Human cells hacked to act like squid skin cells could unlock key to camouflage

But beware of the hype: In healthy people, probiotic supplements offer little benefit, and they can potentially do more harm than good.

Studies show that taking probiotic supplements — for overall health or to counter the effects of antibiotics — can alter the composition of your microbiome and reduce the levels of microbial diversity in your gut, which is linked to a number of health problems.

Probiotic supplements come in the form of capsules, gummies, powders and pills that contain live microorganisms believed to boost gut health.

There is a subset of people who may benefit from taking them, including people with gastrointestinal ailments. Studies have found that probiotic supplements can reduce symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome and inflammatory bowel disease. They can prevent traveler’s diarrhea and reduce some side effects of antibiotic medications.

But for most people, more reliable ways are available to nourish your gut microbiome.

First, eat a variety of vegetables, nuts, seeds, beans and whole grains, which provide gut microbes the fiber-rich fuel that they need to thrive. Researchers have found that eating fermented foods such as yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi and kefir, which contain probiotics and other beneficial compounds, have positive effects on your health and gut microbiome.

Supplements can crowd out the wrong microbes

Your gut microbes are part of a vast ecosystem of bacteria, viruses, archaea and fungi located largely in your colon. People who harbor diverse gut microbiomes tend to age more healthfully and develop fewer diseases.

These microbes thrive on the fiber found in fruits and vegetables, turning it into new compounds or “postbiotics,” including butyrate, acetate, and other short-chain fatty acids that appear to be exceptionally good for your health.

But like residents of any community, the microbes in your gut can work together and compete against one another. Sometimes the proportion of good and bad bacteria in your gut can get out of balance — a condition known as dysbiosis.

Although there are numerous brands of probiotic supplements, many of them contain a limited number of bacterial strains, primarily from the groups lactobacillus, bifidobacterium and a few others. These microorganisms are quite common and have been associated with many health benefits.

But taking concentrated doses of a few strains of bacteria can upset the balance in your gut, said Lorenzo Cohen, a professor and director of the Integrative Medicine Program at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

“You can inadvertently create a form of dysbiosis by having too much of a good thing,” he said. “You’re not only crowding out the bad things, but crowding out the other good things that you want in there to create high microbiome diversity.”

Taking a probiotic when you’re on antibiotics

It’s common for people to take probiotics alongside antibiotic medications. Antibiotics treat bacterial infections, but they can also wipe out beneficial bacteria. The idea behind taking a probiotic supplement with an antibiotic is to rebalance the gut microbiome and minimize side effects. Studies have shown, for example, that probiotics can prevent antibiotic-associated diarrhea.

But one study of probiotic use with antibiotics produced surprising results. Researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science recruited healthy adults and gave them a week-long course of antibiotics.

Then one group took a popular probiotic supplement for four weeks that contained at least 10 species of bacteria. Another group received stool transplants containing their own gut microbes, which were collected before the antibiotics were administered. A third group served as the control.

The microbiomes of people in the control group returned to normal about three weeks after taking the antibiotics. The microbiomes of people who received the stool transplants after the antibiotic-treatment fared the best, returning to normal within days.

But the microbiomes of people who took the probiotics had not returned to normal even after five months. The scientists found that they also had less gut microbiome diversity compared to people in the control or transplant groups.

Different effects in different people

In another recent clinical trial, scientists at Stanford recruited adults with metabolic syndrome — a combination of risk factors for Type 2 diabetes, such as abdominal obesity, high blood pressure and high triglycerides — and then split them into two groups. One was given a probiotic containing several strains of bacteria thought to be good for metabolic and digestive health. The second group did not take probiotics and served as the controls.

After 18 weeks, the scientists found that some people taking the probiotic supplement had improvements in their blood pressure and triglyceride levels. But others in the probiotic group showed a worsening of their blood sugar and insulin levels.

The researchers say that differences in diet could have played a role in the results, but it’s not clear. The findings underscore that probiotic supplements can have very different effects in different people, said Erica Sonnenburg, an author of the study and senior research scientist in microbiology and immunology at Stanford.

“It’s a common theme,” she added. “Probiotics can be beneficial for some individuals. But it also seems that for some individuals they can make things worse.”

Fermented vegetables, sauerkraut, pepper, garlic, beetroot, Korean carrot, cucumber kimchi in glass jars. © iStock/iStock

Adding fermented foods to your diet

So what should you do? If you’ve been prescribed an antibiotic, or you have a digestive ailment, you should talk to your doctor about whether it makes sense for you to take a probiotic supplement — and if so, which brand or product. You may be advised to skip probiotics altogether if you have a severe illness or compromised immune system because of the risk of developing an infection.

Some doctors might recommend adding fermented foods to your diet instead of taking a supplement. “When I do recommend live microbes, it’s often in the context of fermented foods,” said Chris Damman, a gastroenterologist at the Digestive Health Center at the University of Washington Medical Center. “Fermented foods are like nature’s probiotics.”

One of the benefits of fermented foods is that they typically contain not just probiotics (the live microbes) but also prebiotics (the fiber the microbes eat) and postbiotics (the vitamins and other nutrients they produce). In a study published in the journal Cell, Sonnenburg and her colleagues at Stanford found that assigning people to eat fermented foods every day over a 10-week period lowered their levels of inflammation and increased their gut microbiome diversity.

If you’re new to fermented foods, Damman recommended introducing them gradually.

Try using sauerkraut or kimchi as a garnish with your meals. Have a bowl of plain yogurt for breakfast. Drink a cup of unsweetened kefir as a snack or use it to make a fruit smoothie.

“I don’t take a probiotic, but I do eat a variety of fermented foods — and that’s generally the advice that I give people,” Damman said.

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In the article referred to, a paper is considered “disruptive” when it changes the citation dynamics and is more frequently cited within a certain time interval after its publication (here, the interval of five years is used) than the references cited in the article. The study analyzes the citations of 45 million articles and 3.9 million patents. The result shows that, on average, the index measuring the degree of disruptiveness (which has a value between -1.00 and +1.00) decreased from 1945 to 2010 for physical sciences (from 0.36 to 0.00), life sciences and medicine (from 0.21 to 0.00), technology (from 0.44 to 0.02), and social sciences (from 0.52 to 0.04). Patents from 1980 to 2010 show a similar trend.

Is this drop too much? It seems so, according to the experts in the analysis, who speak of an abysmal drop in the relative number of pioneering articles, those that are the origin of new lines of research and in which there is nothing published before them on the subject that deserves to be cited (thus achieving an index of +1). It may or may not be surprising that the analysis of 635 papers belonging to Nobel laureates in chemistry, medicine, and physics shows that, on average, the index went from around 0.8 in 1910 to around 0 a century later. It seems that today’s Nobel laureates are not as groundbreaking as those of the past.

One can perhaps be somewhat skeptical about the use of bibliometrics to study the importance of scientific discovery. Surely, there have been important papers with few citations compared to others in the field and vice versa, as well as important papers that are not immediately recognized, while others have been frequently cited before their importance evaporates. However, leaving aside individual cases and considering the statistical average, it is clear that these results tell us something. In fact, they only confirm what can already be sensed by looking at the evolution of science in the last century: it is clear that science is becoming increasingly expensive and produces results of less “relative” importance and that the number of scientific revolutions is continuously decreasing.

Much has been published, but most papers do not add anything relevant or anything that sets a new trend. The percentage of papers that could be thrown away with little impact on our knowledge has skyrocketed. Moreover, the number of first-rank science articles that mark an important milestone is increasingly scarce. Some individual articles from the 1920s in physics contribute more to our knowledge than tens of thousands of the best articles in physics today because, no matter how much noise they make and regardless of the number of congresses and press releases, they provide only minor results. The golden age of the pure natural sciences (and of almost all cultural areas, in fact) has passed, and what remains now are hordes of university students pursuing careers, inflating their CVs, working to live a bourgeois life, and competing to share part of the generous budget that the States give to R+D+i. The science of adventurous, restless minds searching for truth and new ideas is a thing of the past.

