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The World’s Largest 3D Printer Is Building Cozy Homes from Wood

By
Andy Corbley
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University of Maine, Advanced Structures and Composites Center
University of Maine, Advanced Structures and Composites Center

At the University of Maine, one of the world’s largest 3D printers is using sawdust from the state’s lumber industry to 3D-print cozy 600-square-foot wooden cabins.

It’s part of a move towards making 3D printing faster and more sustainable in a state where the housing shortage that has metastasized in most states around the country is dire.

It’s thought that 80,000 new homes will be needed over the next 5 years to keep pace with demand, and though it takes years for building codes to be changed, the technicians at the Advanced Structures & Composites Center (ASCC) at the Univ. of Maine hope their new toy can help address this need.

Guinness World Records certified the machine at ASCC as the world’s largest prototype polymer 3D printer, capable of creating an object that is 96 feet in length, 36 feet in width, and 18 feet tall—entirely out of bio-based material at a rate of 500 pounds per hour.

In 2022, it could print the walls, floors, and roof of the house in just 96 hours, but the ACSS has been refining the design with the hope of doubling the printing speed and getting it down to a 48-hour timeline.

“When they’re doing concrete, they’re only printing the walls,” Habib Dagher, the executive director of ACSS told CNN. “The approach we’ve taken is quite different from what you’ve seen, and you’ve been reading about for years.”

Indeed, GNN has reported on a fair number of 3D printing projects, but most if not all involve printing only the walls. One fantastical exception is an Italian firm that is 3D-printing domed, beehive-like, modular concept homes inspired by the Great Enclosure in Zimbabwe.

STAND-OUT 3D-PRINTING PROJECTS: 

The ASCC is calling the house design the BioHome3D, and says it’s rare people who tour the concept version don’t ask when they “can have one up?”

The interior gives the feel of a modern Scandinavian wooden cabin, making it fit well with the Maine aesthetic. The ASCC is now doing work on how to incorporate conduits for wiring and plumbing “exactly where an architect would want them,” says Dagher.

WATCH a time-lapse video of the printer doing the job…

SHARE This Mix Of High And Low Tech With Your Mainer Friends… 

“When one must, one can.” – Charlotte Whitton

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Good News Network
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Quote of the Day: “When one must, one can.” – Charlotte Whitton

Photo by: Alexei Maridashvili

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?

The Stonehenge ‘Altar Stone’ Mystery is Solved: It Came from Scotland 460 Miles Away

By
Andy Corbley
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The Altar Stone ringed in red - credit SWNS News Media.
The Altar Stone ringed in red – credit SWNS News Media.

It may have been transported around the coast by sea, or by some sophisticated method the nature of which has not yet been revealed, but whatever the case, the 6-ton Altar Stone at Stonehenge came from Scotland, not nearby Wales.

Previous geological research suggested that the slab of sandstone probably originated from the Brecon Beacons in southeast Wales, approximately 50 miles from the site on the Salisbury Plain.

But a new study, led by Australian scientists, concluded that it actually hails from 460 miles away in northeast Scotland.

The Australian team used state-of-the-art equipment, including specialist mass spectrometers, to examine the composition of the Altar Stone.

Their findings, published in the journal Nature, also point to the existence of “unexpectedly advanced” transport methods and organization at the time of the stone’s arrival in Wiltshire around 5,000 years ago.

Researchers from Curtin University in Perth studied the age and chemistry of mineral grains within fragments of the Altar Stone, which is a 50 cm (19.6 ins) thick sandstone block measuring five meters by one meter (16 ft x 3ft), that sits at the center of Stonehenge’s iconic stone circle.

Study lead author Anthony Clarke explained that analysis of the age and chemical composition of minerals within fragments of the Altar Stone matched it with rocks from Scotland, while also clearly differentiating them from Welsh bedrock.

“Our analysis found specific mineral grains in the Altar Stone are mostly between 1,000 to 2,000 million years old, while other minerals are around 450 million years old,” Clarke said. “This provides a distinct chemical fingerprint suggesting the stone came from rocks in the Orcadian Basin, Scotland, at least 750 kilometers away from Stonehenge.”

Given its Scottish origins, the findings raise fascinating questions considering the technological constraints of the Neolithic era.

“Transporting such massive cargo overland from Scotland to southern England would have been extremely challenging, indicating a likely marine shipping route along the coast of Britain,” said study co-author Curtin University Professor Chris Kirkland.

“This implies long-distance trade networks and a higher level of societal organization than is widely understood to have existed during the Neolithic period in Britain.”

CAN’T GET ENOUGH ANCIENT MYSTERIES?

“We have succeeded in working out, if you like, the age and chemical fingerprints of perhaps one of the most famous of stones in the world-renowned ancient monument,” added co-author Professor Richard Bevins, of Aberystwyth University, Wales.

“While we can now say that this iconic rock is Scottish and not Welsh, the hunt will still very much be on to pin down where exactly in the northeast of Scotland the Altar Stone came from.”

Clarke said the discovery holds a special sentiment to the course of his career, as Stonehenge played a large role in him determining his academic path in life.

“I grew up in the Mynydd Preseli, Wales, where some of Stonehenge’s stones came from,” he said. “I first visited Stonehenge when I was one year old and now at 25, I returned from Australia to help make this scientific discovery—you could say I’ve come full stone circle.”

Despite its worldwide reputation, major discoveries on Stonehenge are rather more frequent than one might imagine. Evidence of a 110-meter (360 ft) stone circle at Waun Mawn near Mynydd Preseli was identified in 2021 and sparked a theory that many of Stonehenge’s bluestones were actually recycled from earlier circles.

