It’s backed by science too! Sans Forgetica, built by designers and behavioral scientists from RMIT University, is a font that could help you more easily remember the information you’ve read or typed. The group of designers used cognitive psychology in the process of creating the font. The science behind the font is: since the font type is more difficult to read, your brain works harder and makes the reader remember what you read more. I might use this while studying for exams!
A strange feature has been observed on the surface of Mars: a deep pit, showing as a black spot of darkness in images taken by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The HiRise team at the University of Arizona adjusted the brightness of the image to find out what the black spot was. The mystery area is a pit with a sand floor and slopes down to the southeast, as Futurism detailed:
The scientists behind the discovery are now trying to figure out if the deep pit could be connected to a network of underground tunnels left behind by fast flowing channels of lava — much like the ones found in Hawaii’s Volcanoes National Park.
Researchers have long suspected that ancient volcanoes may have left behind large cavernous lava tubes on the surface of Mars. In fact, some of these suspected caverns could be big enough to house entire planetary bases, providing future human settlers protection from the harsh environment on the Martian surface above.
“The hope was to determine if this was an isolated pit, or if it was a skylight into a tunnel, much like skylights in the lava tubes of Hawai’i,” Beyer wrote. “We can’t obviously see any tunnels in the visible walls, but they could be in the other walls that aren’t visible.”
If you don’t have the older consoles but would like to play some of the games made for those game consoles, surely you’ve heard of emulation! Emulators are available on Android (sadly not on iPhones), and could run NES, SNES, or Nintendo DS games. It’s easy to find the right emulator just by searching the Play Store. But how do you download the games you’d play on your emulator of choice? Android Center has got you covered! Check their full guide to Android emulation here.
The Toronto museum has acquired a sculpture made from 100,000 pieces of Lego. Hopefully it doesn’t get accidentally dropped, because imagine rebuilding the sculpture, let alone picking up the scattered Lego pieces! The huge sculpture was created by Ghanian-Canadian artist Ekow Nimako, who envisioned the ancient trading an ancient trading town in Mauritania one thousand years in the future:
Kumbi Saleh was the centre of the trans-Saharan trade route at the height of the Ghana Empire, boosting cultural diffusion between Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Europe.
The work was the centrepiece of Nimako’s 2019 solo exhibition Building Black: Civilisations at the museum. It was commissioned as a response to the museum’s concurrent archaeological show Caravans of Gold, Fragments in Time, which explored ancient trades routes in the Sahara and their cross-cultural impact, including their role in the spread of Islam.
The acquisition “enhances the museum’s ability to tell global stories about the contributions of Muslim civilisations across time”, says the museum's curator, Michael Chagnon. And it boosts the institution’s other efforts to spotlight Islamic studies, like a newly launched podcast series exploring Muslim arts and culture.
“His being a Toronto-based artist was also critical to our decision,” Chagnon says. “The museum is a cultural hub for our neighbourhood and part of our work—and part of any museum’s work—must be to support local artists.”
Jamie Hill spotted a northern cardinal that was bright red on the right side, and brownish white on the left side. The Pennsylvania resident spotted the rare bilateral gynandromorph, a bird divided right down the middle, half male and half female,” behind a residence in Warren County, Pennsylvania:
He'd been alerted to it by a friend of the homeowner, who wanted to remain anonymous, and Hill didn't want to reveal the exact location.
He said the rare cardinal "behaved totally normal." But, in theory, he said that it could mate with either a female or male cardinal, depending on which of its hormones were active during mating season.
A similar bird recorded by an Erie couple was featured in a National Geographic article in January 2019. That bird, which was red on one side and brown on the other, was spotted and photographed by Jeffrey and Shirley Caldwell.
A fragment of bone found in a southeastern Alaskan cave believed to be from a large mammal has been debunked. With new DNA evidence, the bone shard was given a new identity. The fragment, also known as PP-00128, did not belong to a bear but to a 10,150-year old ancient dog:
“Ten or twenty years ago, we would have looked through a pile of bone fragments and not seen this,” says Durham University archaeologist Angela Perri, who was not involved in the new study. “This is a nice example of what can be done with some of these advanced methods,” she adds, noting that mass screening of archaeological material can turn up new clues that might otherwise be missed. Advances in how ancient DNA is extracted, corrected for any modern contaminants and sequenced have allowed researchers to quickly assess the genetics of organisms much faster than ever before, building a growing database that can be used to detect broader patterns. The more ancient DNA that’s recovered, analyzed and placed in the database, the bigger the sample researchers have to work from when trying to understand how organisms—be it dogs or humans— relate to each other.