Today, with a few exceptions, the businessman who lives by selling smoke dominates. This is not only because good ideas are finite—with the best ones already having been developed—but also because of the disastrous environment of management of scientific centers, politicization, and the conversion of the profession into a business. It is a business in which the work of the manager who seeks great consensus of scientific flocks is rewarded, and those who work alone to pursue groundbreaking findings are ignored. Such individuals are often treated as pretentious and narcissistic for not joining their mediocre colleagues who only seek to suck up to the State. As I have already pointed out, there are reasons for the twilight of the scientific age in our time.

In my career as an astrophysics researcher, I have seen brilliant researchers who can think of very complex problems in physics or mathematics or astronomy, but these are rarely considered. Those who stand out, those who make a media impact, and those who get professorships and an entourage of workers under them are mostly what I call “astropoliticians.” They have neither the time, the will, nor the intelligence to face complicated scientific problems, but they do have skills as administrative managers.

Research centers and universities are full of full professors who have not written an article as the first author for a long time, and few have written as much in their lifetimes as more prolific authors. However, they have supervised the work of others and have participated in review committees or in large collaborations with dozens or hundreds of co-authors of works in which two or three people do the work while the others watch or give the go-ahead. These articles with a plethora of co-authors rarely produce brilliant ideas. However, they are the result of large economic investments in new data sources that other researchers then use and cite. The citations subsequently multiply as the co-authors themselves, their subjects, and their direct collaborators also cite the work. Thus, such articles obtain more citations than articles of pure science and pure thought written by one or a few co-authors with little time for a social life.

There is an entire mafia-like network in evaluation committees that value a researcher more for their management tasks and participation in large collaborations than for any honest and productive work he or she might have conducted that required thought and was produced and published based on his or her ideas. For example, normalized citations (I.e., the number of citations divided by the number of co-authors), which would be more reflective of productive capacity, are not usually used, and being the first author is valued little more than being the 27th author of a paper. Management carries more weight than scientific work, and when evaluating scientific work, parameters that favor the astropolitician over the scientific thinker are used.

I met a young researcher, about 35 years old, with several publications typical of his age, who was clear that he would not be professionally compensated to continue doing science and publishing articles because he already had enough papers published. He claimed that, after a certain number, it is not worth publishing more and developing the lines of research one has initiated. He considered that he should devote himself to management and other activities to achieve his goal of being a full professor. When evaluators are asked about this way of assessing a curriculum vitae, they shrink back and claim, “It is written in the rules of evaluation.” Those who have dedicated their careers to the system with little or no dedication to the work of a scientist and have devoted themselves to management and politics have designed an evaluation system to suit their needs.

It is not that researchers are useless and lacking in talent for big science (we are, myself included). Rather, what pervades the atmosphere is weariness, the feeling that everything is already hackneyed in pure science research (in applied sciences, it is different in some aspects). It also seems that the only way to progress professionally is to become an expert economic manager who can get a good slice of the States’ budget for projects with increasing costs and diminishing returns. Thus, the lack of scientific quality has been replaced with pompous press releases and publicity exaggerating the relevance of each small finding.

Furthermore, with all the money obtained, departments are filled with hordes of Ph.D. students and young postdoctoral researchers who dedicate themselves to quickly producing massive amounts of routine articles to compete for a job. Since the United States and its neoliberal model dominate how science is done and impose its ways on the rest of the planet, everything is “business as usual.” The history of the West has changed since the Normandy landings, and the chicken has come home to roost, so no one should be surprised that science today is not like it was in 1945 or earlier. The neoliberal economic model is not going to make science great again.

Is it surprising, then, that scientific articles are becoming continually less disruptive on average? The statistics published by Nature merely reflect an obvious fact: that there is much ado about almost nothing. And this statistic only goes back to 2010. The last 13 years have witnessed greater dullness and, therefore, greater continuity and less disruption, and what lies ahead in the future does not look much better.

II) The expression “science and its demons” has been used on several occasions as a vindication of scientific popularization to fight against the obscurantism of pseudosciences and superstitions, paraphrasing the famous science communicator Carl Sagan, or to refer, for example, to the historical struggle between rationalism and romanticism in the philosophy of Nature. I wanted the title of the present article to refer to the inner demons of science: the scientists themselves, who are killing the goose that lays the golden eggs by overexploiting it.

The enemies of science are not outside the guild but inside. The added problems of the current social structure of science are manifold. I have pointed out the absence of innovation or disruptiveness as one such problem. Another notable problem is the restriction of the freedoms that researchers once enjoyed and the pressure to dogmatize within certain ideologies that are sometimes not scientific but purely political.

See, for example, the article ”La ciencia necesita una pizca de libertad, o más” (Science needs a pinch of freedom, or more). As noted, “for the sociologist of science Richard Merton, science is ‘organized skepticism’. One is scientific precisely to the extent that one questions the dominant opinion and looks for errors, ambiguities and counterexamples (...) An uncritical science is simply not a science, it is pseudoscience” (translated from the original in Spanish). It is added elsewhere in the article that “Those who want to subordinate science to morality subordinate it de facto to the State or some other social force. The culture of cancellation is nothing other than this: the subordination of culture through violence. The basis of the Culture of Cancellation is primitive moralism, which says: the boundaries between good and evil are simple: good is what we consider good, and everything else is evil. Whoever doubts this is the enemy. And precisely to avoid falling into this error, science needs a pinch of freedom. Or more.” (translated from the original in Spanish)

Another article, ”Científicos contra la ciencia” (Scientists against science), indicates that science, its journals, and its committees sell out to opportunistic political causes, leaving aside the sacred principles of ideological neutrality in science. The author concludes “That the fear of freedom of research, of approaching a knowledge close to reality, comes from a scientific body gives an idea of the extent to which scientists have been corrupted” (translated from the original in Spanish).

However, not all these vices of present-day science weigh it down. Rather, the opposite is true: the decadent spirit gives rise to them. The scientist of the past was often a scholar, an intellectual, and a thinker, usually with extensive knowledge of history, philosophy, and languages.

Today’s scientist is a specialized technician like an engineer or an industrial worker. The science of the past was beautiful, exciting, and a delight for intelligent, mature minds who enjoyed intellectual challenges. Today’s science is bureaucratic, monotonous, full of boring tasks for pencil pushers, demotivating, and childish. All this anodyne burden is borne by the man of science with the prospect of new trips to congresses, honorary medals in recognition of great nothingness, or economic prizes. Money and career advancement are the only consolations for those who do not expect to do anything valuable in science. The problems of science and culture are industrialization and professionalization.

Everything that becomes an assembly line lacks the spontaneity characteristic of truly creative processes.

Recently, there has been a shameless flirtation of scientific managers with opportunistic political ideologies within what is known as “diversity, inclusion, equity.” As often happens in most Western countries, there is a tendency to imitate and be second in everything, and if another country starts a new trend, we must follow it. It is the best way to be integrated into the international community and for community funds for science to flow, especially if we suck up to politicians by helping them spread their propaganda. However, it is not the best way to innovate ideas, which is supposed to be the mission of science and academia in general.

All public research organizations are obliged to remain neutral in ideological, political, religious, and philosophical debates, as well as any other kind of debate. However, I have observed in the center where I work [Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC, Tenerife, Spain)], as in many others, that, hidden behind the excuse of promoting equity policies, a propaganda machine of feminist ideologies has been created. This propaganda machine acts as a loudspeaker for slogans of certain political parties that proclaim messages about historical and present victimhood of women in science while promoting feminist ideas for social change. A continuous bombardment of ideological publicity has been accompanied by the blocking or censorship of the expression of critical ideas contrary to the established dominant ideology.

This has led, among many other nonsensical actions, to the occurrence at the seminar at the IAC by Professor of Philosophy at Lund University (Sweden) Erik J. Olsson on November 18, 2021, on freedom of expression in the academic world. The lecture reviewed the most important academic norms on freedom of expression based on the 1997 UNESCO recommendations on the status of higher education teaching staff.

Moreover, the major threats to academic freedom in today’s Western world, including the transition from traditional academic values to an excessive focus on human relations and soft values, indicate how radical gender policies in the name of gender mainstreaming have restricted freedom of expression in Swedish universities. The recorded video of the lecture was on YouTube for only about two hours before it was taken down. No legal reason was given for this censorship; rather, an appeal to incompatibility with the institute’s equity policies was responsible. For more, see the account of the author of the seminar in Chapter 26 of this book.

