Paleontologists unearthed three large seeds (up to 7.2 centimeters long) and 43 fossil leaves of the ancient legume at the Wahana Baratama coal mine near Satui in South Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo.
The newly identified legume lived in Southeast Asia between 40 and 34 million years ago (the Eocene Epoch).
Named Juntungspermum gunneriIt is very similar to the Australian black bean plant. Cassis.
“The tree currently occurs only in the coastal rainforests of northern Australia and nearby islands,” said Professor Peter Wilf of Pennsylvania State University and his colleagues.
Paleontologists found three fossil seeds, 43 leaves and pollen samples. Juntungspermum gunneri of Tanjun Formation South Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo.
Also found were fossil tracks of a variety of birds, burrowing evidence of marine invertebrates, and the fossil remains of turtles.
“The seeds Juntungspermum gunneri “Apart from coconuts and other palm trees, it is one of the largest in the fossil record,” the researchers said.
“They probably grew up to a metre (3 feet) in length – about the length of a baseball bat – and in pods that could hold up to five seeds.”
“This fossil is the oldest legume fossil ever found in the Malay Archipelago and the first fossil record of a plant related to the black bean plant anywhere in the world.”
The researchers suggest that ancestors of the black bean plant migrated from Asia to Australia during a plate collision that brought the continents closer together, allowing for the exchange of plants and animals between the continents.
“The collision of the Southeast Asian and Australian plates, which began approximately 20 million years ago and is ongoing today, has led to a large-scale exchange of plant and animal species between the two continents,” the researchers said.
“This discovery provides the first macrofossil evidence of a migration of plant lineages from Asia to Australia following the Asia-Australia tectonic collision.”
“These fossil seeds are Cassis “They migrated from Southeast Asia to Australia during a tectonic collision and then became extinct in Asia,” said Edward Spagnolo, a doctoral student at Pennsylvania State University.
“This proposal runs counter to most of the existing direct macrofossil evidence of plant migration, which shows lineages migrating from Australia into Asia.”
of result Appears in International Journal of Plant Science.
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Edward J. Spagnuolo others2024. Giant seeds of extant Australian legumes are discovered in Eocene Borneo (South Kalimantan, Indonesia). International Journal of Plant Sciencein press; doi: 10.1086/730538
July marked the 14th consecutive month of record-high global temperatures, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The agency predicts that this year is likely to be the hottest or near the hottest on record, with a 77 percent chance of being the hottest and nearly 100 percent chance of being among the top five hottest years. Karin Gleason, from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, reported that record temperatures were observed across nearly a fifth of the world’s land area in July.
Record temperatures were recorded in Europe, Africa, and Asia, making July their warmest month on record. North America experienced the second warmest July. The planet experienced its hottest July on record for two consecutive days, leading to heat warnings in the southwestern U.S. and triple-digit temperatures in Central California, where the Park Fire became the fourth-largest wildfire in state history.
NOAA predicts that most of the continental U.S. will experience above-normal temperatures in September, with the exception of coastal California and parts of the Pacific Northwest. Researchers attribute the extreme temperatures to the burning of fossil fuels and the continued increase in greenhouse gas emissions. The recent temperatures are also influenced by the natural weather pattern El Niño.
El Niño’s influence is expected to weaken, potentially making way for La Niña, which could develop in September, October, and November. La Niña is associated with cooler global temperatures, but it could also intensify hurricanes in the Atlantic. It may lead to wetter winters in the Pacific Northwest and drier conditions in the Southwest, potentially causing recurrent droughts.
The Copernicus project, which combines real-world observations with computer modeling, reported that July was the second-hottest on record. US and European scientists agree that this July’s temperatures were comparable to those of 2023 in terms of heat. Despite slight differences in data and methodologies, the consistency in global data sets suggests that the planet is approaching record levels of heat.
After 15 months of record-high sea surface temperatures, NOAA noted a slight easing in levels. Sea surface temperatures are still trending about 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit above average, although below the record set in 2023.
New Zealand’s justice minister has announced that Kim Dotcom will be extradited to the United States to face criminal charges related to the file-sharing site Megaupload. This decision could finally bring an end to a legal battle that has spanned over a decade.
Kim Dotcom, a German-born resident of New Zealand, has been contesting his extradition to the US since a 2012 FBI-ordered search of his Auckland home. Despite repeated legal challenges, New Zealand’s courts have upheld the decision for his extradition, with the country’s Supreme Court affirming the ruling in 2020.
Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has signed the extradition order for Dotcom, stating, “Having carefully considered all the information, I have determined that Mr. Dotcom should be extradited to the United States to stand trial.”
Dotcom, who is facing charges including money laundering and copyright infringement, has argued against being held accountable for the actions of users on his site. Despite his claims, the courts have ruled in favor of his extradition, citing violations under New Zealand law.
US authorities allege that Dotcom and other Megaupload executives caused significant financial losses to film studios and record companies by profiting from copyrighted material shared on the website.
Following the shutdown of Megaupload, the site was rebranded as Mega in 2013 with a New Zealand domain. Dotcom is no longer associated with the company, which now focuses on online privacy services.
Megaupload executives who were arrested alongside Dotcom have faced legal consequences, with some striking plea deals and others receiving sentences. The unfolding legal saga has drawn attention to issues of copyright infringement and online file-sharing.
TThe story begins on a road miles from the border of another American state. The danger is clear, even when everything else is clear. Pax, the player character, is a black woman in her 30s who has just finished a robbery with friends. The border means freedom. A police car telling you to pull over means trouble.
Pax and her allies are anomalies, people with manipulative voice abilities called Vox. Pax is able to manipulate people into doing what she wants by making them feel bad for her, using abilities she calls “Triggers” and “Cancels.” Her ex-partner, Noam, is able to placate people with an ability she calls “Gaslighting.” What Dustborn is trying to communicate is certainly not subtle. Soon, we encounter people infected with weaponized disinformation.
Vox is available in certain situations, such as dialogue choices, often when the issue is time-sensitive. When you tap on a dialogue choice, you're presented with Pax's thoughts before you decide. Does Pax think it would be better to use a block to stop someone from asking a question, or would using a trigger to start a fight be the better option?
“The story you actively shape”…Dustborn. Photo: Red Thread Games
This is a very handy feature, especially when it's not clear what a one-word dialogue option represents. In my case, my first run-in with the police ends with an agitated officer stepping onto the highway and a truck doing the rest. This is just one of many tense encounters between the group on their way to safely delivering the stolen data drive to Nova Scotia, Canada.
It's amazing how well Dustborn remembers your choices: a little comic book icon appears on screen whenever a character mentions a past event that was influenced by a choice you made. This often happens multiple times in a single conversation, making Dustborn feel like a narrative experience that you're actively shaping.
“A balancing act between serious themes and the supernatural”…Dustborn. Photo: Red Thread Games
Dustborn also has hack-and-slash combat, but it's very easy and monotonous. If you're not enjoying it, you can reduce the frequency of encounters. There's also a small rhythm game section, as the group travels around undercover as a touring punk rock band. It's a fun diversion, but the songs are pretty awful. Maybe it's because of the band's undercover story, but I can't stand songs that rhyme the word “born” with “born.” Three times.
The game will certainly irritate some people by stating the characters' politics loudly and explicitly – Nazis are bad – but it also doesn't say anything else of note beyond that. The setting, for example, doesn't stand up to casual examination. A paranoid JFK is said to have “basically resurrected Nazi Germany” after surviving an assassination attempt. To be clear, Dustborn's setting doesn't reflect the horrors of Nazi Germany in any way. The problem is, it might think it does. There are stories of people talking about book burnings and “fighting,” but it never really connects to anything substantial. A lot of ideas are vying for space – robots, a near-apocalyptic event, the dangers of totalitarianism – but none of them get the space they deserve.
Meanwhile, real-world problems are transformed into supernatural ones, and later in the game you learn how to cure people infected with disinformation. Point the device at a person, and the person regains consciousness screaming something like “Wait, the awakened mind virus doesn't exist! What was I saying?”. Transforming the real fight against disinformation into a supernatural element is very damaging to the game. What's even more offensive is that issues like racism don't seem to be involved. Every member of the team is from a minority background, and none of the characters feel the need to comment on it. This is a good thing, but from my experience as a minority, it's just as offensive as not having any diverse characters at all. The game didn't need this kind of set dressing, it didn't even need supernatural powers. A lot of it would just make the well-intentioned message worthless.
Meanwhile, the characterization is fantastic throughout. Dustborn is a game where characters talk about their feelings openly and in detail, which is charming and complemented by regular check-ins with friends around the campfire after each mission.
Dustborn's fundamental problem is its apparent desire to balance serious themes with the supernatural, and to alternate between fun moments, activism, and drama, but it ultimately fails to achieve this balance. For example, a raccoon's birthday party is held after a tragedy befalls the entire community. I enjoyed it more once I stopped taking it so seriously, because the standout moments come when Dustborn leans into the ridiculousness of its supernatural storyline. In Dustborn, you might expect a tense journey across the United States, but what you actually get is the equivalent of an interactive Marvel movie, and that's fine.
THow do we solve the world's problems? Apparently with a podcast. Today. Assembly requiredA Fine Mess is a new show from former US politician Stacey Abrams that aims to help listeners understand the planet's biggest ills and how they can be part of solving them. The show airs on the heels of A Fine Mess, in which entrepreneur Sabrina Merage Naim tackles some of society's toughest problems and “finds a way out of this chaos” by approaching them with curiosity rather than fear. Will it work? Who knows. But at this point, we're willing to try anything.
This week we're also highlighting the best podcasts about love, from profiles of Hollywood romances to a binge-worthy audio drama about two men falling in love, told over an answering machine. We're also featuring a moving confession from a former professional football player turned match fixer, a fascinating investigation into psychiatric medication, and a preview of the inspiring story of the Olympic refugee team. We hope one of them will bring you joy, even if it can't save the planet.
This week's picks
Dorsa Yavarivafa at the Paris Games. Along with fellow refugee swimmer Matin Barsini, she talks about her Olympic journey on the Unsung podcast. Photo: Kinh Chun/AP
Confession of match fixing BBC Sounds, weekly episodes “I would load up my car with cash and drive around London to see which footballers I could get to throw out,” Moses Swaibu says at the start of this confessional podcast. The former professional footballer admits he had the power to manipulate scores and make millions for overseas betting cartels. His voice is filled with regret as he tells Troy Deeney how he went from promising young player to traitor to the sport he loves. Hannah Verdier
script Radio Atlantic, full episodes available Can a “safe” opioid save you after another has ruined your life? If buprenorphine helped people quit heroin in France, why hasn't it worked in the U.S.? The Atlantic's Ethan Brooks asks these questions in a nuanced, thought-provoking examination of the withdrawal drug. HV
Hidden stars of unknown sports Widely available, available now Formed in 2016, the Refugee Olympic Team made history at Paris 2024 when boxer Sindy Ngamba won the team's first medal. In this special episode of our series celebrating unsung athletes, fellow Refugee Olympians badminton player Dolsa Yabalivafa and swimmer Matin Barsini share what such a journey is really like. Holly Richardson
A wonderful mess Widely available, with weekly episodes Philanthropist and investor Sabrina Meraj Naim lives a seemingly perfect and fulfilling life, but she's not in top shape. So she invites guests to help her face the big questions “with curiosity, not fear.” Questions on AI, cannabis legalization, the meaning of success, and more are all addressed here, with contributions from comedian Samantha Bee and reformed “girl boss” Samhita Mukhopadhyay. HV
Master Plan Widely available, with weekly episodes For two years, David Sirota, former speechwriter for Bernie Sanders and co-author of Don't Look Up, and his highly talented team have been investigating corruption and scandal at the U.S. Supreme Court. From Watergate to the 2020s, this podcast shows how corruption impacts everyday life and offers a frightening vision of what the future may hold. HV
There is a podcast
John Lennon and Yoko Ono was one of many celebrity romances detailed on the Significant Lovers podcast. Photo: Pacific Press/Shutterstock
this week, Charlie Lindler 5 best podcasts A wonderful love storyFrom stories of celebrity couples like John and Yoko to Dolly Alderton's fascinating miniseries
Precious Lover A reimagined Twilight podcast, hosts Melissa Duffy and Kelly Anderson (known to listeners as Mel and Kel) delve into Hollywood romances in detail that borders on obsession, digging into the classics (John and Yoko, Brangelina) as well as a host of millennial-friendly couples, including Adam Brody and Rachel Bilson, Alex Turner and Alexa Chung, and Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart. Their investigative skills and genuine empathy with each couple make every episode heartbreaking.
Hook up and hitch Page Six's podcast about celeb rock-solid marriages ran from 2020 to 2022, but — with apologies to Jason Momoa, Lisa Bonet and co — much of the content is still relevant today. Reporters Eileen Lethreng and Brian Firth dig into showbiz's biggest names' love stories, asking how their marriages have endured long-distance relationships, scandals, and the occasional infidelity. While other podcasts downplay the twists and turns in a tabloid-style manner, Hooked Up to Hitched is surprisingly short, with each episode taking fans on a whirlwind ride through history in under 10 minutes.
