The Dark Universe: A Novel

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

science of phenomena

Being optimistic, believing in your abilities, practicing affirmations, being grateful, and setting clear goals can bring real benefits. But is manifestation pure pseudoscience, or does it mean something? We look at how the WOOP approach can actively support you on your journey towards realizing your dreams. I’ll go.

volcanic eruption

After three years of violent eruptions, experts now believe that Iceland’s Reykjanes Peninsula has entered a new phase of volcanic activity.

counterintuitive universe

The world is not what it seems. This special feature explores how science has exposed fallacies and false beliefs about heaven and earth throughout history.

planet nine

Something strange is happening beyond Neptune, and it may change everything we think we know about our solar system. Could orbital oddities reveal the existence of undiscovered planets near our heavens? Or is it something else?

plus

CES 2024’s biggest innovations: Every year, Las Vegas hosts the Consumer Electronics Show, where technology manufacturers from around the world gather to unveil their latest developments. From transparent technology to domestic robots and the latest cooking appliances, technology expert Alex Hughes shares some of the highlights.
Pothole: There are 750,000 potholes in Britain’s roads, creating a crater-like structure. These can cause serious damage to vehicles and pose a danger to drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians. But with bacteria and self-healing asphalt, it could be smooth again.
First moon base: Head to the moon’s south pole to peer inside what may be the first human habitation on the moon. Initially he planned to house 144 people, but the modular design of the Lunar Habitat Master Plan will expand and evolve with the inhabitants.

Issue 402 Released on February 22, 2024

don’t forget that BBC Science Focus Also available on all major digital platforms. There is a version of android, Kindle Fire and Kindle e-readers, but also, iOS app For iPad and iPhone.

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Brightest Quasar Ever Observed Discovered by Astronomers

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

The black hole in the newly discovered quasar SMSS J052915.80-435152.0 (J0529-4351) accretes about 1 solar mass per day on top of its existing mass of 17 billion solar masses.

This image of the exceptional quasar J0529-4351 is from the Dark Energy Camera Legacy Survey DR10. Adjacent M stars are displayed in red.Image credit: Wolf other., doi: 10.1038/s41550-024-02195-x.

In 1963, Dutch-born American astronomer Maarten Schmidt identified the first quasar, known as 3C 273. It appeared as a very bright star of magnitude 12, and its redshift suggested that it was one of the most distant objects known in the universe. time.

These two facts suggest an incredibly huge light output, and ever since, newly discovered quasars have impressed with their ability to emit enormous amounts of energy from small regions of the universe. Ta.

This can only be explained by the conversion of gravitational energy into heat and light in a highly viscous accretion disk around a supermassive black hole.

Currently, about 1 million quasars are known, but a few specimens stand out. In 2015, ultraluminous quasar J0100+2802 was confirmed to be a supermassive black hole with 10 billion solar masses.

In 2018, an even brighter object, J2157-3602, was discovered, which contains a supermassive black hole with a mass of 24 billion solar masses.

Its brightness suggests rapid growth, but its existence is difficult to explain. When black holes start from the debris of a star's collapse and grow temporarily, they are not expected to reach appreciable mass in the time between the Big Bang and the black hole era. observation.

The quasar that broke the new record is so far from Earth that it took more than 12 billion years for its light to reach us.

The object, called J0529-4351, was first detected using the 2.3 meter telescope at the ANU Siding Spring Observatory.

Australian National University astronomer Christian Wolff and colleagues then turned to ESO's Very Large Telescope, one of the world's largest telescopes, to confirm the full nature of the black hole and measure its mass. Toward.

“We have discovered the fastest growing black hole ever known. It has a mass of 17 billion suns and eats just over one sun a day. This makes it the fastest growing black hole in the known universe. It will be a bright object,” Dr. Wolf said.

The material drawn into this black hole in the form of a disk emits so much energy that J0529-4351 is more than 500 trillion times brighter than the Sun.

“All this light comes from a hot accretion disk seven light-years in diameter, which must be the largest accretion disk in the universe,” said Dr. Student Samuel Lai.

“Given what we know about many other less impressive black holes, it's surprising that it hasn't been detected before. It was hiding in plain sight,” says the Australian National said Dr. Christopher Onken of the university.

This finding is reported in the following article: paper in diary natural astronomy.

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C.Wolf other. Accretion of solar masses per day by a 17 billion solar mass black hole. Nat Astron, published online on February 19, 2024. doi: 10.1038/s41550-024-02195-x

Source: www.sci.news

Breakdown products of Vitamin B3 in excess may increase the risk of cardiovascular disease

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Despite intensive efforts to prevent cardiovascular disease (CVD), substantial residual CVD risk remains, even in people who receive all guideline-recommended interventions. Niacin (vitamin B3) is an essential micronutrient fortified in staple foods, but its role in CVD is poorly understood. Excessive amounts of niacin's breakdown products may be associated with an increased risk of death, heart attack, and stroke, according to a new study.

Niacin is an essential micronutrient that is fortified in staple foods beyond dietary requirements. Image credit: Ferrell other., doi: 10.1038/s41591-023-02793-8.

Although CVD is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide, only a portion of the attributable risk is explained by established risk factors.

Despite significant advances in treatment, the risk of residual cardiovascular disease remains high, and it has been suggested that additional, as yet unrecognized factors contribute to cardiovascular disease.

Research has previously shown that niacin (vitamin B3) reduces levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol.

However, this vitamin does not seem to have the expected effect in reducing CVD risk, the so-called “niacin paradox”.

“Our study shows that niacin breakdown products can promote vascular inflammation, providing a potential explanation for this discrepancy,” said Cleveland Clinic researcher Stanley Hazen, Ph.D. said.

In the study, the authors analyzed plasma samples from 4,325 people in three patient cohorts, including men and women from the United States and Europe.

They found that two breakdown products of niacin, the metabolites N1-methyl-2-pyridone-5-carboxamide (2PY) and N1-methyl-4-pyridone-3-carboxamide (4PY), are associated with increased CVD risk. I discovered that

In subsequent human genetic studies and mouse studies, the research team found that this increased risk is due to these breakdown products increasing the abundance of the pro-inflammatory protein VCAM-1 within the endothelial cells lining the blood. showed that it may be mediated by the ability of one of the (4PY). ship.

“Further studies are needed in large-scale studies to investigate the association between niacin and its degradation products and CVD,” the researchers said.

their findings It was published in the magazine natural medicine.

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M. Ferrell other. 2024. End metabolites of niacin promote vascular inflammation and contribute to cardiovascular disease risk. Nat Med 30, 424-434; doi: 10.1038/s41591-023-02793-8

Source: www.sci.news

First Photo of Rare Yellow-Crested Crested Crest Taken by Ornithologist

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

of Yellow-bellied Shrike (Prionops alberti) It has not been seen for about 20 years and is listed as a “lost bird” by the American Bird Conservancy.

Yellow-bellied shrike (Prionops alberti). Image credit: University of Texas at El Paso.

First described in 1933, the shrike is a member of the bird family. Bangidae.

Also known as the King Albert Shrike, this bird is distinguished by its black plumage and bright yellow crown.

This species is endemic to the mountains of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

“The yellow shrike is endemic to the western slopes of the Albertine Rift in Central Africa, an area that has been largely inaccessible due to war and security issues, but has recently become safe to visit. '' said Dr. Michael Harvey.ornithologist University of Texas El Paso.

Dr. Harvey and his colleagues made the discovery during a six-week expedition to the Itombwe Massif, a mountain range in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.

“It was a shocking experience to encounter these birds,” Dr Harvey said.

“I knew they might be possible here, but I wasn't prepared for how grand and unique it would be.”

The ornithologists walked more than 121 kilometers (75 miles) deep into the Itumbwe massif, studying birds, amphibians and reptiles along the way.

While exploring the cloud forest on the side of a mountain, they encountered a striking black bird with a bright yellow “helmet”, the long-eared shrike.

“These birds appeared to be a fairly noisy and active flock in the mid-levels of the forest,” they said.

A total of about 18 birds were spotted at three locations during the expedition.

“This gives us hope that perhaps this species still maintains a reasonably healthy population in the remote forests of this region,” Dr Harvey said.

“However, mining, logging, and deforestation for agriculture are encroaching deep into the forests of the Itombwe Mountains.”

“We are in discussions with other researchers and conservation groups about further efforts to protect forests and shrike in this region.”

“Now is a great time to protect these tropical forests so species like the long-eared shrike are not lost before they are known and studied.”

Source: www.sci.news

New Study Finds Surprising Similarities in Brain Development Between Sea Lampreys and Humans

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

The lamprey and human hindbrains are built using very similar molecular and genetic toolkits, according to a new study led by the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.

These images show an adult lamprey (top and left) and a developing lamprey embryo. Image credit: Stowers Medical Research Institute.

“Our research on the hindbrain (the part of the brain that controls important functions such as blood pressure and heart rate) is essentially a window into the distant past and can serve as a model for understanding the evolution of complexity. “, said Dr. Hugo Parker. Researcher at Stowers Medical Research Institute.

Like other vertebrates, sea lampreys have a backbone and skeleton, but they noticeably lack a jaw, a characteristic feature of the head.

Most vertebrates, including humans, have jaws, so this striking difference in sea lampreys makes it a valuable model for understanding the evolution of vertebrate traits.

“About 500 million years ago, at the origin of vertebrates, there was a split between jawless and jawed animals,” said Dr. Alice Bedois, also of the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.

