Sounds made by humpback whales—including a previously unknown call—have given researchers a glimpse of their lives in the high seas.
Scientists recorded the sounds hundreds of miles west of South Africa at the Vema Seamount in the Atlantic Ocean.
The “whup” and “grumble” calls captured suggest this location could be an important stop on the whales’ migration to polar feeding grounds.
Whale sounds are categorized into continuous “song” and shorter “non-song” calls. The study recorded 600 non-song calls over 11 days.
These included an “impulsive sound”—dubbed “gunshot” by the researchers— that has never been recorded before. Until now, impulsive gunshot sounds had only been associated with other baleen whale species, notably right whales, and bowhead whales which do not inhabit the region.
The most common whale call detected was the “whup”. The “whup” is known to be used between mother-calf pairs as a contact call that helps them locate each other while moving southward after the breeding season.
The research team from the universities of Stellenbosch (South Africa) and Exeter (UK), and Greenpeace Research Laboratories, used moored hydrophones to record the whales.
They said their study, published in the journal JASA Express Letters, highlights the importance of current negotiations over a UN treaty to govern the high seas.
“50 years ago, governments came together to turn around the fate of humpback whales,” said Dr. Kirsten Thompson, of the University of Exeter.
“Now they have a chance to secure the progress already made and protect the high-seas habitats that whales rely on.
They are advocating for a coherent and connected network of Marine Protected Areas across our oceans to ensure seamounts like Vema are protected. A seamount is an underwater mountain with steep sides rising from the seafloor, formed by volcanic activity.
The area around the Vema Seamount was heavily overfished after its discovery in 1959, but it is now closed for fishing and is recognized as a vulnerable marine ecosystem due to its unique biodiversity.
Will McCallum, Head of Oceans at Greenpeace, said a UN treaty is currently under negotiation, called the Marine Biodiversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction, which would provide a framework for creating a network of Marine Protected Areas to cover 30% of the high seas.
“Once upon a time, the high seas were thought of as barren,” he said. “Ground-breaking research like this shows they are teeming with life.”
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FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of April 30, 2022
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com
TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
“Imagining anything is the first step toward creating it,” wrote author and activist Gloria Steinem. “Believing in a true self is what allows a true self to be born,” she added. Those are excellent meditations for you to focus on right now, Taurus. The time is ripe for you to envision in detail a specific new situation or adventure you would like to manifest in the future. It’s also a perfect moment to picture a truer, deeper, more robust version of your beautiful self—an expanded version of your identity that you hope to give birth to in the coming months.
GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
Gemini author William Butler Yeats won a Nobel Prize for Literature, so I conclude he had considerable talent and wisdom. But he cultivated interests and ideas that were at variance with most other literary figures. For example, he believed fairies are real. He was a student of occult magic. Two of his books were dictated by spirits during séances. In the coming weeks, I invite you to draw inspiration from his versatile repertoire. Welcome knowledge in whatever unusual ways it might materialize. Be eager to accept power and inspiration wherever they are offered. For inspiration, here’s a Yeats’ quote: “I have observed dreams and visions very carefully, and am certain that the imagination has some way of lighting on the truth that reason has not, and that its commandments, delivered when the body is still and the reason silent, are the most binding we can ever know.”
CANCER (June 21-July 22):
You know what’s always good for your well-being? Helping people who are less fortunate and less privileged than you. To enhance your health, you can also fight bigotry, campaign against the abuse of animals, and remedy damage to the natural world. If you carry out tasks like these in the coming weeks, you will boost your vigor and vitality even more than usual. You may be amazed at the power of your compassion to generate selfish benefits for yourself. Working in behalf of others will uplift and nurture you. To further motivate you, here are inspirational words from designer Santiago Bautista: “I am in love with all the gifts of the world, and especially those destined for others to enjoy.”
LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
“There is a moment in each day that Satan cannot find,” wrote author and artist William Blake. Here’s how I interpret his poetic words: On a regular basis, you become relatively immune from the debilitating effects of melancholy, apathy, and fear. At those times, you are blessed with the freedom to be exactly who you want to be. You can satisfy your soul completely. In the next six weeks, I suspect there will be more of these interludes for you than usual. How do you plan to use your exalted respite from Satan’s nagging?
VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
Poet Louis Little Coon Oliver (1904–1991) was a member of the indigenous Mvskoke people. He declared, “I do not waste what is wild.” That might mean something different for him than what it would mean for you, but it’s an excellent principle for you to work with in the coming weeks. You will have more access than usual to wildness, and you might be tempted to use it casually or recklessly. I hope that instead you harness all that raw mojo with precision and grace. Amazingly, being disciplined in your use of the wildness will ensure that it enriches you to the max and generates potent transformative energy.
LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
I suspect you will have the skills of an acrobat in the coming weeks—at least metaphorically. You will be psychically nimble. Your soul will have an exceptional ability to carry out spry maneuvers that keep you sane and sound. Even more than usual, you will have the power to adjust on the fly and adapt to shifting circumstances. People you know may marvel at your lithe flexibility. They will compliment you for your classiness under pressure. But I suspect the feats you accomplish may feel surprisingly easy and breezy!
SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
A Tumblr blogger named Af-70 gives copious advice. From his wide selection of wise counsel, I have selected six tips that are right for your needs in the coming weeks. Please study the following counsel. 1. “Real feelings don’t change fast.” 2. “Connect deeply or not at all.” 3. “Build a relationship in which you and your ally can be active in each other’s growth.” 4. “Sometimes what you get is better than what you wanted.” 5. “Enjoy the space between where you are and where you are going.” 6. “Keep it real with me even if it makes us tremble and shimmer.”
SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
Consider putting a sign on your door or a message on your social media that says something like the following: “I’ve still got some healing to do. While I’m making progress, I’m only partway there. Am open to your suggestions, practical tips, and suggestions for cures I don’t know about.” Though the process is as yet incomplete, Sagittarius, I am proud of how diligent and resourceful you have been in seeking corrections and fixes. My only suggestions: 1. Be bold about seeking help and support. 2. Be aggressive about accessing your creativity. Expand your imagination about what might be therapeutic.
CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
“To uncover what is hidden in my soul might take me a week or two,” my friend Allie told me. I told her she would be lucky if her brave and challenging exploration required such a short time. In contrast, some people I know have spent years trying to find what is buried and lost in their souls: me, for instance. There was one period of my life when I sought for over a decade to find and identify the missing treasure. According to my astrological analysis, you will soon enjoy multiple discoveries and revelations that will be more like Allie’s timeline than mine: relatively rapid and complete. Get ready! Be alert!
AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
A Thai cook named Nattapong Kaweenuntawong has a unique method for cooking the soup served in his Bangkok restaurant. At the end of each night, he saves the broth for use the next day. He has been doing that daily for 45 years. Theoretically, there may be molecules of noodles that were originally thrown in the pot back in 1977. In accordance with current astrological omens, I urge you to dream up a new tradition that borrows from his approach. What experience could you begin soon that would benefit you for years to come?
PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
Pisces-born Casimir Pulaski (1745–1779) was a Polish nobleman and military commander. As a young man, he fought unsuccessfully to free Poland from Russian domination. Driven into exile, he fled to America, arriving during the Revolutionary War with Britain in 1777. General George Washington was impressed with Pulaski’s skills, making the immigrant a brigadier general. He distinguished himself as a leader of American forces, exhibiting brilliance and bravery. For that excellence, he has been honored. The coming months will be a favorable time to question and revise your understanding of your ‘hero’ identity.
ARIES (March 21-April 19):
I recommend you adopt a limitation that will enable you to claim more freedom. For example, you could de-emphasize your involvement with a lukewarm dream so as to liberate time and energy for a passionate dream. Or you could minimize your fascination with a certain negative emotion to make more room for invigorating emotions. Any other ideas? You’re in a phase when increased discipline and discernment can be liberating.
WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com
Quote of the Day: “If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” – Henry Ford
Photo by: Johnathan Ciarrocca
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A 90-year-old has found her late husband’s wedding ring under an apple tree—35 years after he lost it in their garden.
Ann Kendrick says Peter, who passed away 22 years ago, lost his band while working in their back garden in Looe, Cornwall in 1987.
The mother-of-seven discovered the ring on Saturday, 23 April when she was clearing around the base of an apple tree.
She said she was “very excited” to find the ring and added that her husband would have been “as surprised as her.”
“It didn’t look at all like a wedding ring,” Ann told the BBC, “it looked like a dirty piece of bent metal. I looked at it and thought ‘no, it couldn’t be’. I was really quite excited. When I was telling a friend about it I got a bit choked up.”
SWNS
Ann’s 57-year-old son Bob Kendrick runs a restaurant near his home in Dartmouth, Devon.
MIT engineers have developed a paper-thin loudspeaker that can turn any surface into an active audio source.
This thin-film loudspeaker produces sound with minimal distortion while using a fraction of the energy required by a traditional loudspeaker. The hand-sized loudspeaker the team demonstrated, which weighs about as much as a dime, can generate high-quality sound no matter what surface the film is bonded to.
To achieve these properties, the researchers pioneered a deceptively simple fabrication technique, which requires only three basic steps and can be scaled up to produce ultrathin loudspeakers large enough to cover the inside of an automobile or to wallpaper a room.
Used this way, the thin-film loudspeaker could provide active noise cancellation in clamorous environments, such as an airplane cockpit, by generating sound of the same amplitude but opposite phase; the two sounds cancel each other out.
The flexible device could also be used for immersive entertainment, perhaps by providing three-dimensional audio in a theater or theme park ride. And because it is lightweight and requires such a small amount of power to operate, the device is well-suited for applications on smart devices where battery life is limited.
“It feels remarkable to take what looks like a slender sheet of paper, attach two clips to it, plug it into the headphone port of your computer, and start hearing sounds emanating from it. It can be used anywhere. One just needs a smidgeon of electrical power to run it,” says Vladimir Bulović, the Fariborz Maseeh Chair in Emerging Technology and senior author of the paper—who wrote it with Jinchi Han, a ONE Lab postdoc, and co-senior author Jeffrey Lang, the Vitesse Professor of Electrical Engineering.
