A dispute about the origin of twitching frog legs led to the invention of the first battery

Benjamin Franklin described a series of static electricity storage jars as 'batteries'

Discovered over 50 years before the first electrochemical cell was invented, Leyden jars stored electric charge between the metals inside and outside a liquid-filled container. Franklin was the first to use the term "battery" in an electrical sense, though his multiple-jar device—lacking chemical reactions—was actually a series of capacitors.

Electromagnetic induction creates electricity from a changing magnetic field

The phenomenon was discovered in 1831 by Michael Faraday when an electric current was induced in a wire wrapped around an iron ring after a second wrapped wire not connected to the first was connected or disconnected from a battery.

The Baghdad battery shows no evidence of use as a battery

The 2,000-year-old clay jar held an iron rod inside a copper cylinder and could have generated electricity if filled with an available electrolyte, such as grape juice. Before the jar was looted during the US invasion of Iraq, preventing further study, experts suggested it most likely housed scrolls.

Pierre Curie found electricity could be generated by compressing certain crystals

Jacques and Pierre Curie discovered the piezoelectric effect in 1880. Pierre incorporated it into an apparatus used by Marie Curie to discover polonium and radium. This phenomenon is seen in barbecue lighter ignition mechanisms, where quartz is struck to create a spark that ignites fuel.

A collective effort from multiple scientists and inventors led to the light bulb

While Thomas Edison's thin carbon filament design made light bulbs commercially viable, prior contributions, such as Joseph Swan's development of the first successful incandescent filament electric lamp, made its eventual invention possible.

Before discovering cells, life was believed to emerge suddenly from inorganic matter

Popularized by Aristotle in the 4th century BCE, spontaneous generation was used to explain phenomena like mice appearing in seemingly sealed grain storage. The invention of the compound microscope in the late 16th century led to the identification of cells as the basic unit of life, but it was not until 1855 that their origin from preexisting cells was established.

Thomas Edison, eager to communicate with ghosts, tinkered with an apparatus called the 'spirit phone'

The inventor was interested in developing a scientific method for communicating with the dead. He was not interested, though, in the occult figures who believed the dead could be reached through Spiritualism, which he found childish. He believed those kinds of people "permit themselves to become, in a sense, hypnotized into thinking that their imaginings are actualities."

The scientist that biohacked a buff frog

If a tree frog was injected with a DNA mixture containing follistatin, a gene that may influence muscle growth, would it become buff? Josiah Zayner hopes so. By learning how to biohack animals, he hopes people are one step closer to feeling more comfortable "whipping up DIY gene therapy."

Niagara Falls helped decide the battle between AC and DC power

In the 1890s, Niagara Falls became the proving ground for alternating current (AC) when Tesla and Westinghouse built the first large-scale AC hydroelectric plant—defeating Edison’s push for direct current (DC) in the US electrical system.

Learn more about the history of fireworks, which dates back to an accidental invention during an alchemist's quest for information about immortality.

The world's first geothermal power plant was built in 1913 in Devil's Valley

In Tuscany, Italy, Prince Piero Ginori-Conti of Trevignano established the plant nine years after creating a generator that powered five light bulbs using steam vents in the area. Within three years, a second plant was built with two generators, each with 10 times the energy output of the first.

Electric vehicles have been around since the 19th century

The first EVs ran on rechargeable lead-acid batteries, which could travel 60 to 80 miles on a single charge. Women preferred these vehicles, which were quieter, less smelly, and did not require turning a hand crank to start the engine.

In 1898, Nikola Tesla wowed a crowd by controlling a boat with no visible connection

Some onlookers thought it was a trick, such a a monkey being inside the boat, rather than mind control or some other metaphysical phenomenon. In reality, Tesla was pioneering radio waves, proving wireless control was possible.

Being near a lightning strike—even without getting struck—can be fatal

Because animal tissue is generally more conductive than soil, electricity moving along Earth's surface after a strike tends to travel up and back down an animal's legs, discharging dangerous amounts of energy along the way, with risks increasing the farther apart the legs are. This ground current accounts for about half of all lightning-related deaths and injuries in humans.

Genetically modified viruses can help construct battery electrodes

MIT scientists' modifications caused the viruses to attract conductive materials, such as gold ions, which the viruses self-assembled into nanowires that could be used in batteries. These components allow batteries to be thinner and flexible enough to be constructed into new shapes.

Learn more about the history of fireworks, which date back to an accidental invention during an alchemist's quest for information about immortality

When bamboo in China was tossed into fire in 200 BCE, there was an explosion. About 1000 years later, around 800 CE, an alchemist searching for secrets to immortality mixed sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate together, leading to gunpowder. That mixture was then packed into bamboo or paper tubes, leading to fireworks.

Cathode rays are beams of electrons that emit light when hitting a fluorescent screen

When these beams are emitted into an evacuated tube containing charged plates or a nearby magnet, deflections are observed due to the electron charge. In 1897, J.J. Thomson's calculations of this deflection led to his discovery of the subatomic particle.

How brain cells carry information

At any moment, there is an electrical storm coursing through your body. Discover how chemical reactions create an electric current that drives our responses to everything from hot pans to a mother’s caress.

The terms 'bug' and 'debugging' were popularized by Grace Hopper's team

Engineers working on the Mark II computer at Harvard University identified a moth in one of its components in 1947, which caused it to malfunction. Describing the incident as the "first actual case of bug being found," the term first used by Thomas Edison in 1878 to describe faults in an apparatus caught on.

