Quote of the Day: “When the future comes—no matter what comes with it—I’ll be smarter. I’ll be stronger.” – Ally Carter
Photo: by prottoy hassan
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
A new study into how long dogs live busts the myth that each of our years is seven for dogs—and could even help humans live longer.
A commonly-held belief is that dogs age seven times faster than us, so a one-year-old dog is like a seven-year-old child.
But large breeds age ten times quicker than us and some small dogs can be half of that.
Now scientists are studying the genomes of 10,000 dogs in a long-term study called the Dog Aging Project.
And they hope they will be able to see why ‘super centenarian’ dogs that live to 20 can survive so long and apply it to people.
Professor Joshua Akey, at Princeton University, said, “This is a very large, ambitious, wildly interdisciplinary project that has the potential to be a powerful resource for the broader scientific community.
“Personally, I find this project exciting because I think it will improve dog, and ultimately, human health.
LOOK: Researchers Find the Key to Fixing Human Allergies to Dogs
“We are sequencing the genomes of 10,000 dogs.
“This will be one of the largest genetics data sets ever produced for dogs, and it will be a powerful resource not only to understand the role of genetics in aging, but also to answer more fundamental questions about the evolutionary history and domestication of dogs.
“One part of the project that I am super excited about is a ‘super-centenarian’ study, comparing the DNA of exceptionally long-lived dogs to dogs that live to the average age for their breed.”
The researchers hope to identify specific biomarkers of canine aging.
Prof Akey added, “This is the first study of its kind in dogs and I think it’s a clever way of trying to find genetic differences that contribute to exceptional longevity.”
They anticipate that their findings will translate to human aging, for several reasons, dogs experience nearly every functional decline and disease of aging that people do; the extent of veterinary care parallels human healthcare in many ways, and our dogs share our lived environments, a major determinant of aging and one that cannot be replicated in any lab setting.
MORE: Dogs Can Differentiate Between Languages, Study Finds
Professor Daniel Promislow, at the University of Washington and principal investigator, said, “Given that dogs share the human environment and have a sophisticated health care system but are much shorter-lived than people, they offer a unique opportunity to identify the genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors associated with healthy lifespan.”
The project has been outlined in the journal Nature.
DON’T Let Fascinating News Age; Share This Story…..
The media has dubbed them “forever chemicals,” but now scientists are putting their name to the test.
Perflourinated or polyfluorinated alkyl-substances (PFAS) are known to be nearly impossible to break apart, and tend to accumulate in groundwater sources, soils, and other places. Their health effects are known, as is a new method to destroy 99% of them in water sources.
Known as “supercritical water oxidation” (SWO), a paper recently published found the procedure could destroy 99% of of a wide variety of known and unknown PFAS contained in a water sample.
When water is heated to to 374°C (705.2°F) under pressures of 220 bar, it becomes not gas, nor liquid, but a state known as supercritical. Here, accelerated oxidation and other reactions cause the PFAS to dissolve into component elements, which can be more readily collected and disposed of.
In testing SWO, the EPA-backed researchers found that only 27% of the weight of the water sample’s fluorinated content came from the PNAS the scientists were targeting, suggesting a large portion belonged to forever chemicals not identified in the study. Such a finding lends huge credence to SWO as a cleaning method.
RELATED: Tap Water Produces a Protective Shield Against Microplastics, Scientists Discover
“As a destructive technology, SCWO may be an alternative to incineration and could be a permanent solution for PFAS-laden wastewaters rather than disposal by injection into a deep well or landfilling,” the authors write in their paper.
Discovering a way to destroy these chemicals is valuable because restricting their manufacturing and use would be difficult because they are prized for their ability to resist oil and water, and high temperatures—and because they are one of the principal components of fire-fighting technology.
CHECK OUT: New Hydrogel Tablet That Can Purify a Liter of River Water in an Hour
“Given that supercritical water oxidation systems are already commercially available, this may be a technology that could soon be deployed for significantly impacted sites or wastewaters,” lead author Max Krause told Scientific American. “We are currently evaluating air emissions to understand all of the pathways and to be certain we are destroying the PFAS.”
SHARE This Research Breakthrough With Others Online…
Two men from the Democratic Republic of Congo were arrested on November 3 outside of Seattle, Washington, having been indicted on charges of trafficking after they were caught trying to smuggle 49 pounds of elephant ivory into the U.S.
The men owe their indictment and day in court to Samuel Wasser, a crack sleuth on the trail of the world’s major organized crime syndicates responsible for the trade in illegal wildlife parts like elephant ivory.
His 15-year production of a database containing familial relationships between poached animals like elephants is creating maps which authorities are using not only to make arrests of criminal henchmen, but identifying the geographical chokepoints organized crime is operating through.
