SuppleMentally Blog

A multimedia supplement to the Mensa Bulletin’s SuppleMentally science column

By John Blinke

November 25, 2025

HOW DO TURTLE USE EARTH'S MAGNETIC FIELD?

Sea turtles travel huge distances in the ocean, but somehow still find their way back to the same beaches. Scientists think they do it by sensing the Earth’s magnetic field.

This short video from BBC Earth Science explains how that works and what we’ve learned so far.

November 21, 2025

SAND

Zion National Park in Utah has miles of striking petrified rock formations that are hard to figure out. They’re made of sandstone that was once part of a vast desert system. But where could so much sand come from? And how do we know? Here’s geologist Myron Cook — whose YouTube channel focuses on the geology of the American West — to explain:

November 18, 2025

WHAT HAVE YOU HEARD ABOUT 3I/ATLAS?

If you’ve seen rumors floating around about the 3i/ATLAS asteroid, you’re not alone. It’s been making the rounds online with plenty of dramatic claims. The reality is far less exciting and far more grounded in actual astronomy.

Fraser Cain, publisher of Universe Today, breaks down what 3i/ATLAS is, why it’s not a threat, and how these misunderstandings spread in the first place. His short explainer walks through what astronomers actually know about the object and why the science doesn’t match the hype.

November 14, 2025

WHAT'S REALLY IN OUR FOOD

Dr. Karl is one of Australia’s best-known science communicators, and his Shirtloads of Science podcast often brings in experts to break down complicated topics. In this episode, he talks with Professor Clare Collins, a leading nutrition researcher at the University of Newcastle, about what really goes into our food.

They sort out the difference between processed and ultra-processed foods, explain why additives like emulsifiers and flavor enhancers show up in so many products, and look at what current research says about their impact on health. Collins also offers practical, everyday advice for navigating the grocery store without feeling overwhelmed.

If you want more from her, she runs a free site called No Money No Time, which offers simple, budget-friendly nutrition guidance and recipes.

November 11, 2025

FACT-CHECKING JURASSIC PARK

If you are reading this, you are probably a fan of the Jurassic Park movies. Have you wondered what they got right and what they got wrong? This video from Wired covers a lot of ground. A paleontologist answers questions from Twitter about what dinosaurs really looked like and how they lived, separating science from movie magic.

November 7, 2025

PINEAPPLE EXPRESS

We seem to be in for some interesting weather, especially if you’re in the Pacific Northwest. Ryan Hall is a pretty good weather prognosticator — certainly not the only good one, but he gets to the point. This time he’s talking about a Pineapple Express, a stream of warm, moisture-laden air flowing in from near Hawaii that can soak the West Coast when it collides with cold air.

November 4, 2025

MANTIS

Do you like praying mantises? Do you like Ze Frank? This is your lucky day. Ze Frank — the wry voice behind YouTube’s True Facts series — just released a new episode about the praying mantis. It’s science that won’t put you to sleep, though it might give you nightmares. There’s a chuckle or two, maybe a few mildly naughty asides, but nothing too scandalous. Mostly, it’s delightfully weird and only slightly disturbing.

October 31, 2025

MICROSCOPIC MASTERPIECES

Every year, the Nikon Small World competition celebrates the stunning art and science of microscopy, revealing the hidden beauty of life at its smallest scales.

The contest features two main categories: Photomicrography, for still images taken through a light microscope, and Small World in Motion, for videos and time-lapse microscopy. The results are as mesmerizing as they are educational. Enjoy, friends!

A touring exhibit of this year’s winners will visit Los Angeles, Atlanta, Indianapolis, and Durham, N.C., if you happen to be nearby.

October 28, 2025

ZINC ION BATTERIES

I love to read about new kinds of batteries. Lithium-ion is the current golden child, but there are many more battery chemistries on the way. This video from tech enthusiast Matt Ferrell talks about a new kind of zinc battery that resists dendrite formation. You’ll want to check out the entire catalog of “Undecided with Matt Ferrell” videos. They’re all great!

October 24, 2025

THE ANSWER IS BLOWIN' IN THE WIND

Which U.S. state leads the nation in wind-generated electricity? We’ll save you the suspense — it’s Texas. Find out how the Lone Star State became America’s unlikely wind powerhouse in this TED Tech episode.

October 22, 2025

HEY, THIS IS REALLY COOL!

Well, not literally cool. The plasma inside that glowing glass orb is actually hot — ionized gas creating those lightning-like tendrils you can control with a fingertip.

This YouTube Short, “Tokamak in Your Home: A Xenon Plasma Toroid,” is a mesmerizing look at high-voltage physics in action.

October 17, 2025

EVERYDAY PHYSICS

I enjoy simple experiments that illustrate physical principles — little moments when science shows up in the ordinary. Here’s a quick one from YouTube that caught my eye.

