Unlike other plants, sweet potato plants do not have spines or poisons to defend themselves. Some of them have, however, something else that lets hungry herbivores know that they are not an all-you-can-eat buffet, a new study finds.

When one leaf is injured, it produces a chemical that alerts the rest of the plant—and its neighbors—to make themselves inedible to bugs. Sweet potato breeders could potentially engineer plants to produce the chemical as an all-natural pest defense.

Plant ecologists led by Axel Mithöfer of the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Jena, Germany, started to look into sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) defenses after they noticed something interesting about two varieties of the plant grown in Taiwan: The yellow-skinned, yellow-fleshed Tainong 57 is generally herbivore-resistant, but its darker orange cousin, Tainong 66, is plagued by insect pests.

To find out why, the team offered up Tainong 57 and 66 plants to hungry African cotton leafworm caterpillars. Both plants released at least 40 airborne compounds as the caterpillars snacked on their leaves. But Tainong 57 produced a lot more of a chemical called DMNT, which has a very distinct odor, the team details this month in Scientific Reports. (“The smell is not nice,” Mithöfer says. “You wouldn’t want it as a perfume.”)

The chemical DMNT causes the exposed plants to produce a protein called sporamin in their leaves, which makes caterpillars unwell when they eat the leaves.

Find out more about this over at Science.

(Image Credit: ivabalk/ Pixabay)

The ancient Babylonians were an amazing people who had many extraordinary achievements. Among those is a mathematical formula that I believe most of us still remember from eighth grade, and that formula was originally a solution to paying tax.

The particular problem for the ordinary working Babylonian was this: Given a tax bill that has to be paid in crops, by how much should I increase the size of my field to pay it?

This problem can be written down as a quadratic equation of the form Ax2+Bx+C=0. And it is solved with this formula [see photo above]:

Are your middle school memories returning?

Over four millennia later, millions of people across the planet still remember this formula thanks to the modern way mathematics is taught.

But far fewer people can derive this expression. That’s also due to the way mathematics is taught—the usual derivation relies on a mathematical trick, called “completing the square,” that is far from intuitive. Indeed, after the Babylonians, it took mathematicians many centuries to stumble across this proof.

[...]

Enter Po-Shen Loh, a mathematician at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, who has found a simpler way—one that appears to have gone unnoticed these 4,000 years.

Check out the full article over at Technology Review.

(Image Credit: Technology Review)

A neutron star truly has a unique magnetic field properties that it could change how we understand these enigmatic objects. It could also be a representative of an entirely new class of neutron stars.

… never before had a neutron star been detected with a magnetic field from one angle, and without one at others…

GRO J2058+42 is a pulsar neutron star about 30,000 light-years (9 kiloparsecs) away. Its binary companion is a type of star that spins so fast, it is spitting out a disc of material around its equator - a decretion disc. That's not super common, but not rare either.

The neutron star has a spin period of 196 seconds - relatively slow for a pulsar, but not outrageously. It's also what's known as an X-ray transient object, with variable X-ray emission.

More details about this weird space object over at Science Alert.

(Image Credit: NASA/ JPL-Caltech)

There is a LEGO-inspired burger restaurant in the Philippines called the Brick Burger. Not only is the place full of LEGOs, their burgers are, too. That’s right: they have their burgers on LEGO buns.

Sadly, they don’t stack, but that’s okay. Also sadly, these burgers aren’t served by humans dressed as minifigs. You can’t have everything.

The LEGO-themed burger comes in different flavors and colors.

I bet they have the buns all tossed in a bin in the back, just like how many of us store our own LEGO bricks. Except if they step on one of these, it’s no big deal.

Yum!

(Image Credit: Technabob)

Believe it or not, until recently, Buddhist nuns in the Himalayan region weren't allowed to hold leadership positions, or even exercise. That changed when the Drupka order instituted a new regimen for nuns that includes physical training, martial arts, and cycling. This is due to their spiritual leader, Gyalwang Drukpa, who has been working against patriarchy in Buddhism. Read more about the Drupka Kung Fu Nuns at Kottke.

