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142 How Smart Are Orangutans?
Fu Manchu was an orangutan in a zoo. He escaped often. The keepers were confused. They found he used a wire to pick the lock. Orangutans are smart. They live in forests and learn from their mothers. B...
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171 Is Whale Poop the Ocean’s Most Valuable Treasure...
In 1891, James Bartley, a whaler, was said to be swallowed by a whale and survived for 36 hours. While this story is likely false, it reminds us of the ocean’s mysteries. Whales release waste into t...
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150 Why Fish Are Better at Breathing Than Humans
In 2019, Eliud Kipchoge ran a marathon in under two hours, taking in twice as much oxygen as non-runners. But even he can’t breathe as well as a fish. Fish live in water where oxygen is low, so they...
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171 Can You Freeze Your Body and Come Back to Life?
In 1967, James Bedford became the first person to be cryogenically frozen. Cryonics aims to preserve bodies until the future when medicine can reverse death. But to revive people, we need to preserve ...
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156 Why Can Parrots Talk?
In 2010, a British parrot went missing and returned speaking Spanish. Parrots and some birds can mimic human speech, but parrots do it especially well.
Wild parrots are social and use calls to comm...
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159 Should We Eliminate Mosquitoes?
Mosquitoes are the deadliest animals for humans because they spread diseases like malaria. However, only a few of the 3,500 mosquito species are harmful. Scientists are exploring gene drives to target...
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143 The Elephant’s Incredible Nose
An African elephant uses her trunk to explore her world. Her trunk can smell water far away and detect predators. Elephants live in herds led by a matriarch. These herds work together to survive, usin...
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160 What If Satellites Disappeared?
If all satellites vanished suddenly, global chaos would follow. First, TV broadcasts and GPS systems would stop working. Airplanes, ships, and vehicles would lose navigation tools, leading to grounded...
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167 Who Decides How Long a Second Is?
In 1967, scientists decided how to measure a second precisely. Ancient civilizations used the night sky to track time, but the modern second came from the Gregorian calendar in the late 1500s. This ca...
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172 The Journey of a Cup of Coffee
A cup of coffee involves the work of hundreds of people across the world. It begins in places like Pitalito, Colombia, where Coffea trees grow. Farmers pick the coffee cherries by hand, as the fruits ...
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194 Do Personality Tests Really Work?
In 1942, Katherine Cook Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers created the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) to classify people into 16 personality types. Today, personality tests like MBTI, the Big Five, an...
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203 Why Do You Get a Fever When Sick?
A fever happens when the body fights an infection. The hypothalamus, a part of the brain, makes the body’s temperature go higher than normal. This process is called thermoregulation. Normally, the b...
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221 What Causes Volcanic Eruptions?
In 1942, a crack in a cornfield in Mexico grew into the Paricutin volcano. Over nine years, it covered more than 200 square kilometers with lava and ash. Volcanic eruptions start deep in the Earth, wh...
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178 The Corpse Flower
The corpse flower Rafflesia arnoldii grows in Southeast Asia. It is the largest flower in the world. Some flowers are over one meter wide and weigh seven kilograms. It smells like rotting meat to attr...
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209 How Leafcutter Ants Farm Their Fungus
In Texas, a leafcutter ant queen starts a new colony. She carries fungus in her mouth and tiny cockroaches under her wings. After mating in the air, she sheds her wings and digs a nest. Inside, she re...
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127 The Rarest Color in Nature
Nature has many colors, but some are very rare. Colors come from pigments or structures. Pigments absorb some light and reflect other colors. For example, plants use chlorophyll to look green by absor...
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197 How Do Clouds Affect Climate Change?
Earth’s average surface temperature has risen by 0.8°C since 1750. If carbon dioxide levels double, temperatures may rise by 1.5°C to 4.5°C. A small increase, like 1.5°C, might be manageable, bu...
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195 The Asteroid That End...
66 million years ago, a giant asteroid hit Earth near the Yucatán Peninsula. It was about 12 kilometers wide and struck at 20 kilometers per second. The impact created the Chicxulub crater, a hol...
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162 Why Recycling Plastics Is Hard?
Most plastic has a recycling symbol. But only 9% of the world’s plastic is recycled. Some plastics, like thermosetting polymers, cannot be melted and reused. Even thermoplastics, which can be recycl...
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178 The Tiny Plastic Pellets Taking Over the Ocean
Nurdles are small plastic pellets used to make most plastic products, like bottles, bags, and toys. They are tiny and look harmless, but they don’t break down in nature. Every year, nurdles escape d...
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145 Why Do Mayflies Swarm Over Water?
Mayflies are insects with a short adult life, lasting only a day or even minutes. They live most of their lives underwater as nymphs and emerge for a brief reproductive stage. Male mayflies form swarm...
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161 Underwater Farming to Fight Climate Change
Seafood is a key food source for 3 billion people, but wild fishing is unsustainable, with 33% of fisheries overfished and 60% at capacity. Over half the seafood we eat now comes from aquaculture, or ...
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178 How Cacti Stay Alive in Harsh Places
Cacti are plants that live in deserts and tropical forests. They store water in their thick stems and protect themselves with spines. These spines are special leaves that help the plant save water by ...
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203 Sea Lions: Masters of the Ocean
Sea lions may seem like lazy beachgoers, but underwater, they are skilled hunters. They swim at speeds of 4 to 18 miles per hour and hunt for up to 30 hours. Their physical adaptations make them excel...
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154 Inside the Killer Whale Matriarchy
Killer whales live in family groups called pods, led by elder females or grandmothers. These matriarchs, often over 80 years old, play a key role in survival by leading hunts and sharing their knowled...
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