Alright, at first glance this might seem too trivial. A nail polish bottle is so small, you can lift weights made out of a lot of these small items! Simply Nailogical uses two bags full of nail polish bottles as weights to test how many she’d be able to carry. Spoiler: it’s over a hundred bottles per bag.
The structure looks straight from a video game. Meet the IH Residence, a family home in Bundung, Indonesia. Designed by andramatin, the home’s design was influenced by the natural topography and the climate in the region. The eye-catching oversized roof has a purpose- to offer shelter and protection from the heavy rainfall as well as from direct sunlight, as Homedit details:
The house also engages with the site and its surroundings in a really cool and interesting way. The sloping terrain allowed for a series of spaces to be created below the floor level of the main section of the house. They’re mainly a service area and a basement. The house also features several outdoor-oriented functions such as a series of terrain, balconies and reflective pools which surround the living areas and help them transition towards the landscape surrounding the house.
Have you wondered what makes a post on the Internet go viral? Well, research by James Currier and the psychology testing website Tickle.com combed through the data of its 150 million users to crack the code of virality. The research showed that there are eight psychological aspects that can push people to press the share button on respective social media sites. To know the eight aspects that make Internet posts go viral, check the full piece here.
Hopefully by the time we’re all allowed to travel around the world, the cost stays the same. What better way to check alcohol prices than using an infographic? Personal finance site Expensivity tracked the cost of beer in some countries around the world. Researchers (for the website) considered grocery store prices, online menus from bars and hotels, and statistics on alcohol consumption:
The resulting World Beer Index 2021 shows the most expensive and cheapest places for brews, with Qatar at the pricey end ($11.26 per beer) and South Africa the most affordable ($1.68).
Beer prices also appear on a handy map, which is pictured at the top of this post and can be viewed in full size at Expensivity's website. Prices have been converted to U.S. dollars—and, by the way, the average price of a beer in the U.S. is $4.75, according to the map.
When it comes to consuming suds, the Czech Republic tops the list; drinkers there put away 468 beers per person each year. At the other end, Haitians consume just 4 beers per person annually—a relative drop in the keg.
Luther's native Germany, meanwhile, spends the most on beer annually: About $1,900 per person goes to filling steins.
It’s less of a secret, and more of a not-well-known feature of Amazon. Who doesn’t love having coupons ready when you go online shopping? I sure do, especially if it could cut down the total cost of the items big time. Amazon has an entire page dedicated entirely to coupons! These coupons are available in almost every product category Amazon offers, as BroBible details:
The coupons on Amazon are also broken out into categories.
God bless the beauty of mother nature, and the sweet coincidence that photographer Andrea Zampatti had when she was able to capture this delightful photo of a very happy-looking dormouse. In the photo, the small creature can be seen perched on a flower, beaming with happiness. The photo, titled as The Laughing Dormouse, was the winner of the 2017 Comedy Wildlife Photography Awards for the On Land category. While the photo is old, hopefully it still brings a small spark of serotonin for you. God knows we all need one.
Young people never fail to amaze me. Meet 21-year-old Jasmine Harrison, the youngest woman to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Harrison completed a 3,000 mile (4,000 kilometer) journey from Spain to Antigua all alone. She set a new record with her adventure, as she was able to complete the 2020 Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge in 70 days, three hours, and 48 minutes, as CNN details:
Along the way, she had a "near collision with a drilling ship, two capsizes, lots of peanut butter and Nutella consumed," Harrison said on Twitter.
Harrison, from the landlocked town of Thirsk in North Yorkshire, England, wrote on her website that she was inspired to take part in the challenge when she saw the 2018 race finish while teaching swimming in the Caribbean.
"It wasn't just watching and holding the flares at Nelson's Dockyard for a race finish that inspired me, it was also talking to a family member of a lad that had just completed who told me just how much of an amazing thing it was. I didn't say 'not a chance I would do that,' it was more a fact of why not do it?" she wrote.
The Nintendo GameCube is something I’m not really familiar with, a console that I usually forget when someone asks me to list the Nintendo consoles I know in chronological order. I didn’t grow up with any console except for my current Nintendo Switch, but some consider the old game console to be ‘the middle child in every aspect it could’ve been.’ The GameCube was actually more powerful than Sony’s PS2, and most of its good features were underappreciated. SVG features some of the better games that make playing the console worthwhile. If you’re like me, curious to know about the games that the console featured, check their full list here. What’s your favorite GameCube game?
Who doesn’t love a good and intentionally set up tragedy in a story? Tragedies in storytelling are usually associated with the ending of a story. However, it makes readers emotionally invested when their favorite characters have a good ending. People will talk more though, if a story ends tragically. Overly Sarcastic Productions discuss the different aspects of the well-used trope we all enjoy to read in fiction or watch unravel in shows.
