Time for a trawl of the www.scienceworlds.co.uk  website, in which you’ll find a humungous database of science questions and answers. At the moment it’s not searchable, but for a quick browse when you feel like absorbing some random factoids it can’t be beaten. www.scienceworlds.co.uk/questions.cfm

You can also sign up for the free and fab Science Worlds Magazine – which comes direct to your real world door.

Why do all dinosaurs have tails?

Well, dinosaurs have tails because they are "reptiles" in the broadest sense. Reptiles have a way of moving their legs which relies of very powerful muscles (the caudifemoralis muscles) which run from the back of the leg (femur) up and backwards to the sides of the tail; these muscles pull the legs back, and therefore propel the animal forward. This is a very typical method of moving the body, and accounts for the presence of long tails in all dinosaurs.

In animals like ourselves (mammals) the special leg-pulling muscles do not attach to the tail, but rather shift up to attach to the upper part of the hip bones (ilium) creating our gluteal muscles which form the human "bottom".

Having along tail proved to be "handy" for many dinosaurs because the long heavy tail also allowed the front part of the body to be balanced at the hip. As a result very many dinosaurs ran or walked on their hind legs only. All the dinosaurs that walk on four legs do so secondarily. For example if you look at the legs of Triceratops or Stegosaurus you can see that the front legs are much shorter than the back ones - this tends to be a pretty sure sign that their ancestors walked on their hind legs originally.

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The largest commercial or other aeroplane has made its first commercial flight with paying passengers on board, from Singapore to Sydney. It is a giant plane and has twice as much floor space as the nearest jumbo. Officially a SuperJumbo then, the A380 can squeeze in 853 people, in the economy only seat configuration, but most airlines are expected to space people out a bit more.

Flying Firsts! www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0004537.html

First IVM babies born this week! A baby girl and boy were born in Oxford using the new technique that matures the human eggs in the lab, so that women undergoing treatment do not have to have hormonally challenging and expensive treatment to harvest lots of eggs all at once. IVM stands for In Vitro Maturation.

Finding Fertility Firsts Fascinating? news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7058291.stm

Been to see Ratatouille? Apparently the film has caused an upsurge in rat ownership, as Disney and Pixar have catapulted (or should that be ratapulted?) them from pest to pet. If you want to know a good few rat-facts and more then you’ll be needing a November Flipside, full of the usual weirdness and wonderfulness.

If you’d like to win one of ten copies going please email wired-up.news@nesta.org.uk with Flippin’ Rats in the subject line.

Attractive Balloons

What you need

• A balloon.
• A bin bag or old newspaper. In fact, make that several old newspapers...
• A jar of treacle, golden syrup or pourable honey.
• Optional – toast for the syrup to land on (well, no need to waste food eh?)

What you do

1. Cover your table with the bin bag or sheets of newspaper. It wouldn't hurt to cover the floor too, just in case.
2. Blow the balloon up, and rub it on your hair or something woolly. With a bit of luck, you'll rub some electrons onto the balloon, and it'll become negatively electrically charged.
3. If you hold the balloon near a gently-running tap, you might just see the stream of water being deflected towards it. Sometimes this works rather well, but even so, it's not terribly exciting. Which is where the treacle comes in...
4. Hold the treacle jar high above the newspaper, and tip it so a very gentle stream of treacle drizzles out. Now, very carefully, bring the charged balloon near the flowing treacle.
5. You should see the stream of treacle bending right around the balloon. With a little practice, it's possible to make the treacle flow sideways and even slightly upwards, but you'll need a very steady hand. And yet more sheets of newspaper to catch the drips.

What's going on?

The balloon is made of rubber and is a great insulator: it does not let charges move around freely on its surface. When you rub the balloon, electrons which have previously been orbiting hair atoms are physically rubbed off and added to the surface of the balloon. The result is a small patch on the balloon which is negatively charged.

The treacle is a neutral: it doesn't have any excess positive or negative charges. However, the molecules that make up the treacle are polar: although neutral overall, each molecule has a positive and a negative 'side'.

When the negative balloon approaches the flow of treacle the molecules twist with their positive side facing the negative balloon. Since opposite charges attract the treacle moves towards the balloon. And because the treacle is so thick its slow motion allows the molecules to spend longer in the electric field, the treacle moves more than a thinner, faster moving liquid such as water.

The treacle will flow sideways and in some cases even upwards. It is interesting to note that only a charged up balloon can make the treacle defy gravity - showing that the electromagnetic force is considerably stronger than gravity.

Special safety advice

Although perfectly safe, there is a real risk of the treacle pouring onto the floor, and so carpeted rooms are best avoided for this experiment. If you intend to repeat the experiment, try to use a fresh balloon unless you want treacle in your hair.

See an intrepid SciCast team interpret this demo in inimitable style and while you’re at it why not think about contributing your own film to the site?  http://www.planet-scicast.com/view_clip.cfm?cit_id=2663

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