Category: Science

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Learn About the World’s Deepest Underwater Trench, and 5 Other Facts About the Pacific Ocean’s “Ring of Fire”

There are few things as fascinating as the deepest, darkest parts of the ocean. We have no idea what’s down there, for one, and the mythology and lore surrounding spots like the “ring of fire” in the Pacific are enough to pique anyone’s curiosity.

The “ring of fire” is a vast loop of volcanoes, trenches, and other seismically active delights that run all through the in-aptly named Pacific Ocean. Those 24,900 miles are where the majority of the world’s earthquakes and volcanic events take place.

If you’re chomping at the bit to learn more, don’t worry – we’ve got 6 great facts for you below!

6. It could help set up a new “supercontinent.”

Image Credit: Wikipedia

The Pacific has so many subduction zones that it should shrink significantly over the next 250 million years, bringing Asia, Australia, and both Americans together again.

As with most far-off science, there’s no consensus – others think the Atlantic or Artic Oceans will disappear first.

5. It touches more than 15 countries.

Image Credit: Public Domain

The “ring of fire” touches the western coasts of South, Central, and North America, sweeping up toward Alaska before ambling by Russia and through Japan.

From there, it lines up to hit the Philippines, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, and New Zealand on its worldwide tour.

It ends in a number of volcanoes near northwestern Antarctica.

4. It produces a ton of geothermal energy.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

The interior of our planet is a source of nearly endless renewable energy, none of which emits greenhouse gasses.

The United States, Indonesia, Japan, New Zealand, and the Philippines have all capitalized on these natural hot water reservoirs for years.

3. It all comes down to plate tectonics.

Image Credit: Public Domain

The planet is divided into 15-20 tectonic plates that drift over molten lava-like stuff that exists deeper inside the earth. There are three types of boundaries between them, and the “ring of fire” are home to all three.

Divergent boundaries occur when two neighboring plates move in opposite directions, generating new crust in the process.

The huge Pacific Plate is bring pushed away from four others by the another type, the East Pacific Rise.

And in California we have the transform boundary, where two plates sideswipe each other horizontally. The friction is what causes earthquakes.

2. Volcanoes and earthquakes abound.

Image Credit: Public Domain

There are around 452 active and dormant volcanoes through the “ring of fire,” which accounts for around 75% of the world’s volcanic activity.

90% of the world’s earthquakes occur in the general area, with some of history’s most shocking natural disasters all originating around the area’s volatile tectonic boundaries.

1. It’s home to the Mariana Trench.

Image Credit: Hussong, Fryer

A convergent boundary appears when plates collide head-on, and an excellent example sis how the Nazca plate is currently being driven underneath the South American continental plate. The ensuing subduction zone is setting off earthquakes like crazy, while lifting mountains and causing volcanoes to erupt at the same time.

The giant Pacific Plate is being overridden by the Philippine Sea Plate and creating the Mariana Trench, a yawning underwater chasm that’s deeper than Mt. Everest is high. The deepest part of the Mariana Trench, the “Challenger Deep,” has been measured at 36,070 feet below sea level.

The more you know, right?

Good luck to your opponents at your next night of Trivial Pursuit – they’re gonna need it!

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This is How Fireworks Really Work

Whether you love them or hate them, fireworks are here to stay. Too many people fall into the “love” camp on this one – anyone without dogs or little kids, or who can wear earplugs if they need to, basically – and they really are a dazzling, fun way to celebrate any ol’ thing.

You might be curious how they work, though, or how we came up with exploding pretty things in the first place – and if so, we’ve got some fun info for you below.

Firecrackers are a form of fireworks that are smaller and simpler. They’ve been around for hundreds of years, and consist of black powder (gunpowder) in a tight paper tube, and a fuse used to light it.

Image Credit: iStock

Gunpowder contains charcoal, sulfur, and potassium nitrate, though the powder used in fireworks may have aluminum, too, to brighten the explosion.