The history of many kitchen appliances involves unexpected discoveries and applications, including wartime radar turned hamster defroster and replacing an 'ice king' with heat-stealing boxes.

Bioluminescence provides organisms with a method of hunting, defense, or mating

Unlike glow sticks, bioluminescent reactions use renewable resources like oxygen and ATP. This ability allows fireflies to mate and deter predators, anglerfish to confuse and attract prey, and deep-sea shrimp to defend themselves by vomiting glowing slush.

He made a name with a short story about jumping frogs

Twain’s first big break came with “Jim Smiley and His Jumping Frog,” a fictitious story that appeared in a 1865 edition of the New York Saturday Press. (When it was republished elsewhere, the title was changed to “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County.”) That year, American poet James Russell Lowe called it “the finest piece of humorous literature yet produced in America.”

The concept of phantom limbs, the perception that amputated limbs are still present, dates back to a French military surgeon in the 16th century.

The virus was officially described for the first time in 1789

Michael Underwood, an English physician and surgeon, was the first to describe the disorder, noting it caused disability in the lower extremities in children. Large-scale outbreaks of the disease were not observed until the late 19th century.

Rune Elmqvist forwent practicing medicine to invent the first inkjet printer

The Mingograph recorded real-time physiological signals from a patient's electrocardiogram, helping doctors diagnose heart and brain conditions. Eight years later, in 1958, Elmqvist worked with cardiac surgeon Åke Senning to develop the first fully implantable pacemaker.

Everything you know about Phineas Gage is wrong

A stray spark sent a 3.5-foot-long, 1.25-inch thick iron rod through the brain of foreman Phineas Gage in 1848, creating a scientific case that has attracted onlookers for nearly two centuries. His life reportedly soon spiraled out of control, with his behavior tending toward selfishness and chaos. Evidence of these changes is far less common, with Gage's story bloated by fabrication, scientific prejudice, and artistic license.

One of the leading theories behind muscle movement

According to the Sliding Filament Theory, skeletal muscle contraction is made possible by sarcomeres, which are made of bundles of myosin and actin proteins inside muscle cells. Myosin pulls itself along actin to contract a muscle, shortening the muscle and its cells and enabling physical movement. It then releases its grasp on actin so it can start the process over again if so commanded.

The ancient Romans invented the first known artificial sweetener—it involved lead

The product was known as "sugar of lead." It was made by boiling wine in lead pots, concentrating the grapes' natural sugars and adding sweetness from the lead that leached into the grapes. The substance was used until roughly the 1880s for medicinal purposes and also to sweeten wine. (Some users may encounter a paywall.)

At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of young men ate standard American food—replete with food additives like borax and formaldehyde—as part of government research to better understand food safety.

Dirty lightning is a thunderstorm created from friction between rising and falling flows of ash and smoke during volcanic eruptions.

Sony set the standard for cylinder-shaped batteries when it repurposed manufacturing equipment used to make rolls of magnetic recording tape.

English mathematician Ada Lovelace wrote the first computer algorithm a century before computers existed and hypothesized that computing devices would one day be able to compose music—foreseeing the generative AI systems of today.

The first robot in literature may have been a 'mechanical man' in 1907's 'Ozma of Oz,' a book in L Frank Baum's 'Wizard of Oz' series.

Pure water does not conduct electricity because this flow of energy requires the movement of charged particles, and water is a neutral molecule.

Poison ivy was sent to Europe in the 1600s as an exotic, ornamental oddity, where it was purposefully grown in the English royal gardens at Kew, the Faculty of Medicine in Paris, and a few other locations.

Planeterrellas create artificial auroras that mimic the atmospheric displays of light by setting up an electric field between two metal balls in a jar filled with a small amount of air.

Some Pokémon have been named after real and fictional organisms, while some real-world species have been named after Pokémon, such as Chilicola charizard and Binburrum zapdos.

Clever Hans was a 1900s horse that was believed to be able to solve math equations, tell time, and read and comprehend German, until a psychology student discovered how he got his answers.

For centuries, Niagara Falls has been a magnet for daredevils seeking to conquer one of nature's most powerful wonders, with its 200-foot drop and water rushing at 32 feet per second with 280 tons of force.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Scientists have struggled to pin down Ebola's natural reservoir species for decades, but the available evidence suggests that it's very likely fruit and insect-eating bats found in Africa.

Walt Disney's early film 'Alice's Wonderland' was a groundbreaking innovation in the silent film era

The Dracula character, now seen as the vampire archetype, was inspired by a seafood-induced nightmare its creator experienced.

Long before Major League Baseball began allowing instant replay for balls and strikes, an umpire reluctantly used the technology to determine whether a hit was a home run, a move that inadvertently ushered in a new era for the sport.

The first line of 'immortal' human cells, which can divide indefinitely and are used in scientific research, was nonconsensually taken from a Black woman.

Some renewable energy sources may weaken the resiliency of electric grids by removing outage buffers provided by coal- and natural gas-fired plants, which provide the system with more time to find a new power source if a plant goes down.

As of 2025, the most cited papers in science include a review of graphene, methods to improve image recognition, streamlining electron density calculations, and optimizing protein studies.

The Great Salt Lake's distinct dual coloration results from high-salinity organisms that only live in the northern portion and produce a purple protein.

Watch this video that uses Lego bricks to explain how venture capital works.

The rivalry between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson centered on federalism—the question of how much power the federal government should hold relative to the states.