100 Science Facts - Physics, Chemistry, Biology & Astronomy

Physics

A teaspoon of neutron star material would weigh about six billion tonnes on Earth.
Time passes more slowly near massive objects due to gravitational time dilation, a key prediction of Einstein’s general relativity.
Superfluid helium can climb up the walls of its container, defying gravity in a phenomenon known as the Rollin film.
Sound travels nearly five times faster through water than through air.
Absolute zero, at -273.15°C, is the theoretical point where all atomic motion stops.
If you could fold a piece of paper 42 times, it would reach the Moon due to exponential growth in thickness.
Light can behave both as a particle and a wave, depending on how it is observed.
Magnetars, a type of neutron star, have magnetic fields trillions of times stronger than Earth's.
A single bolt of lightning contains enough energy to toast 100,000 slices of bread.
In a vacuum, all objects fall at the same rate regardless of their mass, as Galileo demonstrated centuries ago.

See also: Space Facts - Planets, Stars & Cosmic Mysteries

Chemistry

The only letter not appearing in the periodic table is the letter ‘J’.
Hot water can freeze faster than cold water under certain conditions, a mysterious phenomenon called the Mpemba effect.
Diamond and graphite are both made of pure carbon, yet their properties differ entirely due to atomic arrangement.
Water expands when it freezes, which is why ice floats on liquid water.
Mercury is the only metal that is liquid at room temperature.
Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, making up about 75% of all normal matter.
Table salt is made of sodium and chlorine—both dangerous on their own, but harmless together.
Helium was discovered on the Sun before it was found on Earth, identified through its spectral lines.
Astatine is so rare that less than a gram exists naturally on Earth at any time.
Liquid oxygen is magnetic and can be attracted to a magnet.

See also: Human Body Facts - Brain, Senses & Health

Biology

Octopuses have three hearts and their blood is blue because it uses copper instead of iron to carry oxygen.
Bananas share about 60% of their DNA with humans.
Some lizards can reproduce without males through a process called parthenogenesis.
There are more bacterial cells in your body than human cells.
Tardigrades can survive the vacuum of space, extreme radiation, and near-absolute zero temperatures.
The average human body carries about 37 trillion cells.
Plants can communicate with each other through chemical signals in the air and underground fungi networks.
The blue whale’s heart is so large that a human could swim through its arteries.
Sharks existed before trees, appearing more than 400 million years ago.
Butterflies taste with their feet, which helps them locate suitable plants for their eggs.

Astronomy

If you could fit Saturn in a bathtub, it would float because it is mostly made of gas.
One day on Venus is longer than an entire year on Venus due to its slow rotation.
Neutron stars can spin hundreds of times per second after a supernova explosion.
The Great Red Spot on Jupiter is a storm that has raged for at least 400 years.
A day on Mercury lasts about 59 Earth days.
There are more stars in the universe than grains of sand on all Earth’s beaches combined.
Astronauts grow about two centimetres taller in space because of the lack of gravity compressing their spine.
Pluto’s surface is covered in frozen nitrogen and its heart-shaped plain is made of ice.
Some stars are so dense that a teaspoonful would weigh billions of tonnes.
The observable universe is about 93 billion light years across, though it’s only 13.8 billion years old.

Earth Science

Earth’s inner core is as hot as the surface of the Sun, reaching about 5,500°C.
The Sahara Desert was once a lush region filled with lakes and vegetation thousands of years ago.
The Earth’s rotation is gradually slowing, making days slightly longer over millions of years.
Antarctica contains about 60% of the world’s fresh water, locked up as ice.
Mount Everest grows about 4 millimetres taller every year due to tectonic activity.
Volcanic lightning occurs when ash particles collide and generate static electricity during eruptions.
Earth’s magnetic field is shifting and has even flipped completely many times in the past.
Every year, about 40,000 tonnes of cosmic dust falls onto Earth from space.
The Mariana Trench is deeper than Mount Everest is tall.
The Amazon rainforest produces about 20% of the world’s oxygen supply.

Human Body

Your stomach gets a new lining every few days to prevent it from digesting itself.
The human nose can distinguish over one trillion different scents.
You produce enough saliva in your lifetime to fill two swimming pools.
Your heart beats around 100,000 times a day, pumping about 7,500 litres of blood.
Humans are the only animals known to produce emotional tears.
The acid in your stomach is strong enough to dissolve stainless steel.
Your bones are about five times stronger than steel of the same density.
Half of your body’s bones are located in your hands and feet.
Your skin is the largest organ of your body, covering about 2 square metres on average.
The small intestine is about six metres long, even though it fits neatly in your abdomen.

Evolution

Birds are the last surviving dinosaurs, having evolved from theropod ancestors.
Human embryos briefly have tails, reflecting our evolutionary past.
Giraffes and humans share the same number of neck vertebrae: seven.
The human appendix may once have helped digest tough plant matter.
Flight evolved independently at least four times in the history of life: in insects, pterosaurs, birds, and bats.
Some snakes still have vestigial leg bones hidden beneath their scales.
Dolphins and bats both evolved echolocation independently, an example of convergent evolution.
All life on Earth shares a common ancestor from billions of years ago.
The average human genome is 98.8% identical to that of a chimpanzee.

Weather

A single lightning bolt can heat the air to temperatures five times hotter than the surface of the Sun.
Raindrops are not tear-shaped but rather spherical or slightly flattened as they fall.
Snowflakes form around microscopic dust particles in the atmosphere.
Thunder is caused by the rapid expansion of air heated by lightning.
The smell after rain, known as petrichor, comes from oils and bacterial spores released from soil.
Hailstones can grow as large as grapefruits in the right conditions.
The fastest wind speed ever recorded was over 400 km/h inside a tornado.
Lightning strikes the Earth about 8 million times per day.
The highest temperature ever recorded on Earth was 56.7°C in Death Valley, California.
Antarctica is technically the driest desert on Earth, receiving very little precipitation.

Energy

The Sun provides enough energy in one hour to power the entire Earth for a year if we could capture it all.
Nuclear fusion, the process powering stars, releases millions of times more energy than chemical reactions.
Wind energy originates from the uneven heating of Earth’s atmosphere by the Sun.
Hydropower is the oldest form of renewable energy still in widespread use today.
Photosynthesis captures solar energy and converts it into chemical energy that sustains almost all life.
Less than 10% of the energy from a light bulb becomes visible light; the rest is lost as heat.
Geothermal energy comes from the heat generated by radioactive decay inside Earth.
Electric eels can produce shocks of up to 600 volts to stun prey or defend themselves.
Nuclear reactors use controlled chain reactions to release energy from uranium atoms.
The human body emits about 100 watts of heat energy at rest—enough to power a light bulb.

Quantum Curiosities

In quantum physics, particles can exist in multiple states at once until observed, known as superposition.
Quantum entanglement allows particles to be instantly connected across vast distances, defying classical physics.
Virtual particles constantly pop in and out of existence in the quantum vacuum, even in empty space.
The act of measuring a quantum system changes its outcome, a principle known as the observer effect.
Electrons behave like standing waves around atomic nuclei rather than orbiting like planets.
Quantum tunnelling allows particles to pass through barriers they should not be able to cross.
Schrödinger’s cat is both alive and dead until the box is opened—illustrating quantum superposition.
Quantum computers use qubits that can represent 0 and 1 simultaneously, giving them immense potential power.
At the quantum level, empty space seethes with fluctuating energy fields.
The uncertainty principle means that you cannot know both a particle’s position and momentum precisely at the same time.