Page 84 - Girls’ World (January 2020)

your science scoop
HOW DO

TRICKY Every snowflake starts as a single tiny
SNOWFLAKES FORM?

— Courtni, 8, MA
SCIENCE

QUESTIONS droplet of water in the air. In extremely cold

weather, the water droplet will freeze onto

a pollen or dust particle in the sky and

become an ice droplet. More ice droplets
will then begin to stick to one another,

forming an ice crystal. As more and more

droplets attach to the crystal, it changes

shape and starts to extend out in six
different directions. Eventually, all of the ice

crystals become one big snowflake! Every

snowflake has six sides, or points, but
they’re each made from a different number

of ice crystals. That’s why you won’t find

GW gives you the lowdown on some of the two snowflakes that look exactly the same.
Some are simple and others are complex,
world’s most mind-boggling mysteries!
but they’re all beautiful!

WHAT’S THE GUNK IN
HOW DOES ICE

THE CORNER OF MY EYES?
HELP SWELLING?
— Harlow, 9, NC
— Lara, 11, IA
Whenever you get injured, your body
You might’ve heard some people call that gunk
responds by sending a bunch of blood cells and fluids
“eye boogers,” but it actually has a technical
to the affected body part to help it heal. Because more
name: rheum. Rheum is made up of eye mucus,
fluid is rushing to that area than usual, it starts to swell
skin cells, oil and other debris. During the day,
up. But when you put something super-cold, like ice, on
you blink away all of the debris before it can get
an injury, the tissues and blood vessels will stop flowing
stuck in the corner of your eyes. But because
to that body part and begin to contract. This causes
you don’t blink when you’re sleeping, rheum
the swelling to stop. Even though ice will help keep
is able to build up. The gunk can be sticky or
swelling down, leaving an ice pack on for too long
crusty depending on how long it’s been sitting in
can actually do more harm than good. If the injury
your eyes. Waking up to rheum is totally normal;
site gets too cold, your body will send even
however, getting a lot of eye gunk when you’re
more blood cells and fluids to that area to
awake could be a sign of an eye infection.
try to warm it back up. You should only

keep ice on a swollen body part for
SEND US YOUR QUESTION!
10-20 minutes at a time.
Go to page 96 and follow the instructions.

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