What Does the Moon Smell Like?: 151 Astounding Science Quizzes (9 page)

Trophallaxis

CORRECT ANSWER:

b) food regurgitation by one animal for another It sounds gross, but for wolf pups it’s like fast food delivery. Wolves, and other members of the dog

family, gobble up a heaping helping of the kill, trot it home, and then regurgitate it for the pups to eat.

Some birds, social bees, and ants also practice trophallaxis to share food.

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WHAT IS . . .?

Dead Stingers

They don’t have hearts, brains, or real eyes, but that Q

hasn’t stopped them from becoming some of most

successful species on the planet. They’re also among the world’s oldest life forms, and evolved 260 million years before sharks, 400 million years before

dinosaurs, and about 650 million years before the first humans. They can regenerate lost body parts, and when food is scarce, they can shrink in size to con-serve energy. Pretty amazing, you must admit, but the most remarkable thing about them may be that they can sting you from beyond the grave. Ouch! What is this mysterious life form?

What can still sting you long after it’s dead?

a) cone snail

b) jellyfish

c) scorpion

d) stinging nettle

109

Dead Stingers

What can still sting you long after it’s dead?

A

a) cone snail

b) jellyfish

c) scorpion

WHA

d) stinging nettle

TIS

...?

CORRECT ANSWER:

b) jellyfish

Of the 200 or so species of jellyfish, about 70 sting humans. Even though their stings can be painful, the vast majority won’t kill you. The Australian Box Jelly is a terrifying exception. Its venom is more poisonous than a King Cobra’s, and can kill a human in minutes! They can be very bad news if you happen to run into one, but there’s good news about jellyfish too.

They aren’t threatened by extinction, they’re low in calories and fat, and rich in nutrients. Jellyfish sushi, anyone? Dried, they’re a popular snack in some Asian countries, especially Japan. And one last tidbit: if you change one letter in “snack,” you get “smack,” which is what a group of sea jellies is called.

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Jiggly Food Product

It jiggles, wiggles, and sparkles, and if you believe the Q

advertising, everybody loves it. This colourful treat comes in a wide range of mostly fruity flavours, and is semi-transparent. It’s easy to digest, and literally WHA

melts in your mouth because your body temperature T

is higher than its melting point. We’re talking gelatin.

IS

.

Maybe you’re a fan of the jiggly treat. If not, you’ve

..?

probably eaten it at some time or other, and at the very least, you’ve been in the same room with it. But what do you really know about it?

What is gelatin made of?

a) a yam-like tuber

b) animal skins and bones

c) fruit peels

d) seaweed

111

Jiggly Food Product

What is gelatin made of?

A

a) a yam-like tuber

b) animal skins and bones

c) fruit peels

WHA

d) seaweed

TIS

...?

CORRECT ANSWER:

b) animal skins and bones

Alginate, pectin, agar, and carageenan are some of the gelling agents from plant sources, but gelatin is made from the animal parts that nobody wants. The bones and skins of various animals, including pigs, cows, fish, and in China, donkeys, are boiled down to extract collagen, the stuff that puts the jiggle into jelly. I can hear the vegetarians, and maybe even some squeamish meat eaters, shuddering right about now. OK, it’s not pretty. But on the other hand, if you consume meat anyway, and provided the products are safe to eat, what’s so awful about using up all the odds and ends of the animals we kill for food? If you eat regular hot dogs, you’re already doing that anyway.

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The Goldilocks Zone

Certain words or phrases sound so intriguing, they’re Q

bound to fire up your imagination. Rather than just looking them up, it can be fun to let your creativity run free as you come up with possible answers to WHA

what a word or phrase might mean. Have you ever T

heard of the Goldilocks Zone? If you haven’t heard of IS

.

it, where or what do you think it could be? I’ve come

..?

up with four choices for you, but before you answer, feel free to come up with some possibilities of your own.

What is the Goldilocks Zone?

a) a solar system’s sweet spot

b) manufacturing lingo for mattresses in the medium-firm range

c) that warm, fuzzy, sleepy feeling after eating a big meal d) the depth at which gold is usually found underground 113

The Goldilocks Zone

What is the Goldilocks Zone?

A

a) a solar system’s sweet spot

b) manufacturing lingo for mattresses in the medium-firm range

WHA

c) that warm, fuzzy, sleepy feeling after eating a big meal TIS

d) the depth at which gold is usually found underground

...?

CORRECT ANSWER:

a) a solar system’s sweet spot

The Goldilocks Zone refers to a solar system’s habitable zone — the area that’s just the right distance from a star for life to evolve on an orbiting planet. It’s not too close, and not too far, so it’s not too hot, and not too cold, and liquid water can exist on the surface. How big a sun’s habitable zone is depends on how hot it is. Our sun’s Goldilocks Zone extends from our orbit to Mars’ orbit, and possibly beyond, maybe even to some of Jupiter’s hard, rocky moons.

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Tastes Like Chicken

Would it occur to you grab a bowl of mealworms for a Q

snack? Probably not, unless you’re a Klingon and grew up eating them. Most of us prefer whatever we grew up eating, and avoid foods that are different, or WHA

exotic. Whatever our food preferences, we all eat T

insects without knowing it, but we’re talking ento-IS

.

mophagy here — deliberate insect eating. Fewer

..?

people worldwide are eating insects, thanks to the spread of Western squeamishness, and maybe that’s not such a good thing. The bugs munching on food crops are often more nutritious than whatever they’re eating. Even if they are nutritious, insects can’t possibly taste good, can they? The people who eat them think otherwise . . .

Which bug tastes like chicken?

a) bee

b) cicada

c) locust

d) witchety grub

115

Tastes Like Chicken

Which bug tastes like chicken?

