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
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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 Ontdek de Fascinerende Wereld van UFO's en UAP's: Jouw Bron voor Onthullende Informatie!
Ben jij ook gefascineerd door het onbekende? Wil je meer weten over UFO's en UAP's, niet alleen in België, maar over de hele wereld? Dan ben je op de juiste plek!
België: Het Kloppend Hart van UFO-onderzoek
In België is BUFON (Belgisch UFO-Netwerk) dé autoriteit op het gebied van UFO-onderzoek. Voor betrouwbare en objectieve informatie over deze intrigerende fenomenen, bezoek je zeker onze Facebook-pagina en deze blog. Maar dat is nog niet alles! Ontdek ook het Belgisch UFO-meldpunt en Caelestia, twee organisaties die diepgaand onderzoek verrichten, al zijn ze soms kritisch of sceptisch.
Nederland: Een Schat aan Informatie
Voor onze Nederlandse buren is er de schitterende website www.ufowijzer.nl, beheerd door Paul Harmans. Deze site biedt een schat aan informatie en artikelen die je niet wilt missen!
Internationaal: MUFON - De Wereldwijde Autoriteit
Neem ook een kijkje bij MUFON (Mutual UFO Network Inc.), een gerenommeerde Amerikaanse UFO-vereniging met afdelingen in de VS en wereldwijd. MUFON is toegewijd aan de wetenschappelijke en analytische studie van het UFO-fenomeen, en hun maandelijkse tijdschrift, The MUFON UFO-Journal, is een must-read voor elke UFO-enthousiasteling. Bezoek hun website op www.mufon.com voor meer informatie.
Samenwerking en Toekomstvisie
Sinds 1 februari 2020 is Pieter niet alleen ex-president van BUFON, maar ook de voormalige nationale directeur van MUFON in Vlaanderen en Nederland. Dit creëert een sterke samenwerking met de Franse MUFON Reseau MUFON/EUROP, wat ons in staat stelt om nog meer waardevolle inzichten te delen.
Let op: Nepprofielen en Nieuwe Groeperingen
Pas op voor een nieuwe groepering die zich ook BUFON noemt, maar geen enkele connectie heeft met onze gevestigde organisatie. Hoewel zij de naam geregistreerd hebben, kunnen ze het rijke verleden en de expertise van onze groep niet evenaren. We wensen hen veel succes, maar we blijven de autoriteit in UFO-onderzoek!
Blijf Op De Hoogte!
Wil jij de laatste nieuwtjes over UFO's, ruimtevaart, archeologie, en meer? Volg ons dan en duik samen met ons in de fascinerende wereld van het onbekende! Sluit je aan bij de gemeenschap van nieuwsgierige geesten die net als jij verlangen naar antwoorden en avonturen in de sterren!
Heb je vragen of wil je meer weten? Aarzel dan niet om contact met ons op te nemen! Samen ontrafelen we het mysterie van de lucht en daarbuiten.
14-03-2020
A Scientist Claims It’s Possible Novel Corona Virus Has A Space Connection
A Scientist Claims It’s Possible Novel Corona Virus Has A Space Connection
After the news that a US patient got a novel coronavirus (N-CoV) and its origin has baffled medical authorities, a scientist claimed that the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is the first wave of space alien biological invasion of Earth.
On the evening of February 26, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed that the patient in California who has infected with the COVID-19 didn’t have a travel history in China and any other countries with confirmed cases. According to the CDC, the patient wasn’t exposed to everyone known to have the disease.
California Rep. John Garamendi said that the affected person is in severe condition. CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield said that they already explained to doctors in the United States that a person needed to have travel history to any country with confirmed cases or be a near touch of an individual who had been in affected areas before with COVID-19 cases.
Meanwhile, Cambridge astrobiologist Dr. Chandra Wickramasinghe claims that the COVID-19 virus may have come from a fragment of a comet that exploded in North-East China in October last year.
In Wickramasinghe’s perspective, the sudden outbreak of a new coronavirus is very probable to have an extraterrestrial connection. The British scientist brings up the possibility that masses of trillions of infective viral debris that lived in the bright meteor has been then released embedded within the shape of sweet carbonaceous dust.
Wickramasinghe explains that infectious agents are known to be widespread in the area, which might be transported on comets and fell toward Earth through the troposphere.
Scientists Find The First-Ever Animal That Doesn't Need Oxygen to Survive
MICHELLE STARR
Some truths about the Universe and our experience in it seem immutable. The sky is up. Gravity sucks. Nothing can travel faster than light. Multicellular life needs oxygen to live. Except we might need to rethink that last one.
Scientists have just discovered that a jellyfish-like parasite doesn't have a mitochondrial genome - the first multicellular organism known to have this absence. That means it doesn't breathe; in fact, it lives its life completely free of oxygen dependency.
This discovery isn't just changing our understanding of how life can work here on Earth - it could also have implications for the search for extraterrestrial life.
Life started to develop the ability to metabolise oxygen - that is, respirate - sometime over 1.45 billion years ago. A larger archaeon engulfed a smaller bacterium, and somehow the bacterium's new home was beneficial to both parties, and the two stayed together.
That symbiotic relationship resulted in the two organisms evolving together, and eventually those bacteria ensconced within became organelles called mitochondria. Every cell in your body except red blood cells has large numbers of mitochondria, and these are essential for the respiration process.
They break down oxygen to produce a molecule called adenosine triphosphate, which multicellular organisms use to power cellular processes.
We know there are adaptations that allow some organisms to thrive in low-oxygen, or hypoxic, conditions. Some single-celled organisms have evolved mitochondria-related organelles for anaerobic metabolism; but the possibility of exclusively anaerobic multicellular organisms has been the subject of some scientific debate.
That is, until a team of researchers led by Dayana Yahalomi of Tel Aviv University in Israel decided to take another look at a common salmon parasite called Henneguya salminicola.
(Stephen Douglas Atkinson)
It's a cnidarian, belonging to the same phylum as corals, jellyfish and anemones. Although the cysts it creates in the fish's flesh are unsightly, the parasites are not harmful, and will live with the salmon for its entire life cycle.
Tucked away inside its host, the tiny cnidarian can survive quite hypoxic conditions. But exactly how it does so is difficult to know without looking at the creature's DNA - so that's what the researchers did.
They used deep sequencing and fluorescence microscopy to conduct a close study of H. salminicola, and found that it has lost its mitochondrial genome. In addition, it's also lost the capacity for aerobic respiration, and almost all of the nuclear genes involved in transcribing and replicating mitochondria.
Like the single-celled organisms, it had evolved mitochondria-related organelles, but these are unusual too - they have folds in the inner membrane not usually seen.
The same sequencing and microscopic methods in a closely related cnidarian fish parasite, Myxobolus squamalis, was used as a control, and clearly showed a mitochondrial genome.
These results show that here, at last, is a multicellular organism that doesn't need oxygen to survive.
Exactly how it survives is still something of a mystery. It could be leeching adenosine triphosphate from its host, but that's yet to be determined.
But the loss is pretty consistent with an overall trend in these creatures - one of genetic simplification. Over many, many years, they have basically devolved from a free-living jellyfish ancestor into the much more simple parasite we see today.
(Stephen Douglas Atkinson)
They've lost most of the original jellyfish genome, but retaining - oddly - a complex structure resembling jellyfish stinging cells. They don't use these to sting, but to cling to their hosts: an evolutionary adaptation from the free-living jellyfish's needs to the parasite's. You can see them in the image above - they're the things that look like eyes.
The discovery could help fisheries adapt their strategies for dealing with the parasite; although it's harmless to humans, no one wants to buy salmon riddled with tiny weird jellyfish.
But it's also a heck of a discovery for helping us to understand how life works.
"Our discovery confirms that adaptation to an anaerobic environment is not unique to single-celled eukaryotes, but has also evolved in a multicellular, parasitic animal," the researchers wrote in their paper.
"Hence, H. salminicola provides an opportunity for understanding the evolutionary transition from an aerobic to an exclusive anaerobic metabolism."
What you’re seeing, essentially, is part of a corona -- when a rainbow-like halo engulfs the sun or the moon -- and the bands and colors change as the cloud evolves.
