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Thyristors 11 Jun 2013 | 08:00 pm
Transistors are great: you'll find them in their billions storing digits and switching tiny currents in every single computer made in the last few decades. But they're not so good at handling bigger c...
The Law of Conservation of Energy 15 Apr 2013 | 10:00 pm
Why can't we make energy for free by creating a perpetual motion machine that runs forever? How come rockets have to be going a certain speed to reach the Moon? Why does a drill bit get hot when it bl...
Mobile site... and faster server! 28 Feb 2013 | 04:30 pm
We (finally!) have a simplified mobile version of our website that you'll now see by default if you browse with something like an iPhone or Android device (although not on iPads and other tablets). Ap...
Inventions in the modern world 18 Feb 2013 | 01:30 pm
Think of inventors and you probably think of people like Thomas Edison, Guglielmo Marconi, or Samuel Morse—the lone geniuses who suddenly came up with big ideas that turned the world to a new way of t...
Teaching guide 10 Jan 2013 | 09:50 pm
Our new teaching guide explains how the hundreds of articles on our website support different parts of the physical science curriculum for ages 10 through to 18. It's a valuable new way to explore our...
Materials science 8 Jan 2013 | 01:50 pm
Why do we make walls from brick and windows from glass—and not the other way around? Why do different materials (such as wood, plastic, and metals) behave in such different ways... and how do you choo...
Is the Internet turning into a world-wide brain? 4 Dec 2012 | 01:50 pm
Lots of people have noticed a growing resemblance between the "distributed consciousness" of the Internet/Web and our very own brains. But how useful is it to compare the Internet and the brain? Is it...
10 must-read books for scientists 20 Nov 2012 | 01:50 pm
Are books dead in the days of Facebook and Twitter? Far from it! You can't beat a stack of well-written words for giving you a really comprehensive grasp of a subject. Simply take one book, add 10-50 ...
2012 update complete! 1 Nov 2012 | 03:50 pm
I'm really pleased to report that, for the second year in a row, I've been able to update the entire Explain that Stuff website (all 450 articles!) over the last six months or so. Many of the articles...
Aerodynamics 1 Nov 2012 | 03:30 pm
The faster you go, the harder it gets—and that's why the land-speed record isn't broken very often. If you ride a mountain bike, about 80% of the energy you pump into the pedals is wasted squashing th...