A new approach
Felice Frankel, MIT
A typical loudspeaker found in headphones or an audio system uses electric current inputs that pass through a coil of wire that generates a magnetic field, which moves a speaker membrane, that moves the air above it, that makes the sound we hear. By contrast, the new loudspeaker simplifies the speaker design by using a thin film of a shaped piezoelectric material that moves when voltage is applied over it, which moves the air above it and generates sound.
Most thin-film loudspeakers are designed to be freestanding because the film must bend freely to produce sound. Mounting these loudspeakers onto a surface would impede the vibration and hamper their ability to generate sound.
To overcome this problem, the MIT team rethought the design of a thin-film loudspeaker. Rather than having the entire material vibrate, their design relies on tiny domes on a thin layer of piezoelectric material which each vibrate individually. These domes, each only a few hair-widths across, are surrounded by spacer layers on the top and bottom of the film that protect them from the mounting surface while still enabling them to vibrate freely. The same spacer layers protect the domes from abrasion and impact during day-to-day handling, enhancing the loudspeaker’s durability.
To build the loudspeaker, the researchers used a laser to cut tiny holes into a thin sheet of PET, which is a type of lightweight plastic. They laminated the underside of that perforated PET layer with a very thin film (as thin as 8 microns) of piezoelectric material, called PVDF. Then they applied vacuum above the bonded sheets and a heat source, at 80 degrees Celsius, underneath them.
Because the PVDF layer is so thin, the pressure difference created by the vacuum and heat source caused it to bulge. The PVDF can’t force its way through the PET layer, so tiny domes protrude in areas where they aren’t blocked by PET. These protrusions self-align with the holes in the PET layer. The researchers then laminate the other side of the PVDF with another PET layer to act as a spacer between the domes and the bonding surface.
“This is a very simple, straightforward process. It would allow us to produce these loudspeakers in a high-throughput fashion if we integrate it with a roll-to-roll process in the future. That means it could be fabricated in large amounts, like wallpaper to cover walls, cars, or aircraft interiors,” Han says.
High quality, low power
The domes are 15 microns in height, about one-sixth the thickness of a human hair, and they only move up and down about half a micron when they vibrate. Each dome is a single sound-generation unit, so it takes thousands of these tiny domes vibrating together to produce audible sound.
An added benefit of the team’s simple fabrication process is its tunability—the researchers can change the size of the holes in the PET to control the size of the domes. Domes with a larger radius displace more air and produce more sound, but larger domes also have lower resonance frequency. Resonance frequency is the frequency at which the device operates most efficiently, and lower resonance frequency leads to audio distortion.
Once the researchers perfected the fabrication technique, they tested several different dome sizes and piezoelectric layer thicknesses to arrive at an optimal combination.
They tested their thin-film loudspeaker by mounting it to a wall 30 centimeters from a microphone to measure the sound pressure level, recorded in decibels. When 25 volts of electricity were passed through the device at 1 kilohertz (a rate of 1,000 cycles per second), the speaker produced high-quality sound at conversational levels of 66 decibels. At 10 kilohertz, the sound pressure level increased to 86 decibels, about the same volume level as city traffic.
The energy-efficient device only requires about 100 milliwatts of power per square meter of speaker area. By contrast, an average home speaker might consume more than 1 watt of power to generate similar sound pressure at a comparable distance.
Because the tiny domes are vibrating, rather than the entire film, the loudspeaker has a high enough resonance frequency that it can be used effectively for ultrasound applications, like imaging, Han explains. Ultrasound imaging uses very high frequency sound waves to produce images, and higher frequencies yield better image resolution.
The device could also use ultrasound to detect where a human is standing in a room, just like bats do using echolocation, and then shape the sound waves to follow the person as they move, Bulović says. If the vibrating domes of the thin film are covered with a reflective surface, they could be used to create patterns of light for future display technologies. If immersed in a liquid, the vibrating membranes could provide a novel method of stirring chemicals, enabling chemical processing techniques that could use less energy than large batch processing methods.
“We have the ability to precisely generate mechanical motion of air by activating a physical surface that is scalable. The options of how to use this technology are limitless,” Bulović says.
Occasionally swapping sandals for wading boots, but keeping their veils tucked under their hard hats, a group of Congolese nuns has been trained in electrical engineering to keep the town’s hydroelectric running smoothly.
Powering a convent, a church, two schools, and a clinic, Sister Alphonsine Ciza’s work on the local mini hydroelectric plant is both free and vital for the city of Miti in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Ciza and some of her sisters were sent by their convent to study electrical engineering.
“The convent needed a technician, someone who could help,” Ciza told Reuters. “In me they saw in me the talent of electrical engineering so they offered me the opportunity to go and study.”
What they saw was a young nun repeatedly sticking her head and fingers into the convent’s electricity problems, often with the end result of fixing them.
With power disruptions all too normal in the city of 300,000 people, Ciza began to raise money in 2015 for a more reliable system—that means kids can now learn important computer skills on computers, rather than through books.
“Previously, power often only came on at night, when children were no longer in school,” said headmistress Mweze Nsimire Gilberte. “Having our own turbine has been a great relief.”
There’s an excellent chance to watch a meteor shower in the pre-dawn hours next week.
From May 4th, 5th, and 6th, at a few hours past midnight in the Northern Hemisphere, go outside in a dark area away from artificial lights and look to the south. The Eta Aquariid meteor shower could reveal as many as 20-30 meteors per hour.
