Quote of the Day: “Maybe that’s enlightenment enough—to know there is no final resting place of the mind.” – Anthony Bourdain
Photo by: Katerina Kerdi
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Britain’s deep coal mines have become a surprising source of green energy, one that’s been heating the town of Gateshead successfully for 6 months.
The scheme is believed to be replicable in areas with extensive abandoned mine works, and offers a kind of renewable redemption for a nation with a long history of dirty energy.
Gateshead Council’s mine water project launched in March 2023 and now has a large central heat pump that provides low-carbon heating to 350 high-rise buildings, an art gallery, a college, an industrial park, and several office buildings.
As oil and gas gradually replaced coal, Britain’s hundreds of miles of coal mining tunnels were gradually abandoned over the decades. Inundated by flood waters that became heated by the Earth’s core, Britain suddenly had a semi-naturally occurring geothermal energy source to harvest.
At certain depths, mine water can sit at over 100° Fahrenheit, or precisely 45°C. The renewable energy use here involves pumping the water into home heat pumps which further raises the temperature.
The super-hot mine water then heats the interior space and home water supply. After the heat is expended the water is sent back down to the mine where it’s naturally reheated. Huge advantages come with this kind of heating, including the fact that the water isn’t affected by the winter or the summer, and the water can also be used to cool homes.
“Recovering heat from mine water below the ground within abandoned coal mines provides an exciting opportunity to generate a low carbon, secure supply of heat, benefitting people living or working in buildings on the coalfields,” Gareth Farr, head of heat and by-product innovation at the Coal Authority, told Euronews.
MORE ALTERNATIVE ENERGY SOURCES: Engineers Have Just Finished Drilling the First Geothermal Well in the UK to Use Renewable Energy
The authority owns and manages the disused coal-mining infrastructure on behalf of the UK government, and their water resources amount to about two billion cubic meters, or half the amount of water in Loch Ness.
“With many millions of people living upon abandoned coalfields in Great Britain, the potential for mine water heat could be significant.”
OTHER GOOD BRITISH ADVANCEMENTS: Britain’s Royal Mint is Salvaging Gold from E-Waste – Recycling Precious Metals for Green Investors
While the Gateshead project is the largest in Europe, it’s not the only such setup, nor was it the first. Reclaimed coal mine water projects for heating have been established in The Netherlands and Spain, as well as across the Atlantic in Canada.
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A recent generation of captive-bred Scottish Wildcats that were released into Cairngorms National Park are thriving in their natural habitat.
The Saving Wildcats project was in charge of the release that saw 19 wildcats re-enter the wild this summer, tracked via GPS collars.
Solitary hunting cats have high mortality rates in winter months, and it’s not expected that all 19 will survive the winter. Already one has succumbed to an infection.
However, the breeding and reintroduction program, supported by the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland (RZSS), NatureScot, Forestry and Land Scotland, and the Cairngorms National Park Authority, has another thirteen kittens growing up in captivity in conditions that mimic the Cairngorms for future releases.
The iconic species was declared “functionally extinct in the wild” due to habitat loss and interbreeding with domesticated cats, but a herculean effort by various conservation groups has given the cat a rosier outlook in the decades ahead where they hope to reintroduce 60 juveniles between 6 and 8 months old.
In addition to reintroductions Saving Wildcats is working closely with landowners who have wildcats on their territories to ensure they are free to roam and unenticed to mate with domestic cats.
PEOPLE HELPING WILDCATS: Adorable Photos Show a Newborn Litter of Critically-Endangered Scottish Wildcat Kittens
“The time is now to give the ‘Highland Tiger’ the best chance of survival and I am thankful for the work of our team members, partners, and supporters in making this happen,” said David Field of Saving Wildcats in June when the first reintroductions took place.
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“I am also particularly grateful for the support of our local community in the Cairngorms as, without their engagement, we would not have reached this exciting milestone.”
Visitors who happen to glimpse this feline in the wild are urged not to share the location of the sighting.
WATCH the story below from the BBC…
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A chance social media post by an eagle-eyed amateur astronomer sparked the discovery of an explosive collision between two giant planets, which crashed into each other in a distant space system 1,800 light years away from planet Earth.
The confidence he had in what he saw led to an international team of astronomers being formed to investigate his claims that the light curve of an observed star showed the system doubling in brightness at infrared wavelengths some three years before the star started to fade in visible light.
The study, published in Nature by the team on the amateur’s tip-off, reports the sighting of two ice giant exoplanets several tens of Earth masses in size colliding around a sun-like star, creating a blaze of light and plumes of dust.
Its findings show the bright heat afterglow and resulting dust cloud, which moved in front of the parent star dimming it over time.
“To be honest, this observation was a complete surprise to me,” said co-lead author Dr. Matthew Kenworthy from Leiden University. “When we originally shared the visible light curve of this star with other astronomers, we started watching it with a network of other telescopes.”
