Most people prefer shiny apples to dull ones, crisp French fries to soggy ones, and fresh nuts to stale ones. Enter food coatings. Some are visible and some are invisible, but they’re on much of the food you buy, keeping it fresh-tasting and -looking longer. It’s not easy. After all, the coating has to be …
Category: Science Columns
Lucid dreaming
I enjoy my dreams, which are typically full of James-Bond/science-fictional elements. Sometimes they’re so exciting I regret waking up and not finding out how they end. Maybe I don’t have to. Apparently it’s possible to learn to direct your dream while you’re in it. It’s called lucid dreaming, and researchers at Stanford University have developed …
Purring
I’m a cat person. Don’t get me wrong; I like dogs. But I like cats more. (It’s an odd thing: although many dog people absolutely hate cats, I’ve seldom met a cat person who hates dogs. But that’s probably a topic for another column.) One of the nicest features of a cat is its purr. …
Perfect pitch
The Harding University A Cappella Chorus, when I sang with it, seldom relied on pitch pipe or tuning fork to pitch songs. Instead, we relied on Eve, who hummed pitches as needed–ask her for an A or a C-sharp, and she could produce it, accurately, out of thin air. Eve was one of the estimated …
Plant communication
“I talk to the trees, but they don’t listen to me…” sings one of the characters in the musical Paint Your Wagon. Maybe he’s just not speaking the right language. Far from being inert lumps, plants can and do communicate–both with other plants, and, interestingly, with insects. Of course, we’re not talking Shakespearean sonnets or …
Addiction
We sometimes throw around the word “addiction” a little loosely. “I’m addicted to Harlequin Romances” someone might say, or, “I’m addicted to CBC Radio.” True addiction, however, isn’t just doing something frequently because you enjoy it, or even a habit that’s hard to break: it’s a complex condition that involves the brain’s biochemistry, genetic factors, social factors, …
The smell of babies
“Babies smell good.” I’ve heard more than one person say that over the years, usually a woman, and I’ve always thought that person was, perhaps, just a little strange. The babies I’ve known–always from a distance–didn’t smell like much of anything, and when they did, it was a signal to change their diapers. But since …
Vitalogy
“In this age of education and progress, the Science of Health is no longer the exclusive possession of a profession, but is made an open book for those who have the wisdom to learn.” That’s a very modern-sounding statement, isn’t it? But it’s not referring to the Web. In fact, it’s from the preface to …
Smart fabric
A new technology developed by the Canadian Space Agency to help control the new robot arm on the International Space Station may soon be finding its way into your car, your couch, and even your clothes. It’s called smart fabric, because it turns fabric into a sensitive computer interface. The underlying technology, called Kinotex, was …
The science of flirting
There may be, as Paul Simon wrote, 50 ways to leave your lover, recent research has discovered there are even more ways to attract one–52, to be exact. That’s according to Dr. Monica Moore, an associate professor at Webster University in St. Louis, Missouri, who recently undertook the first serious study of the science of …
Teflon
The first time I saw a Teflon-covered pan, when I was four or five, I thought it was magic. Now that I cook, I’m even more impressed by non-stick surfaces. Teflon was discovered by accident by Roy J. Plunkett, 27, a DuPont scientist who was trying to develop a new chlorofluorocarbon (CFC) for use as …
IQ
Are kids today smarter than kids 30 or 40 years ago? (In other words, their parents?) The kids would say so, but then, every generation thinks it’s smarter (not to mention way cooler) than its parents. However, today’s kids just might have a leg to stand on: there’s been a steady increase in scores on …
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