A sparkler burns over a longer period of time, producing bright and showery lights, and contains different compounds – fuel, an oxidizer, iron or steel powder, and a binder.

Image Credit: Pexels

The fuel is generally charcoal and sulfur, and potassium nitrate is the most common oxidizer. The binder is sugar or starch, and then the whole thing is mixed with water and dipped onto a wire – voila! a sparkler.

To create the bright, shimmering sparks in both firecrackers and sparklers, aluminum, iron, steel, zinc, and magnesium are used, because when the metal fakes heat up they shine incandescently. Different chemicals can be added to create the different colors that make us ooh and ahh.

The large fireworks that you see at displays on the 4th of July or at sporting events are called aerial fireworks, and they’re made up of a shell. A shell has four parts – a container, stars, a bursting charge, and a fuse.

Image Credit: Pexels

Below the shell is a small cylinder that contains the lifting charge to get it off the ground.

The shell is launched from a mortar, like a short, steel pipe with black powder to lift it into the air.

When it launches the shell, it lights the fuse, which burns until the shell reaches the desired altitude before it explodes.

Image Credit: iStock

There are more complicated shells, called multi-break shells, that burst in two or three phases to create different colors or compositions or brighter or softer light. Some of the crackle, or whistle, etc. They’re basically shells within shells, each ignited by a separate fuse, or perhaps set up so that the bursting of one shell ignites the next one and so on.

The different patterns are created by the arrangement of pellets inside the shell. If you space the pellets equally in a circle, you’ll see a set of small explosions equally spaced in a circle. Basically, whatever you want to see in the sky, you create it in the shell with the pellets, then place explosive charges in order to blow them outward into a large figure.

Image Credit: Pexels

I’m kind of surprised that things are a bit simpler than I figured, but I suppose that’s the way with most things, once you pry the lid off.

Even so, I’m not going to be making my own fireworks anytime soon – best to sit back and enjoy, and leave the explodey things to the experts, don’t you think?

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This is Why the Ocean Changes Color, Depending on Your Location

There are few things that attract people the way the ocean does. We’re not natural water-going beings, and yet, the lure of the sea’s vastness, the calming sound of its waves, has drawn us in since the beginning of time.

If you’re someone who has gone out of their way to visit the ocean whenever and wherever you’re in the vicinity, you might have noticed that it’s not always the same color.

Image Credit: Pexels

It makes sense, to some extent, that the ocean is an ever-changing beauty, and you probably guess that it has something to do with the depth in certain regions, but is there more to it?

Hold on – let’s find out together!

First, let’s dispel the notion that the water is – or is even supposed to be – blue. NASA oceanographer Gene Carl Feldman explains:

“The water of the ocean is not blue, it’s clear.

The color of the ocean surface for the most part is based on depth, what’s in it and what’s below it.”

Basically, if a body of water is deep enough that light can’t reflect off the bottom, it appears blue. When the sun’s rays strike the ocean, they interact with water molecules and can be either absorbed or scattered. Light of shorter wavelengths – which looks to the human eye blue or green – is most likely to hit water molecules and scatter.

The depth of the water, as well as the composition of the ocean bottom, will affect whether we see the dusky, dark blue of large parts of the Atlantic, or a sapphire-blue as in the tropics, says Feldman.

“In Greece, the water is this beautiful turquoise color because the bottom is either white sand or white rocks.

What happens is the light comes down and blue light gets down, hits the bottom and then reflects back up so you make this beautiful light blue color in the water.”

Complicating matters is the fact that the ocean isn’t empty – it’s full of small plant and animal life, along with sediment or other, man-made, contaminants.

Image Credit: Pexels

Feldman studies images of the ocean’s surface taken by satellite, and can analyze the color patterns to assess where sediment and runoff are an issue (the water will appear brown) or where phytoplankton, a microscopic plant, turns the water green.

Phytoplankton use chlorophyll to convert water and carbon dioxide into organic compounds, generating about 50% of the oxygen on the planet. They give ocean water a green tint most of the time, though they can also cause us to see yellow or reddish brown in some situations.