SHARE This Groundbreaking News About The Origin Of The Most Famous Stone Circle… 

Babies Don’t Come With Manuals–But in Oregon, They Now Come With a Nurse

By
Andy Corbley
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Christian Bowen - Unsplash
Christian Bowen – Unsplash

Oregon has recently become the first state in the US to offer free nurse visits to new mothers and fathers statewide.

No one can deny that the United States and its citizens have an array of problems and are facing major challenges, but one which isn’t well reported on is the high rates of death among infants and new mothers compared to other high-income countries.

Oregon’s home visit program called Family Connects is based on a successful model deployed in Durham, North Carolina, and involves a nurse visiting the home of a mother who has just given birth, whether to her first child or her fifth, up to three times in the first month.

Family Connects is an opt-in program that comes at no cost to the family, and the nurse is empowered to ‘connect’ the family with any additional service they may need, whether that’s counseling, psychiatric care, financial assistance, or even, as NPR reports, a hearing aid for a grandparent who’s looking after the child.

State Senator Dr. Elizabeth Steiner championed the program. A family physician, Dr. Steiner wasn’t in charge of creating it or setting policy, but advocated for it in the government. She remembers developing severe post-partum depression after the birth of her daughter, and thought that if one of the Family Connects nurses had visited her, it would have been an enormous help.

To wit, a study of Family Connects mothers found that those who availed themselves of a nurse visit were 30% less likely to develop post-partum anxiety or depression. Undoubtedly one reason for this is the opportunity for the new parents to ask the nurse anything they want.

Additionally, the program’s early data witnessed a reduction in Child Protective Services interventions and investigations among families who had nurses visit them during the first few weeks of life.

The reasons behind these improvements are simple: “Babies are just hard,” Dr. Steiner told NPR.

TO GET YOU SMILING: Baby ‘Completely Paralyzed’ by Rare Toxin was Saved After Remedy Found 5,000 Miles Away

One of the nurses in the Oregon state program, Barb Ibrahim, has to drive sometimes as long as 30 to 40 minutes to visit new parents: exactly the reason that Dr. Steiner believed the program was best suited to the state government, as there are many people who live far from any major medical centers.

This isn’t a problem limited to Oregon, where so much of the eastern reaches of the state are very rural. Zero to Three, an early childhood advocacy group, estimates that just 3% of the nation’s babies are in range of existing home visiting programs.

READ MORE ON THE TOPIC: Hug Therapy Helps Premature Babies Develop as Volunteers Sit in for Moms Who Can’t Be There

This question of distance is also partially why the program’s initial cost estimates have long been exceeded. But, if there was ever a reason to overpay it would be for the security and support for the next generation of mothers—and the next generation of Americans.

SHARE This Vitally Important Program Benefiting Thousands In Oregon… 

This Startup Is Using Dead Leaves to Make Paper Without Cutting Trees

By
Andy Corbley
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credit - Releaf Bags
credit – Releaf Bags

Businesses like to talk about the concept of a closed loop or circular economy, but often they’re trying to close small loops. Releaf Paper takes dead leaves from city trees and turns them into paper for bags, office supplies, and more—which is to say they are striving to close one heck of a big loop.

How big? Six billion trees are cut down every year for paper products according to the WWF, producing everything from toilet paper to Amazon boxes to the latest best-selling novels. Meanwhile, the average city produces 8,000 metric tons of leaves every year which clog gutters and sewers, and have to be collected, composted, burned, or dumped in landfills.

In other words, huge supply and huge demand, but Releaf Paper is making cracking progress. They already produce 3 million paper carrier bags per year from 5,000 metric tons of leaves from their headquarters in Paris.

Joining forces with landscapers in sites across Europe, thousands of tonnes of leaves arrive at their facility where a low-water, zero-sulfur/chlorine production process sees the company create paper with much smaller water and carbon footprints.

It is said of the city of Kyiv that one can walk from one side to the other without ever leaving the shade of horse chestnut trees. Whether Ukrainian founders Alexander Sobolenko or Valentyn Frechka of Releaf Paper ever lived or worked in Kyiv, perhaps this preponderance of greenery influenced their thinking while the pair were coming up with the idea in university.

“In a city, it’s a green waste that should be collected. Really, it’s a good solution because we are keeping the balance—we get fiber for making paper and return lignin as a semi-fertilizer for the cities to fertilize the gardens or the trees. So it’s like a win-win model,” Frechka, co-founder and CTO of Releaf Paper, told Euronews.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: 150 Brands Unite to Clean Up Our Paper Supply – Saving Global Forests and Improving Recycling

Releaf is already selling products to LVMH, BNP Paribas, Logitech, Samsung, and various other big companies. In the coming years, Frechka and Sobolenka also plan to further increase their production capacity by opening more plants in other countries. If the process is cost-efficient, there’s no reason there shouldn’t be a paper mill of this kind in every city.

MORE CIRCULAR ECONOMICS: Spanish City is Squeezing Green Electricity From Leftover Oranges

“We want to expand this idea all around the world. At the end, our vision is that the technology of making paper from fallen leaves should be accessible on all continents,” Sobolenka notes, according to ZME Science.

WATCH the production process below from Reuters… 

SHARE This Great Idea And Fantastic Product With Your Friends…

‘Sponge’ Cities Combat Urban Flooding by Letting Nature Do the Work

By
Andy Corbley
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The Benjakitti Forest Park in Bangkok Turenscape/Courtesy The Cultural Landscape Foundation
The Benjakitti Forest Park in Bangkok Turenscape/Courtesy The Cultural Landscape Foundation

In China, a landscape architect is reimagining cities across the vast country by working with nature to combat flooding through the ‘sponge city’ concept.

