Dit is ons nieuw hondje Kira, een kruising van een waterhond en een Podenko. Ze is sinds 7 februari 2024 bij ons en druk bezig ons hart te veroveren. Het is een lief, aanhankelijk hondje, dat zich op een week snel aan ons heeft aangepast. Ze is heel vinnig en nieuwsgierig, een heel ander hondje dan Noleke.
This is our new dog Kira, a cross between a water dog and a Podenko. She has been with us since February 7, 2024 and is busy winning our hearts. She is a sweet, affectionate dog who quickly adapted to us within a week. She is very quick and curious, a very different dog than Noleke.
DEAR VISITOR,
MY BLOG EXISTS ALREADY 12 YEARS AND 11 MONTHS.
ON 06/05/2024 MORE THAN 1.972.210
VISITORS FROM 134 DIFFERENT NATIONS ALREADY FOUND THEIR WAY TO MY BLOG.
THAT IS AN AVERAGE OF 400GUESTS PER DAY.
THANK YOU FOR VISITING MY BLOG AND HOPE YOU ENJOY EACH TIME.
The purpose of this blog is the creation of an open, international, independent and free forum, where every UFO-researcher can publish the results of his/her research. The languagues, used for this blog, are Dutch, English and French.You can find the articles of a collegue by selecting his category. Each author stays resposable for the continue of his articles. As blogmaster I have the right to refuse an addition or an article, when it attacks other collegues or UFO-groupes.
Druk op onderstaande knop om te reageren in mijn forum
Zoeken in blog
Deze blog is opgedragen aan mijn overleden echtgenote Lucienne.
In 2012 verloor ze haar moedige strijd tegen kanker!
In 2011 startte ik deze blog, omdat ik niet mocht stoppen met mijn UFO-onderzoek.
BEDANKT!!!
Een interessant adres?
UFO'S of UAP'S, ASTRONOMIE, RUIMTEVAART, ARCHEOLOGIE, OUDHEIDKUNDE, SF-SNUFJES EN ANDERE ESOTERISCHE WETENSCHAPPEN - DE ALLERLAATSTE NIEUWTJES
UFO's of UAP'S in België en de rest van de wereld In België had je vooral BUFON of het Belgisch UFO-Netwerk, dat zich met UFO's bezighoudt. BEZOEK DUS ZEKER VOOR ALLE OBJECTIEVE INFORMATIE , enkel nog beschikbaar via Facebook en deze blog.
Verder heb je ook het Belgisch-Ufo-meldpunt en Caelestia, die prachtig, doch ZEER kritisch werk leveren, ja soms zelfs héél sceptisch...
Voor Nederland kan je de mooie site www.ufowijzer.nl bezoeken van Paul Harmans. Een mooie site met veel informatie en artikels.
MUFON of het Mutual UFO Network Inc is een Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in alle USA-staten en diverse landen.
MUFON's mission is the analytical and scientific investigation of the UFO- Phenomenon for the benefit of humanity...
Je kan ook hun site bekijken onder www.mufon.com.
Ze geven een maandelijks tijdschrift uit, namelijk The MUFON UFO-Journal.
Since 02/01/2020 is Pieter ex-president (=voorzitter) of BUFON, but also ex-National Director MUFON / Flanders and the Netherlands. We work together with the French MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP.
ER IS EEN NIEUWE GROEPERING DIE ZICH BUFON NOEMT, MAAR DIE HEBBEN NIETS MET ONZE GROEP TE MAKEN. DEZE COLLEGA'S GEBRUIKEN DE NAAM BUFON VOOR HUN SITE... Ik wens hen veel succes met de verdere uitbouw van hun groep. Zij kunnen de naam BUFON wel geregistreerd hebben, maar het rijke verleden van BUFON kunnen ze niet wegnemen...
15-09-2022
Grote vuurbal gespot boven Verenigd Koninkrijk: "Vermoedelijk geen meteoor maar ruimteafval”
Grote vuurbal gespot boven Verenigd Koninkrijk: "Vermoedelijk geen meteoor maar ruimteafval”
Er zijn gisteravond in het Verenigd Koninkrijk honderden getuigenissen binnengelopen van mensen die een grote vuurbal door de lucht zagen klieven. Wetenschappers proberen te achterhalen wat het fenomeen geweest kan zijn. De eerste resultaten wijzen in de richting van ruimteafval dat terugkeerde naar de Aarde en niet naar een meteoriet.
De vuurbal werd woensdagavond rond 22 uur gespot boven Noord-Ierland, Schotland en het noorden van Engeland. Heel wat getuigen deelden op sociale media spectaculaire beelden van de wit-groenachtige bol die een lange streep achter zich trok aan de nachtelijke hemel.
Er liepen intussen al meer dan 1.000 getuigenissen binnen bij de ‘American Meteor Society’ en haar partners en tien video’s waarop het fenomeen te zien is. Sommige getuigen in Schotland zeggen zelfs dat ze een rommelend geluid hoorden.
Fenomeen
Het is niet duidelijk wat het fenomeen precies was. Wetenschappers onderzoeken of het om een meteoriet ging - gesteente uit de ruimte - of om puin van menselijke activiteit rond de Aarde. De eerste resultaten lijken in de richting te wijzen van het tweede. “Er is een vrij hoge kans dat het op ruimteafval gaat, jammer genoeg”, aldus Luke Daly, een planetoloog aan de University of Glasgow, in het wetenschappelijk tijdschrift ‘New Scientist’.
“De vuurbal had een erg lage ingangshoek, een aanzienlijke hoeveelheid fragmentatie die typerend is voor ruimteafval en hij vloog traag. Ruimterotsen verplaatsen zich meestal iets sneller”, vult hij nog aan. Verder onderzoek zal uitwijzen wat het definitieve verdict is.
Starlink
Het ‘UK Meteor Network’ meldt dat het intussen de baan van de Starlink-satellieten van Elon Musk gecontroleerd heeft, maar dat die gisteravond niet in de buurt kwam van het Verenigd Koninkrijk. “Op dit moment zien we geen bekend ruimteafval of geen baan van een satelliet die de vuurbal veroorzaakt kan hebben. We gaan de data herbekijken”, klinkt het op Twitter.
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- Gemiddelde waardering: 0/5 - (0 Stemmen) Categorie:HLN.be - Het Laatste Nieuws ( NL)
The 2 billion year old natural nuclear reactor in Gabon, Africa
The 2 billion year old natural nuclear reactor in Gabon, Africa
In Gabon, Africa is a strange geologic phenomena. Approximately 1.7 billion years ago, a natural nuclear reactor formed without any human intervention at what is now the Oklo Mine.
It formed due in part to an unusually dense uranium deposit alongside a consistent supply of groundwater. Thus, for several hundred thousand years, a natural fission reaction took place.
This video, made by a geologist who is based in Arizona, will discuss this fascinating geologic oddity.
Despite all the wild claims, there's a very real deep state. Listen to long-time expert USAF (Ret) Kevin Randle unpack the true story.
WHEN WILL THEY OPEN THE FILES!?
Mothman: International Moth of Mystery (short documentary) - The Only News That Matters
A lot of folks know about the Mothman & the Silver Bridge collapse associated with his appearance.. but do they know the intriguing cast of characters that Mothman's appearance brought together? Furthermore, what does a smiling man named Indrid Cold & Adam West's "Batman" have to do with the whole situation? What kinda name is Apol? And who is Chief Cornstalk?! Santanon is here with some answers & another episode of The Only News That Matters. He dives into all the high-strangeness that happened in & around Point Pleasant, WV (both before and after the Mothman's first appeared). Tune in to hear all about it & the amazing tales of Mary Hyre & John Keel as well as testimony from the townsfolk of Point Pleasant. God Bless & Hail Santa!
Subtitles/Closed Captions are available on all of our videos!
