TIL a dust cloud in the year 536 plunged Europe into an 18-month-long winter, creating frosty summers and violently harsh winters. Nearly a third of Europe's population got wiped out, with death rates rising as high as 90% in some northern regions.
TIL Babylonians were using a rudimentary form of calculus to calculate Jupiter’s displacement each day along the ecliptic, the path that the sun appears to trace through the stars. Historians had thought such techniques did not emerge until more than 1400 years later, in 14th century Europe.
TIL that woodpeckers don't get their bills stuck in trees because they can move their top and bottom bill independently thus creating a tiny space between the end of their beak and the wood.
TIL a single dose of the antibiotic azithromycin, taken orally, can cure yaws, a horrific tropical disease that causes disfiguring, ulcerating wounds and usually occurs in children. There’s hope that the disease can be completely eradicated, like smallpox has been.
TIL The reason Roman structures survive so long is because they used volcanic ash in their concrete, which slowly transforms to aluminum tobermorite when exposed to sea water. Something modern scientists have been trying to do for decades.