Science News

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Stonehenge served as an ancient solar calendar

Date: March 1, 2022

Source: Bournemouth University

Summary:
New analysis has identified how the design of Stonehenge may have represented a calendar, helping people track a solar year of 365.25 days calibrated by the alignment of the solstices. Although it had long been thought to be a calendar, pinpointing how it functioned was only possible thanks to modern discoveries. The large sarsens that dominate the site appear to reflect a calendar with 12 months of 30 days, divided into 10 day 'weeks'. An intercalary month and leap days aligned it with the solar year. Such calendars had been developed in ancient Egypt, raising the possibility Stonehenge's calendar system had its roots elsewhere.


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[Thumpalumpacus]

Take that! you guitar players.  
Singing in the brain
Neuroscientists have identified a population of neurons in the human brain that respond to singing but not other types of music
Date: February 22, 2022
Source: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Summary: For the first time, neuroscientists have identified a population of neurons in the human brain that light up when we hear singing, but not other types of music.

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No surprise. It's common knowledge that the human voice will command attention over any other sound, provided that the voice can be heard.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Take that! you guitar players.  
Singing in the brain
Neuroscientists have identified a population of neurons in the human brain that respond to singing but not other types of music
Date: February 22, 2022
Source: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Summary: For the first time, neuroscientists have identified a population of neurons in the human brain that light up when we hear singing, but not other types of music.

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No surprise. It's common knowledge that the human voice will command attention over any other sound, provided that the voice can be heard.

I once said "TopWatchLowerLevelLost2AlphaMainCondensatePumpStarting2Bravo" faster than you can read that and everybody knew the shit had hit the fan. That was a good team.

[mordant]

In relation to the OP, plants convert water, sunlight, and CO2 into sugar which is an energy source.  You would think that humans could figure out how to do what the simplest green plants can do, wouldn't you?

There is actually a movement afoot called "green chemistry" that seeks to apply chemistry to manufacturing in environmentally-compatible ways. The basic idea is that we try to accelerate reactions or focus on artificial ones rather than really understanding how these things occur in nature and imitating those. By understanding "green" ways of obtaining desired results, emissions and toxicity can be eliminated. The "father of green chemistry", John Warner, has for example invented a completely non-toxic hair dye, the caveat being that it restores your natural color, you can't pick some new color you want to be. I would imagine that many trade offs like that would run counter to our desire to be in total control of everything, though.

At any rate this concept is gaining some traction in the world of chemistry.

[Thumpalumpacus]

I'd ban hair dyes just to troll the vain.

[mordant]

I'd ban hair dyes just to troll the vain.

Lol.

IDK that it's always vanity. Sometimes it's the unrealistic expectations society puts on women. My wife gradually weaned herself off hair dye because of how it was irritating her scalp. Apat from some lowlights, she's all gray now. She actually began to go gray in her late 20s anyway. It helps that we live in a city with lots of aging hippies who just go au natural and don't give a shit. And I don't mind the $ saved on the hair stylist -- that is one helluva racket.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Sometimes it's the unrealistic expectations society puts on women.

Of course that's the issue. Female imaging in modern society still relies upon bone-thin, perfect-hair gals selling product. $100 bottles of perfume, $80 bras touted by 34-D models.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

A potential breakthrough for production of superior battery technology
Date: February 28, 2022
Source: Chalmers University of Technology
Summary: Micro supercapacitors could revolutionize the way we use batteries by increasing their lifespan and enabling extremely fast charging. Manufacturers of everything from smartphones to electric cars are therefore investing heavily into research and development of these electronic components. Now, researchers have developed a method that represents a breakthrough for how such supercapacitors can be produced.

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[Antonio]

Humans have come a long way in innovative ways to degrade women . At least that's how it appears to me living in the US

I'm guessing it's bad in other countries as well

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Burkas.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Amazon rainforest is losing resilience: New evidence from satellite data analysis
Date: March 7, 2022
Source: Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK)
Summary: The Amazon rainforest is likely losing resilience, data analysis from high-resolution satellite images suggests. This is due to stress from a combination of logging and burning -- the influence of human-caused climate change is not clearly determinable so far, but will likely matter greatly in the future. For about three quarters of the forest, the ability to recover from perturbation has been decreasing since the early 2000s, which the scientists see as a warning sign. The new evidence is derived from advanced statistical analysis of satellite data of changes in vegetation biomass and productivity.

