[Susmita]

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Every day, we eat food to survive. Sometimes, we eat food to satisfy our taste. But whatever we eat, it gets digested in stomach. The stomach produces many acids, fluids, and chemicals. These play an active role in the digestive process. But it is obvious that our stomach doesn’t get digested by these chemicals. It is like, when we cook food in a pot. But the pot remains intact. Now what is the reason behind this?
There is a mechanism that protects our stomach from getting digested. What is that mechanism? Stomach also produces cells or mucus which make a lining or coating in the inside walls of the stomach. This cell lining or mucus coating protects the stomach from being affected by digestive acid, fluids or chemicals. That is why stomach doesn’t get digested along with food.
But sometimes this cell lining or mucus coating fails to protect the stomach. This is because sometimes excess stomach acid may be released due to some reasons like stress, or because of eating spicy foods or fast foods. This excess stomach acid may affect the stomach walls badly, causing ulcers.

[Susmita]

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We like to swim, we like to take bath and we also like to get wet in rain. But have you noticed what happens to your fingers after a long bath or after swimming for long time? Your finger skin becomes wrinkled. But why does this happen?

When we wash our hands, water runs off of our skin. Water does not soaked by skin. It had been a natural assumption of people that water passes through our skin when we stay under water for long time and this is the reason for wrinkled fingers. But if our skin could soak water then after long bath our whole body skin would swell up resulting in wrinkle in our whole body. But then how do wrinkles occur in fingers in water?
Since 1930, researchers and doctors found that people with damaged nerves in their fingers, don’t have wrinkled fingers after staying in water for a long time. From this they came to conclusion that it could be a reaction of the autonomic nervous system. It is the nervous system, which we cannot control. For example, our digestive system, heart- beat etc. These systems are controlled by our autonomic nervous system. Wrinkled fingers after staying under water for a long time, is caused by the autonomic nervous system. We can get a better grip of wet things by wrinkled fingers
You may have noticed that handle of a bicycle or suitcase is made uneven or wavy so that we can hold tightly. Actually, wrinkles in our fingers improve our grip under water for the same reason.

[Susmita]

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Boiled egg, scrambled egg, egg curry, poached egg etc. there are various types of preparation of eggs that we know. And we also know that egg shells are very fragile or brittle. We handle it very carefully. But hold the egg with your palm at the two pointed ends and try to squeeze the egg. Surprisingly you will see that it is not so easy to break the egg.
If you can stand carefully on eggs, as shown in picture, the eggs will not break.
But can you guess why this happens? The answer is that this is because of the dome or arch shape of the egg. In the picture below, you can see that pressure is given at the two pointed end points, marked by red arrows in the picture. Here pressure is distributed or spread evenly all over the eggshell, marked by the yellow arrows and this is the special feature of dome shape that gives the strength to the eggshell.

Remember that dome or arch shaped structures are the strongest structures. If you put any weight on the pointed side of a dome, then the weight spreads easily and evenly in all direction of the dome. Weight does not affect the point where weight has been placed. Now egg is the natural dome shape object. So when any type of weight is put on the two ends of dome shape of the egg, as shown in above pictures, it does not break easily. Hens sit on their eggs, placing it lengthwise and eggs do not break. You may have noticed that egg sellers keep the eggs lengthwise to avoid the breaking of eggs.

[Susmita]

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Necessity is the mother of invention. It was necessity like this when people felt that their feet should be protected from dust and roughness or the harshness of the earth’s surface, thus the idea of shoes came into the mind of people.


Nowadays foot wears are a matter of fashion. But do you believe that foot wears, we call it shoes, have a 40000 years old history. Historical evidences shows that people started to cover their feet with plaited grass and rawhide and it used to be tied with the feet by leather strip or thongs. There are scientific evidences that tell us that much before this period people used to protect their feet from sharp objects or roughness of the earth’s surface in some other way.
According to scientists’, the first shoe was made of leather in Missouri of America, in 8000 BC. Another evidence of primitive shoes was found in the French Alps, in 3300 BC. The world’s oldest leather shoe was found in Armenia.
In ancient civilizations like Egyptian, Chinese, Greek civilization, people also used foot wears or shoes of different types. With time, style or design of shoes gradually changed and became more sophisticated.
In the time of Ramayana and Mahabharata as well, people used foot wear or shoes. In Ramayana, Lord Rama or sanyasis used to wear foot wear made of wood. In the story of Gautama Buddha also, we get reference of shoes. Gautama Buddha took his sandals with him, when he left his palace.
Shoes have its place in our story and folklore. Can you remember the fairy tale Cinderella, in which the glass slipper has an important role?