Are you a math and science lover?
Do you like learning new and interesting facts?
If so, then this is the article for you!
We've compiled a list of nerdy math and science trivia questions, covering everything from famous mathematicians to the planets in our solar system.
We guarantee you'll learn something new.
I guess that also means you'll get some questions wrong.
But that's okay because part of the fun is learning the correct answer!
The best nerdy math and science trivia questions offer a bit of a challenge while also being fun and interesting.
It's that sense of wonder and discovery that we all love about math and science.
Whether it's Neil Armstrong's first steps on the moon or Oppenheimer's famous quote about the atomic bomb, there are plenty of milestones and facts to explore.
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138 Nerdy Math / Science Trivia Questions Ranked From Easiest to Hardest (Updated For 2024)
- According to the musical based on his adventures, which Nickelodeon cartoon is not just any kind of absorbent, multicellular, deep-sea organism, but specifically, Aplysina fistularis?
Answer: SpongeBob Squarepants
- Which appealing yellow fruit is slightly radioactive due to its high potassium content?
Answer: Banana
- Even though James Bond and Liz Taylor got it wrong when they said it’s forever, which substance is still the hardest to naturally occur on Earth?
Answer: Diamond
- What is the only number that has the same number of letters as its meaning?
Answer: Four
- Obelus is the name for the mathematical symbol that has a horizontal line with a dot above and a dot below it. Which arithmetic operation is the sign used for?
Answer: Division
- The quadriceps is, as the name suggests, a group of four prevailing mus les including the rectus femoris. This group of muscles covers the front and sides of what leg bone?
Answer: Femur
- What “P” simple machine is a wheel that carries a flexible rope, cord, or cable on its rim? It can be used to transmit energy and motion, often for lifting weights.
Answer: Pulley
- What geometric theorem allows for the calculation of the square of a hypotenuse of a triangle, by combining the squares of the two other sides? It gets its name from an ancient Greek philosopher.
Answer: Pythagorean Theorem
- On Earth, the recipe for them is water and light. If you were on another planet with a different atmosphere, what colorful post-precipitation meteorological phenomenon would you be less likely to see?
Answer: Rainbow
- Although the exact origin is unknown, this piece of technology and calculating tool used beans or stones moved in grooves of sand to perform calculations. Although computers have mostly replaced it, this tool is still in use for teaching arithmetic to children in many parts of the world. What is it?
Answer: Abacus
- "No" is the negative-sounding chemical symbol that represents an element that was first produced in the US in 1958. The element is named after a man who more famously lent his name to a series of prizes. With a single guess, name either the man or the element.
Answer: Nobelium (Alfred Nobel)
- Also part of cow farts, what simple hydrocarbon, chemical formula CH4, is the primary component of natural gas?
Answer: Methane
- The Mobius strip was the inspiration for a universal symbol first created in 1970 and composed of 3 arrows in a roughly triangular shape. This symbol stands for what action?
Answer: Recycling
- Turtles, toads, and tarantulas are all ectothermic animals, which is typically referred to by what more common term?
Answer: Cold blooded
- What science word technically means the amount of matter? Near the surface of Earth it's basically equivalent with weight.
Answer: Mass
- What scientific instrument measures air pressure in units known as 'atmospheres?'
Answer: Barometer
- You have a cube with has 7-inch sides. What is the surface area of the cube?
Answer: 294 square inches
- What “i” word describes a whole number that is not a fraction?
Answer: Integer
- Theoretically, Hawking radiation is emitted by what terrifying space things that come in stellar and supermassive varieties?
Answer: Black Holes
- What zodiac constellation found in the northern celestial hemisphere has a name which means "twins" in Latin? It is associated with the twins Castor and Pollux from Greek mythology.
Answer: Gemini
- Which is the only planet in our solar system whose rotation is almost at a right angle to its orbit (i.e., it spins on its side)? The largest moon of this planet is Titania.
Answer: Uranus
- Although the word is often used in popular culture to reference a specific film franchise, technically the definition of a certain math term is "a rectangular array or table of numbers, symbols, or expressions, arranged in rows and columns." What is this term?
Answer: Matrix
- What type of chemical bond is formed when two atoms each contribute one electron to a shared pair?
Answer: Covalent bond
- There was a boom in sales of frill-necked lizards as domesticated pets after the release of what 1993 film featuring a similar, very extinct critter?
Answer: Jurassic Park
- Often associated with horses but also used as an anesthetic on many types of animals, what drug is often nicknamed as "Special K"?
Answer: Ketamin
- Amethyst and citrine are extra-pretty varieties of what common mineral that's great for Scrabble?
