New Scientist - USA (2019-09-28)

52 | New Scientist | 28 September 2019

The back pages Puzzles

Quick crossword #41 Set by Richard Smyth Quick quiz #22 Puzzle set by Rob Eastaway

#23 Circling the squares

Darts player Juan Andred has noticed that

on a standard dartboard, there are some

neighbouring pairs of numbers that add

up to a square number. For example, 20

and 5 make 25, while 6 and 10 add up

to 16. He has been wondering if he can

come up with a new arrangement of the

numbers 1 to 20 so that all neighbouring

pairs add up to a square number. And he

has nearly succeeded.

He has 20 at the top of the board,

and every pair of neighbours adds to a

square - with one exception. On his new

board, 18 doesn’t form a square with its

clockwise neighbour, which is 15, or with

its anticlockwise neighbour.

What does Juan’s “square” dartboard

look like?

Answer next week

#22 The 9-minute egg

Solution

The slow method for boiling an egg for 9

minutes: start the 7-minute and 4-minute

egg timers. When the 4 runs out, flip it. When

the 7 runs out, there is 1 minute left in the 4.

Put the egg on. When the 4 runs out (after

1 minute), flip it. When it runs out, flip it again

to get 9 minutes. This means I won’t get my

egg for 7+9=16 minutes.

Fast method: Start timers 7 and 4 and

put the egg on. When 4 runs out (elapsed

time 4 minutes), flip it. When 7 runs out

(after 7 minutes) flip it. When 4 runs out

again (elapsed time 8 minutes), flip the 7.

When the 7 runs out (total 9 minutes), the

egg is cooked. So I get my egg in 9 minutes.

1 The male sperm whale

has the largest what of

any animal on the planet?

2 Marie Curie (1903),

Maria Goeppert Mayer

(1963). What name and

year come next?

3 Which element makes

stainless steel stainless?

4 What were Tiangong-1

and Tiangong-2?

5 ARCT, GFST and MEDI

are three examples of the

56 four-letter Longhurst

codes used by earth

scientists to refer to what?

Answers below

Cryptic

Crossword #15

Answers

ACROSS 1 Rebuke, 4 Ice bag,

9 Pasteur, 10 Lardo, 11 Ad hoc,

12 Traffic, 13 Hippocampus,

18 Fractal, 20 Tacit, 22 Veins,

23 Tagging, 24 Regard,

25 Enigma

DOWN 1 Repeal, 2 Bosch,

3 Kneecap, 5 Cilia, 6 Bird flu,

7 G-force, 8 Criticality,

14 Imaging, 15 Mutagen,

16 Q fever, 17 Stigma,

19 Taser, 21 Cling

Quick quiz #22

Answers

Brain 1

Donna Strickland (2018). 2

an to She was the third wom

win the Nobel prize in physics

uminim , at a mium Chrom 3

ass of 10.5 per cent by m

Chinese space stations, 4

orbiting 2011-2018 and

e 2016-2019. The nam

eans “heavenly palace”m

Sea areas with distinctive 5

ical conditions: biogeochem

here, the Atlantic Arctic, the Gulf

and the MediterraneanStream





 

  

   



   

  

 

ACROSS

8 Height (8)

9 More proximate (6)

10 Device facilitating rotation

around a fixed axis (10)

11 H 2 SO 4 or HNO 3 , say (4)

12 County noted for its

Jurassic geology (6)

14 Parts of the auricles (8)

15 Flightless bird,

Struthio camelus (7)

17 Inability to process

sensory data (7)

20 Rb (8)

22 Crack; interpret (6)

24 Jaeger (4)

25 Deprived of O (10)

27 Elastic coil that stores

mechanical energy (6)

28 Sent digital data to a

remote system (8)

Answers and the next quick crossword next week.

DOWN

1 Proportion of sunlight

diffusely reflected by a

planetary surface (6)

2 Approximately 568ml (4)

3 ___ spectrum, range of

neurodevelopmental

disorders (8)

4 Earwax (7)

5 Not in neutral (2,4)

6 Geologic era that began

541 million years ago (10)

7 Thiamine deficiency (8)

13 CH 3 (CH) 4 CO 2 H (6,4)

16 Foul-smelling

Florida cryptid (5,3)

18 Kaiju unveiled in 1954 (8)

19 Clot (for example) (7)

21 Blue dye (6)

23 Rudolf ___, mechanical

engineer (6)

26 Large-screen

cinema system (4)

Get in touch

Email us at

[email protected]

[email protected]

20

3

5

17

12

2

9

15

14

10

11

6

8

(^13)
(^16)
4
7
(^18)
(^19)
1