But just as the Chinese Communist Party famously describes its policies as “Socialism: China style,” Yu Kongjian has put a decidedly Middle Kingdom spin on this concept which has taken root across Holland as well.

Through his architecture firm Turenscape, Yu has created hundreds of projects in dozens of cities using native plants, dirt, and clever planning to absorb excess rainwater and channel it away from densely populated areas.

Flooding, especially in the two Chinese heartlands of the commercial south and the agricultural north, is becoming increasingly common, but Yu says that concrete and pipe solutions can only go so far. They’re inflexible, expensive, and require constant maintenance. According to a 2021 World Bank report, 641 of China’s 654 largest cities face regular flooding.

“There’s a misconception that if we can build a flood wall higher and higher, or if we build the dams higher and stronger, we can protect a city from flooding,” Yu told CNN in a video call. “(We think) we can control the water… that is a mistake.”

Yu has been called the “Chinese Olmstead” referring to Frederick Law Olmstead, the designer of NYC’s Central Park. He grew up in a little farming village of 500 people in Zhejiang Province, where 36 weirs channel the waters of a creek across terraced rice paddies.

Once a year, carp would migrate upstream and Yu always looked forward to seeing them leap over the weirs.

This synthesis of man and nature is something that Turenscape projects encapsulate. These include The Nanchang Fish Tail Park, in China’s Jiangxi province, Red Ribbon Park in Qinghuandao, Hebei province, the Sanya Mangrove Park in China’s island province of Hainan, and almost a thousand others. In all cases, Yu utilizes native plants that don’t need any care to develop extremely spongey ground that absorbs excess rainfall.

The Dong’an Wetland Park, another Turescape project in Sanya. Turenscape/Courtesy The Cultural Landscape Foundation

He often builds sponge projects on top of polluted or abandoned areas, giving his work an aspect of reclamation. The Nanchang Fish Tail Park for example was built across a 124-acre polluted former fish farm and coal ash dump site. Small islands with dawn redwoods and two types of cypress attract local wildlife to the metropolis of 6 million people.

Sanya Mangrove Park was built over an old concrete sea wall, a barren fish farm, and a nearby brownfield site to create a ‘living’ sea wall.

One hectare (2.47 acres) of Turenscape sponge land can naturally clean 800 tons of polluted water to the point that it is safe enough to swim in, and as a result, many of the sponge projects have become extremely popular with locals.

OTHER GREAT MINDS AT WORK: Portland’s New Airport Built with Local Tribal Timber is Inherently Fire Resistant and Less Carbon-Intensive

One of the reasons Yu likes these ideas over grand infrastructure projects is that they are flexible and can be deployed as needed to specific areas, creating a web of rain sponges. If a large drainage, dam, seawall, or canal is built in the wrong place, it represents a huge waste of time and money.

A walkway leads visitors through the Nanchang Fish Tail Park. Turenscape/Courtesy The Cultural Landscape Foundation

The sponge city projects in Wuhan created by Turenscape and others cost in total around half a billion dollars less than proposed concrete ideas. Now there are over 300 sponge projects in Wuhan, including urban gardens, parks, and green spaces, all of which divert water into artificial lakes and ponds or capture it in soil which is then released more slowly into the sewer system.

ALSO CHECK OUT: Businessman Uses Nature’s Wisdom to Transform Drought-ruined Texas Hills into Lush Landscape

Last year, The Cultural Landscape Foundation awarded Yu the $100,000 Oberlander Prize for elevating the role of design in the process of creating nature-based solutions for the public’s enjoyment and benefit.

SHARE This Man’s Vision For A Greener Urban World, Protecting Against Floods…

“Only the educated are free.” – Epictetus

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Good News Network
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Quote of the Day: “Only the educated are free.” – Epictetus

Photo by: ©GWC

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?

Speedy Desert Tortoise is Finally Safe After Covering 3 Miles and Entering a Highway Following Ranch Jailbreak

By
Andy Corbley
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Arizona State Department of Public Safety - released
Arizona State Department of Public Safety – released

Why did the tortoise cross the road?

Or better yet, how did the tortoise outpace its keepers for 3 miles before crossing the road?

These are no doubt questions that a local ostrich ranch in the Arizona town of Picacho will be asking after state troopers called and asked if they were missing a large desert tortoise.

The charade began on July 30th when a Department of Public Safety trooper received a call from a concerned citizen that a sulcata tortoise as big as a Thanksgiving turkey was trying to cross Interstate 10 between Casa Grande and Tuscon.

DPS Sgt. Steven Sekrecki arrived on the scene and located the large reptile who was at that point still unharmed.

On its shell, the Sergeant noticed the word “Stich” written in pen, and assumed it was held by a facility near by.

According to the Arizona Republic, a local ostrich range confirmed Stitch was one of their resident tortoises and had recently escaped from his habitat.

The speedy tortoise had managed to wander 3 miles from the ranch before it made itself known on the highway.

LOVE FOR OUR BROTHERS IN SCALES: 500 Giant Tortoises Reintroduced to Four Galapagos Islands in 2023

The sulcata, or African spurred tortoise, is actually an endangered species of reptile and is native to the Sahara Desert, not North America.

