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Friday, June 1, 2018

Why is the brain divided?

Why is the brain divided?


Why is the brain divided?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 02:39 AM PDT

  • A search doesn't reveal anything that answers this question specifically.

  • Yes, I know that many of the left brain/right brain claims are false.

  • Essentially I'm asking about the cerebrum's longitudinal fissure--why would such a feature be selected for? Doesn't it waste space that could be used for more brain? Is there a benefit from inhibited interhemispheric communication?

  • And what about non-human animals--are their brains divided too? How long ago did this feature arise?

submitted by /u/envatted_love
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What do ants do when they are separated from the colony?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 05:05 AM PDT

I had an interesting experience with ants yesterday. They have been coming in through my kitchen window to feed on food in my kitchen. I closed the gap in the window that they were coming in through, but some ants were still inside the house. I found the behavior of these remaining ants interesting: They huddled into "groups," as if they were talking, and then they started to spread out, as if they were searching for a way back to the colony.

I have two questions:

  1. What do ants usually do when they are separated from the colony (e.g., as above)?

  2. What were the ants who were trapped in my house probably doing?

Thanks.

submitted by /u/Torin_3
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In apes, does sexual attraction to breasts have an adaptive value? Are human female breasts sexually attractive only because of social conditioning?

Posted: 31 May 2018 10:53 PM PDT

It seems to me that breasts in female humans could have a number of different possible adaptive values, and because of this it seems logical that the perception of them as sexually attractive is at least partially hardwired, and not entirely socially motivated. I am asking from the perspective of evolutionary biology.

For instance, female breasts are mammary glands and have the function of nurturing young. It seems like their size would not be an honest indicator of any functional aspect, but would more likely be a simple indicator of sexual maturity. Additionally, increased fatty tissue in the breasts would be an indicator of good health, since malnourished individuals would not have energy to allocate to fat tissue in the breasts.

My hypothesis is that there is some biologically hardwired sexual selective pressure for visible breasts because they are direct indicators of sexual maturity (thus decreasing failed mating attempts among individuals) and/or indirect indicators of individual's fitness.

The alternative hypothesis is that apparent sexual selection for visible breasts has no adaptive component and is entirely motivated by social taboos and sexualization of females.

Is there evidence for my hypothesis? Note that my hypothesis doesn't say that social pressures are not important, or even predominating (in humans), but that there is some biological component either additional to the social factor, or underlying the social factor.

One related question. In human societies where breasts are not taboo, are they considered desirable in some proportion of males in those societies?

submitted by /u/roach_brain
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How do you forecast wind? I understand being able to forecast things like rain, snow, and sunny days based on cloud formations? But how can someone determine if a day in the future will be windy, and how strong that wind will be?

Posted: 31 May 2018 08:16 PM PDT

Why are there so many research stations on the Antartica and what are we actually researching?

Posted: 31 May 2018 01:53 PM PDT

I live in Libya, why is that we have sandstorms only in summer and not winter? And why we get sandstorm even when the wind is blowing from the north (sea) and not south (desert)?

Posted: 31 May 2018 03:15 PM PDT

I live in Benghazi, which is costal city and today we had a sandstorm despite weather information says that the wind is blowing from the north (the sea is only 20km north from my place) and I was really confused. Does it have to do with humidity? Also we have days on winter where it doesn't rain for weeks so I don't think it has to do with "wetness".

submitted by /u/ikkou48
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Why do we define the mass of a proton/neutron as 1/12 of carbon-12, and not 1/56 of iron-56?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 05:42 AM PDT

I've been reading a new chemistry book and it made a tangent explaining that the idea of calculating the relative atomic mass of various elements by simply considering it a sum of proton/neutron particles' mass is wrong due to mass deficiency caused by fusion.

As far as I know, iron is the cutoff point where fusion releases more energy than it takes, from which I assume that mass deficiency is eliminated above iron, and instead we get more mass than the constituent particles' mass should give. Is this a valid idea?

