Mummy Portrait of a Man from Roman Egypt Flavian Period, circa late 1st century A.D. – Courtesy Sotheby's
Mummy Portrait of a Man from Roman Egypt Flavian Period, circa late 1st century A.D. – Courtesy Sotheby’s
Sotheby’s recently sold a painting of a man from Roman-controlled Egypt in the first century CE that experts suggest represents the dawn of realistic portraiture 1,200 years before it appeared in Italy.
The image is part of a family of works known collectively as the Fayum Mummy Portraits, all of which were found during 19th century excavations at a site called Hawara in Egypt’s Fayum region.
The portraits were placed atop mummified remains like masks, and were painted with pigment mixed with melted beeswax on wooden panels. Over 900 have been found, and some have been auctioned.
This portrait of a dark-skinned senior with graying hair, piercing hazel eyes, and a large lower lip recently brought in $889,000 with fees. Though they were painted and entombed in Egypt, the subjects could be Romans, whose nobility could afford both mummification and portrait commissions.
The nose might give the man up as a Roman; the substantial bridge being a feature of the Italian race still today. Others are perhaps less obvious.
What unquestionably stands out is the true air of realism in the work—one gets the feeling all at once that the man truly appeared as he is portrayed.
“It invites you to want to know more about him and to feel his presence,” said Alexandra Olsman, a Sotheby’s specialist in ancient sculpture and works of art.
Roman domination of Egypt came only after Macedonian domination of Egypt under the Ptolemaic dynasty. Whatever skin/eye color and features the ancient Egyptian race had, the population in the major cities would have long been altered by intermarrying with northern Mediterraneans.
It’s not known whether the sitters were painted in death or life, or some state in between of infirmity. Olsman told CNN that with the sincere connection through the eyes, it would seem unlikely to be the artist’s interpretation of a dead man.
Sotheby’s has sold over a dozen Fayum mummy paintings over the years, and this one along with another featuring a curly-headed, younger man, commanded the highest bids.
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As the Winter Olympics roars into life in northern Italy, athletes will be sporting state-of-the-art airbag vests that inflate during crashes, protecting speed skiers from the worst injuries.
For those unfamiliar, the Olympics are being held at the renowned ski area called Cortina d’Ampezzo, which is also a stop on the downhill events at the skiing World Cup, and if you didn’t know that, than you wouldn’t know that some of Cortina’s slopes are the fastest on Earth, with skiers routinely hitting freeway speeds.
One wrong turn of the ski could invite disaster, and amid a spate of fatalities in the sport among young Italian skiers, the engineering firm Dainese has worked for several years to perfect a wearable airbag vest.
At the same time, organizers, and the International Skiing Federation (FIS) are re-designing training courses for greater safety, including through measures like installing nets and incorporating larger fall zones.
“You can’t make a sport of speed totally safe… but you can do much more on training pistes [slopes],” the retired Italian downhill skier Kristian Ghedina, told Reuters.
The FIS made airbag vests mandatory for all speed events for the 2024-2025 World Cup circuit. The mandate will also come into affect for the downhill events at the Olympics.
The airbag uses sensors trained on years of runs and GPS technology to monitor an athlete’s motion and trigger only in real crashes. Some athletes have tried to argue their way out of the mandate, suggesting they reduce speed, and don’t want to have their course time put at risk by a misfiring vest, which manufacturer Dainese claims occurs at an extremely low rate.
Just after Christmas, 5 World Cup skiers crashed and suffered serious injuries including a brain hemorrhage on the Stelvio course at Bormio—the site of the Downhill and Super-G events at this year’s Winter Olympics.
Stelvio has several sections where downhill skiers hit speeds of 90mph, and it’s one of the most hair-raising courses on the World Cup circuit. Reuters spoke with some Italian skiers who say that the Dainese airbag will help safety catch up with the last 20 years of innovation in skies, boots, and ski suits—which have had only speed and performance in mind.
Airbags have existed in the sport for over a decade, and post-crash examination and research in some cases has shown that damage would have been worse if not for the deployment.
While some skiers argue the vest impedes their movement, another said it offered peace of mind that allowed him to focus on performance.
The airbag mandate should help protect skiers during the downhill events, and companies are looking at how quick-release ski bindings or boots could help reduce the number of knee and tibia injuries when skies don’t snap off in a crash.
WATCH the story below from Reuters…
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Quote of the Day: “The happiest people seem to be those who have no particular cause for being happy except that they are so.” – William Inge
Photo by: Natalia Blauth For Unsplash+
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
152 years ago today, American Pulitzer Prize-winning Poet Amy Lowell was born. During a career that spanned just over a dozen years, she wrote and published over 650 poems, yet scholars cite Lowell’s tireless efforts to awaken American readers to contemporary trends in poetry, including by substantially aiding the rise of Ezra Pound’s work, as her more influential contribution to literary history. READ some of her verse… (1874)
Artist Gary Harper uses cremation ashes to make personalized paintings for grieving families – SWNS
Artist Gary Harper uses cremation ashes to make personalized paintings for grieving families – SWNS
An artist is using cremation ashes in his paintings to create unique memorial landscapes that grieving families can personalize as a way to remember loved ones.
Gary Harper began painting professionally just two years ago and was inspired by the loss of his cousin to respectfully experiment with blending a small amount of ashes into his artwork.