October 14, 2025

IT TAKES TWO

The red supergiant Betelgeuse has long puzzled astronomers with its strange fluctuations in brightness — was it about to explode, or hiding a secret companion? NASA scientists have now confirmed the latter, photographing a second star nestled within Betelgeuse’s outer atmosphere. Using the Alopeke speckle instrument on the Gemini North telescope in Hawaii, they combined thousands of ultra-short exposures to reveal the hidden partner.

The companion orbits Betelgeuse every six years and likely causes its flickering brightness — though in about 10,000 years, Betelgeuse will probably consume it.

NASA has the full story here, and astrophysicist YouTuber Space Mog breaks it down in this video.

October 9, 2025

THE FIRST POLYNESIAN ISLAND HOPPERS

Do you wonder how the Polynesian islands were settled in prehistoric times? People had to cross oceans to reach them. Was it luck, or were they able to navigate there? This Skeptic podcast episode is worth hearing.

November 25, 2025

BLAZAR BRUNCH

We do not know everything that spews out of galactic jets, but we do know they produce cosmic rays and neutrinos. Because cosmic rays are charged particles, their paths are bent many different ways by intergalactic magnetic fields, and you cannot tell where they come from. But neutrinos have no charge, and they can travel as straight as a laser pointer.

Putting all this together with observations from gamma-ray satellites and gigantic ground-based neutrino detectors, astronomers were able to say that blazar TXS 0506+056 is a source of cosmic neutrinos and cosmic rays. For now, we can only speculate about the other particles generated in the blazar that never reach our detectors.

Launchpad Astronomy explores the discovery of a neutrino fired from a blazar’s black.

September 19, 2025

BUNNY VS. SNAKE

There are all kinds of ideas about the great pyramids of ancient Egypt. Professional archaeologists say they were built by powerful rulers as monuments and launch pads to the afterlife. But pyramids also became giant “rob me” signs for thieves. In a YouTube lecture, archaeologist Beth Hart walks through the sequence of development, from ornate wooden pavilions in predynastic times to the massive Fourth Dynasty “Horizon of Khufu” that we call the Great Pyramid of Giza.

September 16, 2025

THE UNCHAINED GODDESS (1958)

I watched this Bell Science Hour film as a kid, and I think it set me on the course I’m on today. Remarkably, it was already discussing climate change back in 1958.

September 9, 2025

SOUTHERN MAMMOTHS

Forty thousand years ago, there was a lake north of Mexico City that attracted Colombian mammoths — the big ones: camels, horses, giant sloths — and every other kind of animal ththe carcasses of extinct animals remained and are now being excavated by the hundreds to make room for an airport on a military base. This lake was not a “tar pit” like Le Brea. It was full of sticky mud that small animals could escape. But the giants remained stuck for scientists to unearth. You could say researchers found enough to fill a museum, but the military actually had to build a museum to hold the fossils, and there still is not enough room for them! The excavations are being done by archaeologists because Mexico has plenty of those, and comparatively few paleontologists. The story was highlighted on the Science Magazine Podcast, which dives into the extraordinary scale of the discovery and what it means for our understanding of Ice Age megafauna.

September 2, 2025

WHY CO₂ MATTERS

At first, I had trouble tracking down Scottish geologist Dr. Iain Stewart (chalk it up to Bing, not him). Once I did, I found his videos refreshingly clear. One short demo in particular stands out: CO₂ absorbing infrared heat. In just a few minutes, Stewart makes visible what we usually can’t see — that carbon dioxide traps heat energy. That supports the idea that CO₂ contributes to global warming.

August 20, 2025

A SNOWBALL'S CHANCE

There was a time, between 635 and 720 million years ago, when the entire Snowball Earth was covered in snow and ice. It is called the Cryogenian Period, and Macroscopic organisms had not evolved yet. But single-celled organisms had evolved, and they persisted through the snowball period. MIT researchers went to the Antarctic to see how life survives there, under Snowball Earth conditions. They found microbes in sun-melted ponds on top of the ice. Every puddle contained eukaryotic life (that is to say, cells with a nucleus), and different ponds had different varieties depending on how salty they were. Dirty ice melted more easily and was more richly inhabited. Geologist Myron Cook explores how the intense glaciation of Snowball Earth flattened mountain ranges and exposed the geological mystery known as the Great Unconformity.”

John Blinke has been the Mensa Bulletin’s science editor since 1984 and is a two-time recipient of American Mensa’s National Service Award. He lives in the wilderness of Michigan and keeps busy with a wide range of hobbies, including astronomy, RC models, drones, photography, model rockets, and fooling around with microscopes and other scientific gear. John spent 50 years as an electrician with Ford Motor Company. He holds a BA in English from Wayne State University, completed the UAW-Ford electrical apprenticeship, is a certified Level II Thermographer, and has an Extra Class amateur radio license. Email him at BulletinSupplementally@us.mensa.org.