Based on the above idea I thought - "Why not define the mass of proton/neutron as 1/56 of Iron-56? Doing so would eliminate inaccuracies borne from fusion's heat colouration."

p.s..: Don't know how "Endothermic/exothermic" is referred to in English literarture. In Hungarian, we call it the "Heat colouration."

submitted by /u/Hoihe
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When a substance is oxidized, does it gain or lose energy?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 02:44 AM PDT

More specifically, could I create a battery that used two substances that started out as oxides and as the reaction happens they are reduced to base elements? Could such a battery be recharged by simply exposing it to open air?

submitted by /u/Critwhoris
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Can the growth of humans (or other animals) or their final height/size be altered by a specific diet or is it determined by genes?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 02:19 AM PDT

You live in an arctic igloo (with electricity). Will a refrigerator still be able to keep things at 40 degrees Fahrenheit?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 01:30 AM PDT

I once watched a documentary on an arctic outpost and the narrator said something like "the temperature here is 0 degrees. in this weather, you'd use a fridge to keep things WARM!". It was a bit cheesy, but makes me wonder whether a refrigerator DOES have heat capacity.

submitted by /u/prettyflyforabrowngy
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How is google maps able to track live traffic changes?

Posted: 31 May 2018 11:41 PM PDT

Is there an equivalence between information, energy and matter?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 01:55 AM PDT

Some Science,....without Quantum mysticism

In the context of the holographic principle,

.
who states that the entropy of ordinary mass (not just black holes)
is also proportional to surface area and not volume;

that volume itself is illusory

and the universe is really a hologram which is isomorphic
to the information "inscribed" on the surface of its boundary.

actually none can explain how is encoded the information on the surface of the volume' s boundary ?

with

""Consider the physical world as made of information, with energy and matter as incidentals.""

This statement must be placed in the context of the holographic principle and the works of Bekenstein ...

Indeed, according to Bekenstein

the thermodynamic entropy and Shannon entropy are conceptually equivalent.

the number of arrangements that are counted by Boltzmann entropy reflects the amount of Shannon information that would be needed to implement any particular arrangement ...

...of matter and energy

The only fundamental difference between the thermodynamic entropy of physics and the entropy of Shannon lies in the units of measurement; the first is expressed in units of energy divided by the temperature, the second in "bits" of information essentially dimensionless.

so

""Can we talk about an equivalence of information, energy and matter ...?""

submitted by /u/alamata-sod
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This sounds stupid but, how does water(puddle, wet clothes) dries out without reaching its Saturated Temp (100 deg C)?? Does evaporation occurs in the drying process?

Posted: 31 May 2018 10:01 PM PDT

Is the rate in which radiation decreases with distance through an object/air exponential?

Posted: 31 May 2018 08:04 PM PDT

My idea is that lets say with alpha radiation,roughly 6cm of air would stop alpha radiation,but does the 1cm of air stop the most alpha radiation?My kinda theory is that since there is a higher possibility at the start for radiation to collide with air particles,the first cm of air would have the most collisions hence stopping the most alpha radiation particles.

submitted by /u/XDPie
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When you put Aloe Vera gel on a sunburn, does the skin soak it in, does it dry quickly, or what happens?

Posted: 31 May 2018 08:40 PM PDT

Does humidity effect the speed/ease with which bugs can fly trough the air?

Posted: 31 May 2018 04:51 PM PDT

A follow-up question I would have for this is whether bugs in certain climates that are more/less humid have adapted differently as a result.

submitted by /u/schneidrew
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Do local galaxies act as large capacitors? Do they store charge between them?

Posted: 31 May 2018 05:16 PM PDT

Also, could they oscillate like circuits and would this cause changes in their shape/structure?

submitted by /u/Wizzinator
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How or could a small consistent charge of electricity affect the way cells communicate?

Posted: 31 May 2018 10:47 PM PDT

What properties determine the density of elements?

Posted: 31 May 2018 07:41 PM PDT

Why is it that some elements, while having less mass than another, is still more dense? For example Au is more dense than U although U has more mass. At first I thought the difference could be due to atomic radius. However, Cu (radius of 140 pm) is more dense than Zn (139 pm). Does effective nuclear charge play into this somehow? What things actually effect density of elements?

submitted by /u/SapphireZephyr
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I just found an equation that makes perfect square roots with the Fibonacci sequence. please explain?