Palaeontologists from Japan, Belgium, and the United States have identified a new species of the extinct genus. Ontocetus Nearly complete fossil jaws from the Early Pleistocene in Britain and the Netherlands, and a fragmentary jaw from the Late Pliocene in Belgium, have been found. Ontocetus posti The new species shows striking similarities in its adaptations to modern diets. Walrus (Odobenus rosmarus) It highlights an intriguing case of convergent evolution.
Ontocetus posti Image courtesy of Jaime Bran.
“Walruses are one of the most iconic mammals of the Arctic, distinguished from all other seals (pinnipeds) by their large bodies and conspicuous tusks,” said paleontologist Matthieu Boisville of the University of Tsukuba and his colleagues.
“Walruses are one of the largest carnivorous animals, with males of this species weighing up to 2.5 tonnes and reaching an average length of 3 meters.”
“They live in the shallow, cold Arctic waters, where males form small harems during the breeding season.”
“Their primary diet is bivalve mollusks such as clams, which they capture using a unique ‘suction feeding’ technique, sucking out the shellfish flesh using their lips, tongue and arched palate as pistons.”
“Extant walruses live mainly in the Arctic, but their extinct relatives once lived in temperate and subtropical latitudes, mainly in the eastern North Pacific Ocean during the Miocene. They come in a wide range of shapes and sizes, from small, sea-lion-like ‘adults’ to the bizarre and unique two-tusked walrus.”
Ontocetus posti It lived in what is now Europe between 3.7 and 1.7 million years ago (Late Pliocene to Early Pleistocene).
The remains of this marine animal were initially thought to belong to a different species, Ontocetus emmonsi.
However, detailed analysis of the specimen revealed a unique combination of characteristics that distinguished the creature as a new species.
These features include four posterior canine teeth, large mandibular canines, and a fused and short mandibular symphysis.
These anatomical features are Ontocetus posti They are highly adapted to feeding by sucking cups, somewhat similar to their modern relatives, the walruses.
“Ontocetus and Odobenus They did not coexist in the North Atlantic. Odobenus Appeared almost a million years after extinction Ontocetus” the paleontologist said.
“Described as a temperate to high temperature resistant tusked walrus, Ontocetus They colonized the western North Atlantic during the Early Pliocene and migrated to the North Sea during the Late Pliocene warm period.
“Its prevalence in warm waters is Odobenus.”
“The global climatic cooling during the Early Pleistocene inevitably affected the North Sea’s molluscan fauna and contributed to its isolation from the North Atlantic,” the researchers said.
“External factors related to the specialization of sucker feeding are Ontocetus posti This probably contributed to their extinction about 1.7 million years ago.”
“We hope that more detailed investigations will shed light on past diversity. Ontocetus and Odobenus This revealed the superiority of cold-tolerant plants on a global scale. Odobenus rosmarus As the sole survivor.”
M. Boisville others2024. A new species Ontocetus The pinniped family Odobenidae, which lived in the Lower Pleistocene of the North Atlantic, is a similar group to modern walruses (Odobenus rosmarus). Peer J 12
Archaeological sequence Abrik Pissarro ruins The southeastern Pre-Pyrenees About MIS4 (about 71,000 years ago), a little-known period in Neanderthal history.
Iberian Neanderthals sampled wild mushrooms, pine nuts, and forest moss. Image by Abel Grau, CSIC Communication.
A team of archaeologists led by the Australian National University has collected hundreds of thousands of artefacts at the Abric Pizarro site, including stone tools, animal bones and other evidence, providing crucial data about Neanderthal lifestyles.
The discovery reveals that Neanderthals were able to adapt to their environment, calls into question archaic humans' reputation as slow-footed cavemen, and sheds light on their survival and hunting abilities.
“Our results show that Neanderthals knew how to best exploit their area and territory, and were able to withstand harsh climatic conditions,” said archaeologist Sophia Samper-Caro of the Australian National University.
“The amazing finds at Abric Pizarro show how adaptable the Neanderthals were. The animal bones we found show that they made good use of the fauna around them, hunting red deer, horses and bison, but also eating freshwater turtles and rabbits. This suggests a level of planning that is rarely associated with Neanderthals.”
“These new findings call into question the widely held belief that Neanderthals only hunted large animals such as horses and rhinos.”
“The bones we found contain cut marks, providing direct evidence that Neanderthals were able to hunt small animals.”
“The bones at this site are so well preserved that you can see traces of how the Neanderthals handled and butchered these animals.”
“Analysis of stone tools also shows a great deal of diversity in the types of tools made, indicating that Neanderthals were capable of exploiting the resources available in their region.”
By uncovering this critical transition period, archaeologists are one step closer to solving a mystery that has vexed researchers for decades: what caused the Neanderthals to go extinct?
“The discovery of sites like Abric Pizarro from this particular, poorly documented period gives us information about how Neanderthals lived and shows that they were thriving at a time when modern humans were not yet in the area,” Dr Samper-Caro said.
“The unique site of Abric Pissarro offers us a glimpse into the behaviour of Neanderthals in the landscape they roamed for hundreds of thousands of years.”
“The Neanderthals disappeared about 40,000 years ago. All of a sudden, we modern humans showed up in this part of the Pyrenees and the Neanderthals disappeared. But before that, the Neanderthals had been living in Europe for almost 300,000 years.”
“They obviously knew what they were doing. They knew the area and they knew how to survive for a long period of time.”
“One of the most fascinating aspects of this site is that it provides unique information about a time when Neanderthals lived alone in harsh conditions and how they thrived before the arrival of modern humans.”
Thanks to modern excavation techniques, Abric Pizarro and other nearby sites provide detailed data for understanding Neanderthal behavior.
“We make a 3D plot of each and every bone found that is larger than one or two centimetres,” Dr Sampar Karo said.
“This slows down the work – excavations at some sites have been going on for over 20 years – but the result is that the sites are documented with unparalleled accuracy.”
“We're interested in how all these different pieces of data, from stone tools to bones to hearths, relate to each other.”
“This more thorough excavation will provide archaeologists with information about how Neanderthals lived and how long they were in the area.”
“It's not just the individual item that gives us clues, but knowing where it is found in relation to other items at the site helps us understand how and when Neanderthals visited these sites. Did they settle there or were they just passing through?”
of result Appears in Journal of Archaeological Sciences.
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Sophia C. Samper-Caro others2024. Living dangerously: Abrik Pissarro, a MIS 4 Neanderthal site in the lowermost foothills of the southeastern Pre-Pyrenees (Lleida, Iberian Peninsula). Journal of Archaeological Sciences 169: 106038; doi: 10.1016/j.jas.2024.106038
A new study led by archaeologists from Curtin University suggests that Stonehenge’s iconic circle of stones – the Altar Stone, a six-tonne sandstone megalith – was discovered at least 750 kilometres from its current location.
Stonehenge. Image by Regina Wolfs.
Stonehenge, a Neolithic standing stone monument on Salisbury Plain in Wiltshire, England, provides invaluable information about prehistoric Britain.
Construction of Stonehenge began around 3000 BC and was modified over the next 2000 years.
The megaliths at Stonehenge are divided into two main categories: sarsens and bluestones.
The larger sarsens consist mainly of duriclast silicrite, taken from Marlborough’s West Woods, about 25km north of Stonehenge.
Bluestone is a general term for a variety of locally uncommon rocks, including volcanic tuff, rhyolite, dolerite, and sandstone.
Stonehenge’s central megalith, the Altar Stone, is the largest of the bluestones, measuring 4.9 x 1 x 0.5 metres, lying stone, weighing 6 tonnes, and is composed of a pale green mica sandstone with a distinctive mineral composition.
In the new study, Curtin University PhD student Anthony Clark and his colleagues studied the age and chemical composition of mineral grains within the altar stone fragments.
“Analysis of the age and chemical composition of the minerals in the altar stone fragments showed that they matched rocks from north-east Scotland, but were clearly different to the bedrock in Wales,” Mr Clarke said.
“We found that certain mineral grains in the altar stones are mostly between 1 and 2 billion years old, while other minerals date back to around 450 million years ago.”
“This provides a clear chemical fingerprint suggesting that the stone came from rocks in Scotland’s Auckland Basin, at least 750km from Stonehenge.”
“Given the constraints of Neolithic technology and its Scottish origin, this discovery raises intriguing questions about how such large stones could have been transported long distances around 2600 BC.”
Stonehenge layout and view of the Altar Stone. Image courtesy of Clark. others., doi:10.1038/s41586-024-07652-1.
“This discovery has important implications for our understanding of ancient communities, their connections and transportation,” Professor Chris Kirkland, from Curtin University, said.
“Our discovery of the altar stone’s origins highlights the importance of social co-operation in the Neolithic period and helps to paint a fascinating picture of prehistoric Britain.”
“Transporting such a large amount of cargo over land from Scotland to southern England would have been extremely difficult, so it is more likely that it was transported by sea along the English coast.”
“This suggests the existence of longer-distance trade networks and more advanced social organisation than is widely understood to have existed in the Neolithic in Britain.”
“We have succeeded in determining the age and chemical signature of perhaps one of the most famous stones from any world-famous ancient site,” said Professor Richard Bevins, from Aberystwyth University.
“We can now say that this iconic rock is Scottish rather than Welsh, but further research is needed to establish exactly where in the north-east of Scotland the Altar Stone came from.”
“The discovery is truly shocking, but if plate tectonics and atomic physics are correct, the altar stone is Scottish,” said Dr Robert Iksar, from University College London.
“This work raises two important questions: why and how was the altar stone transported from the far north of Scotland, over 70 kilometres away, to Stonehenge?”
Some people in comas can imagine themselves swimming or walking
Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP via Getty Images
As many as one in five people in a coma may be “locked in,” meaning they are aware of their surroundings but unable to communicate, and a large study has found that some people with severe brain injuries can carry out complex intellectual tasks when instructed, despite being unable to move or speak.
“It was easy to downplay this phenomenon when it was thought to be a rare event,” he said. Nicholas Schiff The study was published at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York. But in light of the latest findings, “no one can ignore this.”
People with so-called disorders of consciousness are either in a comatose or vegetative state, unaware of their surroundings, or in a minimally conscious state, with occasional signs of wakefulness like opening their eyes. In 2019, researchers found that as many as one in 10 of these people may have disorders of consciousness.
To find out whether doctors are missing these patients, Schiff and his colleagues conducted behavioral and brain imaging tests on 353 people with severe brain injuries over an eight-year period at six international centers.
Participants were asked to think about performing different activities for 15 to 30 seconds — playing tennis, swimming, clenching their fists or walking around the house — then pause and think about the activity again, seven times over the course of five minutes.
In healthy people, these thoughts produce clear brain activity that can be seen on MRI scans and electroencephalograms (EEGs). Of the 353 people with brain damage, 241 showed no visible reaction to verbal commands, but 25% of these matched the brain activity of volunteers without brain damage; for those in a coma or vegetative state, the figure was 20%.
“This is an extremely demanding task — think about swimming intermittently for five minutes,” Schiff says. “We don’t know exactly what they’re going through, but the fact that they’re able to do this means they’re likely conscious.”
Schiff said estimates suggest there are 300,000 to 400,000 people worldwide who suffer from long-term consciousness disorders, and up to 100,000 who may have subconscious disorders.
This research is very important, Ranan GillonFor many people, the prospect of being kept alive while unconscious is at best futile and at worst abhorrent, says the professor, who is emeritus professor of medical ethics at Imperial College London. “But if unconsciousness is likely to be merely spurious, as these studies suggest, we might expect more people to want to be kept alive and to want to be consulted about their wishes before a decision is made to withdraw life-sustaining treatment.”
Several ethical issues, including respect for people’s autonomy and human rights, “all need to be reevaluated in light of these studies,” he says.
The results also raise questions about equity regarding access to MRIs and EEGs, he said. Erin Puckett “If non-specialized centers do not have access to these technologies, their patients may not have the same life-changing opportunities as others,” say researchers at Northwestern University in Illinois.
Brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) could offer a way to provide two-way communication for people with impaired consciousness, but they aren’t commonly used by this group, Schiff said. It takes just 30 minutes to train a BCI to translate brain activity. Associated with attempts to dictate text onto an on-screen screen.
“Why not give it to someone who is impaired by cognitive impairment and see if we can use it to communicate with them? At worst, we’ll have two weeks of useful data, but at best, we’ll set them free.”
Should NASA opt to utilize SpaceX for the return journey, Wilmore and Williams would be required to stay aboard the space station for an additional six months.
SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft is set to launch a new crew to the orbital outpost in September on a mission named Crew 9. NASA has announced a change in plans to send only two astronauts instead of the initial four, and could potentially use the available seats to bring back Wilmore and Williams at the conclusion of Crew 9 in February.
Under this scenario, the Starliner spacecraft would return to Earth without one crew member, as stated by NASA.
Bowersox mentioned on Wednesday that no decisions have been made as yet, but NASA must soon finalize a plan to manage the space station’s resources and ensure smooth operations in orbit.
“We’re approaching a point where a decision needs to be made by the end of August, potentially even earlier,” he explained.
The launch of Wilmore and Williams marked the first crewed test flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. This mission was intended to serve as a critical final test before NASA grants approval for Boeing to conduct regular trips to and from the International Space Station.