Taking DNA samples of a single elephant tusk isn’t likely to reveal anything that authorities, either rangers or detectives, might need to know to stop elephants being poached. Ivory is often mixed together in the scramble to smuggle it out of Africa, meaning that the right and left tusk of a single elephant could be separated by thousands of miles and hundreds of days.
Directing the Center for Environmental Forensic Science at the University of Washington, Wasser has pioneered a method of connecting metaphorical red yarn between elephant ivory confiscated by authorities, and where in Africa it was taken from.
Now, when Wasser gets to take DNA samples from confiscating ivory, he can look for distant familial matches in his database to get a picture of where the animals and their family lived, and where they were smuggled to.
He can gather family IDs, their migration paths, national park locations, airports, shipping ports, transit countries, nationality of arrested suspects, smuggling methods, and more that can give him and wildlife authorities an idea of the patterns poachers, and their organized backers, are using.
MORE: Baby Elephant Rescued After Falling Into Indian Well 30-Feet Deep
Recently, in 2019, a seizure of nine tons of ivory in Singapore allowed Wasser to enter dozens of individual genotypes into his database, which created a family tree of 40 familial matches. He can then look at where those familial matches came from, where they ended up, who was arrested in conjunction, and provide the authorities with leads to use in further busts, or evidence to beef up prosecution power.
SHARE This Great Conservation News With Others…
A team of German astronomers, led by Professor Klaus Werner of the University of Tübingen, have discovered a strange new type of star covered in the by-product of helium burning. It is possible that the stars might have been formed by a rare stellar merger event.
While normal stars have surfaces composed of hydrogen and helium, the stars discovered by Werner and his colleagues have their surfaces covered with carbon and oxygen, the ashes of helium burning—an exotic composition for a star.
The situation becomes more puzzling as the new stars have temperatures and radii that indicate they are still burning helium in their cores—a property typically seen in more evolved stars than those observed by Werner and his team in this study.
Published alongside the work of Professor Werner and his team, a second paper from a group of astronomers from the University of La Plata and the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics offers a possible explanation for their formation.
“We believe the stars discovered by our German colleagues might have formed in a very rare kind of stellar merger event between two white dwarf stars,” says Dr Miller Bertolami of the Institute for Astrophysics of La Plata, lead author of the second paper. White dwarfs are the remnants of larger stars that have exhausted their nuclear fuel, and are typically very small and dense.
RELATED: What Wintering Squirrels Can Teach Astronauts
Stellar mergers are known to happen between white dwarfs in close binary systems due to the shrinking of the orbit caused by the emission of gravitational waves. “Usually, white dwarf mergers do not lead to the formation of stars enriched in carbon and oxygen,” explains Miller Bertolami, “but we believe that, for binary systems formed with very specific masses, a carbon- and oxygen-rich white dwarf might be disrupted and end up on top of a helium-rich one, leading to the formation of these stars.”
Yet no current stellar evolutionary models can fully explain the newly discovered stars. The team need refined models in order to assess whether these mergers can actually happen.
MORE: Even Dying Stars Can Still Give Birth to Planets, Scientists Discover
These models could not only help the team to better understand these stars, but could also provide a deeper insight into the late evolution of binary systems and how their stars exchange mass as they evolve. Until astronomers develop more refined models for the evolution of binary stars, the origin of the helium covered stars will be up for debate.
“Normally we expect stars with these surface compositions to have already finished burning helium in their cores, and to be on their way to becoming white dwarfs.
These new stars are a severe challenge to our understanding of stellar evolution.” explains Professor Werner.
This research was published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters.
Source: Royal Astronomical Society
Share This Far-Out News on Those Social Feeds…
Quote of the Day: “How fast you have forgotten your strength… You were born a winner, a warrior—one who defied the odds.” – Suzy Kassem (Rise Up and Salute the Sun)
Photo: by Xuan Nguyen
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
People who say they don’t have time to exercise might have to rethink after scientists proved just three seconds a day lifting weights was enough to strengthen muscle.A new study by researchers in Australia and Japan found doing just one downward bicep curl a day using a heavy weight increases muscle strength by more than 11 percent.
Whole body workouts could be over in just 30 seconds if the findings hold up in other muscle groups, the scientists added.
For the study, 39 healthy university students were told to complete one muscle contraction a day ‘at maximum effort’ for just three seconds, five days a week for four weeks.
The students were split into groups who did three different types of bicep curl.
One group used their biceps to lower a weight down towards the floor, which fitness experts call an eccentric bicep curl.
Other participants lifted the weight up, called a concentric curl, or held it parallel to the ground, called an isometric contraction.
