Moment of Um

Dragons are fantastical fairytale creatures that fly and breathe fire. They aren’t real, but there are animals that can do the things dragons do! So … if dragons did exist, how would they fly and breathe fire? We asked science professor Dr. Mark Lorch to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s DRAGON you down? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll fire off an answer!

There are more than 8 billion people living on our big wonderful planet. What if all of those people traveled to the exact same spot on Earth and jumped at the same time? What would happen? Would we move the Earth? We asked physicist Dr. Kiley Kennedy to help us find the answer. Got a question jumping around in your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll find an answer that moves you!

Energy powers our entire universe, whether it’s light from a star or energy stored in the food we eat. But could we ever run out? Will there be a time, far in the future, when the last drop of energy is used up? We asked physicist Dr. Kiley Kennedy to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s draining your mental battery? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact and we’ll find the answer for you, because knowledge is power!

Have you ever noticed how sometimes when you wash and dry a piece of clothing, it comes out a little smaller? Why does that happen? We asked science professor Dr. Mark Lorch to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s tumbling around your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we won’t shrink away from answering it!

Some snakes make a chemical in their bodies called venom. They use it to hunt and protect themselves. Sometimes, if a human gets bitten by a snake, they need to take a special medicine called antivenin. How does this medicine work? We asked pediatrician Emma Gerstenzang to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s snaking around in your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help find a sssssatisfying answer!

Ping pong is a super fun game. It’s like miniature tennis, where people use paddles to make balls fly across a table., and sometimes way, way up in the air! But how do those tiny plastic balls manage to bounce so high? We asked physicist Dr. Kiley Kennedy to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s bouncing around your brain? Ping us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll serve up the answer!

Lots of cars, trucks and buses are powered by gasoline. You put the gasoline in a little hole on the side of the vehicle, it powers the engine and then it comes out of the tailpipe as exhaust fumes. But what’s going on inside that engine? And how does gas turn into exhaust anyway? We asked chemistry professor Dr. Josie Nardo to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s really exhausting you? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll steeryou toward the answer!

There are all different kinds of trees in the world, from towering redwoods to tiny willow trees smaller than an action figure. Why are there so many different sizes of trees, anyway? We asked tree expert Jake Miesbauer to help us find the answer. Got a tree-mendous question? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll ginkGO find the answer!

Black holes are mysterious. They are so dense that no light can escape them, which makes them super hard to find! So how did we discover the first black hole? We asked NASA engineer Varoujan Gorjian to help us find the answer. Got a mystery you’d love to shed some light on? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help search the skies for an answer.

Records are big flat discs with circular lines on them that you can use to play music. But how does a record work, anyway? We asked audio engineer Josh Bonati to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s spinning around in your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help find an answer that’s music to your ears!

Have you ever been to the doctor and had them listen to your body with a stethoscope? It’s that funny looking thing that looks like a long rubbery tube with a round metal circle on one end and two ear pieces on the other. Doctors always seem to have one handy, but what is it and how does it work? We asked pediatrician Emma Gerstenzang to help us find the answer. Got a question that you need scoped out? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll prescribe you an answer!

Have you ever seen a sinkhole? These are spots in the Earth’s surface where the ground has collapsed and formed a hole. Sometimes they can be more than a hundred feet deep! But how do sinkholes form? We asked geologist Hazel Barton to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s a real hole in one? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help dig up the answer!

Black holes are super dense spots in space. They have so much gravity that when something falls into a black hole, it can’t escape. We asked UCLA astrophysicist Dakotah Tyler to help us imagine what it would be like if we traveled through one of these dark marvels. Is there a question that’s really pulled you in? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll spaghettiFIND you an answer!

Vocal cords are magical things. They let us speak, sing, squawk and scream. But what are vocal cords and how do they do all that? We asked pediatrician Emma Gerstenzang to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s chattering away in your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll belt out an answer!

Bricks are all around us: in walls, sidewalks, park benches, and more. How are these bodacious blocks made, and what makes them different colors? We asked construction and masonry expert Brian Trimble to help us find the answer. Constructing a question? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help you find a solid answer!

People around the world eat with a variety of utensils like forks, chopsticks, and sporks. But what did people do before silverware was invented? We asked human evolution expert Briana Pobiner from the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s unFORKgettable? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll spoon-feed you an answer.

Have you ever noticed that when you eat something salty, you feel extra thirsty for a while afterwards? Ever wondered why? Turns out, scientists are wondering why as well, and it’s a perfect example of how science is always changing how we understand the world. Gastroenterologist Dr. Kaveh Hoda tells us the salty story. Thirsting for knowledge? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll conSALT all our resources to find the answer!

Warts are small bumps that can show up on our skin, especially on our hands, knees, or elbows. What are they? Where do they come from? We asked Dr. Kaveh Hoda to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s got you TOADally stumped? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help sort out wart’s wart.

Platypuses seem like they were put together from other animal’s spare parts. They’ve got a bill like a duck, a flat tail like a beaver, and…venom? What’s up with that? We asked biologist Imogene Cancellare to help us find the answer. Got a question that’s as confusing as platypus anatomy? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we won’t even bill you for the answer!

Peregrine falcons are the fastest animals on earth. They’re the super sonic jets of the animal kingdom! So what does the word “peregrine” mean and how did these amazing birds get their name? We chatted with conservation biologist Imogene Cancellare to help us find the answer. Got a question soaring through your brain? Send it to us at BrainsOn.org/contact, and we’ll help you capture the answer!