Feldman says green water should make us smid
As with everything in this world, balance is key – and both a decrease or increase in phytoplankton is not a good thing. It’s one more sign that our planet’s climate is out of whack.

Image Credit: Pexels

In the ocean’s least-touched, least-polluted sector – in the water off the coast of Easter Island – the water is deep and remarkably clear. It appears to the naked eye a pure, deep indigo.

“The light just keeps going down, down, down; there’s nothing that bounces it back.

Here is the deepest blue you’ll ever see.”

Just one more reason to love the ocean, y’all.

And if you do, with the depths of your heart, it’s long past the time to join in the fight to save it.

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This is When Turquoise Is More Valuable Than Diamonds

There are a lot of stones and gems out there that are more valuable than diamonds. The coveting of diamonds, the idea that they’re the end-all, be-all for women around the globe, that you must have a large one ready if you’re going to propose marriage, is all a marketing scheme.

That said, if I asked you to name a gem other than a diamond that has a large inherent value, I bet you would say a ruby, or maybe an emerald.

Not, probably, turquoise.

Image Credit: Rob Lavinsky

There are people, though, who have been mining, buying, and selling turquoise in the American Southwest for generations – people who know it’s history, it’s value, and can pick out both with a quick glance at the raw stones.

People like Michael Garland of Sedona, Arizona, whose family has worked with American Indian art for four generations.

He told How Stuff Works,

“Turquoise has a fascinating and unique history. This beautiful stone has captured human imagination all over the globe for thousands of years, from King Tutankhamun’s death mask to Aztec and Mesoamerican art.

Turquoise has been cherished and used by the Southwest Native American Indian tribes for centuries in trade, for ceremonial purposes, and to enhance their beautiful art forms — from sandpaintings to jewelry. Its rarity and beauty continue to make it a highly coveted stone.”

Cultures all over the world have long treasured the precious stone, and though its chemical compound is well known, the truth is that its value goes far beyond the science.

Image Credit: Public Domain

Here’s more from Garland…

“Turquoise is formed by a complex combination of aluminum, copper, phosphorus, water, and other local ingredients that may change the color or add matrix (host rock). Turquoise is found at elevations between 3,000 and 8,500 feet (914 and 2,590 meters) and typically in dry, arid climates.

Only certain regions on earth provide this recipe for turquoise to form. Turquoise mines in the Southwest United States are the most famous, such as Bisbee, Lander Blue, Number Eight or Lone Mountain. However, other areas in the world produce high quality natural turquoise such as Iran, Tibet, China, Egypt and Kazakhstan.”

Emerald Tanner and her father, who own Tanner’s Indian Arts in New Mexico, talk about how the value can vary widely.

“The value of turquoise comes from the quality and rarity of the stone. Some mines produced tons of material over numbers of years — others, only a hundred or so pounds and for a very short period of time. Turquoise can be as soft as chalk or as hard as a 6 or 7 on MOH’s scale — the harder and more intense colors tend to be more valuable. Another variable in valuing turquoise is comparing all-natural turquoise to ‘stabilized’ or ‘enhanced’ turquoise.”

The fact is there’s a lot of turquoise out there – but not a lot that’s strong enough to survive the cutting and polishing process.

There is a process for “strengthening” turquoise that’s not naturally strong enough, but since it has to be manipulated and stabilized, it’s not as valuable.

Which means that even though you’ve probably seen something touted as turquoise in gift shops all over the world, only about 10% of turquoise on the market is natural and untreated.

The tanners say this definitely matters.

“Over 90 percent of the ‘turquoise’ on the world market has been stabilized, treated, or tampered with to enhance the color or harden the stone. Some of the ‘turquoise’ on the market isn’t even turquoise at all, but an imitation material that has been dyed or colored to look like the stone.