In the Southern Hemisphere, look essentially straight up, and you should be able to see about forty meteors per hour. In fact, Earthsky say it’s the best shower to see south of the Equator.
In astronomy, a meteor shower has a “radiant,” which is the word used to identify the place in the sky from which the meteors seem to emerge. This shower is called the Eta Aquariid as the radiant is from a star called Eta Aquarii, which makes up the “Water Jug” of the constellation Aquarius the Water-Bearer. For those in the Northern Hemisphere, it should be to the south, rising higher as the dawn nears, while in the south it should be more or less above one’s head.
The fact that the meteors seem to be radiating from Aquarius gives the shower only its name, as the constellation is 170 light years away, i.e. an irrelevant amount of trillions of miles, while the meteors themselves burn up just 60 miles above the Earth.
You don’t necessarily need to locate the radiant to see shooting stars, but it’s good to do not only to get a sense of the cosmic environment—it also stops you needing to constantly scan the sky worrying you’ll miss a star.
Last April, the spectacular Lyrid meteor shower was obscured by a full moon. This year on May 9th, the moon will be a waxing crescent that dips below the horizon in pre-dawn, meaning in the days before there will be plenty of darkness to see the Eta Aquariids. Enjoy the show.
Featured image: Channone Arif, CC license
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Quote of the Day: “I believe while I tremble; I trust while I weep.” – Charlotte Bronte
Photo by: Milan Popovic
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Mara Braghini, who volunteered to represent several Ukrainian children arriving in Italy.
Ukrainians fleeing across the border to Poland have found an unlikely yet devoted group of supporters in the form of a north Italian law practice.
It’s not a characteristic that one immediately associates with lawyers—free labor—but whether it’s driving through the night to personally bring people to temporary homes or volunteering to legally-represent refugees needing integration into society, Studio Legale in the city of Varese is a credit to the profession.
Andrea Boni helps unload supplies he brought from Italy to Ukraine
In the sagas of the Icelanders, we can read that no-one played a more critical role, and no-one was more respected in Viking-Age society, than lawyers.
Avv. (attorney-at-law) Andrea Boni is a kind fellow, but doesn’t have a long history of volunteering. But just ten days after the Russia-Ukraine war began, he jumped in a van and drove from Lombardy to Przemyśl, the Polish town on the border with Ukraine.
“We left on the 6th [of March] with an organization from the parish Almavera near Varese,” Boni told GNN. “The parish had a contact in an association in the camp near the border with Ukraine. We had different things we were bringing—food, medicine, clothing, and there were around 15 people ready to come here in Italy. They already had referrals for where they could go.”
Boni had witnessed a refugee camp from the Lebanon War in the 1980s, but that was the extent of his experience with relief efforts.
“I remember the human tragedy,” he said. “I never thought I would do something of the sort, to go into a refugee camp for people escaping from war.”
“I tried to put myself in their position. I thought, ‘What would I want if it were my family?’” he said.
No sleep ’til Przemysl
Neighborly conduct
Northern Italy is a part of the country where immigration from eastern Europe is common. It’s just a short boat ride from Albania, and those from the former Soviet republics need only cross through Slovenia (a country about half the size of Switzerland) to arrive in Veneto. Like many people here, Boni was struck by the near-ness of the conflict.
“This war is really close, and we can see it on the television in real time. It’s 1,600 kilometers away, yes, but it’s Europe. It’s your home,” he told GNN. “So I didn’t think even for a moment: ‘It’s 1,600 kilometers, it’s 20 hours travel, should I go, shouldn’t I?’ No. We left immediately because it was the right thing to do.”
Boni left with two vans loaded with supplies, and drove 20 hours through Austria, the Czech Republic, and through Poland to Przemyśl where a shopping mall has been turned into a shelter for those arriving via train.
He was expecting 15 people, but when he reached the mall only three had arrived. Since Russia had struck targets in the vicinity of the railways, service had been temporarily suspended to protect people fleeing the country. Nine were unable to leave, but a separate group of three, a mother and two children, had been able to take a train to Budapest.
“So we left for Budapest, arrived at the station, and found them. Then we came back to Italy.”
Since his intervention, Boni has already returned along the same route for a second trip, while the family he brought back have settled in the city of Varese, about fifty minutes outside of Milan, where he practices.
Mara Braghini, who volunteered to represent several Ukrainian children arriving in Italy.
Helping Viacheslav
The courts of Varese and Milan are trying to do what they can to quickly and seamlessly integrate Ukrainians minors into society. They needed volunteers to act as representatives of refugees to ensure they have access to the opportunities insured to them by EU refugee law.
Avv. Mara Braghini, who practices in the same firm as Boni, immediately volunteered.
“Some weeks ago the Child Court of Milan nominated me the representative of this 16-year-old Ukrainian guy, Viacheslav,” Braghini told GNN. “He left Ukraine after his mom and little brother. He wanted to stay with his father, but his father decided to volunteer to fight.”
With the help from an association called Us with You, Viacheslav arrived Lombardy in March.
“They arrived here after a long bus ride at 5:00 in the afternoon, and the group called a woman who had volunteered to host him named Patrizia, and said, ‘Okay they are here, he needs you,'” says Braghini, who offered to help another child named Yulia, who is staying next door to Viacheslav’s host family.