Approximately 9,000 tortoises were taken from the wild for the illegal pet trade between 1990 and 2010. It makes for a good pet because it’s incredibly docile and not territorial, while also being the third-largest species of tortoise in the world, behind the Aldabara giant tortoise and those of the Galapagos.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: Town Saves the Threatened Bum-Breathing Punk Turtle–a 9lb Wonder Found Only in the Mary River

Suddenly, Sergeant Sekrecki’s reptile rescue became one of tangible value to global wildlife conservation, and for that we salute him.

SHARE This Remarkable Escape Attempt By This Beautiful Tortoise… 

Teens Invent Device that Removes Microplastics with Ultrasound Waves, Winning $50k

By
Andy Corbley
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Justin Huang and Victoria Ou - credit Chris Ayers / Society for Science / ISEF
Justin Huang and Victoria Ou – credit Chris Ayers / Society for Science / ISEF

A pair of high schoolers invented a unique water filtration device that uses a wall of sound to hold back microplastic particles from running water.

In lab tests, the acoustic force from the high-frequency sound waves removed between 84% and 94% of the suspended microplastic particles in a single pass, and they are using the reward money from a prestigious prize to attempt to scale up their invention.

Without beating a dead horse, microplastic particles are everywhere on Earth—raining down from the jetstream, blowing up to the summit of Everest, and located at the deepest points of the ocean. Once ingested by humans they have been found to infiltrate every organ that has so far been examined for them.

It’s a monumental challenge to address this pancontaminant, but high schoolers Justin Huang and Victoria Ou of Woodlands, Texas, may just have a clever solution.

Using ultrasonic sound waves that move through water freely, the teens have managed to capture as much as 94% of microplastic contaminants by pushing them away from the water’s outflow point.

Their device is no bigger than a pen, and improves on other designs that have tried to use ultrasonic waves to address microplastics in wastewater and drinking water.

“This is the first year we’ve done this,” Huang told Business Insider backstage after receiving their award. “If we could refine this—maybe use more professional equipment, maybe go to a lab instead of testing from our home—we could really improve our device and get it ready for large-scale manufacturing.”

Ou and Huang presented their work at last week’s Regeneron International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) in Los Angeles, during which they won the Gordon E. Moore Award for Positive Outcomes for Future Generations worth $50,000.

They also picked up first place in their Google-sponsored category, Earth and Environmental Sciences.

THE ISEF WINNERS AS REPORTED BY GNN: 

“This is a pretty new approach. We only found one study that was trying to use ultrasound to predict the flow of particles in water, but it didn’t completely filter them out yet,” said Ou, who has known Huang since elementary school.

In developing their device, the pair visited wastewater and sewage treatment plants near their home and asked how they regulated microplastics. The answer they received was somewhat of a surprise: the plant had no such regulations in place. For starters, there isn’t a cost-effective means of doing so, and also the United States EPA doesn’t have regulations for microplastic contaminants in the water.

Ou and Huang believe their technology could be used in wastewater treatment plants like the one they visited, as well as industrial textile plants, and rural water sources. On a smaller scale, it could filter microplastics in laundry machines and even fish tanks.

WATCH Justin and Victoria explain their device…

SHARE These Two Brilliant Minds Solving Today’s Problems For The Future… 

One Key to Success For U.S. Women’s Gymnastics Team Is a Support Dog to Calm Nerves

By
Andy Corbley
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Simone Biles with Beacon, the team’s support dog – Photo by Tracey Callahan Molna / Instagram
Simone Biles with Beacon, the team’s support dog – Photo by Tracey Callahan Molna / Instagram

The US Women’s Gymnastics team has won 8 medals—which may be down to the excellence of the effervescent Simone Biles, although it may have furrier explanations.

All throughout the games, Beacon the golden retriever has been within petting distance of any one of the five members who may feel some pre-performance jitters.

The topic of mental health in gymnastics has never been far from stories about the US Olympic team after Biles decided to withdraw from the Tokyo games in 2020 to focus on her own mind state.

At the time, news of the scope of sexual harassment and exploitation of Olympic gymnasts by former team doctor Larry Nassar had already been in the news for two years.

Beacon has been with the team since it was undergoing Olympic trials in Minneapolis. With so many hopeful young gymnasts sitting jittery on the sidelines waiting for their turn, what could have been better for their nerves than a big oafish golden retriever walking by and sticking it’s big blonde schnoz into their hand?

Beacon followed the team to Paris where he has become a hit among rival teams as well.

Tokyo Olympic all-around champion Suni Lee posted a picture of herself with the shiny-nosed pooch from the trials. “Thank god for Beacon,” read her caption, helping launch him to stardom.

The team with Beacon at the Olympic trials in Minneapolis – credit Tracey Molnar, released.

He is a professional stress dog and therefore of course has an official Instagram account. His trainer is the former rhythmic gymnastics coach Tracey Callahan Molnar, who says the dog has incredible powers of intuition and empathy. He will find exactly which member of the team is the most nervous and go offer his services as a comfort dog, should they accept it.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: College is Pairing Service-Dogs-in-Training With Stressed Students Who Could Use a Furry Friend

Molnar’s previous golden was Tulsa, who passed away in 2019. Molnar went to the exact same Michigan breeder to adopt Beacon, such was Tulsa’s excellence at his job.

SHARE These Gymnasts’ Unlikely Secret Weapon With Your Friends…

Fund for Library Set Ablaze by Rioters in Liverpool Raises Over $250,000 for Books and Repairs

By
Andy Corbley
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credit Alex McCormick, retrieved from GoFundMe
credit Alex McCormick, retrieved from GoFundMe

Over 11,000 small donors have managed to raise £245,000 ($270,000) to repair a library in Liverpool that was set partially ablaze during a spate of violent acts of disorder that took place in England and Belfast last week.