Another group of 13 students did no exercise at all.
Students who did the downward bicep curl saw their muscle strength grow by 11.5 per cent.
Participants who performed other types of curl also grew stronger, although their increase in muscle strength was smaller than for those who did a downward bicep curl.
The group of volunteers who did no exercise at all did not see any increase in their muscle strength.
RELATED: Get Your Body Moving to Put the Brakes on Early Parkinson’s, Study Says
Professor Ken Nosaka from Edith Cowan University in Perth, Australia, who designed the study, said the results show people don’t need to spend vast amounts of time exercising to get stronger muscles.
Prof Nosaka added, “The study results suggest that a very small amount of exercise stimulus—even 60 seconds in four weeks—can increase muscle strength.
“Many people think you have to spend a lot of time exercising, but it’s not the case. Short, good quality exercise can still be good for your body and every muscle contraction counts.”
During the study, the researchers measured each group’s eccentric, isometric and concentric strength.
Only the group of students who did the downward or eccentric curl saw an increase in their all three types of strength.
Participants who did concentric lifting saw some improvement in their isometric strength but no improvement elsewhere, while the isometric group only saw an increase in their eccentric strength.
MORE: Intensive Exercise the ‘Best Way to Alleviate Symptoms of Chronic Anxiety Without Drugs or Therapy’
Prof Nosaka added, “The findings are exciting for promoting physical fitness and health, such as prevention of sarcopenia—a decrease in muscle mass and strength with ageing.
“We haven’t investigated other muscles yet, but if we find the three-second rule also applies to other muscles then you might be able to do a whole-body exercise in less than 30 seconds.
“Also, performing only one maximal contraction per day means you don’t get sore afterwards.”
The findings were published in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine and Science in Sports.
LIFT UP Those News Feeds; Share This Story…
Couples have flocked to a medieval church to be blessed by a priest with an ancient shard of bone purported to be from the finger of St Valentine himself.
The fragment of bone has been displayed in a 10cm (4 inch) reliquary placed on the altar at St John the Baptist in central Coventry for Valentine’s Day.
The relic is believed to have been at the church for more than 180 years and even survived The Blitz when the English city faced heavy German air raids in 1940.
Loved-up couples visited the church over the weekend to be blessed by Father Dexter Bracey, the Rector of St John’s, with the unusual relic.
One visitor said, “I know some people might find it a bit bizarre but we don’t have many mysterious ancient relics in Coventry so we find it really fascinating.
“It might be slightly macabre rather than romantic but to be blessed in the presence of St Valentine himself can only be a good thing, right?”
The story of how a piece of the 3rd-century Roman saint ended up in Coventry is typical of the church, which is renowned for a past shrouded in mystery.
In the early 1830s, a catacomb in Rome said to contain St Valentine was excavated and the tiny basilica of Santa’s Maris in Cosmedin in Rome now houses his skull.
In 1838 the Roman Curia ordered the sending out of various body parts in packages to Roman churches all over the world.
Relics became symbols of prestige for churches and cities, and St John’s Church was a well-established and influential place of worship.
It was founded in 1344 following the death of Edward II by his widow Queen Isabella, and continued to have royal patronage.
At that time Coventry did not have a Roman Catholic church and St John’s appeared to be an active church, but within the strict discipline of the Church of England.
Mike Polanyk, visitor liaison and communications officer, said, “Sadly existing records during the 19th century are scant—they were either burnt in a fire in 1861 or lost in the Great Flood of 1900.
MORE: A Valentine’s Day Message for the World: Love Never Fails
“We do know the 1906 renovation and subsequent additions to the fabric of St John’s reflected the influence of the Oxford movement and a ‘high church’ worship under rector Fr Robinson at the church—both before and during the First World War, so the relic could have been transferred to the church then.
“When the War Memorial Window was being constructed in 1921, we know of an instruction that says ‘the window is in keeping with the sacred artefacts on display there’… but it doesn’t say what.”
There was no firm mention of the relic in the church records until the 1930s when acclaimed architect Sir Ninian Comper redesigned the south-facing Saint John’s Chapel.
Mr Polanyk added, “He also gave the chapel an Oxford movement feel as well as a fetching tabernacle for the relic, which gained the admiration of Sir John Betjeman.
“Comper wanted a suitable resting place for the artefact, being impressed by the wax seal affixed to it with a stamp of authenticity.
“I find it interesting the relic and tabernacle survived the first Blitz in 1940, despite the damage to the rest of the chapel.”
SHARE This Fascinating History With Others on Social Media…
Lisa McDonald and her sister had been caring for their mother in palliative care for sometime, when they thought of a perfect way to bring a smile to her face.
