I made "photosynthesis" out of Legos. What did you do?

OK, I lied. But in celebration of Lego's fiftieth anniversary, I COULD have made photosynthesis-- or at least the molecules involved.

Most of us are familiar with the robotics/programming-centric Mindstorms imprint of Legos, but they also have a whole division dedicated to science-tastic models. The "life-sciences" section has badass double helixes and chromosomes, in addition to the aforementioned plant life process.

Wanna see the original patent for the toy that tipped millions of parents off to their children's nascent nerd-dom (and probably created many a scientist/engineer in the process)? Sorry, it's a PDF. But it's super-cool anyway.

(Incidentally, the last Lego patent expired in 1988, which WASN'T something Lego was inclined to celebrate.)

Another little-known fact: in 2001, Legos were part of the first "toy-based experiment" conducted aboard the International Space Station. Saith the press release:

"The LEGO(R) Life on Mars "Red Planet Protector" set, along with 300 miniature LEGO aliens, blasted into outer space on the Soyuz 206 ("2S") launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, Russia to the I.S.S.

Cosmonauts Talgat Musabaev, Soyuz Commander, and Yuri Baturin, flight engineer, performed a videotaped experiment to measure mass in space and the importance of learning to live and work in a zero-gravity environment. Using the LEGO Life on Mars Red Planet Protector model, they were able to demonstrate how the mass of an object is determined in a weightless environment by measuring its oscillation frequency."

Take THAT, Pokemon!