› added 6 years ago

79

TIL of Dr. Frances Kelsey a female Canadian/American pharmacologist working for the FDA in the 1960s who stopped authorization of Thalidomide (a drug that caused the deformation in fetuses) saving countless children and also helping reform standards in the FDA/U.S against pharmaceutical companies

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xgXo TIL Alexander Graham Bell developed the metal detector as a last ditch effort to locate a bullet lodged in the chest of American President James Garfield in 1881; the attempt was unsuccessful because the metal coil spring bed Garfield was lying on confused the detector.
wooL8 TIL Women taking the contraceptive pill can skip periods indefinitely. If you choose to skip the placebo pills each month there is no requirement to take a ‘break’ from the active pills. Ever.
ABv7 TIL the projectile in badminton, called a shuttlecock, can be real feathers or synthetic. Real feather shuttlecocks, like those used in the Olympics, contain 16 feathers plucked from the left, and only left, wing of a goose. This ensures consistent rotation.
4ABo TIL when AOL 4.0 launched in 1998 they used the entire world’s CD production market for several weeks. No other major market CDs were created during this period of time.
j6OE TIL the awesome smell of rain is caused by Geosmin, which is an “organic compound with a distinctly earthy flavour and aroma”. Humans can detect it at 5 parts per trillion.