UFOs: The Situation in Germany | Robert Fleischer Presentation for UFORQ
UFOs: The Situation in Germany UFOs don't exist in Germany - officially, at least. While the German government denies any interest in flying saucers, its military seriously claims that they never had anything unusual on their radar screens which they could not eventually identify. Thus, you hardly ever hear anything from Germany about UFOs. The German journalist and researcher Robert Fleischer is trying to change that. For more than 13 years, he has been working to find out what the German government really knows about UFOs, digging into government archives and asking questions to politicians and the military. In his presentation, he discusses what the German Bundestag knows about Flying Saucers, how the German intelligence agency BND investigated UFO reports during the Cold War, what politicians say about the subject and how it all relates to the situation in Germany after World War II.
About Robert Fleischer:
Robert is a TV journalist, presenter and filmmaker. He has worked for a number of German public broadcast TV networks and writes articles for magazines in Germany and abroad. In 2007, he founded Exopolitics Germany (www.exopolitik.org) and in 2013, he launched ExoMagazin.tv, a subscription-based online TV magazine for open-minded people. He not only reports on UFOs and the paranormal but also on a wide array of subjects, including politics, future sciences and consciousness research. His work has been featured in major TV and radio shows as well as newspaper articles. He holds a university degree in conference interpreting for French and Spanish and has given talks in many European countries, including Austria, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Portugal, the Czech Republic and the UK.
*Information and opinions presented at these meetings do not necessarily reflect the views of UFO Research Queensland Inc and are presented by speakers for research purposes only.
The UFO Lie: Shocking truth of Pentagon AAWSAP program | The Basement Office
Everything you were told is wrong. In 2017, the New York Times released a bombshell story revealing AATIP, the Pentagon's "UFO program" and Lue Elizondo, the director of that program. It proclaimed a shocking truth: UFOs are real. Since then, that story has been reprinted hundreds and thousands of times across the world and Mr. Elizondo has reached the status of cultural icon. But we've since learned that the whole story... was wrong. In this episode, we reveal the real story of the Pentagon's AAWSAP program - led by scientist James Lacatski - and it's even crazier than you could possibly imagine: $22 million in taxpayer money spent on werewolves, ghosts, goblins, and "dinobeavers" at the infamous Skinwalker Ranch in Utah. But UFO advocates, who are currently lobbying Congress to spend money on UFO investigations, hope you never find out about that. | Season 3, Episode 1
PODCAST - John Greenewald Jr gets into an interesting conversation about UFO/UAP disclosure within the US DOD and Senate, and also discuss the counter intelligence "Game" being played out. Will a significant public disclosure on UAP ever happen ?.
IS DIT DE ECHTE REDEN DAT TWEE GROTE OUDE BESCHAVINGEN ZIJN VERDWENEN?
IS DIT DE ECHTE REDEN DAT TWEE GROTE OUDE BESCHAVINGEN ZIJN VERDWENEN?
Jeannette Kras
Het is vaak gissen hoe het oude beschavingen is vergaan. Verdwenen ze door klimaatverandering, rampen, oorlogen of ziektes? Een nieuw onderzoek werpt licht op de ondergang van het Oude Rijk in Egypte en het Akkadische Rijk.
Een onderzoeksteam van het Max Planck Institute en de British School in Athene heeft bewijs gevonden dat beide beschavingen vermoedelijk niet ten onder zijn gegaan door klimaatverandering, maar door ziekten. Ze vonden daarvan sporen in de tanden van menselijke resten uit de bronstijd. Deze tanden zijn gevonden in de grot Hagios Charalambos op het eiland Kreta.
Droogte Eerder onderzoek toonde aan dat de bevolking van het Oude Rijk in Egypte (2639-2216 voor Christus) en van het Akkadische Rijk (2350–2170 voor Christus) plotseling sterk slonk. Klimaatverandering in de vorm van extreme droogte werd aangewezen als een van de oorzaken. Dit zou ook hebben geleid tot schade aan infrastructuur, een ingestorte handel en grote culturele veranderingen. Maar in deze nieuwe studie hebben onderzoekers ontdekt dat ziektes mogelijk ten grondslag lagen aan de ondergang van beide beschavingen.
De onderzoekers bestudeerden tanden van menselijke resten die teruggaan tot 2290 en 1909 voor Christus. Daarin vonden ze bewijs van de typische mondbacteriën die ook nu nog in onze mond zitten en die kunnen leiden tot tandbederf. Maar belangrijker: ze vonden tekenen van de Yersinia pestis, de pestbacterie en van salmonella, de bacterie die verantwoordelijk is voor buiktyfus. De bevindingen doen dus vermoeden dat een epidemie kan hebben geleid tot de ondergang van een of beide beschavingen uit de bronstijd.
Andere bacteriën Er is wel een kleine kanttekening: de pestbacterie die is gevonden in de tanden van de oude Egyptenaren was niet dezelfde als die Europa eeuwen later zou teisteren. De bacterie is uitgestorven, net als de gevonden salmonellavariant. Daardoor is onduidelijk hoe besmettelijk de bacteriën waren of hoe dodelijk. Toch betekent het bewijs van de bacteriën dat geschiedkundigen de mogelijkheid mee moeten nemen dat ziektes de oorzaak waren van de val van twee grote beschavingen. Verder genetisch onderzoek van oude menselijke overblijfselen moet uitwijzen hoe wijdverspreid de ziektes waren.
Het Oude Rijk Met het Oude Rijk wordt een periode in de tijd van het grote Egyptische rijk aangeduid tussen grofweg 2700 en 2200 voor Christus. Het omvat de derde tot de zesde dynastie en staat ook bekend als de ‘Eeuw van de Piramides’, omdat in die tijd de grote piramidebouwers uit de vierde dynastie heersten, zoals koning Sneferu en de koningen Khufu, Khafre en Menkaure, die de piramides van Gizeh bouwden. Het oude Egypte bereikte zijn eerste beschavingspiek in deze periode. Het rijk liep van de Nijldelta naar het zuiden tot Abu en tot de Sinaï-woestijn in het oosten. De ondergang van het rijk werd ingeluid door een tanende macht van de farao en toenemende controle van regionale heersers. In de decennia na de dood van farao Pepi II werd het rijk geteisterd door burgeroorlogen. De extreme droogte in de 22ste eeuw voor Christus deed er nog een schepje bovenop en leidde tot hongersnood. Maar mogelijk waren het dus ziektes, die het definitieve einde betekenden van het Oude Rijk.
Het Akkadische Rijk Het Akkadische rijk omvatte tussen 2350 en 2170 voor Christus grote delen van Mesopotamië, in de regio, waar nu Irak, Iran en Syrië liggen. Sargon de Grote heeft de stad Akkad, waarnaar het rijk vernoemd is, waarschijnlijk machtig gemaakt. Van daaruit breidde hij zijn rijk uit. Daaropvolgende heersers gingen zich koning van Sumer en Akkad noemen, omdat het zuidelijke deel van Mesopotamië, Sumer (een van de oudste beschavingen ter wereld), ook bij het rijk ging horen. De Goeteeërs, een bergvolk, zouden het Akkadische rijk hebben vernietigd en de stad Akkad zo erg hebben verwoest dat er nooit meer iets van is teruggevonden. Dezelfde droogte die het Oude Rijk in Egypte in ellende stortte zou ook het Akkadische rijk in de problemen hebben gebracht. Maar mogelijk waren het dus ook hier ziektes die de oude beschaving echt de das omdeden.
PISSEBED ONTDEKT DIE 25 KEER GROTER IS DAN DE EXEMPLAREN IN JOUW ACHTERTUIN
PISSEBED ONTDEKT DIE 25 KEER GROTER IS DAN DE EXEMPLAREN IN JOUW ACHTERTUIN
Vivian Lammerse
En hij ziet eruit als een echte Pokémon!
Onderzoekers hebben in de Golf van Mexico een gigantische en vrij griezelige zee-pissebed ontdekt. Het gaat om een nieuwe soort uit het geslacht Bathynomus – een mysterieuze en primitieve groep die leeft in de diepste uithoeken van de oceaan; plekken die nog nauwelijks door mensen zijn verkend. Het nieuw ontdekte, reusachtige, roomgele familielid is ongeveer 26 centimeter lang en doet volgens de onderzoekers vooral erg denken aan een Pokémon.