“We wanted to know how vertebrate brains evolved and whether there is something unique to jawed vertebrates that jawless vertebrates don't.”

Previous research had identified genes that structure and subdivide the sea lamprey's hindbrain as identical to genes in jawed vertebrates, including humans.

However, these genes are part of an interconnected network or circuit that needs to be initiated and directed to properly build the hindbrain.

In a new study, the authors identify common molecular cues known to direct head-to-tail patterning in a variety of animals as part of a genetic circuit that guides hindbrain patterning in the lamprey. .

“We found that the same genes, as well as the same cues, are involved in hindbrain development in sea lampreys. This suggests that this process is ancestral to all vertebrates. ,” Dr. Bedwa said.

“This signal is called retinoic acid, commonly known as vitamin A.”

Researchers have known that retinoic acid signals the genetic circuits that build the hindbrains of complex species, but they believe it is involved in more primitive animals like sea lampreys. was not considered.

Surprisingly, they discovered that the lamprey's core hindbrain circuit is also initiated by retinoic acid, providing evidence that these sea monsters and humans are much more closely related than expected.

“People thought that because lampreys don't have jaws, their hindbrains don't form like other vertebrates,” says Dr. Rob Krumlauf, a researcher at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research.

“We showed that this fundamental part of the brain is built exactly the same way as in mice, and even in humans.”

Signaling molecules that signal cell fate during development are well known.

Now, researchers have discovered that retinoic acid plays another key role in signaling important steps in development, such as the formation of the brainstem.

Furthermore, if hindbrain formation is a conserved feature in all vertebrates, other mechanisms must be involved to explain its incredible diversity.

“We all come from a common ancestor,” Dr. Bedwa said.

“The lamprey provided further clues.”

“We now need to go further back in evolutionary time to discover when the genetic circuits controlling hindbrain formation first evolved.”

of study It was published in the magazine nature communications.

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AMH Bedwa other. 2024. Lamprey reveals the origins of retinoic acid signaling and its coupling to vertebrate hindbrain segments. Nat Commune 15, 1538. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-45911-x

Source: www.sci.news

Increased Cancer Risk in Relatives of Men with Infertility

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

The study looked at men who produced less than 1.5 million sperm per milliliter of semen, which is considered to produce very few or no sperm.

Joshua Resnick/Shutterstock

Relatives of men who have infertility problems may be at increased risk of cancer, and the odds vary widely from family to family.

Research suggests that certain relatives within three generations of such men are more likely to develop a variety of cancers, including cancers that affect the colon, testicles, and uterus. However, the risk varies by family lineage and whether the man is infertile or subfertile.

Male infertility has been linked to multiple health problems; cardiovascular diseases etc.. Previous research has also pointed out the following: Association between male infertility and increased cancer risk in relatives of such men.

Joey Ramsay Researchers at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City suspected this might vary from family to family. To find out, they analyzed the sperm counts of 360 men who produced fewer than 1.5 million sperm per milliliter of semen and 426 men who produced no sperm at all. These men were matched in age to more than 5,600 of his others with whom he had at least one biological child. Researchers do not know whether any of the participants were transgender.

Next, they obtained information on cancer diagnoses in the men's first-, second-, and third-degree relatives from Utah's database.

The research team found that relatives of men with low sperm counts within three generations were more likely to develop colon and testicular cancer compared to the general population, and some of those related to men with low sperm counts They discovered there was a high chance of developing sarcoma, Hodgkin said. Lymphoma, cancer of the uterus and thyroid. Both of these groups had much higher rates of bone and joint cancer than the general population.

The researchers then used specially developed software to determine the increased risk of cancer combinations in 34 body regions within different families (both fertile and infertile groups). We have detected a tendency to This resulted in “clustering” that allowed trends within families to be detected.

Two-thirds of male relatives who did not have sperm were at no higher risk of cancer than the general population. However, other families showed a significantly increased risk of various types of cancer, and that risk varied by family lineage, with higher risks for childhood, adolescent, and young adult cancers. There were people too.

Relatives of men with low sperm counts all had an increased risk of at least one type of cancer compared to the general population, but the degree of risk and type of condition varied.

It is unclear why this increased risk occurs, but it may be due to genetic factors or common environmental exposures among relatives. It is hoped that further research will investigate this and lead to tests that identify families at higher risk, Ramsay said.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Neanderthals Used Ocher Glue to Make Stone Tools, According to Scientists

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Archaeologists have discovered traces of an ancient ocher-based multicomponent adhesive in 40,000-year-old stone tools unearthed in Le Moustiers, France.

Photographs, drawings and details of stone tools from Le Moustiers, France. Image credit: D. Greinert / Schmidt other., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adl0822.

“These surprisingly well-preserved tools show technical solutions that are broadly similar to examples of tools made by early modern humans in Africa, but the exact recipes reflect a Neanderthal 'spin.' “This is the manufacture of hand tool grips,” he said. Radu Iovita, researcher at New York University's Center for Human Origins Research.

In the study, Dr. Iovita and colleagues examined stone tools with traces of red and yellow colorants excavated from the French ruins of Le Moustiers, discovered in the early 20th century.

These stone tools were made by Neanderthals during the Middle Paleolithic period, between 120,000 and 40,000 years ago.

They are kept in the collection of the Museum of Prehistory and Early History in Berlin, but have not been studied in detail until now.

“The products had been individually wrapped and left untouched since the 1960s. As a result, the remains of attached organic matter were very well preserved,” says Eva, a researcher at the Museum of Prehistory and Early History in Berlin. Dr. Dutkiewicz said.

Researchers found traces of ocher and asphalt mixtures on some Mousterian stone tools, such as scrapers, flakes, and blades.

Ocher is a naturally occurring earth pigment. Bitumen is a component of asphalt and can be produced from crude oil, but it also occurs naturally in soil.

“I was surprised to find that it contained more than 50% ocher. This is because air-dried asphalt can be used directly as an adhesive, but adding so much ocher would cause it to lose its adhesive properties. '' said Dr. Patrick Schmidt, a researcher at the University of Tübingen.

Scientists tested these materials in tensile tests and other measurements used to determine strength.

“The situation was different when we used liquid bitumen, which is not very suitable for bonding. When you add 55% ocher, a malleable mass forms,” said Dr. Schmidt.

It was sticky enough to pierce stone tools, and did not stick to hands, making it ideal as a material for handles.

In fact, microscopic examination of the signs of wear from use on these stone tools revealed that the adhesive on Le Moustier's stone tools had been used in this way.

“The tool showed two types of micro-wear: one is the typical grinding of sharp edges, which is usually caused by machining other materials,” says Dr. Iovita.

“Secondly, there was a bright polish distributed all over what appeared to be the hand grip, but not anywhere else. We interpreted it to be the result of wear and tear.”

The use of adhesives containing several ingredients, including various sticky substances such as tree resins and ocher, was known from early Homo sapiens in Africa, but not since early Neanderthals in Europe. It wasn't known.

Overall, the development of adhesives and their use in tool manufacturing is considered to be some of the best physical evidence of early human cultural evolution and cognitive abilities.

“Composite glue is thought to be one of the first expressions of modern cognitive processes that are still active today,” said Dr. Schmidt.

In the Le Moustiers area, ocher and asphalt had to be collected from remote locations, which required a great deal of effort, planning and a targeted approach.

“Given the overall circumstances of the find, we believe that this sticky material was created by Neanderthals,” Dr. Dutkiewicz said.

“Our research shows that early homo sapiens “African Neanderthals and European Neanderthals had similar thought patterns,” Dr. Schmidt said.

“Their adhesion techniques have the same importance for understanding human evolution.”

Regarding this research, paper Published in today's magazine scientific progress.

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Patrick Schmidt other. 2024. Ocher-based composite adhesives used in Mousterian typesetting have recorded mixed recognition and significant investment. scientific progress 10(8); doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adl0822

Source: www.sci.news

European Space Agency predicts a dramatic crash landing for satellite on Earth

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

A European satellite that is malfunctioning is expected to fall to Earth and plunge uncontrollably through the atmosphere on Wednesday.

The European Space Agency said that most of the dead satellite is anticipated to burn up in the atmosphere and any surviving debris is unlikely to cause harm. However, it is challenging to determine the exact time and location of the spacecraft’s fall.

According to the Latest blog posts, the space agency estimated that the re-entry time will be around 10:41 a.m. ET on Wednesday, which would take approximately two hours. Based on the satellite’s orbit, the spacecraft was expected to be somewhere off the coast of North America in the Pacific Ocean during that period.

The space agency explained that much of the uncertainty about the re-entry of satellites is due to the challenge of predicting atmospheric density. Changes in air density, influenced by solar activity, impact the drag experienced by objects passing through Earth’s atmosphere.

The space agency stated that although there is uncertainty about the re-entry point of the dead satellite, it is unlikely to pose a threat to populated areas.

“Most of the satellites will burn out, and the surviving debris will be scattered somewhat randomly over a ground orbit averaging hundreds of kilometers long and tens of kilometers wide (this is why the risks involved are so great). “The reason for this is low),” said an expert from the agency’s Space Debris Countermeasures Office. I wrote it in a blog post.

The spacecraft, known as European Remote Sensing 2 or ERS-2, was an Earth observation satellite that collected data about Earth’s oceans, polar caps, and surface. The space agency said the satellite, launched in April 1995, was also used to monitor severe floods, earthquakes and other natural disasters in remote areas of the world.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

First-ever photograph of a majestic yellow ibis bird captured

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

First photo of Kijimozu

Matt Brady/University of Texas at El Paso

A rare bird with a spectacular yellow crown has been photographed for the first time in the tropical mountains of the Democratic Republic of Congo, almost 20 years after it was last seen.