He holds consultations with families to learn about the deceased and any their favorite memories, focusing on landscapes with a personal connection.
The 33-year-old from Liverpool began painting while at college and developed a love for still life and landscapes.
It wasn’t until he became an occupation therapy assistant in a psychiatric hospital that he saw first-hand the profound effect art could have on people.
“I held an art therapy session with a patient and we made so many paintings together,” said the 33-year-old. “I was guiding her through the process and I realized how much I enjoyed it.
“A month later, I picked up the brush and started painting for myself. The piece was abstract sunflowers and the feedback I got was overwhelming.”
Artist Gary Harper uses cremation ashes to make personalized paintings of landscapes or still life – SWNS
While painting in his free time in December 2024, his cousin Donna passed away from cancer.
“It was so close to Christmas and it was really emotional.
A year later, he was painting some seascapes when the thought crossed his mind that he could add some ashes.”
In November 2025, Gary painted his first Ashes to Art commission, aiming to provide a personalized memorial in acrylic paint for the bereaved.
“It was lovely the family trusted me,” he told SWNS news agency. “It’s a respectful process.”
“I do a consultation with the loved one, learning everything about the person and what they enjoyed.
“With a painting, when it’s done, the family can feel the painting texture with the ashes, so they can still ‘feel’ the person in the painting, especially if it’s a place they used to love.”
Chester Zoo saves Bermuda snail (Poecilozonites bermudensis) from extinction
Chester Zoo saves Bermuda snail (Poecilozonites bermudensis) from extinction
A button-sized snail once thought extinct has been officially saved after conservationists bred and released more than 100,000 into the wild.
The greater Bermuda snail (Poecilozonites bermudensis) was believed to be lost forever until a small surviving population was rediscovered in an alleyway in Bermuda’s capital, Hamilton, a decade ago.
Now, following an international effort, the species has been confirmed as safe and secure—a moment conservation experts describe as “once in a career.”
The landmark success announced yesterday has been achieved through a partnership between the government of Bermuda, a conservation researcher from the Canada-based organization Biolinx Environmental Research and England’s Chester Zoo, where thousands of snails were carefully bred before being returned to Bermuda.
“It’s every conservationist’s dream to help save a whole species – and that’s exactly what we’ve done,” said Tamas Papp, an invertebrates manager at Chester Zoo.
“The greater Bermuda snail is tiny, but this is one of the biggest success stories in conservation.”
“This scientific confirmation that we’ve saved them is testament to the role zoos can play in preventing extinction, and in the power of collaboration, and is something everyone involved will carry in their heart.”
Six colonies of the released snails have successfully established in Bermuda, an archipelago situated in the north Atlantic Ocean, a fact that was confirmed by an assessment of how the snails are faring, which is forthcoming in Oryx, The International Journal of Conservation.
“It is remarkable to think we only began with less than 200 snails and have now released over 100,000,” said Dr. Mark Outerbridge, a Wildlife Ecologist at the Department of Environment and Natural Resources in Bermuda.
Bermuda snail (Poecilozonites bermudensis) – Courtesy of Chester Zoo
To boost population numbers, an expert group of scientists and keepers at Chester Zoo were entrusted with several of the snails in hope they could be bred off-site and returned to the wild.
Gerardo Garcia, Animal & Plant Director at Chester Zoo, was among the team that bred the snails in specially designed pods at the zoo and painstakingly released them in protected woodland habitats.
“The fact the snails are firmly established in six areas is massive,” he said. “These are the ones where the colonies are growing and expanding in range. That itself is really important information, because not much was known about P. bermudensis.”
Keepers adapted existing snail husbandry methods to find the best conditions for P. bermudensis to multiply. Their findings are now part of the first conservation breeding guide for the species.
“They nearly vanished, so being able to say the snails are now safe from extinction is amazing. It’s an incredibly good feeling to make a huge difference for a species, and something conservationists might get to say only once in their whole career,” said Dr. Garcia.
Snails are among the least researched animals on the planet, and among the most vulnerable to extinction.
Endemic snails in Bermuda have been affected by habitat loss and climate change, and their decline was accelerated by the introduction of predatory ‘wolf snails’, and carnivorous flatworms which ate the much smaller native species. This had a broader impact on the Bermuda ecosystem.
“The snails function both as prey for larger animals and as consumers of live and decaying vegetation, so they are vital for turning over nutrients within their habitat,” said Dr. Kristiina Ovaska from Biolinx.
In the future, climate change and environmental issues may affect the newly established P. bermudensis snail colonies, but the team is confident they now know how to reinforce the population quickly and effectively.
It’s another example of what is possible when conservationists collaborate across borders to reverse biodiversity loss and restore nature’s balance.
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43-year-old bonobo named Kanzi – Courtesy of Ape Initiative / Johns Hopkins / SWNS
43-year-old bonobo named Kanzi – Courtesy of Ape Initiative / Johns Hopkins / SWNS
Apes share the human ability to imagine and pretend, suggests new research that included a series of tea party experiments.
Scientists at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, called it the first study to show the capacity for pretending is not unique to mankind.
They learned that apes can use their imagination and play pretend. One bonobo engaged with cups of imaginary juice and bowls of pretend grapes “consistently and robustly” across three experiments, challenging long-held assumptions about the abilities of animals.
