Nature gauntlet
Every question we've got in Nature, back to back. How far can you get?
- Question 1 of 12
When Van Wassenbergh's team filmed woodpeckers with high-speed cameras in 2022, what did they find?
The skull decelerated in lockstep with the beak, with no measurable cushioning anywhere in the head. If the skull were a shock absorber, it would slow more gently than the beak tip. It did not, so the head works like a stiff hammer, not a helmet.
Read the full answer → - Question 2 of 12
In the 2017 Chang and Ting study, what happened when a flamingo cadaver was stood on one leg?
The cadaver held a stable one-legged pose unassisted, with zero muscle activity, because the joints lock passively under gravity. Tellingly, the same cadaver toppled when propped on two legs, showing one leg is the stable configuration.
Read the full answer → - Question 3 of 12
Why does coastal water so often look green instead of deep blue?
Coastal water is not pure water. It is full of phytoplankton, whose chlorophyll leaves green, plus dissolved organic matter and stirred-up sediment. The open ocean stays the deepest blue precisely because it is nearly empty of life.
Read the full answer → - Question 4 of 12
How do the volatiles affect neighbouring plants?
Neighbouring plants detect the drifting signal and switch on defence-related genes before any pest reaches them, so they are partly pre-armed. It is a broadcast that changes how downwind plants behave.
Read the full answer → - Question 5 of 12
In the 2015 MIT high-speed imaging study, how does the smell get from soil into the air?
Youngsoo Joung and Cullen Buie filmed drops hitting porous ground, trapping tiny bubbles that fizz upward and burst, flinging aerosols (and their smell) into the air. Oddly, light rain releases more aerosols than a heavy downpour.
Read the full answer → - Question 6 of 12
In the original study, where were obelisks most often detected?
Obelisks turned up in roughly 7% of analysed stool samples and about 50% of oral samples; a later global survey catalogued nearly 30,000 distinct obelisks across many niches.
Read the full answer → - Question 7 of 12
What did the Stanford team describe in 2024?
In 2024 a Stanford team led by Ivan Zheludev described obelisks, a new class of viroid-like RNA elements in the human microbiome that form their own group unlike any known agent.
Read the full answer → - Question 8 of 12
Why do biting flies matter so much to zebras in the first place?
In Africa, tabanids and tsetse flies can transmit diseases such as trypanosomiasis that are dangerous or fatal to equids, whose thin coats leave skin exposed to bites.
Read the full answer → - Question 9 of 12
What is the 'dorsal light response' that explains the behaviour?
Outdoors the brightest light is the sky, so keeping your back to it is a reliable way to stay upright. Near an artificial point of light that ancient reflex misfires and traps the insect at the wrong angle.
Read the full answer → - Question 10 of 12
That lovely fresh-cut-grass smell is actually the plant doing what?
The smell is a wound response. Cutting or crushing the blade ruptures its cells and triggers the lipoxygenase pathway, which throws off a burst of green leaf volatiles (dominated by cis-3-hexenal) within seconds. The signal primes nearby plants to arm their defences and summons predators of the bugs eating it. You're relaxing on the lawn while the grass is, in effect, screaming.
Read the full answer → - Question 11 of 12
What actually gives blood its red colour?
The colour comes from the haem group: a flat ring with a single iron atom that absorbs blue and green light and reflects red. It is the whole arrangement catching light, not loose iron on its own, which is why rust is a different colour entirely.
Read the full answer → - Question 12 of 12
What is the leading idea for why a cube shape might benefit a wombat?
Wombats stack droppings on raised spots to mark territory by smell, and a flat-sided cube resists rolling off. It is a plausible, popular idea rather than a proven one: the shape may instead be mostly a by-product of a very dry gut.
Read the full answer →
// every question here is drawn from our fact-checked quizzes, follow any “read the full answer” link for its sources