“An astronomer on social media pointed out that the star brightened up in the infrared over a thousand days before the optical fading. I knew then this was an unusual event.”
Bristol University which first covered the story released no information about who the amateur was, what training he had, or if he was associated with an institution.
The network of professional and amateur astronomers studied the star intensively including monitoring changes in the star’s brightness over the next two years. The star was named ASASSN-21qj after the network of telescopes that first detected the fading of the star at visible wavelengths.
The researchers concluded the most likely explanation is that two ice giant exoplanets collided, producing the infrared glow detected by NASA’s NEOWISE mission, which uses a space telescope to hunt for asteroids and comets.
“Our calculations and computer models indicate the temperature and size of the glowing material, as well as the amount of time the glow has lasted, is consistent with the collision of two ice giant exoplanets,” said co-lead author Dr. Simon Lock, Research Fellow in Earth Sciences at the University of Bristol.
MORE EXOPLANET STORIES: NASA Just Found an Ocean World with Atmosphere–The Best Place to Look for Life in Our Galaxy
The resultant expanding debris cloud from the impact then traveled in front of the star some three years later, causing the star to dim in brightness at visible wavelengths.
Over the next few years, the cloud of dust is expected to start smearing out along the orbit of the collision remnant, and a tell-tale scattering of light from this cloud could be detected with both ground-based telescopes and NASA’s largest telescope in space, known as JWST.
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The astronomers plan on watching closely what happens next in this system.
“It will be fascinating to observe further developments,” said co-author Dr. Zoe Leinhardt, Associate Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Bristol. “Ultimately, the mass of material around the remnant may condense to form a retinue of moons that will orbit around this new planet.”
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Our partner Rob Brezsny, who has a new book out, Astrology Is Real: Revelations from My Life as an Oracle, provides his weekly wisdom to enlighten our thinking and motivate our mood. Rob’s Free Will Astrology, is a syndicated weekly column appearing in over a hundred publications. He is also the author of Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How All of Creation Is Conspiring To Shower You with Blessings. (A free preview of the book is available here.)
Here is your weekly horoscope…
FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of October 21, 2023
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
I’m not enamored of Shakespeare’s work. Though I enjoy his creative use of language, his worldview isn’t appealing or interesting. The people in his stories don’t resonate with me, and their problems don’t feel realistic. If I want to commune with multi-faceted characters dealing with fascinating dilemmas, I turn to French novelist Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850). I feel a kinship with his complex, nuanced understanding of human nature. Please note I am not asserting that Shakespeare is bad and Balzac is good. I’m merely stating the nature of my subjective personal tastes. Now I invite you to do what I have done here: In the coming weeks, stand up unflinchingly for your subjective personal tastes.
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
As much as I love logic and champion rational thinking, I’m granting you an exemption from their iron-grip supremacy in the coming weeks. To understand what’s transpiring and to respond with intelligence, you must partly transcend logic and reason. They will not be sufficient guides as you wrestle with the Great Riddles that will be visiting. In a few weeks, you will be justified in quoting ancient Roman author Tertullian, who said the following about his religion, Christianity: “It is true because it is impossible.”
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
As a Sun-conjunct-Uranus person, I am fond of hyperbole and outrageousness. “Outlandish” is one of my middle names. My Burning Man moniker is “Friendly Shocker”. So take that into consideration when I suggest you meditate on Oscar Wilde’s assertions that “all great ideas are dangerous” and “an idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea.” Oscar and I don’t mean that interesting possibilities must be a risk to one’s health or safety. Rather, we’re suggesting they are probably inconvenient for one’s dogmas, habits, and comfort zones. I hope you will favor such disruptors in the coming days.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
Some people might feel they have achieved the peak of luxury if they find themselves sipping Moët & Chandon Imperial Vintage Champagne while lounging on a leather and diamond-encrusted PlumeBlanche sofa on a hand-knotted Agra wool rug aboard a 130-foot-long Sunseeker yacht. But I suspect you will be thoroughly pleased with the subtler forms of luxury that are possible for you these days. Like what? Like surges of appreciation and acknowledgment for your good work. Like growing connections with influences that will interest you and help you in the future. Like the emotional riches that come from acting with integrity and excellence.
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
There are over 20 solutions to the riddle your higher mind is now contemplating. Several of them are smart intellectually but not emotionally intelligent. Others make sense from a selfish perspective but would be less than a blessing for some people in your life. Then there are a few solutions that might technically be effective but wouldn’t be much fun. I estimate there may only be two or three answers that would be intellectually and emotionally intelligent, would be of service not only to you but also to others, and would generate productive fun.