The findings, published this week in the journal Science, suggest that the capacity to understand pretend objects is within the cognitive potential of, at least, an “enculturated ape”, and likely dates back six to nine million years, to our common evolutionary ancestors.
“It really is game-changing that their mental lives go beyond the here and now,” said study co-author Dr. Christopher Krupenye.
“Imagination has long been seen as a critical element of what it is to be human, but the idea that it may not be exclusive to our species is really transformative.
“Jane Goodall discovered that chimps make tools and that led to a change in the definition of what it means to be human—and this, too, really invites us to reconsider what makes us special and what mental life is out there among other creatures.”
He said that, by the age of two, human children can engage in pretend scenarios, like tea parties. Even at 15-months-old, infants show measures of surprise when they see a person “drinking” from a cup after pretending to empty it.
Credit: Getty Images For Unsplash+
There had been no previous studies of pretend behavior in non-human animals, despite several reports of animals seemingly engaging in pretending behavior from both the wild and in zoos or captivity.
For instance, in the wild, young female chimps have been observed carrying and playing with sticks, holding them like mothers would hold their infants. And a chimp in captivity seemed to drag imaginary blocks along the floor after playing with real wooden blocks.
Dr. Krupenye and co-author Amalia Bastos, a former Johns Hopkins postdoctoral fellow who is now a lecturer at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, wondered if they could test the capacity to pretend in a controlled environment.
They created experiments similar to a child’s tea party to test Kanzi, a 43-year-old bonobo living at Ape Initiative in Iowa, is the world’s only research center and sanctuary dedicated exclusively to the study and conservation of bonobos, our closest primate relative.
Kanzi had been anecdotally reported to engage in pretense, and could respond to verbal prompts by pointing.
In each test, a researcher and Kanzi faced one another, tea party-style, across a table. In the first task there were two transparent cups on the table, both empty, alongside an empty transparent pitcher.
Kanzi – Courtesy of Ape Initiative / Johns Hopkins / SWNS
The researcher tipped the pitcher to “pour” a little pretend juice into each cup, then pretended to dump the juice out of one cup, shaking it a bit to really get it out.
The researcher then asked Kanzi: “Where’s the juice?”
The bonobo pointed to the correct cup that still contained pretend juice, even when the researcher changed the position of the cup filled with pretend juice.
In case Kanzi thought there was real juice in the cup, even if he couldn’t see it, the team ran a second experiment, during which a cup of real juice was placed alongside the cup of pretend juice.
When Kanzi was asked what he wanted, he pointed toward the real juice almost every time.
A third experiment repeated the same concept, except with grapes. A researcher pretended to sample a grape from an empty container, then placed it inside one of the two jars.
After pretending to empty one of the containers, he asked Kanzi: “Where’s the grape?”
Kanzi again indicated the location of the pretend object. The researchers said Kanzi wasn’t perfect, but he was consistently correct.
“It’s extremely striking and very exciting that the data seem to suggest that apes, in their minds, can conceive of things that are not there,” said Dr. Bastos.
“Kanzi is able to generate an idea of this pretend object and, at the same time, know it’s not real.”
The researchers now want to test whether other apes and animals can engage in pretend play or track pretend objects. They also hope to explore other facets of imagination in apes, perhaps their ability to think about the future or to think about what’s going on in the minds of others.
“Imagination is one of those things that in humans gives us a rich mental life,” said Dr. Krupenye.
“And if some roots of imagination are shared with apes, that should make people question their assumption that other animals are just living robotic lifestyles constrained to the present. We should be compelled by these findings to care for these creatures with rich and beautiful minds and ensure they continue to exist.”
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A would-be thief was caught by police after a herd of llamas cornered the suspect in a field until officers could arrive.
It was dark outside when a man was alerted to an intruder on the couple’s farmland by animals making a loud alarm call last Monday evening.
The crook was fleeing the scene after stealing from a woman in Derbyshire, England, and he decided to squeeze through a fence onto farmland belonging to Heidi Price and Graham Oliver.
But his escape from police officers did not go according to plan, after eight llamas galloped over to him as he was running through the field and surrounded him.
Their warning cry alerted Graham who then discovered that the crime-fighting llamas had made a “citizens arrest”.
Graham went into the field with his dog to find the “terrified” suspect encircled by the 6-foot animals before police arrived on the scene.
SWNS
“We’ve got eight llamas and llamas don’t like people entering their personal space after dusk,” said Heidi, who arrived home to find police officers gathered on the road.
“Our llamas galloped over to him and surrounded him. They literally made a circle around him, and then started releasing their warning cry, which sounds like an old man laughing.
“He didn’t know what to do next and looked absolutely terrified,” she told SWNS news agency.
The dog started barking around the intruder’s feet, which scared him even more.
“My partner led him back across the field, to where he’d come from, and back over the fence where the police arrested him.
Heidi speculated the man’s demise could have been a lot scarier. If he hadn’t been caught by the llamas, he might have ventured further into the field and been met by five huge bulls—and his fate could have been a nasty one.
“But the llamas made a citizens arrest,” she joked. “I was wondering if they would get some sort of citizens recognition award!”
Since reluctantly rescuing the llamas 10 years ago when a farm was closing down, Heidi has become a member of the British Llama Society and learned a lot.
The eight animals weren’t accustomed to being touched by people at all, but during Covid, she worked with them until they could be handled—and now, thanks to Heidi’s support and patience, the llamas are calm and confident about being around people and even work as therapy animals supporting patients with mental health issues.