Yellow-bellied shrike (Prionops alberti)Also known as the King Albert Shrike, it is a small bird that lives in the damp forests of the Albertine Rift Mountains in Central Africa. Adults are covered in glossy black feathers, with a magnificent crown of bright golden feathers on their heads. Their eyes are surrounded by distinctive orange tissue called wattles.

After not being seen for many years, the long-eared shrike was listed as an endangered species. Find a lost bird partnership.

michael harvey Researchers at the University of Texas at El Paso finally encountered this phenomenon again during a six-week expedition into the Itobwe Mountains from December 2023 to January 2024.

As team members wandered through the cloud forest, they encountered a flock of elusive birds.

“It was a shocking experience to come across these birds. I knew it might be possible here, but I wasn't prepared for how spectacular and unique it would be in my life.” ,” Harvey said in a statement.

A total of 18 Long-tailed Shrikes were spotted at three locations during the expedition. This suggests that there may be healthy populations of birds currently considered vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

The group also developed the red-bellied mushroom frog (Articular leptis hematogaster), last seen in the 1950s.

“Now is a great time to protect these tropical forests so we don't lose species like the long-eared shrike before they are known and studied,” Harvey said. Ta.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Brain Scan Shows How Neural Network Boosts Creativity

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Practicing mindfulness improves creative thinking

Giraxia/Getty Images

It's easy to name people who have evolved human thinking, from Jane Austen to Albert Einstein, Zaha Hadid to Ai Weiwei, but why are these people so much more creative than others? It's much more difficult to explain what kind of thinking you do. Are their brains just built that way, or can anyone learn it? The mystery of creativity has long puzzled scientists. Now, researchers are finally making some progress towards closing the curtain. Even better, their insights can help us all exercise a little more original thinking.

Some of them are exciting insights This stems from the “dual process theory” of creativity, which distinguishes between idea generation and idea evaluation. Idea generation involves digging deep into existing knowledge for seeds of inspiration. Perhaps it is done by drawing analogies from completely different areas. Free association is key at this stage, as one thought leads to another, more original insight. The second phase, idea evaluation, requires you to apply a more critical eye to select the ideas that best fit your goals. Novelists must decide whether strange, supernatural plot twists will excite readers or turn them off. Engineers must consider whether a fish-inspired airplane would be practical and efficient. Large projects require these two stages to be repeated many times during the long and winding journey from concept to completion.

Brain scans of people engaged in creative problem solving suggest that idea generation and evaluation relies on…

Source: www.newscientist.com

The specialized larynx of humpback whales allows them to sing underwater

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Humpback whales use songs to communicate with each other across oceans

Karim Ilya

Biologists have discovered how baleen whales produce their unique songs. It involves the uniquely shaped larynx.

Baleen whales, including humpback whales, communicate through complex songs that can be heard over great distances. “People recorded the first whale sounds in his 1970s, but only recently have we started to recognize the different sounds these animals actually make,” he says. Cohen Elemans At the University of Southern Denmark. “Now the question is, how do they do this?”

To learn more, Elemans and his team extracted the larynxes of three recently deceased baleen whales.Balaenoptera borealis), humpback whale (Megaptera novaeangliae) and the northern minke whale (Balaenoptera acutorostrata).

The larynx, commonly known as the voice box, is an organ located in the upper neck of mammals. As air flows through the organ, the tissue folds vibrate, creating sound.

But that's not the case with baleen whales, Ellemans says. When the researchers examined the whale's larynx, they discovered that the organ had an unexpected shape, with a cushion of fat on one side.

When these whales breathe, air is forced against the fatty material, which vibrates and makes sound. “I've never seen this in any other animal,” Ellemans says. “This is unique to baleen whales.”

Whales can also recycle air from their lungs, which is useful when they are underwater for long periods of time. When you exhale through the trachea and larynx, air enters a sac with walls that contract, returning air to the lungs.

Using a computer model of its larynx, the researchers found that baleen whales can generate frequencies of up to 300 hertz at depths up to 100 meters below the ocean's surface. This is within the frequency range of noise emitted by ships, raising concerns that ship noise could drown out their songs.

“These whales can't escape this situation,” Elemans said. “Therefore, we need to take steps to reduce noise.”

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Unusual rainfall leads to temporary lake formation in extremely arid Death Valley

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

View from a kayak on Death Valley Temporary Lake, February 9, 2024

Michael Kohler/NPS

Heavy rain has fallen in California in recent weeks, resulting in the remarkable formation of a rare temporary lake in Death Valley, the driest place in the United States.

Record levels of rain have flooded California over the past month. Numerous atmospheric river storms (narrow bands of highly concentrated moisture in the air) worsen wet conditions, putting up to 37 million people at risk of flooding.

Heavy rainfall also hit Death Valley National Park along the California-Nevada border. In fact, it rained so much that the park's Badwater Basin, normally a dry salt flat, temporarily turned into a shallow lake.

At 86 meters below sea level, the basin is the lowest point in North America and was home to an ancient body of water that researchers named Lake Manly tens of thousands of years ago.

Over the past few decades, the lake has been backfilled several times. In August 2023, rains associated with Hurricane Hillary formed a lake 11.3 kilometers long and 0.6 meters deep, which shrank in the following months. Well, it has been replenished once again. The current maximum length of the lake is nearly 10 kilometers and the depth is approximately 0.3 meters.

Last year, Death Valley National Park Closed for several weeks after Hurricane Hillary This is because flooding damaged the road network and limited opportunities for visitors to explore the temporary lake. This time, the park opened and the re-emergence of Lake Manly attracted tourists, including swimmers and kayakers.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

The Complexity of the Human Brain: Is It Truly Unmatched in the Universe?

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Crescent Nebula: More complex than the human brain?

Reinhold Wittich/Stocktrek Images/Alamy

Back in 2012, neuroscientist Christoph Koch wrote in his book: Consciousness: Confessions of a Romantic Reductionist The human brain is “the most complex object in the known universe.” This seems intuitive, given that the brain has approximately 86 billion neurons, which are connected in ways that are still beginning to be understood. But when I put it, David Wolpert At New Mexico's Santa Fe Institute, founded in the 1980s as a hub for the budding field of complexity science, he doesn't think so. “It's almost a travesty that we are the most complex system in the universe,” he says. “That question is actually misguided.”

Nevertheless, I persevere. Is there a common measure of complexity that can be applied to complex systems of all kinds? After all, if you squint, galaxy clusters and the filaments that connect them look like intertwined circuits of neurons. Masu. The human brain even has almost as many neurons as there are galaxies in the observable universe. This formal similarity may have something to do with the general laws by which complexity emerges, he says. Ricard Sole At Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain. Or maybe not. “By chance, it might show up in both systems, but that doesn't mean anything,” he says.

Moreover, complexity is not defined by components and their interconnections. It's the idea that the whole is more than just something.

Source: www.newscientist.com

7,300 years ago saw the largest volcanic eruption in recorded history.

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Iojima is itself a volcano, located on the edge of the massive underwater Akahoya volcanic caldera.

Asahi Shimbun via Getty Images

The largest volcanic eruption in current geological time occurred underwater off the southern coast of Japan about 7,300 years ago. This explosion produced more than three times as much material as the eruption of Mount Tambora, the largest known modern eruption. Mount Tambora exploded in Indonesia in 1815, causing dramatic climate changes that led to the “Year Without a Summer” in 1816.

The new record holder, the Kikai Akahoya eruption, originated from a submerged caldera in an area off Japan's Kyushu island.

The devastating impact this eruption had on humans living on nearby islands has been recorded by geologists and archaeologists, and analysis of volcanic ash deposits has shown that this eruption was the most recent geological event that began 11,700 years ago. It was shown to be one of the largest eruptions of the Holocene era. .

However, the origin and scale of the explosion were unclear because of the difficulty in accessing the submarine caldera, the crater formed after the volcanic eruption, and the volcanic deposits on the ocean floor.

now, Nobukazu Sema Professors at Japan's Kobe University calculated that the Kikai-Akahoya eruption produced far more rock and ash underwater than previously thought, about 70 cubic kilometers. Combining this with previous estimates from volcanic rocks deposited over Japan, the total amount of material pumped out of the volcano equates to more than 300 cubic kilometers of material. This is twice the amount of water in Lake Tahoe in the western United States. “It was huge, more than we expected,” Seema says.

However, it is still far behind the huge eruption of Indonesia's Toba supervolcano, which released more than 2,500 cubic kilometers of magma about 74,000 years ago.

To assess Kikai Akahoya, Seema and his colleagues conducted seismic surveys and mapped the underwater area around the caldera, about 200 meters below the surface. This allowed them to see layers of material around the volcano, but they could not tell which ones were due to the eruption itself.

The researchers used remote-controlled drilling robots to collect sediment from the ocean floor, take core samples from the underlying rock, and identify layers containing characteristic volcanic glass. This data allowed us to isolate the volcanic layers from seismic surveys and calculate the total amount of material produced by the volcano.

“We know that very large, caldera-forming eruptions like this are rare, but we also know that there have been many more of these events in the geological past, and we have found evidence for them. ” he says. David Pyle at Oxford University.

The main reason it took so long for the scale of the eruption to be determined is because calderas deep under the sea are difficult to locate and measure, he said.