B. yucatanensis De reuzenpissebed werd gevonden voor de kust van het schiereiland Yucatán, op een diepte van ongeveer 600 tot 800 meter. Het dier heeft de naam B. yucatanensis gekregen, vernoemd naar zijn vindplaats. Hoewel de pissebed er misschien een beetje eng uitziet – ze zijn maar liefst 25 keer groter dan de exemplaren in jouw achtertuin – is hij volkomen ongevaarlijk, zo benadrukken de onderzoekers.
Foto van B. yucatanensis.
Afbeelding: Dr Ming-Chih Huang, Journal of Natural History
Dat het hier overigens om een nog onbekende soort ging, was niet meteen duidelijk. Aanvankelijk zagen onderzoekers de pissebed namelijk aan voor B. giganteus; de grootste bekende pissebed die wel bijna 50 centimeter lang kan worden.
Nieuwe soort De verwarring is niet onbegrijpelijk. In 2017 werd er bijvoorbeeld nog een B. giganteus op precies dezelfde plek en op dezelfde diepte gevangen. Bovendien lijken B. giganteus en B. yucatanensis op elkaar. Zo hebben ze bijvoorbeeld hetzelfde aantal stekels op hun achterlijf. “Oppervlakkig onderzoek, waarbij er alleen gekeken wordt naar deze stekels, heeft er gemakkelijk toe kunnen leiden dat de nieuwe soort ten onrechte werd herkend als B. giganteus,” schrijven de onderzoekers in hun studie.
Unieke kenmerken Toen onderzoekers echter een betere blik wierpen, ontdekten ze enkele onderscheidende kenmerken. Zo is B. yucatanensis bijvoorbeeld een stuk slanker en net iets korter dan zijn tegenhanger. Daarnaast heeft B. yucatanensis langere antennes op zijn kop. De vlekkerige, roomgele kleur van de schaal onderscheidt hem verder van zijn grijze verwanten. Om er toch honderd procent zeker van te zijn dat het hier om een nog onbekende soort ging, voerden de onderzoekers een genetische analyse uit waarbij ze B. giganteus en B. yucatanensis vergeleken. “Vanwege verschillende sequenties van twee genen, in combinatie met verschillen in morfologie, identificeerden we B. yucatanensis als een nieuwe soort,” zo luidt de conclusie van de onderzoekers.
Verwant Ondanks dat, zijn B. yucatanensis en B. giganteus wel het nauwst verwant aan elkaar. “Dit geeft aan dat de twee soorten waarschijnlijk een gemeenschappelijke voorouder hadden,” aldus de onderzoekers. Bovendien sluiten ze niet uit dat er mogelijk nog meer onbekende familieleden op ontdekking wachten.
Internethit Op dit moment zijn er zo’n 20 levende soorten reuzenpissebedden die tot het geslacht Bathynomus behoren, bekend. Door hun vreemde en ongebruikelijke afmetingen zijn de pissebedden een ware internethit geworden. Er zijn zelfs een reeks producten op de markt gebracht die hun vertederende en bizarre uiterlijk vieren; denk aan pluchen speelgoed tot aan telefoonhoesjes.
Ondanks dat er er nog niet grootschalig op de reuzenpissebedden gevist wordt, worden ze weleens aangetroffen op het menu van Aziatische visrestaurants. “Sommige soorten Bathynomus zijn het doelwit geworden van diepzee-visserij,” zo waarschuwen de onderzoekers. En daarom is het volgens hen nóg belangrijker dat de verschillende soorten goed uit elkaar worden gehouden. “Hoewel de gigantische pissebedden slechts sporadisch worden geëxploiteerd, is het voor het beheer van de Bathynomus-visserij en het behoud van de dieren belangrijk om precies te weten welke soorten er worden gevangen,” besluiten ze.
Hubble Sees Red Supergiant Star Betelgeuse Slowly Recovering After Blowing Its Top
Hubble Sees Red Supergiant Star Betelgeuse Slowly Recovering After Blowing Its Top
Analyzing data from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and several other observatories, astronomers have concluded that the bright red supergiant star Betelgeuse quite literally blew its top in 2019, losing a substantial part of its visible surface and producing a gigantic Surface Mass Ejection (SME). This is something never before seen in a normal star's behavior.
Our Sun routinely blows off parts of its tenuous outer atmosphere, the corona, in an event known as a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). But the Betelgeuse SME blasted off 400 billion times as much mass as a typical CME!
The monster star is still slowly recovering from this catastrophic upheaval. "Betelgeuse continues doing some very unusual things right now; the interior is sort of bouncing," said Andrea Dupree of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
These new observations yield clues as to how red stars lose mass late in their lives as their nuclear fusion furnaces burn out, before exploding as supernovae. The amount of mass loss significantly affects their fate. However, Betelgeuse's surprisingly petulant behavior is not evidence the star is about to blow up anytime soon. So the mass loss event is not necessarily the signal of an imminent explosion.
Dupree is now pulling together all the puzzle pieces of the star's petulant behavior before, after, and during the eruption into a coherent story of a never-before-seen titanic convulsion in an aging star.
This illustration plots changes in the brightness of the red supergiant star Betelgeuse, following the titanic mass ejection of a large piece of its visible surface. The escaping material cooled to form a cloud of dust that temporarily made the star look dimmer, as seen from Earth. This unprecedented stellar convulsion disrupted the monster star’s 400-day-long oscillation period that astronomers had measured for more than 200 years. The interior may now be jiggling like a plate of gelatin dessert.
"We've never before seen a huge mass ejection of the surface of a star. We are left with something going on that we don't completely understand. It's a totally new phenomenon that we can observe directly and resolve surface details with Hubble. We're watching stellar evolution in real time."
The titanic outburst in 2019 was possibly caused by a convective plume, more than a million miles across, bubbling up from deep inside the star. It produced shocks and pulsations that blasted off the chunk of the photosphere leaving the star with a large cool surface area under the dust cloud that was produced by the cooling piece of photosphere. Betelgeuse is now struggling to recover from this injury.
Weighing roughly several times as much as our Moon, the fractured piece of photosphere sped off into space and cooled to form a dust cloud that blocked light from the star as seen by Earth observers. The dimming, which began in late 2019 and lasted for a few months, was easily noticeable even by backyard observers watching the star change brightness. One of the brightest stars in the sky, Betelgeuse is easily found in the right shoulder of the constellation Orion.
Even more fantastic, the supergiant's 400-day pulsation rate is now gone, perhaps at least temporarily. For almost 200 years astronomers have measured this rhythm as evident in changes in Betelgeuse's brightness variations and surface motions. Its disruption attests to the ferocity of the blowout.
The star's interior convection cells, which drive the regular pulsation may be sloshing around like an imbalanced washing machine tub, Dupree suggests. TRES and Hubble spectra imply that the outer layers may be back to normal, but the surface is still bouncing like a plate of gelatin dessert as the photosphere rebuilds itself.
Though our Sun has coronal mass ejections that blow off small pieces of the outer atmosphere, astronomers have never witnessed such a large amount of a star's visible surface get blasted into space. Therefore, surface mass ejections and coronal mass ejections may be different events.
Betelgeuse is now so huge now that if it replaced the Sun at the center of our solar system, its outer surface would extend past the orbit of Jupiter. Dupree used Hubble to resolve hot spots on the star's surface in 1996. This was the first direct image of a star other than the Sun.
NASA's Webb Space Telescope may be able to detect the ejected material in infrared light as it continues moving away from the star.
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, in Washington, D.C.
Once again, advances in technology have forced archaeologists to change their interpretations of history. A new study published in Antiquity has concluded that the world-renowned Machu Picchu site in Peru was in use more than 20 years earlier than previously thought.
So, What’s the Real Age of Machu Picchu?
One of the top tourist destinations in the world, Machu Picchu in Peru is known not only for its ancient Inca ruins, but for its stunning natural setting. Hiking the Inca Trail has become a pilgrimage for backpackers from all over, so much so that the authorities have had to put strict limits on the number of tourists who can hike the trail per day (500). The ruins itself are visited by about 6,500 people per day, according to BD Destinations .
