An elephant’s trunk is amazing. Imagine a robotic arm with the same capabilities. Not only does a trunk have the strength to topple trees and lift hundreds of kilograms in weight, it can also perform precise and delicate movements. These unique capabilities inspired engineers to create a ‘bionic handling assistant’, which can be used for all sorts of complex tasks. Thank you to Pranav, a 7-year-old listener from India, for suggesting the first story of the new season.
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On July 20, 1976, Viking 1 became the first robotic lander to land on Mars. On September 3, its sister Viking 2 followed suit.
Both of them carried experiments to test for biology on Mars, something which no subsequent Mars lander since has replicated.
The results from these chemical experiments have divided researchers for decades and have been the cause of one of the greatest debates in planetary science.
In 1990, filmmaker Peter Brosnan set out to find a legendary Egyptian city that was lost to time and buried by sand dunes. After years of battling local officials, he finally was given the approval to begin an archeological dig.
What he found were 35-foot tall statues of the Pharoah Ramses II and enormous sphinxes weighing over 5 tons.
Where did they make this discovery? Near Santa Barbara.
Learn more about the lost city of Cecil B. DeMille on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
One of the interesting things about temperature is that no matter how cold you’ve ever been, or how low of a temperature anyone has ever achieved, you can always get colder, if only by a little bit.
That is because temperature has an absolute barrier that can never be broken.
Learn more about absolute zero and the attempts to get ever close to the impossible temperature on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
There is an old saying that one person’s trash is another person’s treasure. But sometimes, one person’s treasure is just another persons’ treasure that they can’t afford.
I’m talking about the realm of ultra-expensive items which would be more than most people would make in a lifetime. Items so expensive, that they usually make no financial sense to buy them whatsoever.
Learn more about the world’s most expensive things on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
Fellow officers long suspected a veteran detective in Antioch, Calif., was leaking operational police secrets to a drug dealer. For years, the department didn't act on their concerns. Even after the detective was finally fired in 2017, his record remained secret. In episode six of On Our Watch we look at the incentives departments have to investigate dishonest cops and what the secrecy around police misconduct means for criminal defendants who are prosecuted on their testimony.