However, in June, five of Starliner’s thrusters malfunctioned as the spacecraft was nearing the space station, leading to a delay in the rendezvous and docking process. Helium leakage was detected from the capsule’s propulsion system during the flight. Mission managers were already aware of this issue prior to Starliner’s launch into orbit, but stated that it was unlikely to impact the mission or the astronauts’ safety.
Joe Acaba, astronaut office chief at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, stated that astronauts undergo training for potential contingencies, including accidents that could result in an extended stay in space.
While in orbit, Wilmore and Williams utilize their free time to conduct scientific experiments and assist the space station’s crew with maintenance work.
Acaba mentioned that the duo are kept informed about NASA’s decision-making process, but ultimately must rely on the expertise of engineers and mission managers on the ground.
“They will adhere to our directives. That’s their duty as astronauts,” Acaba affirmed.
People buying insecticide sprays to get rid of cockroaches are wasting money because the bugs have developed a resistance to the key ingredients, prompting calls for U.S. regulators to tighten product testing rules.
There are about 30 species of cockroaches living around humans, but the German cockroach (German cockroachThe common dust mite ( ), found worldwide, is the dust mite most likely to infest buildings. Previous research There is evidence of widespread resistance to pyrethroid insecticides, which are commonly found in consumer products.
now, Jonalyn Gordon University of Florida researchers found that while commercial insecticides continue to work effectively on lab-derived German cockroaches bred from strains that have not been exposed to insecticides, they are ineffective against insects taken from real-world infestations.
The products are designed to be sprayed on surfaces to kill insects that walk across them, but in the team's tests, the coated surfaces killed fewer than 20 percent of the cockroaches they collected after 20 minutes of exposure. “Spraying these products directly in a closed container did not result in a 100 percent kill rate,” Gordon says.
When cockroaches were forced to remain on treated surfaces, most products took between eight and 24 hours to kill them. Previous research In reality, this is unlikely to occur, as these insects have been shown to avoid landing on pyrethroid-treated surfaces.
Pest-control products sold in the United States are regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency and manufacturers must prove they are 90 percent effective, but field testing on insects is not generally required.
That needs to change, Gordon says, noting that any bedbug-control products sold in the US should be required to be tested on recently collected specimens. “If that were to happen for cockroach control, I think it would raise the bar for cockroach-control products and ensure that the products on the shelves are providing the control people reasonably expect,” Gordon says.
In the meantime, cockroach repellents are probably the most effective consumer product for controlling pests, with the added benefit of minimizing human exposure to pesticides, Gordon says. Home measures like eliminating food and water sources the pests use and cleaning up clutter can also help. Professional pest control using non-pyrethroid insecticides is also recommended.
South American lungfish probably has a lot of 'junk' DNA
Katherine Segers/Louisiana State University
The largest sequenced genome on record, containing 90 billion DNA letters, belongs to a South American lungfish.
“Obviously, making this happen was a technical challenge,” he said. Axel Meyer “This is the largest animal genome ever found,” said researchers from the University of Konstanz in Germany.
South American lungfish (Lepidosiren paradoxaThere are two copies of the human genome, with a total of 180 gigabases (Gb) of DNA, which would stretch to 55 metres if laid out in a line – 30 times the amount of DNA found in a single human cell (6 Gb).
The South American lungfish has 19 chromosomes, 18 of which are larger than a single copy of the human genome, Meyer said.
His team also sequenced a single copy of the 40 Gb African lungfish genome (Protopterus annectens), the researchers have now sequenced all six species of lungfish found around the world, all of which have unusually large genomes.
“It's really puzzling how these fish can tolerate such large genomes,” Meyer says. The nucleus in each cell must be very large to accommodate so much DNA, meaning each cell is larger than normal, he says. Replicating that much DNA also requires a lot of energy with each cell division.
There's no evidence that this extra DNA does anything useful. Rather, it appears to be the result of a “genetic parasite” replicating itself endlessly. It's probably mostly junk, Meyer says.
His team found that mechanisms that other organisms use to limit the spread of genetic parasites appear to be damaged or missing in all lungfish species, resulting in the South American lungfish genome growing by 3.7 Gb every 10 million years – more than one copy of the human genome.
The reason for sequencing all lungfish species is to get a better understanding of what their common ancestor was like, a close relative of the lungfish that evolved into the first tetrapod land animal.
“Of all fish, lungfish are our closest relatives,” Meyer says. As their name suggests, lungfish breathe air and would drown without it.
They can also live for more than 100 years and regrow fins and tails, Meyer said, and his team hopes to figure out how they do this.
Some plant genomes are even larger than that of the South American lungfish: a small fern found on several Pacific islands is thought to have 321 Gb of DNA per cell, but there are no plans to sequence it.
The Altar Stone is located within the two large stone rings of Stonehenge.
Gavin Hellyer/Robert Suding/Getty Images
A study of the six-tonne altar stone at the heart of Stonehenge has revealed that it was almost certainly brought from northeast Scotland, much further away than any of the other stones in the megalithic structure.
“We were all in shock, we couldn't believe it,” the geologist said. Anthony Clark Curtin University, Perth, Australia.
It's unclear how the altar stone got from Scotland to southern England, but it was probably by sea, Clark said, because there is evidence people at the time traveled by sea.
Stonehenge is thought to have been begun about 5,100 years ago and constructed over a period of about 1,500 years. The outer circle is made of large stones called sarsens, weighing about 25 tons, while the inner circle and altar are made of small stones called bluestones, weighing about 3 tons. Bluestones are any rock that is not a sarsen. Bluestones are made of many different types of rock.
“What's unique about Stonehenge is the distance the stones were transported,” the geologist says. Richard Bevins Bevins, a researcher at Aberystwyth University in the UK, said most of the stone circles were made from rocks found within one kilometre of the site.
But the sarsens' source has been identified as West Woods in Wiltshire, about 15 miles (25 km) from the site, and Bevins' team has found that almost all of the bluestones came from the Preseli Hills in Wales, about 175 miles (280 km) away. One theory is that they were part of an even older Welsh stone monument that had been moved.
Stonehenge's Altar Stone is different to other bluestones: “By the end of 2021, we had concluded that the Altar Stone does not match any known geology in Wales,” team members said. Nick Piercealso at Aberystwyth University.
The five-metre-long stone is set into the ground with only one side exposed and partially covered by two other stones. It is thought to have been placed there around 4,500 years ago.
Stonehenge's altar stone (which is embedded beneath the other stones) was brought from north-east Scotland.
Nick Pearce, Aberystwyth University
Clark is currently analyzing samples of the altar stone using sophisticated equipment commonly used in the mining industry. The altar stone is made of sandstone, which means grains of rock that were deposited on the floor of an ancient sea eroded away and eventually stuck together to form new rock. The age of each grain varies depending on when the eroded rocks first formed, so each sandstone is a mix of grains of different ages.
Clark analyzed the zircon, apatite, and rutile crystals in the rock sample. These minerals contain uranium, which slowly decays into lead, so the ratio of uranium to lead can be used to determine the age of the rock. For example, the zircon in the rock is between 500 million and 3 billion years old.
The dating pattern indicates with more than 95 percent certainty that the altar stone is made from ancient red sandstone from the Auckland Basin in northeast Scotland, team members say. Chris Kirkland Located at Curtin University, the basin was once a huge ancient body of water called Lake Orcadie.
The nearest older red sandstone sites to Stonehenge are near Inverness, 750 kilometres (470 miles) away, and the furthest are in the Shetland Islands, up to 1,000 kilometres (620 miles) away, so the team believes the altar stone was probably transported by sea.
Glaciers can carry rocks long distances, and there's evidence that during the last ice age, ice in the Orkney region flowed north rather than south, Kirkland said.
So why was the altar stone transported so far? “That's a big question that's impossible to answer,” Clark says. “All we know is that it's a six-tonne rock that was transported from 750 kilometres away. That alone tells us an enormous amount about Neolithic societies and their connections.”
“What they did was pretty rigorous.” David Nash A team from the University of Brighton in the UK has pinpointed the exact source of Wiltshire sarsens: “This is really solid research.”
Nash said pinpointing the source of the altar stone more precisely would be difficult because the Orkney Basin spans a vast area and is up to five miles deep. “It's a huge task, because there's a huge amount of old red sandstone in the north of Scotland.”
In contrast, finding the exact source of the sarsens was easier because there were fewer possible sources, he said.
Genetic studies have shown that the people responsible for much of Stonehenge's construction were largely replaced by new waves of immigrants by about 4,000 years ago, likely after a major epidemic wiped out much of Europe's population.
The Justice Department is weighing various options, including the breakup of Alphabet Inc.’s Google, with a reported market capitalization of approximately $2 trillion, following a court ruling that tech giants monopolized the online search market illegally. The New York Times and Bloomberg News.
According to reports, one of the potential remedies frequently discussed by Justice Department lawyers is the sale of the Android operating system.
Authorities are also reportedly exploring options such as forcing the sale of Google’s search advertising program, AdWords, and its Chrome web browser.
A spokesman for the Justice Department stated that they are assessing the court’s decision and will determine the appropriate next steps in compliance with the court’s directives and applicable antitrust laws.
No decision has been made yet, as per a spokesman, and Google declined to comment. Google intends to appeal the ruling and faces a separate antitrust trial filed by the Department of Justice next month.
Other potential measures being considered by the Justice Department include mandating Google to share data with competitors and implementing safeguards to prevent unfair advantages with its AI products, according to sources familiar with the matter.
In the recent trial outcome, it was revealed that Google had paid over $26 billion in 2021 to secure agreements with companies like Apple to maintain its search engine as the default option on Safari, leading to monopoly allegations and anti-competitive practices, as ruled by the judge.
Following the judge’s ruling, rival search engine DuckDuckGo proposed banning exclusive agreements of this nature.
The ruling, issued last week, found Google in violation of antitrust laws and spending billions to establish an illegal monopoly that cemented its position as the global default search engine. This ruling marks a significant win for federal regulators challenging the dominance of tech giants in the market.
In the last four years, federal antitrust regulators have sued Meta Platforms Inc., Amazon.com Inc., and Apple Inc. for allegedly maintaining monopolies unlawfully.
In 2004, Microsoft reached a settlement with the Department of Justice over claims that it compelled Windows users to use its Internet Explorer web browser.
Around this time last year, Dean Grubbs and his colleagues were celebrating a conservation success story.The star of the show was the smalltooth sawfish, a large ray with a saw-like snout lined with tiny teeth. Victim of coastal development and bycatch, in 2003 it became the first saltwater fish to receive federal protection under the Endangered Species Act. By 2023, Florida's population will be the last sawfish in the US, and it's on the rise. “We were excited. We were seeing the population start to bounce back,” says Grubbs, a marine ecologist at Florida State University.
Then disaster struck. In January, a sawfish was found dead, thrashing about in shallow waters, spinning like crazy. This was after months of the smaller fish exhibiting similar behavior. Suddenly, Grubbs and his team were spending their days pulling dead sawfish from the water. After months of research and testing, the culprit finally emerged: ocean heat. A record-breaking heatwave brought “hot tub” water temperatures to Florida's coast in 2023, setting off a chain reaction that appears to have devastated the vulnerable sawfish population.
This is just one cautionary tale: something is wrong with the world's oceans. From orange algae blooms in the North Sea to outbreaks of gelatinous Bombay duckfish off the coast of China to the disappearance of Antarctic “bottom waters,” evidence is mounting that extreme temperatures are wreaking havoc on our oceans. After years of acting as silent sinks for excess human-made heat, the oceans are beginning to creak under the pressure. And we're finally starting to realize just how worried we should be.
The “altar stone” at the heart of Stonehenge was likely made in what is now Scotland, a study has found.
It’s more than 450 miles away, raising the question of how ancient humans managed to transport the stone that far.
The study authors suggest they may have used boats.
Scientists say they have unlocked the secrets of Stonehenge’s six-tonne rock, a discovery that adds even more mystery to the site.
A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature suggests that the ancient site’s central sandstone “altar stone” was likely created in what is now Scotland, meaning it was transported more than 450 miles to southern England — farther than any of Stonehenge’s other stones of known origin.
The discovery raises important questions: Researchers estimate that the altar stone was placed about 4,500 years ago, meaning Neolithic people could have moved it hundreds of miles, long before the invention of the lightweight spoked wheel.
The find also suggests that culture and social structure in the British Isles at this time was more intertwined than previously thought, and that Neolithic people were capable of carrying out complex projects with relatively simple tools.
The discovery was made based on the dating analysis of mineral grains within the sandstone. After profiling the age of the grains, the researchers were able to compare the altar stone’s age “fingerprint” with a database of sandstone samples from across the UK and nearby areas, such as Brittany in France.
“We can link the age spectrum with a fairly high degree of statistical certainty – in fact more than 95% confidence – to a very specific region in northeast Scotland,” said study co-author Chris Kirkland, professor of earth and planetary sciences at Curtin University in Australia.
“We can’t directly answer the question of why this rock was transported,” Kirkland said, “all we know is that this 6.5-ton rock was transported from 750 kilometers away, and that alone tells us an awful lot about Neolithic societies and their connections.”