This is Manggo. She is one of three cats living together in Japan, and she's an Instagram star because of her delightfully expressive face. Yes, Manggo is a large cat, but she's on a diet and has already lost half a pound.  





You can see 30 ranked pictures of Manggo at Bored Panda, and follow her progress at Instagram.

If you've ever purchased clothing online, you know how difficult it can be to find something that fits right. So you receive it, try it on, and return it for a different size. Or maybe you order three different sizes and return the two that don't fit. You might be surprised to learn that the ones you return may be sent straight to a landfill. This sounds awfully wasteful, and it is, but it's a matter of economics.

It actually costs a lot of companies more money to put somebody on the product, to visually eyeball it and say, Is this up to standard, is it up to code? Is this going to get us sued? Did somebody tamper with this box in some way? And is this returnable? And if it's clothing, it has to be re-pressed and put back in a nice packaging. And for a lot of companies, it's just not worth it. So they will literally just incinerate it, or send it to the dumpster.

Learn about the waste that comes with online retail and what you can do about it at CBC. -via Damn Interesting

(Image credit: Peter Griffin)

Etsy seller Aunt Marty wants to protect both your dignity and your nose from the winter cold. She crochets cute animals that wrap around your face, garbing your schnoz with an animal. In addition to puppy forms, she offers skunks, pandas, cats, ducks, and roosters.

-via Design You Trust

The Kamchatka Peninsula in the far east end of Russia is a geologic wonder. It's covered with both snow and a chain of volcanoes, making it a difficult place for people to settle. Amid the volcanoes is a small gorge discovered only in 1975 that is known as the Valley of Death. There are no people there, and the valley acts as a trap: animals go in, but they don't come out.

When the snow melts, various critters, from hares to birds, appear in search of food and water. Many die soon thereafter. Predatory scavengers such as wolverines spot an easy dinner; they slink or swoop into the valley—only to die themselves. From lynxes to foxes, eagles to bears, this 1.2-mile-long trough has claimed innumerable victims.

But the killer here is a phantom. The dead, whose corpses are naturally refrigerated and preserved, show no traces of external injuries or diseases that would be responsible for their expirations.

Scientists have studied the region in the years since, and have almost pinpointed the reason for the animal deaths. They can't stay there long, however, or they might join the animal carcasses. Read about the cursed geography of the Valley of Death at Atlas Obscura. -via Strange Company

(Image credit: ISS Expedition 25 crew)

Here we have a mathematical and scientific breakdown of Santa Claus' trip around the world on Christmas Eve. It's a good thing little kids don't know all that much about math and physics. Yeah, it's silly, but interesting. -via Laughing Squid

Are we doing codpieces again? Yes, we are. The fashion world is demanding it of us and we must obey.

Don't scoff. They're a symbol of traditional masculinity--assuming one looks back to the Sixteenth Century, when codpieces were all the rage in Western Europe. Rachel Tashijan writes in GQ about a recent podcast discussion between fashion designer Thom Browne and fashion historian Michael Glover about the codpiece:

Like many objects sprung from delusional masculine grandeur, the codpiece is a punchline, yet so much more. “The codpiece is all about boastfulness and braggadocio, sad men pretending to be more than they could ever hope to be,” as Glover diagnoses in his book, and in a recent phone call, he shared the more pedestrian details: “It would have had to have a fairly hard exterior, probably made of leather. Inside, the padding would probably have been horsehair.” (Horsehair is very breathable—hence its starring role in the world of luxury mattresses.) It would have been measured, he confirmed, though a brief google search reveals that if there was once a special term for the profession of codpiece measurer, it has been lost to the sands of time. [...]

A runway fashion observer may not know “the history of it, but they know of a codpiece,” Browne explained in a recent interview. That vague sense of historicism gave the collection its edge of madcap humor, underscoring that the codpiece’s more familiar contemporary cousin, the cup, is far from immune to that same ridiculous interpretation. Rendered in seersucker and affixed to dresses, suits, and dresses that looked like suits, the codpiece, Browne said, was “somewhat for decoration, and for humor.”

