Do You Know About Animal's Super Senses? 🪰

00:00:00
Speaker 1: You're listening to sleep Tight Science. Did you know that the chameleon has a superpowered tongue what It can shoot out its tongue at lightning speed to catch bugs, and the tongue can be up to twice as long as its body. If humans had that superpower, we could grab a snack from the fridge without leaving the couch. Hello, friends, and welcome back to sleep Tight Science, a bedtime show that answers your questions about science. This is our third season of the show, and based on your feedback, we have made some changes. One thing that we haven't changed is that we still read all of your topic suggestions, which might make us your bedtime science investigators. If you have a question, we would be happy to try and answer it directly or include it in a broader topic. In this episode, we will start talking about incredible animals and their super senses. Nature never ceases to amaze us with its endless adaptations, and animals have some truly mind blowing abilities when it comes to their senses. In fact, these extraordinary abilities are like real world superpowers. Our senses help us understand the world. We have five special senses, seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, and tasting. They work together like a team to show us everything around us. But guess what. Animals also have amazing senses, and some have even more special ones. For example, imagine having eyes that can see heat like superheroes. Some animals can do that, and some can hear sounds that are so high pitched we can't even hear them. This is called ultrasonic hearing. Some animals can feel things from far away, like a far away touch. They can even read the tiny ripples in water like it's a secret code. So while our senses are awesome, animals have supersenses that help them understand their world in super cool ways, Senses that allow them to perceive the world around them in ways we can hardly even begin to comprehend. Just like superheroes, animals have some extraordinary abilities that allow them to experience their surroundings in ways we can only dream of. Let's start with extraordinary eyes. Imagine having eyes that can see colors we can't even imagine. Some animals, like the mantis shrimp, are well known for their record breaking punch, but they also hold the world record for the most complex visual system. Their eyes have not three, but sixteen color receptors. This means they see a rainbow of colors that our eye simply can't detect. In fact, they are the soul beings capable of sensing circularly polarized light. This happens when the light's wave takes on a circular path as it travels. They can judge distances with just one eye, and even control each eye separately. It's impossible to imagine what mantis shrimp see, but it's incredible to think about. Speaking of colors, infrared vision is another amazing superpower. Certain snakes and insects can see heat as colors. They have special sensors that detect the heat coming off objects. This helps them find prey in the dark, making them efficient nighttime hunters. It's like having night vision goggles built right into their eyes. Now, let's talk about compound eyes. Insects like bees and dragonflies have these kinds of eyes, which are made up of tiny lenses, each seeing a small part of the world. This gives them a mosaic view of their surroundings, helping them spot movement and changes quickly. They're like living surveillance cameras, keeping a watchful eye on everything around them. We are going to talk more about this in a bit. In various comic book iterations and adaptations, Batman has been portrayed as having an extraordinary sense of hearing, which allows him to hear sounds beyond the range of a normal human's capabilities ever heard of ultrasonic hearing. Bats are the masters of this ability. They emit high pitched sounds that bounce off objects, creating echoes they can hear. Bats can build a detailed map of their environment by listening to these echoes, helping them catch insects mid flight with pin point accuracy. And then there's the incredible power of sensitive smell. Dogs are famous for their extraordinary sense of smell. They have over two hundred and twenty million cent receptors in their noses compared to our puny five million. This allows them to detect sense at incredibly low concentrations. They can sniff out missing people, locate hidden drugs, and even detect diseases like cancer. There is more to a dog's nose than just a cute button. It's a remarkable and intricate sensory tool that allows them to explore and understand the world in ways we can only imagine. Phew, that's quite a lot. Before we continue, take a deep breath and think about what your superpower is. Ever swatted a fly and missed. That's because what looks to us like a swing so fast it's a blur, appears to the fly in slow motion. Flies and other insects can detect movement up to six times faster than we can. In this episode, we have introduced extraordinary eyes, infrared vision, compound eyes, ultrasonic hearing, and sensitive smell. Let's go into a little more depth and talk about compound eyes. We are going to talk more about