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
Naturalist John Muir didn’t like the word “hiking.” He believed people ought to saunter through the wilderness, not hike. “Hiking” implies straight-ahead, no-nonsense, purposeful movement, whereas “sauntering” is about wandering around, being reverent towards one’s surroundings, and getting willingly distracted by where one’s curiosity leads. I suggest you favor the sauntering approach in the coming weeks—not just in nature but in every area of your life. You’re best suited for exploring, gallivanting, and meandering.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
JooHee Yoon is an illustrator and designer. She says, “So much of artmaking is getting to know yourself through the creative process, of making mistakes and going down rabbit holes of research and experimentation that sometimes work out—and sometimes don’t.” She adds, “The failures are just as important as the successes.” I would extend this wisdom, applying it to how we create our personalities and lives. I hope you will keep it in mind as you improvise, experiment with, and transform yourself in the coming weeks.
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
Sometimes, we droop and shrivel in the face of a challenge that dares us to grow stronger and smarter. Sometimes, we try our best to handle a pivotal riddle with aplomb but fall short. Neither of these two scenarios will be in play for you during the coming months. I believe you will tap into reserves of hidden power you didn’t realize you had access to. You will summon bold, innovative responses to tantalizing mysteries. I predict you will accomplish creative triumphs that may have once seemed beyond your capacities.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
Gemini novelist Meg Wolitzer suggests that “one of the goals of life is to be comfortable in your own skin and in your own bed and on your own land.” I suspect you won’t achieve that goal in the coming weeks, but you will lay the foundation for achieving that goal. You will figure out precisely what you need in order to feel at home in the world, and you will formulate plans to make that happen. Be patient with yourself, dear Gemini. Be extra tender, kind, and accommodating. Your golden hour will come.
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
Some astrologers say you Crabs are averse to adventure, preferring to loll in your comfort zones and entertain dreamy fantasies. As evidence that this is not always true, I direct your attention to a great Cancerian adventurer, the traveling chef Anthony Bourdain. In the coming weeks, I hope you will be inspired by these Bourdain quotes: 1. “If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.” 2. “What a great way to live, if you could always do things that interest you, and do them with people who interest you.” 3. “The more I become aware of, the more I realize how relatively little I know, how much more there is to learn. Maybe that’s enlightenment enough—to know there is no final resting place of the mind.” 4. “Travel is about the gorgeous feeling of teetering in the unknown.”
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
Author Iain S. Thomas writes, “The universe is desperately trying to move you into the only spot that truly belongs to you—a space that only you can stand in. It is up to you to decide every day whether you are moving towards or away from that spot.” His ideas overlap with principles I expound in my book, Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How All of Creation Is Conspiring To Shower You with Blessings. There I propose that life often works to help dissolve your ignorance and liberate you from your suffering. I hypothesize that you are continually being given opportunities to grow smarter and wilder and kinder. In the coming weeks, everything I’ve described here will be especially apropos to you. All of creation will be maneuvering you in the direction of feeling intensely at home with your best self. Cooperate, please!
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
“Never do anything that others can do for you,” said Virgo novelist Agatha Christie. That’s not a very Virgo-like attitude, is it? Many astrologers would say that of all the zodiac’s signs, your tribe is the most eager to serve others but not aggressively seek the service of others on your behalf. But I suspect this dynamic could change in the coming weeks. Amazingly, cosmic rhythms will conspire to bring you more help and support than you’re accustomed to. My advice: Welcome it. Gather it in with gusto.
WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com
(Zodiac images by Numerologysign.com, CC license)
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Quote of the Day: “Life is the art of drawing without an eraser.” – John W. Gardner
Photo by: Claudio Schwarz
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An intelligence document from the Pentagon was delivered to Congress this week detailing its ongoing UFO investigations, called “unidentified anomalous phenomena” (UAP)—over 200 sightings this year.
It reveals there have been more UFOs sighted, but they’re doing no harm, according to the annual 2023 Annual Report on Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena.
It detailed 291 new sightings, mostly during 2022. This brought the total cases being reviewed by the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO) to more than 800, as of 30 April, 2023.
The AARO leads the U.S. Department of Defense’s efforts to document and analyze any potential otherworldy sightings.
Reporting from the period reflects a bias towards restricted military airspace, possibly as a result of reports from military personnel and numbers of sensors present in such areas.
This bias has been lessened by reporting from commercial pilots showing a more diverse geographic distribution of UAP sightings across the United States.
No reports have indicated that the mysterious craft interfere with normal air traffic.
“While the mere presence of UAP in the airspace represents a potential hazard to flight safety, none of these reports suggest the UAP maneuvered to an unsafe proximity to civil or military aircraft, positioned themselves in flight paths, or otherwise posed a direct threat to the flight safety of the observing aircraft,” says the document.
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During the reporting period, AARO say they received no statements indicating UAP sightings have been “associated with any adverse health effects”.
However, they add, “many reports from military witnesses do present potential safety of flight concerns, and there are some cases where reported UAP have potentially exhibited one or more concerning performance characteristics such as high-speed travel or unusual maneuverability.”
“The safety of our service personnel, our bases and installations, and the protection of U.S. operations security on land, in the skies, seas, and space are paramount,” said Pentagon Press Secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder, who thanked the many collaborative departments and agencies involved in the report. “We take reports of incursions into our designated space, land, sea, or airspaces seriously and examine each one.”