Stonehenge — UNESCO World Heritage Site One of the best-preserved prehistoric megalithic monuments, the site is surrounded by large sandstone slabs called “sarsens”, which support stone lintels (also horizontal spans of rock, some held together by joints). Inside the outline of the sarsens is an inner circle of “bluestones”, which in turn is a horseshoe shape.
The new study concerns the central Altar Stone, a roughly 16-foot-long slab of stone that shows evidence of being shaped by human tools. Stonehenge’s other slabs currently rest on top of the Altar Stone but have apparently been toppled over time.
“Whatever the reason, this is a special stone,” said David Nash, a professor of physical geography at the University of Brighton who has studied Stonehenge but was not involved in the new study. “It’s totally different to the other stones on the site.”
Kirkland and his colleagues looked at three possible routes the altar stones could have taken from Scotland to Stonehenge: They could have been transported by shifting glacial ice during the Ice Age, but the study authors don’t think that’s a good explanation, or they could have been transported overland by humans, but the team thinks that would be too difficult in the wooded area.
The third possibility, which they consider to be the most likely, is that the stones were transported by ship, and there is evidence of seaborne transport during this period, when England’s coastline was different to what it is today.
Nash said the authors had reached a “sound conclusion” about the altar stone’s origins.
“Their work is really fascinating,” he said, adding that their findings add to the evidence that Neolithic people travelled throughout the British Isles and were part of wider social structures. “There was clearly a social structure, there were connections and there was a very clear transmission of ideas.”
Stonehenge is one of approximately 1,300 surviving ancient stone circles. According to the British MuseumResearchers believe the site’s stones were shaped with hand tools and assembled using a winch and pulley system, with the stones aligned to coincide with the movement of the sun and the summer and winter solstices.
Experts speculate that Neolithic people may have used these sites for rituals and ceremonies, but details have been lost to time — especially what was so special about the altar stones.
“Today’s billionaires decorate their mansions with Italian Carrara marble, but I don’t understand why they do it. It’s a mystery,” said Anthony Clark, lead author of the new study and a doctoral student at Curtin University. “Humans have always been fascinated by finding the perfect stone, and perhaps Neolithic Britons were too, so their motivations have been forgotten over time.”
As a next step, the researchers hope to pinpoint the exact outcrop or region where the rocks originated, but said fundamental mysteries are likely to remain.
“They placed a lot of value in transporting that stone 700, 800, 900 kilometres,” said Nick Pearce, a professor of geography and geosciences at Aberystwyth University in Wales and another co-author of the study. “However they transported it, it meant something to them. What did it mean? Why did it mean so much to them? It gives us all something to think about.”
Google, the creator of Android, is set to release a range of new devices including smartphones, smartwatches, and earbuds featuring advanced AI technology like Gemini Live. This move is aimed at surpassing competitors like Apple and Samsung.
The new Pixel products unveiled at the event in California showcase Google’s commitment to integrating AI into its devices, showcasing their superiority over the competition.
Pixel 9 Series
The Pixel 9 Pro is Google’s first “pro” phone with a smaller screen size. Photo: Google
The new Pixel 9, Pixel 9 Pro, and Pixel 9 Pro XL feature Google’s advanced Tensor G4 chip with a faster AI processor, setting them apart from their competitors.
An exciting new AI feature, Gemini Live, promises natural conversations with AI assistants, reminiscent of sci-fi movies like Iron Man’s Jarvis.
Other notable features include the Pixel Studio image generator and the camera’s “Add Me” function, merging two consecutive images to include the photographer in group photos.
The Pixel 9 comes with a 6.3-inch screen and dual-camera system, the Pixel 9 Pro adds a telephoto camera with 5x optical zoom, and the Pixel 9 Pro XL features a 6.8-inch screen similar to last year’s model.
The “Pro” smartphones are direct competitors to Apple’s iPhone 15 Pro series, offering similar features and a year of access to Gemini Advanced.
All models include two years of free satellite SOS messaging in the U.S., akin to Apple’s latest iPhones.
Prices for the Pixel 9 start at £799, the 9 Pro XL at £1,099, and the 9 Pro at £999, available for shipping in August and September.
Pixel 9 Pro Foldable
The Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold is equipped with a large foldable screen. Photo: Google
Google’s Pixel 9 Pro Fold boasts a thinner, lighter design with an 8-inch flexible internal screen and a 6.3-inch external screen.
Featuring the Tensor G4 chip and advanced AI capabilities, the Pro Fold surpasses its predecessor and rivals other foldable phones on the market.
With 5x optical zoom, the triple camera system outperforms competitors like Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 6, offering innovative features like “Made You Look” animations.
The Pixel 9 Pro Fold is priced at £1,749 and will be available for shipping in September.
Pixel Watch 3 and Pixel Buds Pro 2
The Pixel Watch 3 and Pixel Buds Pro 2 offer advanced AI technology. Photo: Google
Google also revealed new accessories including the Pixel Watch 3 and Pixel Buds Pro 2. The smartwatch features improved health and fitness tracking, longer battery life, and advanced health monitoring capabilities.
The Pixel Buds Pro 2 offer enhanced noise cancellation and support for Gemini Live, allowing users to interact naturally with their AI assistant.
The Pixel Watch 3 is priced at £349 and the Pixel Buds Pro 2 at £219, set to ship in late September.
aAbout 700 well-heeled Democrats packed San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel on Sunday to see Kamala Harris return to the city for the first time since launching her presidential campaign. The crowd at the fundraiser, where the cheapest tickets cost $3,300 and the highest was $500,000, included tech billionaires, corporate executives, and Silicon Valley venture capitalists who are quick to endorse Vice President Harris in her bid for the White House.
The event, which raised more than $12 million, was the latest in the Harris campaign’s outreach to tech Democrats and an extension of ties to Silicon Valley elites that go back more than a decade.
Harris, a former California attorney general and then senator, has extensive ties to some of the tech industry’s most influential figures and big donors. Her campaign has yet to release detailed policy positions on issues such as tech regulation, but tech executives speculate that her track record suggests she could take a more industry-friendly approach than Joe Biden.
Democrats from the tech industry who have promoted or donated to the Harris campaign include former Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg; LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, who attended the fundraiser in San Francisco; philanthropist Melinda French Gates; IAC Chairman Barry Diller; and Silicon Valley venture capitalist Ron Conway. Laurene Powell Jobs, the billionaire philanthropist and former wife of Apple’s Steve Jobs, is a longtime friend of Harris’ and held a fundraiser for her at her home in 2013. Netflix Chairman Reed Hastings, who publicly called on the president to drop out after his disastrous debate performance, publicly endorsed Harris for the race. Donated $7 million It funded a pro-Harris super PACac within days of her becoming the presumptive nominee.
Some of these donors have come to Harris’ campaign with their own agendas. Most notably, Hoffman and Diller have called for the removal of Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan, whose agency has aggressively regulated big tech companies, angering the industry with lawsuits against companies like Microsoft and Amazon. (Hoffman sits on the Microsoft board of directors.) Targeted of the FTC’s antitrust lawsuit.
That Hoffman and Diller are donating heavily to Harris while also calling for the removal of Khan gives the appearance of billionaire donors trying to sway policy for their own benefit. Hoffman’s denial Harris claims Hoffman’s donations were made in exchange for influence. While she has not yet commented on the donations from Khan or her critics, her campaign hosted him at an organizing event in early August after his attacks on the FTC chairman.
Harris has received public pledges of support from big-name donors as well as hundreds of venture capitalists and technology industry insiders. “VCs For Kamala” website More than 800 signatures were collected from various companies. Bloomberg reported Tech4Kamala’s open letter has garnered more than 1,200 signatures, and the two groups are planning to hold an event later this month.
Trump battles Harris to build new relationships in Silicon Valley
Harris may have more vocal tech advocates than Biden, but the industry has also seen a shift toward conservatism and embrace of far-right ideology, and she faces a host of strong opponents. Last month in San Francisco, venture capitalists David Sachs and Chamath Palihapitiya hosted a fundraiser for Donald Trump that raised about $12 million, while Silicon Valley powerhouses Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz announced plans to make large donations to the former president.
Trump’s running mate, J.D. Vance, also ran his Ohio Senate campaign with roughly $15 million in contributions from tech billionaire Peter Thiel, who was briefly employed by Thiel’s venture capital firm in 2015. Before becoming a senator, Vance worked in Silicon Valley and was connected to a wide network of wealthy conservatives in the tech industry.
Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has openly supported Trump while promoting attacks on Harris and the Democratic Party on his social media platform, X. Last month, Musk shared a deepfake parody video on the platform that showed manipulated footage of Harris saying, “I’m the ultimate diversity hire.” Musk’s Grok chatbot has also Spreading disinformation Harris drew condemnation from Democrats after suggesting she was ineligible to appear on the ballot in some states.
On Monday, Musk spoke with Trump in a more than two-hour interview in which he praised the president and did not refute a variety of falsehoods and baseless election conspiracy theories.
“The Trump campaign is run by self-centered rich people like Elon Musk and Trump himself who have betrayed the middle class and won’t be able to live stream in 2024,” Joseph Costello, a spokesman for the Harris campaign, said in a statement after the interview.
California’s ties to big tech companies
Harris, who served as California’s attorney general and then senator from 2010 to 2020, served during a pivotal period in the rise of Silicon Valley’s largest social networks, including Facebook. Her record on tech legislation and litigation has been praised by regulatory and privacy advocates, but she has also been criticized for not trying to rein in companies that have accumulated monopolies.
Harris, as attorney general, had close ties to the industry, and had been close to Sandberg, who was Facebook’s COO, and had worked on the PR campaign for her memoir, “Lean In.” Sandberg made the maximum legal individual contribution to Sandberg’s 2016 Senate campaign, Emails obtained by HuffPostsent Harris a message two days after the election saying, “Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!! We need your help now,” but Harris did not respond.
aAt first glance, Wanderstop seems to stimulate the same restless urge as many other feel-good games: the desire to escape a stressful life into a secluded wilderness. The game begins with you taking a job as an assistant in a tea shop in the forest, where you spend your days cleaning, tending to the garden, and researching the perfect tea blend to satisfy the needs of visiting customers. Dig a little deeper, however, and you’ll find that the game rips away the hollow rewards of escapist fantasies.
This idyllic setting was born from an idea that game designer Davey Redden had in mind a few months after the game’s release. Beginner’s Guide for 2015He had a recurring daydream about going to a coffee shop in the woods and lying on a bench by the water. He drew various sketches of that scene for several months, before finally deciding that it would be his next game.
“I thought feel-good games would soothe my soul. But I was so wrong” … Wanderstop. Photo: Ivy Road
“I was feeling extremely exhausted,” he says, “like I was trying to summon up some energy within myself to rest and relax. I thought that some feel-good games would soothe a part of me. But it didn’t take long for me to realize that this was completely wrong.”
Making a feel-good game is a marathon of hard work, just like making any other game, and one that’s not made easier by a cute sensibility, but Wreden was also consumed by the same illusion at the heart of the genre: that the satisfaction of completing a series of tasks is the same as solace.
It wasn’t until Carla Zimonja, one of the creators of Gone Home, came on board that Welden realized he was making a seemingly heartwarming game about trauma.[We realized Wanderstop’s] “The characters were really conflicted and in a really bad situation,” he says. “And they’re not going to be magically cured by having tea in the middle of the woods.”
The protagonist, Alta, is at the heart of Wonderstop’s heartwarming fantasy, a character who seeks healing through escapism and the mundane. Once a champion fighter and human weapon, she was sharp and violent. “Her whole life and mind is focused on progressing and achieving future accomplishments,” says Redden. Her time in the arena left her traumatized, and she believes completing the tea shop job will help her heal.
If Alta were a player, she’d be a quintessential min-maxer, figuring out the most efficient way to get the coffee shop’s work done in the shortest time possible. She sweeps her broom as if she were swinging a sword. But without spoiling the story, Ureden makes it clear that running through a checklist of wholesome tasks won’t lead to the solace Alta or her customers are looking for. “A character who offers you a cup of tea and says, ‘Great, well done, thank you for cheering me up. Here’s a token of my appreciation!’ and then just walks away is the last thing we can do,” Ureden says. “I think this place is a place where you can be yourself and not just be yourself.” [challenge] If she doesn’t, the activity won’t have the predictable results that players are accustomed to.”
“WonderStop was created not to shatter the comfort zone of gamers and their escapist fantasies, but to change our understanding of where healing comes from,” he said. “In Studio Ghibli films, [we watch] “This is someone doing chores,” Zimonja says, “sweeping the floor, washing dishes, tidying up. You can see that these ritualistic elements, these ongoing acts of maintenance, are important and meaningful parts of living in the world.”
Through Arta’s story, we learn that tasks are restorative only because of the intrinsic pleasure of performing them, and not, as Redden puts it, “because of the promise of future reward.” As Zimonja adds, “It’s our daily rituals that are the foundation of our lives.”
Charles Darwin observed that dogs exhibit a sense of humor in between their other activities like studying bird beaks or riding giant turtles.
In his work, The Origin of Man, Darwin recounted a dog playing a prank by dropping a stick near its owner, then running off with it when the owner tried to pick it up. Darwin suggested that the dog found this prank amusing.