Iridescence is most often seen close to the sun.
It's usually spotted when part of a cloud is forming because that's when all of the water droplets have a similar history and similar size.
A once-hidden island has been uncovered in Antarctica after melting glaciers caused by record high temperatures revealed its rocky shore to passing scientists.
A group of polar researchers from the Thwaites Offshore Research (THOR) project spotted the island as their ship passed through Pine Island Bay in Antarctica.
The island has been named Sif after the Norse goddess of fertility and family, who was also the wife of the warrior god Thor, by the THOR glacier research team.
Researchers on board the Nathaniel B. Palmer ship are studying the Thwaites glacier in Pine Island bay, one of the fastest-retreating glaciers in Antarctica.
The team don't know how long the 634,400 sq ft island has been exposed, but say it was likely revealed by higher than usual temperatures caused by climate change.
Scroll down for video
The new island has been named Sif by researchers who say it was uncovered due to warming temperatures causing ice sheets to melt
'After being the first visitors, we can now confirm that Sif Island is made of granite and that it is covered by remnant ice shelf, and a few seals,' said Julia Smith Wellner from the THOR expedition team
It is big enough for satellites to spot from space but the never-before-seen island has previously been hidden under thick layers of ice, and was only revealed after parts of the glacier broke off and melted.
Cartographers for the British Antarctic Survey estimate the island, made of granite, is about 1,240ft across by 520ft wide - roughly 634,400 sq ft or about the same size as Windsor Castle.
Researchers hope to be able to reveal more about the composition of the island and how it came to be uncovered when their journey finishes at the end of March.
Ships rarely travel as far south as the Palmer so the crew are probably the first to discover the island and may be the first humans to step foot on its rocky shore.
'After being the first visitors, we can now confirm that Sif Island is made of granite and that it is covered by remnant ice shelf, and a few seals,' said Julia Smith Wellner from the THOR expedition team.
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Cartographers for the British Antarctic Survey estimate the island, made of granite, is about 1,240ft across by 520ft wide - roughly 634,400 sq ft or about the same size as Windsor Castle
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This satellite image shows Sif Island and a series of icebergs - Sif is the large white block in the bottom middle of the image
They took samples from the island in the hope of getting a clearer picture of how the frozen continent is shifting, but won't know for sure until they get to a lab in March.
'This one island could hold a lot of clues,' University of Virginia in Charlottesville glacial geologist Lauren Simkins told Nature News.
As glaciers retreat they release pressure on the continent allowing the ground underneath the ice to rise up - a process called rapid rebound.
This sometimes stabilises the ice by anchoring it in place but can also accelerate the break up of the glacier by creating more cracks.
'Rapid rebound could increase stress on the remaining ice sheet, causing it to break apart more quickly', she said.
'But a rising continental shelf could also anchor glaciers, increasing their stability and slowing their march to the sea.'
When they first spotted the new island, there was a commotion on board as everyone rushed to see the rocky land amongst miles of water and ice.
'I think I see rocks,' shouted an officer aboard the ship.
They looked at charts and maps of the area and realised it was a 'brand new island' likely 'never seen before'.
'There was a commotion as everyone on board rushed to see the rocky, ice-covered outcrop and suggest potential names.
'But the hubbub quickly gave way to excitement about the scientific implications of the find,' says Wellner, a marine geologist at the University of Houston in Texas.
Thwaites Glacier is in West Antarctica and is sometimes called the Doomsday Glacier due to its potential impact on global sea levels
Climate scientist Peter Neff examined the new images and satellite data to try and determine how long it has been uncovered for.
He said it looks like 'Sif Island' has been slowly revealed since about 2010.
The THOR project is an international mission tasked with studying the stability of the massive Thwaites glacier in Pine Island Bay, Western Antarctica.
Researchers say the melting ice on the new rock will help them better determine how quickly changes are happening and what this means for the glacier.
Ships rarely travel as far south as the Palmer so the crew are likely the first to discover the island and may be the first humans to step foot on its rocky shore
'New islands emerging as ice sheets retreat is not particularly surprising', Paul Cutler, a programme director in glaciology at the US National Science Foundation in Alexandria, Virginia told Nature News.
'New islands have appeared over the past few years in the Canadian Arctic and Greenland' but this is 'an exciting opportunity to piece together the geological history of a vastly under-studied region of Earth'.
The new discovery comes as NASA recorded a record high temperature for the continent - at 64 degrees Fahrenheit with melted ice spotted from space.
This is also not the first island in Antarctica to be effected by rising temperatures.
The island is big enough for satellites to spot from space but the never before seen island has previously been hidden under thick layers of ice
Satellite images last week revealed 20 per cent of snow on Eagle Island melted in just 10 days due to the extreme temperatures.
The warm spell began on February 5 and ran through to February 13, peaking on February 6, with temperatures on the Antarctic Peninsula reaching 64.9°F (18.3°C).
'I haven’t seen melt ponds develop this quickly in Antarctica,' said glaciologist Mauri Pelto of Nichols College in Massachusetts.
'You see these kinds of melt events in Alaska and Greenland, but not usually in Antarctica.'
Sometimes called the Doomsday Glacier due to the potential impact its collapse could have on sea levels, Thwaites is unusually broad and fast.
Already, Thwaites accounts for about four per cent of global sea-level rise as warming waters cause it to melt from the underside.
Researchers have long held concerns that a tipping point in the stability at its foundations could result in a run-away collapse of the glacier.
There are multiple teams studying the glacier at the moment to determine the risk it poses to global sea levels and the newly uncovered island will feed into that work.
HOW MUCH WILL SEA LEVELS RISE IN THE NEXT FEW CENTURIES?
Global sea levels could rise as much as 1.2 metres (4 feet) by 2300 even if we meet the 2015 Paris climate goals, scientists have warned.
The long-term change will be driven by a thaw of ice from Greenland to Antarctica that is set to re-draw global coastlines.
Sea level rise threatens cities from Shanghai to London, to low-lying swathes of Florida or Bangladesh, and to entire nations such as the Maldives.
It is vital that we curb emissions as soon as possible to avoid an even greater rise, a German-led team of researchers said in a new report.
By 2300, the report projected that sea levels would gain by 0.7-1.2 metres, even if almost 200 nations fully meet goals under the 2015 Paris Agreement.
Targets set by the accords include cutting greenhouse gas emissions to net zero in the second half of this century.
Ocean levels will rise inexorably because heat-trapping industrial gases already emitted will linger in the atmosphere, melting more ice, it said.
In addition, water naturally expands as it warms above four degrees Celsius (39.2°F).
Every five years of delay beyond 2020 in peaking global emissions would mean an extra 20 centimetres (8 inches) of sea level rise by 2300.
'Sea level is often communicated as a really slow process that you can't do much about ... but the next 30 years really matter,' lead author Dr Matthias Mengel, of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, in Potsdam, Germany, told Reuters.
None of the nearly 200 governments to sign the Paris Accords are on track to meet its pledges.
KLIMAATVERANDERING ONTHULT GLOEDNIEUW EILAND VOOR DE KUST VAN ANTARCTICA
KLIMAATVERANDERING ONTHULT GLOEDNIEUW EILAND VOOR DE KUST VAN ANTARCTICA
Caroline Kraaijvanger
Het ons tot voor kort onbekende eiland was altijd bedekt met een dikke laag ijs, die door de opwarming van het gebied nu grotendeels is verdwenen.
Het eiland bevindt zich in de Pine Island-baai, die weer onderdeel uitmaakt van de Amundsenzee, gelegen voor de kust van West-Antarctica. In deze baai komen onder meer de beruchte Pine Island- en Thwaites-gletsjer uit. Beide gletsjers zijn de laatste tijd vaak in het nieuws door de snelle veranderingen die ze ondergaan. Zo laat de Pine Island-gletsjer regelmatig grote brokken ijs los en is de grote, snel smeltende Thwaites-gletsjer momenteel reeds verantwoordelijk voor zo’n 4% van de wereldwijde zeespiegelstijging.