Answer: Quartz
- The "main-sequence" stage of what type of large, hot object comes from the balance of gravity and nuclear reactions? Fun fact: main-sequence stages can last millions or billions of years.
Answer: Stars
- Iodine and Europium are two of the three chemical elements whose names start with 2 vowels. First identified in the 1950s, the third element to fit that category is named after what science guy?
Answer: Albert Einstein
- Titan is one of the few moons in the solar system known to have an atmosphere of any substance. Around which second-largest planet does Titan revolve?
Answer: Saturn
- Which organ in the human body is the only one that can float in water (not that it would help if you’re drowning)?
Answer: Lungs
- In the 1500s, a Welsh mathematician named Robert Recorde invented which mathematical symbol to “avoid to avoid the tedious repetition of these words: "is equal to’?”
Answer: Equal sign
- -459.67 Fahrenheit degrees (or 0 Kelvin) equals what two-word term for when all particles completely stop moving?
Answer: Absolute Zero
- What is the acronym for the correct sequence of steps to follow when using the order of operations for a math expression?
Answer: PEMDAS
- The most abundant sulfide mineral is pyrite. But this mineral's lustrous appearance is more commonly known by what two-word phrase?
Answer: Fool's gold
- Now displayed in Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History, 90 percent of the fossils from what massive theropod dinosaur was unearthed in South Dakota in 1990 and was nicknamed “Sue” after it was discovered by paleontologist Susan Hendrickson?
Answer: Tyrannosaurus Rex
- What is the two-word phrase for the set of ideas that suggest the universe is not made up of points, but rather tiny vibrating lengths? Note: cheese is not involved at all.
Answer: String theory
- Ohm's law of electricity, expressed as "V = IR," states that voltage is directly proportional to current, represented by I, and what quantity represented by the letter R?
Answer: Resistance
- In mathematical physics, Minkowski space is a four-dimensional space consisting of three-dimensional Euclidean space and which other quantity?
Answer: Time
- New Zealand famously has the highest density of sheep per unit area in the world. What was the name of the sheep who was the first mammal cloned from an adult cell?
Answer: Dolly
- Used to indicate a measurement of medicine, what does the abbreviation “cc” stand for?
Answer: Cubic centimeter
- Gustatory cells are primarily found on what sensory organ of the body?
Answer: Tongue
- In geometry, what S-adjective describes a triangle whose three sides all have different lengths?
Answer: scalene
- According to a popular theory, dinosaurs got wiped out by the Chicxulub crater impact in what back-half-of-the-alphabet Mexican peninsula?
Answer: Yucatán
- Though Thomas Edison primarily used carbon filaments, most incandescent light bulbs today are made with filaments of what element, whose atomic symbol is a W for its alternate name, "wolfram"?
Answer: Tungsten
- Which two organs are connected by the only veins that carry oxygenated blood in the body?
Answer: Lungs and Heart
- Mycologists often spend a lot of time digging through dirt as they study what type of natural organism?
Answer: Fungi
- What unit, equivalent to approximately 3.26 light years, has a name derived from a portmanteau of “parallax in one second?”
Answer: Parsec
- One novel way to retain thermal energy collected by a solar tower is through a mixture of sodium nitrate, potassium nitrate, and calcium nitrate. This method is often referred to as "molten ______." What dinner table-sounding word fills in the blank?
Answer: Salt
- A planned NASA mission will be the first to land astronauts on the moon since the Apollo program, including the first woman. This program is named, appropriately enough, for what sister of Apollo?
Answer: Artemis
- Acceleration is the change in an object's velocity with respect to time. The change of an object's acceleration with respect to time is called what, a name it shares with some chicken dishes, and some inconsiderate people?
Answer: Jerk
- What mathematical function can be defined as multiplying a number with all integers less than or equal to that number?
Answer: Factorial
- A gigaannum is a term that represents a very long time. One billion years in fact. About 3.5 gigaannumms ago was when what critical process used to convert light energy into chemical energy is estimated to have begun?
Answer: Photosynthesis
- Which of the four standard bases in DNA typically pairs with thymine?
Answer: Adenine
- In trigonometry, the cosecant ratio is the reciprocal of what other ratio often associated with waves?
Answer: Sine
- Linux uses all the letters of what operating system family that it was designed to imitate?
Answer: Unix
- It is likely that the first of these animals was the "Stellar" variety in which the male has a pronounced mane and is a fairly aggressive carnivore. This likely led to the misnomer for the creature. What is the name of these pinnipeds long foreflippers, the ability to walk on all fours, and a big chest and belly? They range from subarctic to tropical waters in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.