“She speaks English fortunately, so it’s easier to speak with her, but with Viacheslav it’s not so easy but we’ve had some good moments,” she adds. “I told (Yulia’s family) if they have any difficulties, if they have any problems, I will be there to help them.”
“At the moment he’s in school, and there’s an old teacher who speaks Ukrainian and who can help them with their Italian,” she says. “I saw the difference in Viacheslav with respect to the first time I met him ten days ago, he speaks quite well. He told me and Patrizia that he’d love to stay in Italy, which isn’t something common among Ukrainians because they usually want to go back to their families.”
At the time of writing, Viacheslav has acclimatized very well.
There are two other lawyers at Studio Legale, both of whom pitched in financially to fill up Boni’s vans with supplies.
In Italy, lawyers are always addressed as “Avvocato,” which is like being called “doctor,” or “officer.” Many believe the Italian Bar exam is the hardest in Europe. They are always addressed in the formal tense—the equivalent of referring to someone in English as “the Gentleman,” or “the Madame.”
People like Mara and Andrea are a credit to the fundamental humanity of their ancient profession.
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Editor’s note: This story has been altered to correct the name of the group that brought Viacheslav to Italy.
Three out of five Americans think they’ve wasted their summer if they haven’t traveled anywhere, according to a new poll.
The poll, which surveyed 2,000 adults, revealed that 58% are either planning a summer vacation or already have one in place for this year.
Meanwhile, the average respondent took about four different vacations per year when they were a kid.
So it’s no surprise that more than two in five (42%) identified vacations as their favorite type of trip as a child, more so than family visits (41%) and school field trips (35%).
Conducted by OnePoll on behalf of Roadpass Digital, the survey asked respondents to explore how their past childhood travels might inform their current plans.
Today, almost two-thirds (63%) of respondents are more interested in planning “staycations”—trips that are closer to home—than they were a few years ago.
This could be because of issues that weren’t at the forefront of people’s minds during previous years—like uncertainty surrounding the pandemic (59%) and overcrowding (55%), which respondents cited as concerns for this upcoming summer.
Another 63% said they are looking to travel more within their home state during the summer than other seasons, possibly due to similar worries.
Whether in their home state or not, 68% have fond memories of going on summer vacation as a kid, and 71% say they enjoy the nostalgia that comes with revisiting childhood vacation destinations.
Three in five would consider returning to those destinations, but only if they could plan the trip differently.
The biggest changes: more than half (51%) would change the length of their stay, and 42% would opt for a different method of travel than they took with their parents when they were a child.
In fact, two-thirds of respondents overall said they prefer to use different methods of travel than their parents or guardians did on family trips.
“With so much beauty in North America, it’s no surprise that Americans are creating memories in their own backyards,” said Steven Hileman, Roadtrippers spokesperson. “Because the data shows nostalgia is a powerful factor when it comes to making travel decisions, we can see how today’s travelers are reinventing the age-old American pastime of road trips to fit their flexible lifestyles.”
Almost half (48%) of respondents are planning to drive to their destination this summer— perhaps because they seem more concerned about plane ticket prices (67%) than they are gas prices (59%).
Only 10% of respondents feel less concerned about travel costs than their parents were in the past, and 53% actually reported feeling more concerned instead.
Fifty-four percent expressed concern about lodging for their upcoming summer trips, and 57% would consider booking an RV, camper, overnight train or other transportation method that doubles as lodging.
In fact, 58% of respondents are more interested in going on road trips now compared to when they were a kid.
“Despite higher fuel prices, people are still getting on the road,” said Mona Kishore, Campendium spokesperson. “Other studies show that traveling by RV is a more affordable way to travel, especially for young families and those with pets. Additional data shows that more young adults are purchasing RVs now than ever.”
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Large Hadron Collider by Maximilien Brice, CC license
The world’s largest and most powerful particle accelerator has restarted after a break of more than three years for maintenance, consolidation and upgrade work.
On April 22, two beams of protons circulated in opposite directions around the Large Hadron Collider’s 27-kilometre ring at their injection energy of 450 billion electronvolts (450 GeV).
“These beams circulated at injection energy and contained a relatively small number of protons. High-intensity, high-energy collisions are a couple of months away,” says the Head of CERN’s Beams department, Rhodri Jones. “But first beams represent the successful restart of the accelerator after all the hard work of the long shutdown.”
“The machines and facilities underwent major upgrades during the second long shutdown of CERN’s accelerator complex,” says CERN’s Director for Accelerators and Technology, Mike Lamont. “The LHC itself has undergone an extensive consolidation programme and will now operate at an even higher energy and, thanks to major improvements in the injector complex, it will deliver significantly more data to the upgraded LHC experiments.”
Pilot beams circulated in the LHC for a brief period in October 2021. However, the beams that circulated today mark not only the end of the second long shutdown for the LHC but also the beginning of preparations for four years of physics-data taking, which is expected to start this summer.
Until then, LHC experts will work around the clock to progressively recommission the machine and safely ramp up the energy and intensity of the beams before delivering collisions to the experiments at a record energy of 13.6 trillion electronvolts (13.6 TeV).