Called Spellow Hub, the library had recently been transformed into a community space with job training and outreach activities for some of the most disadvantaged parts of Liverpool, but the rioting left the whole of the ground floor badly burned.

“I always loved to read as a child and seeing a library and community space destroyed broke my heart,” the fundraiser’s organizer, 27-year-old Alex McCormick told the Guardian. “I felt helpless and wanted to do something to help and thought fundraising would be a nice way to replace some of the books lost in the fire.”

McCormick described herself as being “overwhelmed with the response and the sense of community,” and by the time she had spoken with the British paper the fundraiser already accumulated £120,000.

An update posted on Monday announced that work had already started to restore the Spellow Hub to its former joy.

The riots were described as the worst instances of their kind in 13 years. The deaths of three young girls and the injury of 10 others when an assailant attacked a Taylor Swift-themed dance and yoga class shook the nation.

SIMILAR COMMUNITY-LED INITIATIVES: When Builders in Maui Constructed Tiny Homes for Man’s Family, it Grew into Crowdfunded Rehousing Project

Two false claims: first that the killer was on an MI6 watchlist, and the second—that he was a Muslim asylum seeker, quickly flooded social media in the wake of the stabbings. He was actually born to Rwandan parents in Cardiff.

With immigration long being a contentious political issue, it triggered a wave of destructive vandalism against Muslim neighborhoods.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE: Meet the Street Librarian Changing the Lives of Baltimore Youth and Beyond

However, communities have largely rallied together, including in Southport where the stabbing occurred, when after a mosque was vandalized in the wake of the attack, local bricklaying companies rushed to rebuild the exterior wall in scorching temperatures.

SHARE This Story With Anyone You Know From Britain’s Northwest…

“To love abundantly is to live abundantly.” – Henry Drummond

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Good News Network
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Quote of the Day: “To love abundantly is to live abundantly.” – Henry Drummond

Photo by: Tyler Nix

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?

– Tyler Nix

Honey Added to Yogurt Bolsters its Bacterial Benefits–a Classic Greek Dessert Turned Medicine

By
Andy Corbley
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Photo by Jana Ohajdova on Unsplash
Photo by Jana Ohajdova on Unsplash

A new study found that adding honey to yogurt helps the beneficial bacteria in the yogurt survive longer in the hostile environment of the GI tract.

It’s just another reason to value the wisdom passed down to us from the classical Greeks, who recognized honey as a medicinal food over 2,000 years ago.

Bifidobacterium and Lactobacillus, two genera of microorganisms that are present in fermented milk products like yogurt, form one of the foundational parts of a healthy gut microbiome. Both kinds have been found to improve bowel function in all stages of digestion from breakdown to absorption to defecation.

It’s never been more important to disseminate this information, since the honey-yogurt study reports that between 10 and 25% of the American population report unsatisfactory bowel function. In other words, for as many as one in every four people in the room, trips to the bathroom are miserable.

“As yogurt with honey is a common food pairing, and honey supports probiotic survival in vitro, we aimed to determine if this functional food combination would enhance probiotic abundance and improve functional outcomes in vivo,” the authors write.

The study had a randomized, controlled, single-blind, crossover design with two 2-week intervention periods. Yogurt beverages were consumed twice daily during each intervention period, with one group consuming theirs with sugar, and the other with clover honey. There was nothing special about the yogurt, and it was in fact a pasteurized, name-brand product with natural vanilla flavoring.

While almost none of their study outcomes were met, it was clear from the results that the in vitro effect reported above carried over in vivo as there was a greater abundance of Bifidobacterium animalis in the stools of those who consumed yogurt with honey rather than just yogurt or yogurt with sugar.

The study also failed to produce evidence that yogurt with honey improved any digestive function, but the authors noted that most of the participants had predominantly normal bowel functions during the trial period, and they suggest that those with dysfunctional activity arising from constipation, IBS, or other complications should be included in future studies on the topic.

“Plain yogurt is fantastic for gut health thanks to its probiotic content,” wrote Chris Kresser MS, co-founder of the California Center for Functional Medicine, who wasn’t involved with the study. “I’m not surprised by these results. Honey (especially raw) is a remarkable food with numerous healing properties. It is truly one of nature’s most potent superfoods.”

NATURE’S WONDER FOODS: 

If you go to any Greek restaurant, and you finish polishing off that plate of souvlaki or moussaka, you’ll notice the first two dessert items are always yogurt with honey and walnuts and baklava.

According to a Greek honey shop in Belgium (take that for what it’s worth) Hippocrates, who was a little like the father of Western medicine, “prescribed honey for fever, injuries, and for wound treatment.” Honey was a panacea as far as he was concerned. During the ancient Olympic games, honey became the testosterone of the day, with athletes doping on it to regain their strength between events.

Before expounding on what he learned from his teacher Plato, or what Plato had learned from his teacher Socrates, Aristotle actually wrote his first book on beekeeping.

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Woman Gives Birth in Lobby of Welsh Cinema and the Daughter Now Has Free Movies for Life

By
Andy Corbley
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Gareth and Sarah with newborn wrapped in a blanket at Cinema World
Father Gareth, son Liam, mother Sarah, and their newborn Lowri wrapped in a blanket at Cinema World

Welsh news media described it as a “blockbuster” arrival at a local movie theater—no not Deadpool 2—a beautiful baby girl whose mom gave birth in the lobby.

Sarah Vincent was 39 weeks-pregnant when she went to the Cinema World in her hometown, near the capital city of Cardiff, with her 3-year-old son Liam and her parents when, 20 minutes into the screening of Sing 2, she began to feel discomfort.