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This year’s UAP report covers the period between Aug 31, 2022, and April 30, 2023, as well as another 17 that occurred from 2019-2022, but had not been included in previous annual reports—for a total of 291 reports.
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Scientists conducted clinical trials into the effects of an herbal extract on mild cognitive impairment (MCI) found the herbal extract improved participants’ memory in under three months.
Sailuotong (SLT) is an herbal preparation containing standardized extracts of Panax ginseng, Ginkgo biloba and Crocus sativus L.
The patients also performed better during executive function tasks, such as staying focused despite distractions and multitasking.
The Australian research team behind the study also believes dementia—to which MCI is considered a precursor—could be warded off using SLT, and hope to conduct longer studies that might indicate that.
The herbal mixture has been developed as part of a long-standing collaboration between Western Sydney University’s NICM Health Research Institute and Xiyuan Hospital and the China Academy of Chinese Medical Sciences in Beijing.
SLT was already shown to be an anti-inflammatory antioxidant, with antiapoptotic, and cholinergic-enhancing properties—and the team says previous studies have demonstrated SLT’s safety and potential cognitive benefits in vascular dementia and neuro-cognition in healthy adults.
However, this latest study, published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia, sought to test SLT as a potential treatment for MCI, which is characterized by cognitive decline including memory and thinking difficulties, and is often viewed as a precursor to dementia, affecting 17 percent of the world population over the age of 60.
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The researchers conducted a 12-week trial of 78 participants aged 60 and older, all with previous diagnoses of MCI. The participants were randomly assigned either a 180mg capsule of SLT each day or a placebo.
The team’s positive results showed significant improvement in the logical memory of the elderly adults who received the SLT, compared with those in the placebo group.
The SLT group also exhibited improved performance in executive function tasks such as planning, exercising self-control, following multiple-step directions even when interrupted, staying focused despite distractions and multi-tasking.
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“People with mild cognitive impairment have an increased risk of dementia—over fivefold in some cases—and at the moment we do not have any approved medications for mild cognitive impairment,” said lead author Associate Professor Genevieve Steiner-Lim, at NICM Health Research Institute.
“Our findings are very promising as they show that even after a relatively short treatment period of just 12 weeks, SLT can support important aspects of memory and thinking in people with mild cognitive impairment.”
Participants also showed few incidences of any mild or moderate side effects.
Although she admits that further research into the long-term benefits and the impact of the herbal extract on daily functioning and quality of life is needed, Dr. Steiner-Lim remains optimistic about SLT potentially helping to delay dementia.
The team hopes to conduct another trial with a larger sample size and longer treatment period to test whether SLT can be used to treat mild cognitive impairment and potentially delay a diagnosis of dementia.
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A cursory search into any proven benefits of the three herbs individually shows that, for ginseng, the U.S. FDA and Federal Trade Commission have issued numerous warnings since 2019 to manufacturers of those dietary supplements for making false claims of health or anti-disease benefits.
But for Ginkgo, a meta analysis of studies showed in 2017 that evidence suggested it has potentially beneficial effects over placebo on cognitive performance.
The Crocus sativus flower is used in the culinary spice saffron, which has also been used for health purposes, especially in traditional Asian medicine. Its biologically active chemical compounds (mainly alkaloids, anthocyanins, carotenoids, flavonoid, phenolic, saponins, and terpenoids) can cause a mood-enhancing effect in persons with major depressive disorder, among other benefits including sleep and vision problems.
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[Reuters] It was a gas, gas, gas in a club on Manhattan’s West Side late on Thursday, where the Rolling Stones held a private launch party for their first new album in 18 years.
The Stones, in their seventh decade as a rock ‘n roll band, tore through a half-dozen songs for a crowd of hundreds at the Racket NYC club in support of the album Hackney Diamonds—which has garnered the band some of its best reviews in decades.
Lead singer Mick Jagger, 80, joked that doing another New York launch was part of the motivation for getting back into the studio for the record, whose title is a reference to British slang for broken glass.
“We were missing the launches so much we had to go back and make another album,” he told the energized crowd in the middle of a set that alternated new numbers and well-known tracks including Jumpin’ Jack Flash and Tumblin’ Dice.
The band has kicked off previous albums in New York with great fanfare, once rolling down Fifth Avenue on a flatbed truck and on another occasion riding on a caboose into Grand Central Terminal.
The Stones closed with an appearance by Lady Gaga for Sweet Sounds of Heaven, a slow, blues-infused number off the new album that recalls the band’s 70s classic Moonlight Mile.
Gaga and Jagger mimicked each other’s dance movies as they alternated vocals, Gaga in a shimmering red-and-black one-sleeved jumpsuit, Jagger wearing a customarily tight black shirt.
