BozhenaKulіshbk (2024)

18/07/2022

How Did the Planets Get Their Names?

Do you ever look up at the night sky? Can you find the Big Dipper? How about Orion? If you look closely, you can see much more than stars at night. You’ll notice the Moon, of course (unless it’s a New Moon!). But you may also see comets or shooting stars. If you look in the right areas, you might even notice a few planets.

No telescope? No problem! The five planets closest to Earth can be seen with the naked eye. In fact, people have been staring up at Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn for thousands of years.
Ancient Romans paid much attention to Earth’s neighbors. They noticed that each planet had different characteristics. They even mapped the planets' movements. That’s how the Romans gave the planets their names.

Have you ever heard of Roman mythology? It is a set of beliefs Romans held about the world. It included stories about the beginning of the world and about the actions of gods.
The Romans named the planets after their gods. Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, has the shortest revolution. Since it appeared to move faster than the others, the Romans named it after the god that carried messages.

Venus shines brightest in the night sky. That’s why the Romans gave it the name of their goddess of love and beauty. Mars was named after the Roman god of war. That’s because of its color—it’s also called the Red Planet!

On the other side of the asteroid belt, Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. That’s why the Romans gave it the name of the king of their gods. They then named the ringed planet Saturn for Jupiter’s father.

These names stuck. And the practice of naming objects in the sky after stories from mythology caught on, too. When William Herschel discovered Uranus in 1781, he wanted to name it for the English king, George III. However, others decided to call it Uranus. The name came from Ouranos, the Greek god of the sky and father of Saturn.

Decades later, Johann Galle discovered the eighth planet. He wanted to name it for the astronomer Urbain Le Verrier. Instead, seeing the new planet’s blue tint, astronomers named it Neptune after the Roman god of the sea.

Back when there was a ninth planet, Pluto was named for the Roman god of the underworld. This was fitting. The former planet is the farthest world from the Sun. Today, Pluto is called a dwarf planet.
Who gets to name the planets now? An organization called the International Astronomical Union (IAU) has had that honor since 1919. However, most scientists believe they’ve found all the planets in this solar system. Today, the IAU focuses on naming newly found moons, surface features, asteroids, and comets.
Typically, the IAU sticks to the use of mythology for naming new heavenly objects. For example, the moons of Jupiter have the names of characters in the stories of Zeus, Jupiter’s Greek counterpart. The moons of Pluto are named for other characters that exist in the mythological underworld.

How about our Earth? You won’t find any Greek or Roman gods with that name! Instead, “Earth” came from Old English and Germanic words meaning “ground.” Pretty fitting, huh?
Would you like to help name the next rock found in space? You’re in luck! The IAU does take suggestions. So read up on your mythology and send your best ideas their way! What will you choose?

17/07/2022

Iced coffee

Ingredients
• ice cubes
• 1 espresso shot, approx. 40ml/1½fl oz
• 100ml/3½fl oz cold milk
• ½ tsp condensed milk (optional)
Method
1. If you're making a black iced coffee, fill a small glass with ice cubes. If you're making a milky iced coffee (an iced latte), fill a medium-sized glass three-quarters full of ice cubes.
2. Pour the shot of espresso over the ice, then pour in the milk if making an iced latte, adding more or less to taste.
3. Stir in the condensed milk to sweeten, if using. Serve immediately.

15/07/2022

What Are Truffles?

Have you ever been to a fancy restaurant? We’re not talking about the kind of place that has a drive-through window! Instead, we’re picturing linen tablecloths, fine china, and servers in tuxedos!
You might be amazed by the types of food on the menu in fine dining restaurants. You probably won’t see French fries and hamburgers. Instead, you’d find foie gras and caviar. There could even be dishes featuring one of the most expensive foods on Earth. What are we talking about? Truffles, of course!

No, not the chocolate truffles you might see lining store shelves around Valentine’s Day. We’re talking about the rare edible fungus that grows underground, usually at the base of certain types of trees. Similar to mushrooms, truffles can look a bit like potatoes. They have a distinctive aroma and taste that chefs around the world crave.

Unlike most other types of food, truffles can’t really be planted or grown commercially. They can’t be made in a laboratory or raised in a greenhouse, either. Truffles only grow in certain areas. To thrive, they need very specific conditions.

In fact, they usually only grow when partnered with certain trees. These include oak, hazel, poplar, beech, and pine trees. The tree roots provide needed sugars to help the truffles grow. In return, the truffles give nutrients to the tree.

Many people try to grow truffles by planting certain types of trees in limestone soil in the right climate. The rest, however, is up to Mother Nature. Today, most truffles are gathered in the wild. They come from France, Italy, China, and Croatia. Some areas of the Pacific Northwest in the United States have produced truffles, too.
Truffles are quite rare. They’re even harder to find because they tend to grow a foot or more underground. Luckily, their aroma can be sniffed out by specially-trained pigs and dogs. Pigs happen to love truffles. Truffle hunters using these animals must be quick to grab their prize before the pigs can eat them. For this reason, many now prefer to use dogs, since they don’t seem to care for truffles all that much.

