Corn, maize, and especially POPCORN!

One of my favorite foods in the summer is fresh sweet corn served "on the cob" with butter and salt. Maybe you are more familiar with canned corn that you add to a salad. But most everyone knows and loves POPCORN!

Corn, or maize as it is also called, has many uses: corn ethanol as a biofuel, animal feed and other maize products, such as corn starch and corn syrup, which is used as a sweetener in many processed foods. As a result of all of these uses, it is the number two agricultural product globally, after sugar cane. That's right; more corn is grown globally than wheat or rice!


10,000 years ago corn was domesticated in Southern Mexico and had a key role in the development of the civilizations of the Americas. The image on the right is of the Mayan maize god, Hun Hunahpu who appears in the Mayan tale Popol Vuh. At its origin, it was actually a grass, but today the variety of colors and types of corn is quite amazing. It is eaten as Mexican tortillas, corn chips, as tomales, corn "on the cob", or all over the world as popcorn.

This last use of corn as popcorn is the real focus of this post. Skunk Bear from NPR have made a video about the science of popcorn, making use of high speed video and an electron microscope. Enjoy.

PS: If slow motion video interests you, there a numerous videos of popcorn popping on Youtube (i recommend The Slow Mo Guys), but this my favorite, by Warped Perception.

PPS: One final thing, "Popcorn" is an early synth-pop instrumental, composed by Gershon Kingsley in 1969 and first appearing on his album Music to Moog By. This version was recorded in 1972 by Hot Butter and became an international hit.