“Hackney Diamonds” is the band’s first studio album of original material since 2005’s “A Bigger Bang” and first recording since longtime drummer Charlie Watts died in 2021. The surviving core consists of Jagger and guitarists Keith Richards, 79, and Ron Wood, 76.
Guitarist Wood has been a member of the band for nearly 50 years despite joining in 1975, 13 years after the Stones were formed.
Besides Gaga, the new album features guests Stevie Wonder, Paul McCartney and Elton John, and a return appearance by longtime bassist Bill Wyman, who left the band in the 1990s, for the song “Live by the Sword,” which also features drumming by Watts before he died.
The album closes with the song “Rolling Stone Blues,” a Muddy Waters song that was the origin of the band’s name.
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(Reporting by David Gaffen; Editing by Lincoln Feast)
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Two new treatment options for aggressive prostate cancer have shown promise in a major clinical trial that demonstrated improved survival odds.
Both of the treatments for men with recurrent prostate cancer helped patients live longer than the current standard treatment without their disease progressing.
“If these treatments are approved by the Food and Drug Administration, our results will be practice changing,” said Stephen Freedland, MD, a prostate cancer researcher at Cedars-Sinai, and lead author of the study. “Both of these new options improved metastasis-free survival while preserving quality of life.”
The results of the Phase III international study led by Cedars-Sinai Cancer investigators were published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Cancer of the prostate, a walnut-sized gland that helps make semen, is not always a deadly diagnosis. For some, treatment may never be needed because they have a slow-growing form of the disease, but those with more aggressive prostate cancer are often first treated with surgery or radiation therapy.
Unfortunately, in about a third of those patients, the cancer recurs within 10 years.
Patients with aggressive recurrence are treated with a hormone therapy called androgen deprivation therapy (ADT), which reduces the patient’s production of the male sex hormone testosterone, which aids in the growth and spread of prostate cancer cells—as the hormone therapy effectively reduces the growth-stimulating effects.
But ADT has two downsides: It doesn’t completely eliminate testosterone, and it can cause many side effects.
“When you go on ADT, the testosterone level in the blood is reduced, but not completely eliminated,” Freedland said. “And the concern is that the testosterone that remains may still be enough to stimulate tumor growth. Also, patients don’t love the idea of being on hormones.”
In this study of 1,068 prostate cancer patients from 244 sites in 17 countries, Freedland and fellow investigators tested two experimental interventions—one to address each of these issues.
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In the randomized clinical trial, one-third of the patients received ADT plus a medication called enzalutamide, which blocks the effects of testosterone. Enzalutamide keeps any testosterone remaining in the blood from stimulating the growth of cancer cells.
Another third of the patients received enzalutamide alone. This option relied on the medication to block the effects of testosterone even though testosterone levels in the patients’ blood were not reduced.
“We wanted to see whether enzalutamide on its own was so effective that we didn’t need the ADT,” Freedland said.
The final group of patients received ADT alone, which is the current standard treatment.
Investigators found that the combination of ADT plus enzalutamide reduced the risk of metastasis or death by 58% over ADT alone. They found that enzalutamide alone reduced the risk of metastasis or death by 37% over ADT alone. Both treatments maintained quality of life relative to the ADT alone.
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“While the combination therapy offers greater risk reduction, some men might prefer enzalutamide alone. It does a good job of preventing cancer spread or death, with different side effects that may be more acceptable for some men,” Freedland said.
The next step is for the makers of enzalutamide to apply for FDA approval, so the experimental therapy can come into wide use, Freedland said. The study was funded by Pfizer and Astellas Pharma, the co-developers of enzalutamide.
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Quote of the Day: “Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much.” – Blaise Pascal
Photo by: 白士李 (CC License)
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What if washing your hands to prevent getting a simple flu virus was all that was needed to prevent skin cancer? Bold as that sounds, it wasn’t an Anderson Center laureate who came up with the idea, but a 14-year-old.
Heman Bekele, a 9th grader at W.T. Woodson High School in Annandale, Virginia, was awarded the $25,000 grand prize as the winner of the 2023 3M Young Scientist Challenge, with a melanoma treatment in the form of a bar of soap.
As the winner of the nation’s premier middle school science contest, now in its 16th year, Bekele has been accorded the prestigious title of “America’s Top Young Scientist.”
He explains that his work was spurred on by discovering the recovery rate of melanoma in the US compared to sub-Saharan Africa (99% to 20%). By combining simple compounds in the soap that kept costs low he also was able to create a product that stimulates the activity of dendritic cells which act as protectors of skin cells.
“The need for scientists and innovators to develop solutions for the world’s biggest challenges has never been greater. This year’s Young Scientist Challenge finalists have demonstrated the skills required to reimagine what’s possible—intelligence, curiosity, collaboration, and resilience,” said John Banovetz, executive vice president and chief technology officer of 3M.
“The magnitude and complexity of the issues these young minds are working to solve is inspiring. Congratulations to this year’s finalists—we can’t wait to see what you do next!”