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[Gawdzilla Sama]

Lead exposure in last century shrank IQ scores of half of Americans, study finds
Leaded gasoline calculated to have stolen more than 800 million cumulative IQ points since the 1940s
Date: March 7, 2022
Source: Duke University
Summary: Researchers calculate that exposure to car exhaust from leaded gas during childhood stole a collective 824 million IQ points from over 170 million Americans alive today, more than half of the population of the United States.

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[Gawdzilla Sama]

Astronomers discover largest molecule yet in a planet-forming disc
Date: March 8, 2022
Source: ESO
Summary: Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, researchers have for the first time detected dimethyl ether in a planet-forming disc. With nine atoms, this is the largest molecule identified in such a disc to date. It is also a precursor of larger organic molecules that can lead to the emergence of life.

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[Dānu]

Explorers and researchers, battling freezing temperatures, have located Endurance, Ernest Shackleton’s ship that sank in the Antarctic in 1915.

The wreck of Endurance has been found in the Antarctic, 106 years after the historic ship was crushed in pack ice and sank during an expedition by the explorer Ernest Shackleton.

A team of adventurers, marine archaeologists and technicians located the wreck at the bottom of the Weddell Sea, east of the Antarctic Peninsula, using undersea drones. Battling sea ice and freezing temperatures, the team had been searching for more than two weeks in a 150-square-mile area around where the ship went down in 1915.

Endurance, a 144-foot, three-masted wooden ship, holds a revered place in polar history because it spawned one of the greatest survival stories in the annals of exploration. Its location, nearly 10,000 feet down in waters that are among the iciest on Earth, placed it among the most celebrated shipwrecks that had not been found.

The discovery of the wreck was announced Wednesday in a statement by the search expedition, Endurance22.

[Minimalist]

Greenland Meter Crater Dated.

Surprisingly old.


https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/09/world/cra...index.html

Massive meteor crater discovered beneath Greenland's ice is much older than thought

However, the crater, which is one of the world's largest, has now been definitively dated -- and it is much, much older. In fact, it slammed into the Earth just a few million years after dinosaurs went extinct, about 58 million years ago.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I did NOT go extinct, I just respawned.

[Minimalist]

Now seriously.  Who calls you a dinosaur?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

The Tagatu.

[Minimalist]

?

The Kong villagers?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

?

The Kong villagers?

Yep.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Highly porous rocks responsible for Bennu's surprisingly craggy surface
Date: October 6, 2021
Source: University of Arizona
Summary: Using data from NASA OSIRIS-REx mission, scientists concluded that asteroids with highly porous rocks, such as Bennu, should lack fine-grained material on their surfaces.]Highly porous rocks responsible for Bennu's surprisingly craggy surface

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[Minimalist]

?

The Kong villagers?

Yep.

Amazing the kind of useless trivia that clogs up the old neurons, huh?

[Gawdzilla Sama]

When I was nearly five years old, Christmas of 1956, I got a bow and arrow set, with red/white/blue circles painted on the arrows and bow. I remember the first TV show I ever saw, a travelogue about some place with palm trees by a beach. That was the next summer. (Landlord got a new one and gave the old to us, I think.) I remember the Howdy Doowdy Show, when Cowboy Bob had to find a way shrink Clarabell the Clown, who had somehow gotten to be 50 feet tall, and used ... shortening (groan) ... to reduce her height.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Cellular rejuvenation therapy safely reverses signs of aging in mice
Researchers treated mice with anti-aging regimen beginning in middle age and found no increase in cancer or other health problems later on
Date: March 7, 2022
Source: Salk Institute
Summary: Age may be just a number, but it's a number that often carries unwanted side effects, from brittle bones and weaker muscles to increased risks of cardiovascular disease and cancer. Now, scientists have shown that they can safely and effectively reverse the aging process in middle-aged and elderly mice by partially resetting their cells to more youthful states.

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[Gawdzilla Sama]

More alcohol, less brain: Association begins with an average of just one drink a day
Date: March 4, 2022
Source: University of Pennsylvania
Summary: Even light-to-moderate drinking is associated with harm to the brain, according to a new study. Researchers analyzed data from more than 36,000 adults that found a link between drinking and reduced brain volume that begins at an average consumption level of less than one alcohol unit a day -- the equivalent of about half a beer -- and rises with each additional drink.

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