It still remains in the Kikai Akahoya caldera. big magma chamber It's below. If this explodes, there could be another eruption, but it's unclear how big it will be because it depends on the size of the magma chamber, Seema said. He says the chance of an eruption is small, but his team is working on measuring the dome more precisely to better understand the risks.

Creating better models to predict future eruptions by combining historical information from past eruptions, such as the Kikai-Akahoya eruption, with research from recent underwater eruptions, such as the 2022 Hunga-Tonga eruption. Pyle says it could help.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Understanding Consciousness through Entropy and Equilibrium

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Is consciousness a collection of discrete states that we move between?

PM Images/Getty Images

What is consciousness? This is perhaps the greatest mystery remaining in the human brain. No wonder it's known as the “hard problem.” We also cannot agree on whether consciousness is one thing or whether it is various states. But a new way to explore that question sheds interesting light on this most elusive of concepts.

We use words like “blacking out” to describe fainting or falling asleep, but researchers believe that consciousness is much more than simply flipping a metaphorical switch from “on” to “off.” I have long understood that it is complicated. However, there is still much debate as to whether it is a single phenomenon with many continuous shades, as imagined as a dimmer switch, or a collection of discrete states, like separate television channels. there is.

Thinking about consciousness from a physicist's perspective may help answer this question. That's because the brain is constantly transitioning between states defined by patterns of electrical signals, and physicists have metrics to study such busy, ever-changing systems. In 2014, robin carhart harris University of California, San Francisco and colleagues hypothesized that entropy may be particularly useful.

Entropy describes how chaotic a system is. One measure of entropy is how many different microscopic configurations (such as the arrangement of water molecules within a glass) exist within a particular macroscopic property (such as the volume of a glass). Researchers proposed that brain states have greater entropy when measured…

Source: www.newscientist.com

The Age-Defying Power of the New Supercomputer for Your Brain

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

The human brain is likely the most advanced computer in the world. While it operates differently than a traditional computer and has a much softer structure, its computing power is unparalleled.

Neuromorphic computing, which models machines after the human brain and nervous system, has been a growing concept since the 1980s. Many attempts have been made to achieve this, with the DeepSouth project at the International Center for Neuromorphic Systems at Western Sydney University aiming to be the most advanced yet, with the potential to perform 228 trillion actions per second.

How does a brain computer work?

DeepSouth uses an approach to computing that is inspired by the human brain and body, aiming to combine processing power and memory just like the human brain does. By distributing power to billions of tiny units (neurons) that interact through trillions of different connections (synapses), the brain becomes incredibly powerful while consuming very little energy.

What does this mean for the future of computers?

This approach could lead to significant improvements in energy efficiency and battery life for devices such as smartphones. It could also enable the development of smaller and more powerful computers, bringing high-powered computing to a variety of applications and industries.

How DeepSouth can help fight aging

While the primary goal of DeepSouth is to improve computing technology, the neuromorphic approach also offers insights into the workings of the human brain. This could lead to a better understanding of diseases such as Alzheimer’s, dementia, and Parkinson’s and potentially aid in developing treatments for these conditions.

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Winners of the 2024 Underwater Photographer of the Year Awards: 17 Captivating Images from Below the Surface

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Alex Dawson’s stunning photo of a freediver examining a whale carcass has won this year’s award. Underwater Photographer of the Year.

“Whale Bones was photographed in the most extreme conditions,” explains jury chair and renowned photographer Alex Mustard. “A breath-holding diver descends below the Greenland ice sheet to witness a carcass. This composition invites us to think about the impact we have on the great creatures on this planet. Since the advent of humans, wild animals were reduced by his 85%.

“Currently, only 4 percent of mammals are wild animals, and the remaining 96 percent are humans and livestock. We need to change the way we do things to find a balance with nature.”

Portuguese photographer Nuno Sa has been named the Save Our Seas Foundation’s 2024 Marine Conservation Photographer of the Year. His photo, dubbed “Saving Goliath,” depicts a beachgoer’s futile efforts to save a stranded sperm whale off the coast of Portugal.

Underwater Photographer of the Year is an annual competition that celebrates the best underwater photography since 1965.

Today’s competition attracts entries from all over the world, with 13 categories testing photographers in themes such as macro, wide-angle, action photography, and shipwreck photography, as well as four categories specifically for photographs taken in British waters.

Below are the winners of this year’s contest and our favorite ranked images.

Winner – Macro Category

Pot-bellied seahorse (ventral hippocampus) Pictured surrounded by bright green corals with interesting patterns. Photographed on Bear Island, Australia. Photo credit: Talia Grace/UPY2024

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

New Study Identifies the Most Effective Diet for Reducing Loud Snoring

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Dealing with snoring can be a bothersome experience for everyone involved, whether it’s falling asleep on a public bus or waking a loved one. Researchers may have found the best diet to combat this issue.

Obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) is a common condition that puts people at risk for high blood pressure, stroke, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes. This is because OSA causes multiple disruptions during sleep due to loud snoring and interruptions in breathing.

The solution may lie in a diet rich in vegetables, fruits, and whole grains, as suggested by a new study published in the journal ERJ Open Research. This diet may help prevent or treat OSA.

In order to test this theory, researchers at Flinders University in Adelaide, Australia, used data from 14,210 participants in the US National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. Participants were asked to list everything they had consumed in the past 24 hours, and the research team categorized their responses into three dietary patterns: a healthy plant-based diet, an unhealthy plant-based diet, and a diet high in animal products.

The “unhealthy” plant-based diet included high amounts of refined carbohydrates, potatoes, sugary drinks, sweets, desserts, and salty foods.

Additionally, participants completed a sleep questionnaire to determine the likelihood of having OSA. The researchers found that people with diets high in plant foods were 19% less likely to suffer from snoring caused by OSA. On the other hand, those who consumed an unhealthy plant-based diet were 22% more likely to have OSA.

Researchers believe that a healthy plant-based diet may be important due to its anti-inflammatory components and antioxidants, which can impact fat mass, inflammation, and muscle tone, thereby affecting a person’s OSA risk.

Dr. Johannes Melak, the chief researcher, emphasized that diet quality is important in managing the risk of OSA, and that a healthy plant-based diet may reduce inflammation and obesity.

Read more:

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Astronomers find hundreds of massive gas clouds streaming away from the Milky Way’s center

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Using new 21 cm radio observations made with NSF's Green Bank Telescope, astronomers have discovered that more than 250 clouds of neutral gas are blasting out into interstellar space from the center of the Milky Way. These clouds are likely the product of the same phenomenon that created the Fermi bubble.

The artist's concept is that clouds flowing from the center of the Milky Way are caught up in extremely hot winds and accelerated to speeds of hundreds of kilometers per second. Image credit: NSF/GBO/P. Vosteen.

It has long been known that energetic processes at the center of the Milky Way generate high-velocity hot winds that spread through intergalactic space with temperatures of millions of degrees and speeds of thousands of kilometers per second. Most large galaxies have winds like this.

The serendipitous discovery that some of this hot gas is trapped in cold hydrogen clouds was made by Australia's ATCA telescope, which measured 21cm radio emissions from interstellar hydrogen atoms.

This suggests that there may be an undiscovered population of clouds transporting material away from the Milky Way's core.

Hydrogen clouds are important in their own right, but they also act as probes for hot air.

Conditions in very hot winds are difficult to measure, but just as a few leaves thrown up on Earth indicate the direction and speed of the wind in the area, cold clouds can You can track its status.

The sensitivity of the Green Bank Telescope (GBT) makes it an ideal instrument for detecting faint signals from interstellar hydrogen, but mapping these clouds and understanding their true extent is essential. It wasn't easy.

Dr Felix James 'Jay' Rockman, senior astronomer at Green Bank Observatory, said: 'It took many years to systematically map hundreds of square degrees using GBT in search of weak hydrogen emissions. ” he said.

“Once we identify a few promising candidates, we can follow up with targeted observations with other telescopes to show us even more.”

“This cloud must have been ripped off from a region near the center of the Milky Way galaxy and flung outward by a burst of star formation or black hole activity.”

Some of these clouds have the fastest outflow velocities of any cloud ever observed in the Milky Way, and may even escape from the Milky Way.

In an unexpected development, new data from the APEX telescope reveals that some hydrogen clouds contain molecules and dense cold gas.

“No one would have expected that the clouds violently ejected from the Milky Way would harbor relatively fragile molecular material, but that's what happened,” Rockman said.

Astronomers using the MeerKAT array recently mapped hydrogen in several clouds with high angular resolution, showing that it evolves and gets shredded as it flows into interstellar space.

“These new results open the door to further discoveries,” Dr. Rockman said.

“How clouds that are accelerated to speeds of more than 400 kilometers per second remain stable is a mystery.”

“The chemical processes inside these clouds are very unusual and unexplored.”

Dr. Rockman and his colleague Dr. Enrico Di Teodoro of the University of Florence, findings in AAS243243rd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA.

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Felix Rockman and Enrico di Teodoro. 2024. New investigation of neutral clouds in the Milky Way's core wind. AAS243Abstract #2851

Source: www.sci.news

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) may have developed to aid hunter-gatherers in gauging when to stop investing in unproductive pursuits

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Early hunter-gatherers faced with food shortages may have benefited from the impulsivity associated with ADHD

John Civic/Science Photo Library

Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may have evolved in hunter-gatherer societies because it was an advantage for them, according to the results of a new study. Characteristics commonly associated with the disease, such as impulsivity, cause some foragers to move from areas where resources are depleted to areas with richer harvests faster than areas without the disease. It could have been something like this.