A

a) bee

b) cicada

c) locust

WHA

d) witchety grub

TIS

...?

CORRECT ANSWER:

b) cicada

The taste of roasted, fried, or boiled cicadas has been compared to chicken, french fries, or popcorn.

Cicada sushi tastes like raw potatoes with a hint of avocado, or maybe clam, depending on who you ask.

Other tasty bugs on the edible menu include locusts, which are similar to fried shrimp, and witchety grubs, which are big, succulent moth larvae, or caterpillars.

They were the most important insect food in the Australian desert, where they were enjoyed by

Aborigines. Cooked in hot ashes, witchety grubs, apparently, taste like almonds. Ten of them provide a day’s worth of calories, protein, and fat. Despite the nutritional punch some bugs pack, most of us consider them to be pests, not food items.

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THE CAT CONNECTION

Where Have All the

Cat Mummies Gone?

Bast had the body of a shapely woman and the head Q

of a domestic cat, but that only enhanced her appeal as one of the most popular goddesses in ancient Egypt. Cats were sacred to her, and thousands of them lived a life of luxury in her beautiful red granite temple. When they died, they were mummified. Soon enough, cat lovers took to mummifying their pets too.

Some pampered pussies were buried with mummi-

fied rodents to enjoy for all eternity, but for most of them it only seemed like eternity. The peaceful after-life of some 10,000 cats was disturbed in 1888, when a Nile farmer dug into one of the vaults in a cat cemetery, or necropolis. The cat mummies were

stacked as far, and as high, as the eye could see.

What happened to these stacks of cat mummies?

They . . .

a) fueled the Orient Express

b) were processed and ground up for fertilizer

c) were taken to the Cairo Museum

d) were used as ballast in ocean-going vessels

117

Where Have All the

Cat Mummies Gone?

What happened to these stacks of cat mummies?

A

They . . .

a) fueled the Orient Express

b) were processed and ground up for fertilizer

THE

c) were taken to the Cairo Museum

CA

d) were used as ballast in ocean-going vessels

TCONNECTION

CORRECT ANSWER:

b) were processed and ground up for fertilizer

Mummies were used for all kinds of things, including fuel for trains, and even ships’ ballast, but the cat mummies dug up by the Nile farmer in what is now Tell Basta were processed into 17 tonnes (19 tons) of fertilizer. It was a bargain at just £4 a tonne, and was plowed into British soil. Mummies were a cheap and plentiful commodity more than 100 years ago, but these days, they’re priceless. The ones that escaped being processed into mummy “products” have given us a glimpse into the cat’s mysterious past.

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Egyptian Cat Fancy

Ancient Egyptian cat lovers mummified millions of Q

cats. Over thousands of years, more and more

cemeteries were built to accommodate the felines, but they couldn’t be built fast enough. Eventually, THE

there was standing room only for the eternal kitties.

CA

Three hundred thousand crowded cat mummies were TCONNECTION

excavated from the necropolis in Beni-Hassan alone, but by the time scientists became interested in studying them to learn about the domesticated cat’s evolution, they were fairly rare. Luckily, there were enough “surviving” cat mummies to uncover the mystery of which cats the Egyptians revered and loved.

What kinds of cats did the ancient Egyptians

mummify?

a) Abyssinian cats

b) Mau cats

c) wildcats

d) all of the above

119

Egyptian Cat Fancy

What kinds of cats did the ancient Egyptians

A

mummify?

a) Abyssinian cats

b) Mau cats

THE

c) wildcats

CA

d) all of the above

TCONNECTION

CORRECT ANSWER:

d) all of the above

Based on the shape of the skull, the ancient

Egyptians kept felines that were dead ringers for today’s Abyssinian and Mau cats. Unlike us, the ancient Egyptians didn’t recognize breeds. They called all cats, whether wild or domesticated, Mau or Miu. They mummified lots of wildcats, and several of the same species are still found in the area today.

Would some of these wildcats prove to be the queen mothers of all modern kitties?

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The Queen Mothers of All Kitties

A fluffy, flat-faced Persian doesn’t look much like a Q

sleek, pointy-nosed Siamese, or a hairless Rex, or a Manx with no tail. No one would blame you for

thinking that they all descended from different wild-THE

cats, but the truth is just the opposite. The scientists CA

who tested the DNA of close to 1,000 cats, and their TCONNECTION

wild relatives, think that all domestic cats descended from a handful of female wildcats who lived about 130,000 years ago. Once the genetic identity of the

“Eve” cats was discovered, the mystery of their origins was revealed too.

Where did the “Eve” cats live? In the . . .

a) Fertile Crescent

b) Golden Horseshoe

c) Golden Triangle

d) Valley of the Queens

121

The Queen Mothers of All Kitties

Where did the “Eve” cats live? In the . . .

A

a) Fertile Crescent

b) Golden Horseshoe

c) Golden Triangle

THE

d) Valley of the Queens

CA

TCONNECTION

CORRECT ANSWER:

a) Fertile Crescent

The Fertile Crescent, in the Middle East, is considered to be the cradle of human civilization, and it was the cat’s cradle too. Domestic cats descended from the most-mummified cats in Egypt, the Near Eastern Wildcat, which still lives in the Middle East. No one knows how wildcats behaved for the first 100,000

years they associated with us, but it seems likely that they finally committed to domestication between 10

to 12 thousand years ago. That’s when humans took up farming in the Fertile Crescent and, from the cat’s point of view, when the all-you-can-eat rodent buffet was invented. Was this the point at which cats

decided that the 24/7 free lunch was worth putting up with us, maybe even being nice to us? We’ll never know, but we do know that being nice to us was key to making the domestic cat the most successful feline species on the planet today.

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The Cougar on the Couch

Although they’d never admit it, domestic cats owe Q