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Skin cancer is the most common cancer in the United States, with an average annual treatment cost of $8.1 billion. Inspired by this costly and widespread health issue, Heman developed an affordable soap solution that could positively impact skin cancer outcomes.
Over the next five years, he hopes to refine this novel innovation and create a nonprofit organization that will distribute this low-cost solution to communities in need.
WATCH Heman break it down…
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A Chicago Marathon runner gave up a record finish in order to save a stray kitten she found on the course.
The story got sweeter when amid the spectators on the side of the road, she found Andrea Maldonado who called out that she would give the kitten a new home.
Marathoner Sarah Bohan was on track for a personal best when she made a mid-race decision that showed her sponsors PAWS Chicago they had backed the right runner.
Ditching the record, Bohan stopped when, within arm’s length of her place near the side of the road during the 2023 Chicago Marathon, she saw a tiny white face huddled under a pile of leaves. There was always a chance that the athlete might have put the little fellow down and hoped its momma would show up to take him away by the scruff of the neck, but with two rescue cats of her own at home, it was a slim one.
She instead decided to walk the rest of the course, gently nuzzling the 1 pound kitten until she ran into a friend and fellow animal lover Gia Nigro who helped Bohan try to find someone amid the crowds of onlookers to take the kitten off their hands so they could finish.
That’s when Nigro and Bohan came past a barbershop in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago and found a family group gathered there.
“We were on the sidelines having fun,” recalled the mom of 4 Andrea Maldonado, “and all of a sudden this girl came up to me with a kitten.”
PAWS Chicago, the rescue organization that Bohan was running to raise money for, posted on Instagram that they were looking to reach Maldonado to offer free vet services as a thank-you for supporting their runner, and the stray kitty.
Maldonado was informed of their offer and took them up, bringing in the little fellow for an examination. Although underweight, he was given a clean bill of health after receiving vaccinations, microchipping, and a flea/tick treatment.
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“Casper” as he is now called in his home with Maldonado, her husband Tony, children Emma, Elise, Evelia, and Enzo, and their two cats and one dog, was the subject of more than 350 media stories in more than a dozen languages.
“Our girls love him,” Maldonado told Business Insider. “Our family loves him. Our dog loves him.”
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Bohan finished the marathon at 3 hours 33 minutes this year and says next year she will go again for that record.
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A unique cat with a huge nose has stunned her new caregivers at an animal shelter in England, after it was discovered she actually has two noses.
The feline is named Nanny McPhee after the fictional film character and was given to Cats Protection Adoption Centre in Warrington, Cheshire, after her owner’s ill health meant they could no longer care for pet.
Staff at first thought she just had a large nose, but a check-up by vets revealed the four-year-old moggy actually had two noses.
It is believed the ‘one-of-a-kind’ second schnoz was caused by a congenital abnormality—but the black and white cat has suffered no ill effects from it.
“A cat with two noses is a first for us,” said veterinary officer Fiona Brockbank. “This is a real rarity and, thankfully, it isn’t causing her any problems at all.
“Like all of our cats, Nanny McPhee will be neutered before re-homing so any concerns about inherited problems are resolved as she won’t have kittens.”
Shelter manager Lindsay Kerr believes the petite cat will find a new home quickly because of her two noses.
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“We have all fallen in love with our one-of-a-kind Nanny McPhee,” she said. “We can’t stop looking at her two noses!
Other congenital malformations near the nose of a cat such as a cleft lip and cleft palate are not uncommon and can either be inherited or due to incidents while developing in the uterus.
“She has proven to be a gentle lady who adores a fuss and a cuddle and we are hopeful her newfound fame will mean she will have no shortage of potential adopters, so she can settle down and become the center of a loving family.”
Watch a cute video of Nanny M. below…
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With the help of AI, a word written on a papyrus scroll 2,000 years ago and destroyed in a library in Pompeii has been deciphered, an astonishing feat that puts Roman scholars on the cusp of rediscovering knowledge from the era.
If you saw the Herculaneum scroll in question, you’d think it was a piece of charcoal, and in a sense it is. Carbonized by the heat and gases, but safe under rubble, it and nearly 2,000 others like it were discovered in 1,752, but have remained in museum storerooms ever since.
It has been believed for some time that technology could be used to access the writing on some of these scrolls. This year, Silicon Valley figures Daniel Gross and Nat Friedman created the Vesuvius Challenge, to place up to $1 million in cash prizes in the hands of any engineers who could program AIs to read the carbonized papyrus.
Luke Farritor, one such contestant of the Vesuvius Challenge, became the first person in two millennia to see an entire word from within an unopened scroll this August when his machine learning module found ink strokes, complete letters, and finally, πορφύραc.
Porphyras (πορφύραc) means purple, a color associated with royalty, but ‘papyrologists’ noted that it’s impossible at the moment to rule out either the noun, purple dye, clothes; or the adjective, purple.