We always encourage anyone looking to purchase turquoise or turquoise jewelry to ask questions about the stones and forever say ‘if you don’t know your turquoise, know your turquoise dealer.’ Natural gem quality turquoise is one of the most rare and collectable natural commodities of our world. It is indeed a special stone and one to be collected and celebrated.”

Turquoise is graded like any other gemstone, on the four C’s of color, clarity, cut, and carat weight. There are other factors to weigh, as well, such as where it was mined.

Image Credit: Tim Evanson

Since it’s so much rarer than a diamond of the same grade, turquoise definitely qualifies as more valuable.

It’s worth more than gold, as well, and most other precious gems that people consider high value.

Garland says that, when it comes to turquoise, the hardness, aesthetic beauty, and rarity all play a huge role.

On hardness:

“Only a small percentage of all turquoise mined is naturally hard enough to be used in jewelry. In some cases, as much as 90 percent of the turquoise mined is chalky and soft and would need to be stabilized in order to be used. The top-level of turquoise that is naturally hard enough to be used is called ‘natural’ or ‘untreated’ turquoise. Within this top tier of natural turquoise, there are further categories such as ‘high-grade’ and ‘gem-grade’ that describe the absolute best and hardest natural stones.”

When it comes to aesthetic beauty:

“The depth of the stone’s color and the presence of matrix or host rock can both add value. Deeper, darker colors are generally more expensive. Tight webbing in the matrix (called ‘spider webbing’) can also add value to turquoise. There is an ongoing debate regarding value in the turquoise world: matrix vs. clear gem turquoise,” they write. “A gemologist will tell you the more clear, the more perfect the stone, and the more valuable. Collectors and Native American jewelers may deem the more matrix with intense and beautiful webbing, the more valuable.”

And last, the stone’s rarity:

“Rarity is a huge factor in price, specifically as it relates to the turquoise mines. A fantastic example of this is the Lander Blue turquoise mine in Nevada. Lander Blue was considered a ‘hat mine,’ meaning the entrance to the mine was so small you could cover it with a cowboy hat. High-grade Lander Blue turquoise can sell for as much as $500 per carat.

To put that in perspective, that’s more than $1.1 million per pound. Why is it so expensive?

Because it is considered to be some of the hardest and highest grade turquoise ever discovered. On top of its quality, it was an extremely small deposit — only about 100 pounds was mined before the deposit completely ran out in the 1970s. The rarity, combined with the quality of the stones and their aesthetic beauty, makes Lander Blue the most expensive turquoise mine in the world.”

It’s not uncommon, then, for gem-grade turquoise to sell for anywhere before $40-$200 per carat – nearly four times the price for the same amount of gold, even at the low end.

Image Credit: Mike Beauregard

All of the experts recognize the significance the stone has for Native Americans who populate the American Southwest, and the Tanners make sure to point it out at every turn.

“Turquoise is a sacred stone to many of the Native American tribes of the American Southwest.

The unique appeal of turquoise comes from its color kinship to the sky and compatibility to water, which is the most precious thing in the Southwest.”

The Navajo, especially, says Garland, have a connection to the stone.

“Turquoise took on special meaning for the Navajo people, specifically, as one of the four sacred stones of the Navajo tribe.

Along with white shell, abalone and jet, these stones are associated with the Four Sacred Mountains, which form the traditional boundaries of Navajoland.”

In short, there are many things that make a stone valuable.

When it comes to turquoise, none of them are man made, and marketing is the last thing on any miner’s mind.

Just a few things to think about the next time you pass through a gift shop or visit a gem show – the turquoise might be a better investment than you might have thought!

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Could Planting 1 Trillion Trees Help To Save Us From Climate Change?

Most of us are looking for ways to combat climate change, since the science is irrefutable – we’re running out of time. If we want to have a viable earth to pass down to our kids and grandkids, time is of the essence.

What’s the answer, though? That’s a little harder, but even if planting trees couldn’t hurt anything, could planting a whole lot of trees actually save us?

The answer is… scientists think so.