This scenario is familiar to many dog owners, prompting the question of whether dogs are truly aspiring comedians or if there’s something else going on.
Dogs are descendants of wolves, which are highly social animals that live in packs, leading to dogs also being social creatures by nature.
It is instinctual for dogs to interact with humans and other animals in their group, attempting to elicit a response, whether through a playful bow, a wagging tail, or even attempting to open the fridge for a snack.
Human ancestors began domesticating dogs over 30,000 years ago, and selective breeding has further shaped their behavior, making them more playful and less timid compared to their wolf ancestors.
Dogs essentially remain forever young mentally, displaying a mischievous nature that stems from their lack of mental maturation.
Some dog breeds are more playful than others, with Irish setters and English springer spaniels considered more clumsy while Samoyeds and Chihuahuas are seen as more serious.
During play, dogs may exhibit “play panting” vocalizations and wag their tails, which can help alleviate stress.
This behavior has been described as a “dog laugh,” reflecting the pleasurable experiences that elicit laughter among humans. However, it does not necessarily mean that dogs possess a sense of humor or are intentionally trying to make people laugh.
If dogs engage in playful antics like stealing sticks, it’s likely for fun rather than intentional comedy. Dogs are adept at reading human emotions and social cues, understanding that laughter is positive. Consequently, if stealing a stick leads to laughter, the dog is more likely to repeat the behavior.
While it may seem like dogs are intentionally trying to be funny, they might simply be responding to the joy and reduced stress their actions bring to humans.
In the end, only the dog truly knows if it’s intentionally trying to make us laugh. Until we can communicate with dogs more effectively, the joke may remain on us.
This article is in response to a query from Joseph Bennett of Manchester: Is my dog intentionally trying to make me laugh?
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Charles Darwin observed that dogs possess a sense of humor when not preoccupied with other activities like studying bird beaks or riding giant turtles.
In his work, The Origin of Man, he recounted a dog playing a prank on its owner by dropping a stick and then grabbing it before the owner could. Darwin interpreted this as the dog enjoying the joke.
While many dog owners may have experienced similar antics, the question remains: are dogs truly aspiring comedians or is there a deeper motivation behind their behaviors?
Dogs, being descendants of wolves, are inherently social animals due to their pack-oriented nature. This sociability extends to interactions with humans and other animals within their social group, manifesting in behaviors like playful gestures, wagging tails, and curious exploration.
Human domestication of dogs over millennia, coupled with selective breeding practices, has further molded their behavior to be less timid and more playful. Essentially, dogs retain a puppy-like demeanor throughout their lives, a trait absent in their wolf ancestors.
Various dog breeds exhibit different levels of playfulness, with some like Irish setters and English springer spaniels being known for their exuberant antics, while others like Samoyeds and Chihuahuas seem more reserved.
Dogs also engage in “play panting” vocalizations and tail-wagging to initiate play and reduce stress, behaviors that have been equated to laughter due to their pleasurable nature. However, whether dogs possess a genuine sense of humor remains a topic of debate.
Despite this uncertainty, dogs are adept at interpreting human emotions and behaviors, often engaging in behaviors that evoke positive responses from their owners. So, while it may seem like dogs are purposefully trying to be funny, their actions are likely driven by a desire to elicit a positive reaction.
Ultimately, deciphering a dog’s intentions, especially regarding humor, remains a challenge without the ability to communicate with them directly. Until we bridge this communication gap, the humor in our interactions with dogs may remain a subjective experience.
This article addresses a question posed by Joseph Bennett from Manchester: Is my dog deliberately trying to make me laugh?
If you have any inquiries, please reach out to us via the provided contact information.
Water on Mars may be lurking beneath or even above the planet’s surface.
NASA/JPL/USGS
Mars isn’t as dry as it seems. Billions of years ago, oceans and rivers of liquid water rippled across its surface, but now it appears that all of that liquid has disappeared, leaving behind a dusty barren landscape. But as we explore Mars with probes, landers, rovers, and even distant telescopic images, more and more traces of water are popping up.
Each hint fascinates researchers about how important water is to life and how it could aid future exploration. Water has now been found in various forms all over Mars. Here are five places where water has been found.
1. Buried underground
The InSight lander, visualized here, recently discovered new potential water reservoirs on Mars.
NASA/JPL-California Institute of Technology
Just beneath Mars’ dry surface lies an icy wonderland. These deposits are insulated by an overlying layer of dust, but erosion or meteorite impacts could expose them to the watchful eye of Mars orbiters. A single icy deposit recently identified using data from the Mars Express spacecraft appears to contain enough water to cover the entire Martian surface with an ocean 1.5 to 2.7 meters deep.
It’s not just ice buried under the orange sand. There’s a controversial theory that there’s a huge lake beneath Earth’s Antarctic pole. It could just be wet silt or volcanic rock. But… New Research Using data from the InSight lander, researchers have uncovered the possibility of another reservoir of water near the Martian equator. InSight found this water, buried 11.5 to 20 kilometers underground, by sensing Martian earthquakes and measuring the speed at which seismic waves travel. The results revealed that the rocks through which the earthquakes travel appear to be saturated with water.
2. Frost the pole
Frost in a crater on the North Plains of Mars
NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona
Reaching buried water on Mars will be difficult. For future explorers, the more promising reservoirs are probably exposed on the surface. Mars has ice caps at both poles, just like Earth’s, and we’ve known about them for decades. Many of Mars’ craters also contain small ice sheets inside them, the only places on the Martian surface cold enough to hold ice.
However, at higher latitudes on Mars, the air is cooler and more moist, and temporary frosts can occur. On frigid Martian mornings, volcano peaks are also covered in frost, likely caused by water vapor in the atmosphere freezing.
Deuteron It is believed that atomic nuclei consisting of protons and neutrons, like those of helium-3 nuclei, are formed in collisions between helium-4 nuclei and other nuclei in the interstellar medium. If this were the case, the flux ratio of deuterons to helium-4 should be similar to that of helium-3 to helium-4. However, this is not the case. Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (AMS) are watching.
Aguilar othersThe deuteron flux was measured using the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) on board the International Space Station.
Cosmic rays are high-energy particles with energies ranging from MeV to 10.20 Electronic V.
These properties are studied from measurements of the energy (stiffness) spectrum (number of particles per unit time, solid angle, surface area, and energy as a function of energy), which is characterized by a rapid decrease in the spectrum as the energy increases.
Cosmic rays with energies below PeV are thought to originate in our own Milky Way galaxy.
The elemental composition of these galactic cosmic rays is dominated by hydrogen nuclei, primarily protons, with helium nuclei making up about 10%, and electrons and nuclei heavier than helium making up just 1% each.
The species synthesized in stars, such as protons, electrons, and most atomic nuclei, are called primary cosmic rays.
Light nuclei, synthesized by nuclear fusion in the cores of stars, are more abundant than heavy nuclei because their production becomes energetically unfavorable as mass increases.
The synthesis of atomic nuclei heavier than iron, such as nickel, occurs through explosive phenomena such as supernova explosions that occur at the end of the life of massive stars, so atomic nuclei heavier than iron are extremely rare.
When primary nuclei are ejected from their source in space, they can collide with interstellar material and split into lighter species.
This is the primary production mechanism for atomic nuclei that are energetically unfavorable to produce by stellar nucleosynthesis, such as lithium, beryllium, boron, fluorine, scandium, titanium, and vanadium. These are called secondary cosmic rays.
Compared to primary nuclei of similar mass, secondary nuclei are less abundant and, as stiffness increases, their stiffness spectrum decreases faster than that of primary nuclei.
The energy (or rigidity) dependence of the cosmic ray spectrum arises from a combination of source-directed emission, acceleration, and propagation mechanisms that occur during a cosmic ray's passage through the galaxy.
Cosmic rays are diffusely accelerated by expanding shock waves, propagate diffusely through the interstellar medium, and are scattered by irregularities in the galactic magnetic field, both of which depend on the particle's momentum, and thus on its magnetic stiffness.
Cosmic ray propagation is described by a stiffness-dependent diffusion coefficient that incorporates the properties of turbulence in the galactic magnetic field.
“Hydrogen nuclei are the most abundant species of cosmic ray,” members of the AMS collaboration wrote in the paper.
“They are made up of two stable isotopes: protons and deuterons.”
“Big Bang nucleosynthesis predicts negligible production of deuterium, and over time the abundance of deuterons has decreased from its primordial value, with the ratio of deuterons to protons measured in the interstellar medium being 0.00002.”
“Deuterons are thought to arise primarily from the interaction of helium with interstellar matter, rather than being accelerated in supernova remnants like primary cosmic ray protons and helium-4.”
“Deuterons, along with helium-3, are called secondary cosmic rays.”
For the latest study, AMS physicists examined data from 21 million cosmic deuterons detected by AMS between May 2011 and April 2021.
When investigating how the deuteron flux varies with rigidity, a surprising feature was discovered.
The AMS data show that these ratios differ significantly above a stiffness of 4.5 GV, with the deuteron to helium-4 ratio decreasing more slowly with stiffness than the helium-3 to helium-4 ratio.
Furthermore, and again contrary to expectations, when stiffness exceeds 13 GV, the data show that the flux of deuterons is nearly the same as the flux of protons, the primary cosmic ray.
Simply put, researchers found more deuterons than expected from collisions between main helium-4 nuclei and interstellar matter.
“Measuring deuterons is very challenging due to the large cosmic proton background radiation,” said Dr Samuel Ting, spokesman for the AMS collaboration.
“Our unexpected results show how little we know about cosmic rays.”
“Future upgrades to AMS will increase the acceptance rate by 300 percent, enabling AMS to measure all charged cosmic rays with 1 percent accuracy, providing the experimental basis for the development of accurate cosmic ray theory.”
The team's paper was published in the journal Physics Review Letter.
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M. Aguilar others(AMS Collaboration). 2024. Properties of cosmic deuterons measured with the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. Physiotherapy Rev Lett 132(26):261001;doi:10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.261001
Chloride deposits are indicators of the presence of water on early Mars and have important implications for understanding the Martian climate and habitability. Color and Stereo Surface Imaging Systems Using the spacecraft (CaSSIS) aboard the European Space Agency's (ESA) Mars Trace Gases Explorer (TGO), planetary researchers conducted a planet-wide search for chloride-bearing deposits in Terra Sirenum and other parts of Mars.
This CaSSIS/TGO image shows chloride-bearing deposits (purple-colored scaly waves) in Terra Sirenum on Mars. Image credit: ESA/TGO/CaSSIS.
“Mars is currently a desert world, but around 3.5 billion years ago it was covered by rivers, lakes and possibly oceans,” said University of Bern researcher Valentin Bickel and his colleagues.
“The Cold Period began as Mars lost its magnetic field, could no longer retain its atmosphere, and water evaporated, froze, or became trapped within the surface.”
“Over time, the water disappeared, leaving behind mineral fingerprints on the surface.”
In this study, the researchers used neural networks to map potential chloride-bearing deposits in CaSSIS images across a large portion of Mars.
They identified a total of 965 potential chloride deposits ranging from 300 to 3,000 metres in diameter.
“These salt deposits probably formed from shallow pools or brines that evaporated in the sun,” the scientists said.
“Similar methods are used in saltwater pools on Earth to produce salt for human consumption.”
“Highly salty water could be a haven for life and an indicator of habitable parts of Mars,” the researchers added.
“Due to the high salinity, the water remains liquid even at minus 40 degrees.”
“The presence of chloride deposits, pictured above, and their direct association with liquid water, make areas like Terra Sirenum good targets for future robotic missions to search for signs of life.”
“While chloride-bearing terrains are not noticeable in regular black-and-white images, they show up as a distinct purple color in color infrared images, making CaSSIS a unique tool for studying the distribution of salts across Mars.”
“Our paper contains never-before-seen data that will help us better understand the distribution of water on Mars' distant past,” they said.
“TGO continues to image Mars from orbit to understand the planet's ancient past and potential habitability.”
“Not only will the spacecraft send back stunning images, it will also provide the best inventory of atmospheric gases and map water-rich areas on the planet's surface.”
“Understanding the history of water on Mars and whether it once allowed life to thrive is at the heart of ESA's ExoMars mission.”
Team paper Featured in this month's journal Scientific Data.
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VT Bickel others2024. Global dataset of potential chloride deposits on Mars identified by TGO CaSSIS. Scientific Data 11,845;doi: 10.1038/s41597-024-03685-3
Using new data about the Martian crust collected by NASA’s InSight spacecraft, geophysicists from the University of California, San Diego and the University of California, Berkeley estimate that groundwater could cover the entire planet to a depth of one to two kilometers. Groundwater exists in tiny cracks and pores in rocks in the mid-crust, 11.5 to 20 kilometers below the surface.
A cross section of NASA’s InSight lander and the data it collected. Image courtesy of James Tuttle Keane / Aaron Rodriquez.
“Liquid water existed at least occasionally in Martian rivers, lakes, oceans, and aquifers during the Noachian and Hesperian periods more than 3 billion years ago,” said Dr Vashan Wright of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, and his colleagues.
“During this time, Mars lost most of its atmosphere and therefore the ability to support liquid water on its surface for any sustained period of time.”