Adjourning to the restroom, the discomfort grew until she had to lay down in the lobby and that’s when her water broke. The cinema staff were quickly there to help, and help they did—calling an ambulance and assembling screens to block the sight of passersby.

On the instructions of the paramedic who picked up the phone, cinemagoer Amy Screen, and the manager on duty at the cinema Jacey Howcroft, arrived to help should the baby be unwilling to wait for the ambulance.

And it’s all a good thing too, because Lowri, the newborn baby girl, did not in fact wait for the ambulance.

With Screen and Howcroft’s assistance, Lowri Miles was born 7 pounds just 10 minutes from the point at which Vincent had gone into labor.

THE UNEXPECTED ARRIVAL: Dad Helps Delivers Baby at Home Using Just One Hand Since Other Arm Was in a Cast

Missing the momentous occasion, father Gareth Miles was working in Cardiff when he got a call from Vincent’s dad explaining what was happening. He rushed down to the cinema to find his baby girl waiting for him.

“The staff were great,” he said. “Jacey was the staff member who went to get Sarah’s parents from the cinema and helped with delivery, Andrew at Cineworld rang the ambulance and talked with paramedics on phone to help with the birth, the rest of the staff were great at putting up screens, also one member of the public, Amy, helped with delivery as well.”

He told Wales Online that Liam, their son, was also born extremely quickly but in a car rather than a movie theater.

WILD STORIES FROM THE MATERNITY WARD: These Twins Are Thriving 10 Years After Open Heart Surgery at Queensland Children’s Hospital

“It’s one we’re never going to forget. I thought the car was bad enough, and we’ve got the cinema story to tell as well now!”

Mo Williams, the General Manager of the Cinema World, said his staff were understandly proud of their teamwork during the unexpected emergency. He added that little Lowri is now an honorary Cinema World Member for life, and will never have to pay for a movie ticket as long as she lives.

SHARE This Cute Story From Wales On Social Media… 

First Women’s Sports Bar in California Officially Opens with Line Around the Block

By
Andy Corbley
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Credit - Watch Me Sports Bar, retrieved from Facebook
credit – Watch Me Sports Bar, retrieved from Facebook

Just off the Pacific Coast Highway, a line around the block heralded the presence of an exciting new spot in Long Beach—the state’s first sports bar dedicated to the women’s game.

Watch Me is not only the first such location in the state, but just 1 of 5 in the whole world, according to local news.

Resting on the 6500 block of Pacific Coast Highway in Long Beach, Mean Eddy and her partner Jax Diener opened the bar after months of laboring.

“We look at the sea of people and realize the need is here,” Eddy told NBC 4. “It’s been a labor of love. We’ve put our heart and souls into it for months and months.”

“It’s an exciting moment,” said Rex Richardson, Long Beach Mayor, who attended the opening with his wife and two daughters. “I just wanted to be here because it’s so important and it’s important to me personally as a dad of two athletes—two girl athletes.”

MORE UPLIFTING WOMEN’S NEWS: All-Female Auto Repair Shop Lets Clients Get Mani-Pedis While Waiting For Their Cars

Live reporting from NBC 4 shows the bar packed to the gills, with a line to get a table stretching around the adjacent corner yoga studio, evidencing an interest in women’s sports among the community.

At the moment, Watch Me is operating on a special 9 to 9 schedule for the Paris Olympics, but will return to normal operating hours when the games conclude.

WATCH the story below from NBC 4…

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Buddhist Nations Team Up to Use Heavy Lifting Drones to Clear Everest Slopes of Trash

By
Andy Corbley
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A DJI drone used during the test flight. Photo Khumbu Pasang Lhamu Rural Municipality
A DJI drone used during the test flight. Photo Khumbu Pasang Lhamu Rural Municipality

Buddhist nation Nepal and a drone manufacturer in majority Buddhist China, have signed an agreement to supply Mount Everest’s Buddhist authorities with heavy lift drones that will help clear trash off Everest’s holy slopes.

Dealing with trash on the world’s highest mountain is a complex and multifaceted operation, but the drones, piloted by the same Sherpa porters who for decades have been clearing trash on foot, will allow them to work in the most dangerous areas without risk to their lives.

Da Jiang Innovations, the largest drone manufacturer in China, will supply the equipment to a drone operator, who signed a memorandum of understanding between the rural municipality where Everest is located, and the Sagarmatha Pollution Control Committee (SPCC) for the use of drones in cleaning the sacred mountain.

“After a successful test in April, we plan to use drones commercially in the Everest region,” said Jagat Bhusal, chief administration officer of the rural municipality Khumbu Pasang Lhamu.

The SPCC works to ensure as much pollution of trash and dead bodies as possible is removed from the slopes every year. Along with hiring Sherpas to pack out trash from higher altitudes, and using helicopters to recover bodies, every climber who plans to reach Everest Base Camp must return back down with 8 kilograms (17.2 pounds) of garbage or lose a $4,000 deposit put down to ensure compliance.

If the climber goes to Camp I, or Camp II higher up the slopes, they must return with lower and lower weights of trash to ensure they aren’t overburdened in the low oxygen.

Reporting from Mr. Sangam Prasain at Kathmandu Post details the dangers of crossing the Khumbu Icefall during the first part of the climb from Everest Base Camp to Camp I. A river of ice 0.6 miles long, it’s one of the most dangerous features on Everest, as the rays of the Sun cause the ice to melt, shift, become unstable, and trigger avalanches, or crevasses to open up.