Although it has become known as the “lost city” discovered by American explorer Hiram Bingham in 1911, in reality it was never “lost” as locals knew it was there all along. What is surprising is that with such a huge influx of visitors, and income, there is still more to be learned about this stunning World Heritage Site, including its age and ancient origins.
The construction of an Indiana Jones-style narrative, in which American explorer Hiram Bingham found the “lost” Inca city of Machu Picchu, has added to its allure.
The legendary story of the Inca ruler Pachacuti has been told and retold for generations, and repeated as part of the tours of Machu Picchu . It is believed that he rose to power thanks to a vision involving Inti, the Sun god, who inspired him to defend the city of Cusco from the Chanca. The first Inca ruler with imperialistic aspirations for an Inca Empire he has been recognized as the creator of “the most powerful empire in pre-Colombian America,” explains an Antiquity press release.
Pachacuti has also been credited with building Machu Picchu , located to the north of Cusco. In fact, the ancient ruins are often described as having been his private estate. The Inca citadel was chosen as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World in a contest organized by the New7Wonders Foundation back in 2007, alongside Petra and the Great Wall of China. It was famously built using differently-shaped polished stones which fit together like a jigsaw puzzle to create walls without the use of mortar.
Researchers at Machu Picchu in 1911, shortly before the remains dated in the new study were recovered.
Applying New Technology to Discover the Age of Machu Picchu
“Determining a site’s archaeological age isn’t always easy,” explained Erin Blakemore in a National Geographic article which gave a simple run-through of the ways in which archaeologists calculate the date of ancient sites. Assessing the age of Machu Picchu is no different.
Richard Burger, a professor from Yale University and the lead author of the paper published in Antiquity explained why the famed Peruvian ruins have been labeled with the incorrect age in the past. “Until now estimates of its antiquity and the length of its occupation were based on contradictory historical accounts written by Spaniards in the period following the Spanish conquest,” he stressed. Remember, the Inca themselves had no written language, apart from a system of knotted cords known as khipu.
A team made up of professionals from several institutions in the United States decided to apply the technique of accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) in order to more precisely date the human remains which have been exhumed at Machu Picchu. This technology has been successful in dating human remains when minimal organic matter has been left behind.
Most history books state that Machu Picchu was built by Pachacuti in the mid-1400s. Nevertheless, the team used AMS dating technology to date bone and teeth from 26 skeletons found in cave burials which had been excavated back in 1912. Although past attempts had failed to provide consistent results, this new research concluded that Machu Picchu was actually in use from 1420 to 1530 AD.
The construction date of Machu Picchu has now been pushed back thanks to dating technology.
Changing the History of the Inca Empire and the Age of Machu Picchu
If this is true, it would mean that the scripted guided tours of Peru’s top tourist destination have been mistaken for decades. If Machu Picchu was in use from 1420, then this would push back the date of Pachacuti’s rise to prominence, as well as the age of the ancient citadel, by at least two decades.
The Antiquity study also puts into sharp relief the importance of continued application of groundbreaking technology to archaeology and ancient history. “The results suggest that the discussion of the development of the Inca empire based primarily on colonial records requires revision,” emphasized Burger.
“Modern radiocarbon methods provide a better foundation for understanding Inca chronology than the contradictory historical records,” explained the lead author of the study. The idea that our understanding of history is versatile and apt to change as technology evolves assures that the study of famous sites like Machu Picchu will continue to be an adventure as we unravel the “lost” reality of the past.
Top image: Experts are reassessing the age of the Peruvian ruins at Machu Picchu.
NASA's Perseverance rover has collected some intriguing samples of Martian rock. Just wait till we get them into a lab on Earth.
Amanda Kooser
Perseverance inspects a sedimentary sample site called Skinner Ridge.
NASA, JPL-Caltech, ASU, MSSS
This story is part of Welcome to Mars, our series exploring the red planet.
In just a year and a half on Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover has rocked its science mission. The space agency hosted a briefing Thursday to discuss highlights from the mission so far, and it was a celebration of rock samples and the discovery of organic matter.
Organic molecules in Wildcat Ridge
A rock named Wildcat Ridge, located in an ancient river delta region of Jezero Crater, was one of the stars of the show. Percy successfully collected two samples from the mudstone rock. Wildcat Ridge is particularly exciting because the organic molecules (called aromatics) found in it are considered a potential biosignature, which NASA describes as a substance or structure that could be evidence of past life but may also have been produced without the presence of life.
The rover team emphasized that finding organic matter doesn't mean it's found evidence of ancient life. Organic molecules have been spotted on Mars before, by the Curiosity rover in Gale Crater and also by Perseverance, which found carbon-containing molecules earlier in the mission.
Enlarge ImagPerseverance collected two core samples from Wildcat Ridge and also abraded a round patch to inspect the rock with its Sherloc instrument.
NASA, JPL-Caltech, ASU, MSSS
The rover's Sherloc instrument investigated the rock. (Sherloc stands for Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman & Luminescence for Organics & Chemicals.) "In its analysis of Wildcat Ridge, the Sherloc instrument registered the most abundant organic detections on the mission to date," NASA said.
Scientists are seeing familiar signs in the analysis of Wildcat Ridge. "In the distant past, the sand, mud and salts that now make up the Wildcat Ridge sample were deposited under conditions where life could potentially have thrived," said Perseverance project scientist Ken Farley in a statement. "The fact the organic matter was found in such a sedimentary rock -- known for preserving fossils of ancient life here on Earth -- is important."
Perseverance isn't equipped to find definitive evidence of ancient microbial life on the red planet. "The reality is the burden of proof for establishing life on another planet is very, very high," said Farley during the press conference. For that, we need to examine Mars rocks up close and in person in Earth labs.
Sample drop
Percy currently has 12 rock samples on board, including the Wildcat Ridge pieces and samples from another sedimentary delta rock called Skinner Ridge. It also collected igneous rock samples earlier in the mission that point to the impact of long-ago volcanic action in the crater.
NASA is so happy with the diversity of samples collected that it's looking into dropping some of the filled tubes off on the surface soon in preparation for the future Mars Sample Return (MSR) campaign. MSR is an ambitious plan to send a lander to Mars, pick up Percy's samples, rocket them off the surface and bring them back to Earth for close study. The mission is under development. If all goes as planned, those rocks could be here by 2033.
The complexity and importance of MSR means NASA and its partners are working out ways to ensure the samples can be collected. There's hope Perseverance will still be operating in good condition by the time the MSR lander arrives, and will be able to meet it and personally deliver samples. Leaving some samples on the ground this early in the mission at a cache site in the crater will give MSR another opportunity to get the precious rocks on board.
Percy has been collecting paired samples. For example, it could keep one Wildcat Ridge tube on board and drop the other on the ground. "That we are weeks from deploying Perseverance's fascinating samples and mere years from bringing them to Earth so scientists can study them in exquisite detail is truly phenomenal," said NASA JPL Director Laurie Leshin. "We will learn so much."
What's next for Percy
As thrilling as the delta has been, the rover team is looking ahead at future adventures beyond it. Perseverance could wander up the crater rim, with the team eyeing several possible paths for the climb. Its companion Ingenuity helicopter is in good health and expected to take to the air again.
NASA chose Jezero Crater for exploration because of its fascinating history of water and how the rocks there might preserve evidence of ancient life, if it existed during more habitable times on Mars. Sherloc scientist Sunanda Sharma likened the mission to a treasure hunt for organic life on another planet, saying the samples with aromatics are a clue. The Martian mystery is only just beginning to unfold.
The Mystery of Egyptian Tomb KV55 in the Valley of the Kings
The Mystery of Egyptian Tomb KV55 in the Valley of the Kings
Tomb KV55 in the Valley of the Kings was discovered by Edward R. Ayrton on January 6, 1907. Ayrton’s sponsor, Theodore M. Davis, published a summary of the excavation (The Tomb of Queen Tiye) in 1910.
KV55 is from the 18th dynasty, being a problematic archaeological site as it seems to have been used for several burials: the first is attributed to Queen Tiye, based on the broken wooden shrine dedicated to her (Tiye was brought here after the abandonment of Amarna, and finally brought to KV35).