ADHD affects people's behavior, which can result in them acting impulsively and having trouble concentrating. Although its exact cause is not fully understood, the condition tends to run in families.

Its origins are similarly unknown, he says. Arjun Ramakrishnan At the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur. “Is it a remnant of the hunter-gatherer world?”

To explore this, Ramakrishnan, david barak Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania recruited 506 people in the United States to play an online foraging game. Players were instructed to collect as many berries as possible in 8 minutes by moving their cursor over the bush.

They were given the choice of staying in the bush or trying their luck in another bush that might have more or less fruit. Moving to a new bush also resulted in a short timeout, so players had to balance the chance of getting more berries with the time lost by moving.

Before playing the game, participants completed a questionnaire assessing whether they had symptoms of ADHD, such as difficulty concentrating or restlessness.

People with ADHD symptoms spent about four seconds hovering over a particular bush compared to those without symptoms, and as a result, the former group collected an average of 521 berries. However, I was able to collect 602 berries.

The findings suggest that selective pressures faced by early hunter-gatherer societies, such as lack of food and other resources, may have driven the evolution of ADHD. There may have been some foraging situations in which it was better to stay than move on, but Barak said this tendency to leave could have been an advantage in some scenarios.

“Humans and other apes are very sophisticated foragers, but like almost all other animals, we tend to stay in our plots too long and harvest too much in our fields.” he says. “Therefore, starting action early may be beneficial to reduce over-harvesting, and this may be where the impulsive characteristics of ADHD come in handy.”

Although many people around the world are no longer looking for food, situations still exist where similar decision-making processes occur. If a person is studying for an exam, he may start by looking at one resource. If it doesn't help you understand the topic, Barak says, you may quickly switch to another resource, which may be more efficient and helpful.

“Although it is difficult to determine exactly how ADHD-related behaviors were adaptive in past environments, we find that people with and without ADHD show measurable differences in foraging strategies. In that sense, these results are convincing,” says Dr. Dan Eisenberg at the University of Washington in Seattle.

but Annie Swanepoel North East London NHS Foundation Trust said it did not reflect the scarcity of resources experienced by many of the early hunter-gatherers, as foraging operations produced abundant berry crops.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Discovery of a New Anaconda Species in the Orinoco Basin

Posted on February 21, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

An international team of herpetologists led by scientists from the University of New Mexico Highlands and the University of Queensland has described a mysterious new species of anaconda living deep in the Amazon.

Eunectes Acaima.Image credit: Rivas other., doi: 10.3390/d16020127.

anaconda (genus Eunectes) is a group of aquatic snakes endemic to the east of the Andes Mountains of South America.

These large-bodied snakes live in lowland rivers and wetlands. They have typical adaptations for an aquatic lifestyle, such as their nostrils and eyes located on the dorsal side of their heads, and exhibiting dorsal coloration and markings that blend well with aquatic plants.

Prior to this study, four species were recognized in this genus. Eunectes murinus represents the sister lineage of a group consisting of Eunectes veniensis, Eunectes deschaouenseiand Eunectes Noteus.

The largest of these species is Eunectes murinusor the blue anaconda, lives in most tropical regions of the continent, including the Amazon, Essequibo, and Orinoco river basins and several smaller watersheds.

The other three species are smaller Eunectes murinus distributed within or adjacent to the distribution of Eunectes murinus.

recently described species Eunectes veniensisor venian anaconda, is restricted to the Beni region of Bolivia.

Eunectes deschaouensei, or black-spotted anaconda, is distributed in the northeastern part of the continent. They range from the Amazon River Delta in Brazil to French Guiana and possibly Suriname.

Eunectes Noteusor yellow anaconda, is distributed in the south. Eunectes murinus Includes the Pantanal, Chaco, and other highly seasonal regions of tropical and subtropical South America, including Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Argentina, and Uruguay.

“Our team received an unusual invitation from the Huaorani people to explore the area and collect samples from an anaconda population, rumored to be the largest extant species,” the University of Queensland said. Professor Brian Fryco-lead author of the study.

“Indigenous hunters took us on a 10-day expedition into the jungle to search for snakes they consider sacred.”

“As we paddled our canoes down the river system, we were lucky enough to spot a few anacondas lurking in the shallows, waiting for prey.”

“The size of these magnificent creatures was incredible. The female anaconda we encountered was a whopping 6.3 meters (20.7 feet) long.”

“The Huaorani have reported other anacondas in the region measuring over 7.5 meters (24.6 feet) and weighing about 500 kilograms.”

named Eunectes Acaimaor northern green anaconda, a new species occurs in the Orinoco Basin.

“Eunectes Acaima branched from Eunectes murinus They are almost 10 million years old and genetically 5.5% different,” Professor Fry said.

“This is very important. To put it into perspective, there is only about a 2% difference between humans and chimpanzees. This discovery is the highlight of my career.”

“The Amazon continues to face alarming ecological threats,” he added.

“Deforestation in the Amazon basin due to agricultural expansion has resulted in an estimated loss of 20-31% of habitat and could affect up to 40% of the forest by 2050.”

“Another growing problem is habitat degradation due to land fragmentation caused by heavy metal pollution associated with runoff from industrialized agriculture and oil extraction activities.”

“Forest fires, drought and climate change are also notable threats.”

“These rare anacondas and the other species that share this remote ecosystem face significant challenges.”

“Our next research project will focus on heavy metal pollution in the Amazon,” Professor Fry said.

“It's not just these giant snakes that are facing environmental threats, but almost every creature in this region.”

“While the discovery of a new species of anaconda is exciting, it is important to emphasize the urgent need to further study these endangered species and ecosystems.”

“Particularly urgent is investigating how petrochemicals from oil spills are affecting the fertility and reproductive biology of rare snakes and other keystone species in the Amazon.”

discovery of Eunectes Acaima is explained in paper in diary Diversity.

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Jesus A. Rivas other. 2024. Untangling the anaconda: Unraveling a new species of green and rethinking yellow. Diversity 16(2):127; doi: 10.3390/d16020127

Source: www.sci.news

The Importance of Forgetfulness in Brain Function

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Forgetting may be essential for the brain to remember

Hans Nelemann/Getty Images

There's nothing more frustrating than trying to remember a fact or memory only to realize it's gone. You may ask yourself, is this the beginning of mental decline or the beginning of a degenerative brain disease? You probably don't think forgetting is a good thing. But it's possible. New research on memory suggests that it is actually a healthy and necessary brain function that is becoming increasingly important in our rapidly changing lives. “You want to be able to adapt to your environment because the environment is always changing. But if you get too attached to your initial experience, you won't be able to act adaptively,” he says. thomas ryan At Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland. Interestingly, his research also suggests that forgotten memories remain in the brain and could be restored if needed.

Everyday forgetfulness, such as not remembering what you had for dinner last week, is called natural forgetfulness. This is in contrast to pathological forgetfulness caused by conditions such as brain injury or Alzheimer's disease. Far from being a problem, natural forgetfulness supports one of our most unique and powerful traits: our ability to generalize. There are times when having a very detailed memory can be invaluable, such as when reviewing for an exam or acting as a witness to a crime, but you can't generalize without considering the specifics quickly and flexibly. says Mr. edwin robertson At the University of Glasgow, UK. “For a chair to be considered a chair…

Source: www.newscientist.com

Physicists Create New Isotopes of Osmium and Tungsten through Synthesis

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

A team of Chinese physicists has synthesized two new isotopes: osmium-160 and tungsten-156.

Location of the new isotopes osmium-160 and tungsten-156 on the nuclide chart. Image credit: Huabin Yang.

“The magic numbers of protons and neutrons make the nucleus particularly stable. The traditional magic numbers are 8, 20, 28, 50, 82, and 126,” said Dr. Huabin Yang, a physicist at the Institute of Modern Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. said the colleague.

“In previous research, physicists discovered that traditional magic numbers disappear and new magic numbers appear on the neutron-rich side of the nuclide chart.”

“Will other traditional magical numbers also disappear in the nuclear region where there is an extreme lack of neutrons?”

“Further exploration is critical to enriching and developing nuclear theory and improving our understanding of nuclear forces.”

In the new study, Dr. Yang's team conducted experiments at the Gas-Filled Recoil Separator Spectrometer for Heavy Atom and Nuclear Structures (SHANS) in Lanzhou, China.

Researchers have synthesized two new isotopes, osmium-160 and tungsten-156, using nuclear fusion vaporization reactions.

They measured the energy of the alpha particle and the half-life of the alpha-emitting isotope osmium-160.

On the other hand, the daughter nucleus, tungsten-156, was found to be a β+ emitter with a half-life of 291 ms.

The researchers used the newly measured alpha decay data to derive the alpha decay reduction for osmium-160 and compared it to other nuclei with 84 neutrons and fewer protons.

They discovered a surprising trend: the higher the number of protons, the lower the decay rate.

“This trend is interpreted as evidence of enhanced closure of the 82 neutron shell towards the proton drip line, which is supported by the increase in the neutron shell gap predicted by the theoretical model,” Dr. Yang said. said.

“The increased stability of the 82 neutron shell closure is thought to be due to the increasing proximity of the double magic nucleus lead 164, which may be a stable atomic nucleus with 82 protons and 82 neutrons. Masu.”

“Although lead-164 is predicted to cross the proton drip line, enhanced shell effects could make it a bonded or quasi-bonded nucleus.”

of study It was published in the magazine physical review letter.