The issue of the censorship of Olsson’s talk has tail. Sources of documentation proving the facts of the matter have revealed that the “Women and Astronomy” committee of the Spanish Society of Astronomy Sociedad Española de Astronomía; SEA) is another branch of gender ideology within astronomy research in Spain. This committee pressured the director of the IAC to censor Olsson’s talk. One of the committee members expressed that the underlying objective was to make the IAC director feel “as uncomfortable as possible about all this.” Amid coercion and false accusations and disqualifications of the speaker and the person who invited him to give the talk [myself], one of the members of the “Women and Astronomy” committee, a professor of astrophysics, expressed her disagreement with the leftist-sectarian biased decisions that were made.

The remaining members expelled her from the committee for refusing to accept the conclusions of her colleagues—that’s how a consensus is reached today.

There were reactions from various colleagues at the IAC to the blatant and unconstitutional censorship undertaken by the IAC board, but cowardice prevailed in the end, and let the powerful impose their will. One researcher initially stood up and bravely proclaimed in an internal e-mail exchange (translated from the original in Spanish), “Where has Voltaire’s wisdom disappeared ‘I disagree with you [in what you say,] but I will defend to the death your right to say it’?” (Actually, the quote is not from Voltaire but from an author who wrote a biography about Voltaire and used this phrase to illustrate his thinking).

He saw that he did not convince the majority. Subsequently, in the face of the wave of offended little people proclaiming nonsense (e.g., letting critics talk about “equity policies” is like letting someone expound a theory about the flat Earth), he recanted and stated (translated from the original in Spanish) “despite my comment that has raised disagreement with what I said, I do not want to give the impression that I found Olsson’s talk to my liking. Quite the contrary,” thus abandoning any reference to “I will defend to the death the right to say it.” Other researchers have expressed their indignation in private but not in public. As one researcher told me, “Actually, I wish I had participated in the discussion publicly, but my self-esteem was incompatible with getting mired in that peat bog (not to say plebeianism).”

He was right, and it would have been no use to argue with a pleb that does not listen to reason. Nevertheless, this is how the plebeians and their culture of cancellation advances, sweeping away the sacred enlightened principles of our civilization within the academy with no one doing a thing to stop it. This is the fate of our times, and this is how radical feminism and similar causes thrive: some madwomen shout, and people keep quiet, fearful that the next shout will be directed at them or because they do not want to get embroiled in debates with the filthy plebs.

The research center where I work is not an exceptional case, nor is Spain an exceptional country regarding its attachment to the institutionalization of gender ideology or, similarly, the repression of academic freedom . It is a global problem in the countries of the “free” world.

In some centers, the experience in the curriculum is valued more than the experience in the chatter about “equality” and the knowledge about the science that pretends to investigate.

Ultimately, science will become totally docile and submissive to the political powers. Science will side with the powerful and become an indoctrinated science that repeats like a parrot the slogans of the prejudices that the official cultural caste establishes a priori. Science has ceased to be a beacon that illuminates the truth and has become an accomplice of dark powers, thirst for status, and the unreason of capital. Its pacific workers will continue to consent as long as they continue to support their bourgeois life.

III) These problems are not exclusive to science but also relate to academia as a whole. They are also not exclusive to our times. The weariness produced by university life and the lack of freedom has been the subject of many reflections for centuries. The academy is the place of the first degradation of culture; then came others that would sink it even further.

Miguel de Unamuno (1864-1936), a Spanish philosopher, writer, professor, and rector of the University of Salamanca who earned his living with his classical language classes, said in a letter to José Ortega y Gasset (1883-1955, Spanish philosopher), “And I am drowning, dear Ortega, I am drowning; I am drowning in this environment of vulgarity and lies. I have seriously thought of leaving... where to? But no, this is my place.” (translated from the original in Spanish)

Unamuno’s question is one that many of us are asking ourselves: where to? Is the world of private enterprise, whose ultimate goal is money and nothing but money, better for intellectual purposes? Should we set up an eco-village and live by selling bracelets in street markets like hippies?

Or, if we work as a cashier at McDonald’s, will we have the true life of a free thinker that will allow us to develop our intellect? No, we have to recognize that, within what we have in our society, universities and research centers are a necessary evil. At least they help provide and maintain a comfortable life to develop other intellectual aspirations. It is quite clear, however, that if one pursues an academic life exclusively to fulfill a task for which one receives a salary, poor would be their existence, and poorer would be the fruits of their thought.

Things in the business culture are getting worse, and we do not have to be very smart to see it. Old problems are being joined by new ones, and what was already bad is getting worse. Educational systems are also sinking in quality, which is highlighted every time an education system is evaluated. The presence of technology in and out of the classroom today makes the average student (of course, there are exceptional brilliant students) an increasingly useless being, more functionally illiterate for anything other than reading messages on their cell phones. “It is increasingly difficult to get students to read a whole book,” a university philosophy professor told me about his first-year students.

And why do I not leave science or academia? Why do I not leave the temple of the Pharisees? Maybe I will someday, but I am still here for various pragmatic reasons—where am I going to find another job with a similar salary that allows me to get up every day at 10:00 a.m. and do whatever I want the rest of the day?—and vocational ones—some of the last Mohicans among senior researchers still enjoy doing science and carrying out the implementation of ideas through their own efforts instead of doing management or directing others to do the work. Or maybe it is because of what Unamuno asked himself: “Where to?” As long as I do not find a better place...

In any case, I follow the advice given by José Luis Pérez Velázquez, a Spanish biologist and researcher based in the United States, in his book The Rise of the Scientist-Bureaucrat :

"The first advice that comes to mind is to avoid importance; do not become too important, do not climb too high in the hierarchy. The more important one becomes, the more probable the researcher will be invited to join panels, committees, editorial boards etc. If your aim is to become a very high-ranking scientist —the head of a department, division or institution— you can be guaranteed beyond any reasonable doubt that you will step into your laboratory no more than two or three times per month, and only for a few minutes. On the other hand, if you are content with being a P.I. with a laboratory, if you are happy being not tremendously renowned, then you will most likely enjoy more time to devote yourself to that most satisfying of scientific demands: experimentation, the pleasure of directly asking nature a question about one particular phenomenon and finding out the response, or, as most of times go, trying to find out the solution, for research takes a long time and many experiments fail for one or another reason; but yet, the answer is waiting to be found there, and there is nothing more thrilling for some, like yours truly, that discerning that answer in situ, looking under the microscope, scrutinising a protein gel, or analysing the results of a computation."

This is good advice for surviving the abundance of filth, and I am not doing too badly with it. In research centers we can observe the decline of the West as well as in any other place; to contemplate the setting of the luminous sun of reason and the spirit of enlightenment and continue thinking about what nature and humanity are and will be.

NOTE: This article is a translation into English of the original one in Spanish published here.

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Marie Curie (1867-1934) was often the only woman in a room full of male scientists. But that didn't stop her from being the first female to win a Nobel Prize, and the first and only to win the award in two separate fields.

The Polish-born French physicist gained recognition for her research on radioactivity, but she racked up accomplishments throughout her life.

Marie was a child prodigy who exhibited extraordinary skills as young as age four. Born to two teachers who had instilled the value of education, 4-year-old Marie taught herself to read both French and Russian. Equally as impressive was Marie's memory, which allowed her to recall vivid events from her toddler years.

In 1891, her French came in handy as the young scientist headed for Paris to further her education at Sorbonne University, where she studied chemistry, maths and physics. There she discovered two radioactive elements: radium and polonium. Soon after, she met her husband and science partner, Pierre Curie. They shared a love for science and research, which led to their ground-breaking discovery of radioactivity — the spontaneous emission of energetic particles or waves via unstable atomic nuclei. The term radioactivity was coined by Marie herself and garnered the world's attention.

For their groundbreaking work, the pair received the Nobel Prize in physics in 1903. Even though Marie became the first woman to receive a Nobel Prize, she didn't stop there. In 1911, she became the sole recipient of the Nobel Prize for chemistry for her work on pure radium. Today, Marie Curie's discoveries on the properties of radioactive elements have paved the way for diagnosis and radiation therapy in medicine.

What Are Some Interesting Facts About Marie Curie?

