Why do eggs explode in the microwave?
This, and other questions & answers for your curious inner child.
If you’re new to this newsletter, this is my just-for-fun segment each month that is essentially: “What I Googled This Month”. The intention is to bring some levity to your inbox and who knows- maybe you can parade some new fun facts at your next gathering.
You can read a brief blurb about my insatiable thirst for random facts here.
Please note: I am not an expert and this is truly just for fun. I don’t personally stand behind any of the sources. If you’d like to learn more or fact check, feel free to do some googling on your own as well and let me know what you find!
What I learned:
The two most widely published genetic theories of human hand preference argue that evolutionary natural selection produced a majority of individuals with speech and language control in the left hemisphere of the brain. Because the left hemisphere also controls the movements of the right hand--and notably the movements needed to produce written language--millennia of evolutionary development resulted in a population of humans that is biased genetically toward individuals with left hemisphere speech/language and right-hand preference.
As for the specific genes that lead to left or right handedness:
There are two alleles…. that are associated with handedness. One of these alleles is a D gene (for dextral, meaning right) and the other allele is a C gene (for chance). The D gene is more frequent in the population and… it is the D gene that promotes right-hand preference in the majority of humans. The C gene is less likely to occur within the gene pool, but when it is present, the hand preference of the individual with the C gene is determined randomly. Individuals with the C gene will have a 50 percent chance of being right-handed and a 50 percent chance of being left-handed. (Source)
**The article also mentions how cultural factors & societal pressure can also play a role in whether someone stays left handed.
Why I googled: For the first time in my adult life, I was hit with pink eye last month and while I don’t think someone else’s flatulence is behind my ailment, I did fall down a google rabbit hole of all things Pink Eye and I though this one was kind of funny to debunk. 🙈
What I learned: No, you cannot get Pink Eye from a fart because flatulence is mostly methane gas and doesn’t contain bacteria. (Source) You CAN, however, get pink eye from all sorts of bacteria (not just coming into contact with fecal matter), as well as viral pink eye which can accompany cold/ flu symptoms. (Source)
What I learned: The size of an egg is determined by five factors: the age and breed of a hen, the season/ the amount of light, living conditions, and nutrition.
Age: Young hens can lay a variety of egg sizes from “peewee” to “jumbo”, however older hens are more consistent with medium to large eggs.
Breed: A hen's breed determines the size of her frame, which helps determine the size of her eggs. Breeds like Jersey Giants, Cochins, and Orpingtons, for example, are larger birds and therefore lay larger eggs. On the other hand, Bantam hens are smaller than an average chicken and tend to lay eggs to match. (Source)
Season & Light: In the winter time, most hens will stop laying eggs unless artificial lighting is used and those who do lay eggs will lay smaller ones.
Living Conditions: Stressed or over-crowded hens will lay smaller eggs. (Source)
Nutrition: More protein and more calcium can increase egg size. (Source/ Source)
Follow up question #1: Do hens feel pain when they lay eggs?
According to this blog— generally no, unless the hens are very young, or the eggs are very large.
Follow up question #2: Why do chickens lay so many eggs/ Why do they lay unfertilized eggs?
Short answer: Human-engineered evolution (aka human selection).
Wild Junglefowl (a domesticated chicken’s wild ancestors) typically only lay 10-15 eggs a year. Since chickens are indeterminate layers, it means they will continue to lay eggs until they reach a clutch of approx 12 eggs (meaning, they’ll keep laying if you methodically take an egg away and keep their clutch at 11 eggs 🥲 ). (Source)
As for why they lay unfertilized eggs? This link explains that it’s impossible for chickens to know, when releasing their egg cells (that will later become their clutch), whether or not sperm cells are around to fertilize them so their body does it just in case.
Note: I fully acknowledge that a lot of the sources/ a lot of the results on google come from chicken farmers who arguably have an invested stake in all of this 🙃
What I learned:
The yolk of an egg heats up much faster than its surroundings. Perhaps, they reasoned, tiny pockets of water are getting trapped inside the proteins and getting superheated.
At normal air pressure, those pockets would have room to expand and turn into steam. But inside an egg, pressure from surrounding, hardening proteins might be forcing the pockets to remain liquid even as their temperatures climb.
But disturb one of those pockets (for example- by taking a bite 🫣), and the water molecules would rush to fill the void — expanding, disrupting the surrounding tissue, and allowing any other pockets to flash through a phase change at the same time. The resulting collective bubble-bursting would tear the egg to bits, flinging the pieces far and wide in a way that might resemble a more typical explosion under pressure. (Source)
One more thing, ha: there’s an artist (whose name escapes me, ack) who wrote down everything she googled for a year in little journals. Absolutely everything. A braver soul than me.
I’m almost over infections in both eyes. I looked like a demon! For me it tends to be caused by seasonal allergies, which are brutal here in the spring. I’ll never forgive Pineapple Express for making everyone think it’s because I don’t wash my hands 😭💜