Unique bacteria
One variety of bacteria has only ever been isolated from the wreck of the RMS Titanic; another type of bacteria has only ever been found inside clean rooms used to assemble spacecraft.
Category: Sciences
The magician’s toilet
John Nevil Maskelyne was a turn of the century stage magician who created the first levitation trick, built an automaton that could play whist, revealed the secrets of card sharks, and invented the pay toilet.
Experimental pi
If you have a piece of striped paper and some sticks, you can estimate the value of pi through a simple experiment.
Human blood type systems
Your blood type is most commonly defined by two systems: ABO (blood types A, B, AB, and O) and Rh (+ or -). But these aren’t the only systems; there are more than thirty others.
Sky tubes
A Bangladeshi engineer named Fazlur Rahman Khan revolutionised the design of skyscrapers by modelling them on bamboo tubes.
Animal actors
From 1951 to the 1980s the PATSY Award celebrated the greatest animal actor in Hollywood; from 2001 to today the Palm Dog Award celebrates the greatest canine actor showing at Cannes.
Beer beetles
The Australian beetle Julodimorpha bakewelli attempts to mate with discarded beer bottles, sometimes to the point of its own death.
Sentinel chickens
Specially designated “sentinel chickens” allow health officials to track the emergence of infectious diseases like West Nile virus amongst human populations.
Sun storm
In 1859 a geomagnetic storm from the Sun knocked out telegraph equipment in Europe and North America and sent auroras almost as far as the equator; it was the largest such event in recorded history.
Sludge of the universe
Many moons, dwarf planets, comets, and trans-Neptunian objects are covered in a kind of complex chemical sludge sometimes called “tholins.” And this sludge may be much more common throughout the universe.
First wheels
A prehistoric pot found in Poland and a wooden slab pulled out of a Slovenian marsh are the earliest evidence of wheels in Europe.
Stalactite music
Within the Luray Caverns in Virginia, United States, is an electric organ made of stalactites. It literally makes rock music.
Smallest self-replicating program
A quine is a computer program that outputs its own source code. An entrant in the 1994 International Obfuscated C Code Contest created the smallest quine possible.
Victorian carpet train
The Birmingham Dribbler was one of the earliest model train toys. Powered by steam, it leaked water everywhere and caused fires when it fell over.
Cosmic sound
According to our understanding of the Big Bang, “cosmic sound” is older than neutral hydrogen. We can still spot its echoes today.
Eyeglasses for chickens
In the early 20th century, millions of chickens wore rose-coloured eyeglasses so they wouldn’t turn into cannibals.
The Generalist Academy 