International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration Wetenschappers houden de laatstgenoemde gletsjer – niet in de laatste plaats omdat deze in zijn eentje een zeespiegelstijging van zo’n 65 centimeter kan veroorzaken – nauwlettend in de gaten. En er werd zelfs een expeditie opgezet die helemaal om deze gletsjer en zijn omgeving draait. De International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration doet momenteel ter plekke onderzoek naar de stabiliteit van de gletsjer en de bijdrage die deze gletsjer en omgeving kan leveren aan de wereldwijde zeespiegel. Zo werden er eind vorig en begin van dit jaar diepe gaten in de gletsjer geboord, wat leidde tot de ontdekking van warm water dat het ijs van onderaf aantast en zo waarschijnlijk bijdraagt aan de versnelde smelt van de gletsjer die zich qua oppervlakte grofweg kan meten met Groot-Brittannië.
Nieuw eiland Wetenschappers die aan deze belangrijke onderzoeksexpeditie deelnemen, hadden – afgaand op wat we van de Thwaites-gletsjer weten – ongetwijfeld wel verwacht getuige te zijn van grote en snelle veranderingen in het gebied. Maar dat ze er op een gloednieuw eiland zouden stuiten..dat had niemand zien aankomen.
Sif De onderzoekers hebben het eiland ‘Sif-eiland’ gedoopt. “Ons project (dat onder de vlag van de International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration valt, red.) draagt de naam THwaites Offshore Research, of kortweg Thor,” vertelt onderzoeker Julia Wellner, vanuit Antarctica aan Scientias.nl. “Thor is een Noorse God en zijn vrouw Sif is de godin van de aarde. Haar naam leek goed te passen bij een stukje land dat we tijdens ons project hebben ontdekt.” Wellner is voornemens om de naam – na terugkeer in de bewoonde wereld – officieel in te dienen en hoopt dat deze door instanties bevoegd om het eiland een naam te geven, wordt omarmd. “Ik hoop dat Sif blijft hangen.”
Op Sif Natuurlijk hebben de onderzoekers kort na de ontdekking van het eiland hun werk even neergelegd om het eilandje te bezoeken. Daarmee zijn ze niet alleen de ontdekkers van het eiland, maar waarschijnlijk ook de eerste mensen die het eiland hebben bezocht. “Het eiland was in het verleden bedekt door een ijsplaat: gletsjerijs dat richting de oceaan is gestroomd en op het water is gaan drijven,” zo vertelt Wellner. “Het eiland lag altijd al boven de zeespiegel, maar we hebben het nooit gezien, omdat het onder het ijs lag. De ijsplaat heeft zich in de laatste jaren echter teruggetrokken, waardoor het eiland bloot is komen te liggen.”
Opwarming Onderzoek ter plaatse wijst uit dat het eiland nu slechts nog wat restjes van die ijsplaat herbergt. Het is allemaal zeer waarschijnlijk te herleiden naar de opwarming van de aarde, aldus Wellner. “De Thwaites-gletsjer is de snelst veranderende ijsmassa op West-Antarctica en de reden dat we hier zijn. Dus we wisten al dat het ijs zich hier terugtrekt. Dat is dan ook geen verrassing. Maar het eiland is dat wel.”
Julia Smith Wellner@houston_wellner
After being the first visitors, we can now confirm that Sif Island is made of granite and that it is covered by remnant ice shelf, and a few seals. Photos by CD Hillenbrand (BAS) and Laura Taylor (UH). @glacierthwaites@glacieroffshore@GAViglione#nbp2002@BAS_News@UHEAS
Waardevol En de ontdekking van het eiland kan wel eens heel waardevol blijken te zijn voor de missie van Wellner en collega’s. Ze hebben namelijk goede hoop dat het eiland meer kan vertellen over hoe het gebied er in het verleden uitzag en door de tijd heen veranderd is. Daarom hebben ze op het eiland onder meer al enkele stenen verzameld die later uitgebreid geanalyseerd kunnen worden. “Eén van de belangrijkste dingen die we zullen gaan doen, is het dateren van de periode waarin de gesteenten blootlagen. We willen achterhalen of ze in de laatste 100 of 1000 of 10.000 jaren ook al eens ijsvrij zijn geweest en zo meer te weten komen over hoe het ijs zich in het verleden heeft gedragen.”
Het komt niet elke dag voor dat onderzoekers een nieuw eiland ontdekken. Maar Wellner sluit niet uit dat het in de toekomst nog wel vaker gebeurt. “Het is zeker mogelijk dat er doordat het ijs zich steeds sneller terugtrekt, meer nieuwe eilanden worden ontdekt.”
Bronmateriaal:
Interview met Julia Wellner Afbeelding bovenaan dit artikel: Gui Bortolotto
Guys this just came up in the news about coronavirus. The mainland China authorities are warning that the virus not only could cause permanent damage to the lungs and immune systems, it could also possibly make men sterile. You heard me right. Further testing on more individuals who have caught the virus needs to be done, but if all males who catch the virus can't have children...and if this virus spreads across the population of humanity, it could cause humans to no longer be able to reproduce. That means eventual extinction. Thats just a worst case scenario and probably wont happen. But I wonder if females also get permentant damage to their reproductive systems? We need further testing and more info. I will keep you updated. I wonder if this virus was a weapon made in a lab. If it sterilizes males then its 100% that its a weaponized virus. Scott C. Waring News states:
The damage of the new coronavirus to the human body is mainly caused by the lungs and the immune system. However, the mainland authorities and the Hubei Provincial Government have also released the latest news to remind men who have been infected with new coronary pneumonia that fertility tests should be performed. They are worried that the new coronavirus may also cause men. Reproductive system damage.
Now and again I’m asked about the issue of “cattle mutilations”/”animal mutilations” in the U.K. Well, yes there are such things in the U.K. I should stress, though, that when I’m asked about these grisly and undeniably disturbing phenomena, people are usually talking about the theory that aliens are the culprits. The truth, though, is that most mutilations in the U.K. are undertaken by sick people who should be behind bars. That said, there are some genuinely weird cases. On April 11, 1977, no less than fifteen wild ponies were found dead at Cherry Brook Valley, Dartmoor, Devonshire, England, by a Tavistock storekeeper named Alan Hicks, who had been crossing the wild and desolate moors with his children. It was not until mid-July, however, that the media began reporting on the incident in-depth. Newspaper articles in my possession demonstrate that the story traveled as far as South Africa; however, consider the following story, extracted from the U.K.’s Western Morning News of July 13, 1977:
“Fears that the mystery deaths of fifteen ponies near a Dartmoor beauty spot were caused by visitors from space were being probed by a Torbay team yesterday. Armed with a Geiger counter, metal detectors and face masks, four men are investigating what leading animal authorities admit seems a ‘totally abnormal happening,’ and are hoping their equipment will throw a new light on the three month old mystery. While other investigators have looked for signs of malnutrition, disease or poisoning – or even gunshot wounds – the four men are seeking proof that extra-terrestrials were responsible for the deaths.”
The trail went icy cold until pretty much 1991 when a great mate of mine, Jonathan Downes, a prolific author, journalist, investigator, and the director of the Center for Fortean Zoology, began to probe the case. Jon – who was living in Devonshire at the time, and who still resides there to this very day – succeeded in tracking down a number of those people that had been quoted by the newspapers some fourteen years previously. Curiously, Jon detected a very distinct reluctance to talk, even after almost a decade and a half. Even more bizarre, one of those same individuals, who strictly adhered to a non-paranormal explanation for the pony deaths, complained to a research colleague of Jon’s acquaintance for constantly pestering her day and night by phone, when, in actuality, the only contact had been one, solitary telephone call. It was a mystery never solved.
On the afternoon of a spring day in 1992, Jon Downes was deep in conversation with a police officer from Middlemoor Police Station in the English city of Exeter. The subject of the conversation was the so-called “big cat” sightings (such as the notorious Beast of Bodmin, Beast of Dartmoor, and Beast of Exmoor) that have been reported throughout the British counties of Devon and Cornwall for decades. Was Jon aware, the officer inquired, that there had occurred at nearby Newquay Zoo in the late 1970s a series of grisly mutilations of animals under extremely strange circumstances? Jon replied that, no, he was not.