This third run of the LHC, called Run 3, will see the machine’s experiments collecting data from collisions not only at a record energy but also in unparalleled numbers.
The ATLAS and CMS experiments can each expect to receive more collisions during this physics run than in the two previous physics runs combined, while LHCb, which underwent a complete revamp during the shutdown, can hope to see its collision count increase by a factor of three. Meanwhile, ALICE, a specialized detector for studying heavy-ion collisions, can expect a fifty times increase in the total number of recorded ion collisions, thanks to the recent completion of a major upgrade.
The unprecedented number of collisions will allow international teams of physicists at CERN and across the world to study the Higgs boson in great detail and put the Standard Model of particle physics and its various extensions to the most stringent tests yet.
Other things to look forward to in Run 3 include the operation of two new experiments, FASER and SND@LHC, designed to look for physics beyond the Standard Model; special proton–helium collisions to measure how often the antimatter counterparts of protons are produced in these collisions; and collisions involving oxygen ions that will improve physicists’ knowledge of cosmic-ray physics and the quark–gluon plasma, a state of matter that existed shortly after the Big Bang.
A five-year odyssey for a cat named Dexter seems to have finally come to an end, after a long, covert stay at a prison was interrupted by his arrival onboard an offshore oil rig, which finally resulted in a call to animal services.
The cat was a regular “well-loved” hangabout at Her Majesty’s Prison Grampian in Peterhead, Scotland, where staff used to “fuss over” him and even gave him the nickname One-eyed Joe.
Then a most unexplainable thing happened: One-eyed Joe somehow ended up in a shipping container a mile-and-a-half away at the town’s port, before being shipped onto an offshore oil rig, where workers “ran away frightened” after the all-black cat jumped out of the container.
After filling out an incident card, (which must have been humorous) the staff aboard the rig took to Joe most kindly, who was now quite comfortable with living alongside the rig workers. According to The National, he was “spoiled rotten” during his time there.
Eventually though, someone called the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) in Aberdeen, who retrieved Joe after the cat had been flown off the rig on a helicopter—a remarkable feat considering how hard it is normally just to get a cat into a carrier.
“We were alerted to an incident of a cat being found in a shipping container offshore,” Aimee Findlay, a Scottish SPCA animal rescue officer, said in a statement. “We’ve no idea how the cat ended up there, but attended the heliport to collect him.”
One-eyed Joe was microchipped, and upon scanning the staff learned his name was actually Dexter, and that his owner had lost the cat five years ago.
“We are so glad that he was well looked after for the time he was missing but we’re even more delighted to be able to reunite him with his original owner, thanks to his microchip being up to date,” Findlay said.
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Quote of the Day: “What you DO is what matters, not what you think or say or plan.” – Jason Fried
Photo by: @Morshanik (Mor Shani)
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Our early ancestors probably created intricate artwork by firelight, an examination of 50 engraved stones unearthed in France has revealed.
The stones were incised with artistic designs around 15,000 years ago and have patterns of heat damage which suggests they were carved close to the flickering light of a fire, the new study has found.
The study, by researchers at the Universities of York and Durham, looked at the collection of engraved stones, known as plaquettes, which are now held in the British Museum. They are likely to have been made using stone tools by Magdalenian people, an early hunter-gatherer culture dating from between 23,000 and 14,000 years ago.
The researchers identified patterns of pink heat damage around the edges of some of the stones, providing evidence that they had been placed in close proximity to a fire.
Following their discovery, the researchers have experimented with replicating the stones themselves and used 3D models and virtual reality software to recreate the plaquettes as prehistoric artists would have seen them: under fireside light conditions and with the fresh white lines engravers would have made as they first cut into the rock thousands of years ago.
Lead author of the study, Dr Andy Needham from the Department of Archaeology at the University of York and Co-Director of the York Experimental Archaeology Research Centre said, “It has previously been assumed that the heat damage visible on some plaquettes was likely to have been caused by accident, but experiments with replica plaquettes showed the damage was more consistent with being purposefully positioned close to a fire.
“In the modern day, we might think of art as being created on a blank canvas in daylight or with a fixed light source; but we now know that people 15,000 years ago were creating art around a fire at night, with flickering shapes and shadows.”
Working under these conditions would have had a dramatic effect on the way prehistoric people experienced the creation of art, the researchers say. It may have activated an evolutionary capacity designed to protect us from predators called “Pareidolia,” where perception imposes a meaningful interpretation such as the form of an animal, a face or a pattern where there is none.
A journey to the past
Dr Needham added, “Creating art by firelight would have been a very visceral experience, activating different parts of the human brain. We know that flickering shadows and light enhance our evolutionary capacity to see forms and faces in inanimate objects and this might help explain why it’s common to see plaquette designs that have used or integrated natural features in the rock to draw animals or artistic forms.”
The Magdalenian era saw a flourishing of early art, from cave art and the decoration of tools and weapons to the engraving of stones and bones.
Co-author of the study, published in PLUS One, PhD student Izzy Wisher from the Department of Archaeology at the University of Durham, said, “During the Magdalenian period conditions were very cold and the landscape was more exposed. While people were well-adapted to the cold, wearing warm clothing made from animal hides and fur, fire was still really important for keeping warm. Our findings reinforce the theory that the warm glow of the fire would have made it the hub of the community for social gatherings, telling stories and making art.