McDonald thought that since her mom loves Bambi, wears Bambi T-shirts, has Bambi statues, and thinks deer are the most beautiful animals, what better way to cheer her up than bringing a real-life Bambi into the care home?
She posted a series of pictures and a video on The Kindness Pandemic Facebook group of the astonished look on her mother’s face when a fawn walked into the room, which sent a tear-jerking tremor through the group.
“Brought me to tears. What a special and touching moment. Absolutely beautiful people to drive all that way for your mum to experience something so magical before she passes,” one commenter wrote.
“This is so beautiful. She would have absolutely loved this so much. You can see it in her eyes how much joy it brought to her. Bless them, and bless you and your beautiful Mum,” another commented.
After McDonald came up with the idea, she and her sister found a nearby couple, Chris and Simone, that owned a mobile petting zoo near their home in Melbourne.
They contacted them to see if they could come out with their deer fawn, which was coincidentally called Bambi.
“Mum deteriorated quickly today and Simone and Chris didn’t hesitate… they drove two and a half hours to bring Bambi to meet mum,” Lisa told the Daily Mail. “Out of pure love and kindness. I cannot thank them enough for what they have done for my mum and my family.”
(WATCH the video for this story below.)
SHARE This Adorable Story With All Your Friends…
A metaphorical wanted poster has been pinned to the wall of the eBird app as conservationists hope birders can help find 10 majestic bird species lost to science.
Called The Search for Lost Birds, it’s a partnership between Re:wild, American Bird Conservation, BirdLife International, and the Cornell University Lab of Ornithology and their eBird app which has more than 700,000 users worldwide.
Re:wild used to be called the Global Wildlife Conservation, and created a much-publicized list of the “25 Most Wanted” lost species a few years ago. Building on successes that saw them find six of the 25 within just three years, including through expeditions to far-off Somalia, Vietnam, Madagascar, and the Indonesian island of North Moluccas—they are now launching “Top 10” lists for each animal group.
Some of these birds haven’t been seen for a decade, others for a century. They include species which vary in size from a finch to a falcon.
“During the past five years, since we launched the Search for Lost Species, our list of species that could be considered lost has grown to more than 2,000,” Barney Long, senior director for conservation strategies for Re:wild, said in a statement.
“We never planned to look for all of them alone, but to encourage others to search and develop partnerships to help. Through this new partnership we’ll be able to get more targeted expeditions in the field. If we can find these lost birds, conservationists can better protect them from the threats they face.”
While none of those one billion eBird sightings contain these lost species, birding has been used reliably in citizen science projects before.
The top 10 most-wanted lost birds are currently:
The Search for Lost Birds partnership is launching an expedition to try and find the Siau scops-owl, after unconfirmed reports of a bird matching its descriptions were sighted. The Dusky tetraka will also be the subject of an expedition, while efforts to located the South Island kōkako have yielded 300 reports of its haunting call in recent months.
RELATED: Iconic Pink Flamingos Are Coming Back and Standing Tall in Florida
Playing on this natural instinct for sighting animals that birders have, and which makes Pokémon so popular with all age groups, has hidden benefits as well. An expedition to find the Sinu Parakeet in Colombia, part of the original 25 Most Wanted, yielded dozens of sightings of birds never seen before.
And two birdwatchers from an Indonesian birding club recorded a sighting last year of Asia’s longest missing bird, Borneo’s black-browed babbler. It’s this natural curiosity mixed with the scientific method at a $0 input that makes birdwatchers so valuable in the struggle to conserve bird species.
If a birdwatcher is heading out to India, Madagascar, or any other location on this list, keep the animal and habitat in mind, and a major contribution to science is possible.
FLY This Story Over to Eagle-Eyed Birders in Your Life…
Quote of the Day: “Real love is a pilgrimage. It happens when there is no strategy, but it is very rare because most people are strategists.” – Anita Brookner
Photo: by Damien DUFOUR Photographie
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
A research team at the University of Wisconsin–Madison has identified a new way to convert ammonia to nitrogen gas through a process that could be a step toward ammonia replacing carbon-based fuels.
The discovery of this technique, which uses a metal catalyst and releases, rather than requires, energy has received a provisional patent from the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation.
“The world currently runs on a carbon fuel economy,” explains Christian Wallen, an author of the paper and a former postdoctoral researcher in the lab of UW–Madison chemist John Berry. “It’s not a great economy because we burn hydrocarbons, which release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. We don’t have a way to close the loop for a true carbon cycle, where we could transform carbon dioxide back into a useful fuel.”
To move toward the United Nations’ goal for the world to become carbon-neutral by 2050, scientists must consider environmentally responsible ways to create energy from elements other than carbon, and the UW–Madison team is proposing a nitrogen energy economy based on interconversions of nitrogen and ammonia.