the others in a later episode. If we had the ability to look at the world through the eyes of an insect, we would be very surprised. Everything seems to happen in slow motion. Shapes break apart like mosaic puzzles, and colors transform into something new and exciting. This unique perspective all comes down to the way their eyes are built. Imagine our human eyes like a single camera lens capturing one clear picture. Now imagine insect eyes as two bunches of tiny cameras called compound eyes on either side of their heads. These cameras are made up of lots of tiny lenses called amatidia. Each amatidium is like a mini camera that captures a small part of what's around the insect. Since they are so small, they can only catch a bit of the scene instead of one big picture. Insects see the world as a bunch of small images. It's kind of like looking at a lot of puzzle pieces instead of the whole picture. The more amatidia and insect has, the clearer the overall image becomes. It's like having more pixels on a computer screen to make pictures clearer. Now, not all insects have the same super eyes. Some ants, for instance, might have around ten amatidia per eye, making their vision not so sharp. But dragonflies, those speedy flyers who chase prey while they're flying, can have up to a whooping thirty thousand amatidia in each eye, giving them super sharp sight. Insects can see almost everything around them thanks to their curved eyes. However, they can't adjust their focus like we do. To see something better, they have to move closer. Even though insects might not see as clearly as us, they're great at spotting motion. It's like they have a built in slow motion camera, you know how movies look like they're moving, but they're really just a lot of pictures shown quickly. Well, our eyes can spot about fifty of those pictures per second, but guess what dragonflies can see around three hundred pictures per second. They'd watch a movie and see all the separate pictures like a slide show. This means that things that seem super fast to us seem slower to dragonflies. Imagine flowers swaying in the breeze, they'd look like they're moving in slow motion to dragonflies. But for insects that come out at night, like moths, their eyes work a bit different. They're not as good at seeing movement because they need more time to gather, like to form an image. So that's our sneak peek into the incredible world of insects and compound eyes. Now for some listeners questions. First, we have three amazing questions about rainbows. Violet wants to know if rainbows are hot? Boston, age five asks how does a rainbow have colors? And Madeline Menzies, who's seven from Ketchum, Idaho, asks what are rainbows made of? So are rainbows hot? Actually, rainbows themselves don't have a temperature because they are made of light. Temperature is something we usually associate with physical objects that can be hot or cold to touch, like a cup of hot cocoa or an ice cream cone. Now, how does a rainbow have colors? Imagine sunlight is like a box of crayons. It might look white, but it's actually made up of many colors like red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. When sunlight passes through rain drops in the air, it's like those rain drops are tiny prisms that spread the light out into different colors. This is called dispersion. Each color bends a bit differ differently, which is why we see a spectrum of colors in the rainbow. It's like when you shine a flashlight through a glass of water, the light changes. Lastly, what are rainbows made of? Rainbows are made of two main ingredients, sunlight and rain drops. When sunlight enters a rain drop, it slows down and bends. This bending is called refraction. The light then bounces off of the back of the rain drop and comes out the other side, spread out into different colors. It's like the rain drop is a little mirror, reflecting and refracting the light at the same time. The colors are always in the same order, red on the outer edge of the rainbow, followed by orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet towards the inside. So, in a nutshell, rainbows aren't hot because they are made of light, not physical stuff. The colors come from the sunlight being spread out by raindrops, which act like mini prisms. It's like a natural light show in the sky. Thank you for your questions, Violet, Boston and Madeleine. Our next question comes from Jack, who is five years old. He asks why do some people live when they get struck by lightning? Did you know that Barry Allen, a character from DC Comics known for his incredible speed, gained his superpowers after being struck by lightning while working in his lab. Do you know what the name of this superhero is? If you guess the flash, then you are correct. In real life, getting struck by lightning is kind of scary and not something anyone should try to do. When someone gets struck by lightning and lives, there are a few reasons why they might be so lucky. Lightning is super powerful, so surviving it is like a one in a million chance. First off, lightning doesn't always hit a person directly, Sometimes it strikes nearby and travels through the ground like taking