Farritor, a college student and SpaceX intern, started working on the deep learning module after hearing about CT scans done of the papyrus scrolls on a podcast. Another contestant, Casey Handmer, had revealed “crackles” in the material through arduous study that he determined were the strokes of a stylus.
The Herculaneum is the largest known library that has survived from classical antiquity. Larger ones have been found in parts of Mesopotamia because the contents were written on clay tablets. It’s believed to have belonged to Julius Caeser’s father-in-law, and since the 1,700s, some of the papyrus scrolls have been shown to contain works from Greek philosophers like Epicurus and Philodemus.
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The contest still has a $700,000 grand prize available to anyone who can decipher four separate passages across two scrolls.
National Geographic, reporting on the speed at which the 2,000 contestants have been working on deciphering the scrolls, spoke with Brent Seales, a computer scientist at the University of Kentucky who has worked in this field for 20 years, started an initiative at the university for digital restoration of unreadable ancient texts, and co-directs the Vesuvius Challenge.
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“We’ve seen 10 or 20 person-years of work from these competitors,” Seals told Nat Geo. “Some people might think, ‘What are you going to all that trouble for?’ but I don’t believe that. This is an amazing period in human history. We’re talking about more works from that period.”
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Quote of the Day: “The gain is not in the having of children; it is the discovery of love and how to be loving.” – Polly Berrien Berends
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Officers in Pittsburgh were hot on the trail of a runaway, but they had to improvise in order to save the day.
The caper was an engagement ring that decided to make a break for it through the sewers, but Sergeant Andrew Robinson and Officer Kyle Briggs were not about to be sidestepped so easily.
Out on patrol, the two heard a woman saying she had lost her ring down a sewer as they walked down 16th Street. They decided to stop and help the young woman.
The officers fabricated a device that consisted of a metal pole—found on the street—masking tape and a paperclip attached to the end.
A video, released by the police, shows one of the officers slowly pulling the metal pole and the ring attached to it out of the drain.
“The officers overheard a woman and her fiance’ saying she had lost her ring down a sewer that had a tiny hole in the middle,” said the Pittsburgh Police Bureau in a statement.
“The sergeant who was there said it was a “one in a million shot” that it came off her finger and went into the hole.”
“We don’t know the person’s name. She and her fiance’ were very thankful, jokingly invited them to the wedding, and then drove off in a vehicle with out-of-state plates.”
All in a day’s work for Pittsburgh’s finest.
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An international team of scientists has documented the largest solar storm to have ever struck the Earth, hidden inside the trunks of ancient trees.
Such a massive storm today on the scale of the newly discovered one would cause total disruptions to global technology and infrastructure, from power transformers to satellites, but better understanding how they happen can help organizations predict and potentially protect the Earth from them.
A huge spike in radiocarbon levels was identified by an international team of scientists
who analyzed ancient tree rings found in the French Alps.
Radiocarbon is constantly being produced in the upper atmosphere through a chain of reactions initiated by cosmic rays. But we now know that sometimes, flares of activity can become storms of activity, so-called Miyake Events.
“Such super storms could permanently damage the transformers in our electricity grids, resulting in huge and widespread blackouts lasting months,” said Professor Tim Heaton, of the University of Leeds. “They could also result in permanent damage to the satellites that we all rely on for navigation and telecommunication, leaving them unusable.”
Nine such extreme events have now been identified as having occurred over the last 15,000 years.
The most recent confirmed Miyake Events occurred in 774 CE and 993 CE, the latter of which was actually used to accurately date the timbers that Leif Erikson and his Vikings used to construct their settlements in the New World, 500 years before Colombus arrived.
The newly identified 14,300-year-old event is the largest that has ever been found and roughly twice the size of the other two.
Scientists say the exact nature of Miyake Events remains very poorly understood as they have never been directly observed instrumentally.
“We do not know what causes such extreme solar storms to occur, how frequently they might occur, or if we can somehow predict them,” said Heaton. “Each new discovery not only helps answer existing key questions but can also generate new ones.”
The research team measured radiocarbon levels in ancient trees preserved within the eroded banks of the Drouzet River, near Gap, in the Southern French Alps. The tree trunks were not quite fossilized yet, and the analysis of the material between tree rings revealed the never-before-seen amount of radiocarbons.
By comparing the spike with measurements of beryllium, a chemical element found in Greenland ice cores, the team suggests that the spike was caused by a massive solar storm that would have ejected huge volumes of energetic particles into Earth’s atmosphere.
“Radiocarbon measured in tree rings, used alongside beryllium in polar ice cores, provide the best way to understand the Sun’s behavior further back into the past,” said study lead author, Professor Edouard Bard of the Collège de France.
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The largest, directly-observed, Miyako event occurred in 1859 and is known as the Carrington Event.
It caused massive disruption on Earth—destroying telegraph machines and creating a night-time aurora so bright that birds began to sing, believing the Sun had begun to rise.