“Ancient surface water may have been incorporated into minerals, buried as ice, trapped as liquid in deep aquifers, or lost to space.”
For the study, Dr Wright and his colleagues used data collected by InSight during its four-year mission, which ends in 2022.
The lander collected information from the surface directly beneath it about variables such as the speed of Mars’ seismic waves, which allowed scientists to infer what materials exist beneath the surface.
The data was fed into a model based on mathematical theories of rock physics.
Based on this data, the researchers determined that the presence of liquid water in the Earth’s crust was the most plausible explanation.
“If we prove that there is a large reservoir of liquid water, it could give us insight into what the climate was or could be like at that time,” said Professor Michael Manga of the University of California, Berkeley.
“And water is essential for life as we know it. I don’t see why underground reservoirs wouldn’t be habitable environments. On Earth they certainly are. There is life in deep mines, there is life at the bottom of the ocean.”
“We still don’t have evidence of life on Mars, but we’ve identified places that could, at least in principle, support life.”
“A wealth of evidence, including rivers, deltas, lake deposits, and hydrologically altered rocks, supports the hypothesis that water once flowed on the planet’s surface.”
“But that wet period ended more than 3 billion years ago, when Mars lost its atmosphere.”
“Planetary scientists on Earth have sent many probes and landers to Mars to learn what happened to the Martian water (water frozen in the Martian polar ice caps does not explain the whole story), when this happened, and whether life exists or ever existed on Mars,” the authors said.
“The new findings indicate that much of the water has seeped into the crust rather than escaping into space.”
“The new paper analyzes the deeper crust and concludes that the available data are best explained by a water-saturated mid-crust beneath the InSight location.”
“Assuming the crust is similar across the planet, this mid-crustal zone should contain more water than would have filled the hypothetical ancient Martian ocean.”
of Survey results Appears in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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Vashan Wright others2024. Liquid water exists in the central crust of Mars. PNAS 121 (35): e2409983121; doi: 10.1073/pnas.2409983121
ChatGPT and other large-scale language models (LLMs) consist of billions of parameters, are pre-trained on large web-scale corpora, and are claimed to be able to acquire certain features without any special training. These features, known as emergent capabilities, have fueled debates about the promise and peril of language models. Their new paperUniversity of Bath researcher Harish Tayyar Madhavshi and his colleagues present a new theory to explain emergent abilities, taking into account potential confounding factors, and rigorously validate this theory through over 1,000 experiments. Their findings suggest that so-called emergent abilities are not in fact emergent, but rather result from a combination of contextual learning, model memory, and linguistic knowledge.
Lou othersThis suggests that large language models like ChatGPT cannot learn independently or acquire new skills.
“The common perception that this type of AI is a threat to humanity is both preventing the widespread adoption and development of this technology and distracting from the real problems that need our attention,” said Dr Tayyar Madhavshi.
Dr. Tayyar Madabhushi and his colleagues carried out experiments to test LLM's ability to complete tasks that the model had not encountered before – so-called emergent capabilities.
As an example, LLMs can answer questions about social situations without being explicitly trained or programmed to do so.
While previous research has suggested that this is a product of the model's 'knowing' the social situation, the researchers show that this is actually a result of the model using a well-known ability of LLMs to complete a task based on a few examples that it is presented with – so-called 'in-context learning' (ICL).
Across thousands of experiments, the researchers demonstrated that a combination of LLMs' ability to follow instructions, memory, and language abilities explains both the capabilities and limitations they exhibit.
“There is a concern that as models get larger and larger, they will be able to solve new problems that we currently cannot predict, and as a result these large models may gain dangerous capabilities such as reasoning and planning,” Dr Tayyar Madabhshi said.
“This has generated a lot of debate – for example we were asked to comment at last year's AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park – but our research shows that fears that the models will go off and do something totally unexpected, innovative and potentially dangerous are unfounded.”
“Concerns about the existential threat posed by the LLM are not limited to non-specialists but have been expressed by some of the leading AI researchers around the world.”
However, Dr Tayyar Madabushi and his co-authors argue that this concern is unfounded as tests show that LLMs lack complex reasoning skills.
“While it is important to address existing potential misuse of AI, such as the creation of fake news and increased risk of fraud, it would be premature to enact regulations based on perceived existential threats,” Dr Tayyar Madabhsi said.
“The point is, it is likely a mistake for end users to rely on LLMs to interpret and perform complex tasks that require complex reasoning without explicit instructions.”
“Instead, users are likely to benefit from being explicitly told what they want the model to do, and from providing examples, where possible, for all but the simplest tasks.”
“Our findings do not mean that AI is not a threat at all,” said Professor Irina Gurevich of Darmstadt University of Technology.
“Rather, the emergence of threat-specific complex thinking skills is not supported by the evidence, and we show that the learning process in LLMs can ultimately be quite well controlled.”
“Future research should therefore focus on other risks posed by the model, such as the possibility that it could be used to generate fake news.”
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Shen Lu others. 2024. Is emergent capability in large-scale language models just in-context learning? arXiv: 2309.01809
In the UK, the NHS recommends 6 to 8 cupsThe Harvard Medical School recommends drinking 1.2 liters of fluid per day, and points out that you should also get some fluid from the food you eat. 4-6 cups per dayBut it's the more extreme advice – drinking two litres of water a day – that has taken off online.
In 2016, the idea that getting most of your hydration from water is beneficial was debunked by Dr Stuart Galloway, an associate professor of physiology, kinesiology, and nutrition at the University of Stirling. His research showed that a range of drinks, including diuretic drinks such as lager and instant coffee, It did not promote additional fluid loss compared to drinking normal amounts of water..
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But because everyone has a different body type, diet, and activity level, and different environments (hot, dry, humid, etc.), it's impossible to really say how much everyone needs to drink. Most people can tell if they need more water by feeling thirsty, but this desire weakens as we age. If in doubt, for the majority of adults, the number of times you go to the bathroom can be a useful indicator of adequate hydration, says Galloway.
“It takes into account differences in fluid loss due to environment and activity level, as well as changes in fluid intake. A good rule of thumb is that if your fluid intake is adequate, you'll be going to the bathroom four to six times in a typical day.”
If you're peeing more than six times, you're overdoing it, if you're peeing less than four times, you probably need to drink more water.
“This method has some drawbacks, including influences such as changes in kidney function with age, certain medications, or ingredients in different drinks that can affect urine concentration and volume,” he warns. “So this is a rough rule of thumb rather than a precise guide.”
Urine color can also be helpful, he says, with a similar caveat: “For best results, don't rely on a single marker, but evaluate them in combination.”
About our expert, Dr Stuart Galloway
Dr Galloway is Professor of Exercise Physiology at the University of Stirling. He is also Group Leader of the University's Physiology, Exercise and Nutrition Research Group and has published over 90 peer-reviewed research articles, review articles, and book chapters. His research focuses on human nutrition and exercise metabolism, and fluid and electrolyte balance.
TThe current social media trend is familiar, with self-absorbed individuals posting excessively on the platforms they dominate, a scenario we’ve seen play out in the past. Donald Trump’s incendiary tweets post-election loss resulted in the Capitol siege on January 6, 2021. Following this, the then-president was banned from Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and even Pinterest, disappointing those aiming to emulate the Mar-a-Lago style on their mood boards.
The situation is likely to evolve differently this time, especially with social media provocateur Elon Musk at the helm of the platform he utilizes.
During Trump’s tenure, I was stationed at Twitter as its highest-ranking official outside the U.S. Over my eight-year tenure, it became apparent that there was a disparity in the interpretation of free speech between the UK and the U.S., with the latter often championing a libertarian outlook on the concept.
As the UK subsidiary of an American entity, we witnessed a daily fervent defense of free speech. Twitter’s founding legal advisor, Alex MacGillivray, famously dubbed the company as “the free speech wing of the free speech party.” While the U.S. often assumes its freedoms are unique, the UK’s Human Rights Act of 1998 guarantees freedom of speech while also acknowledging its responsibility, stressing that it should not be used to incite criminal activities or spread hatred.
For American tech firms, the interpretation of “free speech” varies. During my tenure at Twitter under a more enlightened leadership, the UK team quickly realized that the Silicon Valley notion of “free speech” wasn’t always geared towards fostering an ideal world. Instead, it often allowed certain groups to target marginalized sections of society, such as women, the LGBTQ+ community, and ethnic minorities, with impunity, detracting from the platform’s original enjoyable nature.
Working within the UK office felt akin to operating within a parliamentary system devoid of a written constitution, relying more on external expectations to shape the organization’s direction.
Efforts to brand “free speech” as a philosophical conviction notwithstanding, its appeal to tech companies is primarily economic. As journalist Kara Swisher notes, Silicon Valley’s approach is more profit-driven than principle-based, evidenced by the support for Trump within San Francisco’s venture capital realm. Holding tech oligarchs accountable for their platforms’ content is feasible and necessary.
Considerations around Musk’s tweets often offer insights into his actions. For instance, his posts on social media platforms like Instagram highlight his late-night musings, providing clues about his mindset and geographic location. Musk’s propensity for controversial posts and real-world ramifications underscores the need for accountability on social media platforms.
The discussion centers on whether billionaire oligarchs like Musk should be allowed to influence societal discourse unchecked. Calls for regulation and accountability in the social media landscape are imperative to address the challenges posed by influential figures like Musk.
Bruce Daisley served as Twitter’s vice president for Europe, Middle East, and Africa from 2012 to 2020.
If you have any comments on the topics discussed in this article and wish to submit a response of up to 300 words for publication in our Letters section, please click here.
What actions can the UK government take regarding Twitter? Should What are your thoughts on Twitter? What interests does Elon Musk have?
The billionaire proprietor of the social network, still officially referred to as X, has had an eventful week causing disruptions on his platform. Besides his own posts, which include low-quality memes sourced from 8chan and reposted fake concerns from far-right figures, the platform as a whole, along with the other two of the three “T’s,” TikTok and Telegram, briefly played a significant role in orchestrating this chaos.
There is a consensus that action needs to be taken: Bruce Daisley, former VP EMEA at Twitter, proposes individual accountability.
In the near term, Musk and other executives should be reminded of their legal liability for their actions under current laws. The UK’s Online Safety Act 2023 should be promptly bolstered. Prime Minister Keir Starmer and his team should carefully consider if Ofcom, the media regulator frequently criticized for the conduct of organizations like GB News, can effectively manage the rapid behavior of someone like Musk. In my view, the threat of personal consequences is much more impactful on corporate executives than the prospect of a corporate fine. If Musk continues to incite unrest, an arrest warrant could create sparks from his fingertips, though as a jet-setting personality, an arrest warrant could be a compelling deterrent.
Last week, London Mayor Sadiq Khan presented his own suggestion.
“The government swiftly realized the need to reform the online safety law,” Khan told the Guardian in an interview. “I believe that the government must ensure that this law is suitable immediately. I don’t think it currently is.”
“Responsible social media platforms can take action,” Khan remarked, but added that “if they fail to address their own issues, regulation will be enforced.”
When I spoke to Euan McGaughey, a law professor at King’s College London on Monday, he provided more precise recommendations on what actions the government could take. He mentioned that the Communications Act 2003 underlies many of Ofcom’s authorities and is applied to regulate broadcast television and radio, but extends beyond those media.
Simply as section 232 specifies that “television licensable content services” involve distribution “by any means involving the use of an electronic communications network,” this Act empowers Ofcom to regulate online media content. While Ofcom could exercise this power, it is highly improbable as Ofcom anticipates challenges from tech companies, including those fueling riots and conspiracy theories.
Even if the BBC or the government were reluctant to interpret the old law differently, minor modifications could subject Twitter to stricter broadcasting regulatory oversight, he added.
For instance, there is no distinction between Elon Musk posting a video on X about (so-called) two-tier policing, discussing “detention camps” or asserting “civil war is inevitable” and ITV, Sky, or the BBC broadcasting the news… Online Safety Act Grossly insufficient, as the constraints merely aim to prevent “illegal” content and do not inherently address false or dangerous speech.
The law of keeping promises
Police in Middlesbrough responded to a mob spurred by social media posts this month. Photo: Gary Culton/Observer
It may seem peculiar to feel sympathy for an inanimate object, but the Online Safety Act has likely been treated quite harshly given its minimal enforcement. A comprehensive law encompassing over 200 individual clauses, it was enacted in 2023, but most of its modifications will only take effect once Ofcom has completed the extensive consultation process and established a code of practice.
The law introduces a few new offenses, such as bans on cyber-flashing and upskirt photography. Sections of the old law, referred to as malicious communications, have been substituted with new, more precise laws like threatening and false communications, with two of the new offenses going into effect for the first time this week.
But what if this had all happened earlier and Ofcom was operational? Would the outcome have been different?
The Online Safety Act is a peculiar piece of legislation: an effort to curb the worst impulses on the internet, drafted by a government taking a stance in favor of free speech amidst a growing culture war and enforced by regulators staunchly unwilling to pass judgment on individual social media posts.