The mummy found here may be that of her son, the pharaoh Akhenaten, although that of his successor, Smenkhkare (if this was a man) was also considered.
In 1923, Harry Burton used it as a darkroom to develop his photographs during the excavation of Tutankhamun’s tomb by Howard Carter.
Egyptian Tomb KV55: Description
KV55 is a relatively small royal tomb, its total length is only 27.61 meters. It is located next to KV6, the tomb of Ramses IX , above KV7 (of Ramses II) and near KV62, the tomb of Tutankhamun.
Its entrance is open in the rock, heading east. It leads to a system of stairs that lead to a slightly sloping corridor and the burial chamber.
On the south side of this chamber there is passage to a small antechamber, and red masonry markings on the east wall indicate the planning of another room, which had it been built would have matched the layout of Tutankhamun’s tomb.
Although the walls of the tomb are laid out in plaster, which is unusual for a royal tomb, they are not decorated. A drawing on an ostracon found by Lyla Pinch Brock in 1993, has been interpreted as the plan of the tomb, suggesting that its original entrance had been enlarged, corroborated by the marks found on the walls of the tomb.
The place was altered in antiquity, and therefore it is difficult to interpret. Evidence from the tomb complicates its attribution.
The door seals bore Tutankhamun’s name, evidently from the time its tenant was buried a second time; the canopic jars found in the tomb are similar to those of Akhenaten’s secondary wife, Kiya; the broken shrine, whose panels are distributed throughout the chamber, bear the name and representations of Akhenaten‘s mother, Queen Tiye.
Akhenaten’s name appears in a series of “magical bricks” found in the tomb, as well as that of his father, Amenhotep III, and his daughter and wife.
All these data are reminiscent of the main figures of the Amarna period, hence the popular name of the tomb: the Amarna cache.
It is thought that the tomb was initially designed for the burial of some nobleman or official, using it later for a royal burial, as later happened with the tomb of Tutankhamun.
One of the four Egyptian alabaster canopic jars found in KV55, depicting what is thought to be the likeness of Queen Kiya
Identification of the mummy
When the tomb was opened in 1907 the only mummy found inside was that of a male. This mummy was thought to be Akhenaten, due to the presence of some funerary items (mainly magical bricks) as well as the vandalism of the sarcophagus (Akhenaten was later vilified as a heretic).
The cartouches with the mummy’s name are erased and the uraeus removed. In addition, the mummy has several similarities to that of Tutankhamun.
Profile view of the skull recovered from KV55
This identification was not fully accepted because although KV55 does not contain any mention of Smenkhkare, some insisted on identifying the mummy with him. DNA analysis in 2010 confirmed that it was the remains of the famous Akhenaten.
Nicholas Reeves suggests a theory: Akhenaten and his mother, Queen Tiy, were originally interred in the new capital, Amarna, but their bodies were transferred to KV55 during the reign of Akhenaten’s son Tutankhamun and his secondary wife, Kiya.
The door was sealed with the name of Tutankhamun. There the mummies remained for about 200 years, until the tomb was discovered by workers excavating the nearby tomb of Ramses IX..
At that time Akhenaten was despised as the heretic king, so the sarcophagus of Queen Tiye was hastily removed from his desecrating presence, except for the gilded wooden shrine that covered it, which had to be dismantled to remove the sarcophagus. .
The portraits of Akhenaten were erased with a chisel, in his sarcophagus the golden mask was torn and the cartouche with his name removed, to condemn him to eternal oblivion. As a final insult, a large rock was thrown at the coffin, smashing the supports of the lion-shaped sarcophagus.
Two Supermassive Black Holes Are Expected To Collide Within Next 3 Years And We Will Watch It In Real-Time
Two Supermassive Black Holes Are Expected To Collide Within Next 3 Years And We Will Watch It In Real-Time
According to astronomers, one of the most anticipated occurrences in modern astronomy may be upon us soon.
Fluctuations in light measurements from the galaxy SDSS J1430+center 2303 lead to the likelihood of a large collision between two supermassive black holes with a combined mass of around 200 million Suns, according to research.
If the scientists' interpretation of the data is correct, the collision, along with the first black hole image captured by the Event Horizon Telescope, may rank among the biggest modern astronomical events. According to the scientists' data, the black holes in this condition will merge within the next three years, which is a very short period of time in the context of scientific investigations.
The findings of the study can be found on the pre-print portal ArXiv and have been accepted for publication in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.
The event was detected in 2015 as a result of gravitational waves created by the first black hole merger, which rippled through space-time. However, the gravitational force from that collision, as well as subsequent observations, had an impact for years after it occurred. As a result, the collision at the core of SDSS J1430+2303 could be the first time astronomers have witnessed such an occurrence.
There is one crucial caveat in the run-up to this cosmic calamity. The gravitational wave range produced by supermassive black holes is too narrow for our current gravitational wave detectors to detect. Virgo and LIGO, which are both capable of detecting ripples in the frequency created by binary black holes, have identified nearly all black hole mergers to date.
Astronomers expect to be able to observe the event's massive outpouring of light using other observatories, which will continue to produce light over the full spectrum. If and when it happens, it could significantly increase our understanding of the formation of supermassive black holes.
Although there is some evidence that binary black hole mergers may be the source of the genesis of supermassive black holes, we still don't fully understand how they grow to be that large.
Astronomers will direct their telescopes to the region of space where the galaxy J1429+2303 is expected to witness a catastrophic supermassive black hole collision in order to examine the data before and after the event and better understand its implications as well as the processes that led up to it.
For a country with a population of just over 10 million people, it’s impressive that Sweden can maintain one of the best fighter aircraft programs.
An aircraft’s effectiveness is no longer determined mainly by how fast it can fly. Now it’s about how instant AI can interpret information and present the data for pilots to act upon in battle.
Unlike US or Russiαn fighters, Swedish Gripen can’t carry the most weapons, has no real stealth. To be clear, it isn’t the longest-range, the fastest, or even the cheapest jet.
Sweden has chosen another niche to compete. The country’s focus is to develop a fighter jet with the most advanced electronics to become a nightmare for its closest adversary – Russiα.
Scientists Find One of the Most Massive Black Holes With 34 Billion Times The Mass of Our Sun
Scientists Find One of the Most Massive Black Holes With 34 Billion Times The Mass of Our Sun
Scientists just revealed the finding of the most massive black hole ever detected in the early Universe. It weighs 34 billion times as much as our Sun and eats one per day.
The research, headed by the National University of Australia (ANU), disclosed how large the Universe's fastest-growing black hole is, as well as how much stuff it can absorb. The same study team detected the black hole, known as 'J2157,' in 2018.
The report revealing the huge black hole's features was published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
According to Dr. Christopher Onken and his colleagues, this object has a mass 34 billion times that of the Sun and consumes the equivalent of one Sun per day. That's billion with a capital B. The gigantic black hole has a mass nearly 8,000 times that of Sagittarius A*, the black hole at the heart of the Milky Way galaxy.
“If the Milky Way’s black hole wanted to get fat, it would have to swallow two-thirds of all the stars in our galaxy,” explains Onken.
The object was analyzed by scientists when the Universe was just 1.2 billion years old, or less than 10% of its present age, making it the largest known black hole in terms of mass in the early Universe.
“It is the largest black hole ever measured in this early period of the Universe,” says Onken.
The team is now on the search for more black holes in the hopes of discovering some answers as to how black holes grow to be so huge so early in the Universe's infancy.
“We knew we were with a very massive black hole when we realized its rapid growth rate,” says team member Dr. Fuyan Bian, an astronomer at the European Southern Observatory (ESO). “How much black holes can devour depends on how much mass they already have. For this object to be devouring matter at such a high rate, we thought it could become a new record holder. "And we now know," he says.
The team, which included researchers from the University of Arizona, utilized the Very Large Telescope (VLT) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile to accurately determine the mass of the black hole.
“With such an enormous black hole, we’re also excited to see what we can learn about the galaxy in which it’s growing,” Onken said. “Is this galaxy one of the behemoths of the early Universe, or did the black hole swallow up an extraordinary amount of its surroundings? We’ll have to keep digging to figure that out.”