She told SWNS news that a description of her llama therapy program has even been published in the the British Journal of Occupational Therapy.
“Llamas are really interesting animals. Their only defense mechanism is spitting… and they were close to extinction before it was recognized that they have these incredible guard dog abilities—and people started using them to guard sheep and chickens.”
Quote of the Day: “The rose and the thorn, and sorrow and gladness, are linked together.” – Saadi
Photo by: Edward Howell
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
58 years ago today, Planet of the Apesstarring Charlton Heston was released in theaters. In the film, an astronaut crew crash-lands on a strange planet in the distant future. Although the planet appears desolate at first, the surviving crew members stumble upon a society in which apes have evolved into creatures with human-like intelligence and speech. The film was a box-office hit, earning a lifetime domestic gross of $33.3 million. It was groundbreaking for its prosthetic makeup techniques by artist John Chambers and was well received by audiences and critics, particularly for the score. READ more about the (spoiler) “statue in the sand moment”… (1968)
Brown Hairstreak (Thecla betulae) – by Iain H Leach / Butterfly Conservation
Brown Hairstreak (Thecla betulae) – by Iain H Leach / Butterfly Conservation
Numbers of rare butterfly eggs have skyrocketed in South Wales after landowners let their hedgerows grow wild.
Volunteers for the UK nonprofit Butterfly Conservation have counted record tallies of Brown Hairstreak eggs this winter around the Welsh county of Carmarthenshire.
The success, they say, is down to two partner organizations that agreed to reduce the amount they cut back on their hedgerows, which has allowed the Brown Hairstreak to thrive.
“After a decade of heartache for Brown Hairstreaks in Carmarthenshire’s Tywi valley, there is at last signs of an upturn,” said Richard Smith, who has volunteered with Butterfly Conservation for more than 30 years.
Once abundant across the UK, the butterfly declined substantially due to farmers and landowners cutting back their preferred shrubbery, called ‘flailing’, which destroys young shoots of the spiky blackthorn bush.
The species will only lay its eggs on these green shoots, and since 2010, they—and the butterflies—had almost totally disappeared in the region.
Brown Hairstreak egg hunting by Paul Taylor / Butterfly Conservation
“When we found a small remnant population in 2021 just west of Llandeilo, we conducted annual egg counts after help from two key partners, the National Trust team at Dinefwr and the South Wales Trunk Road Agency, who both got more blackthorn planted on their respective estates and got those two sites completely protected from annual flailing,” said Smith.
“Results have been improving year on year, and this winter has seen 50% increases on such protected land.”
Butterfly Conservation volunteers went out each winter for years, armed with magnifying glasses, and spent hours hunting the hedges for the tiny white eggs.
This winter, their years of hard work have paid off.
Brown Hairstreak eggs on branches by Paul Taylor / Butterfly Conservation
“Small changes to the way we look after our hedges can help wildlife thrive and hedges function better for nature and people,” said Dan Hoare, Butterfly Conservation’s Director of Nature Recovery.
“We don’t want to stop anyone managing their hedgerows, but we would love more landowners to try cutting back on their cutting back.
“If hedgerows are only trimmed once every two years, or even every three years, it could make an enormous difference to the survival of the Brown Hairstreak and help many other species as well. The lovely Brown Hairstreak is an indicator of getting that balance right.”
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Visitors sniff the ‘Scent of the Afterlife’ card at the Museum August Kestner in Hannover, Germany – SWNS
Visitors sniff the ‘Scent of the Afterlife’ card at the Museum August Kestner in Hannover, Germany – SWNS
Scents from the past are being recreated using state of the art technology to give museum visitors a whiff of history.
Bio-molecular archaeology can bring ancient odors to life and allow people to breathe in the past.
Advances in the field have shown that ancient objects can retain the “molecular fingerprints” of past aromatic practices—and scientists say those molecules provide “unprecedented” insight into ancient perfumery, medicine, ritual, and daily life.
In a new study, published this week in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology, researchers showed how museums can use molecular evidence to engage audiences with the sensory worlds of the past.
The team, led by archeo-chemist Dr Barbara Huber, combined their expertise to create a new way of converting bio-molecular data into accessible, visitor-ready olfactory recreations.
“This research represents a significant shift in how scientific results can be shared,” said Dr. Huber this week, from the Max Planck Institute of Geo-anthropology and the University of Tübingen, Germany.
Dr. Huber collaborated with scent-based consultant Sofia Collette Ehrich to breathe life into scientific data with perfumery practices.
Building on that foundation, perfumer Carole Calvez developed a series of formulations that translated ancient chemical signatures into a scent suitable for museum environments.
“Bio-molecular data provide essential clues, but the perfumer must translate chemical information into a complete and coherent olfactory experience that evokes the complexity of the original material, rather than just its individual components,” she said.
Moesgaard Museum exhibit ‘Ancient Egypt–Obsessed with Life’ in Aarhus, Denmark – SWNS
“The real challenge lies in imagining the scent as a whole,” she said.
The team developed two ways for presenting ancient odors in public settings.
Most recently, they created a scented card, which quickly became an integral part of guided tours at the Museum August Kestner in Hanover, Germany. The paper holds the essence of the reproduced scent after it is inserted onto the card via scent printing.