The scientists were excited to find that the addition of ammonia to a metal catalyst containing the platinum-like element ruthenium spontaneously produced nitrogen, which means that no added energy was required. Instead, this process can be harnessed to produce electricity, with protons and nitrogen gas as byproducts. In addition, the metal complex can be recycled through exposure to oxygen and used repeatedly, all a much cleaner process than using carbon-based fuels.
“We figured out that, not only are we making nitrogen, we are making it under conditions that are completely unprecedented,” says Berry, who is the Lester McNall Professor of Chemistry and focuses his research efforts on transition metal chemistry. “To be able to complete the ammonia-to-nitrogen reaction under ambient conditions — and get energy — is a pretty big deal.”
Ammonia has been burned as a fuel source for many years. During World War II, it was used in automobiles, and scientists today are considering ways to burn it in engines as a replacement for gasoline, particularly in the maritime industry. However, burning ammonia releases toxic nitrogen oxide gases.
The new reaction avoids those toxic byproducts. If the reaction were housed in a fuel cell where ammonia and ruthenium react at an electrode surface, it could cleanly produce electricity without the need for a catalytic converter.
“For a fuel cell, we want an electrical output, not input,” Wallen says. “We discovered chemical compounds that catalyze the conversion of ammonia to nitrogen at room temperature, without any applied voltage or added chemicals. This is the first process, as far as we know, to do that.”
“We have an established infrastructure for distribution of ammonia, which is already mass produced from nitrogen and hydrogen in the Haber-Bosch process,” says Michael Trenerry, a graduate student and author on the paper. “This technology could enable a carbon-free fuel economy, but it’s one half of the puzzle. One of the drawbacks of ammonia synthesis is that the hydrogen we use to make ammonia comes from natural gas and fossil fuels.”
This trend is changing, however, as ammonia producers attempt to produce “green” ammonia, in which the hydrogen atoms are supplied by carbon-neutral water electrolysis instead of the energy-intensive Haber-Bosch process.
As the ammonia synthesis challenges are met, according to Berry, there will be many benefits to using ammonia as a common energy source or fuel. It’s compressible, like propane, easy to transport and easy to store. Though some ammonia fuel cells already exist, they, unlike this new process, require added energy, for example, by first splitting ammonia into nitrogen and hydrogen.
The group’s next steps include figuring out how to engineer a fuel cell that takes advantage of the new discovery and considering environmentally friendly ways to create the needed starting materials.
“One of the next challenges I would like to think about is how to generate ammonia from water, instead of hydrogen gas,” Trenerry says. “The dream is to put in water, air and sunlight to create a fuel.”
This research is reported in Nature Chemistry journal.
Source: University of Wisconsin–Madison
Clean energy from ammonia: University discovery a step toward carbon-free economy
A recent report from the Forest Survey of India (FSI) found that recent spurious tree planting activities have taken root in terms of the overall forest coverage in the nation.
The country’s forests have grown by 870 square square miles of forest cover—over half a million acres (2,261 square kilometers), over the last three years, and while that isn’t as big as a medium-sized American national park, the sum is part of an equation that includes deforestation.
A full quarter of the world’s second-most populous nation is covered in forest, which the FSI is focused on making qualitatively rich, not just quantitively.
The three Indian states showing the highest increases in forest cover are Andhra Pradesh with 250 square miles (647 square km), followed by Telangana with 242 square miles (632 square km), and Odisha with 207 square miles (537 square km).
Also compared with losses, mangrove forest coverage has increased by 17 square miles.
During the last few years there have been some monumental tree planting efforts undertaken—sometimes in mere hours, by Indians. In 2016, Indians planted 50 million trees in a single day in the state of Uttar Pradesh, which broke a world record set by Pakistan by around 49 million.
A year later, volunteers in Madhya Pradesh planted 66 million trees, another world record.
And India’s love of tree planting is not all monumental efforts. For example in the village of Piplantri, Rajasthan, they combat the historical prejudice against daughters by planting 111 trees upon the birth of every baby girl.
Grow Some Positivity: Share This Green Good News Story…
Billy Macon is a faithful husband, father, and grandfather. He ran his own business, wrote a book, and enjoys his hobbies. But for six decades there was always something which gnawed at the 80-year-old.
Though Macon graduated from West Anchorage High School in 1961, his diploma was given to him with a red stamp displaying a rude reminder that “this student met minimum state requirements,” and turning the diploma from a point of pride, into a point of pain.