According to statistics cited by Prasain, from 1953 to 2023, nearly 50 Sherpa porters lost their lives on the Khumbu Icefall, which is typically crossed during the early morning or late evening after the ice has cooled back down.

NEWS FROM THE ROOF OF THE WORLD: Sherpa Convinces Climber to Let Him Make Rare ‘Death Zone’ Rescue on Mt. Everest

“Yes, there are concerns that the machines may actually cut jobs. But our sole purpose is to reduce potential deaths in the Khumbu Icefall, the danger zone,” said Bhusal. “We will train Sherpas, as drone operators cannot handle tasks at the higher camps. In the future, all work will be done by Sherpas.”

Based on trial data, the heavy lift drones could carry 30 kg, or over 60 pounds of material from Camp I, but as the altitude increased, the load capacity reduced, down to just 18 kg at Camp II at 6,400 meters above sea level.

NEWS FROM THE ROOF OF THE WORLD: Sherpas Laughing in the Face of Death While Saving Partner Who Fell 200 Feet into an Everest Crevasse

As warmer summers melt snow and ice on Everest, garbage and bodies from decades past are uncovered and risk polluting meltwater which feeds streams and rivers all over the valleys around the mountain.

The SPCC is conscientious of this, and is working hard to try and remove these potential contaminants from one of the holiest mountains in Buddhism.

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“No day shall erase you from the memory of time; nessun giorno vi cancelli dalla memoria del tempo.” – Virgil (The Aeneid)

By
Good News Network
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Quote of the Day: “No day shall erase you from the memory of time; nessun giorno vi cancelli dalla memoria del tempo.” – Virgil (from The Aeneid, the Latin epic poem written by the Roman poet about 30 to 19 BCE)

Photo by: Valentin Antonucci

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?

13,000 Years Ago, These Ancient Builders Carved a Calendar into Stone to Mark Destructive Occasion

By
Andy Corbley
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Göbekli Tepe excavations - Teomancimit CC 3.0. BY SA
Göbekli Tepe excavations – Teomancimit CC 3.0. BY SA

Whatever we learned in school about the earliest human civilizations, the discovery of Göbekli Tepe in southern Turkey has made it all null and void.

This sprawling, monolithic complex, of which over 90% remains unexcavated, dates back over 10,000 years—a date which is ascertained by the evidence of the entire complex being deliberately buried by whoever built it.

It’s quite simply the greatest mystery in archaeology since the pyramids, and new examinations of the markings on the pillars inside the stone enclosures suggest the builders could record an astronomical event that triggered a key shift in human civilization, researchers say.

The research claims ancient people were able to record their observations of the Sun, Moon, and constellations in the form of a solar calendar, created to keep track of time and mark the change of seasons.

Fresh analysis of V-shaped symbols carved onto pillars at the site has found that each V could represent a single day. This interpretation allowed researchers to count a solar calendar of 365 days on one of the pillars, consisting of 12 lunar months plus 11 extra days.

The summer solstice appears as a separate, special day, represented by a V worn around the neck of a bird-like beast thought to represent the summer solstice constellation at the time (it was made so long ago that star charts would have been different to ours). Other statues nearby, possibly representing deities, have been found with similar V-markings at their necks.

Since both the cycle of the Moon and that of the Sun are depicted, the carvings could represent the world’s earliest lunisolar calendar, based on the phases of the Moon and the position of the Sun, pre-dating other known calendars of this type by many millennia.

Once considered a fringe theory roundly dismissed in archaeology, Göbekli Tepe presents robust evidence that ancient people used a large stone monument to record the date a swarm of comet fragments hit Earth nearly 13,000 years ago (11,600 BCE) the authors write.

The theory goes that the comet strike caused a mass melting of glaciers that ended the last Ice Age and caused sea levels to rise around 400 feet. It could also have triggered changes in lifestyle and agriculture thought to be linked to the birth of civilization soon afterwards in the fertile crescent of West Asia.

Another pillar at the site appears to picture the Taurid meteor stream, which is thought to be the source of the comet fragments, lasting 27 days and emanating from the directions of Aquarius and Pisces.

credit – University of Edinburgh

The find also appears to confirm that ancient people were able to record dates using precession—the wobble in Earth’s axis which affects the movement of constellations across the sky—at least 10,000 years before the phenomenon was documented by Hipparchus of Ancient Greece around 150 BCE.

MORE ANCIENT ARCHAEOLOGY: 5,000-year-old Rock Art of Boats and Cattle Unearthed in the Sahara Shows Grassland Came Before Desert

The find also supports a theory that Earth faces an increased risk of comet strikes when it crosses the path of orbiting comet fragments, which we normally experience as meteor streams.

“It appears the inhabitants of Göbekli Tepe were keen observers of the sky, which is to be expected given their world had been devastated by a comet strike,” Dr. Martin Sweatman, of the University of Edinburgh’s School of Engineering, who led the research.

In contrast to existing theories about this comet strike, known as the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis, Dr. Sweatman’s paper details that the comet strike ushered in a mini ice age, and that societies practicing agriculture could no longer do so because of the encroaching cold, making it seem to us, until Göbekli Tepe’s discovery, as if civilization started in the Near East, where temperatures were more mild.

DIG THIS: Archaeologists Discover Ancient Cities Hidden in the Ecuadorian Amazon

One of the largest and most vocal proponents of the merits of the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis is none other than the world’s most famous podcaster: Joe Rogan. He has welcomed numerous scientists, writers, and archaeologists on his show over the last 8 years who have made contributions to getting the theory recognized by mainstream archaeological historians.

