Adam Cole
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The corpse flower is a botanical rock star — prized by botanic gardens around the globe. In a new video, NPR's Skunk Bear explores the biology of the stinky giant, which thrives by playing dead.
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The classroom writing implement has roots in exploding stars, the French Revolution, the British crown jewels and Walden Pond.
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There are hundreds of thousands of species of worms wriggling around the world. We made trading cards about six of them.
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Almost all of the cells in a human body get replaced over the course of a life. NPR's Skunk Bear Team sets off on an imagined video tour inside the body to find out which body parts never change.
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In the spring of 2015, a snowy owl named Baltimore was fitted with a backpack GPS transmitter. The data that transmitter collected over the past year shines a light on a mysterious species.
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NPR's Skunk Bear blog received 300 nominations for our Golden Mole Award for Accidental Brilliance. We have a winner: Elizabeth Tibbetts found her luck, and scientific insight, in tiny insect faces.
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You nominated 300 cool stories of scientific surprise for Skunk Bear's Golden Mole Award. Our shortlist has it all: circuits painted with light, imperceptible genitalia, and a terrifying frog.
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German alchemist Hennig Brand started with about 1,500 gallons of urine in his 17th century hunt for gold. Discovering phosphorus was just a nice surprise. Know a modern tale of scientific luck?
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Scientists need curiosity, determination — and luck. We're especially interested in that last bit, so tell us your stories of mistakes and surprises that led to discoveries in the past few years.
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Popcorn has been around at least 4,000 years. The Aztecs even had a word for the sound of kernels popping — totopoca. On National Popcorn Day, ponder the story of this beloved snack.