Posted: 31 May 2018 11:48 PM PDT

watched this video: https://youtu.be/SjSHVDfXHQ4?t=162 and remembered an old trick I used to do with numbers. look at this and tell me if I'm too stoned to be doing math.

Normal Fibonacci is any number plus it's self, and then again in sequence.

Starting with 1 we have; 1, 1, 2 , 3 , 5 , 8 , 13 , 21 , 34

In the video Arthur Benjamin shoes that by squaring the values of the sequence, and then adding them to each other ( see below)

square root of Fibonacci : =1 =1=4=9=25=64=169

Now take 1+1= 2 and 1+4= 5 and 4+9= 13 and 9+25= 34

Basically this shows that rooting something and adding it to it's self in sequence actually gives you the next number in the sequence's square root.

Now here's were I added something.

Imagine taking a 0-10 sequence of numbers; 0 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10

adding 0+1 and 1+2 and 2+3 and so on...

=1=3=5=7=9=11=13=15=17=19=21 (increasing 2 at a time linear)

Now here's where I get some cool numbers

Take all the numbers in the chain from earlier and add them to the number to the right of them, like before but this time also add that number to the previous value. (similar to Fibonacci)

0 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10

So its

0+1 =1 All these values are the square root of the previous number..

1+2(+1) =4

2+3(+4) =9

3+4(+9) =16

4+5(+16) =25

5+6(+25) =36

6+7(+36) =49

7+8(+49) =64

8+9(+64) =81

9+10(+81) =100

10+ Just a cool math thing? or what's happening here

submitted by /u/superiorpanda
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What's the difference between the shapes of pupils of human, felines or horses, do they affect image perceived?

Posted: 31 May 2018 04:16 PM PDT

How close are we to artificial sperm and eggs? Or are we already there yet? Could we essentially create a fertilized embryo without real sperm or egg?

Posted: 31 May 2018 08:00 PM PDT

Do other animals have such pungent body odour?

Posted: 01 Jun 2018 02:47 AM PDT

We all know that humans, when unwashed for a substantial period of time, smell really bad. Sometimes to the point of leaving a lingering scent in the air that lasts for minutes. Why do we have such strong BO? Do other animals have stronger BOs and we just cannot detect it?

submitted by /u/Critwhoris
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Does Cas9 integrate viral DNA into bacterial DNA AND recognize viral DNA and snip it? Or does Cas9 ONLY recognize viral DNA and snip it, and some other enzyme integrates the viral DNA into the bacteria's DNA.

Posted: 31 May 2018 10:54 PM PDT

I'm a bit confused about how bacteria use the CRISPR system to integrate phage DNA into their own DNA. Do they use Cas9 to do that or some other enzyme? Can Cas9 both integrate viral DNA and destroy it?

submitted by /u/thecorndogmaker
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Thursday, May 31, 2018

Why can't we perform a Pancreas transplant for those with Diabetes?

Why can't we perform a Pancreas transplant for those with Diabetes?


Why can't we perform a Pancreas transplant for those with Diabetes?

Posted: 31 May 2018 04:00 AM PDT

Why are battery-powered devices such as phones fully operational all the way until 0% charge while flashlights lose functionality the lower the battery gets?

Posted: 30 May 2018 06:52 PM PDT

How long does someone have to remain on immunosuppressants for after receiving a transplant?

Posted: 31 May 2018 06:54 AM PDT

Would the body "get used" to the transplanted organ, or would you have to stay on immunosuppressants for the rest of your life? Wouldn't that cause serious quality of life issues?

submitted by /u/Rob-With-One-B
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Can an electrical device be powered using only negative voltage?

Posted: 31 May 2018 05:41 AM PDT

I know that one can convert an AC voltage to positive and negative DC voltage, and one can combine the two to obtain different voltages (for instance, +12vdc and -5vdc will give you +17vdc). So, what if I had a device that would provide me with -5vdc, and a ground? Could I then plug the ground into a USB's Vin, and the -5vdc to the USB's ground and power a USB device? Or is there some reason that this won't work? If there is, what is the reason?

submitted by /u/PuddlesRex
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Can we detect rogue black holes?

