Sharks are fish which have cartilages rather than bones. These fish evolved earlier than dinosaurs, which were reptiles. The fossil records show that sharks existed about 400 million years ago. Dinosaurs were found during the Triassic period, i.e. about 225 million years ago.
Cyanide is a lethal chemical found in minute amounts in seeds of some fruits such as apple, cherry and peach. The seeds of these fruits contain a compound called amygdalin, which is a sugar and cyanide based compound. When amygdalin enters a human or animal body, the sugar part of the molecule gets cut off…
Rocketgrams are mail delivered by firing crude rockets towards their destinations. Stephen Hector Taylor-Smith, an Indian aerospace engineer, launched the first rocketgram in the 1930s. In the ten-year span of his experiments he made around 270 launches. The first successful livestock dispatch was of a cock and a hen, Adam and Eve, across the Damodar…
A spider’s web is not its home, but rather a trap for its prey. It is woven by the spider using the spider silk produced by special glands in their abdomen. The webs are as unique as snowflakes, with no two ever being the same. Some tropical spiders have built webs over 5.5 m across.
World’s first recorded women’s test match was played in 1725 in Surrey, England, between Bramley and Hambledon villages. The Bramley team sported white dress and blue ribbons while the Hambledon team wore white dress and red ribbons. This report appeared in The Reading Mercury on July 26, 1745.
Spoonerism is a verbal mistake in which the speaker unintentionally switches the first sounds of two or more words often producing humorous results. The noun ‘spoonerism’ was formed after William Archibald Spooner, a highly respected university don in England. Spooner was known to be very absent-minded and he often transposed the letters of two words accidentally. One…