Fortunately, however, the officer was able to put Jon in touch with the one man in a position to discuss the facts: the head keeper at the zoo at the time in question. And here’s where things began to get distinctly odd. Jon wasted no time in tracking the man down. Elderly and in failing health, he confirmed to Jon the basics of the story: very strange deaths had occurred at the zoo, and wallabies, swans and geese had been beheaded. But more significantly, their corpses had been totally drained of blood. Another strange saga remained unsolved.
While I don’t personally adhere to the theory/belief-system that the U.K. mutes are the work of ETs, some do. One of those is Mike Freebury. I met Freebury for the first time a few years ago, when I was back in the U.K. for two weeks. He is the author of a 2011 book titled Killers on the Moor. It’s a 252-pages-long book that looks deeply in the matter of mutes in the U.K. If the animal mutilation issue interests you, then you really should get a copy of Killers on the Moor. Regardless of whether you are of the opinion that aliens, wild animals, government conspiracies, or cults are the culprits, Freebury’s book is important, as it’s the only one ever written on the subject of U.K.-based animal mutilations.
They came from outer Finland: the town where everyone saw UFOs – in pictures
They came from outer Finland: the town where everyone saw UFOs – in pictures
The photographer Maria Lax comes from a northern Finnish town where UFO sightings were common – so she set about looking for answers. Her book Some Kind of Heavenly Fire is published by Setanta Books
‘I’m from a small town in northern Finland surrounded by a vast, sparsely populated wilderness. Most pass through the town without ever knowing it was a hotspot for UFO sightings in the 1960s,’ writes Maria Lax
‘It wasn’t until I read my grandfather’s book about the UFO sightings in the area that I learned of the incredible stories of supernatural events, bravery and struggle against hardship in what is largely a barren land. Already suffering from dementia, he was unable to answer any of the questions I had so I went looking for the answers. I turned to the people who had seen the mysterious lights, to newspaper archives and my family’s photo albums from the era’
‘All of the locations in the book are places I have been going to since my childhood. By doing the project, talking to people, reading my grandfather’s book, searching through family albums and walking around the familiar landscapes I got to know my past and my family history much better. This image was taken near my grandparents’ house on a New Year’s Day when there was a long power cut and an eerie fog came out of nowhere - the perfect weather for the type of photographs I wanted to shoot’
‘Over the few years I worked on this project I interviewed several people in the town, and all their accounts are remarkably similar. Colourful lights would follow cars, or people walking home alone. The lights would be silent, pulsating in different colours before disappearing into the sky. Sometimes bright lights would wake people up in their homes in the middle of the night - and would again vanish without a trace’
‘With the lack of sunlight northern Finland experiences for a considerable part of the year, it’s impossible to escape the darkness. I decided to embrace it and felt like the absence of natural light allowed me to experiment with my images. I wanted to fill the darkness with colours and use long exposures to draw out the unexpected from the locations I knew so well’
‘The first known UFO sightings in the area were made as early as the 1920s. But because of fears that they would be labelled as crazy by others, people kept what they saw a secret and would only come forward with their experiences decades later - and more than likely most never spoke of what they saw’
‘There is a larger story running alongside the UFO sightings. Rapid industrialisation in the 60s and early 70s meant that people couldn’t support their families by farming and were forced to move to cities in search of jobs. Some towns lost nearly half their populations. A whole lifestyle disappeared in a matter of a few years, and those who lived through it remember it as a painful, uncertain time. It’s little wonder the UFO sightings embodied a fear of the future and the unknown. I wanted to bring all of this in by photographing the abandoned houses and showing the isolation’
‘One of the people I interviewed told me: “I remember waking up one night and the room being awash with the most beautiful colours. I knew it was the aliens but I wasn’t afraid. I knew they didn’t wish me any harm.” Although some locals I spoke to were still visibly scared and cautious of sharing what they had experienced decades ago, others said the strange lights were a thing that gave them hope; a sign they hadn’t been forgotten’
‘The title Some Kind of Heavenly Fire comes from a quote in my grandfather’s book about the alien sightings. When an older woman saw what looked like the forest on fire on a cold winter’s night, she described the strange lights by saying it wasn’t anything from this world - but what she saw was “some kind of heavenly fire”. The town where I come from was, and still is, deeply religious in parts, and I thought that quote was the perfect summary for the different elements for the photo book’
‘This project is an artistic expression of something that is part of my hometown and my family history. I have kept the narrative ambiguous and hope that anyone who sees these images can form their own truth about this little town with a big secret’
Linda Moulton Howe: Earthly Phenomena Thousands of Years Old Could Have an Alien Origin
Linda Moulton Howe: Earthly Phenomena Thousands of Years Old Could Have an Alien Origin
Linda Moulton Howe – For thousands of years they have been monitoring human development and interacting with the selected, molding and changing historical outcomes. We have been the subject of guidance, manipulation, and experimentation.
They have been referred to as the Ancient Sky Gods and The Watchers. But we would now refer to them as ‘The ET Presence’. Archived Show – Awakening Expo, Manchester, UK.
Linda Moulton Howe…1000′s Of Years Old Earthly Phenomena That Could Have An Alien Origin?
David Wilcock: Russian Secret Projects Utilize Earth Energies for Portal Travel
David Wilcock: Russian Secret Projects Utilize Earth Energies for Portal Travel
David Wilcock rolls up his sleeves and digs into compelling Russian science that shows us exactly what portals are, how they work, why they appear at these points, and the unique conversion of gravitational energy into electromagnetic energy that takes place within them.
You will hear multiple eyewitness reports of people going through portals, what happens to them, and how even natural time travel occurs… from just a few days of “time slip” to far longer events.
David Wilcock: Russian Secret Projects Utilize Earth Energies for Portal Travel
Coronavirus Could Give Us an Idea What Will Take Place When ET Life Reaches Earth
Coronavirus Could Give Us an Idea What Will Take Place When ET Life Reaches Earth
President Nixon talking to the Apollo 11 crew members (left to right: Neil A. Armstrong, Michael Collins, and Buzz Aldrin Jr.) while the astronauts were in quarantine after returning to Earth from their trip to the moon.
It would be nice to find life on other worlds, no doubt about it! However, it may be wise to reconsider this entire thing. If we indeed find alien life, can we handle it epidemiologically, biologically, and emotionally?
We are currently in the middle of an alarming worldwide situation with previously unknown disease COVID-19. As of this writing, confirmed cases reach close to 90,000 in 68 countries, leading to over 3,000 deaths. Tokyo Olympics are threatened to be postponed, flights have been grounded, major international gatherings canceled, and a global recession looms. In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average had its worst week since the 2008 and 2009 recession, shedding one-third of its gains since the 2016 election. Most of these are due to fears of the negative impact of COVID-19.
Humanity is suffering the effects of the disease, but the Chinese and Asian-looking people are taking the big blow. The virus started in Wuhan, China, and ugly behaviors have surfaced around the world. At a California high school, an Asian-American 16-year old was assaulted and accused of carrying the virus. There’s an underlying anti-Chinese sentiment in South Korea, with some shops posting signs not allowing Chinese. In Vancouver, a Chinese boy playing at a school playground was taunted as being a virus carrier.
COVID-19 has nothing to do with space, as it is an entirely terrestrial problem. But the thing is, even its terrestrial origin, it leads to thousands of deaths around the world. What more if the virus came from the space? NASA is poised to launch in July a new rover to Mars that will hunt for microbial life and collect some soil and rock samples that will be bought to Earth. These samples are potentially containing that microbial life.
NASA has a long history of protecting the Earth from biohazards from other planets and vice versa, according to a column in Space.com. The agency has one division solely formed for that goal, which is formally known as the Office of Safety and Mission Assurance (OSMA) and commonly known as the Planetary Protection office.
Still, the risk exists. Even the strictest labs always have a non-zero chance that something could escape. Imagine it will, and many people will become infected. Aside from the impact of their health, they would not only be racialized but also extraterrestrialized, in the sense that they are not even fully human anymore.
The battle against SARS-CoV-2 shows that humanity can have a unified effort, and it will be the same if one of those alien living things threatens us all. Collectivism is among our highest qualities. On the other hand, the othering, racializing, directed at people of Chinese descent, is one of our lowest qualities.
