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11800 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Would you ever try a black hot dog?
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Believe it or not, this is one of the most popular fast-food delicacies sold in Tokyo. It's known as the Black Terra Hot Dog, and it's over 30 cm long! The black color doesn't come from ink, but it's edible bamboo charcoal powder. Bon Appétit ...
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10608 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Colourful candy-striped land snail
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This is the colourful candy-striped land snail ( Liguus virgineus), and it’s only found on Haiti, Dominican Republic and Cuba. For years its colourful shell made a popular souvenir for travellers visiting these Caribbean islands, but now a law forbids people from harvesting the shells and selling them.
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10554 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Heart-shaped watermelons
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Japanese farmer, Hiroichi Kimura, has perfected growing the heart-shaped watermelon.
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8969 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Ladies, would you ever accept a black rose?
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This is the very rare Turkish Halfeti rose. Although it looks like it's been spray painted, it's such a dark crimson colour that it looks pure black. The roses only grow during the summer in a Turkish village called Halfeti thanks to the unique soil conditions of the region and the pH levels of the groundwater. As they first bloom the flowers look dark red and fade to this black hue during the summer months.
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8538 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Blue lava!
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A volcano in Indonesia produces lava that looks BLUE! Though the molten sulfur looks red in daylight, during the night, the blue flames that reach heights of 5 meters (16 feet) are highly visible. The sulfur, which is right around its melting point at 115°C (240 °F), is pumped away from the volcano so it can cool and be collected by miners for 680 rupiahs per kilogram (about 2.5 cents per pound).
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7854 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Super strong immune system
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Pandas produce a super powerful antibiotic that kills bacteria and fungi. The substance is released by the panda’s immune system to protect them from catching infections in the wild. Researchers are trying to decode the substance’s makeup as it could be used to develop treatments against drug-resistant superbugs.
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7683 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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House plants could one day power our computers
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Researchers have discovered a novel method to harness photosynthesis to create electricity. By attaching nanotubes to plant cells, the researchers were able to direct the electrons that plants free during photosynthesis down a wire and generate electrical current – and it was twice as powerful as electricity gathered from solar cells.
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7673 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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My new favourite animal
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Meet the guineafowl puffer ( Arothron meleagris), all puffed-up and poisonous to deter any would-be predators. Found throughout the Indo-Pacific and Eastern Pacific Oceans, this spotty species loves feeding on tiny marine invertebrates and the tips of coral.
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7567 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Solar panels on the moon could one day power Earth
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Architectural and engineering firm Shimizu plans to solve Earth's climate crisis by building a band of solar panels 400 kilometres wide along the entire 11,000-kilometre equator of the Moon. The energy generated will be beamed back to Earth in the form of microwaves and converted into electricity at ground stations. The team hopes to start building the "Luna Ring" from Moon materials in 2035.
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7370 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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The king of the jungle is disappearing
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Lions are now critically endangered in West Africa. Although they once ranged continuously from Senegal to Nigeria, new research has revealed only around 250 adult lions survive in the region, and only one of the four isolated populations contains more than 50 individuals.
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7081 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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What's the world's most delicious fruit?
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Ever wondered why two of the world's most delicious fruits - the mango and the avocado - have such enormous seeds? Turns out they likely evolved to be swallowed whole by megafauna, like our modern-day rhinos and elephants, that once ruled the Earth, to be deposited far away from their host plant and wrapped in a fresh dollop of fertiliser. That's why these seeds are nicknamed 'ghosts of evolution'.
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6625 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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World's newest island
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The world's newest island, Niijima, keeps on growing, and is now eight times the size it was when it first emerged off the coast of Japan on 20 November. Having merged with its neighbouring uninhabited island, Nishino Shima - which sat 500 metres away in November - the pair bears an uncanny resemblance to Snoopy the cartoon dog.
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6336 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Bloody trees
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The dragon’s blood tree ( Dracaena draco) has a thick red resin that makes the plant appear to be bleeding when it is cut. These subtropical plants form huge umbrella-like canopies and can grow for hundreds of years, but they are currently listed as Vulnerable by the IUCN due to the trademark resin being used in traditional medicine, violin staining, and even for embalming the dead.
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5511 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
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Legalize puffer pots!
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Puffer fish release a toxin to protect themselves from predators, but dolphins have figured out how to make the fish release just the right amount and use it to get high and enter in what seems to be a trance-like state. “They [dolphins] began acting most peculiarly, hanging around with their noses at the surface as if fascinated by their own reflection,” said one of the researchers.
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5348 |
duddy |
10 years ago |