Codpieces could be a nice addition to your wardrobe. But you could go even more retro with a New Guinea penis gourd.

-via Ian Miles Cheong | Photo: Etsy seller The Armored Dragon

What makes a presentation stand out in a good way? It’s all in the preparation and delivery, says this article on public speaking. Obviously nerves are inevitable, but 3 certain elements in presentation-giving that are often overlooked can make a huge difference on how receptive your audience is to you, achieving that perfect balance between rehearsal and genuineness.

Sometimes you might end up pulling a Ricky Bobby on your big day. Their suggestion for not knowing what to do with your hands? Just use them! Hand gestures can help make your presentation look more natural compared to keeping stiff at your sides or inside your pocket. Overall...

Don't underestimate the power of a great presentation. The ability to sell yourself and your ideas is more important than ever. If you can craft a good story and deliver it effectively, you'll stand out among a sea of business professionals striving to be heard. 

Why not give these tips a try the next time you have a presentation? Here’s the full article from Inc..  

(Image credit: Imgur)

This dog dancing to Reggaeton is the best thing you’ll ever see today pic.twitter.com/hRojKOJ5iP

— 🇧🇧 (@rahm3sh) December 11, 2019

Wendy Berenguer uploaded this video of herself and a dog named Bailey in what looks like them dancing along together to a beat playing in the kitchen. And soon enough, it went viral. I mean, c’mon, it’s a dancing dog!

she shared the video of the seemingly impromptu kitchen dance party on her Facebook page, so the world could see the dog’s impressive skills. In the video, the dog can be seen sitting up and twisting from side to side along with the beat. When Bailey notices that it’s being filmed, it pauses for a moment, adjusts its position like it knows its best angles, and resumes shaking its tail like its a back-up dancer for Rosalía or Romeo Santos.

Dancing and pets could make a great combo for a simple yet fun exercise and stress-relieving activity, according to this article:

Similarly, dancing has been found to reduce the risk of disability and dementia and an excellent form of exercise. That means that if you are lucky enough to have a dog that knows how to throw down to sweet tune you should be in pretty good shape.

Just watching this video of them having fun helps to lower my stress levels.

-via Time

(Video: Twitter)

Shower head not working as great as it was before? Here are some budget-friendly solutions that don’t require hiring a plumber or buying hardware equipment. What you’ll need: 

A zip-close storage bag, rubber band, water and either CLR [calcium, lime and rust-removing] cleaning solution or plain white vinegar -- plus one hour…

You might experience this problem because of natural wear and tear. 

The problem stems from hard water, which has high levels of dissolved solids -- primarily calcium and magnesium -- according to the Water Quality Association. Over time, these chemicals bond with the metal and plastic in your shower head, causing a buildup that appears as crusty bits around the water spouts.

As this plumbing plaque accrues over time, the holes start to close up and water has to work harder to shoot out. If ignored, eventually it can stop up your spout completely. Shower filters are one way of preventing the problem…

Alternatively, this quick hack can save you both time and money. You can read the full post over at cnet.

Have you tried this method before?

Photo: Pixabay

A research published by the American Psychological Association has shown that students who are better able to understand and manage their emotions effectively (which is a skill known as emotional intelligence) perform better at school compared to their peers who are less skilled, as measured by their grades and standardized scores.

"Although we know that high intelligence and a conscientious personality are the most important psychological traits necessary for academic success, our research highlights a third factor, emotional intelligence, that may also help students succeed," said Carolyn MacCann, PhD, of the University of Sydney and lead author of the study. "It's not enough to be smart and hardworking. Students must also be able to understand and manage their emotions to succeed at school."

The research was published in the journal Psychological Bulletin.

The concept of emotional intelligence as an area of academic research is relatively new, dating to the 1990s, according to MacCann. Although there is evidence that social and emotional learning programs in schools are effective at improving academic performance, she believes this may be the first comprehensive meta-analysis on whether higher emotional intelligence relates to academic success.

More of this over at EurekAlert.

(Image Credit: AbsolutVision/ Pixabay)