Answer: Sea lion
- In DNA, the four nucleotide bases are adenine, cytosine, guanine, and thymine; in RNA, what base replaces thymine?
Answer: Uracil
- What is the type of number expressed as a pair of a real and an imaginary number? An example would be 3 + 6i where i = the square root of -1.
Answer: Complex number
- A box and ______ plot shows data in quartiles, with a vertical line splitting the box at the median. (Hint: The name makes it sound like something a math-savvy cat would use).
Answer: Whisker
- Which I-word applies to atoms of the same element that have the same atomic number but different mass numbers?
Answer: Isotope
- A teaspoon of what “N” type of star would weigh six billion tons? It is the collapsed core of a massive supergiant star.
Answer: Neutron Star
- A perfect number is a positive integer that is equal to the sum of its positive divisors, apart from the number itself. What is the smallest perfect number?
Answer: Six
- In geometry, a curve known as a "lemniscate" most closely approximates the shape of what single-digit number?
Answer: eight
- A regular hexagon has a side length of 6 feet. What is the area of the hexagon? We'll accept responses within 2 square feet of the correct answer.
Answer: 92
- In a controversy that lasts to this day, Isaac Newton and Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz both claim to have developed what mathematical discipline?
Answer: Calculus
- The direct conversion of sunlight into electricity started in 1954, via solar cells using silicon. These cells are alternatively referred to by what longer "P" name?
Answer: Photovoltaic cells
- What is the four-letter name for the jelly-like substance obtained from red algae that is often used as a solid growth medium in Petri dishes to culture microorganisms?
Answer: Agar
- The lightest of the noble gases, which element is the second most abundant in the universe? The most common use of this element is in cryogenics. SCRAPPING DUE TO A WORDING ERROR IN ORIGINAL VERSION
Answer: Helium
- A buckyball is a stable and spherical molecule made up of what element?
Answer: Carbon
- In geometry, which C-term refers to two objects that are the same shape and size—in other words, you could superimpose one on the other and they’d line up exactly or be the mirror image of one another?
Answer: Congruence
- What is the smallest number greater than 1 that has an integer square root and an integer cube root?
Answer: 64
- The smallest known owl is only 5-6 inches tall and weighs less than two ounces. It has a name reminiscent of Middle Earth or Will Ferrell. What is this owl?
Answer: Elf Owl
- Engineer Gilbert Levin insisted that a Viking Lander discovered life on what planet in 1976?
Answer: Mars
- What 16th-century Italian physician and botanist with a “G” last name created the first recorded herbarium in the world, as well as the first botanical garden in Europe?
Answer: Luca Ghini
- What “B” term refers to a line that divides an angle into two equal angles?
Answer: Bisector
- A British scientist gave his name to what familiar four-by-four square, used to illustrate the probability that the offspring of two individuals will have a given genotype?
Answer: Punnett Square
- What do you call the longest side of a right triangle (that is, the side that’s opposite the right angle)?
Answer: Hypotenuse
- What prestigious medical journal founded in 1823, gets its name from a type of window as well as another term for a scalpel?
Answer: The Lancet
- The total amount of greenhouse gas emissions created by human activity is better known by what two-word term which originated from a concept conceived by environmentalists William E. Rees and Dr. Mathis Wackernagel during the 1990s?
Answer: Carbon footprint
- Prior to Hayley Arceneaux’s 2021 flight on SpaceX's Inspiration4 mission, who was the youngest American astronaut to fly into space at 32 years old – who also became the first American woman to fly into space in 1983?
Answer: Sally Ride
- If you dip a paper towel in water, the water will climb up the towel, appearing to ignore gravity. This is an example of ______ action. The same action is what helps plants pull water up their roots. What C-word fills in the blank?
Answer: Capillary
- What colorful word is used to describe a special ratio (approximately equal to 1.618) that appears frequently in architecture, nature, and geometry? The number was the subject of Mario Livio's book, subtitled "The World's Most Astonishing Number."
Answer: Golden
- USGS is a bureau within the US Department of the Interior with the motto "science for a changing world." What do the initials of this organization stand for? The group is headquartered in Reston, Virginia and is a fact-finding organization with no regulatory responsibility.
Answer: United States Geological Survey
- Mathematician Leonard Euler solved a famous problem named for seven of what kind of structures in the city of Konigsberg?
Answer: Bridges
- In a feat of inter-species biotechnology, researchers at the University of Wyoming were able to insert the silk-producing gene from spiders into what mammal which enabled them to harvest long strands of spider milk from the animal's milk?
Answer: Goats
- The first 3-digit number in the Fibonacci sequence is also the largest square number to appear in the sequence - what is it?