In a recent report, the U.N. suggested that adding 2.5 billion acres of forest to the world could limit global warming by 2050.

What’s more? Data backs up their claims.

Image Credit: Pexels

A group of researchers out of Switzerland found that restoring around 223 million acres of canopy cover (that’s an area roughly the size of the contiguous United States) is “our most effective climate change solution to date.”

That number of trees could store about 205 billion tons of carbon – 2/3 of the carbon that has been emitted since the Industrial Revolution.

Jean-François Bastin, from the Switzerland study, lays out what that really means.

“The idea was to estimate what tree cover could be expected when you removed the ‘human factor,’ i.e. what specific types of forest would naturally occur in the absence of other development, and where.”

They built a “model to link tree cover with climate/soil/topography, based on 78,000 observations of tree cover in protected areas.”

Image Credit: Pexels

They used some more fancy math to exclude land currently being used for urban settlements, croplands, and existing forests, which left them the total amount of land available for restoration.

These studies align with global efforts like the Trillion Trees Vision, which wants to plant those trillion trees by 2050, and the Bonn Challenge, a partnership between Germany and the U.N. that wants to restore 371 million acres of deforested land by the end of this year.

If you’re thinking this sounds easy, and we should just do it like, yesterday, but things are always more complicated than they seem.

Mostly, the fact that only a few countries are willing to chip in, says Jim Hallett, chair of the Society for Ecological Restoration’s board of directors.

“Implementation of forest restoration on the scale discussed in this paper is not as straightforward as it might seem.

By 2018, there were commitments of over 420 million acres (170 million hectares) by 58 nations, which exceeds the Bonn Challenge goal.

Current estimates indicate that around 29 percent of the committed lands are now under restoration, but most of this work has been done by a few countries.”

Other major challenges, according to Hallett, include “financing, governance, land tenure and ownership, [and] capacity to do the work. There is ample evidence that, in some contexts, if the benefits of restoration are not equally shared, the project will fail. So incentive programs have to be carefully developed.”

Image Credit: Pexels

Experts also warn that planting trees alone is not enough, even if we plant a billion of them. The models depend on us not further degrading the forested lands we currently have, too.

Not only that, but there are other scientists, like climate change researcher Eike Luedeling, who are skeptical for other reasons.

“Many of the allegedly available restoration areas are clearly unsuitable for more trees than they currently support.

If you look closely at the map, a large proportion of these areas are in regions where soils are permanently frozen.

The methodology implicitly (probably not on purpose) implies that carbon stock is proportional to canopy cover, i.e. ecosystems without trees contain no carbon.

This is clearly false and strongly inflates the global estimate [of restoration].”

Basically, for some, these studies and proposals are nothing more than interesting academic proposals that will never be able to be implemented in the real world.

The U.N. and Hallett, recognize that nothing they’ve proposed will be simple, but it could be a viable course of action if the kinks could be worked out.

Image Credit: Pexels

“What we need is universal action: international agencies, NGOs, governments, all citizens — anyone can be involved.

Local communities and small organizations may be especially effective.

While they do not have the same reach as national agencies, they have the benefit of knowing what works best in their own backyards.”

It seems like this could be a great solution, or at least the start to one.

I mean, who doesn’t love trees, right; they’re the best!

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The Arctic Circle Is Owned by 8 Countries, and 4 More Facts We Think You’ll Love

Ready to learn some good stuff?

Geographers define the Arctic Circle as everything at or above 66 degrees and 34 minutes north latitude -more simply, anything between the 66th and 67th parallels in the Northern Hemisphere.

The Arctic Circle keeps strange hours, with the entire winter being more or less dark and other times of the year being sunny all the time. The land encompasses less than 4% of the globe’s surface, but it’s home to hundreds of thousands of people.

If you’re intrigued to know more, we’ve got you covered – below are 5 super cool facts about the Arctic Circle!