On February 6, weather stations recorded the hottest temperature on record for Antarctica, 64.9°F (18.3°C). The warm spell caused widespread melting on nearby glaciers
These images show melting on the ice cap of Antarctica’s Eagle Island. They were acquired by NASA’S Landsat 8 satellite on February 4 and February 13, 2020.
On February 6, 2020, weather stations recorded the hottest temperature on record for Antarctica. Thermometers at the Esperanza Base on the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula reached 18.3°C (64.9°F) – around the same temperature as Los Angeles that day. The warm spell caused widespread melting on nearby glaciers.
The warm temperatures arrived on February 5 and continued until February 13, 2020.
Mauri Pelto, a glaciologist at Nichols College, observed that during the warming event, around .9 square miles (1.5 square km) of snowpack became saturated with meltwater (shown in blue above). According to climate models, Eagle Island experienced peak melt – 1 inch (30 millimeters) – on February 6. In total, snowpack on Eagle Island melted 4 inches (106 millimeters) from February 6-February 11. About 20 percent of seasonal snow accumulation in the region melted in this one event on Eagle Island.
The heat is apparent on this map, which shows temperatures across the Antarctic Peninsula on February 9, 2020. The map was derived from the Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) model, and represents air temperatures at 2 meters (about 6.5 feet) above the ground. The darkest red areas are where the model shows temperatures surpassing 50°F (10°C).
I haven’t seen melt ponds develop this quickly in Antarctica. You see these kinds of melt events in Alaska and Greenland, but not usually in Antarctica.
He also used satellite images to detect widespread surface melting nearby on Boydell Glacier.
Pelto noted that such rapid melting is caused by sustained high temperatures significantly above freezing. Such persistent warmth was not typical in Antarctica until the 21st century, but it has become more common in recent years.
The warm temperatures of February 2020 were caused by a combination of meteorological elements. A ridge of high pressure was centered over Cape Horn at the beginning of the month, and it allowed warm temperatures to build. Typically, the peninsula is shielded from warm air masses by the Southern Hemisphere westerlies, a band of strong winds that circle the continent. However, the westerlies were in a weakened state, which allowed the extra-tropical warm air to cross the Southern Ocean and reach the ice sheet. Sea surface temperatures in the area were also higher than average by about 2-3°C (about 3.5-5.5 F).
Dry, warm foehn winds also could have played a part. Foehn winds are strong, gusty winds that cause downslope windstorms on mountains, often bringing warm air with them. In February 2020, westerly winds ran into the Antarctic Peninsula Cordillera. As such winds travel up the mountains, the air typically cools and condenses to form rain or snow clouds. As that water vapor condenses into liquid water or ice, heat is released into the surrounding air. This warm, dry air travels downslope on the other side of the mountains, bringing blasts of heat to parts of the peninsula. The drier air means fewer low-lying clouds and potentially more direct sunlight east of the mountain range.
Rajashree Tri Datta, an atmospheric researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, said:
Two things that can make a foehn-induced melt event stronger are stronger winds and higher temperatures.
With warmer air in the surrounding atmosphere and ocean, the conditions were conducive this month for a foehn wind event.
This February heatwave was the third major melt event of the 2019-2020 summer, following warm spells in November 2019 and January 2020. Pelto said:
If you think about this one event in February, it isn’t that significant. It’s more significant that these events are coming more frequently.
Bottom line: In February 2020, weather stations recorded the hottest temperatures on record for Antarctica. The warm spell caused widespread melting on nearby glaciers.
Ever wonder what kinds of unusual objects pilots see from the air?
With a truly unique vantage point, they've reported a range of strange sightings, including UFOs, geoglyphs, and drones. But they've also had unobstructed views to some of nature's most incredible sights.
Here are 10 wild things that pilots have seen while flying.
1. Several pilots have claimed to have seen UFOs.
We might not have confirmation of any UFOs, but pilots have seen something. shanecotee/ iStock
Pilots have claimed to see UFOs (unidentified flying objects) for decades – sightings usually involve bright lights or objects flying in a formations. In June 1947, for example, pilot Kenneth Arnold said he saw nine glowing blue objects flying in a V over Mount Rainier in Seattle, Washington. In November 2018, pilots reported seeing UFOs off the coast of Ireland.
A satellite image shows Hurricane Florence off the eastern coast of the United States on Thursday, September 13, 2018. NOAA via AP
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Pilot Terry Lynch recalled his experience of flying near a hurricane to Popular Mechanics.
"I could see the lights of Charleston going out, and I knew they were catching hell down there. I'd much rather be in the air. When the wind pushes, a plane gives," he said of flying over the South Carolina coast during Hurricane Hugo in 1989.
Commercial flights typically go higher in the air than a hurricane, so aircraft can sometimes just fly over them. Meteorologist and pilot James Aydelott told The Points Guy, "Each storm is different, but down low, near the eye, where the C-130 and P-3 'Hurricane Hunter' flights fly, there is often turbulence. High above, from all accounts I've seen, the ride is smooth. As far as flying goes, there should be no issues flying above a hurricane in an aircraft equipped to monitor radar echo tops."
3. NASA pilots have seen rectangular-shaped icebergs.
It is unusual to see an iceberg that shape. Mario Tama/Getty Images
NASA pilots spotted a rectangular iceberg while flying over the northern Antarctic Peninsula. Such icebergs look as if they have been purposefully cut, and they are rarely seen. Of the experience, one pilot told Mysterious Universe:
"I thought it was pretty interesting; I often see icebergs with relatively straight edges, but I've not really seen one before with two corners at such right angles like this one had."
4. Some lucky pilots get to fly over pink lakes as part of their day job.
So many people want to see pink lakes that scenic flights over them are now offered. The most famous is Lake Hillier in Western Australia. There are also pink lakes in British Columbia, Spain, and Canada. The lakes get their pink color from a high level of salinity along with algae that make carotenoids, or organic pigments, turning the water pink. These lakes create such great amounts of salt that locals harvest and use it.
5. Geoglyphs can also be seen from the sky.
Geoglyphs can only be seen from the air. lovelypeace/ iStock
Geoglyphs are designs built into the natural landscape via mounds of earth. Most geoglyphs are large crosses, squares, and rings. Some geoglyphs can be as wide as 1,300 feet. The structural designs can be found in northern Kazakhstan, Russia, Brazil, Peru, and other places.
6. Pilots have experienced lightning striking their planes.
Some planes can fly better during lightening storms than others. Jurkos/ iStock
It's not uncommon for a plane to get hit by lightning. Aircraft are made of aluminum, which conducts electricity, but their design ensures the lightning current stays on the outside of the plane. Some private planes are not made of the same materials as commercial planes, so pilots flying those aircraft need to be cautious about getting near thunderstorms.
NASA pilot Conway Roberts described flying a jet into a cold front to the New York Times:
''I was flying at about 40,000 feet over Amarillo, when I first started seeing lightning from this front several hundred miles away. The thunderstorms that the front was generating were just like a picket fence. They had very little depth and were shoulder-to-shoulder, hundreds of them, and they all had almost continuous lightning.''
7. St. Elmo's Fire is a phenomenon similar to lightning.
A phenomenon that only some pilots are lucky enough to see, St. Elmo's Fire is similar to lightning.
It's a branch-shaped discharge of atmospheric electricity into the sky that's caused by heavy thunderstorms in combination with a plane flying through an exceptionally high-intensity electric field.
But how exactly does this phenomenon happen? When there is a difference in the concentration of electrons between two objects, the potential difference induces an electric field. This electric field can become so strong that air can no longer suppress it and electrons jump through the air creating a visual spark. This occurrence happens on a lesser scale when you touch a doorknob and give yourself a minor shock. But because thunderstorms create such a powerful electric field, there becomes a dramatic difference in charge between the air and the pointed tip of an airplane, that a continuous spark is created, namely St. Elmo's Fire.
Unlike lightning, St. Elmo's Fire isn't the movement of electricity, but the shot of electrons into the air, aka a "corona discharge."
The flashes in the sky look like dancing lightning bolts. St. Elmo's Fire is usually blue or purple in color, but can also appear to be green. It can also be heard "singing" on the plane's radio — a hissing sound that goes up and down the musical scale.