“At a time when huge amounts of time and effort would have gone into finding food, water and shelter, it’s fascinating to think that people still found the time and capacity to create art. It shows how these activities have formed part of what makes us human for thousands of years and demonstrates the cognitive complexity of prehistoric people.”
Source: University of York
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From the bombed-out streets of Mariupol to the rustic walls of a 15th-century Irish castle, a group of eleven Ukrainians have found a safe place to stay.
Having no space in Madrid where he lives with his Spanish wife Lola, Barry Haughian decided to quickly open up their second home when shells started falling on Ukraine.
That second home just happens to be Ballindooley Castle in County Galway. Haughian (pronounced HOY-en) flew to Poland to pick up a group of eleven refugees, some from Mariupol, and others from Dnipro.
“We were emotional wrecks for probably more than a week. We weren’t sure what we were doing, and just trying to make things better for them,” Haughian told Reuters.
“So now, every week it gets better… You can see the weight coming off their shoulders. We’ve got people dropping in all the time trying to help them. It’s a real ‘céad míle fáilte’ (a hundred thousand welcomes) from the people of Ireland.”
The kids play about the castle grounds, and the group has been able to celebrate a birthday together as they gradually find their feet.
Now one month into their new routines, five of the group have found jobs, including Maria Nazarchuk, who works at a garden center near the castle—and hopes to continue her accounting studies at the National University of Galway in September.
Ireland is proud of its contribution to the EU refugee sharing policy, and two months ago, when national registration opened via the Irish Red Cross to hosting Ukrainians, the website crashed due to the number of applicants.
Neighbors routinely stop by to lighten the mood with whatever supplies they can offer, including everything Nazarchuk needs to continue pursuing her passion for baking outside of her studies.
(WATCH the video for this story below.)
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John Kerry at Our Oceans Conference - Official Photos released by Jesse Alpert/U.S. Department of State
John Kerry at Our Oceans Conference – Official Photos released by Jesse Alpert/U.S. Department of State
The seventh annual Our Ocean Conference concluded recently with the announcement a grand tally of 410 commitments to protect the the oceans and the living beings surrounding them—pledges worth $16.35 Billion. The conference, co-hosted by the Republic of Palau and the United States, was the first to be held in a small island developing state.
Titled “Our Ocean, Our People, Our Prosperity,” the conference highlighted the importance of a healthy ocean to small island developing states—and to all communities where the ocean is a primary source of sustenance.
More than 600 participants representing over 70 foreign delegations attended—all to commit to concrete action to advance ocean issues (see the list below).
Former U.S. Senator John Kerry is not only the current Special Presidential Envoy for Climate. He started the Our Ocean Conferences in 2014—and since then they have mobilized more than 1,800 commitments worth nearly $108 billion across the issue areas of the conference, which include sustainable fisheries, sustainable blue economies, marine protected areas, maritime security, marine pollution, and climate change.
The conference highlighted the importance of ocean-based climate solutions, including shipping decarbonization, marine nature-based solutions, and offshore renewable energy, in keeping the 1.5-degree target within reach and improving global climate resilience.
“Together, we realized extraordinary new commitments and ambition across many sectors,” said Kerry. “Our goal this week was to shine a spotlight on what is happening to our ocean – not just talk, but real commitments to take real actions and make a real difference.”
The conference also featured 22 events focusing on issues from marine protected areas and blue foods to clean shipping and ocean-climate finance.
Commitment videos from the range of donors—from citizen, to governmental, business, and nonprofit—can be browsed here. The full agenda is available on the conference website, www.ourocean2022.pw.
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A Vermont-based company pioneering electric vertical take off and landing planes, or “eVTOL” in the industry, is attracting huge investment and orders from different transportation companies.
The company, called Beta, is now the only western aviation firm to really push the envelope of what is a science-fiction standard—a vehicle that can reach the altitude and speed of a jet, but with the flexible take off and landing of a helicopter.
It’s all happening very fast for what is now the most successful fundraiser in the history of Vermont startups. Beta just achieved their airworthiness certificate for their Alia plane from the U.S. Air Force last May, which represents the first eVTOL to make it that far off the drawing board. In early March of 2022, the Air Force conducted the first test flights.
Beta also recently completing a $375 million financing round, after which Alias were ordered by United Therapeutics to rapidly transport organs, and 10 were purchased by UPS, with the option for an additional 140 planes in the future.
Blade, a private shuttle company that flies passengers from Manhattan in helicopters around New York, ordered five Aliases and reserved up to 20 additional aircraft.
The Alia can carry either five passengers plus the pilot, or 1,400 lbs. of cargo. The real party piece in terms of advanced technologies is the charging time—one hour for a full charge. Frequent fliers will know how much time a jet can be delayed on the tarmac for refueling, especially if there’s a leak.
The company’s first financing round secured over $300 million from Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund.
“Zero emissions aviation is a critical part of turning the corner on climate change, and we are thrilled that our investors see our electric aviation system as a meaningful step towards this ambitious goal,” Kyle Clark, executive director of Beta, said in a news release.