Posted: 31 May 2018 01:06 AM PDT

So we can now, reliably, detect gravitational waves from merging black holes, and even merging neutron stars. But what about black hole - black hole encounters that resulted in one of the pair being ejected out into space? Wouldn't the tremendous velocity of an infinitely dense object dragging through space-time exude it's own gravitational waves?

submitted by /u/Riven55555
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Do people weigh differently in different areas on earth?

Posted: 30 May 2018 05:59 PM PDT

Since the earth is not a perfectly round sphere, different areas on earth must have varying depths of minerals and other elements underground which may affect the gravitational pull of the core of different areas. Would this mean if I weighed the same in one place and I moved to a country on the other side of the world I would weigh differently even if my mass is indifferent?

submitted by /u/Bezelkk
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Is the Axis of the Sun moving in relation to the Milky Way?

Posted: 31 May 2018 12:16 AM PDT

Is our solar system changing its plane in relationship to the rest of the galaxy as we revolve around the galaxy core?

submitted by /u/WeHoRaveLife
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Why are copper and gold brightly colored when most metallic elements, even chemically similar elements, are silvery-gray?

Posted: 30 May 2018 01:45 PM PDT

Why are certain elementary particles considered elementary if they decay?

Posted: 31 May 2018 12:01 AM PDT

Looking at a list of all the elementary particles in the standard model, the charm quark, strange quark, top quark, bottom quark, muon, tauon, W boson, Z boson, and Higgs boson all quickly decay into other particles. So why are they considered elementary particles? Why isn't the W boson considered a composite particle of an electron/antineutrino or positron/neutrino? Why isn't the top quark considered a composite particle made up of a W boson and a bottom quark?

submitted by /u/Popopopper123
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How do they date trees that are thousands of years old? Surely they cant just cut it open and count the rings?

Posted: 30 May 2018 12:43 PM PDT

Did the constructions of the Suez canal and Panama canal have any noticeable effects on the global climate?

Posted: 30 May 2018 03:53 PM PDT

A lot of our climate is dependent on the ocean, iirc past opening and closing of waterways through shifting plate tectonics caused pretty vast climate changes. So would the opening of two canals, which both connect to new oceans cause any significant change?

submitted by /u/Geese-surf-the-net
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How does a plant keep track of large amounts of time? Not day/night. For eg. Kurinji plant in Western ghats of South India blooms every 12 years with consistency.

Posted: 30 May 2018 10:55 AM PDT

It is predictable enough that Govt. has put up ads for tourists to watch this in July 2018. Swathes of hills get blanketed by this blue flowers.

submitted by /u/nosanto
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How "bright" is WiFi?

Posted: 30 May 2018 01:06 PM PDT

Assuming you could convert 100% of the amount of energy that the signal contains and convert it entirely to a certain wavelength of visible light how would that compare to a common bulb or led? Please consider a home series wireless N variety access point, and if possible give us a comparison to a lightbulb, christmas light, etc.

submitted by /u/llamalease
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What makes Ferromagnetism and Paramagnetism dominant over Diamagnetism?

Posted: 31 May 2018 01:34 AM PDT

How did the Apollo 11 crew pass through the Van Allen radiation belt and why can't ot be done today to enhance research in deep space?

Posted: 30 May 2018 11:05 AM PDT

How did we come to realize that some planets are gaseous while others are not?

Posted: 30 May 2018 02:32 PM PDT

Meteorologists, how is there a difference between the actual temperature and the “feels like” temperature my weather app shows?

Posted: 30 May 2018 11:07 AM PDT

Why would Gaddafi implementing the African Gold Dinar have destabilized the American dollar?

Posted: 30 May 2018 02:45 PM PDT

It was supposed to be a currency backed by the value of gold and used by all African countries. I've read that it would have helped out the African economy immensely, and also ruined the American one.