J2157 is the name given to a huge black hole in the heart of a quasar galaxy. Observations with the similarly huge 10-meter Keck telescope in Hawaii and the 8-meter Very Large Telescope in Chile let astronomers understand more about the cosmic monster.
Astronomers were able to calculate the quasar's distance as well as its total brightness. This allowed them to determine the black hole's size and how much stuff from the disc it might swallow.
The black hole is enormous, measuring nearly 200 billion kilometers in diameter. It is so massive that if it were replaced by our Sun, it would engulf the whole solar system.
At the beginning of the Fourth Dynasty,Sneferu wanted to go one step further in achieving a perfect pyramid to be his abode of eternity. In this search, the pharaoh built at least three of these great monuments.
Contrary to what might be thought, the greatest pyramid builder in the history of Egypt was not Khufu, the pharaoh to whom the Great Pyramid of Giza is owed.
That title actually corresponds to his father Sneferu, who, according to scholars have calculated, used for the construction of the three pyramids that are attributed forty percent more cubic meters of stone than his son Khufu, the builder of the Great Pyramid of Giza.
Furthermore, Sneferu was the first Egyptian pharaoh to build a perfect pyramid with smooth faces and to develop the classical structure of Egyptian funerary complexes, which would last for several centuries.
The three great funerary monuments created by Sneferu crowned the sensational development of Egyptian funerary architecture from Dynasty III onwards.
King Djoser, thanks to his well-known architect Imhotep, was the first to build his tomb entirely in stone, thus offering a sense of eternity to buildings that were previously made of adobe and therefore soon faded away.
In addition, in this great work that he carried out in Saqqara (a necropolis near Memphis, the capital of Egypt), Imhotep dispensed with the typical mastaba, a rectangular funerary building with sloping walls.
He replaced it with a stepped pyramid, made up of a total of six levels that reached 62 meters in height. It should be noted that this was the tallest building in the world until Sneferu’s reign.
Engineering feat and embodiment of the power of the pharaonic state, the stepped pyramid had a characteristic structure, in which scholars have seen the reflection of a stellar symbolism typical of Egyptian culture at that time.
Thus, the main axis of the complex, 544 meters long, is oriented from north to south and the entrance to the pyramid is located on the north side, as is the funerary temple of the pharaoh, attached to the pyramid on a base of two meters high.
Furthermore, the so-called serdab – a room on the north side of the pyramid in which the statue of the pharaoh’s ka (his spirit or life force) was placed – had two openings through which a statue of Djoser could observe Dubhe and Kochab, two important circumpolar stars.
Sneferu, The pharaoh who built three pyramids
During Dynasty III, the kings Sekhemkhet and Khaba erected buildings in Saqqara and Zawiyet el-Aryan similar to the step pyramid of Djoser.
The same did Sneferu at his pyramid at Meidum, a necropolis located 55 kilometers south of the stepped pyramid at Saqqara. There the pharaoh erected a great funerary monument in the form of an eight-step pyramid, with a central masonry tower and sloping walls, to which superimposed layers were added, also sloping with a 75º inclination.
However, at the end of his reign Sneferu launched a third constructive phase that would radically change the appearance of the Pyramid of Meidum.
At the base, the workers raised a leveled platform of limestone blocks, and on this they were placing successive horizontal courses of stone.
Finally, the entire construction received an exterior cladding of fine limestone from Tura. In this way, a perfect pyramid was obtained, with four smooth faces of 51º inclination, 144 meters in base and 92 in height.
The pyramids of Dahshur. The image shows the Bent pyramid in the foreground, rising out of the Dahshur plain; in the background the Red pyramid can be seen. Both were built by Sneferu.
The pyramid of Meidum
The architectural innovation promoted by Sneferu in Meidum is related to the rise of the solar cult during Dynasty IV, which promoted the identification of the pharaoh with the sun god Ra.
It is no coincidence that Huni, Sneferu’s predecessor, was the first monarch to inscribe his name and titles on a cartouche, the oval that symbolizes Ra’s journey; nor that Djedefre, Sneferu’s grandson, was the first pharaoh to be called Son of Ra.
According to this vision, the pyramid would symbolize the benben, the primordial hill, that first piece of land that, after the creation of the solar god Atum, emerged from the waters of the nun, the inert, dark and silent primordial ocean.
The pyramid, like the primeval hill, represents creation and rebirth and becomes the vehicle for the revitalization of the deceased pharaoh.
If the pyramids of Dynasty III symbolized stairs to the starry sky, now the pyramid, as a solar element, could also express the idea of the rays of the Sun that allowed the king to rise to the solar divinity.
With their smooth faces that glowed thanks to their coating with white limestone from Tura.
According to this new conception, the main construction axis of the funerary complex became the east-west, instead of the previous north-south.
This is how it was intended to promote the union of the king with the solar god in his daily journey, from when he appeared in the east in the form of the Khepri beetle, passing through its culmination at noon as Ra, in the form of a solar disk, and its sunset by the west in the form of a ram, Atum.
The pyramid of Meidum marked the definitive triumph of this new model of funeral ensemble. Sneferu’s work includes for the first time all the characteristic elements of pharaonic funerary complexes from then on:
A satellite pyramid next to the main one, a funerary temple, another temple located on the river bank and a ramp that linked these two buildings. .
According to the solar model, the funerary temple was attached to the eastern face of the pyramid, instead of the northern one, although access to the interior was still from the north side, as in the pyramid of Djoser.
From this entrance, about 18 meters high, a descending corridor of almost 60 meters in length and an inclination of 28º starts.
The Bent Pyramid
Sneferu built a second pyramid at the Dashur necropolis, 45 kilometers north of Meidum. The final form this monument took is unique. Started as a pyramid with a 60º inclination, later an envelope made of blocks inclined 6º inwards and a reduction of the slope by five degrees was added.
From 47 meters in height, the slope of the faces of the pyramid was reduced to 43º, thus giving it the peculiar appearance of a “rhomboid pyramid”or the Bent Pyramid, as it is known.
It is not known whether this change in slope was due to structural problems that had to be solved on the fly or if it had a symbolic meaning:
The double slope would represent, for example, the unity of Upper and Lower Egypt. Once completed, the pyramid reached 105 meters in height, with a base of 188 meters on each side.
The Red pyramid of Dahshur
The internal structure of the Bent pyramid is unusual because of its two entrances. One is, as was customary, on the north side, 12 meters high, and leads to a corridor 80 meters long that leads to a horizontal corridor; this, in turn, leads to a chamber with a false vault 17 meters high.
The second entrance, originally camouflaged behind a cladding block, is on the west side, 33 meters high. It opens onto a descending corridor that continues as a horizontal corridor after 65 meters, where two chambers with closing blocks were arranged and, finally, a burial chamber with a false vault 16 meters high.
The third pyramid of Sneferu, popularly known as the “Red pyramid“, was built two kilometers north of the previous one, in Dahshur.
It is the second pyramid with the highest base (220 meters), only ten meters less than that of the Great Pyramid. However, it is also the one with the lowest slope of its faces (43º), so it only reached 105 meters in height.
Its access is 28 meters high on the north side, and from there starts a descending corridor of 63 meters that ends in a horizontal corridor.
This passes through two chambers with a false vault and then gives access to a burial chamber, located at a higher level, also with a false vault and almost 15 meters high. Perhaps the pharaoh was buried there.
Flying to (Hypothetical) Planet 9: Why visit it, how could we get there, and would it surprise us like Pluto?
Flying to (Hypothetical) Planet 9: Why visit it, how could we get there, and would it surprise us like Pluto?
In a recent study submitted to Earth and Planetary Astrophysics, an international team of researchers discuss the various mission design options for reaching a hypothetical Planet 9, also known as “Planet X”, which state-of-the-art models currently estimate to possess a semi-major axis of approximately 400 astronomical units (AU). The researchers postulate that sending a spacecraft to Planet 9 could pose scientific benefits much like when NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft visited Pluto in 2015. But does Planet 9 actually exist?
Artist’s rendition of the hypothetical Planet 9, with Neptune’s orbit displayed as a bright ring orbiting the sun.