a detour. This can reduce the impact on the person and increase the chances of survival. Secondly, our bodies are really good at conducting electricity. If lightning does pass through a person, it may travel along the outside of the skin or through paths that don't cause major harms to vital organs. Another reason is that medical help can make a big difference. If someone gets hit by lightning, they might have burns, injuries, or shock, but fast medical care like CPR and treatment for burns can help them to recover. Lastly, as we mentioned, lucke also plays a role. Lightning can be unpredictable, and surviving a strike is often a mix of circumstances from how the person was hit to the weather conditions. Remember, even though surviving a lightning strike is rare, it's always best to stay safe and avoid being outside during storms. Lightning might seem exciting, but it's one of nature's most powerful forces, and it's better to admire it from a safe distance. Thank you or your question Jack. Our next question comes from Teddy, who asks how are clouds made? Clouds are like nature's fluffy sculptures in the sky, And a fun thing to do is to look up in the sky and see what animals they might be. Sometimes you might see faces, animals, or whatever your imagination can imagine. Clouds are made's a fascinating process. Imagine the air around us is full of tiny, invisible water droplets. These droplets are so small and light that they float in the air as vapor, which is like super tiny water particles that you can't see. When warm air rises, it carries some of this invisible water vapor with it. Now, when the warm air rises higher in the sky, it starts to cool down. As it cools, it can't hold as much water vapor as it could when it was warm, So the extra water vapor starts to come together and gather around tiny particles like dust, pollen, or even little ice crystals. These tiny particles give the water vapor something to stick to, kind of like how the cotton candy stick collects sugary fluff. As more and more water vapor sticks to these particles, they start to form tiny water droplets. When billions of these droplets come together, they create a cloud. Clouds can be different shapes sizes and heights depending on how the air is moving and how much water vapor is around. So clouds are made when warm air rises, cools down, and the water vapor turns into tiny water droplets around little particles. These droplets gather together to make the beautiful clouds we see floating in the sky. Thank you for the question, Teddy fun facts. Did you know that snakes don't have eyelids, so they can't blink. Instead, they have a transparent scale over their eyes called a spectacle, which helps protect their eyes while they're slithering around. Narwhales, often called the unicorns of the sea, have a long tusk that can grow up to ten feet. But guess what that unicorn horn is actually a super long tooth. Imagine if you had a tooth that low brushing would be a whole new adventure. Cats are known for their amazing night vision. They have a special layer in their eyes called the tapedum lucidum that reflects light back through their retina, giving them a second chance to see in low light. Penguins are superb swimmers, but did you know they talk with their flippers When they want to show they're happy or excited, They will wave their flippers in the air and do a little dance. Did you know that the bumblebee bat is not only the world's smallest bat, but also weighs less than a penny. It's so tiny that you could consider its superpower to be in busy bat. Imagine a bat that could fit in your pocket and you might not even feel it. Earlier, we asked you to take a deep breath and think about what your superpower is. Have you thought about it? I am sure you have one. Maybe you have an amazing imagination, or you learn things super fast. You might be super kind to others, or maybe you are a fearless explorer willing to try new foods, even green ones like Brussels sprouts. Let us know if you have any superpowers you want to share, We would love to hear them. In this episode, we learned about animal superpowers. We focused on vision and the eyes that different insects have. We looked at ants and dragonflies in particular. We talked about compound eyes and how these helped the insects in answering listeners questions. We talked about rainbows, if they are hot or cold, where the colors come from, and what rainbows are made of. We talked about how some people can live after getting struck by lightning and how clouds are made. This episode was made with questions from Violet Boston, Madeline, Jack and Teddy. Thank you to Ariel from Ontario, Philip from Myrtle Beach, Asher Rowan, James, Francis Jensen from Northumberland, England, Paxton and Willow and Quincy. We hope to use your ideas in future episodes. We love getting your feedback on our show. If you have any feedback, please send it our way, and also we would love it if you left us a review. Wherever you listen to podcasts, your review might help others decide to listen to our show too. If you'd like to send us your questions, please send them to hello at sleep tightscience dot com. Thank you, sleep Tight