Why would it only significantly affect the USD? Or do I only think that because I'm reading US written articles? Or is it to do with Libya's considerable oil reserves?

submitted by /u/chiron42
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Along what axis are polarized sunglasses polarized, and why?

Posted: 30 May 2018 02:27 PM PDT

How do they vary wattage in incandescent light bulbs?

Posted: 30 May 2018 04:23 PM PDT

I understand that standard US incandescent bulbs are receiving 120v from my wall socket directly and I know that reducing the resistance can raise the wattage, but how do they do this? Is it a thicker filament? Different material? Longer filament?

In the same regard, can I buy an incandescent bulb in the USA and put it in a European lamp in Europe or will the bulb burn out from the higher base voltage coming from the wall?

submitted by /u/NorthboundFox
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Ask Anything Wednesday - Physics, Astronomy, Earth and Planetary Science

Posted: 30 May 2018 08:12 AM PDT

Welcome to our weekly feature, Ask Anything Wednesday - this week we are focusing on Physics, Astronomy, Earth and Planetary Science

Do you have a question within these topics you weren't sure was worth submitting? Is something a bit too speculative for a typical /r/AskScience post? No question is too big or small for AAW. In this thread you can ask any science-related question! Things like: "What would happen if...", "How will the future...", "If all the rules for 'X' were different...", "Why does my...".

Asking Questions:

Please post your question as a top-level response to this, and our team of panellists will be here to answer and discuss your questions.

The other topic areas will appear in future Ask Anything Wednesdays, so if you have other questions not covered by this weeks theme please either hold on to it until those topics come around, or go and post over in our sister subreddit /r/AskScienceDiscussion , where every day is Ask Anything Wednesday! Off-theme questions in this post will be removed to try and keep the thread a manageable size for both our readers and panellists.

Answering Questions:

Please only answer a posted question if you are an expert in the field. The full guidelines for posting responses in AskScience can be found here. In short, this is a moderated subreddit, and responses which do not meet our quality guidelines will be removed. Remember, peer reviewed sources are always appreciated, and anecdotes are absolutely not appropriate. In general if your answer begins with 'I think', or 'I've heard', then it's not suitable for /r/AskScience.

If you would like to become a member of the AskScience panel, please refer to the information provided here.

Past AskAnythingWednesday posts can be found here.

Ask away!

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Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Is long exposure necessary in taking pictures of "deep space" and if so, how come?

Is long exposure necessary in taking pictures of "deep space" and if so, how come?


Is long exposure necessary in taking pictures of "deep space" and if so, how come?

Posted: 29 May 2018 06:44 PM PDT

If I had a quality telescope, and just zoomed into the general direction of the centre of the Milky Way, say, and took a quick photo, would I be able to see the centre in good quality?

Edit: hoh, this blew up. Thanks for the responses! Now I know how it's done haha

submitted by /u/TheSovietColossus
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Why is it that when you feel mildly sick from dehydration, within merely the time it takes to drink water, you almost instantly feel better? Is it a psychosomatic case, or is the body that effective at taking in water?

Posted: 30 May 2018 05:01 AM PDT

Why do you need to refrigerate some sealed foods after opening? Doesn’t the temperature matter even when it’s sealed?

Posted: 29 May 2018 05:26 PM PDT

Are submarines vulnerable to storms on the sea?

Posted: 30 May 2018 03:25 AM PDT

Is your brain able to make sense of the situation if one gets shot in the head? Is there any time between impact and death?

Posted: 29 May 2018 01:22 PM PDT

Title. Might be a bit too macabre to post here. I don't know. I'm wondering if a brain has time to process anything if it gets completely destroyed, like in an explosion or something.

submitted by /u/_Surge
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Why does an ideal fuel:air mixture not burn completely, in practice? Why do the "lean" mixtures used in road vehicles not burn completely, either? Is there leftover oxygen, as well? If so, why is secondary air injection needed? Thanks.

Posted: 29 May 2018 08:37 AM PDT

How were photographs sent back to earth from early satellites?

Posted: 29 May 2018 09:21 PM PDT

Digital cameras as we know them didn't exist in the late 1940s and 1950s, but I can't imagine that film was just ejected out of a satellite on a one way trip out of orbit and was expected to make it back to earth, much less survive reentry.

submitted by /u/beau0628
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How, and where do you find promethium?

