Skulls in the Stars

Happy New Year! A new year, another week of new Twitter #weirdscifacts!

655. Dec 28: Beware the “ball-cutter fish“!  What’s the worst interpretation of the term “ball-cutter fish” you can imagine?  Yep, that’s what it is! (via @kzelnio & @deepseanews)

656. Dec 29: The 1903 discovery of safety glass was literally an accident. 

657. Dec 30: In the early 1900s, “glow-in-the-dark” radium condoms were actually sold!  The discovery of radioactivity, particularly radium, led people to suggest it as essentially a “miracle substance”, with pretty much every use imaginable.  I’ve noted in these facts before chemist Frederick Soddy’s suggestion to inhale radium as a cure for tuberculosis; putting radium on one’s junk adds a whole new cringe-factor, however.  (h/t @highlyanne)

658. Dec 31: Samoa just lost a day by moving date line around itself!  A nice New Year’s fact!  The choice of the location of the date line has always been a convention; due to increased trade with places like Australia that lay across the date line, Samoa found it convenient to move it to be more in sync with its trading partners. (h/t @chrislindsay9)

659. Jan 01: The Catatumbo River lightning: 40k flashes of lightning per night! I  had chronicled in a previous fact that Kifuka, Africa is apparently the world record holder in lightning intensity, with 158 strikes per square km per year!  Why is Catatumbo not listed at the top?  My guess is that the linked article is in error in referring to 40k “strikes” per night, and that all the lightning is cloud-based.  Nevertheless, the intensity is so bright that it serves as a natural lighthouse!  (h/t @jenlucpiquant)

660. Jan 02: How a cone snail catches and kills its fish!  (h/t @ericmjohnson)

661. Jan 03: c. 1805, physicist Francois Arago talked a friend out of trying (and likely succeeding) to assassinate Napoleon!  This comes  from Arago’s autobiography, which is so wild that I’m going to have to blog about it in the near future!  This incident occurred when Arago was still in school; Napoleon demanded a “loyalty oath” from the students, and many of those who refused were drummed out of school.  One of Arago’s friends who was expelled later confided to Arago that he planned to assassinate Napoleon, had trained extensively as a marksman and had picked an ambush point along the Emperor’s parade route! Arago managed to delay his friend’s plans and later convinced him to pursue other activities.

Time for a holiday edition of Twitter #weirdscifacts!  Alas, there’s nothing particularly holiday-themed about this collection of facts, but they are weird!

648. Dec 21: Scientific paper retraction by reason of insanity?  In 1951, an entomologist published a paper about “a mite infestation of her scalp that resisted all treatment and was undetectable to anyone other than herself”.  It is now thought that her infestation was imaginary, in what is referred to as “delusional parasitosis”.  (h/t @bonegirlphd)

649. Dec 22: The diamond weevil actually has diamonds (of a sort) on it!  The “diamonds” in question are not true diamonds made of carbon, but are crystals with the same sort of molecular structure.  (h/t @bug_girl)

650. Dec 23: Magnetic bacteria!!?? I actually forgot to include the link on this tweet originally!  Remarkably, a variety of bacteria contain magnetic nanoparticles that allow them to “swim” along magnetic field lines.  (via @boraz and by @labratting)

651. Dec 24: There is actually a beetle named after Robert Redford! (h/t @bug_girl!)

652. Dec 25: What is the psychology of a prisoner or prison guard? The 1971 Stanford prison experiment. 

653. Dec 26: Uranus is the coldest planet in the solar system: as low as 49 degrees Kelvin above absolute zero on cloud tops!  Most planets generate heat in their interior that, together with solar radiation, keeps the surface temperature relatively high.  Uranus is evidently missing that internal source of heat, and is consequently very cold.

654. Dec 27: The gentleman who “hacked” the wireless telegraph in 1903!  We tend to think of hacking as a very recent phenomenon, but during a public demonstration of Marconi’s telegraph the machine started printing out rude messages, seemingly of its own volition!  The culprit was a fellow wireless dabbler whose own research had been frustrated by Marconi’s stifling patents. (h/t @nickycast)

Whew! It’s gotten quite tricky to turn up unused #weirdscifacts, even though I’m sure I’m hardly scratching the surface.  Nevertheless, I’m still going strong!

641. Dec 14: Dolphins playing with humpbacked whales??!!  We’ve seen interspecies cooperation in previous weird science facts, but this is the first one we’ve shown that involves different species playing with one another.  (h/t @edyong209)

642. Dec 15: This is amazing: first “smoke recordings” of human voice from 1860 reconstructed in 2008.  Amazing still isn’t a strong enough word: “awe inspiring” is the phrase that now comes to mind.  These smoke recordings represent the first recordings of the human voice, but it took nearly 150 years for these recordings to be played back.  To listen to them feels like listening to a ghost from the past.

643. Dec 16: New post: Sir Edmond Halley takes a dive! (1714)  This of course is my own post on Sir Edmond Halley, most known for “Halley’s comet”.  Way back in 1714, Halley had perfected the diving bell to the point where he could comfortably stay for an hour or more under 60 feet of water!

644. Dec 17: IPHAS named a nebula after Crown Prince of Spain as wedding gift.  (h/t @allinthegutter)

645. Dec 18: #weirdscifacts from last month: spiders dosing their web with poison?  (h/t @drrubidium)

646. Dec 19: ‘Vocal fry’ is spreading among young American women, thanks to pop music?  This ‘fry’ is a creaking sound used by pop stars to reach low notes.  It turns out that research shows it becoming trendy in normal speech, at least among American English speakers.   (via @moximer)

647. Dec 20: Is it possible to swim in the sand? The sandfish lizard can! “Sandworms.  You hate ’em, right? *I* hate ’em!”