5. It’s not totally dark.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

First of all, even if the sun doesn’t make it all the way over the horizon, there’s still a sort of twilight that lends light to the skies. Even if the cities there don’t get a true sunrise for up to 65 days each winter, it’s not completely dark all the time.

If you’re looking for the “astronomical polar night” you’ll have to head farther north than 88 degrees latitude, where there are no human settlements. There, the complete and total darkness lasts for around 11 weeks.

4. It’s owned by 8 different countries.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

The United States, Canada, Russia, Norway, Finland, Greenland, Denmark, and Sweden all own land that falls north of the border for the Arctic Circle.

That’s fun!

3. It’s far colder in the Antarctic Circle.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

All of the seawater beneath the North Pole moderates the climate, while the South Pole is a larger, deeper landmass with a far lower average winter temperature – -76 degrees F. The North Pole only (!) gets down to around -40 degrees F.

There are no human settlements in the Antarctic Circle.

2. Murmansk, Russia, is the biggest city.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

It’s home to around 295,000 people, as well as the tallest building (236 feet high) in the Arctic Circle.

The second largest city, Norilsk, is also located in Russia, and famous for its mining operations and the historic Nord Kamal Mosque.

Around 295,000 people live in Murmansk, a port city founded in 1916 at the height of World War I. One of its Soviet-era landmarks, the 236-foot (72-meter) Arktika Hotel, is the tallest building north of the Arctic Circle.

The region’s second-largest city is Russian, too. Norilsk, a community of some 179,554 souls, is famous for its mining operations and the historic Nord Kamal Mosque. Outside of Russia, the Arctic Circle’s most populous municipality is Tromsø, Norway, which boasts the world’s northernmost university.

1. It’s shrinking.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

Earth’s axial tilt is changing, which means every 40,000 years or so, the boundary line retreats by between 46 to 49 feet.

Scientists project that the first human settlements will move outside the Arctic Circle by 2050.

I’m feeling ready to best someone at a trivia game any time, anywhere!

What’s your favorite fact about the Arctic Circle? If you’ve got one, lay it on us in the comments!

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This is Why We See Such Beautiful Colors in the Fall

Fall is such a great time of year. It’s a time of transition from summer to winter, and nothing quite embodies that transition like the changing colors of the leaves.

According to an Iroquois Native American legend, the leaves change colors in the winter because a group of young hunters slew the Great Bear, and its blood turned the leaves red.

While a vivid illustration, there’s actually a much simpler and less gory explanation for why the leaves change colors in the fall.

Image Credit: Unsplash

Do you remember learning about photosynthesis in school? If not, let’s do a quick refresher.

Photosynthesis is the process of plants converting carbon dioxide, water and sunlight into energy. Photosynthesis cannot happen without chlorophyll.

According to Gardening Know How,

“chlorophyll, which resides in the chloroplasts of plants, is the green pigment that is necessary in order for plants to convert carbon dioxide and water, using sunlight, into oxygen and glucose.”

So, does that mean the leaves turn shades of yellow, orange, and red because the plants are running out of chlorophyll?

Well… yes and no.

Image Credit: Wikipedia

Chlorophyll isn’t the only pigment present in leaves, even when they looks green. Pigments carotene and xanthophyll are also present, although we can’t see them.

In the fall, when the days are shorter and colder, and the air is dryer, there isn’t as much sunlight for the leaves of the trees to absorb.

Without sunlight, those leaves can’t convert carbon dioxide and water into energy, so they stop their food making process.

The chlorophyll in the leaf breaks down, revealing the other beautiful pigments that were always there.

Image Credit: Unsplash

Have you ever wondered why the leaves fall as they change color?

This happens because as the days get shorter and colder, each leaf grows a layer of cells that seal it off from the tree.

The tree keeps living, and the leaf detaches and decomposes, so that a new leaf can grow in the spring.

While carotene pigments give rise to orange leaves, xanthophyll pigments give us those beautiful yellow leaves like you might see on a Big-leaf Maple.