In an interview with Alaska News, Macon’s wife said he never displayed the certificate in the house, but had it stowed it away in a plastic bag. It belittled his commitment to family and education. For as a senior, he was already married with a child and had a second on the way. He was working at the nearby Elmendorf Air Force base to support them, which required a one-hour walk, while finding time to study when he was able.
“I tried to do homework when I’d get home from school, but by the time I’d get to it a little bit, it was time to get on my walking track out to Elmendorf,” Macon said. “So I’d walk out to Elmendorf, work half the night and then walk all the way back.”
Macon’s granddaughter Tafena Timpson, after seeing what the red stamp had done and was continuing to do to her grandfather’s sense of pride, tried to contact the school district, but had no success.
MORE: 80-Year-old Man Reunited With Long Lost Siblings Thanks to His Litter Clean-up Dog on TV
Later, looking to do something nice for his 80th birthday, Timpson wrote a moving social media post hoping to capture the incredible value of a man which the state’s examiners had failed to notice.
LOOK: Sisters Recreate Adorable Photo – With Daughters Stepping into Roles That Dreamed of Motherhood
Sven Gustafson saw the post and decided to right the wrong. As principal of the same school that Macon had graduated from in 1961, he organized a special re-graduation ceremony, complete with a recital from the school choir and new diploma sans stamp.
“It’s unbelievable, it is unbelievable,” he said. His wife confirmed that he plans to hang this one on the wall.
(WATCH the video for this story below.)
SHARE This Right With Others Who Love Good News…
In classic Japanese horror films, megalithic monsters roam the countryside destroying everything in their path, however, at one Osaka restaurant nearly done in by the COVID-19 pandemic, it was a band of non-marauding “Catzillas” that stepped in to save the day.
Naoki Teraoka’s miniature-railway-themed restaurant was doing well until the pandemic struck. Like many others in the industry, as patronage dwindled, there wasn’t much he could do. Things got so bad the restauranteur was actually thinking of closing his doors—until an unlikely hero in the form of a stray kitten turned things around.
Even in the midst of financial turmoil, Teraoka didn’t have the heart to turn away the sickly kitten he’d noticed hanging around the restaurant. He and his family decided to adopt the baby cat they named Simba—only to realize Simba was part of a package deal.
Soon after they’d taken Simba in, another puss appeared at their window that turned out to be Simba’s mom. With a lack of customers and surplus food to spare, Teraoka started feeding the stray kitty. Then, during a particularly rainy spell, Momma Cat showed up with three kittens in tow. Teraoka decided to adopt them in as well.
“It was a financially difficult time for us, but we decided to help the cat family. Yes, we thought we were helping them, but they were the ones who helped us,” Teraoka told Bored Panda.
The cats began making themselves at home amidst the restaurant’s perfectly scaled model train dioramas. Though diminutive in real life, the kitties towered over the miniature landscapes looking very much like something out of a movie that might easily be titled, “Attack of the 50-Foot Felines!”
Amused by the whimsical tableaux they created, Teraoka began taking photos of the cats lounging and playing in their tiny locomotive world and posting the results to Instagram.
Not only did the photos become a sensation, but they also inspired Teraoka with an idea to reinvent the restaurant that turned out to be a real winner.
While the model trains remained an attraction, Teraoka transformed the place into a cat sanctuary where patrons could interact with stray cats as they dined—and even adopt them! As customers began to flow in and popularity grew, he was able to expand his operations with a second-floor cat shelter and kitty hotel.
RELATED: Ginger Cat is Local Star for Stealing Hundreds of Toys and Presenting Them Sweetly to Neighbors
Teraoka tries to populate his establishment with felines that are most at risk. To date, he’s traveled as far as 200 miles to make a rescue, has been responsible for finding homes for more than 60 strays, and has taken dozens more off the streets.
They say cats have nine lives. While Teraoka may have started out with the intention of saving one Simba’s, it’s a favor that’s since been returned in monster proportions and shows no signs of stopping anytime soon.
Who says you can’t get “catisfaction” in this world?
RAISE a Paw For This Good News; Share This Story…
Quote of the Day: “We are each other’s harvest. We are each other’s business. We are each other’s magnitude and bond.” – Gwendolyn Brooks
Photo: by Jannet Serhan
With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quotes page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?
The ‘world’s most romantic village’ is celebrating Valentine’s Day—including a couple who moved there to be ‘the lovers from Lover’.
The small community of Lover in Wiltshire, England became popular with people who flocked there to post cards for February 14.
The main post office has closed, but a temporary one opens during the week of Valentine’s Day to keep the tradition alive.
Residents of the village formed the Lover Community Trust and in the past five years have stamped more than 8,000 cards and letters with ‘Sent from Lover’.
Supported by the Royal Mail, a team of volunteer cupids stamp cards with Lover’s special postmark before they are sent all around the world.
