Cracking the Egg Sprinkler Mystery

When engineer Tadd Truscott was in grad school, one of his classmates at MIT suggested they spin an egg in a puddle of milk and film it with a high-speed camera. What they saw was a tiny sprinkler system: the milk rose up the sides of the spinning egg, shooting off at the egg’s equator. This became a household science experiment for Truscott and his kids, until one day he realized he didn’t know why the milk rises up the egg. Armed with a PhD in hydrodynamics, Truscott, now at Brigham Young University, and colleagues including mechanical engineering student Ken Langley, set out to crack the case.

Credits

Ffootage courtesy of Ken Langley, Tadd Truscott, Jeff Hendricks and Dan Maynes
Additional footage and production: Flora Lichtman

Meet the Producer

About Flora Lichtman

Flora Lichtman was the host of the podcast Every Little Thing. She’s a former Science Friday multimedia producer.