Image Credit: Unsplash

Some leaves, like those of most oak trees, will simply turn brown. Red or reddish-purple leaves will have various mixtures of anthocyanin pigments residing within them.

Some years you might see more vivid red leaves. This is because weather plays a role in determining how much anthocyanin pigment can be found in certain leaves.

Sunny days mixed with low evening temperatures, above freezing, generally lead to more anthocyanin production in trees like maples.

With the sun shining, the leaf can produce energy, but the cool evenings cause the tree to absorb as much sugar and nutrients from the leaf as possible.

The result is a higher amount of anthocyanin pigments.

Image Credit: Unsplash

Isn’t science cool?

Hopefully, the next time you take an autumn stroll through the park or in the woods, you’ll remember how the colors of fall come to be, and appreciate them all the more.

Personally, I love a maple full of yellow leaves.

What do you think is the most beautiful type of tree in the fall? Let us know in the comments!

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This is How Synesthesia or ‘Crossing of the Senses’ Works

If you experience synesthesia, then you most likely already know what it means. For everyone else, here’s a quick definition: experiencing something with one sense and somehow, that experience translating to a second one.

Like, you see a scone, and can taste the scone. Or, you hear the letter B and imagine the color yellow.

It doesn’t have to make sense, either; music can be a color, letters can taste like cake – whatever your brain comes up with goes.

Image Credit: iStock

For a long time, researchers believed synesthesia was fairly rare, but a 2006 study that employed objective tests found that’s not true – it affects around 2%-4% of the general population.

One of the reasons it can be hard to pin down is that there are so many different forms of the condition, and as a general rule, synesthesia can occur with any combination of senses or cognitive pathways.

The most common type is graphemes (letters or numbers) taking on certain colors. One synesthete will always see the letter A as red, but every synesthete won’t see the letter A as red – although some letter/number combinations are more common than others.

Sound-to-color synesthesia is the second most common type – a 2006 study found that these synesthetes typically associate a higher pitch to a lighter color, leading researchers to conclude that synesthesia might be using the same cross-modal pathways that most people use, rather than ones unique to the condition.

Lexical-gustatory (olfactory), tasting flavors based on a visual picture, word, or sound, is one of the rarer types of synesthesia – they might even associate smells with certain colors or shapes.

Image Credit: Pexels

Some people claim to taste emotions, or to experience a physical sensation when other people are touched, or even to assign personality traits to random letters or numbers.

Now that we understand (?) a bit more of what it means to be a synesthete, let’s talk a little bit about why scientists think people end up with these strange powers.

Only a little bit, because even though it’s become a popular field of study, synesthesia still isn’t well understood. There is some idea that it has a genetic component, because around 40% of people report a first-degree relative who also has the condition, and most recall experiencing it from a young age.

What scientists do agree on is that synesthesia is a sensory phenomenon that is unrelated to memory – meaning you thinking of a letter being blue because it was blue in your childhood bedroom isn’t the same thing.

Image Credit: iStock

It happens early in the perception process – you mind just makes the connection, it doesn’t spend time searching your memory for it.

Researchers believe synesthesia is a cross-wiring in the brain – that the area for one sense stimulates the area for another. There could be increased neural connections that stuck around when others were being pruned while still in utero – there might even be physical differences in brain matter to find.

Scientists also believe there could be some secondary benefits for people who “suffer,” mainly in the area of memorization. Some synesthetes can memorize a large list of numbers by using their color associates, for example, and some others can distinguish between extremely similar colors.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows, though; many report the condition can be grating or uncomfortable, like when they see a letter or number that’s the “wrong” color, if a name doesn’t “taste” right, or other stuff the rest of us will never understand.

I’m not sure I understand humans any better after writing this article, but listen – I do have a renewed respect for how truly different each and every one of us are.

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Gömböc

A ‘gömböc’ is a 3-d shape that will always end up settling in the same position regardless of how it was originally placed. The mathematics of these shapes has helped explain why tortoises can roll back over onto their legs when they’re placed with their shell to the ground.

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