What transpired was either a skillful act of navigating a tricky situation or a clumsy mishap, depending on who you ask. The Online Safety Act does not outright criminalize everything on the web; instead, it mandates social media companies to establish specific codes of conduct and consistently enforce them. For certain forms of harm like incitement to self-harm, racism, and racial hatred, major services must at least provide adults with the option to opt out of such content and completely block it from children. For illegal content ranging from child abuse imagery to threats and false communications, it requires new risk assessments to aid companies in proactively addressing these issues.
It’s understandable why this legislation faced significant backlash upon its passage: its main consequence was a mountain of new paperwork in which social networks had to demonstrate adherence to what they had always purportedly done: attempting to mitigate racist abuse, addressing child abuse imagery, enforcing their terms of use, and so forth.
Advocates of the law argue that it serves more as a means for Ofcom to impose its promises on companies rather than forcing them to alter their behavior. The easiest way to impose a penalty under the Online Safety Act – potentially amounting to 10% of global turnover if modeled after GDPR – is to announce loudly to customers that steps are being taken to tackle issues on the platform, only to do nothing.
One could envision a scenario where the CEO of a tech company, the key antagonist in this play, stands before an inquiry, solemnly asserting that the reprehensible behavior they witness violates their terms of service, then returning to their office and taking no action.
The challenge for Ofcom lies in the fact that multinational social networks are not governed by cartoonish villains who flout legal departments, defy moderators, and whimsically enforce one set of terms of service on allies and a different one on adversaries.
Except for one.
Do as I say, don’t do as I do
Elon Musk’s Twitter has emerged as a prime test case for online safety laws. On the surface, the social network appears relatively ordinary: its terms of service prohibit the dissemination of much of the same content as other major networks, with a slightly more lenient stance on pornographic material. Twitter maintains a moderation team that employs both automated and human moderation to remove objectionable content, an appeals process for individuals alleging unfair treatment, and progressive penalties that could ultimately lead to account suspensions for violations.
However, there’s an additional layer to how Twitter operates: Elon Musk follows through on what he says. For instance, last summer, after a prominent right-wing influencer shared child abuse images, the account’s creator received a 129-year prison sentence. The motive remains unclear, but the account was swiftly suspended. Musk then intervened:
The only people who have seen these photos are members of the CSE team. At this time, we will remove these posts and reinstate your account.
While Twitter’s terms of service theoretically prohibit many of the egregious posts related to the UK riots, such as “hateful conduct” and “inciting, glorifying, or expressing a desire for violence,” they do not seem to be consistently enforced. This is where Ofcom may potentially take aggressive actions against Musk and his affiliated companies.
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and othersLast spring, one of my favorite brand tie-ins of 2023 came when cosmetics giant Lush teamed up with Nintendo to create a range of products based on Super Mario. It was a riot of brightly coloured shower gels and super sweet fragrances, including an amazing Princess Peach body spray that I still wear because I don’t give a damn about gender-based perfume norms.
Rush has released a new video game series. Celebrating Minecraft’s 15th AnniversaryThere are 12 items in the collection, including a TNT block, the most literal bath bomb Lush has ever made, as well as grass and lava blocks, a creeper head shower bomb, and a diamond pickaxe bubble bar, which is pretty heavy despite its small size.
The collection is the result of a year-long collaboration with game developer Mojang, and has been a popular project among the company’s employees. Melody Morton, creative director at Lush Concepts, is a frequent player, but she’s not the only one. “We have a lot of Minecraft players within the company, so we had a lot of input and resources to draw from in terms of product, creative, and messaging,” says Kareem Brinkworth, creative lead on the Lush collaboration team.
How much you want to try these will depend on your love of the game, and Lush’s famously rather strong scents. “Choosing the scent for a product is often the last part of putting everything together, so we all have fun with this part,” says Brinkworth. “Some items had a clear and obvious scent direction. For example, the Glass Block Bath Bomb needed to smell clean, fresh and green – just like grass. We developed a freshly cut grass scent a while back, so this combination was in the cards from the start.”
Brinkworth says some of the other items required trial and error with multiple scents. “We look at the color of the bath bomb and the properties of the item to determine the overall feeling we want to evoke, and that often leads to the perfectly matched scent.” The TNT bath bomb is an explosion of ylang-ylang and jasmine that paints your bath a vibrant red, like you’re immersed in a hippie horror movie. In contrast, Creeper Block has a delicate lemongrass scent that belies the creature’s sinister role in the game. Totem of Undying is a soap made with Brazilian orange and bergamot oils that some people might find off-putting, but as someone who likes to smell like fruit salad chews, I love it.
But what’s really cool about this collection is the way it thinks about form factor: Most of the pieces are cube-shaped, so you can stack them up next to your bath.You can also hit them with an axe. The Lush Bath Bombs add-on for Minecraft: Bedrock Edition is also available to download for free from the Minecraft Marketplace, which allows you to create your own bath bombs to use in the game. I found this really useful a few years ago when I was trying to give my Minecraft-obsessed young sons a bath. For any other desperate parents out there, remember that if you have kids who want to smell like a creeper or the Ender Dragon, you’ll need to hurry up and buy one, as the set will only be available until the end of August.
More than a quarter of the world’s women, which is over one billion women, are in need of contraception, as reported by a 2021 global organization report. Source.
Thankfully, there are numerous options available for women seeking contraception. With over 13 different methods of birth control and more than 200 different brands of birth control pills worldwide, women have a variety of choices. The majority of birth control methods in use today are hormonal, including birth control pills, implants, and intrauterine devices.
Women use contraception for various reasons beyond preventing pregnancy. Some reasons include managing painful or heavy periods, irregular periods, and acne.
Each woman’s contraceptive needs are unique, and variables such as ethnicity, postpartum status, menopausal stage, or other medications can further complicate the selection process.
On average, women try 3.4 different contraceptive methods during their lifetime, according to a US study. Study reference.
The most common issue faced by women using hormonal contraceptives is the side effects, which can be severe and lead to discontinuation of the pills. Side effects may include migraines, blood clots, irregular bleeding, nausea, and mood changes.
Choosing the right birth control method can take years due to the changing hormonal states in a woman’s body throughout life stages. Personalized medicine could provide a solution by customizing contraceptives to individual needs based on genetics and other factors.
read more:
In a groundbreaking study, researchers at the Yale School of Medicine identified genetic variations that affect the efficacy and side effects of hormonal contraception. Genetic mutations, such as the CYP3A7 gene mutation, can impact the metabolism of contraceptive hormones, leading to contraceptive failure in some women.
Another study by the same research team found that genetic mutations in the ESR1 gene may contribute to weight gain associated with using contraceptive implants.
Understanding these genetic factors could pave the way for personalized medicine in women’s health, reducing side effects and enhancing satisfaction with contraception.
Further research and large-scale studies are needed to unlock the full potential of personalized medicine in women’s health and ensure optimal healthcare delivery to women.
HHow do you follow up on a game that made the world cry? It’s a question that’s vexed writer Graham Parks since his 2021 BAFTA-winning Before Your Eyes. Released during the height of lockdown, Parks’ webcam-controlled story uses the player’s blinks to fast-forward through protagonist Benny’s memories, blinking through each uplifting and heartbreaking moment of his existence. It quickly gained a reputation as Twitch’s tearjerker, its moving story and the misery of the pandemic’s last few months creating a perfect, tissue-paper-shredding storm. “As a writer, it was definitely a scary thing,” Parks says. “I’m interested in using games to tell concise, emotional stories, but I can’t say they’re going to make you cry every time.”
Still, tears or no tears, things are already looking pretty promising for Goodnight Universe, an intriguing sequel to Before Your Eyes. Developed by Nice Dream, an all-new studio founded by creators Graham Parks and Oliver Lewin, Goodnight Universe has already won the 2024 Game of the Year award at the TriBeCa Film Festival, beating out the excellent Thank Goodness You’re Here!
So moving…Goodnight universe Photo: Nice Dream
What’s the premise of Goodnight Universe? “It’s a game where you play as a baby with psychic powers,” Parks says with a coy laugh. Using a webcam or a VR headset, players step inside the tiny body of baby Isaac, who begins to develop mysterious abilities. The slithering psychic must grasp his rapidly blossoming new powers and use his eyes to bend the vast world around him to his will – preferably without scaring Isaac’s poor parents, Parker explains.
“Before Your Eyes was a game about disempowering the player,” Parks says, “but we always felt that mechanics like blinking and eye tracking could also be used to empower the player and give them a sense of magic.”
Second grade angst…Goodnight universe. Photo: Nice Dream
Sounding more like Boss Baby than indie darling, Goodnight Universe’s storyline was definitely a tonal shift, and one that took the team a while to realise. “We had been anxious about the second album for a really long time,” Parks says. “We even had to make a rule in ideation sessions that we couldn’t even talk about ‘Before Your Eyes’.”
Luckily, inspiration struck from a new face in the room. “Our lead designer, Bella, had just had her first child,” says Parks. “She started coming into meetings and was at an age where you’d sit down and she’d just stare at one thing for an hour and you’d forget she was there. We’d become known as people who make games that don’t move around a lot… I noticed her quietly staring at me, and that was my ‘Oh, noooo!’ moment.” Goodnight Universe was born.
From kinetically changing TV channels to sending wooden blocks flying, Goodnight Universe takes players on Isaac’s strange but heartwarming journey to understand his powers, be accepted by his family, and avoid being kidnapped by a shady tech company. The diaper-clad protagonist is voiced by Top Gun Maverick’s Lewis Pullman, and the supporting cast includes actors from TV shows like Veep, Barry, and The Daily Show, and the LA studio cleverly takes advantage of its proximity to Hollywood.
“Many indies [the union] “Some actors only do film or TV,” adds the game’s director and composer Oliver Lewin, “but the truth is, these actors are really excited about this.”
Thanks to its BAFTA win, Before Your Eyes has transcended its webcam origins, making its way to PlayStation VR2 and joining Netflix’s steadily growing library of mobile games. But while you can play Goodnight Universe in VR and turn off face tracking, for Lewin, the game’s story is still tied to the humble webcam. “For us, the face-tracking technology is there to enhance immersion,” Lewin says. [few] Developers are researching this…There’s a lot you can do with just a simple webcam, and everyone has one.”
“Our game is, in many ways, a playable movie,” Parks adds. “I think what motivates us more than any exciting controls is how we can use this medium to tell a story in an interesting and unique way.”
In a medium that revolves around slaying dragons, crushing demons and embarking on intergalactic power fantasies, there’s something fresh and quaint about Goodnight Universe, but after shedding a fair few tears over Before Your Eyes, if anyone can do justice to this strange premise, it’s the quirky LA Art Games collective.
Binary asteroid systems have attracted the attention of the scientific community due to their intriguing properties and significant impact on our understanding of the Solar System. Unlike single asteroids, binary systems provide unique insights into many fundamental processes, including planetary formation and evolution, collision dynamics, and gravitational interactions.
Gaia has discovered possible moons around 352 asteroids that are not known to have companion stars. Image courtesy of ESA.
Asteroids are fascinating celestial objects that hold unique insights into the formation and evolution of our solar system.
Binary stars are even more fascinating because they allow astronomers to study how different objects in the universe form, collide, and interact.
With our unique all-sky scanning function, ESA's Gaia satellite Since its launch in 2013, it has made a number of important asteroid discoveries.
In Data Release 3, Gaia pinpointed the positions and movements of more than 150,000 asteroids. That precision has allowed scientists to probe deeper, looking for asteroids that exhibit a characteristic “wobble” caused by the gravitational pull of their orbiting companion stars.
Gaia has also collected data on the asteroid's chemistry, compiling the largest ever collection of asteroid reflectance spectra – light curves that reveal an object's color and composition.
More than 150,000 orbits determined in Gaia's Data Release 3 were refined as part of the mission's Focused Product Release last year, making them 20 times more accurate.
Gaia's upcoming Data Release 4 (due after mid-2026) is expected to reveal the orbits of even more asteroids.
“Binary asteroids are difficult to find because most are very small and far away from Earth,” said Dr Luana Liberato, an astronomer at the Observatory of the Côte d'Azur.
“Although just under one in six asteroids are predicted to have companion stars, only half a billion of the one million known asteroids have been found to be in binary systems.”
“But this discovery shows that there are many more asteroid moons still waiting to be discovered.”
“If confirmed, this new discovery adds 352 potential binary systems, nearly doubling the known number of moon-bearing asteroids.”
“Gaia is proving to be an excellent asteroid explorer, working hard to unlock the secrets of the universe, both within our solar system and beyond,” said Dr Timo Prusti, ESA's Gaia project scientist.
“This discovery highlights the Gaia data release as a major improvement in data quality and demonstrates the incredible new science made possible by this mission.”
a paper A paper describing the results has been published in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics.
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L. Liberato others2024. Binary asteroid candidate in the Gaia DR3 astronomical measurements. A&A 688, A50;doi: 10.1051/0004-6361/202349122
This article was based on an original release from ESA.
NASA has released a stunning new image of the active center of nearby spiral galaxy Messier 106, taken with the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope.
This Webb image shows Messier 106, a spiral galaxy 20 million light-years away in the constellation Canes Venatici. Image courtesy of NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb / J. Glenn.
Located more than 20 million light years from Earth in the small northern constellation Canes Venatici, Messier 106 is one of the brightest spiral galaxies and closest to our Milky Way Galaxy.