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HB Yang other. 2024. Discovery of new isotopes ¹⁶⁰with oz ¹⁵⁶W: Reveals improved stability of N=82 shell closure on the neutron-deficient side. Physics.pastor rhett 132 (7): 072502; doi: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.132.072502

Source: www.sci.news

Ensuring Optimal Brain Function: Tips for Peak Performance

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock k

Thomas Edison says: He held a steel ball in each hand as he prepared for a nap.. When he nodded, they would fall and wake him up so he could write down ideas that came to him in the moments just before sleep, when he believed he was most creative. But are there really specific times when our brains perform better? And more broadly, are we better at different kinds of thinking at different stages of life? If so, it's worth asking how you can make the most of these mental peaks and maximize your brain's capabilities.?

Edison's methods may have been unorthodox, but It turned out that he was onto somethingas Delphine Audinet It was discovered in 2021 by the Paris Brain Institute and colleagues. They gave 103 slightly sleep-deprived people a seemingly complex math problem that they could solve with simple creative insight. Participants who woke up immediately after falling asleep were almost three times more likely to take a creative leap and solve a problem than those who stayed awake throughout the experiment.

This knowledge may be useful if you are looking for inspiration. But if that's the memory you're trying to optimize, deep sleep is when your brain does the heavy lifting, accumulating new long-term memories from the day's experiences. To get the most out of this, you need plenty of sleep. Adults need 7 to 9 hours of sleep each night. If you are among them, A lot of people…

Source: www.newscientist.com

Deadly Plants: Lethal to Pollinators but Nourishing to Their Offspring

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

The Arisaema plant is a death trap for pollinating mushroom gnats.

ArchivePL/Alamy

Pulpit flowers, famous for trapping and killing pollinators, may also act as nurseries for insect eggs, revealing a more subtle and mutually beneficial relationship that challenges existing assumptions. Become.

These jug-shaped plants are Alisa EmmaThey mimic the look and smell of musty mushrooms to attract fungus gnats, which are major pollinators. But when insects dip into the flower's spathe in search of this pungent food, they are unable to crawl out because the interior of the flower's elongated hood is too waxy. The gnat struggles violently inside its mottled red-green cup, scattering pollen all around it to thoroughly pollinate the plant, but eventually dies of exhaustion.

At least this is what botanists think I've been thinking about it for a long time.

But when Kenji Suetsugu A team from Japan's Kobe University hatched 62 flowers of the Asian pulpit jack-in-the-pulpit species Alisa Emmathunbergi, they realized something was wrong. The gnat was helplessly captured and laid eggs in the crown of the flower. When the flowers begin to wither, these larvae feed on the shriveled and rotting flesh and emerge as adults a few weeks later.

The fact that traps can serve the dual function of pollination sites and nurseries for the next generation of pollinators is “really surprising,” Suetsugu says.

Furthermore, some adults are able to escape from flower traps before it is too late. So the ducks aren't “technically lethal,” Suetsugu said. This suggests that plants strike a balance between ensuring pollination and not completely depleting the number of pollinating gnats.

These findings suggest that the relationship between jack-in-the-pulpit and its pollinators is much more complex than previously thought and cannot be neatly categorized as purely mutualistic or antagonistic.”, says Suetsugu.

This relationship may represent a step in the evolution of plants, from purely deceptive pollinators to mutually beneficial relationships with pollinators. Importantly, the findings may also suggest that there is more to the relationships between other plants and pollinators around the world than meets the eye.

Indeed, these findings challenge some preconceived ecological concepts. Jeff Ollerton at the University of Northampton, UK. In this particular case, the situation is mixed, as only some insects seem to be benefiting.He has more types of Alisa Emma (This genus includes more than 190 species) To learn more, you need to study this species in detail.

“The deeper we look into plant-pollinator interactions, the more we learn about the ability of plants to manipulate pollinator behavior and how pollinators can evolve strategies to acquire resources. There are more surprises to come,” Ollerton said.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Powerful winter storm causes historic California palm tree to fall into ocean

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Refugio State Beach, Calif. — Severe storms that hit California have caused damage in some parts of the state. the most iconic tree.

A majestic palm tree that normally flanks Refugio State Beach just north of Santa Barbara has fallen over the past few days. Images show how a huge 100-year-old tree fell into the sea and was completely uprooted.

Local officials say multiple factors caused the trees to fall. Years of coastal erosion were combined with powerful storm surges and supersaturated soil from a series of atmospheric rivers that brought heavy rain and high winds across the state.

“When the ground becomes saturated, the trees begin to fall, and both eucalyptus and palm trees fall over because the ground becomes too wet for their roots to hold in the ground.” Santa Barbara Craig Vanderswag, chief of the County Fire Battalion, told NBC News.

California State Parks Channel Coast District Superintendent Dena Bellman said officials have tagged several more trees on the coast as at high risk of falling, especially with the new heavy rains hitting California. Ta.

Due to this threat, the park is currently temporarily closed to the public.

The dramatic footage is a symbol of the power of these atmospheric rivers, which climate experts say is growing stronger as the planet's temperature rises.

Los Angeles received 75% of its annual average precipitation in the first three weeks of February alone. The city has received more rainfall than Seattle, New Orleans and Miami, and is about 2 inches away from setting a record for the wettest February.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

The Bitcoin Halving: Date and Significance Explained

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Bitcoin price volatility appears to be decreasing

Pedrošek/Shutterstock

What is Bitcoin halving?

Bitcoin is a digital currency that operates freely from central control. Rather than an authority like a bank or government tracking who owns what, Bitcoin relies on encryption.

So-called miners collect information about transactions and record them on a ledger called a blockchain. These miners perform a huge number of calculations with the aim of completing cryptographic problems, 0.69% of the world's electricity in the process. The first miner to solve this problem adds a collection (block) of transaction data to the blockchain.

You will also be rewarded with a certain amount of newly created Bitcoins. Bitcoin is built into the source code that writes and runs the network. Every 210,000 blocks, an event called a halving occurs where the size of the reward is reduced by 50%. This is intended to avoid inflation due to too many coins being created.

The first block ever mined gave a reward of 50 coins, which is now down to 6.25 coins after three halvings. The last halving was in May 2020.

When is the next Bitcoin halving?

The next Bitcoin halving is expected to occur around April 19th, reducing miners' rewards to 3.125 coins. The reward continues to decrease and disappears completely around 2140 after 21 million coins have been created. At that point, there are no new coins.

Why is it important?

For those who use Bitcoin to purchase goods and services or hold Bitcoin as an investment, nothing changes. The current Bitcoin pool will remain. However, for miners, the value of the rewards they receive will be significantly reduced.

This could lead some miners to close up shop if they decide the effort isn't worth the reward. But the reality is that mining economics are constantly changing, and the industry is likely to adapt and continue as it has always done.

More powerful computers are being created all the time that can perform mining calculations faster, making it easier to mine blocks. However, the feedback mechanism within Bitcoin's code constantly adapts to this by increasing or decreasing the difficulty of calculations depending on the total computer power currently allocated to mining. The purpose of Bitcoin's source code is that a new block is created approximately every 10 minutes, and the network adjusts to speed up or slow down as needed.

When Bitcoin was first launched in 2009, it was possible to mine coins almost instantly with even a basic computer. Nowadays, you need a room filled with powerful equipment, often high-end graphics cards and computationally proficient custom hardware.

What will happen to the price of Bitcoin?

The recent emergence of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), regulated financial products offered by large banks that offer an easier way to invest in Bitcoin, has been long anticipated and was expected to drive up prices. .Some analysts are now estimate Approximately 704,400 coins are already in the hands of the ETF.

There are currently two schools of thought regarding the effect of half-life. Some think the halving will give Bitcoin more impetus, causing the price to rise further, while others think the impact is already priced in. Regulatory approval for Bitcoin ETFs is by no means certain, but the halving is a certainty, so its impact may already be reflected in the price. But it's almost certain that halving won't double the price.

The wild price fluctuations that Bitcoin has experienced over the past few years have become less frequent, and metrics that track volatility seems to be on a downward trend. But at the end of the day, any discussion about Bitcoin's price is just speculation.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Study claims new diet that mimics fasting could reverse biological age

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

A new study led by the University of South Carolina Leonard Davis School of Gerontology suggests that fasting-mimetic dieting (FMD) cycles can significantly reduce disease risk factors and decrease human biological age. FMD was developed by Professor Walter Longo and his team, involving a five-day diet high in unsaturated fats and low in overall calories, protein, and carbohydrates. The diet mimics the effects of water-only fasting while providing necessary nutrients and making fasting more manageable for individuals.

During the five-day fasting period, participants were allowed to consume specified amounts of plant-based soups, energy bars, energy drinks, chip snacks, and tea and given supplements to ensure they didn’t miss out on important vitamins, minerals, and essential fatty acids.

Previous studies have shown the various health benefits of FMD, including promoting stem cell regeneration, reducing chemotherapy side effects, and decreasing signs of dementia in mice. The recent study focuses on the effects of FMD on human immune system aging, insulin resistance, liver fat, and biological age.

The research team analyzed two groups of men and women aged 18-70 who received three to four cycles of FMD per month. The results showed reductions in diabetes risk factors, reduced fat in the abdomen and liver, and rejuvenation of the immune system. Data analysis also demonstrated that FMD participants lost an average of 2.5 years in biological age.

