Inspired by Tom Whitwell’s list of 52 things he learned last year, I created my own list (with a focus on science, aviation, technology and food) which I’m still adding to throughout 2019.

1. There is only about one atom per cubic metre of space in the universe. Source: George Gamow’s book One Two Three Infinity
2. In the late 1700s Oxford had a climate similar to that of present day Edinburgh. Source: The Times
3. Commercial airline pilots sometimes greet fellow pilots at cruising altitude by flashing their landing lights. Source: FT
4. Sesame Street has a venture capital firm. Source: The Times
5. Japanese researchers once invented a wasabi fire alarm which can wake deaf people up in the night. Source: Quartz
6. Moby is the great-great-great-nephew of Herman Melville, author of Moby Dick, hence the nickname. Source: The Times
7. The first cultivated carrots were purple and yellow, not orange. Source: Pop Sci
8. Ciabatta bread was invented in 1982 by an Italian jealous of the popularity of the French baguette. Source: The Guardian
9. The word “blazer” comes from the colour of the red ivy flowers growing on the side of the St John’s College building, Cambridge University, which the rowers of the Lady Margaret Boat Club used as inspiration for their outfits. Source: The Telegraph
10. In parts of New Orleans the graves are overground concrete tombs because of the city’s water level. Source: Itotd
11. Until 1987 it was common to operate on newborn babies without anaesthetic. Source: The Times
12. Reuters News Agency was founded in 1850 with a flock of 45 messenger pigeons which filled a “telegraph gap” between Brussels and Aachen in western Europe. Source: Reuters
13. Sharks have been around for at least 420 million years and survived four of the “big five” mass extinctions. Source: New Scientist
14. Ordnance survey, the UK mapping company, was set up because the English were worried about revolutions in Scotland and France and wanted to know where they could easily transport their troops in case of war. Source: Ordnance Survey
15. Mosquitos may have killed half of the 108 billion people who have ever lived across our 200,000 year existence. Source: New Scientist
16. Only 20 per cent of Americans can do a single push-up. Source: The Atlantic
17. Fanta was developed in Nazi Germany in response to an embargo on Coca-Cola. Source: The Local via Frank Swain
18. Finland has a government committee called the “Committee for the Future” dedicated to discussing and solving big, future problems. Source: Jared Diamond interview in New Scientist
19. Gold smugglers have set up fake gold mines in Uganda which are designed to legitimise gold that’s been smuggled in from Congo. Source: The Economist
20. Over millions of years of chimp and human evolution there have been, on average, six changes to the roughly three billion letters in our genetic code every year. Source: The Guardian
21. Spandex, the material used in most leggings, was invented during the Second World War when the military was trying to find a new material for parachutes. Source: The Guardian
22. Almost all bananas sold today are direct descendants of one plant grown in the early 1800s in the greenhouse of Chatsworth House in the peak district. Source: BBC News
23. The Nike “Just Do It” slogan was inspired by the last words of a murderer who was about to be executed by firing squad. Source: New Yorker Mar 18 2019
24. The brain consumes about a fifth of a person’s metabolic energy each day. Cooking was essential for human evolution, because it means we don’t need to spend all day chewing — unlike chimps. Source: 1843 Magazine
25. Swatch once invented a new unit of time for the internet called the “beat” which split the day into 1000 parts. Source: BBC News
26. The first reference to a “freelancer” in literature is Sir Walter Scott’s 1819 novel Ivanhoe, where a feudal lord talks about his army of solders for hire taking over shipping in Hull. Source: Anna Codrea-Rado’s (excellent) freelancing newsletter
27. Candle flames are hollow. Source: Massimo
28. San Francisco has a dedicated human faeces removal team. Source: New York Times
29. Honey found in Egyptian tombs for thousands of years is still unspoiled and edible thanks to its sugar content, acidity and low moisture. Source: Smithsonian Magazine
30. Medical scanners are built with steel from sunken battleships because the steel has not been contaminated by the decades of nuclear testing. Source: Science Made Simple
31. The yellow traffic signal was first conceived in 1920. Source: The Register
32. Naturally occurring radioactivity in the body from isotopes like carbon-14 and potassium-40 disrupts the DNA of 85,000 cells every single day. Source: New Scientist
33. China has only one time zone for the whole country, despite covering five time zones geographically. Source: New Scientist
34. As many as 100,000 people are buried in mass, unmarked graves in Spain after decades under General Franco’s rule. Source: The Guardian
35. The National Insurance fund which pays for everyone’s state pensions in the UK will run out by 2032. Source: FT Money Podcast and FT Adviser
36. More nuclear bombs have been dropped on or have exploded in or above American soil than on that of any other country in the world. The true scale of US nuclear testing (1,054 tests in total) was unknown publicly until May 1993. Source: Emmet Gowin in The Nevada Test Site
37. One of the best (open) sources of air pollution in Beijing is the US embassy’s RSS feed reporting the real-time air quality index. Source: Adam Vaughan
38. Quorn, the “original” meat replacement product based on starch and protein, took decades to develop and cost £2 billion in today’s money to develop. Source: The Bottom Line
39. Tom Hanks is related to Abraham Lincoln. “The maiden name of Lincoln’s mother, Nancy, was Hanks, and yes, it’s the same Hanks.” Source: The New York Times
40. One of the major causes of plane crashes in Israel and Lebanon are bird strikes caused by migrating pelicans and hawks flying to Africa every spring and back again in the autumn. The Israeli Air Force has lost many aircraft to flocks of birds which are too small to be picked up on radar. To prevent this, Israel and Lebanon have an arrangement involving birdwatchers who warns each other’s air traffic control about migrating flocks. Source: TAUVOD