WonderQuest
April Holladay, science journalist for HappyNews.com, lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico. A few years ago Holladay and her husband canoed the flood-swollen Mackenzie. For forty-six days they paddled alone a thousand miles through Canadian wilderness to the Arctic Ocean.
Now she writes a column about nature and science, which appears each Monday at HappyNews.com. The syndicated Q&A column takes a lucid look at what interests people about our world. April Holladay solves the mysteries we wonder about! To read April's past WonderQuest columns, please check out her site, www.wonderquest.com. If you have a question for April, visit this informational page.
Q: How many and what ratio of men and women will be required to create a healthy human population on another planet?
Andre, Mumbai, India
The lander touched down some 200 years after it left Earth, 20 light years away. Descendants of the original pioneers looked out at a new planet ? a dark alien world. Some despaired; others stared with excitement at the challenge. More than a few wondered, 'What had their ancestors gotten them into?'
A red-dwarf Sun, fifty times dimmer than...
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Light is an electromagnetic wave that rips through space — interacting with everything it encounters. In space, light meets little. A dense material like, glass, however, slows light as the wave "decides" how to interact with the material. But decisions aren't easy and there are many. The quantum-mechanical rules light follows are rigid, allowing only discrete answers: "yes" or "no." The rules forbid "almosts."
Q: Why is glass transparent even though it is made of...
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