and Birds Plants Scientific
you run only 25% of the chemical energy in your muscles is converted into
kinetic energy, the rest changes into heat energy.
When you get goose pimples and your hair stand, the hair helps to trap air
making you feel warmer by keeping in, your body heat.
Over half the people in
Iceland get their hot water from geothermal energy.
A person who weighs 50 kg on earth will weigh 13,200 kg on Jupiter.
The compressed air used by scuba divers in their cylinders can occupy the
same volume if not compressed.
On a clear day, a beam of sunlight can be reflected off a mirror and seen
up to 40km away.
The sound energy of 200 pianos is equal to the electrical energy needed to
light just one light bulb.
Sound travels 15 times faster through steel and 4 times faster through
water than through air.
The world's largest and loudest musical instrument is in the
USA. It is an organ of 33,112 pipes that can make a sound as loud as 25
A piece of
buttered toast contains about 315 kJ of energy. With that energy you
That amount of energy could,
Facts about the Earth
Inside the earth it gets 3
degrees hotter every 100m further down.
The largest lake in the world i.e. the Caspian sea measures about 980 km
from North to South and 215 to 440 km in breadth, with an area of 371,800 sq.km.
The deepest point in the crust is the Mariana's Trench in the Pacific ocean
which is 11km below sea level.
One of the driest places on earth, Africa, Chile in South America gets an
average rainfall of only about 0.5 mm.
The most destructive earthquake occurred in September, 1923 in Japan.
143,000 people lost their lives and the cost of the damage was estimated at 1
billion pounds i.e. $30 billion or Rs.120,000 crores.
Switzerland is one of the only countries to have no mineral deposit in it.
The largest known uncut emerald is 5 cm long and 5 cm in diameter.
Making a simple vase out of the precious stone- Jade, may take more than two
years of work.
The amount of gold in all the oceans together is estimated to be as much as
10 thousand million tonnes.
Less than 1 gram of gold can be beaten into a sheet of nearly 2 sq.mt.
The largest hailstone ever, was found in Kansas, USA. It was the size of a
melon, 19cm wide and weight 758gms.
The Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia is 2000km long and covers
an area of 250,000sq-km. It has been constructed by stony corals over a period
of 600 million years and supports more life than any other habitat on earth.
Animals and Birds
The largest flying animal ever was a prehistoric reptile, Quetzalcoallus
Northropi which lived 65 million years ago. It had a 12m wingspan, the width of
a two seater airplane.
their wings 200 times per second.
Eagles have the best eyesight of all animals and can spot a hare from 3 km
Arctic terns fly a distance of 35,000km while going from the Arctic to the
Antarctic and back.
Fish hear through their bodies.
The loudest animal in the world is the Blue Whale. It can make sounds as
loud as 188dB, that can be picked up 850 km away.
Electric eels store enough energy in their tails to light up 12 light bulbs.
A shock from it could kill a person.
Leeches vary from a size of 25 cm to 1 metre.
Grasshoppers hear with their legs, waving them in the air to tell where a
sound is coming from.
The arrow-poison frog in South America is very brightly coloured and is one
of the most poisonous animals in the world.
Snakes do not have ears and cant hear sounds through air. They pick up low
sounds through the ground.
A particular breed of snakes, called Rattle snakes can see heat and can find
and catch their prey even in the dark.
The fastest land animal in the world is the cheetah, which can run faster
than 100 kmph. It can accelerate from 0 to 70 kmph in about 2 seconds!
Tiny plants called plankton live in the sea and make nearly three quarters
of the earth's oxygen. The biggest is about 1mm across and the smallest is about
50 times smaller.
The tallest tree is the giant redwood called the Founder's tree, growing in
the Humboldt National Forest, California, and is over 110mts high.
Some of the Sequoia trees in
the USA are more than 4000 years old!
The kelp seaweeds along the
Atlantic coast grow as long 6 mts, and the giant kelp of the pacific coast is
The first machine to carry people up in the air was a balloon. It was built
by the Mongolfier brothers and first flew in Paris in 1783.
In 1969, the Concorde was the first passenger plane to fly faster than
The solar challenger was the first solar powered aircraft to cross the
English channel in 1981. It's 262 km journey took 5.5 hours
The longest pipeline in the world is 2856km long and is used for carrying
crude oil. It runs from Edmonton, Canada to Buffalo, USA.
The world's largest hovercraft can carry over 400 passengers and 60 cars,
and can travel at the speed of 120kmph.
The largest machine in the world is a coal digger in Ham Bach, West Germany.
It is 220mts long and 85mts high, i.e. as tall as a 30 storey building.
One of the world's most powerful fire engine is the Oshkosh fire truck, used
for aircraft fires. In just 3 minutes, it can spray enough foam to cover a
Moving waves were used to produce electricity by Japan about 35 years ago.
The amount of energy liberated in the form of light in a supernova explosion
is so much that the explosion can be seen even during day!