Natural Sciences on ZME Science

The Smelliest Creatures in the Animal Kingdom

Take a look at the smelliest animals in the world. Continue at your own risk...

9 Mathematical facts that will blow your mind [and a delicious bonus]

Many people believe math is boring, but in reality - it's anything but.

Sea squirts: These cute "big-mouthed" underwater creatures digest their own organs

It's hard to believe that something so cute can lie at the bottom of the sea, but don't let the appearances fool you.

Why it's illegal to own one guinea pig in Switzerland

At first, it sounds like one of the silliest laws ever: in Switzerland, you’re not allowed to own just one guinea pig or parrot. The reason for this is that they’re social species, and they are considered victims of abuse if they aren’t able to regularly interact with others of their species. If you’re an […]

The locks of a goddess and solidified glass lava: Pele's hair

Believe it or not, this is actually lava.

Celebrating Diversity: Stunning Villages Around Europe

If you don’t travel a lot it’s easy to forget just how big and diverse the world really is – and sure, everyone knows about Paris, London or New York, but villages were where humanity’s culture and spirit was preserved for centuries. Here are just a handful of villages and small towns which brilliantly exhibit the serenity […]

The difference between silicon and silicone

It’s one of the most common confusions in the English language. In short, silicon is the chemical element Si, while silicone is a synthetic polymer. Although it appears like the words are synonyms and can be used interchangeably, they’re not and they designate completely different things. Let’s detail a bit on what each of them are, […]

Returning the world's last wild horses to the wild

Przewalski's horses are the only breed which was never domesticated. They were once common across Russia's and Mongolia's steppes, but were slowly hunted down. Now, coming back from the brink of extinction, these wild horses are slowly returning to their habitat.

10 Beautiful Visual Mathematical Proofs: Elegance and Simplicity

"Beauty is the first test; there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics," G. H. Hardy (1877-1947)

An incursion in the colorful world of fluorescent proteins

The discovery of green fluorescent proteins heralded a revolution in cell biology, enabling researchers to monitor cellular processes by applying themselves to a variety of protein and enzyme targets. Over the years, they’ve enabled thousands of successful experiments, triggering events that ultimately saved many lives. In 1961, Osamu Shimomura and Frank Johnson, working at the Friday Harbor […]

What are tornadoes and how do they form?

Tornadoes are associated with the strongest and most violent storms, reaching winds of up to 300 miles per hour (480 km/h).

How old is the Earth and how do we know it?

The age of the Earth is 4.54 billion years - plus or minus 1% (0.05 billion years). But how do we know this?

Japan's North coast is riddled with ancient carved stones - tsunami warnings

“High dwellings are the peace and harmony of our descendants,” the rock slab says. “Remember the calamity of the great tsunamis. Do not build any homes below this point.” Stones with messages like this one are surprisingly common on Japan’s coast; they tell a long forgotten story, a story of danger, tragedy and tsunamis. They […]

Why cats love boxes so much

They're basically the opposite of claustrophobic.

What are the layers of the Earth?

We know what the layers of the Earth are without seeing them directly -- with the magic of geophysics.

Volcano facts and other pieces of hot science

Volcanoes are some of the most amazing geological features but quite often, they’re misunderstood or not understood at all. Here we’ll get to know them a bit better, starting with the basic facts and the moving onto cool and surprising facts, and of course, continuing with everyone’s favorite (from a distance): eruptions. Basic Volcano Facts 1. Volcanoes are […]

How fruits and veggies looked like before we domesticated them

Imagine a banana. The familiar yellow, seedless shape pops to mind, but that’s only how domesticated bananas look like. Before we “molded” and modified the plant, it looked completely different – as you can see below. The first bananas we know of were cultivated in Papua New Guinea, stocky and filled with seeds. By […]

What is concrete: how concrete is made and why it's so important

Concrete practically surrounds us, but how many of us really know what it is?

What are sinkholes: how they form and why they're so dangerous

Sinkholes can be dangerous. Here's what you need to know.

11 Volcanic Craters to Blow Your Mind

Volcanoes are truly amazing – spewing out lava from the depths of the planet, they are a close reminder that our planet is very much alive and constantly changing. Even after they become dormant or extinct, volcanoes are still incredibly majestic – here we’ll take a look at just some of the most spectacular craters they […]

The geometry of a Pringle

Mathematics is not about equations, numbers, computation or algorithms: It is about Understanding! There are many ways to understand it – the one that this post is based on is real life visualization. The Pringle shape is what is known in mathematics / calculus as a hyperbolic paraboloid. Why are Pringles a hyperbolic paraboloid? The […]

Crown Shyness - Trees can shy away too!

Crown shyness is a phenomenon observed in some tree species, in which the crowns of fully stocked trees do not touch each other, forming a canopy with channel-like gaps.

The most and least peaceful countries in the world ranked

Earlier this year, the Institute for Economics and Peace released its GPI - Global Peace Index. Tiny spoiler alert: the United States ranked 94th.

How does an eraser work?

When you rub an eraser across a pencil mark, the abrasives in the eraser gently scratch the surface fibers of the paper to loosen the graphite particles.

What makes things coloured - the physics behind it

Have you ever wondered where do colours come from?

Featured Creature: The Fried Egg Jellyfish

It's time for some marine eye candy - "Fried Egg Jellyfish" exist, and they're really amazing!

Everything about Aluminium: facts, recycling, importance

The next time you throw away an aluminium can, picture the can half full of gasoline. That's how much energy goes into making it, and how much energy will have to be spent to produce a new one rather than recycle.

Volcanoes in Italy: the complete guide

Italy is home to some of the world's most interesting volcanoes.

What is metal glass: the wonder material you've never heard of

Such materials combine the best properties of glass and metals into one amazing product.

