,' chose to be immortalized in cheddar," according to Smithsonian.

The purpose of the project was apparently to change how people think about microbes. Whether or not that goal was achieved, the exhibit surely had people looking at cheese a little differently.

05/08/2023

Red rain once fell in India.

Back on July 25, 2001, "blood-red rain fell over the Kerala district of western India," according to The Guardian. The strange drops even "[turned] local people's clothes pink." Yellow, green, and black rain also fell in other districts in the area, according to The Hindu. It's believed that the rainwater turned various colors due to the fact that the wind had swept up similarly colored sand before it came down with the rain.