Residents of the pretty village also hang heart-shaped bunting, wreaths, and balloons on their garden fences and front doors.
MORE: A Valentine’s Day Message for the World: Love Never Fails
One local couple, 71-year-old Jill Stark and her 72-year-old husband Fred, moved to Lover after falling in love with a property located in the centre of the village.
The pair were drawn in by the name of the village—and the idea of being the ‘lovers from Lover’.
Jill said, “We’ve been helping with the Lovers Community Trust since we moved here.
“I can see the post office from my back window and it seems to be thriving with business which is so lovely to see.
RELATED: 6 Authentic Ways To Impress Your Partner on Valentine’s Day Without Going Broke
“The village has such an amazing vibe and there is a real feeling of togetherness about the place.
“We felt that as soon as we arrived and every day since—we’re just so happy here.
Fred added, “The name Lover really stood out to us, and although the property itself and the village were hugely important, that name really helped us make a final decision.
“Being the ‘lovers from Lover’ just sounded too good of an opportunity to miss so we went for it.
“The village is amazing and we feel lucky to have been residents here now for over 18 years.”
MAKE a Loved One Smile Today; Share This Sweet Story…
Michel Roccati was paralyzed in a motorbike accident which completely severed his spinal cord. Unlike some other forms of paralysis, there’s no therapy for him, and absolutely no sensation whatsoever in his legs.
An hour after receiving a new medical implant that emits electrical signals into his spinal cord however, he was able to take some steps supported by a wheeled-walking aid.
“I used to box, run, and do fitness training in the gym. But after the accident, I could not do the things that I loved to do, but I did not let my mood go down. I never stopped my rehabilitation,” Roccati told the BBC. “[Now] I stand up, walk where I want to, I can walk the stairs—it’s almost a normal life.”
In various cases of paralysis, damage to the spinal column prevents signals from the brain from reaching the extremities, but like a WiFi repeater, the implant carries the signals further down the body. The surgery to install the device is complex, and requires fibers to be attached to individual nerve sections.
It also contains powerful artificial intelligence software, and emits signals like nervous system biology would. Controlled by software on a tablet, pre-set programs train the electrodes on the implant to command the trunk and legs to perform certain kinds of movements.
“Within a single day, activity-specific stimulation programs enabled these three individuals to stand, walk, cycle, swim, and control trunk movements,” the researchers wrote in their recently published paper in Nature Medicine. “Neurorehabilitation [created] sufficient improvement to restore these activities in community settings, opening a realistic path to support everyday mobility.”
Backing from the study came from Dr. Ram Hariharan at the Northern General Hospital of Sheffield, UK.
MORE: Paralyzed Patient Can Now Write as Fast as Smartphone By ‘Mindwriting’ With Brain Signals
“I have not heard of any study where they have put in an implant [into a patient with a complete spinal cord cut] and demonstrated muscle movements and improving balance, enough to stand and walk,” he told the BBC. “They have done something that has not been done before.”
It’s not a complete therapy yet, as the device is too complicated to be used in everyday settings, but the rehabilitations exercise the dormant leg muscles to improve health, mood, and often restore little bits of movement capabilities.
RELATED: Scientists Demonstrate Success of a Possible ‘EpiPen’ to Prevent Paralysis From Spinal Cord Injuries
Professor Grégoire Courtine, who led the team that developed the technology, believes that if used in conjunction with stem cell regeneration, farther down the line it could bring patients back to something like normal life.
(WATCH the video for this story below.)
SHARE This Breakthrough News Story in Those Social Feeds…
A James Bond-inspired concept will allow Elon Musk’s Cybertruck to be driven on water.
The Cybercat idea is designed to quickly transform Tesla’s vehicle into an all-electric high performance amphibious catamaran.
It sees the addition of electric outboard motors, pontoons, and optional hydrofoils in the Foiler model, which fold or collapse into parts to be stored in the vehicle.
They can then be installed “by a single person in less time than it takes to launch a boat.”
Elon Musk has previously said the Cybertruck design “influenced partly by The Spy Who Loved Me”, and even bought the 1976 Lotus Espirit featured in the film.
Now Cybercat creator Anthony Diamond believes that taking the vehicle onto the water will “pay homage to this passion.”
MORE: New Lightweight Material From MIT Scientists is Stronger Than Steel and as Light as Plastic
He explains, “We believe that with more than 1.3 million Cybertruck reservations, the market potential for Cybercat is immense and total gross margins comparable to those generated from the Tesla Model S and X vehicle lines combined are achievable.”
The Cybercat has estimated pricing of between $22,900 and $32,900, while the Foiler would market at $35,400 to $42,900.