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YouTuber Rescues Senior Great Pyrenees Dog During Cross-Canada Canoe Trip

By
Andy Corbley
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credit - Tom Hudson / Instagram
credit – Tom Hudson / Instagram

A Kiwi kayaker on a cross-country trip on Canada’s creeks and rivers took a brief detour to rescue a man’s dog who was trapped under a log.

For all her strength, Ivy, a 14-year-old Great Pyrenees had been wasted by the mud of a river in Manitoba, and after wandering too far beyond her owner’s property, was trapped and couldn’t escape.

Ivy’s fortitude had been sapped away by the heavy mud weighing down her fur, and with only enough energy to keep her head above water, Tom Hudson—a quite unlikely hero, found her just in time.

Flying to BC from his home in New Zealand Tom Hudson had crossed Canada as far as Manitoba near The Pas when he heard faint barking and decided to take a detour to investigate on the morning of July 29th.

Unbeknownst to him, Ivy’s owner had been looking for her all the previous day, but heavy brush prevented him from seeing or hearing the elderly pooch, who was stuck just a quarter of a mile from her home.

Hudson tied up his canoe, lifted the log off her back, and carried her through knee-deep mud before attempting to position her comfortably on the canoe. She had never been afloat before, and Hudson, who was documenting his cross-country canoe quest on Instagram and YouTube, snapped a self-explanatory photo of Ivy’s first impressions.

He paddled about 400 yards downstream and found a dock. He plopped the Pyrenees down and went to ring the doorbell, hoping whoever answered would be able to help.

credit – Tom Hudson / Instagram

As it happened, they could.

“She’s a pretty lucky old dog that he came by when he did,” said owner Tom Stait, who opened the door and saw the pair covered in mud. “Because he could have went the other way on the other side of the river and he would never have seen her. I probably would have never found her.”

DOG RESCUES: Fishermen Pull Off Dramatic Rescue of 38 Dogs Treading Water with No Shore in Sight

The New Zealand accent must have been as startling as the fact that a stranger was returning his dog. Hudson stuck around to help wash Ivy off, after which Stait invited him to eat with his family and rest for the night. Hudson accepted, and told CBC News reporting on the story that he could have done nothing else but help the dog.

“Being hundreds of meters from your home, probably able to hear your owner, probably able to smell your owner … I just thought it would have been a terrible way to go,” he said. “So there was no way I could have not done what I did.”

IMPERILED POOCHES: Helicopter Herder Follows a Dog’s Tracks from the Air to a Miracle Rescue

His time on the canoe ended before he could reach Montreal, but Hudson plans to return next spring to finish the voyage. He told CBC News that he left with a feeling that all the world’s kind people were located in Canada, endearing the nation to him as much as the wilderness and wildlife he had seen along his route.

WATCH The story below from CBC News…

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Female Entrepreneur Set to Revolutionize Transportation for All of Africa, After Transforming her Native Ghana

By
Andy Corbley
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Delivery drivers on their Wahu! bikes - courtesy of Valerie Labi-Wahu Mobility
Delivery drivers on their Wahu! bikes – courtesy of Valerie Labi-Wahu Mobility

Early this year, GNN reported on the woman behind the wheels of Wahu!, an electric bicycle company and the only native electric vehicle manufacturer in Ghana, Valerie Labi.

From 100 bikes sold to delivery drivers on a pay-per-week basis, Wahu! has shifted another 200 units, driven down the cost of insurance, and is set in the coming months to unleash Africa’s first native 4-wheeled electric vehicle.

Valerie Labi, her three children, and the ebike – courtesy of Valerie Labi-Wahu Mobility

The bikes are sold under an affordable payment plan of around $23 per month for 18-24 months. They cost around $13.5 per month in electricity to charge, a huge drop from the $250 in gasoline that comparative petrol-powered delivery bikes cost.

All this adds up to significant savings for the riders who are plugged into Wahu!’s proprietary riding system through which they can access work immediately through companies like Glovo and Bolt.

“The average age of a vehicle in Ghana is 14 years,” Labi, of Ghanaian origin but brought up in England, told the Guardian. “We know there are going to be a lot of Amazon-type businesses needing last-mile mobility – do we really want them to be 14-year-old petrol vehicles?”

Anyone who’s visited Accra, Ghana, in the dry season will remember the incredibly poor air quality. Poor roads mean that cars are stuck in second and third gears, and old cars traveling in second and third gears mean plenty of extra car exhaust.

Poor roads also mean exposed dirt, and exposed dirt means fine-grained dust. Combined with a lack of rain, the smog, dust, and car exhaust make the air in parts of the capital unfit for human health.

To make matters even worse, cheap two-wheeled electric vehicles imported from Asian manufacturers are not built for the rigors of African roads. They often break down, require owners to constantly replace parts, and generate unnecessary waste.

IMPROVEMENTS FOR AFRICA BY AFRICANS: 

By contrast, Wahu!’s bikes were designed with Africa in mind, and the earliest models are still running well. Additionally, GPS tracking of the bikes has meant that of the 300 units sold and running in Ghana, only one has been stolen—and was quickly located.

Should the notorious aggression of African drivers become too dangerous, Labi and her team can simply deactivate the e-bike from their headquarters. This, as mentioned earlier, has meant that insurance costs for the drivers are remarkably low for a brand-new, pioneering electric vehicle.

Another update from GNN’s January story is that Labi and Wahu! have just closed a funding round in which they received $8 million in capital to expand production at their plant on Spintex Road, Accra. In the coming months, they plan to launch a four-wheeled vehicle, as well as open new locations in Lusaka, Zambia, and Lagos, Nigeria.

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