Professor Longo hopes these findings will encourage more doctors to recommend FMD cycles to patients with elevated risk factors for disease and to the general public interested in improving their health and vitality. He suggested that healthy people between the ages of 20 and 70 should consider trying FMD two or three times a year, cautioning that there may be concerns when used in combination with certain diabetes medications.

About our experts:

Walter Longo is the Edna M. Jones Professor of Gerontology and Biological Sciences and Director of the Longevity Institute at the University of Southern California Leonard Davis School of Gerontology in Los Angeles.

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

Research: Vertebrate Brain Resembles an Ancient Retrovirus

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Biologists from the Altos Institute, Cambridge Institute of Science, and the University of Cambridge have discovered that genetic elements derived from retroviruses (retrotransposons) are essential for the production of myelin (the insulating sheath that surrounds nerve axons) in mammals, amphibians, and animals. I discovered that fish. This gene sequence, called retromyelin, is likely the result of an ancient retroviral infection, and comparisons of retromyelin in mammals, amphibians, and fish indicate that retroviral infection and genome invasion events occurred separately in each of these groups. suggests that it has occurred.

gauche other. suggest that retrovirus internalization played an important role in the emergence of vertebrate myelin. Image credit: Ghosh other., doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2024.01.011.

Myelin, the complex fatty tissue that lines vertebrate nerve axons, allows rapid impulse conduction without the need to increase axon diameter. This means that the nerves can be packed more closely together.

It also provides metabolic support for the nerves, allowing them to lengthen.

Myelin first appeared on the tree of life around the same time as the jaw, and its importance in vertebrate evolution has been recognized for a long time, but until now it is unclear what molecular mechanism caused its appearance. was.

Tanay Ghosh and colleagues at Altos Labs-Cambridge Institute of Science noticed the role of retromyelin in myelin production while studying the gene networks used by oligodendrocytes, the cells that produce myelin in the central nervous system. .

Specifically, they were studying the role of non-coding regions, including retrotransposons, in these gene networks. This has not been previously studied in the context of myelin biology.

“Retrotransposons make up about 40% of our genome, but we know nothing about how they helped animals acquire specific traits during evolution.” said Dr. Ghosh.

“Our motivation was to learn how these molecules serve evolutionary processes, especially in the context of myelination.”

Researchers discovered that in rodents, retromyelin RNA transcripts regulate the expression of myelin basic protein, one of the key components of myelin.

When we experimentally inhibited retromyelin in oligodendrocytes and oligodendrocyte progenitor cells (the stem cells from which oligodendrocytes are derived), the cells were no longer able to produce myelin basic protein.

To find out whether retromyelin is present in other vertebrate species, scientists looked for similar sequences within the genomes of jawed vertebrates, jawless vertebrates, and some invertebrate species. Searched for.

They identified similar sequences in all other classes of jawed vertebrates (birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians) but found no similar sequences in jawless vertebrates or invertebrates. did not.

Robin Franklin, a neuroscientist at the Altos Institute at the Cambridge Institute of Science, said: “There was an evolutionary drive to speed up the conduction of impulses in axons, because the faster the impulse conduction, the faster we can grab objects and move away from them.'' Because they can run away.”

Next, the authors wanted to know whether retromyelin was integrated once in the ancestor of all jawed vertebrates, or whether there were separate retroviral invasions in different branches.

To answer these questions, they constructed a phylogenetic tree from 22 jawed vertebrate species and compared their retromyelin sequences.

This analysis revealed that retromyelin sequences are more similar within species than between species, suggesting that retromyelin has been acquired multiple times through a process of convergent evolution.

The researchers also showed that retromyelin plays a functional role in myelination in fish and amphibians.

When they experimentally disrupted the retromyelin gene sequence in fertilized zebrafish and frog eggs, they found that the developing fish and tadpoles produced significantly less myelin than normal.

“Our findings open new avenues of research exploring how retroviruses are involved in directing evolution more generally,” said Dr. Ghosh.

of study It was published in the magazine cell.

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Tanai Ghosh other. 2024. Retroviral involvement in vertebrate myelination through retrotransposon RNA-mediated control of myelin gene expression. cell 187 (4): 814-830; doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2024.01.011

Source: www.sci.news

Peru Unearths 4,750-Year-Old Monumental Stone Square

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

A team of anthropologists from the University of Wyoming, the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the University of New Hampshire has discovered a 4,750-year-old megalithic rotunda measuring 18 meters (60 feet) in diameter at Calakpuma in America's Cajamarca Basin. Peru. It is one of the oldest known monuments and megalithic structures in the northern Andes of Peru, and one of the earliest examples in the Western Hemisphere.

It is centered around a 4,750-year-old rotunda, with the modern city of Cajamarca in the background. Image credit: Toohey other., doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adl0572.

Monumental architecture is central to many aspects of the development of human social organization and social complexity, but the drivers of its origin remain poorly understood.

This form of architecture is intentionally built to be larger and, in some cases, more elaborate than necessary given the desired functionality.

The world's oldest ceremonial monumental architecture, whether represented by megalithic arrangements, large platforms or buildings, or bounded plazas, were larger than immediate households and were often larger than the population of the local area. was the result of a collective or corporate activity by a larger group.

Early well-known examples of this type of ceremonial architecture include Göbekli Tepe in Turkey, Stonehenge in England, and the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt, which were built in 9,000 BC, 2,900 BC, and 2,900 BC, respectively. It was built by 2,650 AD.

Göbekli Tepe is of particular importance here, as it was built during the pre-Pottery Age, during the Neolithic period, by hunter-gatherer-forager tribes who were at the pinnacle of sedentary living and food production.

Early examples of monuments in the Western Hemisphere include Watson Brake and Poverty Point, which date to 3400 BC and 1700 BC, respectively.

The newly discovered megalithic square is Late preceramicIt dates back to 2850 BC.

The structure is located at the Calapuma archaeological site in the Cajamarca Basin in the northern Peruvian Andes and is built of large, free-standing, vertically placed megaliths.

This construction method has never been reported in the Andes and is different from other monumental rotunda in the region.

“This structure was built about 100 years before the Great Pyramids of Egypt, around the same time as Stonehenge,” said Dr. Jason Toohey, an anthropologist at the University of Wyoming.

“It was probably a meeting place and a ceremonial place for the early people who lived in this part of the Cajamarca Valley.”

“These people were primarily hunter-gatherers, and may have only recently begun growing crops and domesticating animals.”

Kalakpuma Square is formed by two concentric walls, approximately 18 meters in diameter.

“The Late Preceramic Period, during which Plaza Calapuma was constructed, was a period of socio-economic transition in the Andes,” the researchers said.

“On the central coast, the communities that came together to build giant mounds in places like Caral were not yet full-time farmers, but engaged in complex systems of exchange with coastal fishing villages.”

“Inland communities grew some food and industrial crops, but also relied on hunting and trading seafood.”

“In the northern highlands of Peru, the people who built the plazas of Calapuma may have begun experimenting with food production, but they were also probably still relatively mobile hunter-gatherers.”

“Like Nanchoc centuries earlier, groups in Cajamarca may have engaged in the construction of enterprises in Calapuma's plaza and subsequently repeatedly negotiated group identity there through the integration of events and perhaps feasts.”

“The construction of Late Pre-Peraque monumental ceremonial buildings in the coastal and highlands of the central Andes probably originated from small groups, as was the case with earlier monumental mass buildings outside the Andean region of South America, such as Göbekli Tepe. It represented a change in the social world with changes in the associated belief systems into more collective and locally focused beliefs and actions.”

of findings It was published in the magazine scientific progress.

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Jason L. Twohey other. 2024. A monumental stone plaza located at an altitude of 4750 meters in the Cajamarca Valley in Peru. scientific progress 10(7); doi: 10.1126/sciadv.adl0572

Source: www.sci.news

The Sun-Fueled Black Hole: Potential to Shine as the Brightest Object in the Universe

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — Researchers have identified a quasar with a black hole at its center that may be the most luminous object in the universe. This quasar is growing at an incredible rate, capable of consuming an amount equivalent to the sun in a single day.

The record-breaking quasar shines 500 trillion times brighter than the sun. Scientists reported in the journal Nature Astronomy that the black hole fueling this quasar is more than 17 billion times more massive than the sun.

Despite appearing as mere dots in images, scientists believe quasars to be formidable entities.

The disk of luminous gas and other material orbiting a quasar’s black hole is akin to a cosmic hurricane.

“This quasar is the most violent place in the universe as we know it,” said lead author Christian Wolff of the Australian National University.

The object, known as J0529-4351, was initially discovered by the European Southern Observatory in 1980 and misclassified as a star. It was not confirmed to be a quasar until last year, after telescope observations in Australia and the Atacama Desert in Chile.

“What’s interesting about this quasar is that it’s hiding in plain sight and was previously misclassified as a star,” said Priyamvada Natarajan of Yale University.

Further analysis revealed that the quasar consumes the equivalent of 370 suns a year, or one sun a day, and the black hole at its center has a mass between 17 billion and 19 billion times that of the sun. More observations are needed to understand its growth rate.

Quasars are located 12 billion light years away and have existed since the beginning of the universe. One light year is 5.8 trillion miles.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

Possible Origins of the Basque Language Unraveled by Ancient Bronze Hand

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Ancient bronze hand discovered in Irregui, northern Spain

Juancho Egana

An inscription found on a 2,000-year-old metal needle may be written in a language related to modern-day Basque. If this interpretation is correct, it could help explain one of the biggest mysteries in linguistics: the origin of the Basque language.

However, other linguists say there is not enough evidence to link the inscription to Basque.

