Planet Science | Wired | Scrabblicious October

Superglue yourself to your seat it’s a new quiz!

(No! don’t really – that’s not a good idea…) Answer all ten questions correctly and you could win a set of floor/garden/park/beach sized pick up sticks!

Ready? Steady? Get stuck in!

George de Mestral invented Velcro in 1948 after being inspired by sticky-hooked burrs. But the invention of what other material (by Wallace Carothers) made it possible?
- Nylon
- Teflon
- Neon
Sundew plants trap and consume their unwitting insect prey by producing a sticky substance - and what other types of digesting chemicals - from stalked glands on their leaves?
- Detergents
- Enzymes
- Oils
Which of these is NOT a type of chemical bond?
- Ionic
- Van der Waal
- Von Trapp
The human respiratory system produces sticky nasal mucus. What is the main purpose of the mucus?
- To trap bacteria and dust and prevent these entering the body.
- As an outward sign that a person is ill so other people will stay away.
- To dehydrate a person to the point where bacteria cannot survive.
Suction cups stick to smooth surfaces without the need for glue. They have been used on Earth for centuries, but would they work outside a space craft on the Moon?
- Yes - the Moon's gravity is strong enough.
- No - they require air pressure to keep them in place.
- Maybe - it depends on how dusty the surface is.
Octopuses have suctions cups on their arms which work in a similar, if more sophisticated, way to normal manufactured suction cups. However, each suction cup has chemoreceptors which allow it to do what, to the object it is stuck to?
- Taste it.
- Talk to it.
- Kiss it.
Rubbing an inflated rubber balloon on hair creates a static electric charge where electrons are added to the surface of the balloon. The attraction between the electrons and the positive charge in a wall makes the balloon stick to the wall. The electrons don't flow away from the rubbed section because a rubber balloon is...
- ...an insulator.
- ...too cold for the electrons to move.
- ...not silver.
In an unusual collaborative effort, thousands of spiders created a sticky spider web over the summer which was 180 metres long, enveloped whole trees and blocked out the sunlight in places. Where was this web discovered?
- Cumbria, England.
- Texas, USA.
- Mars
That enemy of all adventure heroes, quicksand, is a mixture of soil or sand and water. It sometimes behaves as a solid and sometimes as a liquid depending on how our hero is moving in it. This mixture, along with other substances like milk, paint and smoke, are known collectively as what?
- Cocktails
- Collages
- Colloids
What kind of sticky creature is Ctenomorpha chronus?
- Stick bat
- Stick insect
- Stick bee

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