Trivia questions and answers, drawn fresh from the well

• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1923 Compton X-ray scattering experiment, what changed when X-rays collided with electrons?

Answer

Their wavelength

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• Easy Easy difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1909 Geiger–Marsden experiment, what did the small number of sharply deflected alpha particles reveal?

Answer

A small atomic nucleus

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• Easy Easy difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1928 Griffith experiment with pneumococci, what process changed harmless bacteria into a virulent form?

Answer

Transformation

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In Avery, MacLeod, and McCarty’s 1944 experiment, which molecule was identified as the bacterial transforming principle?

Answer

DNA

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1913 Bohr hydrogen-spectrum experiment, what did the observed spectral lines reveal about electron energies?

Answer

They are quantized

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the Stern–Gerlach experiment of 1922, what property of silver atoms was shown to have discrete values?

Answer

Angular momentum

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• Hard Hard difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1887 Michelson–Morley experiment, what result did the apparatus find for the expected change in light’s travel time?

Answer

No significant change

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1927 Davisson–Germer experiment, what behavior of electrons was demonstrated when they scattered from a nickel crystal?

Answer

Diffraction

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In Thomas Young’s double-slit experiment with light, which wave phenomenon produced alternating bright and dark bands?

Answer

Interference

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• Intermediate Intermediate difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1881 Louis Pasteur vaccination experiment with sheep, which disease did his vaccine successfully prevent?

Answer

Anthrax

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• Easy Easy difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In the 1928 experiment that led to penicillin, what mold contaminated Alexander Fleming’s bacterial culture plate?

Answer

Penicillium notatum

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• Easy Easy difficulty.
• Famous Scientific Experiments

In John Snow’s 1854 Broad Street investigation, which suspected source did he identify as linked to London’s cholera outbreak?

Answer

The Broad Street pump

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