This title belongs to the Australian tiger snake, which is only five feet long. Its poison glands contain enough venom to kill three hundred sheep!

Christian Johan Doppler (1803-1853) was an Australian scientist born in Salzburg who made and important discovery about the effects of sound and light when the sources are moving in relation to the observer. You may find the Doppler effect easier to understand if you consider what happens to the noise of a train as it approaches you and then fades …

The world race is often wrongly used. For example, the Jews are not a race, but a religious and cultural group, who, in racial terms, are exactly the same as the Nazis who persecuted them. Many scholars say that there is only one race-the human race. However, the human family can be divided into several groups according to such features …

As a result of Tasman’s discoveries, Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand were thought to be part of one enormous continental island. It was shown on maps of the time as Terra Australis Cognita (or Southern Known Land) separated from another to the south shown as Terra Australis Incognita (or Unknown). Captain Cook, however, proved that the former was not one …

Tidal waves, or tsunami, as scientists call them, are very often the result of earthquakes on the bottom of the ocean. The sea bed shifts and slides like an earthquake on land, causing a great shock wave. Ships that are in the area of the quake fell this shock wave as if they had just struck a rock. Sometimes the …

In about 1500 B.C., Queen Hatshepsut of Egypt sent a fleet to the ‘Land of Punt’. No-one is sure where Punt was, but experts think the Egyptian sailors ventured out of the Mediterranean and sailed south along the coast of Africa. Astonishing voyages were also made by Arab and Chinese explorers. People from Asia reached Australia 25,000 years ago, by …

In a way, this is true of the north and south polar regions, and is caused by the tilt of the earth in relation to the sun. In fact, summer at the north pole is a time when the sun never actually sets from March to September, because the earth does not tilt enough for it to disappear below the …

The average lifespan of people varies from country to country. If you live in a developed country, then you can expect to live longer. For example, Australians live, on average, 76 years, West Germans and North Americans 75 years and Britains 74 years. In poorly developed countries, where many people do not have enough to eat, suffer many diseases and …

The Cutty Sark was one of the last of the clipper ships specially built for the tea trade between China and Britain. Her unusual name was taken from the witch in Robert Burns’s poem ‘Tam O Shanter’, and her figurehead represented a witch. She carried a great spread of canvas and it was said of her that in her day …

Yoga brings immense positive energy, mental and physical health and inculcates spirituality. We come to know better of our inner self, with yoga and meditation, said renowned yog guru Swami Dayanand Saraswati on the fifth day of International Yoga Festival being held at Swarg Ashram, Rishikesh in Pauri Garhwal, here today. Film actors Pooja Bedi, Dino Morea, and Anu Aggarwal, …