8. Some claim they have flown over rainbows.
It is technically impossible for a rainbow to appear in front of a plane. undefined undefined/ iStock
People have claimed to have flown over rainbows, but the laws of physics tell us that this is not possible. Rainbows are formed when sunlight hits water. The water splits the light into its various colors, reflecting them at an angle of 42 degrees. Since the rainbow is only seen when that consistent angle is maintained, it's impossible to see a rainbow in front of you and then also fly over it. It is possible, however, for a rainbow to appear to the side of or below a plane.
9. Balloons have appeared at high altitudes.
Helium balloons have obstructed flight sensors. jakkapan21/ iStock
High-altitude balloons have caused trouble for pilots and airports, since they can obstruct flight sensors and create other problems. A passenger flight over London (flying 10,000 feet over the city) once hit a helium balloon, but it did not have any adverse effects on the flight. However, these high-altitude balloons could potentially cause a collision — they are certainly not something a pilot wants to see at eye level when mid-flight.
10. Drones have also been getting a little too close to planes, according to pilots.
There are strict laws for drones, but sometimes they aren't followed. Naypong/ iStock
Pilots have seen drones get very close to their planes. In London earlier this year, a pilot reported spotting a drone flying just 20 feet below the plane. There are strict regulations for drones in flight – they can't come within 50 meters of people or structures or within a kilometer of airports, and can't get higher than 400 feet. The pilot reported the following, which was announced by the UK Airprox Board, according to ITV:
"He had no doubt that it was being deliberately flown under the flight path in an attempt to collide with an aircraft."
“We warned at the start of ZetaTalk, in 1995, that unpredictable weather extremes, switching about from drought to deluge, would occur and increase on a lineal basis up until the pole shift. Where this occurred steadily, it has only recently become undeniable. ZetaTalk, and only ZetaTalk, warned of these weather changes, at that early date. Our early warnings spoke to the issue of global heating from the core outward, hardly Global Warming, a surface or atmospheric issue, but caused by consternation in the core. Affected by the approach of Planet X, which was by then starting to zoom rapidly toward the inner solar system for its periodic passage, the core was churning, melting the permafrost and glaciers and riling up volcanoes. When the passage did not occur as expected in 2003 because Planet X had stalled in the inner solar system, we explained the increasing weather irregularities in the context of the global wobble that had ensued – weather wobbles where the Earth is suddenly forced under air masses, churning them. This evolved by 2005 into a looping jet stream, loops breaking away and turning like a tornado to affect the air masses underneath. Meanwhile, on Planet Earth, droughts had become more intractable and deluges positively frightening, temperature swings bringing snow in summer in the tropics and searing heat in Artic regions, with the violence of storms increasing in number and ferocity.”
The wobble seems to have changed, as the temperature in Europe suddenly plunged after being like an early Spring, Alaska has its coldest temps ever while the US and much of Canada is having an extremely mild winter. India went from fatal cold spell to balmy again. Has the Earth changed position vs a vs Planet X to cause this?[and from another]Bitter cold records broken in Alaska – all time coldest record nearly broken, but Murphy’s Law intervenes[Jan 30]http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/30/bitter-cold-records-broken-in-alaskaJim River, AK closed in on the all time record coldest temperature of -80°F set in 1971, which is not only the Alaska all-time record, but the record for the entire United States. Unfortunately, it seems the battery died in the weather station just at the critical moment. While the continental USA has a mild winter and has set a number of high temperature records in the last week and pundits ponder whether they will be blaming the dreaded “global warming” for those temperatures, Alaska and Canada have been suffering through some of the coldest temperatures on record during the last week.
There has been no change in the wobble pattern, the wobble has merely become more severe. Nancy noted a Figure 8 format when the Earth wobble first became noticeable, in early 2005, after Planet X moved into the inner solar system at the end of 2003. The Figure 8 shifted along to the east a bit on the globe between 2005 and 2009, (the last time Nancy took its measure) as Planet X came closer to the Earth, encountering the magnetic N Pole with a violent push earlier in the day. But the pattern of the Figure 8 remained essentially the same. So what changed recently that the weather patterns became noticeably different in late January, 2012?
The N Pole is pushed away when it comes over the horizon, when the noon Sun is centered over the Pacific. This regularly puts Alaska under colder air, with less sunlight, and thus the historically low temps there this January, 2012 as the wobble has gotten stronger. But by the time the Sun is positioned over India, the N Pole has swung during the Figure 8 so the globe tilts, and this tilt is visible in the weather maps from Asia. The tilt has forced the globe under the hot air closer to the Equator, warming the land along a discernable tilt demarcation line.
The next loop of the Figure 8 swings the globe so that the N Pole moves in the other direction, putting the globe again at a tilt but this time in the other direction. This tilt is discernable in weather maps of Europe, again along a diagonal line. Depending upon air pressure and temperature differences, the weather on either side of this diagonal line may be suddenly warm or suddenly cold. The tilt and diagonal line lingers to affect much of the US and Canada, but the Figure 8 changes at this point to be an up and down motion, pulling the geographic N Pole south so the US is experiencing a warmer than expected winter under a stronger Sun. Then the cycle repeats, with the magnetic N Pole of Earth pushed violently away again as the Sun is positioned over the Pacific.
Would the Zetas be able to let us know what is causing the early break-up of the Arctic Ice, the ice seems to have taken on a swirling pattern at the same time, would this be wobble related?[and from another]
The ice in Canada’s western Arctic ripped open in a massive “fracturing event” this spring that spread like a wave across 1,000 kilometres of the Beaufort Sea. Huge leads of water – some more than 500 kilometres long and as much as 70 kilometres across – opened up from Alaska to Canada’s Arctic islands as the massive ice sheet cracked as it was pushed around by strong winds and currents. It took just seven days for the fractures to progress across the entire area from west to east.[and from another]http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=80752&src=iotdrss A high-pressure weather system was parked over the region, producing warmer temperatures and winds that flowed in a southwesterly direction. That fueled the Beaufort Gyre, a wind-driven ocean current that flows clockwise. The gyre was the key force pulling pieces of ice west past Point Barrow, the northern nub of Alaska that protrudes into the Beaufort Sea.
The Figure 8 formed by the N Pole during the daily Earth wobble has shifted somewhat to the East, due to Planet X positioned more to the right of the Earth during its approach. This was anticipated, and well described in ZetaTalk, the Earth crowding to the left in the cup to escape the approach of Planet X, so the angle between these two planets would change slightly. This shift of the Figure 8 to the East is due to the push against the Earth’s magnetic N Pole occurring sooner each day than prior. Thus instead of occurring when the Sun is high over the Pacific, over New Zealand, it is now occurring when the Sun is high over Alaska. All the wobble points have shifted eastward accordingly.
This has brought a lingering Winter to the western US, and a changed sloshing pattern to the Arctic waters. Instead of Pacific waters being pushed through the Bering Straits into the Arctic when the polar push occurs, the wobble is swinging the Arctic to the right, and then later to the left, creating a circular motion in the waters trapped in the Arctic. Since the Earth rotates counterclockwise, the motion also takes this path. This is yet another piece of evidence that the establishment is hard pressed to explain. They are attempting to ascribe this to high pressure and wind, all of which are not new to the Arctic, but this circular early breakup of ice in the Arctic is new.
'Kevin Costner, eat your heart out – you may want to start planning the prequel,' said the research team.
'Early Earth, home to some of our planet's first lifeforms, may have been a real-life "waterworld" – without a continent in sight.
'It may even have looked a bit like the post-apocalyptic, and land-free, future imagined in Costner's infamous film Waterworld.'
In the film, humanity struggles to survive after the ice caps melt and inundate the planet with water.
But, unlike in the movie, there were no fish – only tiny aquatic organisms called cyanobacteria.
A vista of the Panorama district looking down from the top of the ancient ocean crust to its base
The discovery, reported in the journal Nature Geoscience, is based on an analysis of rocks from Northwestern Australia's outback.
They date back to a period known geologically as the 'Paleoarchean' – spanning a period 3,600 million to 3,200 million years ago – when life consisted of nothing more complex than bacteria.
'The history of life on Earth tracks available niches,' said co-author Professor Boswell Wing, of the University of Colorado Boulder.