The Scent of the Afterlife scented card at the Museum August Kestner in Hannover, Germany – SWNS
They also erected a fixed scent diffusion station (pictured above the card) that was integrated into an exhibition two years ago called, The Scent of the Afterlife, to provide a recreation of the aromas that accompanied the ancient Egyptian mummification process.
The team’s aroma analysis centered on the mummification substances used to embalm the noble lady Senetnay in the 18th dynasty, circa 1450 BCE.
“We analyzed balm residues found in two canopic jars from the mummification equipment,” said Dr. Huber. The team found that the balms contained a blend of beeswax, plant oil, fats, bitumen, Pinaceae resins (most likely larch resin), a balsamic substance, and dammar or Pistacia tree resin.
“These complex and diverse ingredients, unique to this early time period, offer a novel understanding of the sophisticated mummification practices and Egypt’s far-reaching trade-routes,” says Christian E. Loeben, Egyptologist and curator at the Museum August Kestner.
“The ingredients in the balm make it clear that the ancient Egyptians were sourcing materials from beyond their realm from an early date,” says Prof. Nicole Boivin, senior researcher on the project. “The number of imported ingredients in her balm also highlights Senetnay’s importance as a key member of the pharaoh’s inner circle.”
“Scent provides a new approach to mummification, moving away from the scare factor and horror movie clichés towards an appreciation of the motivations behind the actions, and the desired results.”
The fixed scent station was installed in the Moesgaard Museum in Aarhus, Denmark, to accompany the exhibition Ancient Egypt – Obsessed with Life.
“The scent station transformed how visitors understood embalming,” said curator Dr. Steffen Terp Laursen.
“Smell added an emotional and sensory depth that text labels alone could never provide.”
This work demonstrates how molecular traces of the past can be transformed into meaningful cultural experiences.
Ms. Ehrich says they can offer museums compelling new tools for bringing visitors closer to past environments and their peoples through engaging the senses.
Pollution from smokestacks at the US Mining and Smelting Co. plant in Midvale, Utah in 1906 - via SWNS
Pollution from smokestacks at the US Mining and Smelting Co. plant in Midvale, Utah in 1906 – via SWNS
Lead pollution today compared to 100 years ago has dramatically declined—by 100-fold over the last century—according to new research.
Lead is a dangerous neurotoxin that accumulates in human tissues and is linked to developmental deficits in children. Due to the health risks, the United States and other countries start phasing out lead in the 1970s, with the US achieving total elimination for on-road vehicles by 1996.
The UK followed, banning general sale of leaded auto fuel by early 2000—and the last country, Algeria, stopped sales in July 2021.
Researchers examined hair samples from local residents going back a century to document how banning lead in gasoline has been a major success in reducing environmental pollution.
Before the 1970 establishment of the EPA, the Environmental Protection Agency, Americans lived in communities awash with lead from industrial smokestacks, paint, water pipes, and—most significantly—exhaust emissions.
The analysis of hair samples conducted by scientists at the University of Utah show “precipitous” reductions in lead levels since 1916.
“We were able to show through our hair samples what the lead concentrations were before and after the establishment of regulations by the EPA,” said University of Utah Professor Ken Smith.
“Back when the regulations were absent, the lead levels were about 100 times higher than they were after the regulations.”
The study showed that after the Nixon administration banned lead in gasoline in the 1970s, even as fuel consumption escalated in the US, the concentrations of lead in the hair samples plummeted, from as high as 100 parts per million (ppm) to 10 ppm by 1990.
And in 2024, the level was less than one part per million.
He says the findings, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), underline the vital role of environmental regulations in protecting public health.
The study notes that US lead laws are now being weakened by a White House administration moving to ease environmental protections.
“The lesson is: those regulations have been very important,” said study co-author Professor Thure Cerling.
“Sometimes they seem onerous and mean that industry can’t do exactly what they’d like to do when they want to do it, but it’s had really, really positive effects.”
Lead is the heaviest of heavy metals and, like mercury and arsenic, accumulate in living tissue, and are toxic at even low levels. By the 1970s its toxicity became well established and EPA regulations began phasing it out of paint, pipes, gasoline and other consumer products.
The researchers acquired multiple hair samples from 48 participants—both recent and when they were younger—which offered a window into lead levels along Utah’s ‘Wasatch Front’, which historically experienced heavy lead emissions from industrial sources.
Some participants were even able to find ancestors’ hair preserved in family scrapbooks dating as far back as a century.
“The Utah part of this is so interesting because of the way people keep track of their family history,” said Prof. Smith.
“I don’t know that you could do this in New York or Florida.”
He explained that this particular Utah region supported a vibrant metal smelting industry through most of the 20th Century. Most of Utah’s smelters were shut down by the 1970s, after the EPA clamped down on the use of lead in consumer products.
The research team ran the hair samples through mass spectrometry equipment and says the surface of the hair is special.
“Lead is not lost over time,” said research team member Professor Diego Fernandez. “It is concentrated and accumulated in the surface. It tells you about that overall environmental exposure.”
Before the 1970s, gasoline contained around two grams of lead per gallon, which added up to nearly two pounds of lead per person a year released into the environment.
“It’s in the air for a number of days and it absorbs into your hair. You breathe it and it goes into your lungs,” explained Prof. Cerling.
But, thanks to federal regulations, the median blood lead level today in children, aged 1–5 years, fell from over 15 in the late 1970s to just 0.6 in 2020.