Here are five fun facts about Marie Curie, a radiant woman who paved the way for women in science:

1. She Didn't Have a Fancy Lab

When you think of a Nobel Prize-winning physicist, you can only imagine how legit their workspace must be. Marie Curie may have broken barriers in science, but her lab was far from glamorous. When Marie and her husband sought to conduct a series of experiments that would prove the existence of the elements radium and polonium, they needed plenty of space — a traditional laboratory just didn't make the cut. Turns out Team Curie opted to work out of an old shed for much of their Nobel prize-winning research.

2. She Was a World War I Hero

Curie helped save thousands of soldiers by developing mobile radiology units that were delivered to the front lines for army doctors to use. The portable technology allowed them to X-ray the wounded soldiers and helped guide their surgeries. Over a million soldiers benefited from the “Petites Curies," Marie's invention that came with a generator, a hospital bed, an X-ray and the ability to save a life.

3. Nobel Prizes Run in the Family

Winning Nobel Prizes was a family affair: The Curie family had a total of five total Nobel Prizes. Marie held the most, with two to her name, while her husband, Pierre, held one. In 1935, daughter Irène Joliot-Curie followed in her parents' footsteps and received a Nobel alongside her husband, Frederic Joliot, for their discovery of new radioactive isotopes. Following the family tradition, the youngest Curie married a Nobel Peace Prize winner, Henry Richardson Labouisse, who received the award as the head of UNICEF in 1965.

4. Albert Einstein Was a Huge Marie Curie Fan

Who would think that Albert Einstein be part of the fun facts about Marie Curie? In 1906, Pierre was killed in a tragic road accident. As a grieving widow, Marie faced the brutal sexism that accompanied her fame as a solo female scientist. It was then that Einstein decided to send a glowing letter to Marie in hopes of uplifting her. The note not only described how Einstein was inspired by her drive and intellect, but also that she had his full support. Here's what the father of modern physics had to say about this remarkable woman: “Marie Curie is, of all celebrated beings, the only one whom fame has not corrupted."

5. A Science Love Story

Nothing says true love like a shared passion for science. Marie and Pierre Curie were introduced by Marie's colleague shortly after she graduated from Sorbonne University. The dynamic duo soon became partners in both life and research. In fact, it was Pierre who insisted his wife be equally recognized when awarded the Nobel Prize for their scientific discoveries. Though Marie was often undermined as a woman in a male-dominated field, Pierre backed her every step of the way.

Source

The man, who doesn't want to be named, made the discovery in Victoria's goldfields - which were the heart of Australia's gold rush in the 1800s.

Darren Kamp, who valued and bought the specimen, said it is the biggest he's seen in his 43-year career.

"I was just gobsmacked... It's a once in a lifetime find," he told the BBC.

Mr Kamp hadn't thought too much of it when a man wearing a large backpack walked into his prospecting store in Geelong, about an hour south-west of Melbourne. Normally people come in with fools gold or other rocks that look like gold, Mr Kamp says.

"But he pulled this rock out and as he dropped it into my hand he said, 'Do you think there's A$10,000 worth in it?'"

"I looked at him and said, 'Try A$100,000'."

The man then proceeded to tell him the rock in Mr Kamp's hand was only half the find.

All up, the 4.6kg rock contained 83 ounces - or about 2.6kg - of gold.

After having it valued, Mr Kamp bought it from him.

He says the lucky man is looking forward to spending the windfall on his family: "He said to me, 'Oh the wife will be happy'."

While discoveries like this are rare, Australia is estimated to have the world's largest gold reserves and many of the world's biggest nuggets were found in Australia.

Source

A deep-water fish, called a Rattail, brought up as part of research into the effects of mining in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone of the Pacific Ocean.

Image: Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images

The race for more battery materials could cause ‘irreversible’ damage under the sea

In 2025, astronauts will begin returning to the moon, eventually building bases and space stations, putting robotic landers and rovers to work, and mining for resources. In this bustling new era of lunar activity, they’ll need to synchronize with each other. But so far there is no agreed-upon time system or zones, and there’s neither GPS nor internet on the moon. 

Setting those up will require developing new technologies on Earth to be deployed 239,000 miles away. Javier Ventura-Traveset, an engineer at the European Space Agency, is leading this work with a project called Moonlight, which aims to design satellites for astronauts and robotic explorers. Moonlight and its US counterpart, the Lunar Communications Relay and Navigation Systems, will support NASA’s Artemis program, and the work is raising questions about whether the moon should have a single time zone—and how that would work.

NASA’s Apollo missions didn’t need all this stuff. A few astronauts visited, completed their work, and then flew home. But space agencies’ plans for the 21st century call for a permanent human presence on the moon, potentially with people from Europe, the US, Japan, China, and Canada there at the same time. “Up to now, when you have a mission on the moon, you would always synchronize with a time zone on the Earth. But we’ll have many missions in the future, and having a common reference time is really needed,” Ventura-Traveset says. 

That poses logistical and engineering challenges and gives rise to significant political and philosophical ones. What is time on the moon?

Pretty much everyone agrees on the definition of a second. (It’s 9,192,631,770 cycles of microwave radiation emitted by a cesium atom, if you’re curious.) But that’s not really helpful when it comes to navigating everyday life. People need larger chunks of time to do things like set a clock or run a computer or know when to go to work or how long it takes to get from point A to point B. On Earth, we use a 24-hour day, based on the planet’s rotation and cycles of light and dark, to which our circadian rhythms are tuned.

But our lunar neighbor rotates much more slowly—every 29.5 Earth days. This means a particular side of the moon stays illuminated or pointed away from the sun for long periods. (On Earth, we don’t notice this lunar rotation because the moon is tidally locked with us. It takes as long to revolve along its axis as it does to rotate around the planet, so the same side of the moon always faces us.) People like Ventura-Traveset need to define what time means in a place where many of the cues we use on Earth—sunrise, sunset, rush hour, prime time—are no longer there to guide us.

Whether space agencies adopt a single time zone or several hasn’t been decided yet, Ventura-Traveset says. Given the moon’s slow rotation, he thinks it makes sense to have fewer than Earth’s 24 zones. To him, one zone would be the most practical and natural: We’d reproduce something like Coordinated Universal Time so astronauts could follow a 24-hour cycle as they do on the International Space Station. Sure, each day will be out of sync with the moon’s light and dark periods, but he doesn’t think it makes sense to have a weeks-long “day” followed by a weeks-long “night.” 

But he does note one counterargument: A 24-zone system would make it easier for astronauts from different countries to communicate with people in their home regions. After all, syncing between heavenly bodies has been a constant challenge for operators of missions to Mars. The Martian day, or Sol, is 24 hours and 39 minutes. That’s 3 percent longer than an Earth day, and it has made things difficult for the operators of NASA’s Mars rovers, who have to spend their work lives on Martian time and their personal lives on Earth time. “If the experience of continuously changing local time every day sounds like it could feel like relentless jet lag, you are correct,” Zara Mirmalek, a social scientist at NASA Ames Research Center and author of Making Time on Mars, wrote in an email to WIRED. Working remotely can have its drawbacks.

Erika Nesvold, space ethicist and author of the book Off-Earth, also asks: Who gets to decide what time it is on the moon? These decisions are often politically fraught on Earth, and they could prove to be so on other worlds. Consider the confusing wiggly lines of our planet’s time zones: Some vast countries like China operate on a single time. Others, like Iran, are offset from their neighbors. And of course there’s that perennial dispute about daylight saving time, which this year gave rise to two rival time zones in Lebanon. If it looks like space agencies in Europe and the US are imposing lunar time zones, she says, other nations could consider it a step toward colonialism on the moon.

The current effort isn’t completely limited to Western nations, Ventura-Traveset argues. For these time-related decisions, his team is working with an interagency organization that includes Chinese observers. The ESA and NASA groups are also planning to provide recommendations that could be discussed at the International Astronomical Union, whose national members include every spacefaring nation, wrote Joshua Finch, a NASA spokesperson, in an email to WIRED.

The project of setting the time on the moon is wrapped up in navigation and communication systems, which depend on precise timekeeping. After all, astronauts will need to know exactly where they are, when they are, and how to coordinate with others. On Earth, we rely on rubidium atomic clocks aboard the US’ GPS or Europe’s Galileo satellite systems. The signal from a satellite tells you both the time and exactly where you’re located. 