Also known as M106 or NGC 4258, the galaxy was discovered in 1781 by Charles Messier's observational assistant, Pierre Méchain.
“Despite its name, Messier 106 was neither discovered nor catalogued by the famous 18th century astronomer Charles Messier,” astronomers Webb said in a statement.
“This galaxy was discovered by his assistant Pierre Méchain, but was not catalogued during his lifetime.”
“Messier 106, along with six other objects they discovered but did not record, Messier Catalogue In the 20th century.”
Messier 106 is similar in size and brightness to our galactic neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy.
Messier 106 measures more than 130,000 light-years from end to end, but because of its great distance from the Milky Way galaxy, it appears very small from Earth's perspective.
At the center of Messier 106 lies an extremely active supermassive black hole with a mass about 40 million times that of the Sun.
Unlike the black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy, which only occasionally sucks in gas particles, Messier 106's black hole is actively consuming material.
“As the gas spirals toward Messier 106's black hole, it heats up and emits powerful radiation,” the astronomers said.
“The observations were made as part of a dedicated program to study active galactic nuclei – luminous central regions of galaxies dominated by light emitted by dust and gas falling into a black hole,” the researchers said.
“The blue areas in this image reflect the distribution of stars throughout the central region of the galaxy.”
“Orange areas indicate warmer dust, while more intense reds represent cooler dust.”
“The blue-green, green and yellow tones near the center of the image represent the various gas distributions across the region.”
Messier 106 also has a notable feature: it has two “unusual” extra arms that are visible in radio and x-ray wavelengths, rather than visible light.
“Unlike normal arms, these are made up of hot gas rather than stars,” the scientists said.
“Astronomers think these extra arms are the result of black hole activity, a feedback effect that has been seen in other galaxies.”
“These could be caused by outflows of material produced by the violent churning of gas around the black hole, creating a phenomenon similar to waves rushing out of the ocean when they hit rocks near the shore.”
Just as the much-anticipated conversation between Donald Trump and Elon Musk was set to begin, users of X (formerly Twitter) were met with a message stating, “This space is no longer available.”
X’s livestreaming audio feature, Spaces, was supposed to host the conversation, but technical difficulties prevented it from working. Clicking on a link to Trump’s inactive account, @RealDonaldTrump, caused the site to freeze and become unusable, leading to complaints from users about being unable to join and browsers crashing.
Musk, the owner of X, posted that it seemed the platform had been hit with a massive DDOS attack. However, the rest of X seemed to be functioning without issues.
The interview was scheduled for 8pm ET, but due to resolving technical problems, Musk announced a 30-minute delay. Eventually, users were able to join the broadcast by clicking a link.
When the hold music on X stopped at 8:30 p.m. ET, a rustling sound could be heard from Trump’s microphone, leading to 10 minutes of silence before the interview finally began. X showed a high listener count of over 1 million as the interview progressed.
Musk mentioned that the DDOS attack had been mostly overcome, stating, “There is strong opposition to listening to President Trump, as evidenced by this massive attack.”
Trump expressed satisfaction with the incident, calling it an honor alongside millions of others.
This mishap is particularly damaging for X’s image as a tech innovator and a reliable advertising platform. The company recently filed a lawsuit against major advertisers for monopolistic practices.
Despite some challenges, Musk continues to position X as a platform at the forefront of politics and free speech.
The new biomaterial, called C-ELM, incorporates live cyanobacteria in translucent panels that can be attached to the interior walls of buildings. The microbes embedded in these panels grow through photosynthesis, absorbing carbon dioxide from the air and attaching it to calcium through a biomineralization process to produce calcium carbonate, which traps carbon.
C-ELM is Camptonema Animal Cyanobacteria extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Image courtesy of Prantar Tamuli.
One kilogram of C-ELM (cyanobacterial engineered biomaterial) can capture and sequester up to 350 grams of carbon dioxide, while the same amount of traditional concrete releases as much as 500 grams of carbon dioxide.
A 150-square-metre wall covered with these C-ELM panels will trap around one tonne of carbon dioxide.
“By developing C-ELM materials, my goal is to transform the construction of future human settlements from one of the largest carbon emitting activities into one of the largest carbon sequestration activities,” said Planter Tamri, a graduate student at University College London.
“I was inspired to develop this material through my study of stromatolites – natural stone structures that formed over millions of years from sediments trapped by algal mats, the oldest living organisms on Earth.”
Tamri et al. Camptonema AnimalA type of photosynthetic cyanobacteria, it grows in long filamentous structures that help attach the microbes to the surrounding material within the panel.
The calcium carbonate produced by the cyanobacteria helps strengthen the panels.
The panels themselves are designed to provide a variety of aesthetic and structural benefits to buildings.
It is lightweight, sound absorbing, translucent enough to let light through, and has insulating properties, making buildings more energy efficient.
The first such panel was unveiled at an exhibition in the “Bioscope” pavilion at St. Andrews Botanic Garden in Scotland.
Designed by design collective Studio Biocene, the exhibit showcased low-carbon, low-impact building methods that mimic the natural environment.
“The potential of this type of biomaterial is enormous,” said Professor Marcos Cruz, from University College London.
“If mass-produced and widely adopted, it has the potential to dramatically reduce the construction industry's carbon footprint.”
“We hope to scale up the production of this C-ELM and further optimize its performance to make it suitable for use on construction sites.”
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This article is a version of a press release provided by University College London.
Marine Life a small genus of seabird OceanidaeThis includes all of the small petrels in the Southern Hemisphere.
“The family Oceanidae consists of petrels with a phylogeographic origin in the Southern Hemisphere, and the genus contains 10 species. Marine Life, Garodia, Pelagodroma, Freguettaand Nesofregetta,” paleontologist Gerardo Norambuena of the University of Santo Tomas and his colleagues said.
“The marine distribution of this family includes tropical, temperate, sub-Antarctic and Antarctic oceans of the Southern Hemisphere, as well as temperate waters of the North Atlantic.”
“The family was once considered a subfamily of the Hydrobatidae, although scientists had long ago suggested, based on osteological and myological analyses, that Oceanidae species should not be grouped with other petrels.”
“Recent molecular phylogenetic studies have confirmed that the family Oceanitiidae is not the sister lineage of the family Hydrobatidae. However, the systematics of Oceanitiidae, especially within the genus, remain unclear. Marine Life.”
“Currently, this genus Marine Life It consists of three species: Oceanitas oceanica, Oceanitis gracilisand Oceanites pinkoyaeHowever, the taxonomic status of subspecies (and some species) remains under debate.”
In a new study, the researchers Oceanitas oceanica The species complex is formed under the hypothesis that it corresponds to multiple species.
They analyzed new mitochondrial sequence data and morphological measurements of all species and subspecies. Marine LifeThis includes a mysterious new species discovered in the Chilean Andes.
“When I think about that Oceanites “Because birds have such conservative plumage variation and cryptic colours, breeding distributions may be the best way to understand the distribution of each taxon,” the researchers said.
“The new species, Oceanites BarocciIn central Chile, Oceanitis gracilis To the North Oceanites pinkoyae To the south, far from its known breeding range, Oceanitis chilensis.”
“Oceanitis gracilis They breed mainly in the Atacama Desert, Oceanites Barocci Based on multiple lines of evidence, it apparently breeds in the Andes in central Chile.”
The team's analysis also Marine Life Occurred from the Antarctic Ocean to the southeastern Pacific Ocean Oceanitis gracilis, Oceanites pinkoyaeand Oceanites Barocci Approximately 15 to 18 million years ago.
“The colonization of Antarctica occurred about 17 million years ago. Oceanites exasperatus on that continent,” the authors state.
“Colonization of the Atlantic (Oceanitas oceanica) is thought to have originated in the southeast Pacific Ocean 15 million years ago.
“However, these patterns can be better understood through genomic or multilocus approaches, which should allow for more precise assessment of divergence times between groups.”
of Survey results Published in the journal on July 29, 2024 Animal taxa.
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Gerardo V. Norambuena others2024. Resolving conflicting lineages Marine Life (Oceanitisidae: Pelecaniformes) and description of a new species. Animal taxa 5486(4):451-475;doi:10.11646/zootaxa.5486.4.1
JUICE spacecraft may be visible from Southeast Asia during unprecedented operation
European Space Agency
The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) will land on Earth in what the European Space Agency (ESA) calls a “double world first.” It is scheduled to fly past Earth and the Moon on August 19 and 20, the first of several complex maneuvers along a looping path to Jupiter. You may be able to see the spacecraft in the sky as it speeds past.
JUICE was launched on April 14, 2023, and has been orbiting the Sun almost parallel to Earth ever since. But on August 19, its journey will start to get interesting: it will pass within 700 km of the Moon's surface, slowing down slightly using a method called gravity assist. The next day, it will drop to less than 7,000 km above Earth's surface, curving its orbit even further. That's when eagle-eyed astronomy fans in Southeast Asia may get a glimpse of the spacecraft.
All of this is necessary because if JUICE were to fly in a straight line to Jupiter, it would need more than 60,000 kilograms of fuel to get there, and even more to slow down and enter orbit once there. With the entire spacecraft's mass unfueled at 2,420 kilograms, this just isn't feasible. Instead, upcoming Earth-Moon flybys will send the spacecraft to Venus, where it will begin to accelerate, then fly past Earth twice to get it just fast enough to reach Jupiter in 2031.
The first maneuver may be the most complex of the entire mission, as JUICE must pass precise points relative to both the Earth and the Moon to en route to Venus. “It's like going through a very narrow corridor very fast, with the accelerator at full speed with only millimeters of clearance on the side of the road,” said ESA's Ignacio Tanco in statementA dual Earth-Moon flyby has never been attempted before, nor has a dual gravity assist been performed.
If all goes well, JUICE will not only head to Venus and then Jupiter, but it will also perform the first major tests of its scientific instruments. For some of the probes, this will be their only chance to observe the planet's surface and iron out any kinks before they reach orbit around Jupiter and begin their mission to search for hints of possible life on the planet's giant moons.
One of the world's most endangered marine fish has been saved from extinction thanks to researchers who caught specimens in the wild and helped breed them in captivity.
Stingray (Zearajah Mageana) is found only in Port Macquarie, on the extremely isolated and rugged southwest coast of the Australian island of Tasmania, a region that is naturally low in oxygen, making it difficult for fish to thrive, but this is exacerbated by human impacts, particularly the alteration of river flows by salmon farming and hydroelectric dams.
Jason Semmens A researcher from the University of Tasmania said that while no one knows the exact population of these rays, there has been a dramatic decline, with their numbers halving between 2014 and 2021. He said the population may now be just over 1,000, and what's most worrying is that the majority of the rays are adults, meaning the young have not yet reached maturity.
As a marine heatwave raged in this area off the southeast coast of Australia last year, Semmens and his colleagues decided to make a bold intervention to save the rays from extinction.
In December 2023, the team collected 50 eggs, more than half of which hatched in captivity. They also collected four adult insects, two of which died within two weeks. The two surviving females were kept separately, so the team was shocked when the remaining female laid eggs.
That's because rays can store sperm and fertilize the eggs, Semmens says. “On average, rays lay two eggs every four days,” he says. “We've seen over 100 eggs laid by rays, and the majority of them appear to be viable.”
To maximise the genetic diversity of the captive-raised young, the team is considering capturing other, already-fertilised females to obtain eggs and then releasing them back into the wild.
But the team members David MorenoResearchers from the University of Tasmania said captive breeding was not a complete solution and they were also working to solve environmental issues at Port Macquarie, including experimenting with pumping oxygen into the water.
There is no quick fix, and even if captive-bred individuals could be released straight away, it would take four to five years for them to mature and be able to contribute to the population.
If recovery efforts fail, the cost will be huge: “This would be the first extinction of a ray or shark species in modern history,” Moreno says, “so this is a really big red line.”
Mars A recent study indicates that the Earth may be hiding a global ocean beneath its surface, with cracks in rocks potentially holding enough water to form it.
Scientists believe that the water lies about seven to 12 miles (11.5 to 20 kilometers) deep in Mars’ crust, possibly originating from the planet’s ancient surface water sources such as rivers, lakes, and oceans billions of years ago, according to Vashan Wright, the lead scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego.
Despite the presence of water inside Mars, Wright noted that it does not necessarily mean that life exists there.
“However, our findings suggest the possibility of habitable environments,” he mentioned in an email.
The research team combined computer simulations with InSight data, including earthquake speeds, to suggest that groundwater is the most likely explanation. These results were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Monday.
Wright remarked that if InSight’s observations near the equator of Mars at Elysium Planitia are representative of the entire planet, there could be enough groundwater to fill a terrestrial ocean approximately a mile (1 to 2 kilometers) deep.
Tools like drills will be required to verify the presence of water and search for signs of microbial life.
Despite the InSight lander no longer being in operation, scientists are still analyzing the data collected between 2018 and 2022 to gain more insights into Mars’ interior.
Over 3 billion years ago, Mars was mostly covered in water, but due to the thinning of its atmosphere, it lost its surface water, becoming the dry and dusty world we see today. It is believed by scientists that the ancient water either escaped into space or remains hidden underground.
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