HOW HOT IS MERCURY?

Despite being closest to the sun, Mercury is not the hottest planet. The hottest planet is Venus (at 462 Celsius). The temperature on Mercury may reach 450 degrees C (840 degrees F) during the day. But at night, the temperature may drop as low as -170 degrees C (-275 degrees F). The sunlight on Mercury's surface is 6.5 times as intense as it is on Earth due its closeness to the sun.

WHAT DOES LIGHTNING DO TO THE ATMOSPHERE?

There are lightning strikes somewhere on earth 100 times a second. And every time lightning strikes, it generates Ozone gas. This strengthens the Ozone Layer in the upper atmosphere you know, the one with the big hole that heightens our need for sunscreen. A cloud to ground bolt of lightning carries between 100 million and 1 billion volts. It can reach 50,000 degrees Fahrenheit 3-4 times hotter than the surface of the sun!

INSECT EATING PLANTS

Insect-eating plants (Carnivorous plants) grow mainly in soils poor in nitrogen. They have evolved various methods of trapping insects and digesting their bodies to obtain nitrogen. Sundew is a tiny, reddish bog-plant with round or oval leaves covered in sticky hairs. Insects that land on the leaves cannot fly away and the hairs close around them. Digestive juices break down the insect's body and the leaf absorbs the nutrients. Bladderwort lives underwater. Its leaves have little bladders that open inwards by means of a tiny trap-door. Water fleas and other small creatures may swim into a bladder but they are unable to swim out again. They die, and the plant uses the products from their bodies. The pitcher plants are large, tropical species whose leaves are modified into flasks or pitchers. Insects that land on the rim slide into the flask over the slippery, waxy coating and drown in the liquid at the bottom of the flask.

Five basic trapping mechanisms are found in carnivorous plants.

1.   Pitfall traps (pitcher plants): trap prey in a rolled leaf that contains a pool of digestive enzymes or bacteria.

2.      Flypaper traps: use a sticky mucilage.

3.      Snap traps: utilize rapid leaf movements.

4.      Bladder traps: suck in prey with a bladder that generates an internal vacuum.

5.      Lobster-pot traps: force prey to move towards a digestive organ with inward-pointing hairs.

HOW BIG IS OSTRICH'S EYE?

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain. Despite the tiny brains, ostriches are big birds. They can weigh between 140 to 290 lbs and their eggs range from 3 to 5 lbs. Ostriches are closely related to dinosaurs, and have similar tissue to a T-Rex. One thing that's not true about ostriches is that they don't bury their heads in the sand when they're scared. Male ostriches dig large holes with their beaks to make a nest for ostrich eggs. The male and female both tend to the nest regularly by flipping the eggs with their beaks, and they both take turns sitting on the nest.

WHO INVENTED SUBMARINE?

Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) made sketches of a submarine and William Bourne, a British mathematician, drew plans for a submarine in 1578. But it was only in 1620 that Cornelius van Drebbel, a Dutch inventor, managed to build a submarine. He wrapped a wooden rowboat tightly in waterproofed leather and had air tubes with floats to the surface to provide oxygen. Of course, there were no engines yet, so the oars went through the hull at leather gaskets. He took the first trip with 12 oarsmen in the Thames River staying submerged for 3 hours.

WHAT'S THE ORIGIN OF GOLD?

The origin of gold on our planet is believed to be the result of a bombardment by meteorites which occurred more than 200 million years after Earth was formed. Sulfur plays very important role in the creation of gold deposits because it enhances gold solubility. Gold is formed together with dozens of other elements such as iron, manganese, silicon, lithium, in massive stars that become supernova. These all elements come together in a package and gold has no chemical or physical properties that would cause only gold molecules to bind together and form planets or any other space bodies.

WHAT ARE HALOES?

Like rainbows, haloes are formed around the Sun due to moisture (in this case ice crystals) being refracted from the Sun's rays in the upper atmosphere. Sometimes two or more areas of the circle or arcs surrounding the Sun will be brighter, forming what are called Sun Dogs. Haloes can also form around the Moon, and occasionally around the brighter stars and planets like Venus.

SECRET OF MONA LISA

The enigmatic smile remains a mystery, but French scientists say they have cracked a few secrets of the "Mona Lisa." French researchers studied seven of the Louvre Museum's Leonardo da Vinci paintings, including the "Mona Lisa," to analyze the master's use of successive ultrathin layers of paint and glaze-a technique that gave his works their dreamy quality. Specialists from the Center for Research and Restoration of the Museums of France found that da Vinci painted up to 30 layers of paint on his works to meet his standards of subtlety. Added up, all the layers are less than 40 micrometers, or about half the thickness of a human hair, mentioned by researcher Philippe Walter. The technique, called "sfumato," allowed da Vinci to give outlines and contours a hazy quality and create an illusion of depth and shadow. His use of the technique is well-known, but scientific study on it has been limited because tests often required samples from the paintings. The French researchers used a noninvasive technique called X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy to study the paint layers and their chemical composition. They brought their specially developed high-tech tool into the museum when it was closed and studied the portraits' faces, which are emblematic of sfumato. The project was developed in collaboration with the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble. The analysis of the various paintings also shows da Vinci was constantly trying out new methods, Walter said. In the "Mona Lisa," da Vinci used manganese oxide in his shadings. In others, he used copper. Often he used glazes, but not always. Tradition holds that the "Mona Lisa" is a painting of Lisa Gherardini, wife of Florentine merchant Francesco del Giocondo, and that da Vinci started painting it in 1503. Giorgio Vasari, a 16th-century painter and biographer of da Vinci and other artists, wrote that the perfectionist da Vinci worked on it for four years.