“If your clock is off, you’ll make an error,” says Biju Patla, a physicist at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, colourado, whose cesium atomic clock serves as the US’ time and frequency standard. A few nanoseconds off time-wise can mean a whole meter off distance-wise. That might not matter for a pedestrian looking at a map on their phone, but it would be a big deal for a lunar rover operator trying to steer around a boulder or a crater, he says.

This is where Moonlight will come in. The system may involve three navigation satellites in lunar orbit plus one dedicated to communication. That way, multiple satellites can ping Earth at any given time, and the system would be resilient if a single orbiter fails. (Because the moon lacks an atmosphere, the satellites would be more vulnerable to solar storms and other space weather than the GPS or Galileo systems.)

Most of the technologies needed for Moonlight are already available, since the ESA and NASA already have satellites orbiting Earth. But the moon project comes with its own challenges. For example, if one were to place an atomic clock on the moon and compare it to an identical one on the Earth, the lunar device would gain 56 microseconds every 24 hours. That would add up, eventually messing with the precision of navigation systems. 

This misalignment happens because of general relativity, thanks to the moon’s lower gravitational pull, says Patla. Technically, the ideal measure of time would come from an atomic clock in the vacuum of space, where there’s essentially no gravity. Atomic clocks on Earth are affected by the planet’s gravity, but they’re a known standard. Lunar time would be affected by a different gravitational pull that would contribute to the additional microseconds. Still, it’s not a huge problem: The lunar time offset is predictable and can be corrected.

There’s also the question of what orbital path those satellites should take. Most satellites around Earth have circular orbits, and that’s useful for a population that’s sparse at the planet’s poles and spread throughout the middle latitudes. But realistically, most astronauts in the next decade or two will be stationed near the lunar south pole because it hosts water ice that people want to mine. The ESA is looking into deploying the satellites on elliptical orbits so that they’ll have more time within range of polar regions. Later, the agency and its partners could add satellites on different orbits to better cover other areas, and ground stations for additional accuracy.

The satellites will use a different frequency (S-band, at around 2 to 2.5 megahertz) than their terrestrial counterparts (L-band, at about 1 to 1.6 MHz) so that their signals don’t interfere with Earth-based communications or disrupt future radio telescopes on the far side of the moon.

The ESA is planning to launch a technology-testing satellite called Lunar Pathfinder by the end of 2025, and then have Moonlight’s “initial operational capability” ready by the end of 2027, with a dedicated satellite providing limited communication services and a first navigation ranging signal. The full constellation of—most likely—four satellites would be operational by the end of 2030. 

And Moonlight won’t be alone. NASA’s developing its own analogous system, working on a similar schedule. The Chinese space agency is planning its satellite constellation as well, and some of those spacecraft could launch by the end of 2024, with the initial goal of supporting Chang’e 6, a lunar sample return mission. The Japanese space agency has one in the works too, with a demonstration mission scheduled for 2028.

These initiatives will play a fundamental role in the future of space travel, Ventura-Traveset says. New generations of spacecraft, including commercial ones, won’t need complex, expensive antennas or landing systems; they can simply tap into these. “There are more than 250 missions over the next 10 years intending to go to the moon,” he says. “We need to have this infrastructure. It will be an accelerator for the moon economy.” 

On a philosophical level, these programs represent a profound shift in the concept of timekeeping, says Nesvold. “Throughout most of human history, we have used space to tell time by, including the plants and stars and phases of the moon,” she says. “It’s only relatively recently that we have come up with this idea of clock technology, which lets us coordinate with each other without having to depend on space. And now we’re implementing this technology on the moon itself.”

What Time Is It on the Moon?

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Dr Lorena Hernandez-Garcia, who is part of the team, stated that they initially studied the galaxy because of its peculiar properties. The study revealed that the galaxy, previously classified as a radio galaxy, has now rotated 90 degrees, pointing its center towards Earth. Consequently, the galaxy is now classified as a "blazar," which refers to a galaxy with jet points that are directed towards Earth.

According to the Royal Astronomical Society, blazars are powerful phenomena in the Universe and considered to be highly energetic objects. The team's findings provide an opportunity for researchers to study blazars' properties, including the impact of the high-energy particles that emanate from these objects.

Astronomers have observed that the jet material emanating from the supermassive black hole in PBC J2333.9-2343 has created two massive lobes on opposite sides of the galaxy. These lobes are readily observable with radio waves and are among the most prominent features of the galaxy.

Dr Lorena Hernandez-Garcia explains that the presence of the lobes indicates that the nucleus is no longer feeding them, which implies that they are quite old. These lobes are considered relics of past activity. In contrast, structures closer to the nucleus represent younger and active jets. This discovery suggests that the galaxy has undergone significant changes over time, and studying these changes can provide valuable insights into the evolution of galaxies and their constituent parts.

According to the study, the exact cause of the shift in direction of the supermassive black hole in PBC J2333.9-2343 is unknown. However, some astronomers speculate that the black hole's shift may have been due to a collision with another galaxy.

Additionally, it is currently unclear what impact the black hole's new direction will have on our galaxy. Further research is required to understand the potential implications of this discovery. Nevertheless, this finding highlights the complexity and interconnectedness of astronomical phenomena, emphasizing the need for continued exploration and discovery in the field of astronomy.

What we can learn from blazars

As previously stated, blazars are among the most energetic and powerful objects in the Universe, emitting high-energy particles and light that can be observed across the electromagnetic spectrum. The recent reclassification of PBC J2333.9-2343 as a blazar offers astronomers a unique opportunity to study the properties and behavior of these fascinating objects.

Studying blazars like PBC J2333.9-2343 can provide valuable insights into the behavior and evolution of galaxies, particularly their central supermassive black holes. These objects are believed to be powered by the accretion of matter onto the black hole, which creates a relativistic jet that produces the bright emission observed from blazars. Understanding the relationship between these jets and the properties of the host galaxy can help astronomers to refine models of galaxy evolution and black hole growth.

Blazars are also important sources of information about the nature of the Universe itself. High-energy particles produced by blazars can interact with the cosmic microwave background, revealing information about the Universe's structure and history. By studying blazars like PBC J2333.9-2343, astronomers can gain a better understanding of the fundamental properties of the Universe and the processes that govern its behavior.

A window on the universe’s past

The recent reclassification of PBC J2333.9-2343 as a blazar provides a valuable opportunity for astronomers to deepen our understanding of galaxies, black holes, and the Universe as a whole. Through continued observation and analysis, we can gain valuable insights into the complex and interconnected phenomena that make up our Universe.

Astronomers Discover Galaxy with Supermassive Black Hole Aimed at Earth

Webb Telescope confirms nearby rocky planet has no significant atmosphere

The use of antibiotics leads to "collateral damage" to the microbiome, ramping up the number of resistance genes being passed back and forth between strains in the microbiome. The findings also suggest these genes spread so easily through a population, that regardless of your own health and habits, the number of resistance genes in your gut is heavily influenced by national trends in antibiotic consumption.

The rise of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) among human pathogens is widely seen as one of the most serious threats to global health in the coming decades. AMR is already believed to be contributing to tens of thousands of deaths in Europe each year.

Tracking the emergence and spread of genes that help these pathogens to shrug off antibiotics has generally been limited to samples taken from infected individuals. The majority of microbes living in the human body, however, are not pathogenic.

The human microbiome is a complex and dynamic community of millions of species of microbes, primarily living in the gut and coexisting with us. Microbiomes play an important role in health and disease, with the gut microbiome known to help with the digestion of food and the development of our immune system.

Professor Chris Quince, author of the research at the Earlham Institute and Quadram Institute, said, "Even a healthy individual who hasn't taken antibiotics recently is constantly bombarded by microbes from people or even pets they interact with, which leads to resistance genes becoming embedded in their own microbiota. If they exist in a population with a heavy burden of antibiotic consumption, it leads to more resistance genes in their microbiome."

To better understand the impact of antimicrobials on the gut microbiome, researchers at the Earlham Institute and Quadram Institute in Norwich, together with collaborators in the Republic of Korea, analyzed over 3,000 gut microbiome samples, collected from healthy individuals across 14 countries.

They then compared the resistance genes identified in samples to those found in large genome collections in order to understand the movement of AMR genes between microbe and pathogen species.

"We deliberately focused on samples from healthy people, or at least those we could be confident weren't taking antibiotics," explained Professor Quince. "We needed to see the gene profile in the gut microbiome without the influence of any antimicrobials."

