14800. Science Facts

Fake mermaids made from bits of monkey and fish have been produced to fool scientists for years – most recently with one claimed to have been washed up by the tsunami in Asia in 2004. The oldest so-called mummified mermaid is 1,400 years old and from Japan.

14801. Science Facts

Australian Benjamin Drake Van Wissen invented machinery to mine guano on the Pacific island of Nauru and turn it into fertilizer.

14802. Science Facts

Green potatoes contain a poison, solanin, which can be deadly. It develops in old potatoes that are not kept in the dark. Eating 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) of green potatoes could be fatal.

14803. Science Facts

If you are trapped in snow in an avalanche, it's impossible to tell which way is up (and so which way to dig yourself out). Urinate and see which direction the yellow stain spreads – gravity will pull the urine down.

14804. Science Facts

In 1822, Dr. William Beaumont studied human digestion as it happened, through a hole in the side and stomach of a patient who had been shot. The hole did not heal, allowing Dr. Beaumont to study, but also allowing food and drink to ooze out if it was not covered up.

14805. Science Facts

Oil is made from the decayed bodies of animals and plants that died millions of years ago and have been squashed deep underground.

14806. Science Facts

In an attempt to kill malaria-carrying mosquitoes, an American scientist built towers to attract bats. He enticed them in with fabric covered with bat droppings, and played music near the bats' old homes to drive them out.After a few years, malaria infection dropped from 89 percent of the population to zero.

14807. Science Facts

If you cut spinach with an iron knife, both will go black as a chemical in the spinach reacts with the iron.

14808. Science Facts

During the First World War, goldfish were used to check whether all traces of poisonous gas had been washed out of gas masks. The mask was rinsed and filled with water, then a goldfish was dropped in. If it died, there was still gas left in it.

14809. Science Facts

The most poisonous metal in the world is arsenic. It used to be made into fly papers for killing flies, but it killed some people, too.

14810. Science Facts

People used to use white lead powder to make their skin look white and beautiful, but it gave them lead poisoning and slowly killed them. As their skin looked worse once the poison took effect, they used more white lead to cover up the damage.

14811. Science Facts

Around 1,400 years ago, the Chinese used to make gunpowder by boiling up and burning pig manure.To make sure it was ready, and not polluted with salt, they licked the crystals.

14812. Science Facts

It can take a hundred years for the body of a whale at the bottom of the sea to disappear completely, as it is slowly eaten away by different animals, plants and microbes.

14813. Science Facts

Early matches were made of poisonous chemicals and would sometimes burst into flames on their own if they got warm and damp. They poisoned the children employed to make them, and set fire to people's pockets unexpectedly!

14814. Science Facts

A small animal such as a mouse can be dropped 1,000 metres (3,280 feet) down a mineshaft and suffer no harm because the fastest speed it can fall it is not enough to crush its body.The larger an animal or object, the shorter the distance it can safely fall.

14815. Science Facts

Our blood is red because it uses an iron compound to carry oxygen – some spiders have blue blood because theirs uses a copper compound instead.

14816. Science Facts

John Haigh killed six people in London, UK, in the 1940s, dissolving their bodies in a bath of acid, hoping he could wash away all the evidence. However, on finding three human gallstones and a pair of dentures belonging to one of his victims in the sludge left behind, the police had enough evidence to convict him.

14817. Science Facts

Old cannonballs brought up from the seabed can explode and kill divers. Bacteria eat away part of the metal, producing gases that rapidly expand when the cannonballs come to the surface.

14818. Science Facts

Scraping mould off your food doesn't get rid of it – behind the fuzzy part you can see, strings extend into the food up to nine times the length of the visible part.

14819. Science Facts

If you draw pictures in the condensation on a window, the picture will reappear next time the window mists over as a layer of grease from your skin stays on the glass and repels the water.

Fact
An adult esophagus can range from 10 to 14 inches in length and is one inch in diameter      .. More >>