Does a balloon pop when it reaches the atmosphere?

Q: Does a balloon pop when it reaches the atmosphere?

A: A regular helium balloon can go up to about 5 miles, then it will start to freeze. It will also expand because of the decreasing pressure. Then, it will pop.

Why is the sky blue?

Q: Why is the sky blue?

A: If you looked directly at the Sun, (which of course you should never do, as you will blind yourself.) you would see all the different wavelengths of light. When you look away from the Sun, you see shorter wavelengths, like violet and blue. 

 You have things called cones in your eyes to let you see color. They can see 3 different colors, but they overlap, so different colors can be seen as the same color (like violet and blue.)

The Moon

Q: How much time can an astronaut spend on the moon?

A: There have been 6 moon landings. The shortest time spent on the moon was 21 hours and 36 minutes. The longest time was 3 days, 2 hours and 59 minutes.

2 more questions

Q: Will an asteroid hit Earth, wiping out the population? How big was the asteroid that destroyed the dinosaurs?

A: The asteroid that killed the dinosaurs was about 6 miles wide. In the year 2182, an asteroid called 1999 RQ36 is very likely to hit Earth. It has a 1 in 1,000 chance of hitting. That's actually a pretty big chance. The asteroid is  about 1,837 feet across. There is an asteroid called Ceres that is about 22 miles wide. It is the biggest asteroid that we have found. Ceres will NOT hit Earth. Another asteroid, Toutatis, is 3 miles wide and weighs 5,500 million pounds. It was supposed to hit Earth, but it didn't. Apophis is an asteroid that is about 1,065 feet long. It was going to hit Earth in 2036, but it didn't pass through an area in space called the keyhole. If it did, it would hit Earth. 1999 RQ36 is probably the most likely asteroid to hit Earth. We will all be dead by 2182, though.


Q: How hot is a nuclear explosion?
A: A nuclear explosion is over 10 million degrees Kelvin. The center of the Sun is 10 million degrees Kelvin, too. 

My New Blog

Now I started another blog. Click here to see it: larynsstuff.blogspot.com
(I will still be working on this one, though.)

The next question

Q: How much does the Sun weigh?
A: The Sun is 875,000 miles across, or 1,392,000 kilometers! It could fit 2 million Earths inside it. The Sun weighs about 2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kilograms. 

Q: Why do some people have allergies and other people don't?
A: Your parents have different genes that you get so if they have an allergy to peanuts then you might, too.

Something worse

Okay. So I just posted that thing about solar flares, right? Now, we have something worse. A Coronal Mass Ejection, which will reach Earth in one to three days. This one wil not be super powerful, but you might notice it happen. A CME is millions of tons of solar material that is launched from the Sun. These particles are traveling around 575 miles per second. www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=_D9DaPbrF_A

To all you Doomsday Preppers, please don't spend another million dollars on this thing. Seriously.

Did you know that a CME is what causes the northern and southern lights?

                                                                                                                 

                                                                                                           

More questions

Q: Why do people have different hair colors?

A: You inherit hair color from your parents. You get 4 genes from your mom and 4 from your dad. So if both your parents have the same hair color, then you will too. But if they have different colors, then yours will probably be somewhere in the middle. For example, my mom has black hair and my dad has blond, so I have brown hair.

Q: Do centipedes really have 100 legs?

A: No. The word centipede means 100 legs, but the adults can have 30 to more then 300 legs. They never have exactly 100 legs, though.

New question

Q: How does rock salt melt the ice?
A: Salt lowers the freezing point of the water. There is always a thin film of liquid water around the ice, so most of it will melt.

Don't panic

It's 2013. The Sun is at the end of it's 11 year cycle. We WILL have solar flares. THIS SPRING. In case you don't know what a solar flare is, it's a massive burst of solar energy that can knock out power grids. Hooray, right? But don't panic. We'll be fine. This happens every 11 years. You have probably heard about this already. But, I'm just telling you that it will be fine.