They carefully catalogued and recorded the number of antimicrobial resistance genes found in the samples by comparing data to the Comprehensive Antibiotic Resistance Database, a public health resource where resistance genes are documented.

The team identified a median of 16 AMR genes per stool sample analyzed. They also found that the median number of genes varied across the 14 countries for which they had data. For example, they saw a five-fold variation in median resistance levels between the lowest in the Netherlands and the highest in Spain.

Using World Health Organization and ResistanceMap data, the team were able to show a strong correlation between the frequency of resistance genes present in a country and national antibiotic consumption levels.

"We found that in countries where antibiotics are taken more regularly, their populations also have higher numbers of resistance genes in their gut microbiome," said Professor Quince.

The reason this collateral damage is such a major problem is that microbes are constantly sharing genes with each other. Known as horizontal gene transfer, this process helps AMR genes to spread back and forth between species.

"Our bodies are continually importing and exporting microbes and pathogen strains," explained Professor Quince. "These strains are themselves passing genes back and forth, which means the challenge of AMR has to be tackled at both the micro and macro level. Given our complex relationship with microbes, we need to do more research to understand how we maximize the benefits and minimize the risks when it comes to guiding treatment decisions and developing new medicines."

Professor Falk Hildebrand, research author at the Quadram Institute and Earlham Institute, said, "We've known for some years that antimicrobial resistance genes can spread incredibly fast between gut bacteria. This study is so important because it can, for the first time, quantify the impact national antibiotic usage has on our commensal bacteria, as well as giving us insights into the common types of resistance we can expect to evolve."

The researchers plan to carry out further research—and encourage others to—in order to investigate the relationship in more countries and inform public health strategies.

Samples studied came from Austria, Canada, China, Germany, Denmark, Spain, France, Israel, Italy, Kazakhstan, Madagascar, Netherlands, Sweden, and the U.S..

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The executive order states:

Foreign governments and persons have deployed commercial spyware against United States Government institutions, personnel, information, and information systems, presenting significant counterintelligence and security risks to the United States Government. Foreign governments and persons have also used commercial spyware for improper purposes, such as to target and intimidate perceived opponents; curb dissent; limit freedoms of expression, peaceful assembly, or association; enable other human rights abuses or suppression of civil liberties; and track or target United States persons without proper legal authorization, safeguards, or oversight.

One such example was reported in December 2021. Nine iPhones used by employees of the US State Department who had worked or had connections in Uganda were hacked by spyware designed by the NSO Group. Today's executive order didn't name any specific spyware apps or the companies that make them, but you can bet the NSO Group's software would have been banned under this order.

This new spyware ban applies to all aspects of the federal government. That includes law enforcement, intelligence, and defense departments. It also bans the use of apps that were previously used to reveal US government details that would normally not be revealed publicly.

The executive order comes even as the US bans the use of the China-based TikTok app on all government devices, for suspected security issues. Some lawmakers would like to see TikTok banned entirely from all US devices, government and otherwise, because of the company's connections to China.

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The community of pottery artisans was named Kerameikos and their style of elaborately painted earthenware was called Kerameikos (Greek for ceramic). Mythology credits Keramos (Ceramus) for lending his name. He was the lord of the Keramaikos pottery district and the mortal son of Dionysus, the god of wine who went on a campaign to India.

The 11-acre archaeological site is filled with tombstones and statues of astonishing design and quality. One of these tombs is that of an Indian Buddhist monk. On his tomb was placed this inscription: “Here lies Zarmanochegas, of Barygaza, who according to the ancestral custom of the Indians gave himself immortality.”

Tamil or Punjabi Mission?

Scholars have been debating whether the mission  Zarmanochegas was a part of to the court of Romans via Athens, was sent by a Tamil King or a Punjabi King of India.

Pakistani journalist Majid Sheikh mentions in his article in Dawn newspaper “in my student days while hitch-hiking through Europe, I stumbled across a mysterious tomb of Porus’ (King of Punjab area now divided between India and Pakistan) ambassador…”History tells us that ‘Zarmanochegas’ was a Rajput Khokhar from Lahore and reached Athens along with his 85 slaves. He was honored with a tomb in Athens.

A statue depicting Buddha performing the vitarka mudra. Credit: Purshi / Wikimedia commons CC BY 3.0

As per R. N. Dandekar in his research paper SOME ASPECTS OF THE INDO-MEDITERRANEAN CONTACTS published by Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, a Pandya embassy, under the leadership of Zarmanochegas (Sramanacarya), had left Bhrukaccha (Barygaza) in 25 B. C. and waited upon Augustus at Sumos in 21 B. C. with presents for the Emperor which are said to have consisted, among other things, of a gigantic python, huge tortoises, and an armless boy who could shoot arrows with his feet.

Pandyas were a Tamil dynasty of Dravidian origin, hence, if what Dandekar mentions is right, then Zarmanochegas was part of a Tamil mission to Roman court via Athens.

Self Immolation

As per Kim Han-Sang HK Research Professor at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, South Korea, self-immolation refers to ascetic Buddhist practices that include the voluntary termination of one’s life or the offering of parts of one’s body usually by setting oneself ablaze. In both the Northern (Mahayana) and Southern (Theravada) Buddhist traditions, self-immolation has been considered a heroic bodhisattva act to end one’s life with a spiritual motivation and strong sense of determination.

Kalanos and Zarmanochegas

Alexander the Great Statue. Credit Alexander Gale / Greek Reporter

Zarmanochegas was not the first Indian monk to self immolate himself in front of ancient Greeks; long before him, Alexander the Great’s friend Kalanos or Swami Kalyan also did it.

When the Macedonian army reached North Western India, Alexander met gymnosophist Dandamis. Alexander wanted him to come with him back to Greece but he refused, but one of the Gymnosophistai there, a man named Kalanos (Indian Kalyana), followed the conqueror to the west, where he died. The story of the interview and the story of the death of Kalanos are described in several sources, such as the Anabasis by the Greek author Arrian of Nicomedia.

Mosaic Depicting the Battle of Issus between Alexander the Great and Darius III of Persia. Credit: Wkimedia Commons / Dave  and Margie Hill CC BY SA 2.0

It was in Persia that Kalanos mounted the pyre and with due ceremony laid himself down. All the troops were watching. Alexander could not but feel that there was a sort of indelicacy in witnessing such a spectacle – the man, after all, had been his friend; everyone else, however, felt nothing but astonishment to see Kalanos give not the smallest sign of shrinking from the flames.

A map of Alexander the Great’s empire at its largest extent c.323 BCE including details of key roads, location, and battles. Credit: Generic Mapping Tools / Wikimedia Commons CC BY-SA 3.0

We read in Nearchus’s account of this incident that at the moment the fire was kindled there was, by Alexander’s orders, an impressive salute: the bugles sounded, the troops with one accord roared out their battle-cry, and the elephants joined in with their shrill war trumpetings.
Details of Mission of Zarmanochegas

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As per Strabo, during the rule of Emperor Augustus, a Pandya embassy, under the leadership of Zarmanochegas (Sramanacarya), had left Bhrgukaccha in 25 B. C. and waited upon Augustus at Samos in 21 B. C. with presents for the Emperor, which are said to have consisted, among other things, of a gigantic python, huge tortoises, and an armless boy who could shoot arrows with his feet.

Indeed, at least nine embassies from India are known to have visited Roman emperors up to the times of Constantine. The purpose of these embassies must have been both diplomatic and commercial. Indian philosophy seems to have made a tremendous impression upon the thinkers of the Graeco-Roman world.

As per Roman History by Cassius Dio Book LIV “…the people of India, who had already made overtures, now made a treaty of friendship, sending among other gifts tigers, which were then for the first time seen by the Romans, as also, I think by the Greeks. They also gave him a boy who had no shoulders or arms, like our statues of Hermes and yet, defective as he was, he could use his feet for everything, as if they were hands: with them he would stretch a bow, shoot missiles, and put a trumpet to his lips.

How he did this I do not know; I merely state what is recorded. One of the Indians, Zarmarus, for some reason wished to die, — either because, being of the caste of sages, he was on this account moved by ambition, or, in accordance with the traditional custom of the Indians, because of old age, or because he wished to make a display for the benefit of Augustus and the Athenians (for Augustus had reached Athens);— he was therefore initiated into the mysteries of the two goddesses, which were held out of season on account, they say, of Augustus, who also was an initiate, and he then threw himself alive into the fire.”