'If you've got a waterworld, a world covered by ocean, then dry niches are just not going to be available.'
It was identified from the chemical signatures of an ocean in a chunk of crust that's been turned on its side in the Panorama desert in the Aussie outback.
It is possible to walk across what used to be the hard, outer shell of the planet in the space of a day.
Benjamin Johnson inspects an outcrop in the Panorama district by what was once an ancient hydrothermal vent
It will take you from the base to spots where water once bubbled up through the seafloor via hydrothermal vents.
The researchers described it as a 'once-in-a-lifetime opportunity' to pick up clues about the ocean water from billions of years ago.
'Today, there are these really scrubby and rolling hills that are cut through by dry river beds,' said lead author Dr Benjamin Johnson, now at at Iowa State University.
'It's a crazy place. There are no samples of really ancient ocean water lying around, but we do have rocks that interacted with that seawater and remembered that interaction.'
He likened it to looking at coffee grounds to gather information about the water that poured through it.
US post-apocalyptic action film Waterworld depicts a future in 2500 where every continent on Earth is now underwater, due to a rise sea levels. This projected future could resemble an early Earth
The researchers analysed data from more than 100 rock samples from across the dry terrain.
They were looking, in particular, for two different flavours, or 'isotopes', of oxygen trapped in stone – Oxygen-18 and the slightly less heavy Oxygen-16.
The ratio may have been a bit off in seawater 3.2 billion years ago – with just a tiny bit more Oxygen-18 than you'd see today.
Professor Wing said these are 'super sensitive' to the presence of continents.
Today's land masses are covered by clay-rich soils that disproportionately take up heavier oxygen isotopes from the water – like mineral vacuums for Oxygen-18, he explained.
Nostoc, a genus of cyanobacteria, under microscopic view. Cyanobacteria would have inhabited the early 'waterworld' of Earth 3.2 billion years ago
There simply weren't any soil-rich continents around to suck the isotopes up, but there could have been tiny spots of land dotted about.
'There's nothing in what we've done that says you can't have teeny, micro-continents sticking out of the oceans,' Professor Wing said.
'We just don't think there were global-scale formation of continental soils like we have today.'
The researchers are now planning to scour other, younger rock formations at sites from Arizona to South Africa to see if they can find when the land masses we know today first roared onto the scene.
'Trying to fill that gap is really important,' said Dr Johnson said.
New research suggests that early humans in Africa interbred with a ghost population that likely split from the ancestors of humans and Neanderthals between 360,000 and 1.02 million years ago.
Homo rhodesiensis is an example of an archaic human.
One of the more startling discoveries arising from genomic sequencing of ancient hominin DNA is the realization that all humans outside Africa have traces of DNA in their genomes that do not belong to our own species.
The approximately six billion people on Earth whose recent ancestry is not from Africa will have inherited between 1% and 2% of their genome from our closest but now extinct relatives:the Neanderthals. East Asians and Oceanians have also inherited a small amount of ancestry from the Denisovans, another close relative of Homo Sapiens.
Now a new study, published in Science Advances, suggests that early humans living inside Africa may also have interbred with archaic hominins. These are extinct species that are related to Homo sapiens.
The interbreeding outside Africa happened after our Homo sapiens ancestors expanded out of Africa into new environments. It was there they had sex with Neanderthals and the related Denisovans.
This led to new discoveries. Early genetic studies of people from across the globe had previously suggested that our current distribution was the result of a single expansion out of Africa around 100,000 years ago. But the identification of Neanderthal and Denisovan ancestry in modern Eurasians complicated things.
We still think that most – anywhere between about 92% and 98.5% – of the ancestry in people not living in Africa today does indeed derive from the out-of-Africa expansion. But we now know the remainder came from archaic species whose ancestors left Africa hundreds of thousands of years before that.
What was happening inside Africa?
Insights into interbreeding have been driven by the much greater availability of modern and ancient genomes from outside of Africa. That’s because the cold and dry environments of Eurasia are much better at preserving DNA that the wet heat of tropical Africa.
But our understanding of the relationship between ancient human ancestors within Africa, and their connection with archaic humans, is beginning to deepen. A 2017 study of ancient DNA from southern Africa investigated 16 ancient genomes from people alive over the last 10,000 years. This showed that the history of African populations was complex. There wasn’t just a single group of humans around in Africa when they expanded out 100,000 years ago.
It’s a result that was supported earlier this year by a paper examining ancient DNA from four individuals from what is now Cameroon. Taken together, this research suggests there were geographically diverse groups in Africa well before the main expansion out of the continent. And many of these groups will have contributed to the ancestry of people alive in Africa today.
In addition, it now appears that there was potentially gene-flow into ancient African Homo sapiens populations from an archaic ancestor. One way in which this could happen is for people to expand out of Africa, have sex with Neanderthals, and then migrate back into Africa. Indeed, this has been demonstrated in one recent study.
The new paper provides evidence that there may also have been gene-flow into the ancestors of West Africans directly from a mysterious archaic hominin. The researchers compared Neanderthal and Denisovan DNA with that from four contemporary populations from West Africa. Using some elegant mathematics, they then built a statistical model to explain the relationships between the archaic hominins and modern Africans.
Interestingly, they suggest that 6%-7% of the genomes of West Africans is archaic in origin. But this archaic ancestry wasn’t Neanderthal or Denisovan. Their model suggested the additional ancestry came from an archaic population for which we don’t currently have a genome.
This ghost population likely split from the ancestors of humans and Neanderthals between 360,000 and 1.02 million years ago. That was well before the gene-flow event that brought Neanderthal DNA back into West Africa around 43,000 years ago – although the value of this could be anywhere between 0 and 124,000 years ago.
These dates position this ghost species as something akin to a Neanderthal, but that presumably was present within Africa, during the last 100,000 years. An alternative explanation is that the archaic hominin was present outside of Africa and interbred with populations there before they migrated back in.
Despite a raft of analyses that show that this result is not an artifact of either their methodology or some other genetic process, the authors are cautious about this result. They call for further analysis of both contemporary and ancient DNA from diverse populations in Africa.
Nevertheless, this research contributes to the ever-growing canon of research demonstrating the promiscuous, species-crossing and complicated behaviors of the ancestors of all of us.
Bottom line: New research suggests that early humans in Africa interbred with a ghost population that likely split from ancestors of humans and Neanderthals.
Nothing scares the powers that be who create the power that’s being consumed by everyone more than free power for all. Well, if you’re one of those powers, get ready for the non-electrical shock of your life … engineers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst have invented a generator that runs on air. Air is still free … right? Better start filling up some balloons, just in case.
“It’s the most amazing and exciting application of protein nanowires yet.”
Who knew there were ANY applications for protein nanowires? This is truly a ‘making something from almost nothing’ story from the very beginning. As described in an article in the journal Nature, electrical engineer Jun Yao and microbiologist Derek Lovely were actually working on something else two years ago when a graduate student working with protein nanowires in their lab noticed that nanometer-width rod-shaped proteins called Geobacter sulfurreducens (created by the bacteria Geobacter) seemed to be emitting electrical current without being connected to a power source. These Geobacter sulfurreducens had a truly humble beginning – they were first isolated in Norman, Oklahoma, from materials found around the surface of a contaminated ditch.
After further experimentation, Yao and Lovely determined that the nanowires were pulling moisture from the air and pushing it through a film of nanowires pressed between two electrodes. That push varied the amount of electrical charge in the film, which generated a charge that the electrodes picked up. The team found that between 40-50 percent relative humidity is ideal for the nanowire generators, but they can produce detectable voltages between 20-100 percent relative humidity (even the Sahara Desert falls in that range). According to their summary in Device & Materials Engineering, one pair of electrodes generates .5 volts and a string of five puts out 2.5 volts. Would that scale hold true if thousands or even millions were chained together?
Yes … provided that could find sufficient amounts of Geobacter sulfurreducens nanowires. There aren’t enough contaminated ditches in Norman, so Lovely is leading separate research to use E. coli for something good for a change – growing protein nanowires. So far, the E. coli nanowires are as conductive as those produced with G. sulfurreducens. With E. coli everywhere, how far are we from giant air-sucking generators?
