Why are honeybee stingers barbed?
There are many other bee species that can sting Humans and survive, but the European honeybee has a barbed stinger, so it cannot remove the stinger once it's stung. In attempting to remove the stinger the bee will rupture its lower abdomen and then die....
Is the heat produced by fossil and nuclear fuel negligible?
We often talk about the climate impact based on greenhouse gases, but extracting fuel from the ground and using it in exothermal processes of course also releases energy as heat....
Spring Potential Energy
Say a dissolvable spring is compressed with a bolt and nut that do not melt in a sulfuric acid solution. The spring has quite a bit of potential energy at this point since it is compressed. Assuming the spring dissolves perfectly (no breakage, just complete disintegration), what happens to the potential energy of the spring?
How dense would the atmosphere need to be to result in a cataclysmic chain reaction during a nuclear explosion?
Famously, Oppenheimer and co worked out how close a nuclear bomb test would be to causing a chain reaction of nitrogen fusion in the atmosphere. They made a lot of worst-case-scenario assumptions and still came to the conclusion that no, a nuclear bomb test wouldn’t scour the surface of the world....
If two identical radios are side by side and tuned to the same frequency, will they both pick up the signal at 100%, or will they wrestle for the same radio waves?
tRNA suppressor mutation to transcribe nonsense mutations
Okay, so I know this might be a bit hyperspecific, but I don't know where else to ask it. I'm working through a microbiology lecture, and the professor says the the B strain of E. coli has a tRNA suppressor that allows it to transcribe phage genes that have any nonsense mutation. That seemed a bit vague, so I decided to look it...
What can I use to harden acrylic paints or resin?
Asking because while I see that paint hardeners exist in the USA, there doesn't seem to be anything similar in my country (Brazil)...
Where is all the water going from climate change?
Now that late spring/early summer is upon us, there's increasingly more headlines about less rain in various places (recent floods notwithstanding). I'm assuming that's because water is evaporating and not returning to those places, but where is it going?...
How does the impact of disposed rubber on the environment compare to plastics?
I assume it would break into smaller particles similar to the formation of microplastics. I hear about the effects of microplastics all the time. Are the effects of disposed rubber on the environment studied as extensively?
Regarding sleep quality, why did humans evolve to require full darkness?
I know evolution is governed by chance and it is random but does it make sense to "ruin" sleep if there's light? I mean normally, outside, you never have pure darkness, there are the moon and stars even at night. In certain zones of the Earth we also have long periods of no sunshine and long periods of only sunshine....
In the deep, far future, at the time of the "heat death" of the universe, if I turn on a radio will I get the sound of static or of total silence?
Beyond the established symmetries of physics - Charge, Spin, Color, Time, etc. - is there any such thing as symmetry of Information?
Does having fur help or hinder animals like otters/beavers/polar bears when they swim about?
[Physics] Does gravity have 'elasticity'? If a solid sun-sized object zooms across space at the speed of light, then abruptly stops, does it take gravity some time to 'settle' around it?
Is it a stable/static effect no matter what, or is it a bit more stretchy/bouncy depending on how the object is behaving?...
Is there a temperature so hot that relativistic effects are noticeable?
Can you get a sunburn from light reflected by a window pane?
Say I am sitting in the shadow, but the sunlight gets reflected by some window pane onto me. Does this contain enough UV light to give me a sunburn?
If life never emerged on Earth, would the continents still be more or less the same today? In other words, does life affect the formation and movement of continents significantly?
Does sociology extend to other social animals besides humans?
If sociology's exclusive to humans, then what might be the field of other social animal research?
Can someone explain what the various parts of this picture of atoms are? ( lemmy.world )
They say it's a picture of atoms, but what are the atoms: the glowing yellow balls or the entire meatball including the darker red? If it's the meatballs, then why do some have apparently two nuclei?...
Do we have any estimates as to how long it takes for a species of bacteria to go technically extinct entirely via genetic drift?
So, let’s say there’s a species of bacteria that is known to dwell in Greek yogurt. How long would it take before that species of yogurt-dweller only has modern descendants different enough to qualify as one or more new species?
Certified online course for learning STEM subjects?
I'm thinking of switching fields within STEM and there are some mathsy modules which I missed out on during my undergrad (biology) that would come in really handy right now....
Why does melted cheese just taste better?
How long will the Great Lakes last?
Is it possible to receive an electric shock when you *stop* touching something?
I seem to remember as a young child being told that it is safe to touch a Van de Graff generator (for the hair demonstration), but that if you let go before it is safe you will get a nasty shock. I know a bit more about electricity now, and I'm a little skeptical now. Is it possible to get a shock from letting go of something?