Beta has already begun construction on 65 charging stations in areas across the United States, some of which are finished. They’re filing permits for hundreds more, with plans to cover the whole country by 2025.
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Quote of the Day: “Innocence is knowing everything and still being attracted to the good.” – Clarissa Pinkola Estés
Photo by: sebastiaan stam
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The prototype in Alabama released Credits- NASA_Michael Zanetti
The prototype being used in Alabama; NASA, Michael Zanetti
Imagine a mountaineering expedition in a wholly uncharted environment, where the hikers had the ability to generate a real-time 3D map of the terrain.
NASA researchers and their partners have developed a remote-sensing mapping system set to aid explorers in the most isolated wilderness imaginable: the airless wastes at the South Pole of the Moon.
The Kinematic Navigation and Cartography Knapsack (KNaCK) is a mobile lidar scanner—a remote sensing method that uses light detection and ranging laser light to measure range.
Donned like a hiker’s backpack, it makes use of an innovative type of lidar called frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) lidar in order to provide Doppler velocity and range for millions of measurement points per second. These measurement points instantly create a real-time navigation system, delivering to the explorer a 3D “point cloud” or high-resolution map of the surrounding terrain.
Think of it as a superpowered version of laser range finders used by surveyors or the highly sensitive proximity alarms that help smart cars avoid collisions, said planetary scientist Dr. Michael Zanetti, who leads the KNaCK project at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
“Basically, the sensor is a surveying tool for both navigation and science mapping, able to create ultra-high-resolution 3D maps at centimeter-level precision and give them a rich scientific context,” Zanetti said. “It also will help ensure the safety of astronauts and rover vehicles in a GPS-denied environment such as the Moon, identifying actual distances to far-off landmarks and showing explorers in real time how far they’ve come and how far is left to go to reach their destination.”
Probing shadow lands
That’s a key challenge as Artemis-era explorers prepare to undertake the first modern missions to the Moon, and the first ever to its South Pole. The Sun never rises more than 3 degrees above the lunar horizon there, leaving much of the terrain in deep shadow. That makes distances to various points of interest difficult to eyeball.
Initiated in 2020 with funding by NASA’s Early Career Initiative, the KNaCK project has partnered with Torch Technologies Inc. of Huntsville to develop the backpack prototype and associated navigation algorithms that permit accurate mapping without GPS.
Using KNaCK during rover excursions and when traveling on foot, explorers could precisely map the topography of the landscape, including deep ravines, mountains, and caves. Lidar even works in pitch blackness, relieving astronauts of the need to haul cumbersome lighting rigs everywhere they go.
“As human beings, we tend to orient ourselves based on landmarks—a specific building, a grove of trees,” Zanetti said. “Those things don’t exist on the Moon. KNaCK will continuously enable explorers traversing the surface to determine their movement, direction, and orientation to distant peaks or to their base of operations. They can even mark specific sites where they found some unique mineral or rock formation, so others can easily return for further study.”
That’s vital for astronauts on a clock, their excursions limited by the oxygen supply in their suits. KNaCK’s ultra-high-resolution precision—an order of magnitude greater than conventional lunar topography maps and elevation models—makes it a vital resource for conducting science and mission operations 238,900 miles away from mission control, Zanetti said.
The hardware will get another major field test in late April at NASA’s Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute (SSERVI) in Kilbourne Hole, New Mexico. The team previously put the KNaCK system through its paces at that ancient volcanic crater— estimated to be 25,000-80,000 years old—in November 2021.
They also used it recently to conduct a 3D reconstruction of the 6-mile-long sea barrier dunes at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which protect its primary rocket launch pads. Kennedy and Marshall engineers will continue to use KNaCK to assess the impact of storms on dune erosion, ensuring the safety of future flight missions as they further refine the system.
Next, the KNaCK team will work to miniaturize the hardware—the backpack prototype weighs about 40 pounds—and harden the sensitive electronics against the punishing effects of microgravity and solar radiation.
“Taking advantage of the latest advancements in lidar technology from Aeva, our next-generation space-hardened unit with support from Torch Technologies will be about the size of a soda can and could enable lunar surface operations like never before,” Zanetti said. He envisions mounting it on a rover or on the side of an astronaut’s helmet—which should leave plenty of room in future lunar mountaineers’ all-purpose backpacks.
A new record for the world’s oldest dog living has been official confirmed in Florida: Born on 9 January, 2001, meet 21-year-old chihuahua TobyKeith.
TobyKeith’s owner, Gisela Shore, has been with him for much of his life after adopting him from a shelter.
“I was a volunteer at Peggy Adams Animal Rescue and one of the employees told me about an elderly couple trying to surrender a puppy because they could not take care of him any longer,” Gisela told Guinness World Records.
“I met with the elderly couple and I was introduced to a tiny tan Chihuahua. They had named him Peanut Butter. I later changed his name to TobyKeith.”
TobyKeith has a close friendship with Gisela’s 28-year-old umbrella cockatoo Coco, and often walks around with her. Otherwise, he enjoys eating slices of turkey, going on little walks, and lying next to Gisela’s work station while she works from home.
To celebrate being named the world’s oldest dog, on the day Guinness confirmed the news, TobyKeith got a bath, he had his nails trimmed down, and then he went on a car ride—his favorite treat.