There are several different types of truffles. The French black Périgord truffle, can be found in southwestern France. It is known for its aroma and can weigh two pounds or more. The Italian white Piedmont truffle can be found in northwestern Italy and is extremely rare. It has the strongest aroma of all truffles and can weigh as much as one pound.

Chefs who love truffles usually shave or slice them raw over dishes. They might add them to pastas, rice, salads, eggs, and meats. They can also be infused into sauces, soups, cheese, butters, and oils.
Because truffles are so rare and sought after, they can be very expensive. The cheapest truffles can cost $100 or more per pound. And those white Piedmont truffles from Italy? Those rare fungi can command prices of several thousand dollars per pound! Recently, a charity auction sold a pair of rare white truffles, one of which weighed about two pounds, for a whopping $330,000!

14/07/2022

Why Are Pandas Rare?

If you could choose any wild animal or zoo resident to keep at home as a pet, what would you choose? If you're like many kids, you'd soon have a giant panda to cuddle up with at night. But would a giant panda make a good pet?

Sure, they're cute. Who can resist those pudgy bodies and adorable faces? They look so cuddly that you just want to pinch their cheeks and give them a hug. They would be a real chore to take care of, though.

First of all, they eat A LOT. An adult giant panda eats about 12 hours each day. Over the course of that time, it consumes about 20-40 pounds of bamboo. That also means that pandas have to use the bathroom dozens of times a day. That's a lot of clean-up!
So it's probably best to leave the pandas in the wild and in the zoos. Unfortunately, there aren't many pandas left in either place these days.

If you want to see a giant panda in the wild, you'll have to visit the cool, wet bamboo forests of the remote, mountainous regions of central China. You'll also have to be super sneaky, as pandas have an advanced sense of smell that helps them keep their distance from predators — and other pandas.

Giant pandas tend to live a mostly solitary existence. They do search for mates in the spring, and females will give birth to a cub or two in the fall. Unfortunately, the giant panda's birth rate is quite low. Pandas in the wild have only recently been able to begin to replenish their numbers thanks to ongoing conservation efforts worldwide.

Estimates of wild panda populations vary wildly. Some experts believe there are as few as 1,000 giant pandas left in the wild. Other scientists believe there are about 1,600 pandas left. A recent study using DNA analysis, however, concludes that there could be as many as 3,000 pandas still in the wild.

In addition to wild pandas, there are about 250 pandas in zoos, mostly within China. These beautiful, peaceful creatures are adored by millions of people around the world. In their homeland of China, they're considered a national treasure. They have few natural predators. So why are they so rare? Who is their worst enemy?
Sadly, it's us. Human beings are the reason so few pandas roam the forests of China today. In the past, pandas were hunted for their valuable furs. Poaching has declined in recent years, due to new laws and greater public awareness of conservation efforts.
The biggest problem, however, resulted from habitat loss that began in earnest around 1950 when China experienced a population boom. Increased development led to deforestation and farming, all of which drove many pandas out of the lowland areas where they once used to live.

As roads and railroads were built through these areas, the forests the pandas called home became increasingly fragmented. For solitary animals that struggled to mate successfully, mating became even more difficult. Perhaps more critically, destruction of their native forests destroyed much of the bamboo pandas relied upon to survive.

Fortunately, some scientists believe that panda populations are once again on the rise. The Chinese government has opened over 50 panda reserves, which is over four times as many as existed just a couple decades ago. Once listed as an endangered species, the giant panda has recently been upgraded to "vulnerable" status, an indication that conservation efforts are working. With continued conservation efforts, there is good reason to hope that giant pandas will once again rise to the levels that existed in the past.

13/07/2022

Vikings Helped Cats Conquer the World

While Vikings don’t exactly have a reputation for being cuddly, their travel companions do. Hoping to shed some light on the early history of cats, in 2016 researchers reported the results of a study in which they sequenced the DNA of 209 felines, the remains of which had been found at various archaeological sites, dating from 15,000 to 2,700 years ago. What they discovered was that cats expanded geographically in two waves.

During the first wave, the feline critters traveled from the Middle East to the eastern Mediterranean, an area known for its fertile lands. This finding supports the long-held belief that farmers—in desperate need of rodent control—encouraged the spread of cats. The next wave—which occurred thousands of years later—started in ancient Egypt, where cats were worshipped, and moved to Africa and Eurasia via seafarers. Researchers notably found that the DNA from an Egyptian cat matched that of a feline found at a Viking site in Germany. It is believed that Vikings—along with other mariners—took cats on ships in order to control rats and mice. These findings are not surprising, given the presence of cats in Norse mythology. The goddess Freyja—who was in charge of love, fertility, battle, and death—traveled in a chariot pulled by two large cats.

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