In 2024, the average US wedding cost was around $33K

As part of the up to 15 pounds of seafood they consume daily, sea otters eat urchins that feed on kelp forests—sources of shelter and food to over 800 species—thereby making the marine mammal a keystone species.

Miracle berries make things that normally taste acidic or sour, such as lemons, taste sweet, like sugar-coated candy, by binding a special protein called miraculin to taste buds.

The collapse of gas bubbles in the joint synovial fluid causes 'cracking' knuckles.

Here are some tips from Pew Research to help you distinguish between a good poll and an unreliable one.

'Golden blood' is the rarest blood type in the world—fewer than 50 people are known to have it.

Located on Ross Island in Antarctica, Mount Erebus is the southernmost active volcano on Earth and features a lava lake—one of eight known worldwide as of 2026—that erupts regularly.

Explore an interactive forecast of the future of the universe, from the return of Halley's Comet to the last light in the cosmos.

There are 'YouTube camps' that teach children how to create content for the video platform.

A dog's nose can be up to 100,000 times more sensitive than a human's, and each possesses a secondary organ for smelling, which helps learn about other dogs when they sniff each other's butts.

Watch Dr. Laurence Peter explain his 'Peter Principle,' which states that people are promoted to their level of incompetence and explains why bosses aren't always good at their jobs.

The animatronic shark from 'Jaws' was a complex machine called 'Bruce.'

Watch President John F. Kennedy's speech on going to the moon

Rapid intensification is the increase in a hurricane's sustained wind speed by at least 35 miles per hour within 24 hours, which can strengthen it by up to two categories.

On a cruise ship, the average person uses about 50 gallons of water a day, which is treated by bacteria and onboard filtration systems, then stored until the ship can legally discharge the wastewater.

Watch Bruce Springsteen's 1985 performance of Woody Guthrie's 'This Land Is Your Land,' which he calls 'the greatest song ever written about America.'

Explore the history of American restaurants through an archive of menus dating back to the early 1800s.

Abraham Lincoln had to sneak into Washington, DC, in disguise for his 1861 inauguration after a detective uncovered a plot to assassinate him in Baltimore.

Explore 3D models of some of the most dangerous viruses, allowing us to understand these and other pathogens in new ways.

Computer scientists first started trying to optimize dating using computers in the 1950s.

All rainbows are 'raincircles' caused by water droplets separating white sunlight into a spectrum of colors, but Earth's surface blocks the bottom half of the circle from our line of sight.

Semaglutides, which belong to a class of drugs called GLP-1s, are prescribed for weight loss in combination with diet and exercise because they trigger the release of the appetite-suppressing hormone incretin.

Fecal transplants can help treat infections by transplanting healthy gut bacteria from a donor into a patient's gastrointestinal tract using samples of human waste, which are turned into a liquid mixture and often delivered via a colonoscopy procedure.

In 1962, the US detonated a nuclear weapon in space, which produced an electromagnetic pulse that disabled three low Earth orbit satellites and damaged electrical equipment in Hawaii.

If a source of music traveled past someone at twice the speed of sound, assuming sufficiently sensitive hearing and powerful equipment, they would hear the music backward.

On planets in systems with two stars, such as the fictional Tatooine from 'Star Wars,' observers would see overlapping rainbows and double rainbows.

Metamorphosis evolved over millions of years as species that hatched as smaller versions of adults started exhibiting genetic mutations that differentiated juvenile and adult bodies.

Check out some of the best books that can be read in a single day, with titles from Han Kang, Denis Johnson, Muriel Spark, and more.

Explore (and debunk) the world's most contagious misconceptions—from the 5-second rule to sugar rushes—on this interactive site. Click on each misconception for further evidence.

The Aztec Empire ruled over 80,000 square miles of central Mexico for nearly a century—until a small band of Spanish conquistadors brought it down in 1521.

Give your memories a place to live and explore the personal stories left by strangers, tied to specific locations, in this interactive map of the world.

Watch footage from the moments the Titanic wreck was discovered by a joint US-French research team in 1985.

Watch what would happen if you literally had all the money in the world.

'Tulip mania,' the 1630s Dutch craze where rare bulbs were briefly traded like luxury assets, may have been the first financial bubble—and it still shapes markets today.

Use this tool to calculate the dollar value of your parental mental load, from meal planning to coordinating after-school care, then see resources that help generate solutions.

Explore how temperatures compare to historical averages in cities worldwide with this interactive global monitor.

Cats have a mutation that prevents them from tasting sweetness, and goldfish rank among the world's supertasters.

Humans may have as many as 100,000 to 150,000 individual hairs on our scalps, growing at a rate of roughly 1 centimeter per month.

The tallest tsunami in recorded history was 524 meters (1,720 feet) high—taller than the Empire State Building—and occurred in Lituya Bay, Alaska, in 1958 after an earthquake dislodged a rockface into the water.

Pregnancy makes someone more attractive to the mosquito species that transmits malaria.

Watch 4-plus decades of Pixar's opening logos.