A few more questions

Here's an interesting question from Phil Plait, the Bad Astronomer (www.badastronomy.com/index.html):

Q: You're the captain of a spaceship. Space pirates have taken your ship, and captured you. They leave you floating in the middle of a room with the gravity off. You can't foil the pirates and take your own ship until you get to the wall of your room first so you can escape. How do you do it?

A: If you are near the other wall, you can place your feet against it and propel yourself to the wall you want to be on, or if you sneeze, then it wil propel you backwards. Then get to the exit!

Q: Do hummingbirds ever perch?

A: Yes. They perch on branches, clotheslines, and bird feeders.

The next question

Q: How is water carbonated?
A: Carbonated water is water in which carbon dioxide gas has been dissolved. To make carbonated water, you need dry ice and cold water. Add one piece of dry ice to the glass using tongs, then another. Be very careful when doing this. Dry ice hurts if you touch it. When the first two pieces are gone, add another two. When those melt, you have carbonated water!

                                                      The dry ice will look like this.



                                                         

Astronomy website

If you are interested in astronomy and space, go here: www.slate.com/authors.phil_plait.html

The next 2 questions

Q: How is a rainbow formed and why? 
A: Each rainbow begins with millions of tiny raindrops. They serve as a reflector of light. White light enters one rain drop and exits as a specific color of the rainbow. Without all these raindrops, a rainbow could not occur. If you only had a couple of raindrops, you would only see a couple of colors. The rainbow forms in a complete circle, but the horizon only allows us to see half of it.






Q: If I have a bottle of water filled to 500ML and I keep it open, how much water will evaporate in 1 month?
A: Good question, Gabriel! This depends on if you keep the water out in the Sun, or indoors. It also depends on the humidity and temperature of the water. I'm sorry, but I don't have a good answer for you. Why don't you try this at home?

The next questions

Q: A can of pop just exploded in my car. Can you tell me how that happened?

A: If you shake it, the can could explode. If it was very hot outside, then that would have made it explode. But no one knows why.

Q: How can it rain in 26 degree weather?

A: The atmosphere is made of different layers and different temperatures. It could be 22 degrees up high, and 32 degrees lower.  When a drop of rain passes through these layers, it can freeze and unfreeze. If it was 26 degrees on the ground, and 37 degrees a little bit higher, then the raindrop would not have enough time to freeze.

The first 4 questions

Q: How are sleet & freezing rain different?

A: Sleet will mostly bounce off a surface, but freezing rain will form ice.

Q: How big is an atom?

A: An atom cannot be measured with centimeters or inches, of course. It is too small. But, if an atom was the size of a coin, you would be the size of a skyscraper. There are 2,000 billion billion atoms in a drop of water.

Q: Why do balloons stick to your hair?

A: This is because of static electricity. Static electricity happens when electrons build up. Static electricity is electricity that is not moving. Electrons have a negative charge, and protons have a positive charge, so they attract.

Q: What is the life cycle of the praying mantis? 

A: It consists of 3 main stages. These are: The egg stage, the nymph stage, and the adult stage. The egg stage happens right before winter. During autumn, the female praying mantis can lay 100-400 eggs. She secures the eggs on a safe, sturdy leaf or stem with a liquid that hardens and protects the eggs during the winter. 

 The nymph stage happens in the spring. After the nymphs get a first taste of the outside air, they will hang around the egg for a little while. Some of the babies will try to eat each other at this time.  Soon, they will start to hunt for small insects, like fruit flies. Not all of the nymphs will survive this stage due to larger predators. 

 The adult stage happens in the summer. The adult will spend this time hunting and eating anything that will not eat it first. They molt as muchas 10 times until reaching their full size at the end of summer. When they are done molting, they are strong and can lay the eggs.

My first post

Hi. This is my first post on The Science Blog. You can send in stuff that you want me to write about (it has to be about science, of course), and I will write about it.