Answer: 144
- What is the "R" name for DNA created by combining fragments from different sources? These are occasionally referred to as "chimeric" DNA and are considered a key feature in much of DNA biotechnology applications.
Answer: Recombinant DNA
- There are three basic shapes of bacteria: round, called "coccus," spiral, called "spirilla," and cylindrical, whose technical name is what B-word?
Answer: Bacillus
- What is the sum of the only number that is spelled with its letters in alphabetical order and the only number that is spelled with its letters in reverse alphabetical order?
Answer: 41
- Commonly found on live oaks and bald-cypresses, what is the name of the flowering plant with a doubly-inaccurate name that is referred to as "grandpas beard" in French Polynesia and is generally considered to be in a commensalistic relationship with the trees on which it lives?
Answer: Spanish moss
- Symbolized as “PW," 1000 terawatts is equivalent to one of what unit of measurement commonly used to measure the potency of solar electricity?
Answer: Petawatt
- What math-y word is considered a foundational working tool in calculus and can be geometrically interpreted as the slope of the curve of a mathematical function?
Answer: Derivative
- What is the most common name for the geometric term which is the part of a straight line that originates at one point on the line and extends in one direction indefinitely from that point?
Answer: Ray
- The four conic sections are the nondegenerate curves generated by the intersections of a plane with one or two nappes of a cone. A hyperbola is a conic section. An ellipse is a conic section. And some consider a circle a conic section. What conic section is missing from this list?
Answer: Parabola
- The James Webb Space Telescope, launched by NASA in 2022, observes deep space objects using what form of electromagnetic radiation, which has wavelengths longer than those of visible light?
Answer: Infrared
- Group 17 on the periodic table of elements, which includes fluorine, chlorine, bromine, iodine, and astatine, are also commonly referred to by what term, which comes from Greek roots meaning "salt-producing?"
Answer: Halogens
- What is the (quite fun to say or spell) name for an infection disease caused by an agent that has jumped from a non-human animal to a human?
Answer: Zoonosis
- Which type of elementary particle that carries a fractional electronic charge shares its name with a dairy product made by warming sour milk?
Answer: Quark
- At only one-half of one millimeter long, tardigrades are considered a microanimal found in marine environments that also happen to be one of the most resilient animals known. What is the more common two-word name for these animals based on their resemblance to a certain land-bound animal?
Answer: Water bear (or moss piglet)
- Silver iodide is a favorite "seeding agent" that is used in meteorological professions largely because it has a crystalline structure very similar to a natural ice crystal. What are the everyday objects that silver iodide is used to "seed"?
Answer: Clouds
- According to a famous theorem, one of the first to be proven by computation, no more than how many colors are needed to color the regions of any map so that no two adjacent regions share the same color?
Answer: Four
- In what year did the Manhattan project start? We'll accept responses within one year of the correct answer. As a reminder, this is the project that led to the development of the atomic bomb.
Answer: 1939 (1938 - 40 accepted)
- Rotational symmetry is the property in which a shape looks the same after a partial rotation or turn. When applied to biology such as in sea anemones, what other "R" term is used to describe this characteristic?
Answer: Radial symmetry
- Earth is the densest planet in the solar system. Which of the giant planets of the solar system is its least dense planet?
Answer: Saturn
- Because it is formed through the cooling and solidification of magma or lava, it's often known as magmatic rock. But it has a more common name as well. What is it?
Answer: igneous rock
- A Type II error in statistics is a failure to reject a false null hypothesis in a test procedure. What is the two-word phrase by which type II error's are more popularly known in day-to-day vernacular?
Answer: False negative
- Two consecutive elements on the periodic table have the same atomic number as the number of letters in their English names. What are they? We need the names of both.
Answer: Boron (5) and Carbon (6)
- Microbiology has many branches including virology (studies viruses), parasitology (studies parasites), and nematology (you guessed it -- studies nematodes). What is the more common compound-word name for a nematode?
Answer: Roundworm
- Also NPR's Puzzlemaster since 1987, who has served as crossword editor of the New York Times since 1993?
Answer: Will Shortz
- What biome is also known as the boreal forest or snow forest? The biome is identifiable through its coniferous forests consisting mostly of pines, spruces, and larches. Although sparsely populated compared to other biomes, it is the world's largest apart from the oceans. In North America it covers most of inland Canada and Alaska.
Answer: Taiga
- What is the "T" name given to fossils that consist not of animal body parts but rather their footprints, nests, poop, and other associated objects?
