› added 10 years ago

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TIL J. Robert Oppenheimer, the “father of the atomic bomb”, once confessed that he left a poisoned apple on his tutor’s desk.

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e0B7b TIL of an estimated 1.5 million species of mushrooms and fungi, about 75,000 have been named by scientists, 1100 have documented uses, and 10 are regularly grown for food
YpPlZ TIL that we humans have been dependent since 1977 on the blue blood of horseshoe crabs to keep our medicines safe. The crabs have been 'bled' for a chemical which is used to test for bacterial contamination in drugs. Finally, pharmaceutical companies are committing to a synthetic version.
b6YG9 TIL At the height of the Berliner Luftbrücke, a plane landed in West Berlin every 30 seconds to supply the besieged city with food, coal and other necessities.
vPwV7 TIL at her 80th birthday, Queen Elizabeth II quoted Groucho Marx: "Anyone can get old - all you have to do is to live long enough".
4k4ka TIL that the Alaska oil pipeline (and other pipelines) have naturally occurring magnetic fields. Due to its length, location near the north pole, and running mostly north-south, the earths magnetic field induces a charge in the pipeline that can be measured.