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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of February 7, 2026
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
The coming weeks will challenge you to think with tenderness and feel with clarity. You’ll be called on to stay sharply alert even as you remain loose, kind, and at ease. Your good fortune will expand as you open your awareness wider, while also firming up the boundaries that keep mean people from bothering you. The really good news is that cosmic forces are lining up to guide you and coach you in exactly these skills. You are primed to explore intriguing paradoxes and contradictions that have valuable lessons.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
In alchemy, solve et coagula is a Latin phrase translated as “dissolve and coagulate.” It means that transformation must begin with the process of breaking down before any building begins. You can’t skip over the dissolving phase and jump straight into creating the new structure. I mention this, dear Pisces, because I believe you’re now in the dissolving phase. It might feel destabilizing, even a bit unnerving, but I urge you to stick with it. When the moment comes to construct the beautiful new forms, you will know. But that time isn’t yet. Keep dissolving a while longer.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
I’m thrilled by your genius for initiating what others only dream about. I celebrate your holy impatience with fakery and your refusal to waste precious life-force on enterprises that have gone stale. I’m in awe of how you make fire your ally rather than your enemy, wielding it not to destroy but to forge new realities from the raw materials of possibility. Everything I just described will be in your wheelhouse during the coming weeks.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
How do I love you? Let me count some of the ways. 1. Your patience is masterful. You understand that some treasures can’t be rushed and that many beautiful things require slow nurturing through your devoted attention. 2. You have a knack for inducing the mundane world to reveal its small miracles and spiritual secrets. 3. You practice lucid loyalty without being in bondage to the past. You honor your history even as you make room for the future. 4. You know when to cling tightly to what needs to be protected and preserved, and you know when to gracefully loosen your grip to let everything breathe. In the coming weeks, all these superpowers of yours will be especially available to you and the people you care for.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
In carpentry, there’s a technique called “kerf bending.” It involves making a series of small cuts in wood so it can curve without breaking. The cuts weaken the material in one sense, but they make it flexible enough to create shapes that would otherwise be impossible. I suspect you’re being kerf-bent right now, Gemini. Life is making small nicks in your certainties, your plans, and your self-image. It might feel like you’re being diminished, but you’re actually being made flexible enough to bend into a new form. Don’t interpret the nicks as damage. They’re preparation for adjustments you can’t see yet. Let yourself be shaped.
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
In Irish folklore, “thin places” are situations or areas where the material and spiritual worlds overlap. They aren’t always geographical. A thin place may be a moment: like the pre-dawn hour between sleeping and waking, or the silence after someone says “I love you” for the first time. I believe you’re living in a thin place right now, Cancer. The boundary between your inner world and outer circumstances is more porous than usual. This means your emotions may affect your environment more directly. Your intuitions will be even more accurate than usual, and your nightly dreams will provide you with practical clues. Be alert. Magic will be available if you notice it.
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
In traditional Korean jogakbo, scraps of fabric too small to be useful alone are stitched together into a piece that’s both functional and beautiful. Every fragment contributes to the whole. I encourage you to treat your current life this way, Leo. Don’t dismiss iffy or unfinished experiences as “wasted time.” Instead, see if you can weave all the bits and scraps together into a valuable lesson or asset. Prediction: I foresee a lovely jogakbo in your future.
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
The Maori people of New Zealand practice mirimiri, a form of healing that works not by fighting disease but by restoring flow. The technique involves removing blockages so life force can move freely again. I think you need the equivalent of mirimiri, Virgo. There’s a small but non-trivial obstruction in your life. The good news is that you now have the power to figure out where the flow got stuck and then gently coax it back into motion. Let the healing begin! Here’s a good way to begin: Vow that you won’t hold yourself back from enjoying your life to the max.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
In the coming weeks, I encourage you to prioritize mirth, revelry, and gratification. For starters, you could invite kindred spirits to join you in pursuing experimental forms of pleasure. Have fun riffing and brainstorming about feeling good in ways you’ve never tried or even imagined before. Seek out stories from other explorers of bliss and delight who can inspire you to expand your sense of wonder. Then, with your mind as open as your heart, give yourself the freedom to enjoy as many playful adventures and evocative amusements as you dare.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
In the Inuktitut language of the Intuit people, the word ajurnarmat is translated as “it can’t be helped.” It acknowledges forces at work beyond human control. Rather than pure resignation, it reflects an attitude of accepting what can’t be changed, which helps people conserve energy and adapt creatively to challenging circumstances. So for example, when hunters encounter impossible ice conditions, ajurnamat allows them to refrain from forcing the situation and notice what may actually be possible. I suspect you’re facing your own ajurnarmat, Scorpio. Your breakthrough will emerge as soon as you admit the truth of what’s happening and allow your perception to shift. What looks unnavigable from one angle may reveal a solution if you approach it from another direction. Practice strategic surrender.