Answer: Trace fossils
- Beginning nearly 12,000 years ago (after the last glacial period), what is the name of the current geological epoch? It's also the name of a song on Bon Iver's self-titled 2011 album.
Answer: Holocene
- Talc is a one and Diamond is a ten on what qualitative scale that uses “scratching” to discern differences between minerals?
Answer: Mohs Scale of Hardness
- German mathematician Felix Klein was the first to describe the object seen here, a "non-orientable" surface that, despite appearances, has only one side. This object is usually referred to as a Klein ____, where the blank is filled with what kind of common household object?
Answer: Bottle
- In chemistry, what 10-letter A-word means the adhesion of atoms or molecules from a gas or liquid to a surface, creating a thin film on the surface?
Answer: Adsorption
- Which element (number 100 on the periodic table) is the only one named after an Italian?
Answer: Fermium
- Although at least 500 naturally-occurring amino acids are known, a much smaller subset are considered the "essential" amino acids. How many of these necessary compounds exist?
Answer: Nine
- Written around 300 BC, "The Elements" is a famous treatise on geometry by what legendary ancient Greek mathematician?
Answer: Euclid
- Stat 101: what is the term in statistics for the number of standard deviations by which the value of a raw score is above or below the mean value of the measured data? These can be positive or negative and are often used as a step in determining statistical significance.
Answer: Z-score
- Who is the only woman in history to win an unshared Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine? She received the award in 1983 for the discovery of mobile genetic elements.
Answer: Barbara McClintock
- In chemistry, what E-word means two molecules whose atomic arrangements are mirror images of each other, and that cannot be superimposed on each other just by turning them in space?
Answer: Enantiomers
- One of the most common and least-costly practical applications of solar power is through a solar cooker. In particular, the p______ solar cookers which concentrate sunlight to a single point and require no fuel or operating costs. What geometric word fills in the blank in the preceding sentence?
Answer: Parabolic
- An ancient algorithm for finding prime numbers is known as the _____ of Eratosthenes, where the blank is filled with what kind of tool you might find in your kitchen?
Answer: Sieve
- Trepanging is the harvesting of what elongated, leathery Pacific creature you probably don't want in your gyro?
Answer: Sea cucumber
- What “A” science refers to the scientific approach to crop production?
Answer: Agronomy
- On July 5, the Earth will be the farthest from the Sun that it will be for all of 2022—that’s 94,510,886 miles, to be exact. What astronomy term is used to describe this phenomenon?
Answer: Aphelion
- In what decade did scientists observe seafloor spreading at mid-ocean ridges and start accepting the earlier proposed theory that Earth’s lithosphere is separated into tectonic plates?
Answer: 1960s
- If you just drooled after smelling cold cream, your saliva was activated by what part of your brainstem with what P-word name from the Latin for "bridge"?
Answer: Pons
- The Italian method, the Chinese method, gelosia multiplication, and shabakh are all alternate names for what popular method of multiplication to multiply multiple multiple-digit numbers?
Answer: Lattice multiplication
- Which synthetic chemical element with the symbol Sg was the first chemical element to be named after a person alive at the time?
Answer: Seaborgium
- What kind of "motion," the random movement of particles in a liquid or gas, is named for a Scottish botanist?
Answer: Brownian Motion
- The Sieve of Erastothenes is an ancient algorithm used to find what?
Answer: Prime Numbers
- What “P” organic compound is represented by the chemical formula “C 5H 5N”? It is highly flammable, so it makes sense that it’s prefix is from the Greek for “fire.”
Answer: Pyridine
- In linear algebra, what “i” is a square matrix consisting of zeros apart from on the main diagonal on which there are ones?
Answer: Identity
- What "effect"--by which a rotating object experiences a force perpendicular to the direction of motion--is the reason toilets flush clockwise in the Northern hemisphere and counterclockwise in the Southern hemisphere?
Answer: Coriolis Effect
- What “A” bacterium uses horizontal gene transfer to cause plant tumors? Its name is reminiscent of a prefix used to refer to plant production.
Answer: Agrobacterium
- Formed of leaflike parts called sepals, what five-letter word means the bottom part of a flower, which provides support for the petals?
Answer: Calyx
- The solstice is defined as the start of summer because it is the date when the Earth gets the most exposure to the Sun’s rays. What “i” term is a technical measurement of this exposure?
Answer: Insolation
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For many people, math is more than just a school subject.
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Science is all about understanding the world around us, and there's always something new to learn.
From the smallest particles to the largest galaxies, science is full of fascinating facts and discoveries.
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Eli Robinson is the Chief Trivia Officer at Water Cooler Trivia. He was once in a Bruce Springsteen cover band called F Street Band.