The Iron Snail lives on volcanic vents, two miles under the sea, all thanks to its spectacular armor

It's hard to believe anything can be alive thousands of feet below the Indian Ocean where thermal vents effectively boil the water. Yet even in the most inhospitable conditions, life has a way of creeping in. Such is the case of chrysomallon squamiferum, a snail-like creature which may very well sport the best armor in the animal kingdom.

How many germs you can find in your home: about 9,000 different species

Nothing to freak out about. This is perfectly normal.

Snow Leopards: What You Need To Know About These Magnificent Cats

For millennia, they've been the uncontested kings of the mountains, hunting prey up to three times bigger than them.

'Fire Rainbows' - What they are, how they form, and of course, great pictures

With the recent sighting of a fire rainbow in South Carolina, there seems to be a sudden surge of interest for this phenomenon, so I thought I’d come back with some more information. First of all, they’re not ‘fire rainbows’; in fact, they’re not rainbows at all. The correct name is circumhorizontal arc, and it’s […]

The Skypunch - not a fancy anime combat move, but just as awesome

"Skypunch" is the colloquial name of a phenomenon known as a Fallstreak hole - a large circular or elliptical gap that can appear in cirrocumulus or altocumulus clouds.

Skeleton flower turns translucent when it comes in contact with water

This rare flower's petals are usually white, but turn translucent (their "skeleton" form) when exposed to water. Being completely clear and of striking, glass-like beauty while wet, they turn white again when they dry off.

Domes of ice and grass: the Pingos [with great pics]

Also called hydrolaccoliths, pingos are spectacular domes of earth and vegetation covered ice usually found in the Arctic and subarctic. They can reach up to 90 metres (300 feet) high and more than 800 metres (0.5 mile) across and are usually circular or oval-shaped. They may be green on the outside, but the core is solid, clear ice. […]

Tiny fluffy sea slugs have Japan's netizens going crazy, and they'll give you our cute-dose for the day

Japan’s Twittersphere has just rediscovered (and is loosing its collective mind over) what is probably the cutest sea slug ever – Jorunna parva, a sea slug that looks like a fluffy bunny.

They did the math - things you won't believe people on the internet calculated

Every once in a while, you stumble upon a statement or question so preposterous that you don’t even bother thinking about it – but somewhere, someone on the internet did the math. This is a list of that kind of things – crazy things that someone actually calculated. This is not real science though, so […]

If you fold an A4 sheet of paper 103 times its thickness will roughly be the size of the Universe

Whaaaat? It’s just a matter of math, really. Fold an A4 once and it will be twice as thick, fold it again and it will be four times as thick as it initially was. Turns out, according to Dr Karl Kruszelnicki, if you do this 103 times the sheet’s thickness will be larger than the observable Universe: […]

How would the world look like without ice?

There are more than five million cubic miles of ice on Earth, and throughout our planet’s history, there have been periods with both more, and less ice. We tend to think of ice as an immovable reality but in truth, planetary ice is quite volatile. With continuously rising temperatures, melting ice and rising sea levels […]

The Mind Bending Types of Geological Folds

Folds are some of the most common geological phenomena you see in the world – a geological fold occurs when planar (usually sedimentary) layers are curved and/or bent, permanently deformed due to outside pressure. Folds’ sizes can vary from microscopic to mountain-sized, as you can see above. Despite being a fairly simple process (in principle), […]

Why do we have chins?

Chins are weird and make little evolutionary sense.

The Colugo (flying lemur): the cutest mammalian glider

The flying lemur is the most accomplished mammalian glider.

Why some tropical mushrooms glow in the dark

The tropical forests of Northeaster Brazil have their own nightlight: a peculiar mushroom called Neonothopanus gardneri that glows in the dark. Like a street light, it's tuned to activate its bioluminescence only in the dark, first in the twilight then peaking at about 10 PM. Researchers at Dartmouth College in the US and the University of São Paulo in Brazil have now fond out what this strange behavior is all about: 'candy' for insects.

Watch: The surprising chemical reaction between Coke and Milk

Watch the video all to the end – it starts off a bit slow, but it gets pretty rad towards the end. I’m not sure what I was expecting to happen… but it clearly wasn’t this: So what’s happening here? Well, it’s plain to see that a bunch of dark particles precipitate at the bottom […]

Places on Earth that actually look like Hell

The orange molten rocks beneath Kamchatka’s volcanic landscape looks surreally out of this world. It looks like a gateway to hell, or even yet, like Mordor. The Kamchatka peninsula, located in eastern Russia, is riddled with 160 volcanoes, including 29 active ones. The highest volcano is Klyuchevskaya Sopka (4,750 m or 15,584 ft), the largest active volcano in the […]

Are Birds Really Dinosaurs -- according to scientists, they are

It's remarkable what evolution can do in millions of years.

The Heaviest Living Organism in the World

What is the heaviest living creature in the world? It’s not an elephant or a blue whale, the heaviest organism is actually an Aspen. Pando, as it is called, is a clonal colony of a single male quaking aspen; basically, it looks like more trees, but it’s actually just one living creature with one massive underground […]

The largest organism in the world

If you want to know what the biggest organism in the world is, then you’re in for a big surprise – it’s not an elephant or a tree, it’s not even a blue whale! It’s 2 miles across, and you don’t even see most of it – because it’s a mushroom. That’s right, the largest living […]

Doggerland -- the land that connected Europe and the UK 8000 years ago

We all know that Earth used to look very different in the geological past, but few would imagine that Europe was such a different place just 8,000 years ago. Back then, continental Europe was connected to the UK with a land mass called Doggerland. The area had a thriving history both for wildlife or for […]

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