Cornelius Jacobszoon Drebbel

The first submersible with reliable information on its construction was built in 1620 by Cornelius Jacobszoon Drebbel, a Dutchman in the service of James 1, while working for the british Royal Navy. It was propelled by means of oars. Between 1620 and 1624 Drebbel successfully built and tested two more submarines, each one bigger than the last.

Honey bee

An average worker Honey bee makes about 1.5 teaspoons of honey in its lifetime and it would have to visit two million flowers to make just 500 gms of honey. A bee usually visits any where between 50 to 100 flowers during just one collection trip.

Vikram Sarabhai

Indian physicist, Vikram Sarabhai (1919-1971) is considered to be the Father of the Indian space program. It was he who convinced the Indian government of the importance of a space programme for a developing country like India. The establishment of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) was the result of his efforts.

Pompeii

Pompeii is a ruined Roman city in Italy. It was destroyed during a catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, which buried the city under many feet of ash. Lost for 1,600 years, the town was rediscovered in 1559, but it was only in 1748 that excavation at the site began- a labour that revealed many complete buildings and wall paintings.

FIFA

FIFA has licensed World Cup video games since 1986. The license was originally handed to developer US Gold but was later acquired, in 1997, by Electronic Arts. The first game based on FIFA was actually an older game called World Cup Football, which US Gold re-packaged with the proper licensed items before selling it again.

Firefox

Firefox (version 1.0) reached 25 million downloads in just 99 days after its November 9, 2004 release. It then went on to clock its 100 millionth download in less than one year (344 days to be exact). And as of July 31, 2006, Firefox has been downloaded 200 million times.

Earth

Earth has approximately 6.5 billion human inhabitants. Projections indicate that human population will reach 7 billion in 2013 and 9.1 billion in 2050. It is estimated that only one eighth of the surface of the Earth is suitable for humans to live on- three-quarters is covered by oceans, and half of the land area is desert, high mountains or other unsuitable terrain.

Toshihiro Nishikado

Toshihiro Nishikado who designed Space Invaders, based on the look of the aliens on the description of the alien invaders in H G Wells' classic science fiction story, The War of the Worlds:In the story, the alien looked like an octopus. Nishikado also created several other aliens to look like other sea creatures such as squid or crab.

Cornea

The cornea is the transparent front part of the eye that covers the iris, pupil and anterior chamber, providing most of an eye's optical power. Although the cornea seems to lack substance, it is actually a highly organized group of cells and proteins. The cornea is one of the most sensitive tissues of the body as it is densely innervated with sensory nerve fibres.

Ants

Ants are one of the most successful groups of social insects and form highly organised colonies, which sometimes consist of millions of individuals. Colonies of invasive ant species will sometimes work together and form super-colonies, spanning a very wide area of land. As of 2006, there are over 11,800 known ant species, most of which reside in hot climates.

The Time Machine

H G Wells' The Time Machine is generally credited for the popularisation of the concept of time-travel using a vehicle that allows an operator to travel purposefully and selectively. The idea was also the basis for the Back to the Future trilogy of movies. The latest movi version of The Time Machine (2002) was directed by H G Wells' great grandson Simon Wells.

Chip Art

Prior to 1984, Chip art or silicon doodles served a practical purpose. If a competitor produced a similar chip, and examination showed it contained the same doodles, this was used as evidence that the design was copied and not independently derived. However, after a 1984, there was a revision of the US copyright law, which made all chip automatically copyrighted, making chip art useless.

The Lotus

Hindus associate the lotus blossom with creation mythology, and with the gods Vishnu, Brahma and Lakshmi. It is often used as an example of divine beauty, for example, Lord Krishna is often described as the 'Lotus-Eyed One'. The lotus flower is quoted extensively within Puranic and Vedic literature.

Prickly Lettuce

The wild predecessor, 'Prickly Lettuce' (Lactuca serriola), of modern-day lettuce contained something called 'lactucarium', a narcotic similar to opium. The Romans and ancient Egyptians took advantage of this property, consuming it to induce sleep.

Elk Cloner

A program called Elk Cloner is credited with being the first computer virus to appear "in the wild" - that is, outside the lab where it was created. It was written in 1982 by Rich Skrenta and was originally meant to be a joke. The virus embedded in a game would release on the 50th time of starting the game where it would show a blank screen that read a poem about the virus and then infect the PC.

Baldness

Baldness is not only a human trait. Other primates, such as chimpanzees, stump-tailed macaques, and South American nakari show progressive thinning of the hair on the scalp after adolescence. In fact, Adult stump-tailed macaques, are commonly used in laboratories for the testing of hair-regrowth treatments.

Nintendo DS

The Nintendo DS released in 2004, was code-named Project Nitro during its development. The 'DS' in the name are meant to stand for both Dual Screen and Developer's System, the latter of which refers to the features of the handheld designed to encourage innovative gameplay ideas among developers.

$100 Laptop

The $100 laptop will come complete with a free Linux OS, a 66 Mhz processor with integrated graphics controller, a 7.5-inch (800x600) LCD screen, 512Mb-1Gb flash memory, external SD card slot, wireless networking (802.11b/g), standard keyboard, touchpad, built-in stereo speakers and microphone and external USB ports.