Credit: European Southern Observatory/Tom Ruen/nagualdesign
“It is hard to put a specific number on the confidence level because so many uncertainties remain,” said Dr. Manavsi Lingam, who is an Assistant Professor at the Florida Institute of Technology, and a co-author on the study. “For now, I would say that it seems likely that there is an unusual clustering of extreme trans-Neptunian objects. We do not know what is causing this clustering, but Planet 9 appears to be a promising candidate.”
Before NASA’s New Horizons arrived at Pluto in 2015, the only images scientists had of Pluto were fuzzy pictures from Earth-based telescopes, and even the Hubble Space Telescope couldn’t get anything better. The science about Pluto was equally scant, as we had an estimate for its mass, but since we couldn’t make out surface features, we knew very little about its atmosphere, geologic diversity, and interior. As the researchers point out, the “wealth of new data” from New Horizons surpassed the old, but could we be just as surprised with Planet 9 data if a spacecraft were to visit there?
“It is very likely,” said Dr. Andrew Hein, who is an Associate Professor/Chief Scientist at the University of Luxembourg, and a co-author on the study. “Even the best telescopes are vastly inferior to close-up observations from a probe flying by a celestial body. This is even more true for bodies which are far away and faint, which is the case for Planet 9. The reason is physics. The fainter an object, the larger your telescope needs to be to collect more light from that object and the longer you need to observe. The farther away the object, the more light you need to collect and the larger the telescope needs to be.”
For how to get to Planet 9, the researchers propose several mission designs. These include, Jupiter gravity assist, using either Jupiter’s or the Sun’s gravity well to accelerate the spacecraft, chemical rockets, nuclear propulsion, and laser sails. With the exception of laser sails, the amount of time each method would need to reach Planet 9 ranged from just under 40 years to 100 years. With laser sails, the researchers estimated that a spacecraft could reach Planet 9 within 6.5-7 years. But what steps are being taken to make this technology a reality?
“Laser sail technology is currently being pursued by Breakthrough Starshot, a project I am part of, and which has significantly advanced the technology over the last 6 years, including laboratory prototypes,” said Hein. “While flight technology is conceptual for now, some of the technology building blocks already exist in the lab. The project’s aim is to launch a laser sail to another star, but a small-scale version should be feasible to develop within the next 10-15 years or so with a budget of less than the one for a traditional space probe (few hundreds of millions of dollars). This small-scale version could be used to reach Planet 9 within a few years, once developed. But once the laser beamer is developed, such probes could be launched on a weekly basis at costs hundreds of times cheaper than current probes.”
For now, Planet 9 remains purely a hypothesized member of our vast and illustrious solar system, but would the vast time it takes to get there using conventional methods prevent us from potentially visiting this mysterious object so far from the Sun?
“Although we find that minimum mission times of 40-50 years are required (except for light sails), this long flight time ought not deter us,” said Lingam. “The Voyager spacecraft have been functional for roughly the same duration and continue to provide a wealth of data. A putative mission to Planet 9 (should it exist) would not only revolutionize our understanding of the outer Solar system, but it can also enable us to study other targets along the way – for instance, some of the maneuvers take us close to Jupiter and the Sun, indicating that these worlds could also be surveyed.”
As always, keep doing science & keep looking up!
Featured Image:Artist’s rendition of the hypothetical Planet 9, with Neptune’s orbit displayed as a bright ring orbiting the Sun. (Credit: European Southern Observatory/Tom Ruen/nagualdesign)
Barb Bergfeld on witnessing & filming a triangular-shaped UFO & lights in the sky, Owensville, 1994
Barb Bergfeld on witnessing & filming a triangular-shaped UFO & lights in the sky, Owensville, 1994
Nov. 10, 1994; Owensville, OH 2:00 AM. Multiple witnesses reported a silent triangular configuration of lights that were captured on a home video camera. A dangerous rollover maneuver, putting the “aircraft” upside down at the conclusion of the roll, would seem to preclude this object being a stealth flight over populated areas.
The Navy admitted it has a lot more footage of UFOs — but won't share them anytime soon.
The U.S. Navy confirmed in a letter that the agency has unreleased footage of UFOs, which have been deemed national security secrets.
(Image credit: Getty/ Bettmann)
The U.S. Navy holds unseen videos of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) — or unidentified aerial phenomena (UAP), as the Department of Defense (DOD) prefers to call them — but will not release the footage publicly because it would "harm national security," a Navy spokesperson wroteWednesday (Sept. 7).
The admission came in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by the government transparency site The Black Vault, which has previously shared thousands of pages of UFO-related documents received via FOIA requests to the CIA and other government agencies. The Black Vault filed the FOIA request to the U.S. Navy in April 2020 — just one day after the Navy declassified three now-infamous videos shot by Navy pilots showing high-tech aircraft moving in seemingly impossible ways. The Black Vault requested that the Navy now turn over any and all other videos related to UAP.
More than two years later, the government responded with a letter that both confirmed that more UAP videos exist and denied the request to turn them over due to national security concerns.
"The release of this information will harm national security as it may provide adversaries valuable information regarding Department of Defense/Navy operations, vulnerabilities, and/or capabilities," Gregory Cason, deputy director of the Navy's FOIA office, wrote in a response letter. "No portions of the videos can be segregated for release."
Cason added that the Navy was able to declassify the three UAP videos released in April 2020 only because the videos had been previously leaked to the media and had already been "discussed extensively in the public domain." The Navy deemed it possible to officially release the footage "without further damage to national security," Cason wrote.
Interestingly, in its response to The Black Vault's request, the Navy did not make any attempts to conceal the existence of additional UAP videos. There are clearly more videos of inexplicable UFO encounters in the Navy's archives, but how many and what they depict will have to remain a mystery for now.
It's clear, however, that the U.S. military takes the potential threat of UAP very seriously. In May 2022, the DOD held its first public hearing on UFOs since the 1960s. The hearing primarily discussed a June 2021 Pentagon report that revealed U.S. Navy pilots had reported 144 UAP sightings since 2004. More recently, the DOD announced that it will receive federal funding to open a new office focused exclusively on managing reports of UFO sightings by the U.S. Army, Navy and Air Force.
Originally published on Live Science.
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Big Difference Between Neanderthal and Modern Human Brains Discovered
Big Difference Between Neanderthal and Modern Human Brains Discovered
Neanderthals, a subspecies of archaic humans who split from modern humans sometime between 300,000 and 80,000 years ago, have been the subject of a new study. This study has revealed the presence of a single amino acid difference possessed by modern humans that dramatically increased the number of brain cells created, leading to a split in development and providing a cognitive edge for Homo sapiens over their Neanderthal cousins. This is being claimed as the first physical proof modern humans were smarter than Neanderthals.
How Did Modern Human Brains Outcompete Their Older Cousins?
For a long time, scientists and historians have been perplexed about the question – what makes modern humans unique? What sets them apart from other cousins on the evolutionary spectrum ? The study, published in Science, shows an increase in brain size and subsequent neuron production during brain development, even though Neanderthals and modern humans had brains of a roughly similar size.
“One concrete fact is that wherever Homo sapiens went, they would basically out-compete other species there. It’s a bit weird,” said Professor Laurent Nguyen, of the University of Liège, who was not involved in the latest research. “These guys [Neanderthals] were in Europe a long time before us and would have been adapted to their environment, including pathogens. The big question is why we would be able to out-compete them,” he said, quoted in a Guardian report.
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics (MPI-CBG) focused on a variation that was identified in Homo sapiens brains. This variation, occurring in our neocortex, boosts the brain progenitor cell counts, which implies that as a species, we made more neurons during the development process, compared to the Neanderthals during theirs, around 130,000 to 40,000 years ago.
“Making more neurons sets the basis for higher cognitive function ,” said Wieland Huttner, who led the work at the Max-Planck-Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics. “We think this is the first compelling evidence that modern humans were cognitively better than Neanderthals.”
