TED-Ed
TED-Ed: How the world's longest underwater tunnel was built
Flanked by two powerful nations, the English Channel has long been one of the world’s most important maritime passages. Yet for most of its history, crossing was a dangerous prospect. Engineers proposed numerous plans for spanning the...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The surprising link between stress and memory - Elizabeth Cox
You spend weeks studying for an important test. On the big day, you wait nervously as your teacher hands it out. You're working your way through, when you're asked to define "ataraxia." You know you've seen the word before, but your mind...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: What are mini brains? - Madeline Lancaster
Shielded by our thick skulls and swaddled in layers of protective tissue, the human brain is extremely difficult to observe in action. Luckily, scientists can use brain organoids - pencil-eraser-sized masses of cells that function like...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: This is Sparta: Fierce warriors of the ancient world - Craig Zimmer
In ancient Greece, violent internal conflict between border neighbors and war with foreign invaders was a way of life, and Greeks were considered premier warriors. Sparta, specifically, had an army of the most feared warriors in the...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The myth of Narcissus and Echo | Iseult Gillespie
One day, Echo was drifting through the woods and fell in love with a handsome young hunter named Narcissus. Cursed by Hera to only repeat the last words spoken by another, Echo was unable to converse with him and was soon cruelly...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Why do some people snore so loudly? | Alayna Vaughan
A leather mask that clamps the mouth shut. A cannonball sewn into a soldier's uniform. A machine that delivers sudden electrical pulses. These were all treatments for a problem that has haunted humanity for millennia: snoring. It might...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Tim Seibles: "First Kiss"
This animation is part of the TED-Ed series, "There's a Poem for That," which features animated interpretations of poems both old and new that give language to some of life's biggest feelings. [Poem by Tim Seibles, directed by Hannah...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The Irish myth of the Giant's Causeway - Iseult Gillespie
On the coast of Northern Ireland, a vast plateau of basalt slabs and columns called the Giant's Causeway stretches into the ocean. The scientific explanation for this is that it's the result of molten lava contracting and fracturing as...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: How does your body know what time it is? - Marco A. Sotomayor
Being able to sense time helps us do everything from waking and sleeping to knowing precisely when to catch a ball that's hurtling towards us. And we owe all these abilities to an interconnected system of timekeepers in our brains. But...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The myth of Loki and the master builder | Alex Gendler
Asgard, a realm of wonders, was where the Norse Gods made their home. There Odin's great hall of Valhalla towered above the mountains and Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, anchored itself. Though their domain was magnificent, it stood...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: The evolution of animal genitalia - Menno Schilthuizen
Genitals are the fastest-evolving organs in the animal kingdom. But why is this so? And what's the point of having decorative private parts? Menno Schilthuizen explains how the evolutionary biology of nature's nether regions uncovers a...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: The Sun's surprising movement across the sky - Gordon Williamson
Suppose you placed a camera at a fixed position, took a picture of the sky at the same time every day for an entire year, and overlaid all of the photos on top of each other. What would the sun look like in that combined image? A...
TED-Ed
Real-life "Alien" jaws | Darien Satterfield
After stalking a cuttlefish, a moray eel finally pounces. As the eel snags the mollusk in its teeth, its prey struggles to escape. But before it can wiggle away, a second set of teeth lunge from the eel's throat. This adaptation is...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The Tower of Epiphany | Think Like A Coder, Ep 7 | Alex Rosenthal
This is episode 7 of our animated series "Think Like A Coder." This 10-episode narrative follows a girl, Ethic, and her robot companion, Hedge, as they attempt to save the world. The two embark on a quest to collect three artifacts and...
TED-Ed
The world's most dangerous fart | Nick Caruso and Dani Rabaiotti
For most humans, farts are a welcome relief, an embarrassing incident, or an opportunity for a gas-based gag. But for many other creatures, farts are no laughing matter. Deep in the bowels of the animal kingdom, farts can serve as tools...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Learning from smallpox: How to eradicate a disease - Julie Garon and Walter A. Orenstein
For most of human history, we have sought to treat and cure diseases. But only in recent decades did it become possible to ensure that a particular disease never threatens humanity again. Julie Garon and Walter A. Orenstein detail how...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Can you solve the giant iron riddle? - Alex Gendler
The family of giants you work for is throwing a fancy dinner party, but there’s a problem — the elder giant’s favorite shirt is wrinkled! To fix it, you’ll need to power up the giant iron. It needs two batteries to work, but the baby...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The science of snowflakes - Maruša Bradač
One could say that snowflakes are simply frozen water — but if you compare a snowflake to an ice cube, you’ll notice a big difference. Why are all snowflakes six-sided? Why are none of them exactly the same? And how do we ski on them?...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: How do dogs "see" with their noses? - Alexandra Horowitz
You may have heard the expression that dogs 'see with their noses.' But these creature's amazing nasal architecture actually reveals a whole world beyond what we can see. Alexandra Horowitz illustrates how the dog's nose can smell the...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: What's hidden among the tallest trees on Earth? - Wendell Oshiro
When Stephen Sillett was a boy, he took to the forests of Pennsylvania with his brother and grandmother. Looking up into the dense branches and leaves, his curiosity was piqued: What was hidden up there? Wendell Oshiro tells the story of...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: A brief history of plural words - John McWhorter
All it takes is a simple S to make most English words plural. But it hasn't always worked that way (and there are, of course, exceptions). John McWhorter looks back to the good old days when English was newly split from German -- and...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Can you solve the human cannonball riddle? | Alex Rosenthal
They call you the human cannonball. Your act involves flying through rings of fire, bouncing through a trampoline course, and catching the trapezist in the grand finale. Today's pre-flight test fails dramatically, and upon inspection,...
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The Artists | Think Like A Coder, Ep 5 | Alex Rosenthal
This is episode 5 of our animated series "Think Like A Coder." This 10-episode narrative follows a girl, Ethic, and her robot companion, Hedge, as they attempt to save the world. The two embark on a quest to collect three artifacts and...
TED-Ed
The strange history of the world's most stolen painting | Noah Charney
Throughout six centuries, the Ghent Altarpiece, also called "The Adoration of the Mystic Lamb," has been burned, forged, and raided in three different wars. It is, in fact, the world's most stolen artwork— and is considered one of the...