To protect English manufacturers of woolen goods both against American and Irish competition, England passed the Woolens Act of 1698, which prohibited the export of woolen cloth beyond a colony's borders.

Despite there being no fundamental difference in shipbuilding traditions in Viking-Age Scandinavia from the ones in other parts of Northern Europe, archaeological evidence shows that Viking ships were lighter, slimmer, faster, and thus probably more seaworthy than the heavier vessels used by the English at that time.

According to a 1996 study published in the Journal of Human Resources, Americans of Middle Eastern descent were twice as likely as was the national average to be self-employed.

The federal rules aimed at protecting human subjects of medical experiments were established to ensure that patients must be warned of potential risks and an independent panel would evaluate the experiment before it was conducted.

In human hearing, subtle differences in how the two ears hear a given sound help the listener determine the qualities of that sound.

On Earth, among the surest indications of sunspot cycles are believed to be the rate that trees grow, as seen in the rings visible in the cross sections of their trunks.

According to scientists at the University of Alaska, while the surface temperature of the globe has risen over the last century by about one degree Fahrenheit, the surface temperature in Alaska, Siberia, and northwestern Canada has increased in the previous thirty years by about five degrees.

The Swedish warship Vasa, sunk in 1628 and raised in 1961, was preserved in the cold water of Stockholm harbor, where low salinity inhibits the growth of marine borers that in most seas devour every exposed scrap of a sunken ship's wooden hull.

It seems likely that a number of astronomical phenomena, such as the formation of planetary nebulas, may be caused by the interaction where two stars orbit each other at close range.

At one time, the majestic American chestnut was so prevalent that it was said a squirrel could jump from tree to tree without once touching the ground between New York State and Georgia.