Cybercat would have a top speed of around 25+ mph and a range of 115 miles, while the Foiler is expected to reach 40+ mph with a similar range.
Diamond says the patent pending concept is “not a third-party aftermarket solution. Instead, we intend to work directly with OEMs (original equipment manufacturer) to bring the concept to market.”
“We are both serious and excited about this concept and intend to work with OEMs to bring these watercraft to market,” he adds.
RELATED: A Flying Car Just Got Certified as Airworthy to Fly
Seattle-based Cybercat company TSWLM Electric Vehicles Inc.—named after the Bond film —are now accepting emails to demonstrate market interest and “substantially increase the probability that Cybercat becomes real.
CYBERCAT SPECS (estimated):
TOP SPEED (Est.) – 25+ mph (22+ knots)
RANGE (Est.)
– 115+ mi. at 6 mph (100+ NM at 5 knots)
– 50+ mi. at 15 mph (44+ NM at 13 knots)
POWER – Up to 335 HP (5x 50 kW outboard electric motors)
PRICING: $22,900 TO $32,900
CYBERCAT FOILER SPECS (estimated):
TOP SPEED (Est.) – 40+ mph (35+ knots)
RANGE (Est.)
– 75+ mi. at 25 mph (65+ NM at 22 Knots)
– 115+ mi. at 6 mph (100+ NM at 5 knots)
POWER – Up to 335 HP (5x 50 kW outboard electric motors)
PRICING: $35,400 TO $42,900*
SHARE The New Elon Musk Design; Share This Story…
A girls’ soccer team has gone from losing 20-0 each week to winning promotion to the top division—after a dad started coaching.
Leek Town Devils under 15s were getting routinely thrashed every time they turned out, until Stuart Henley stepped in two years ago.
The 41-year-old car valeter took the job when the previous manager quit because no-one else would, and he’s transformed the team’s fortunes.
With the help of 50-year-old assistant Ivan Austin, also a parent, they renamed the team the Devils and started training hard in February 2020.
The team, who used to be called Golden Hill, now win regularly—and secured promotion for next year after finishing second in their division.
Stuart, from Stoke-on-Trent in England, credits off-field bonding sessions like quizzes and a focus in training the basics.
A handful of players had never kicked a football before joining the team, so training them took hours of hard work and patience.
CHECK OUT: Football Fans Can Now Eat Their Coffee Cups After They’re Done Sipping
He said, “After a good few weeks we got down to training and they really started to take it in what I wanted.
“My ethos has really been on doing the basic stuff well and letting the girls decide what they feel they need to work on rather than dictating the sessions myself.”
Stuart’s first season was blighted by the pandemic, which forced him and Ivan to get creative with training.
They organized team-building activities with the girls to help them bond on and off the field.
Stuart then spent the sessions they could hold focusing on the basics of football like passing, shooting, and movement to try and bring the girls up to a good standard.
He said, “The 2020/2021 season was really stop and start because of the pandemic but this gave us more time to train together as a team.
“Our first game together we were at home, and when we scored a goal it was like winning the World Cup.
MORE: Why Senegal Winning Africa’s Biggest Sports Trophy is the Ultimate Feel-Good Story
“Watching their faces light up was great to see, and although we lost the game, we didn’t care because the goal was a sign of progress.
“Each week we’d go back to training and work on the bits that went wrong the previous Saturday which really helped the girls learn.”
Stuart watched the girls develop over the course of last year, and in September they played their first match of the new season.
They won the game, and since then went on an unbeaten run of eight games, drawing just one fixture.
The team’s star player, 15-year-old Chelsea, has also impressed individually, becoming the top scorer in the league with a whopping 30 goals.
Their newfound form led them to a top of the table clash at the start of February, where they were sadly beaten 3-2 by rivals Wyrley Pumas.
Although this means they have been denied the league title, the team have still exceeded expectation by winning promotion to the county’s top division.
Stuart, whose 14-year-old daughter Rebecca plays for the team, added, “We are about giving girls the opportunity to play football no matter what.
“We gave it everything we had on the weekend but sometimes it’s just not your day.
“No-one would have ever thought this time two years ago that we’d be in this position yet here we are.
“All the effort that the girls, us coaches and parents have put in to get this point has been immense.
“If I didn’t have the support of Ivan helping me every week this would have been an impossible task so I’m incredibly grateful to have him on side.
“All we want is to bring more girls into the game and show that it’s not all about having the best players; it’s about hard work and giving everyone the chance to play.
“We’re going into next season full of confidence and ready to compete against tougher opponents, but for now we’re still very much enjoying our victory.
STRIKE a Good News Goal in Those News Feeds; Share This Story…
