Current Science, a Weekly Reader publication articles from November 2002

Current Science, a Weekly Reader publication archives from November 2002

Have fun learning about science! (Sci-Triv Game).
November 8, 2002... Want to play a game of science trivia? See how many points you can win by correctly answering the following questions. To find your score, give yourself 10 points each time you get the first question right, 20 points for each second...

Think pieces.
November 8, 2002... 1. You are competing in a race, and you overtake the runner in second place. In what position are you now? 2. You are competing in another race. If you overtake the last runner, what position are you now in? 3. Do this addition problem...

Bad breath! What causes halitosis and how to get rid of it. (Health).
November 8, 2002... "So I go, `What'd you do that for?' And she goes, `I felt like it, duh.' So I go--" " Yo, dude." "What?" "Get a mint, man. I mean, your breath--it's rancid." What? Me? Bad breath? After I heard that, I started popping mints...

High seas: monster ocean waves that rise out of nowhere to swallow ships and sailors are more than just mariners' tales. (Earth).
November 8, 2002... The Marques was one of 39 tall ships that took part in a transatlantic race in 1984. Shortly before dawn on Sunday, June 3, the ship sailed into a fierce squall north of Bermuda. The gusty weather was not unusual, but the wave that slammed the...

All wet? Did our apelike ancestors live in the water? (Life).
November 8, 2002... If a friend said you looked like a hippopotamus, you'd be insulted, right? Your friend wouldn't necessarily be wrong, though. Humans and hippos are a lot alike. Those likenesses might even be a key to a great scientific mystery--the origin...

Sudden impact: a new study estimates that strict seat belt laws played a part in saving more than 4,000 teen lives in a five-year period. (Physical).
November 8, 2002... Last summer, 19-year-old Leslie John Banyay was enjoying a weekend trip to Vermont with his brother Stephen Banyay and his cousin Michael Macura. One night, while driving near Okemo Mountain, Macura lost control of his Jeep, which veered off...

Crow makes her own tools. (Life).
November 8, 2002... OXFORD, England--Betty the crow is no birdbrain. In an experiment conducted at Oxford University, Betty demonstrated skills never seen before in a nonhuman animal. Betty is a New Caledonia crow, a jet-black species that has been observed...

Insight. (Discoveries).(Hoag's Object galaxy)
November 8, 2002... This beautiful apparition is Hoag's Object, a ring-shaped galaxy in the constellation Serpens. Astronomer Art Hoag first spotted it in 1950. This image was taken recently by the Hubble Space Telescope. The entire galaxy is about the size of...

Earliest human ancestor found. (Earth).
November 8, 2002... DJURAB DESERT, Chad--The Djurab desert in Africa is one of the most forbidding landscapes on Earth. Daytime temperatures soar to about 100 degrees Fahrenheit, rain rarely falls, and the sand blows constantly. Yet for fossil hunters, the land is...

Too weird. (Discoveries).(breeding miniature cattle)
November 8, 2002... ROCKWELL, Iowa--If Austin Powers's nemesis, Dr. Evil, had a little pet cow, what might he call it? Mini Moo, maybe? And where would he get such an animal? From Dustin Pillard, a miniature cow breeder. For the last ten years, Pillard has been...

Ask professor Ossolotch. (Discoveries).
November 8, 2002... What's the difference between real and fake diamonds? --Karen Rybolt Hixson, Tenn. Dear Karen, Fake diamonds may glint and glow, but they are nothing like the real thing. Nature's diamonds are made of only one element--carbon....

Who knew? (Discoveries).
November 8, 2002... Human beings have fewer genes than many plants. The human genome has anywhere from 30,000 to 45,000 genes. A rice plant has as many as 55,000 genes. Since 1998, Earth has become fatter around the equator and flatter at the poles. ...

Mystery photos. (Optricks).(Illustration)
November 8, 2002... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Top: bark of a palm tree Middle: side of an office building Bottom: scratch pad on a book of matches

Bend your mind. (Optricks).
November 8, 2002... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] This illusion is called the scintillating grid illusion and is a later version of an illusion called the Hermann grid illusion, discovered in 1870 by Ludimar Hermann. You should see black dots instead of white dots...

Whatizit? (Optricks).(Illustration)
November 8, 2002... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Grind up the carbohydrates that some cereal plants use to store energy and this is what you get. Mix with other ingredients and then bake to make a delicious source of energy for yourself. baking flour

Discoveries.
November 8, 2002... Fill in the Blank Find the word or words that best complete each sentence. Write the words in the blanks. 1. Hoag's Object is a--galaxy. 2.--is the soft material in lead pencils. 3.--are members of a family of organisms that...

