Statements like he can eat a lot because he has a fast metabolism are somewhat misleading. Metabolism isnt about the digestion of food in your stomach; its the name given to all of the chemical changes that occur in an organisms tissue cells. There a...
In order to build tissue and repair it, however, anabolism requires energy, as well as material with which to build. This energy and building material comes from the breaking down of larger, more complex material, a process called catabolism. As well...
Sunspots occur at places where the suns irregular magnetic field is highly concentrated. The suns surface is usually reheated by a continual flow of hot material from deep inside the sun. However, a strong concentration in the magnetic field can inte...
No matter what your cell was doing before, it will stop its healthy functioning and make only viruses, following the viral recipe until it runs out of raw materials. Then your once healthy cell bursts open, releasing new viruses to infect more cells....
Although snails can and do successfully mate without stabbing each o the r, studies have shown that darted snails store one-hundred-sixteen percent more sperm than undarted snails....
To stay healthy, your cells must continuously perform a wide variety of chemical tasks. Your DNA genes, in the nucleus of every cell, help orchestrate this activity. A cell uses its genes as a kind of biochemical cookbook: whenever it has to do anyth...
The problem is that sometimes the veins cant remove the blood fast enough from the area and so the blood begins to clot. If additional surgery fails to correct the situation, they bring in the leeches. The leeches do three things. They attach to the...
PV solar technology is more complex. When sunlight hits a PV cell, electrons in the cell are knocked out of their orbits. Electric fields channel the electrons in a current used to generate electricity. Unlike thermal solar panels, PV technology isnt...
No matter the species, mating rituals are pretty weird. Take the praying mantis. After an intimate tryst, the female mantis bites its partners head off. But when it comes to sexual hijinks, nothing beats the garden snail. During sex, garden snails of...
In a thermostat, the bimetallic coil is fastened firmly at one end. The other end is free to move. Its motion, as the temperature changes, can be used to control your furnace. For example, if the coil tightens as it cools, the free end can curl towar...
Thermometers just tell you the temperature. Thermostats need to do more than that. In addition to reading the air temperature, thermostats also turn your furnace on if the air gets too cool, and turn it off again when the air heats up. How do they do...
Now, a few tens of thousands of years ago, wolves and people started becoming friendly species. You can imagine a person tossing a bone to a friendly wolf from time to time. But friendly is the key. Nobody ever gets close to a hostile wolf. So over m...
In terms of evolution, there has to be a reason for barking, or it probably wouldnt be there. Is it to warn of predators? But dogs bark when there are no predators around. Is it play? Some dogs play without barking. In fact, people who study canine b...
The biggest reason its bad to lose too much water is that the actual volume of your blood goes down. When blood volume goes down, blood pressure goes down. As blood pressure goes down, body heat goes up, because your blood helps regulate your core bo...
There are different factors involved here. A human being isnt an automobile which needs a certain amount of gas. There are conditions under which a person could die of dehydration within a single day, and other conditions whereby a person might live...