The bronze hand was discovered in July 2021 at the top of a hill called Irregui in the Pyrenees Mountains in northern Spain. Archaeologists have been excavating there since 2007, first discovering a medieval castle and then exploring a much older settlement from the Iron Age.

This settlement was founded between 1500 and 1000 BC. It was probably attacked by the Romans and abandoned in the 1st century BC.

Irreghi's hand is a bronze plate measuring 14 centimeters long, 12.8 centimeters wide, and only 0.1 centimeter thick, with a patina tint. On the back of the hand are his four lines of text, rewritten by first scratching and then dotting into the metal.

Most words cannot be associated with any known language, but the first word is “sorionek”. Matin Ayesteran Professors at the University of the Basque Country in Bilbao, Spain, and their colleagues claim it is similar to Basque. Zorio cat, which means “lucky.” Furthermore, the last word is “elaukon”, which is likened to a Basque verb. Zelaucon.

Irregi's hand carved in a mysterious language

Matin Ayesteran et al.

It is said that this hand was probably intended to represent good fortune or attract good fortune by appealing to the gods. Mikel Edeso Eguia in Aranzadi Scientific Society Assisted with excavations at Donostia (also known as San Sebastian), Spain.

The researchers also claim that the hand is evidence that languages related to Basque have been spoken in northern Spain for 2,000 years. Most languages currently spoken in Europe belong to the Indo-European family, but Basque does not. “It has nothing to do with any other language we know,” says Edeso Eguia. Previous research has tentatively linked the Basques to a group of people known as the Bascons, who lived in the Pyrenees according to classical sources.

However, the idea that the inscriptions on the hands are written in a language related to Basque is not widely accepted.After the hand was first described in his 2022 book, linguists Celine Munour at the University of Pau and the Adour region in France. Julen Manterola Presented at the Basque University of Vitoria-Gasteiz Criticism.

“There's not enough evidence,” Manterola said. This is also because there are very few words in the hands of the Irregian language. Not enough, he says, to properly compare with known languages.

Furthermore, the connection with the Basque language is based almost exclusively on the similarity between “sorionek” and “solionek”. Zorio cat. “You can't connect other words with historical Basque,” Munor says.

Even that similarity can be misleading, Manterola says. Similar phrases in Basque have changed in predictable ways over the centuries, arriving at their current form. Zorio catmust have taken a completely different path.

“We expect more inscriptions to emerge,” Munour says. “In this case, we will be able to learn more about the possible relationship between this language and the Basque language.”

topic:

Source: www.newscientist.com

New Species of Stegosaurus discovered by Paleontologists

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

in new paper Published in the magazine on January 31, 2024 historical biologypaleontologists announced the discovery of a previously undocumented species of dinosaur related to the famous dinosaur. stegosaurus.

Hypothetical reconstruction of Enbokuryu Artimus. Image credit: Ddinodan / Sci.News.

stegosaurus A group of armored, plant-eating dinosaurs that lived during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods.

These dinosaurs were four-legged and reached a maximum length of about 9 meters (30 feet).

They had small heads, stake-like teeth, vertical bony plates and spines on their backs and tails, and hoof-like toes on all four limbs.

Dr. Lei Jia of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and colleagues said, “Stegosaurs are a minor but iconic group of ornithischian dinosaurs.''

“They range from the Middle Jurassic to the Early Cretaceous, but are rare and poorly represented in the Cretaceous.”

“Until our study began, there were only four valid taxa from the Cretaceous. Palantdon, Verhosaurus homheni, Verhosaurus ordoseensis and Mongolostegus exspectabilis”

Fossilized bones are Enbokuryu Artimus. Image credit: Jia other., doi: 10.1080/08912963.2024.2308214.

A new species from the Cretaceous period, Enbokuryu Artimuslived in what is now China from 113 million years ago to 100 million years ago.

The fossilized remains of this sword dragon were collected from the Zuoyun Formation in Zuoyun County, Shanxi Province, China.

“Enbokuryu Artimus “This is one of the most recent records of a stegosaur taxon in the world,” the paleontologists said.

“Compared to other sword dragons, Enbokuryu Artimus The dorsal vertebrae and iliosacral block have several unique features. ”

“The dorsal vertebrae have higher neural arches, smaller neural canals, and fewer fused vertebrae/sacral and fenestra/sacral ribs in the iliosacral block.”

“As a result of phylogenetic analysis, Enbokuryu Artimus It is recovered as a sister taxon of the clade containing. Stegosaurus Stenops and Vuelhosaurus homheni” they added.

“However, it differs from these two taxa in several anatomical features, including the dorsal sacral ribs, sacral ribs, caudal vertebrae, and ilium.”

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Ray Jia other. A new species of sword dragon from the Late Early Cretaceous period of Zuoyun City, Shanxi Province, China. historical biology, published online on January 31, 2024. doi: 10.1080/08912963.2024.2308214

Source: www.sci.news

Stunning marine life captured in underwater photography contest

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Gannet diving

Kat Chou/UPY 2024

Snow-white northern booby (Moras Bassanus) In this action-packed photo, a man dives for food in the icy waters off the coast of Scotland's Shetland Islands. The seabird is about the same size as an albatross, with a wingspan of up to 180 centimeters. They also have strong neck muscles and nostrils on the inside of their beaks that can close to prevent water from entering, making them uniquely adapted to high-speed diving.

This shot was one of the most spectacular in the 2024 Underwater Photographer of the Year competition, which celebrates the wonders of the marine world.here are some new scientistThese are carefully selected works from among the many entries.

Virgo Shipwreck near Recife, Brazil

Fabi Fregonesi/UPY 2024

In this photo by Fabiana Fregonesi, a school of fish swarms around a shipwreck, forming a shape that momentarily resembles a boat's sail. The ship, called Virgo, was intentionally sunk in 2017 to serve as a diving site near Recife, Brazil.

“At that moment, I knew the ship was ready to set sail and the journey into an unknown adventure began,” Fregonesi said in a statement.

gray whale eyes

Rafael Fernandez Caballero/UPY 2024

Eye of Eastern Gray Whale (Eschrichius Robtus) penetrates this mysterious shot taken from just above the surface of a saltwater lagoon in western Mexico. These marine giants are friendly creatures and often approach boats to show curiosity. Whales undertake the longest annual migration of any mammal, from their summer feeding grounds in the Arctic south along the west coast of North America to the warm lagoons of Baja California, Mexico.

Octopus ringed with pyrosomes

Dennis Corpus/UPY 2024

In contrast to the giant gray whales, this 10 centimeter wide creature was captured up close in the deep waters off the coast of the Philippines. The circular object in the image is a pyrosome. This is a colonial animal called a zooid, which is made up of hundreds or thousands of tiny individuals. Encased in a strange pyrosome, a tiny octopus peeks out.

diving cormorant

John Anderson/UPY 2024

This ravenous cormorant mistakes photographer John Anderson's camera for a fish and heads straight for it. This stunning image was taken on a bright summer afternoon in a kelp forest at a dive site in Monterey, California. Many cormorant species rely on these special marine ecosystems to survive. However, local kelp forests have declined by 80% over the past decade.

Comparisons are difficult because men’s brains tend to be larger than women’s.

Sergiy Tryapitsyn / Alamy

Hubble’s Discovery: Dwarf Spiral Galaxy Found in the Coma Constellation

Posted on February 19, 2024 by Igor Mitreski

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have captured stunning images of the dwarf spiral galaxy IC 3476 in the constellation of Coma.

This Hubble image shows IC 3476, a dwarf spiral galaxy located 54 million light-years away in the constellation Coma. This image consists of observations made by Hubble's Altitude Survey Camera (ACS) in the near-infrared and optical parts of the spectrum. This is based on data obtained through his two filters. Color is obtained by assigning different hues to each monochromatic image associated with an individual filter. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / M. Sun.

IC 3476 It is located in the constellation Coma, approximately 54 million light-years from Earth.

This galaxy is first discovered It was proposed by German astronomer Arnold Schwassmann on November 22, 1900.

IC 3476, also known as IRAS 12301+1419 or LEDA 41608, is a member of the Virgo Cluster.

On the other hand, new Hubble images of the galaxy don't look quite as dramatic. The actual physical events occurring in IC 3476 are highly energetic.

“IC 3476 is undergoing a process known as ram pressure stripping, which promotes unusually high levels of star formation within the region of the galaxy itself,” the Hubble astronomers said.

“We tend to associate the letter 'ram' with the acronym RAM, which refers to random access memory in computing.”

“But ram pressure has a perfectly clear definition in physics: it is the pressure exerted on an object by the overall resistance of the fluid as it moves through some form of fluid.”

“If the entire galaxy is under ram pressure, then the galaxy is a 'celestial body', and the intergalactic medium or the intracluster medium (dust and gas that permeates the space between galaxies, in the latter case the intergalactic space) becomes a “celestial body”. fluid'. “

“Lamb pressure stripping occurs when gas is stripped from a galaxy by ram pressure,” the astronomers explained.

“Gas is absolutely key to star formation, so removing this gas could lead to reduced levels of star formation or even a complete cessation.”

“But the ram's pressure could also compress other parts of the galaxy, which could actually promote star formation.”

“This is what appears to be happening in IC 3476: no star formation appears to be occurring at the edges of the galaxy, which are bearing the brunt of the ram pressure separation, but in deeper regions of the galaxy, the rate of star formation slows down. It seems to be clearly above average. ”

Source: www.sci.news