NASA has begun to take planetary defense as a serious funding priority, believing that the odds are essentially inevitable that some space-based event will threaten Earth in the long term. They have so far only investigated defending against asteroids that might impact Earth, but solar storms could become a priority too as more information becomes available.
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A tiny uninhabited island in the Caribbean waters of the territory of Anguilla was almost completely empty but for mice, but has recently been totally restored to a pre-colonial state of biodiversity.
Called Sombrero, the island has joined a number of case studies around the Caribbean and the world on how to completely eradicate invasive species and protect these unique ecosystems.
Caribbean islands account for only 0.16% of the Earth’s landmass, but rank in the top three in the world as a collective for biodiversity.
These isolated ecosystems have historically been vulnerable to invasive species like goats and rats, and on Sombrero the situation was critical, as mice were preying on native reptiles and nesting seabird eggs.
Several endemic species found nowhere else like the Sombrero wind scorpion, the Sombrero bee, and the Sombrero ground lizard were nearly extinct from a combination of mice, vegetation loss, and hurricanes, but a program launched by Anguillan conservationists with help from the large NGOs Flora & Fauna and Re:wild, was able to both eradicate the mice, and see rebounds in the populations of these animals in just 2 years.
For example, the ground lizard numbers nearly 900 individuals according to the most recent survey, compared to less than 100 when the program started in 2021.
After the mice were gone, the Anguillan National Trust began a replanting campaign to restore native vegetation to help ensure the island’s soil stays put under hurricane-force winds.
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“The more diversity you have in terms of the vegetation, the more resilient it will be to a changing climate,” said Anguillan conservationist Devon Carter. “Already, the island is looking greener and healthier. In the future we hope to see a whole different landscape and much more wildlife.”
Per Flora & Fauna, the Sombero project is just one of more than 30 successful offshore island restorations carried out by Fauna & Flora and Re:wild and their wide network of local partners, all of which have swiftly led to impressive improvements in vegetation cover and the recovery of numerous native species.
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It isn’t a trend happening merely across the Caribbean, but elsewhere as well. Several islands off the coast of Australia and the Pacific Ocean have experienced similar bouncebacks after rats or rabbits were eradicated.
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Swedish researchers say they have developed a new method of recycling batteries from electric vehicles that allows recovery of 100 percent of the aluminum and 98 percent of the lithium.
Researchers at Chalmers University of Technology have presented the efficient way to recycle metals from spent batteries, and at the same time minimize the loss of valuable raw materials such as nickel, cobalt and manganese.
Furthermore, no expensive or harmful chemicals are required in the process because the researchers use oxalic acid—an organic acid that can be found in the plant kingdom.
“So far, no one has managed to find exactly the right conditions for separating this much lithium using oxalic acid, whilst also removing all the aluminum,” said Léa Rouquette, PhD student in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering. “Since all batteries contain aluminum, we need to be able to remove it without losing the other metals.”
In the Chalmers battery recycling lab, Rouquette and research leader Martina Petranikova showed how the new method works—taking the pulverized components in the form of a finely ground black powder and dissolving it in a transparent liquid – oxalic acid.
Rouquette produces both the powder and the liquid in something reminiscent of a kitchen mixer. Although it looks as easy as brewing coffee, the exact procedure is a unique scientific breakthrough. By fine-tuning temperature, concentration and time, the researchers came up with a new recipe for using oxalic acid, an environmentally friendly ingredient that can be found in plants such as rhubarb and spinach.
“We need alternatives to inorganic chemicals. One of the biggest bottlenecks in today’s processes is removing residual materials like aluminum,” says Martina Petranikova, Associate Professor at the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering at Chalmers. “This is an innovative method that can offer the recycling industry new alternatives and help solve problems that hinder development.”
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The aqueous-based recycling method is called hydrometallurgy. In traditional hydrometallurgy, all the metals in an EV battery cell are dissolved in an inorganic acid. Then, you remove the “impurities” such as aluminum and copper. Lastly, you can separately recover valuable metals such as cobalt, nickel, manganese and lithium. Even though the amount of residual aluminum and copper is small, it requires several purification steps and each step in this process can cause lithium loss.
With the new method, the researchers reverse the order and recover the lithium and aluminum first. Thus, they can reduce the waste of valuable metals needed to make new batteries.
The latter part of the process, in which the black mixture is filtered, is also reminiscent of brewing coffee. While aluminum and lithium end up in the liquid, the other metals are left in the “solids”. The next step in the process is to separate aluminum and lithium.
“Since the metals have very different properties, we don’t think it’ll be hard to separate them. Our method is a promising new route for battery recycling – a route that definitely warrants further exploration,” says Rouquette, who published her results in the journal Separation and Purification Technology.
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Petranikova’s research group is involved in various collaborations with companies to develop electric car battery recycling and is a partner in major research and development projects, such as Volvo Cars’ and Northvolt’s Nybat project.
The research was funded by the Swedish Energy Agency, BASE Batteries Sweden, Vinnova.
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