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
Your hunger for meaning is admirable! I love it. I never want you to mute your drive to discover what’s interesting and useful. But now and then, the hot intensity of your quest can make you feel that nothing is ever enough. You get into the habit of always looking past what’s actually here and being obsessed with what you imagine should be or could be there. In the coming days, dear Sagittarius, I invite you to avoid that tendency. Rather than compulsively pursuing high adventure and vast vistas, focus on the sweet, intimate details. The wisdom you yearn for might be embedded in ordinariness.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
In architecture, a “flying buttress” is an external support system that allows a massive building like a cathedral to reach greater heights without collapsing under its own weight. Because the buttress is partly open to the air rather than solidly built against the wall from top to bottom, it appears to “fly,” which is where the name comes from. In the coming weeks, I encourage you Capricorns to acquire your own equivalent of at least one new flying buttress. Who or what could this be? A collaborator who shares the load? A new form of discipline that provides scaffolding? A truth you finally speak aloud that lets others help you? To get the process started, shed any belief you have that strength means carrying everything all by yourself.
WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com
Quote of the Day: “We love life, not because we are used to living but because we are used to loving.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
Photo by: Patty Brito
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
Bruce McCandles out in Space with a self-propelled backpack - NASA archives, via SWNS
42 years ago today, astronaut Bruce McCandless II drifted away from the space shuttle Challenger as the first human to undertake an untethered space walk. He used NASA’s Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) to control his movements rather than being joined to the craft by a safety tether. A picture of McCandless floating in space some 320 feet (98 meters) from the shuttle has become one of the most popular in the NASA archive. READ more about the nerve-wracking event… (1984)
A long-lost sport once feared dead is being dusted off and played again in the villages where it was born.
“Knurr-and-spell” was once played widely in pubs across England’s South Yorkshire, but had all but vanished by the 1970s. The quirky ball game which bears a similarity to golf sees players hit a clay ball with a specially fashioned stick.
The winner is the person who can hit the ball—called the knurr or “pottie”—the farthest. The knurr sits on a stressed iron rod, which is triggered like a catapult by a quick tap of the player’s stick to throw the ball up in the air, at which point the player takes a swing at it.
Boz Davison, from Crane Moor near the county town of Barnsley is on a mission to bring back the game which he said suffered from elitism.
“I came across a book with some pictures of knurr-and-spell from 1933,” he told England’s Southwest News Service. “In the series of books called Played In Britain, it was described as a ‘defunct game.’ That was like red rag to a bull.”
Knurr-and-spell is believed to have its roots in the Germanic world, in part because of the name—”knurren,” meaning a wooden ball and “spielen,” meaning to play. A similar game is played in Switzerland.
While the traditionally carved, flexible sticks of hickory or ash are now almost impossible to come by, that has not deterred Mr. Davison, who first started by looking at how to make some of the equipment himself, and relaxing the rules a bit.
Boz Davison preparing to hit a knurr ball – credit, Iconic Media, via SWNS
Among those who have been watching Mr. Davison’s efforts with interest include former players from knurr-and-spell’s last revival in the 1970s.
“There’s a player at Grenoside, Eric Wilson, who won the World Championship in 1969, and he’s been… and another player, Tommy Chambers, who played in the 1972 World Championships,” said Davison. “We’ve played 4 games so far.”
Davison has relaxed the rules around the sticks for his version of the revival, he explained.
“You had to have certain equipment and someone who could make the sticks. The sticks are a nightmare, if you had a go at trying to make them it would take you at least a week,” he said. “Years ago, people used to walk around with a walking stick practicing. All that has gone, the techniques have all gone.”
For his game days, he permits hockey sticks and hurling sticks, as they’re similar weight and heft to a knurr-and-spell stick.
The next formal match is planned for Leeds later this year, and Davison hopes to set up games in Lancashire to reignite the classic Roses rivalry, referring to any match in any sport between Yorkshire and Lancashire.
While in the 1970s, players might have been less concerned about health and safety than people today, Davison has ensured everyone is covered having taken out a special public liability insurance in case someone takes a whack from one of the knurrs.
WATCH the game and its continental cousin games below…
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A Fish and Wildlife Service biologist holds a handful of endangered Topeka shiners - credit, Kimberly Emerson / USFWS
A Fish and Wildlife Service biologist holds a handful of endangered Topeka shiners – credit, Kimberly Emerson / USFWS
Across Iowa, a tiny fish has inspired an enormous conservation program that has seen hundreds of ponds restored to their natural state.
Though originally for the sake of this small federally-endangered fish, the lakelets soon demonstrated their power to alleviate the state’s nutrient runoff problems as well.
The Topeka shiner is from the minnow family and was once found widely across Iowa, which despite its reputation as a prairie state, used to be covered by wetlands. Heavy rainfall would cut new channels in the meandering course of rivers that would change their path, leaving wide bends cut off from the main flow.
These oxbow lakes, as they’re called for the U-shape, formed a micro wetland ecosystem that covered 11% of Iowa before agriculture. That transformation left over 10,000 of these water bodies barren and erased, and with every one that thusly vanished, the little silver and orange shiner vanished with them.
In 1998, the shiner was placed on the Endangered Species List, and in 2000, the US Fish and Wildlife Service worked together with the Iowa chapter of the Nature Conservancy to identify and begin restoring some of these oxbow lakes in order to save the shiner.
After the first 20 or so of these lakelets were restored, identified by a scar they would leave several dozen meters beyond the zenith in a river bend, either existing or historical, conservationists began to see how agricultural pollutants in waterways were being washed out of streams to settle in the mud of the oxbows.
“It really is a success story,” said Karen Wilke, associate director of freshwater at the Nature Conservancy in Iowa. “Now we’re not just doing it for Topeka shiner, but we’re doing it for water quality as well.”