The mission of Zarmanochegas was an attempt to create a stronger relationship between India and Rome, but his self-immolation in Athens astonished the Greeks, like that of Kalanos several years before him had astonished the Macedonian soldiers of Alexander the Great.

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Employees are submitting sensitive business data and privacy-protected information to large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT, raising concerns that artificial intelligence (AI) services could be incorporating the data into their models, and that information could be retrieved at a later date if proper data security isn't in place for the service.

In a recent report, data security service Cyberhaven detected and blocked requests to input data into ChatGPT from 4.2% of the 1.6 million workers at its client companies because of the risk of leaking confidential information, client data, source code, or regulated information to the LLM.

In one case, an executive cut and pasted the firm's 2023 strategy document into ChatGPT and asked it to create a PowerPoint deck. In another case, a doctor input his patient's name and their medical condition and asked ChatGPT to craft a letter to the patient's insurance company.

And as more employees use ChatGPT and other AI-based services as productivity tools, the risk will grow, says Howard Ting, CEO of Cyberhaven.

"There was this big migration of data from on-prem to cloud, and the next big shift is going to be the migration of data into these generative apps," he says. "And how that plays out [remains to be seen] — I think, we're in pregame; we're not even in the first inning."

With the surging popularity of OpenAI's ChatGPT and its foundational AI model — the Generative Pre-trained Transformer or GPT-3 — as well as other LLMs, companies and security professionals have begun to worry that sensitive data ingested as training data into the models could resurface when prompted by the right queries. Some are taking action: JPMorgan restricted workers' use of ChatGPT, for example, and Amazon, Microsoft, and Wal-Mart have all issued warnings to employees to take care in using generative AI services.

More users are submitting sensitive data to ChatGPT. Source: Cyberhaven

And as more software firms connect their applications to ChatGPT, the LLM may be collecting far more information than users — or their companies — are aware of, putting them at legal risk, Karla Grossenbacher, a partner at law firm Seyfarth Shaw, warned in a Bloomberg Law column.

"Prudent employers will include — in employee confidentiality agreements and policies — prohibitions on employees referring to or entering confidential, proprietary, or trade secret information into AI chatbots or language models, such as ChatGPT," she wrote. "On the flip side, since ChatGPT was trained on wide swaths of online information, employees might receive and use information from the tool that is trademarked, copyrighted, or the intellectual property of another person or entity, creating legal risk for employers."

The risk is not theoretical. In a June 2021 paper, a dozen researchers from a Who's Who list of companies and universities — including Apple, Google, Harvard University, and Stanford University — found that so-called "training data extraction attacks" could successfully recover verbatim text sequences, personally identifiable information (PII), and other information in training documents from the LLM known as GPT-2. In fact, only a single document was necessary for an LLM to memorize verbatim data, the researchers stated in the paper.

Picking the Brain of GPT

Indeed, these training data extraction attacks are one of the key adversarial concerns among machine learning researchers. Also known as "exfiltration via machine learning inference," the attacks could gather sensitive information or steal intellectual property, according to MITRE's Adversarial Threat Landscape for Artificial-Intelligence Systems (Atlas) knowledge base.

It works like this: By querying a generative AI system in a way that it recalls specific items, an adversary could trigger the model to recall a specific piece of information, rather than generate synthetic data. A number of real-world examples exists for GPT-3, the successor to GPT-2, including an instance where GitHub's Copilot recalled a specific developer's username and coding priorities.

Beyond GPT-based offerings, other AI-based services have raised questions as to whether they pose a risk. Automated transcription service Otter.ai, for instance, transcribes audio files into text, automatically identifying speakers and allowing important words to be tagged and phrases to be highlighted. The company's housing of that information in its cloud has caused concern for journalists.

The company says it has committed to keeping user data private and put in place strong compliance controls, according to Julie Wu, senior compliance manager at Otter.ai.

"Otter has completed its SOC2 Type 2 audit and reports, and we employ technical and organizational measures to safeguard personal data," she tells Dark Reading. "Speaker identification is account bound. Adding a speaker’s name will train Otter to recognize the speaker for future conversations you record or import in your account," but not allow speakers to be identified across accounts.

APIs Allow Fast GPT Adoption

The popularity of ChatGPT has caught many companies by surprise. More than 300 developers, according to the last published numbers from a year ago, are using GPT-3 to power their applications. For example, social media firm Snap and shopping platforms Instacart and Shopify are all using ChatGPT through the API to add chat functionality to their mobile applications.

Based on conversations with his company's clients, Cyberhaven's Ting expects the move to generative AI apps will only accelerate, to be used for everything from generating memos and presentations to triaging security incidents and interacting with patients.

As he says his clients have told him: "Look, right now, as a stopgap measure, I'm just blocking this app, but my board has already told me we cannot do that. Because these tools will help our users be more productive — there is a competitive advantage — and if my competitors are using these generative AI apps, and I'm not allowing my users to use it, that puts us at a disadvantage."

The good news is education could have a big impact on whether data leaks from a specific company because a small number of employees are responsible for most of the risky requests. Less than 1% of workers are responsible for 80% of the incidents of sending sensitive data to ChatGPT, says Cyberhaven's Ting.

"You know, there are two forms of education: There's the classroom education, like when you are onboarding an employee, and then there's the in-context education, when someone is actually trying to paste data," he says. "I think both are important, but I think the latter is way more effective from what we've seen."

In addition, OpenAI and other companies are working to limit the LLM's access to personal information and sensitive data: Asking for personal details or sensitive corporate information currently leads to canned statements from ChatGPT demurring from complying.

For example, when asked, "What is Apple's strategy for 2023?" ChatGPT responded: "As an AI language model, I do not have access to Apple's confidential information or future plans. Apple is a highly secretive company, and they typically do not disclose their strategies or future plans to the public until they are ready to release them."

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Would building a Dyson sphere be worth it? We ran the numbers.

Haunting satellite imagery shows the aftermath of a severe tornado in Mississippi.

The small town of Rolling Fork, Mississippi was decimated yesterday (March 26) by a high-speed tornado that left at least 25 people dead, according to media reports. The community lies about 90 minutes north of Jackson and like many others, is facing more severe weather due to climate change.

Maxar satellites caught evidence of the destruction from Earth's orbit, revealing information that may assist with disaster recovery. The photos show homes, buildings and other infrastructure torn to pieces by the E-4 tornado on a pathway moving from the southwest to the northeast through Rolling Fork's heart.

Rolling Fork has a population of 1,883 with a median household income of about $38,500 in 2020, United States census numbers show(opens in new tab). Roughly 20 percent of the population lives below the poverty line and most families identified themselves as Black or African-American.

The Washington Post noted that for many of these families, they have lost nearly everything and that despite commitments from all levels of government to help out, "everything that once stood for their lives is gone." Some of the town lived in rental housing without insurance, for example.

Grants for temporary housing or for repairs are available in the region, which saw wind gusts of more than 166 mph (267 km/h). Given the amount of wreckage, the total numbers of casualties and the amounts of property damage are still being tallied.

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Portions of Twitter's source code recently appeared on GitHub, and Twitter is trying to force GitHub to identify the user or users who posted the code.

GitHub disabled the repository on Friday shortly after Twitter filed a DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) takedown notice but apparently hasn't provided the information Twitter is seeking. Twitter's DMCA takedown notice asked GitHub to provide the code submitter's "upload/download/access history," contact information, IP addresses, and any session information or "associated logs related to this repo or any forks."

The GitHub user who posted the Twitter source code has the username "FreeSpeechEnthusiast," possibly a reference to Twitter owner Elon Musk casting himself as a protector of free speech.

"It was unclear how long the leaked code had been online, but it appeared to have been public for at least several months," a New York Times article said. Despite that, the NYT article said Twitter "executives were only recently made aware of the source code leak."

GitHub user FreeSpeechEnthusiast's profile indicates the user joined GitHub on January 3, 2023, and made its only code submission on the same day. Twitter's DMCA notice to GitHub described the code as "proprietary source code for Twitter's platform and internal tools."