Sci-triv game: have fun learning about science!
November 22, 2002... Want to play a game of science trivia? See how many points you can win by correctly answering the following questions. To find your score, give yourself 10 points each time you get the first question right, 20 points for each second question,...

Yesterday once more: 75 years of Current Science.
November 22, 2002... October 2-6, 1939--Current Science reported on the research of William Ruggles, an engineer at General Electric Laboratories who "worked for nothing." Ruggles built a vacuum tube that was 99.99999999 percent empty space. Even though the tube...

Birth of a station: a new type of radio technology--satellite radio--offers listeners a fresh alternative to the obnoxious talk jocks and boring playlists of AM and FM radio. (Physical).
November 22, 2002... Here's something unusual. You hop in your friend's new family car and flip on the radio. On come Nelly and Ashanti and Eve. Then come Alicia Keys and Beck and the Dixie Chicks. And then Ja Rule and Ludacris and India. Arie. So what's so...

Sound beam: a new type of loudspeaker transmits sound directly to a listener and no one else. (Physical).
November 22, 2002... When director Steven Spielberg set out to make the crime thriller Minority Report, he gathered a team of futurists to help him imagine what new forms of technology might exist in the year 2054. The futurists envisioned jet packs, mind-reading...

On the rocks: friends and family of a recently deceased baseball are squabbling over his son's decision to have the corpse frozen and brought back to life some time in the future. (Health/Life).
November 22, 2002... Many baseball fans consider Ted Williams the greatest hitter of all time. But when the "Splendid Splinter" died of cardiac arrest last summer at age 83, a bizarre turn of events overshadowed the news coverage of Williams's career highlights....

Fault finders: a team of California scientists plans to dig deep into the San Andreas Fault to learn what goes on underground when an earthquake happens. (Earth).
November 22, 2002... At 5:04 p.m., October 17, 1989, baseball fans were excitedly pouring into San Francisco's Candlestick Park stadium to watch the third game of the World Series. Suddenly, the stadium started to sway dangerously, shaken by the force of a major...

Split ends send geckos up walls. (Life).
November 22, 2002... PORTLAND, Ore. -- One of science's oldest mysteries has at last been solved. The ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle (384-322 B.C.) first wrote about the gravity-defying stunts of the gecko, a little lizard that can scamper up walls and hang...

Caffeine a cancer cure? (Health).
November 22, 2002... PISCATAWAY, N.J. -- Skin cancer strikes more Americans than any other type of cancer. About 1 million new cases are diagnosed in the United States every year. Now researchers at Rutgers University have found a way of combating skin cancer...

Who knew? (Discoveries).
November 22, 2002... A 10-meter (33-foot)ash tree releases about 118 kilograms (260 pounds) of oxygen each year, or enough to supply the needs of one person. Austrian animal psychologists have found that cats prefer music with a fast beat and low-pitched tone....

AIDS virus might save lives. (Health).
November 22, 2002... CAMBRIDGE, England -- The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which causes AIDS, has produced immeasurable suffering since the first cases of the disease were identified in the United States about 21 years ago. At last count, the virus has...

Was meteorite a gas? (Earth).
November 22, 2002... BONN, Germany -- In 1908, a humongous explosion flattened 2,100 square kilometers (about 810 square miles) of forest in a remote area of Siberia. Most scientists think the blast was caused by a celestial object--a comet or a...

Too weird. (Discoveries).
November 22, 2002... ERRINGTON, British Columbia -- Birds don't have teeth. Still, wildlife rescuers sought the help of dentist Brian Andrews last spring to help an injured bald eagle whose upper beak had been partly shot off by hunters. Using a National Geographic...

Insight. (Life).
November 22, 2002... Finding the right-sized parking space is no problem for the Rinspeed Presto convertible, With the push of a button, the Presto shrinks by 0.8 meters (2.5 feet) in just 10 seconds. The car has front and back sections that slide in and out on...

Bees keep bugs as livestock. (Discoveries).
November 22, 2002... SAO PAOLO, Brazil -- Humans aren't the only creatures that practice animal husbandry, the control and management of domestic animals. Scientists have found a species of bee that lives in the Amazon River basin and keeps herds of aphidlike...