Most importantly, the shiner returned along with the oxbows. But the benefits—which many landowners were happy to gain—go far beyond the shiner, with some 57 fish species and 81 bird species documented living in the restored oxbow wetlands, and beyond that—mussels, turtles, amphibians, beavers, and even river otters.
“I think all the species are hungry to have this habitat come back, hungry to have more water on the landscape,” Wilke told Inside Climate News.
The work has cost tens of thousands of dollars per wetland, but has been picked up by a combination of private capital, state, and federal grants, so as to ensure landowners have all the incentive and none of the downside.
In 2011, the Iowa Soybean Association trade group came on board, joining forces to restore more oxbows in the Boone River watershed in north-central Iowa, which lent new vigor to the project.
Topeka shiners have been documented in 60% of the over 200 oxbow lakes restored across Iowa’s landscape, 97% of which is privately-owned.
A 2021 review of the shiner’s status recommended it be moved from “endangered” to “threatened,” which would represent yet another success story for the Endangered Species List, one of the most effective wildlife conservation measures ever put in place by any nation.
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Revolution Wind under construction - credit Wosketomp, CC BY-SA 4.0
Revolution Wind under construction – credit Wosketomp, CC BY-SA 4.0
A district court judge struck down the stop-work order on the Sunrise Wind project, marking the fifth time courts have overturned the Department of Interior’s order halting work on 5 offshore wind projects under construction along America’s eastern seaboard.
Sunrise Wind now joins Coastal Virginia Wind, Empire Wind, Revolution Wind and Vineyard Wind, all of which have been cleared to resume work. Collectively, the projects will provide enough power for roughly 2.5 million homes and businesses on the East Coast.
Ronald Reagan-appointed District Judge Royce C. Lamberth, who was presiding over the Sunrise Wind case, ruled that as it was losing $2.5 million a day while it sat idle, the project would “be irreparably harmed” unless work is allowed to continue during the legal fight.
The lead firm on the project, Denmark’s Orsted, has already been invoiced $7 billion, and work is only 45% complete. “I find that Sunrise Wind faced greater harms by a total pause of construction than the government faces from continued mitigation efforts while the construction continues,” said Lamberth.
Last month, Judge Lamberth ruled in similar favor to the Revolution Wind project off the coast of Rhode Island.
The three other projects are each owned and under construction by Dominion Energy, Norway’s Equinor, and Spain’s Iberdrola, and each have been granted their respective requests for preliminary injunctions to halt the stop-work orders.
“Because the East Coast relies so heavily on volatile natural gas, adding more cost-stable wind power to the grid is essential for increasing supply and keeping bills down,” wrote Environmental Defense Fund Director Ted Kelly, who supported the court challenge.
“Offshore wind delivers immense value during electricity crunches in the winter because ocean winds are often at their strongest. The already-built portion of Vineyard Wind saved New Englanders $2 million per-day in energy costs during a December cold snap.”
Vineyard Wind is already 95% complete, meaning the company has spent billions, investors will have contributed tens of millions, banks will have made hundreds of millions in loans, and all of them will be—such is the nature of large-infrastructure economics—expecting a return on those investments.
No American executive should be able to tell a company and its investors what they should and shouldn’t spend their time and money building if permits and permission from the relevant agencies have already been granted. If offshore wind farms aren’t profitable as the Administration has claimed, than the best and quintessentially American action would be to allow them to fail, for the investors to learn their mistakes, and for the firm to have its assets auctioned in bankruptcy court to those wiser and more capable of using them.
Instead, the Administration has attempted to block the various firms, citing national security concerns, while failing providing evidence or details of those concerns.
Since Judge Lamberth was presiding over the Sunrise Wind project, he was permitted to view the classified national security assessment, and said “the administration failed to explain which features or activities related to the Sunrise Wind project were implicated in the new security issues [and] also didn’t explain how these concerns differ from the same ones that the developers committed to mitigating in an earlier agreement,” Japan Times reported.
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At 0.77 children per woman in 2025, South Korea was the world’s least fertile country.
Perhaps heralding a reversal of fortune, though, childbirths have grown at the fastest pace in 18 years on the Peninsula, with a 6.2% increase totaling 233,708 babies between January and November.
The number of divorces, meanwhile, went down 9.8% on-year to 6,890 by November.
It’s a big problem the world over, receives virtually no attention compared to other existential issues, and demonstrates cross-cultural spread: most native populations aren’t having enough babies.
No region is more greatly affected by this phenomenon than East Asia, where Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and China make up 5 of the 10 least fertile countries on Earth.
Hopefully, this sharp increase in South Korea can be sustained. In November alone, the Ministry of Statistics reported, 20,710 babies were born, the highest for the month since 2019, and up 3.1% from 20,083 a year earlier.
2025’s mini baby boom pushed the fertility rate to 0.79. It’s believed that economic assistance for childcare has helped incentivize couples desiring children but who were wary of the economic burden in the high-cost country.
Yet more joy for the nation’s future came from data on marriages, which were also up year-over-year. Korea Times reports that increases in marriage rates tend to be followed by increases in childbirths, since pregnancy out of wedlock is rare in the country.
Marriage rates increased in November by 2.7% on-year to 19,079, “marking the 20th consecutive month of growth,” Korea Times reports, citing an increase in the percentage of the population entering their 30s.
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