Science & Nature50 randomly selected Science & Nature questions for quizmasters. New random selection made weekly. Next update: Monday 9th March 2026 (Please note: Questions are taken from our database of previous quizzes. Some questions and answers may be outdated.) |
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| 1. | What is the title of the work of scientific literature first published by Charles Darwin on 24th November 1859? |
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On the Origin of Species | |
| 2. | Resembling a jellyfish, their venomous tentacles can deliver a painful sting. By what common name is this family of creatures known? |
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Man o' war (Portuguese Man o' war pictured. Also Indo-Pacific Man o' war.) | |
| 3. | What is the name given to young geese? |
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Goslings | |
| 4. | Write down the chemical symbols for potassium, nitrogen, oxygen and tungsten, in that order, to reveal a four-letter word. |
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Know (K - N - O - W) | |
| 5. | What metal's silicate and aluminate compounds are used to give a distinctive deep blue colour to glass, ceramics, inks, paints and varnishes? |
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Cobalt (cobalt(II) aluminate - CoAl2O4 - is a common form of cobalt blue) | |
| 6. | How many people have walked on the moon? |
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12 (Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, Pete Conrad, Alan Bean, Alan Shepard, Edgar Mitchell, David Scott, James Irwin, John W. Young, Charles Duke, Eugene Cernan, Harrison Schmitt) | |
| 7. | What 8-letter word can be spelt using the chemical symbols for sulphur, lanthanum, palladium, arsenic, and hydrogen? |
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Slapdash | |
| 8. | What chemical element is represented by the symbol I? |
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Iodine | |
| 9. | In reference to a coherent beam of light, what does the 'A' in the acronym LASER stand for? |
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Amplification (Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation) | |
| 10. | Often considered pests because of their ability to damage and kill crops, what type of insect are weevils? |
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Beetle | |
| 11. | How many pairs of chromosomes make up the cells of a normal human body? |
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23 | |
| 12. | What 16th century Polish astronomer is famed for formulating a model of the universe that placed the Sun rather than the Earth at the centre of the universe? |
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Nicolaus Copernicus (Copernican Revolution) | |
| 13. | How is the metal Wolfram better known in English? |
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Tungsten (Chemical symbol W) | |
| 14. | What 'P' describes an artificial device that replaces a missing body part? |
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Prosthetic / Prosthesis | |
| 15. | The Chinese and the American are the only two known living species of what creature? |
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Alligator | |
| 16. | What common term is used to describe milk that has been processed by breaking down the fat molecules so that they stay integrated rather than separating as cream? |
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Homogenised | |
| 17. | In geometry, how many flat faces does a dodecahedron have? |
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12 | |
| 18. | Rockhopper, Jackass, Macaroni and Chinstrap are all types of what animal? |
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Penguin | |
| 19. | What four-letter word is the mathematical term for the value that appears most often in a set of data values? |
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Mode | |
| 20. | By what initials do we more commonly know dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane? |
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DDT | |
| 21. | The leaves of what tree make up most of a Koala Bear's diet? |
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Eucalyptus | |
| 22. | The world's highest-production dairy animals, what breed of cattle is this? |
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Holstein Friesian (often shortened as Friesians in Europe, and Holsteins in North America) | |
| 23. | What 'C' is an adjective applied to any disorder you are born with? |
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Congenital | |
| 24. | Cs is the symbol for what metal element? |
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Caesium | |
| 25. | What chemical element was historically called brimstone? |
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Sulphur / Sulfur | |
| 26. | What name is given to animals that neither possess nor develop a backbone? |
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Invertebrates | |
| 27. | What chemical element takes its name from the Greek word for pale green? |
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Chlorine (Greek: χλωρóς khlôros) | |
| 28. | What is the chemical symbol for gold? |
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Au | |
| 29. | What organs of the body are affected by exotropia? |
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Eyes | |
| 30. | Used to measure an absorbed dose of ionizing radiation, what SI unit is represented by the symbol Gy? |
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Gray | |
| 31. | What name is given to the two instants of time each year when the centre of the visible Sun is directly above the equator? |
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Equinox (around 20 March and 23 September) | |
| 32. | What 'V' describes the chemical process that hardens rubber with the addition of sulphur? |
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Vulcanisation | |
| 33. | Derived from the Latin word for 'fire', what 'I' describes a type of rock formed from the cooling and solidification of magma or lava? |
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Igneous | |
| 34. | Reputed to have the second most painful insect sting in the world, this wasp's name comprises a type of spider and a type of bird. What is it called? |
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Tarantula hawk | |
| 35. | How many wings does a bee have? |
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4 | |
| 36. | What 'V' describes the science, production and study of grapes? |
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Viticulture / Viniculture | |
| 37. | What 'M' describes this genus of Old World monkeys? |
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Macaque | |
| 38. | Would a strong acid have a pH value nearer to 0 or 14? |
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0 | |
| 39. | What animal's name is derived from the Afrikaans for "earth pig"? |
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Aardvark | |
| 40. | What is measured in amps? |
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Electric current | |
| 41. | Native to Africa, by what name are Galagos more commonly known? |
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Bush babies / Nagapies | |
| 42. | The Bortle scale is a nine-level numeric scale that measures the brightness at any given location of what? |
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The night sky (from 1 "Excellent dark-sky" to 9 "Inner-city sky") | |
| 43. | What single unit of area is approximately 4,047 square metres? |
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Acre | |
| 44. | The symbol for what chemical element is derived from its Latin name, cuprum? |
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Copper (Cu) | |
| 45. | What 5-letter word can be spelt using the chemical symbols for Tungsten, Astatine, Carbon and Hydrogen? |
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Watch | |
| 46. | With a highly developed sense of smell, unusual in a bird, what are the only birds with nostrils at the end of their long beaks? |
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Kiwis | |
| 47. | What four letter acronym describes the organisation in charge of the Large Hadron Collider beneath the France-Switzerland border near Geneva? |
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CERN (Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire) | |
| 48. | What 'P' describes any chemical substance released by an animal that serves to influence the physiology or behaviour of other members of the same species? |
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Pheromone | |
| 49. | What 'A' describes the study of human biological and physiological characteristics and their evolution? |
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Anthropology | |
| 50. | According to the SI standard, how many bytes are there in a terabyte? |
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1 trillion or 1012 | |
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