› added 5 years ago

98

TIL bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, can communicate with each other and coordinate attacks. They produce a chemical called Arbitrium which signals to other phages that a host has been infected.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

P10Vn TIL Ernest Hemingway had a transgender daughter. Gloria Hemingway (born Gregory Hancock Hemingway) was an American physician and writer. Although she lived most of her life publicly as a man, she struggled with her gender identity from a young age, and in her sixties underwent surgery to transition
vPme8 TIL a quasi moon of Venus was named after a misprint on a child's astronomy poster
ZrpQ TIL DC police officer William West warned Ulysses S Grant, the sitting President of the United States at the time, about recklessly driving his horse-drawn carriage. The next day West saw Grant driving in the same manner and placed the POTUS under arrest. (Washington Post, NOV 7 1925)
Bg0yL TIL that two billionaires each married the same woman. Aristotle Onassis and Stavros Niarchos were rival Greek shipping tycoons who married a total of seven times. Onassis first married Athina Livanos, then Jacqueline Kennedy (JFK's widow); Athina later became one of Niarchos's five wives.
6Lel TIL that growing up, Stephen Colbert always wanted to pronounce his last name with a silent “t” and decided to do it while on a flight to attend college as no one knew him there. Colbert says his father always wanted to switch too, but he “lacked the pretentious gene that I have.”