Tycho Talk

1. The best way to retain information according to several studies is to take a few days’ break between learning sessions. Don't cram. Study, skip a couple of days, then review and study some more. Also, don’t just read- quiz yourself (flash cards, etc.). Quizzes seem to help you retain more information.

2. Blowing out birthday candles on a cake is apparently kind of gross. Generally in doing this you’re spraying bacteria from your mouth all over the cake, although how much is very person-dependent; some people are much neater about it than others. Evidently there was a video of Mitt Romney picking up each candle off a cake and blowing them out one by one, and everyone thought this was really weird. Frankly, it still is, but it turns out it is also notably more hygienic.

3. The interiors of neutron stars are, as the name implies, a mass of neutrons, all compressed very tightly. Normal neutrons are made of up and down quarks, like most matter (all quarks are of the following types- up, down, top, bottom, strange, charm). Scientists speculate that it’s possible that some of these quarks could get squashed in such a way that they turn into strange quarks. If strange quarks are not contained within the neutron star, which could happen if the star was ripped open by a black hole or another neutron star companion, the strange quarks could turn every other quark they encounter into strange quarks. Chunks of strange quarks (called ‘strangelets’, endearingly) could be flying through the Universe as we speak, and if one hit the Earth, it would quickly turn everything into strange quarks, which we assume will effectively destroy everything. If one hits the Sun, it will end the Sun’s effectiveness as our life-giving star. We have no way of detecting this and no way of avoiding it. Sleep well! There’s a possibility that the mysterious dark matter that makes up a large fraction of the mass of the Universe is made of strange quarks from either neutron stars, strangelets, or from the initial Big Bang.

1. Joel's back was bothering him so we applied Icy Hot, and he wondered how it worked. “The main ingredients in topical rubs that cause such a big fuss are menthol and methyl salicylate, which is also known as wintergreen oil. Menthol is made from peppermint oil. It can trigger nerves that are sensitive to coolness. This is why it is frequently used in mouthwashes, chewing gum and cough drops for its cooling and soothing sensation. However, no research has shown menthol to actually cause a decrease in the temperature of the skin or muscles.

“While nerve receptor stimulation gives menthol its counter irritation effects, the analgesic or pain-relieving properties are due to stimulation of opioid receptors. Methyl salicylate is a chemical that causes vasodilation (opening of the blood vessels) close to the skin surface. The increased blood flow can have some pain-killing effects on nerve receptors in the treated area.” Short version - it doesn't heal anything by itself, but relieves pain (salicylate sounds similar to aspirin) which probably makes it easier to do stretches and whatnot. Though maybe you can tear things worse if you're not feeling the pain? Unclear.

2. Nature documentaries invariably have three repeating acts: grand sweeping vistas of nature being majestic, pretty or funny; nature fucking up other nature (e.g wolves hunting caribou); and man fucking up nature. Netflix series ‘Our Planet’ is no exception. The man-fucking-up-nature bit in the first episode included a lot of information about glaciers, including that they can move up to 45 meters a day.

3. Rainforests have half of all life on Earth, according to this docco, but it wasn’t clear if that was total number of organisms, mass of organisms, number of different species or what exactly.