Science and Technology

Bizarre Fact #91:
Did you know...
A cosmic year is the length of time it takes the sun to complete one revolution around the center of the Milky Way galaxy. That's approximately 225 million earth years.

Bizarre Fact #92:
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A day on the planet Mercury is twice as long as its year. Mercury rotates very slowly but revolves around the sun in slightly less than 88 days.

Bizarre Fact #93:
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A dog was killed by a meteor at Nakhla, Egypt, in 1911. The unlucky canine is the only creature known to have been killed by a meteor.

Bizarre Fact #94:
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A downburst is a downward blowing wind that sometimes comes blasting out of a thunderstorm. The damage looks like tornado damage, since the wind can be as strong as an F2 tornado, but debris is blown straight away from a point on the ground. It's not lofted into the air and transported downwind.

Bizarre Fact #95:
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A full moon always rises at sunset.

Bizarre Fact #96:
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A raisin dropped in a glass of fresh champagne will bounce up and down continually from the bottom of the glass to the top. This is because the carbonation in the drink gets pockets of air stuck in the wrinkles of the raisin, which is light enough to be raised by this air. When it reaches the surface of the champagne, the bubbles pop, and the raisin sinks back to the bottom, starting the cycle over.

Bizarre Fact #97:
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A scientist at Michigan State University has calculated that the production of a single hen egg requires about 120 gallons of water, a loaf of bread requires 300 gallons, and a pound of beef, 3,500.

Bizarre Fact #98:
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A shrimp has more than a hundred pair of chromosomes in each cell nucleus.

Bizarre Fact #99:
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A temperature of 70 million degrees Celsius was generated at Princeton University in 1978. This was during a fusionism experiment and is the highest man-made temperature ever.

Bizarre Fact #100:
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About 500 meteorites hit the Earth each year. The largest known meteorite was found at Grootfontein in Namibia, southwest Africa, in 1920. It is 9 feet (2.75m) long and 8 feet (2.43m) wide.