The General Science Quiz

Both Venus and Mars are close to Earth at various points, but Venus wins the title of Earth's closest planetary neighbor. If you're trying to remember the order of the planets, try My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Nachos -- Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.

Albert Einstein is remembered as one of the most brilliant minds of all time. The German scientist made important advances in the field of physics, including his theory that E=MC^2, or energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared.

Scientists group all living things into five basic kingdoms, which include Monera, Protista, Fungi, Plantae and Animalia. Mammalia is not one of them.

Believe it or not, the air you breathe is made up of about 78 percent nitrogen and just 21 percent oxygen. The rest is a mix of argon, carbon dioxide, water vapor and various other gases.

Despite its name, a light year is a measure of distance, not time. It reveals how far light can travel in one year -- about 6 trillion miles or so.

Atoms are the building blocks that make up everything you see -- and many things you don't. Groups of atomic elements, such as H20, are known as compounds. By joining together, these atoms make up every living and non-living thing on Earth.

In the 17th century, Isaac Newton developed three basic laws of motion. They include an object at rest/motion staying at rest/motion; force being a product of mass times acceleration; and the fact that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Oxygen makes up around 47 percent of the Earth's crust, and around 30 percent of the Earth's total mass. Iron is the real building block of the Earth, however, representing more than a third of the planet's mass.

The outer layer, or crust of the Earth, is around 25 miles thick. The layer below that, known as the mantle, is about 1,800 miles thick. Tucked inside the mantle is a fiery ball known as the core.

The Celsius temperature scale goes from 0 to 100, so water freezes at 0 degrees and boils at 100 degrees. In Fahrenheit, water freezes at 32 degrees and boils at 212 degrees.

Comets are bands of ice and dust that streak through the sky. While both asteroids and meteors are made of rock, a chunk of rock that passes through Earth's atmosphere and lands on the planet is known as a meteorite.

The amplitude of a sound wave -- how high or low it goes -- determines the loudness of sound. Pitch is determined by frequency, or how close together the waves appear.

Herbivores, like sheep and most rodents, dine on plants. Carnivores, like lions and bears, eat meat. Omnivores are creatures that do a little of both, like humans,

All the planets rotate counter-clockwise -- except for Venus, which spins clockwise. Venus is also the slowest of the planets, completing a single rotation every 243 Earth days.

Einstein is perhaps best remembered for his theory of relativity. The famous physicist won the 1921 Nobel Prize in Physics for his work associated with the photoelectric effect and quantum theory.

The ocean tides on Earth are largely established by the gravitational pull of the moon. This pull creates bulges of water which we recognize as high tide.

In the 16th and 17th centuries, Galileo Galilei made early advancements in the field of astronomy, Today, the moons of Jupiter are named the Galilean moons in his honor. When NASA launched a Jupiter mission in the '90s, they named the spacecraft for Galileo as well.

Light travels at 343 meters per second, or 1,125 feet per second. This speed can vary widely based on room temperature, however.

In 1952, 3,000 people died and more than 20,000 were paralyzed from polio in the U.S. Three years later, Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine, saving countless children from misery and death.

Cellphones use radio waves to transmit sound. These waves fall on the frequency in between the waves used in FM radio and those used in a microwave oven.

Cells are the basic building blocks that make up all living things. At the center is a nucleus, which serves as the command center. A typical human is made up of trillions of cells.

In 1859, Charles Darwin published his masterpiece, "On the Origin of Species," which outlined new theories on evolution and natural selection. Darwin's ideas were revolutionary and controversial at the time, but today are largely accepted as scientific fact.

Though similar, speed and velocity are not the same thing. Velocity refers to a direction of travel, so an example of this concept would be, 10 meters per second in an easterly direction.

A typical adult body has 206 bones -- and more than half of these are in the hands and feet! Each hand has 27 bones, while each foot has 26 bones.

Around 71 percent of the Earth is covered by water. Roughly 97 percent of that is found in the oceans, while just a small fraction is made up of freshwater in lakes and streams.

Prior to the 1920s, countless people died from simple infections. Scottish scientist Alexander Fleming saved millions of lives over the years with his 1928 discovery of penicillin.

Until around the 16th century, many people held a geocentric theory that put Earth at the center of the universe. It wasn't until later that many scientists began to recognize that the sun was actually the center of the solar system -- a concept known as heliocentric theory.

Photosynthesis is the process where plants use sunlight, carbon dioxide and water to generate the nutrients they need to thrive. The byproducts of this process are oxygen and water.

Deciduous trees lose their leaves in Autumn, and include species like Oak, Elm and Maple. Evergreen or coniferous trees include Pines, Firs and Spruces.

Earth is located within the Milky Way galaxy, which consists of around 100 to 400 billions stars, and as many as 100 billion planets. Our tiny solar system is just a speck of dust in this mighty galaxy.

Marie Curie discovered the elements Radium and Plutonium. She later became the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, as well as the first woman to win two Nobel Prizes when she was awarded a second one a few years after the first.

The pH scale measures acidity. A rating of 7 is considered neutral, while anyhing below a 7 is acidic. Objects valued over 7 are basic, and include things like baking soda and bleach.

The Earth revolves around the sun once every 365 days. It rotates around its own axis once every 24 hours.

Electrons, neutrons and protons are the particles that make up an atom. The negatively-charged electrons float around the nucleus, which consists of positively-charged protons and neutrons, which are, as their name implies, neutral.

Twentieth century scientist Nikola Tesla is known for his contributions to the field of electricity. He and Thomas Edison waged a War of the Currents, with Tesla pushing alternating current and Edison proclaiming the virtues of direct current.