Posted: 30 May 2018 02:13 AM PDT

Why aren't white objects mirrors?

Posted: 30 May 2018 12:33 AM PDT

If white objects reflect all light, then why don't they act like mirrors? Only think I can think of is maybe that white objects are "messy" in the way they reflect light? Like the reflections go in different directions but I don't know if that's right or if there's maybe a better explanation.

And similarly, why are mirrors silver in color but reflect seemingly all light?

submitted by /u/PatrioTech
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Could somebody please better explain the difference between the speed of electricity through a conductor and an electron’s drift velocity?

Posted: 29 May 2018 10:11 PM PDT

How is it that an electron's energy can travel at nearly the speed of light but it physically take an electron an hour to make it across a meter long conductor? This confuses me.

submitted by /u/spooker11
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Does the Arthur–Merlin protocol in Complexity Theory have any connection with probabilistic "proofs" such as the Miller-Rabin Primality Test?

Posted: 30 May 2018 05:31 AM PDT

Scott Aaronson refers to the MA complexity class as being about probabilistic proofs. Does this mean things such as probabilistic proofs of primality, such as Miller-Rabin, or is it referring to something completely different?

submitted by /u/Jooseman
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Do you need a nervous system to get tired (i.e. experience tiredness)?

Posted: 30 May 2018 03:54 AM PDT

Can plants get tired? My rock looks tired. Is my rock tired though? What about my walls - are they tired?

submitted by /u/MisterShizno
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Why do manual transmission cars typically have 5-6 instead of 7-8?

Posted: 29 May 2018 01:11 PM PDT

Wouldn't it be more efficient, especially at high speed, to have a larger gear ratio?

With that said, isn't it common for automatic transmission cars to be "7-8 speed"?
Why are larger gear ratios more common to automatic transmission vehicles?

submitted by /u/StormwindChampion_
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How does testosterone make people become sexually attracted to others?

Posted: 29 May 2018 11:04 PM PDT

I remember the day I started liking the opposite sex, but I don't understand how testosterone goes from my gonads to my brain to doing something in my brain that makes me start noticing figures and long legs.

What does testosterone do once it reaches my brain that makes me like the opposite sex?

submitted by /u/Greybleak
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How does the size of an atom change as you move through the periodic table?

Posted: 29 May 2018 08:06 PM PDT

I know that the mass of an atom is due primarily to the nucleus and the make up of its nucleus determines the atomic number. Since mass and density goes up as we go along the periodic table, I would assume that the overall volume of the atom itself must not increase in a linear way. i.e. an atom with 10 times the mass of hydrogen is not 10 times the volume. My question is this, if a hydrogen atom were the size of a baseball, how big would some of the other atoms be? (C, Au, U, etc.)

submitted by /u/cpawoodwork2
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Is there any way to describe the right-handedness of a coordinate system without resorting to hands?

Posted: 29 May 2018 11:43 AM PDT

How does the umbilical cord form?

Posted: 29 May 2018 10:23 PM PDT

Why do we not know the exact 3-dimensional structure of the scrapie form of prion protein yet we know the proportion of alpha and beta sheets within its structure?

Posted: 29 May 2018 09:27 PM PDT

How do people create "x-ray videos"?

Posted: 29 May 2018 09:14 PM PDT

I am wondering how people get x-ray images that are videos. From how I understand normal x-rays work, it seems that a video would be impossible, and with my understanding of radiation exposure, probably be giving them cancer anyway. How would you take a video and not give the person involved cancer?

example of what I am talking about here.

submitted by /u/ModernAtomX
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Is pH What Determines What Is an Antioxidant/Oxidant?

Posted: 29 May 2018 01:18 PM PDT

Processed cocoa is cocoa that has been alkalized. It is said that it doesn't have as much antioxidative capability.

Are all these "antioxidants in health"-publications just exploring the pH of the body?

In other words, whats the difference between pH and a measure like ORAC?

submitted by /u/citruskeptic1
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