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Olympic athletes who win the gold at Sochi on February 15th are in for a special treat -- a medal containing meteorite pieces from the Chelyabinsk meteor, which streamed across the Russian sky on February 15, 2013. The meteor is believed to have been the largest natural object to enter the atmosphere and ultimately fragment and crash into the Earth as meteorites since the 1908 Tunguska event struck Siberia. Gold medal winners on February 15th will get the regular gold medals, plus the 10 athletes will be awarded special commemorative medals with a piece of meteorite embedded in their centers. The Chelyabinsk meteor produced chondrite meteorites that contain 10% iron. The medals holding the meteorite fragment have been crafted of gold and silver. Fifty of the medals have been made, with the other 40 going to private collections. According to Chelyabinsk Region Culture Minister Aleksey Betekhtin, " We will hand out our medals to all the athletes who will win gold on...

February 3 rd , 1966 was a day for two 'firsts' during the Space Race between the United States and Soviet Union. The United States launched the first meteorological satellite, the ESSA-1. ESSA-1 (Environmental Science Services Administration) would take photographs of cloud cover and transmit the data to the National Meteorological Center. It would be supplemented by 8 other ESSA satellites over the next three years and provided weather information to receiving stations in 45 different countries. The Soviet Union successfully landed a probe on the surface of the Moon for the first soft landing on another celestial body. The Luna 9 spacecraft touched down and began taking photographs of the area around the landing site. Luna 9 was the second spacecraft to reach the moon after the Luna 2 probe crashed into the surface in 1959.

Chemistry isn't just for the classroom. In everyday life, you encounter chemistry in cooking and cleaning... really, just about everywhere. Some hobbies use a lot of chemistry. For example, if you get into home brewing, you'll learn about how fermentation works, so you can control alcohol and sugar content of your beer. Is beer hard to make? Not at all. The trick is to make good beer.

Have you ever wondered what whales drink? You probably know all animals require water to live. Humans drink fresh water and get water from the foods we eat. If we eat foods that contain enough water, we could get the water we need without actually drinking it. If we drink seawater the salt overwhelms our kidneys, essentially making us thirstier. However, whales ingest some seawater with the foods they eat, yet are fine. Just like us, whales need fresh water in order to live. They get most of this water from the food they eat (krill, fish, or plankton). Whale kidneys are made to extract water from their food and possibly some seawater. This is similar to the way terrestrial desert animals get water from their food.

February 1 st  is Emilio Segré's birthday. Segré was an Italian physicist who discovered the first artificial element. He was visiting the University of California, Berkeley's radiation laboratory when he was given a sample of molybdenum that had been a target in the University's cyclotron that appeared to emit radiation from an unknown source. Segré identified the source of the radiation as an unknown element. The new element was named technetium after the artificial method it was created. Segré also discovered the element astatine and co-discovered the antiproton with Owen Chamberlain. The discovery of the antiproton would earn both men the 1959 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Did you know 96% of your body mass consists of just 4 elements or that your body consists of 50-75% water? Here's a look at the elemental chemical composition of the human body. You are welcome to download and print the infographic.

Bleach is one of those household chemicals that loses its activity over time. It doesn't matter whether or not the bleach container has been opened or not. Temperature is the primary factor affecting how long bleach remains active.                                        According to Clorox™ , the amount of hypochlorite that is added to their bleach depends on the season in which it is manufactured, because temperature affects the decomposition rate of sodium hypochlorite. So, more hypochlorite is added to bleach made in the summer than in cooler months. Clorox aims to maintain a 6% hypochlorite concentration for at least six months after the manufacturing date, assuming the bleach is stored around 70°F. It takes about 4-8 weeks from the time chlorine bleach is made to when it gets to a store so that you can buy it to take home. This leaves you 3-5 months where the bleach ...