Detailed wax figure of Neanderthal prehistoric caveman. Faster development of modern human brains eventually helped Homo sapiens out-compete Neanderthals
Comparing Modern Human Brains vs. Neanderthal Brains
For the study, the scientists inserted a Neanderthal brain gene into mice, ferrets, and blobs of lab-grown tissue called organoids. Organoids are tiny, self-organized three-dimensional tissue cultures derived from stem cells, sometimes called ‘mini brain structures’, reports Nature.
They focused on the gene TKTL1 (protein transketolase-like 1), which is heavily involved in the neuronal production in a developing brain. The Neanderthal version of this same gene differs by one letter from the modern human version. In modern humans, TKTL1 contains an arginine at the sequence position, whereas in the Neanderthals, it is the related amino acid lysine.
"We found that with the Neanderthal-type of amino acid in TKTL1, fewer basal radial glial cells were produced than with the modern human-type and, as a consequence, also fewer neurons. This shows us that even though we do not know how many neurons the Neanderthal brain had, we can assume that modern humans have more neurons in the frontal lobe of the brain, where TKTL1 activity is highest, than Neanderthals,” concluded Anneline Pison, first author of the study.
From these experiments, it was determined that the Neanderthal version of the gene created neurons slowly during the brain’s cortex development. This slower pace could be a huge factor that explains the superior cognitive abilities of modern humans. It wouldn’t be farfetched to say that it was all in the mind!
Therefore, if the production of neurons in the neocortex is greater during fetal development, it can be speculated that modern humans cognitive abilities associated with the frontal lobe were promoted, leading to better tools, weaponry, language, art, symbolism, and ultimately, smarter brains. Moving forward, Pinson hopes to understand the mechanisms through which TKTKL1 drives the birth of brain cells.
Earth’s crust grew faster when our planet passed through the Milky Way’s spiral arms, study suggests
Earth’s crust grew faster when our planet passed through the Milky Way’s spiral arms, study suggests
Galactic voyage Artist’s impression of the Milky Way showing its spiral arms. (Courtesy: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ESO/R Hurt)
The rate at which Earth’s continental crust builds up goes through cycles, peaking around every 200 million years when the solar system travels through one of the Milky Way’s spiral arms. That is the conclusion of an international team of researchers, who argue that crustal production is boosted when more high-energy comets crash into the Earth. They say that these comets are dislodged from the Oort cloud by the influence of regions of space with dense interstellar clouds.
“As geologists, we normally think about processes internal to the Earth being really important for how our planet has evolved,” says team member and isotope geologist Chris Kirkland of Australia’s Curtin University. “But we can also think about the much larger scale and look at extraterrestrial processes and where we fit in the galactic environment.”
So far, Earth is the only planet that we know has continents and active plate tectonics. These features have helped make Earth hospitable to life because they influence the atmosphere, hydrosphere and biosphere.
Ancient crust
In their study, Kirkland and colleagues analysed zircon crystals deposited in the North American craton in Greenland and the Pilbara craton in western Australia — two regions that preserve some of Earth’s oldest continental crust, which dates to the Archean Eon.
By measuring the decay of uranium within the crystals, the team established a timeline for the formation of the cratons, spanning from around 2.8–3.8 billion years ago. They also looked at hafnium isotopes, which allowed them to identify times of juvenile magma influx associated with crust production. Analysis revealed a longer period, 200-million-year-long oscillation in the data, which correlates with Earth’s motion through the Milky Way. This finding is also mirrored in oxygen isotope data.
More specifically, they found that the observed rate of crustal production tracks the solar system repeatedly passing into the Milky Way’s spiral arms. “Our solar system and the four spiral arms of the Milky Way are both spinning around the supermassive black hole at the galaxy’s centre, yet they are moving at different speeds. The spiral arms orbit at 210 km/s, while the Sun is speeding along at 240 km/s, meaning our solar system is surfing into and out of the galaxy’s arms,” the researchers.
Stellar traffic jam
“You can think of the spiral arms as dense regions that slow the passage of stars, much like a traffic jam, which only clears further down the road,” they said, adding: “This model results in approximately 200 million years between each entry our solar system makes into a spiral arm of the galaxy.”
Every time the solar system makes one of these entries, Kirkland and his team propose that interactions occur between the galaxy’s relatively dense spiral arms and the Oort cloud of icy planetesimals that surrounds the solar system. This increases the rate at which comets are ejected from the Oort cloud, with some of these icy bodies ending up hurtling towards Earth. These comets strike the Earth with considerably more energy than the more frequent meteorites that come from the asteroid belt.
Kirkland points out that this higher energy is important because it results in greater melting of the crust upon impact. “When it hits, it causes larger amounts of decompression melting, creating a larger uplift of material, creating a larger crustal seat.”
Spherule beds
Further evidence linking periods of increased crustal generation with higher rates of comet impacts come in the form of spherule beds. These are deposits containing small spheres formed either directly from molten impact ejecta or rained out from rock and vapour plumes in the wake of an impact event. The researchers note that the known ages of spherule beds around the globe also correspond with the solar system’s movement into the Milky Way’s spiral arms around 3.25–3.45 billion years ago. The dating of additional spherule deposits in the future could provide more evidence to support the hypothesis.
The team hopes that its findings will motivate further investigation of how forces from outside the solar system have shaped the planet on which we live. “It’s very hard to prove these things,” says team member and astrophysicist Phil Sutton of the UK’s University of Lincoln. He adds, “We want to make that link and start the conversation to look at geological processes beyond the Earth, beyond the solar system, and what might drive those. We didn’t just form in isolation.”
James Webbtelescoop maakt “uitzonderlijk gedetailleerde" foto die toont waar sterren geboren worden
De James Webbtelescoop pakt alweer uit met een indrukwekkende foto. Dit keer wordt de Orionnevel - een enorme gas- en stofwolk in het sterrenbeeld Orion - in de schijnwerpers gezet. De uitzonderlijk gedetailleerde foto gunt ons zelfs een blik achter de schermen van de kraamkliniek voor piepjonge sterren (en planeten).
Het is amper een week geleden dat NASA nog een nieuw beeld van de James Webbtelescoop deelde. Toen ging het om de Tarantulanevel met duizenden “nooit eerder waargenomen sterren”, dit keer gaat het om de Orionnevel, een plaats waar sterren geboren worden. “Dankzij deze adembenemende beelden kunnen we weer iets beter begrijpen hoe massieve sterren de gas- en stofwolken transformeren waarin ze ontstaan”, aldus astrofysicus Eva Peeters van Western University (Canada).
“We zijn reeds in 2017 met dit project gestart en wachten dus al meer dan vijf jaar op deze gegevens”, zegt Peeters nog. Het geduld van de astronomen werd misschien op de proef gesteld, maar evenzeer beloond met de nieuwe beelden: “Deze tonen ons hoe grote sterren precies ontstaan. Het is verbazingwekkend hoe scherp en gedetailleerd de beelden zijn.”
Wat we dan precies moeten zien op de foto? De astronomen duidden enkele jonge sterren aan met daarrond enkele gas- en stofwolken. “We zien als het ware een kraamkamer voor jonge sterren. Daarnaast is er ook sprake van enkele protosterren (sterren die nog niet geboren zijn, red.).”
Over James Webb
De James Webb ruimtetelescoop is de opvolger van de Hubble. Het is onze grootste en geavanceerde ruimtetelescoop ooit. Zeker 10.000 mensen hebben aan dit project dat 20 jaar duurde meegewerkt. Met de James Webb telescoop kunnen we elke fase van ons universum bestuderen, ook de geboorte van de eerste sterren zo’n 13,5 miljard jaar geleden.
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Over mijzelf
Ik ben Pieter, en gebruik soms ook wel de schuilnaam Peter2011.
Ik ben een man en woon in Linter (België) en mijn beroep is Ik ben op rust..
Ik ben geboren op 18/10/1950 en ben nu dus 73 jaar jong.
Mijn hobby's zijn: Ufologie en andere esoterische onderwerpen.
Op deze blog vind je onder artikels, werk van mezelf. Mijn dank gaat ook naar André, Ingrid, Oliver, Paul, Vincent, Georges Filer en MUFON voor de bijdragen voor de verschillende categorieën...
Veel leesplezier en geef je mening over deze blog.
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