“The ultimate goal is to make large-scale systems. For example, the technology might be incorporated into wall paint that could help power your home. Or, we may develop stand-alone air-powered generators that supply electricity off the grid. Once we get to an industrial scale for wire production, I fully expect that we can make large systems that will make a major contribution to sustainable energy production.”
Lovely predicts this will happen soon. The team is so confident, they’ve already named the environmentally-friendly nanowire device “Air-gen.” All they need now is funding for the development, funding for the marketing and funding for the inevitable lawsuits by the conventional non-renewable energy power companies.
Did the whale oil makers sue when oil was discovered? Probably.
It's summer in Antarctica, which means record-high temperatures, jarring glacial melt and — in a very metal symbol of our changing climate — a bit of blood-red snow spattered across the Antarctic Peninsula.
Over the past several weeks, the ice around Ukraine's Vernadsky Research Base (located on Galindez Island, off the coast of Antarctica's northernmost peninsula) has been coated in what researchers are calling "raspberry snow." A Facebook post by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine shows the scene in full detail: streaks of red and pink slashing across the edges of glaciers and puddling on the frosty plains.
Blood-red algae blanket the snow near Antarctica's Vernadsky Research Base. (Image credit: Andriy Zotov)
That blood (or "jam" as the researchers whimsically call it) is actually a type of red-pigmented alga called Chlamydomonas Chlamydomonas nivalis, which hides in snowfields and mountains worldwide. The algae thrive in freezing water and spend winters lying dormant in snow and ice; when summer comes and the snow melts, the algae bloom, spreading red, flower-like spores.
This phenomenon, which Aristotle noticed way back in the third century B.C., is known as "watermelon snow," "blood snow" and a host of other less poetic names.
The phenomenon's red color comes from carotenoids (the same pigments that make pumpkins and carrots orange) in the algae's chloroplasts. In addition to their crimson hue, these pigments also absorb heat and protect the algae from ultraviolet light, allowing the organisms to bask in the summer sun's nutrients without risk of genetic mutations.
That's good for the algae but not great for the ice. According to the Ukrainian researchers, it’s easy for these blooms to kick off a runaway feedback loop of warming and melting.
"Snow blossoms contribute to climate change," the team wrote in the Facebook post. "Because of the red-crimson color, the snow reflects less sunlight and melts faster. As a consequence, it produces more and more bright algae."
The more heat the algae absorbs, the faster the surrounding ice melts. The more ice that melts, the faster the algae can spread. That, in turn, leads to more warming, more melting, and more algal blooming.
A similar feedback process is driving more extreme algal blooms in oceans all over the world, resulting in surreal scenes like an invasion of sea foam in Spain and blue, bioluminescent "tears" clinging to China's coasts. While watermelon snow has existed for millions of years, algal blooms thrive in warm weather, meaning we can probably expect to see more events like this as the climate changes.
The year 2020 has not started off well for the continent of Antarctica. In early February, the highest temperature in recorded history was reached 64.9 degrees Fahrenheit (18.3 degrees Celsius). A few days later, an iceberg the size of the U.S. city of Atlanta broke off of the Pine Island Glacier – one of the most watched chunks of ice on the planet because it has been calving frequently and these plus future icebergs are raising the ocean level. If that weren’t enough, this week the Ukrainian Antarctic station “Academician Vernadsky” was hit by the classic Fortean phenomena of blood red snow. Are these signs? Should we be worried? Who do we believe?
“For a few weeks, the Ukrainian Antarctic station “Academician Vernadsky” has been otočena… raspberry snow!” (Google translation)
The Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine posted pictures and information about the red snow on its Facebook page on February 24. (Other pictures here.) To prevent any panic or misinterpretation of the “raspberry” snow and ice, the Ministry gave the biological explanation for the phenomena.
“Our scientists have identified them under a microscope as Chlamydomonas nivalis chlamydomonas.”
“Because, besides green pigment – chlorophyll, their cells contain also a red carotene layer, red spots occur on snow as if from raspberry jam. By the way, this layer protects algae from ultraviolet radiation.”
Chlamydomonas nivalis chlamydomonas
Yes, red snow is a good thing … at least for the algae giving it that color. Summer is nearing an end in Antarctica, so the algae needs all the red color it can generate to protect itself. That’s especially true this summer with the record high temperatures. Climate change?
“”Blossom” of snow contributes to climate change. Because of red-raspberry coloring, snow less hitting sunlight and melts faster. As a result, it forms more bright seaweed.”
It’s both a cause and effect of climate change. If anyone would know this, it’s the scientists at Vernadsky Research Base, the only Ukrainian Antarctic station, whose mission is research geophysics, meteorology, and ionospherics using meteorology, upper atmospheric physics and studies of geomagnetism, ozone, seismology, glaciology and more. The 12-person base was opened by the UK in 1947 as Faraday Station and is a center for long-term temperature studies. According to a 2013 report on daily observed temperatures from 1947 to 2011, we’ve got bigger problems than raspberry snow.
“Faraday/Vernadsky is experiencing a significant warming trend of about 0.6°C/decade (1.1°F) over the last few decades. Concurrently, the magnitude of extremely cold temperatures has reduced.”
So yes, the red snow is biological, not Fortean, and it’s a sign.
Researchers at Tel Aviv University (TAU) have discovered a non-oxygen breathing animal. The unexpected finding changes one of science’s assumptions about the animal world.
A study on the finding was published on February 25 in PNAS by TAU researchers led by Prof. Dorothee Huchon of the School of Zoology at TAU’s Faculty of Life Sciences and Steinhardt Museum of Natural History.
TEM image of H. salminicola mitochondrion-related organelle with few cristae.
Credit: TAU
The tiny, less than 10-celled parasite Henneguya salminicola lives in salmon muscle. As it evolved, the animal, which is a myxozoan relative of jellyfish and corals, gave up breathing and consuming oxygen to produce energy.
“Aerobic respiration was thought to be ubiquitous in animals, but now we confirmed that this is not the case,” Prof. Huchon explains. “Our discovery shows that evolution can go in strange directions. Aerobic respiration is a major source of energy, and yet we found an animal that gave up this critical pathway.”
Some other organisms like fungi, amoebas or ciliate lineages in anaerobic environments have lost the ability to breathe over time. The new study demonstrates that the same can happen to an animal — possibly because the parasite happens to live in an anaerobic environment.
Its genome was sequenced, along with those of other myxozoan fish parasites, as part of research supported by the U.S.-Israel Binational Science Foundation and conducted with Prof. Paulyn Cartwright of the University of Kansas, and Prof. Jerri Bartholomew and Dr. Stephen Atkinson of Oregon State University.
The parasite’s anaerobic nature was an accidental discovery. While assembling the Henneguya genome, Prof. Huchon found that it did not include a mitochondrial genome. The mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell where oxygen is captured to make energy, so its absence indicated that the animal was not breathing oxygen.
Until the new discovery, there was debate regarding the possibility that organisms belonging to the animal kingdom could survive in anaerobic environments. The assumption that all animals are breathing oxygen was based, among other things, on the fact that animals are multicellular, highly developed organisms, which first appeared on Earth when oxygen levels rose.
“It’s not yet clear to us how the parasite generates energy,” Prof. Huchon says. “It may be drawing it from the surrounding fish cells, or it may have a different type of respiration such as oxygen-free breathing, which typically characterizes anaerobic non-animal organisms.”
According to Prof. Huchon, the discovery bears enormous significance for evolutionary research.
“It is generally thought that during evolution, organisms become more and more complex, and that simple single-celled or few-celled organisms are the ancestors of complex organisms,” she concludes. “But here, right before us, is an animal whose evolutionary process is the opposite. Living in an oxygen-free environment, it has shed unnecessary genes responsible for aerobic respiration and become an even simpler organism.”
American Friends of Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv University
Publication:
A cnidarian parasite of salmon (Myxozoa: Henneguya) lacks a mitochondrial genome Dayana Yahalomi, Stephen D. Atkinson, Moran Neuhof, E. Sally Chang, Hervé Philippe, Paulyn Cartwright, Jerri L. Bartholomew, Dorothée Huchon.. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2020; 201909907 DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1909907117
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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..
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