Suspect list could include thousands of ex-employees

The leaker may have been one of the roughly 5,500 employees who left Twitter via layoff, firing, or resignation after Musk bought the company. Twitter also reportedly laid off about 5,000 contractors shortly after the Musk acquisition. There were presumably many employees who did not have access to the specific source code that was leaked, however.

"Twitter began an investigation into the leak and executives handling the matter have surmised that whoever was responsible left the San Francisco-based company last year, two people briefed on the internal investigation said," the NYT wrote.

Musk said on March 17 that Twitter will make "all code used to recommend tweets" open source by March 31, but the leaked code may be much more sensitive. The NYT said its sources indicate that Twitter executives are concerned "that the code includes security vulnerabilities that could give hackers or other motivated parties the means to extract user data or take down the site."

Twitter sent the takedown notice on Friday and asked a federal court to issue a subpoena later the same day. "The DMCA Subpoena is directed to service provider GitHub," Twitter's request for a subpoena said. "GitHub operates a website to which the infringing party or parties (identified by their GitHub username as FreeSpeechEnthusiast) posted various excerpts of Twitter source code, which posting infringes copyrights held by Twitter in those materials."

Twitter seeks “all identifying information”

Twitter's proposed subpoena seeks "all identifying information, including the name(s), address(es), telephone number(s), email address(es), social media profile data, and IP address(es), for the user(s) associated with the following GitHub username:

FreeSpeechEnthusiast." It also asks for "all identifying information provided when this account was established, as well as all identifying information provided subsequently for billing or administrative purposes."

The subpoena request further seeks all identifying information for any "users who posted, uploaded, downloaded or modified the data" at the repository where the Twitter source code was posted.

When contacted by Ars, GitHub did not comment on Twitter's request for the user's identifying information or the attempt to obtain a subpoena. "GitHub does not generally comment on decisions to remove content. However, in the interest of transparency, we share every DMCA takedown request publicly," a GitHub spokesperson said. The Twitter DMCA takedown notice was posted by GitHub here.

GitHub is owned by Microsoft. Another Twitter court filing contains the email thread between Twitter and GitHub that led to the takedown on Friday. It appears that GitHub disabled the repository less than an hour and a half after Twitter filed the takedown notice.

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A little more than six months after the failure of its New Shepard rocket, Blue Origin has published a summary of the findings made by its accident investigation team.

For a private company flying a private launch system, the analysis of this "NS-23" mission is reasonably detailed. Essentially, the rocket's main engine nozzle sustained temperatures that were higher than anticipated, leading to an explosion of the rocket.

The accident occurred at 1 minute and 4 seconds into a research flight that launched on September 12, 2022. The emergency escape system performed as intended, rapidly pulling the spacecraft away from the disintegrating rocket. Had a crew been on board this flight, they would have experienced a significant jolt and some high gravitational forces before landing safely in the West Texas desert.

Blue Origin led the investigation, with assistance from the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board. Investigators had a wealth of data to pore over, both from telemetry obtained during the flight and hardware recovered from the desert in West Texas.

From this information, the mishap team noted "hot streaks" on the nozzle and determined that it was operating at higher temperatures than it was designed for. Although the summary does not explicitly say so, it appears that at some point in the flight campaign of this booster, design changes were made that allowed for these hotter temperatures to be present.

"Blue Origin is implementing corrective actions, including design changes to the combustion chamber and operating parameters, which have reduced engine nozzle bulk and hot-streak temperatures," the company stated.

The company says it intends to return to flight "soon" with an uncrewed flight to give the three dozen payloads that were flying on the NS-23 mission another shot at weightlessness. Previously, Blue Origin said that it plans to resume human flights on the suborbital space tourism spacecraft later in 2023.

The summary omits some key information. For example, the company has not precisely said what forces the spacecraft experienced during its emergency escape other than to say that humans on board would have survived the experience.

Additionally, it is not clear what rocket will be used to launch the return-to-flight mission. The company's first New Shepard rocket, Booster 1, was lost during an April 2015 flight. Booster 2 was retired in October 2016 after performing a successful test of the launch escape system on its fifth and final flight. Booster 3, which launched the NS-23 mission in September, was the company's oldest operational rocket, making its debut in December 2017.

The company has used its newest rocket, Booster 4, exclusively for human launches. It has some modifications from Booster 3 to qualify it as a human-rated rocket. The company has also built a fifth booster that may be ready for its debut flight. A company spokesperson told Ars that she could offer no information about the next flight beyond what was in the summary.

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NORTHERN FULMARS AND Cory’s shearwaters are masters of the sea and air, gliding above the waves and plunging into the water to snag fish, squid, and crustaceans. But because humans have so thoroughly corrupted the ocean with microplastics—at least 11 billion pounds of particles float at the surface, and that’s likely a huge underestimate—their diet now also includes substantial amounts of synthetic poison. 

A study published today in the journal Nature Ecology & Evolution shows that those microplastics (defined as particles under 5 millimeters long) might be altering the seabirds’ gut microbiomes, with as-yet-unknown implications for their health. Another recent paper introduced the world to “plasticosis”: severe scarring in the digestive system of birds that had eaten plastic. With plastic pollution increasing exponentially along with plastic production, the new papers are a hint of the suffering to come.

The researchers behind today’s paper dissected 85 northern fulmars and Cory’s shearwaters caught in the wild. (Northern fulmars live around northern oceans and the Arctic; Cory’s shearwaters throughout the Atlantic.) Then the team flushed plastic particles out of the birds’ digestive tracts, looking for bits as small as 1 millimeter, and analyzed the species of microbes in the gut. When the researchers analyzed microplastics in the birds by mass, the greater the mass, the lower the gut microbiome diversity. But when they counted the number of plastic particles, “the more particles there were, the more diverse the microbiome was,” says Gloria Fackelmann, a microbiome biologist at Ulm University in Germany, and lead author of the study. In this case, diversity isn’t necessarily a good thing: The more particles, the more pathogenic and antibiotic-resistant microbes the researchers found in the gut. 

In other words, a shift in the microbiome appears to favor potentially harmful, pathogenic microbes. Significantly, it happened among seabirds that had been eating “environmentally relevant” amounts of microplastics—meaning, what they found in their own habitat. (In previous laboratory studies, scientists have exposed various species to unrealistically high concentrations of microplastic.)

This paper didn’t track whether the birds became sickened by microbial diseases, “so we can't say the seabirds that had more plastic were unhealthier,” says Fackelmann. But that will be one of the big questions as researchers try to parse what effects the particles might be having. As microplastics break down, they leach out their component chemicals—around 10,000 varieties are used in plastics, many of which are known to be toxic to life. They’re especially prone to leach in a hot, acidic place like a digestive tract. “This all paints a really scary picture,” says Britta Baechler, associate director of ocean plastics research at the Ocean Conservancy, who wasn’t involved in either of the new papers. The gut, she says, is “a very harsh environment—things can be released, and that includes pathogens, bacteria, but also chemical contaminants.” 

As microplastics tumble through the ocean, they accumulate an extremely diverse community of viruses, algae, and even the tiny larvae of animals. (An especially common bacteria that scientists are finding on microplastics is Vibrio, which causes severe illness when people eat raw or undercooked seafood or are exposed to hurricane floodwaters.) This teeming world even has its own name: the plastisphere. When a fish or bird accidentally eats microplastic, it also eats that community of lifeforms. “If a seabird is ingesting more of these particles, and it does act as a vector, then you would have a higher diversity” of gut microbes, says Fackelmann.

This might be why her team got contrasting results in their analysis: The more individual microplastics in the gut, the greater the microbial diversity, but the higher mass of microplastics, the lower the diversity. The more particles a bird eats, the greater the chance that those hitchhiking microbes take hold in its gut. But if the bird has just eaten a higher mass of microplastics—fewer, but heavier pieces—it may have consumed fewer microbes from the outside world.

Meanwhile, particularly jagged microplastics might be scraping up the birds’ digestive systems, causing trauma that affects the microbiome. Indeed, the authors of the plasticosis paper found extensive trauma in the guts of wild flesh-footed shearwaters, birds that live along the coasts of Australia and New Zealand, that had eaten microplastics and macroplastics. (They also looked at plastic particles as small as 1 millimeter.) “When you ingest plastics, even small amounts of plastics, it alters the structure of the stomach, often very, very significantly,” says study coauthor Jennifer Lavers, a pollution ecologist at Adrift Lab, which researches the effects of plastic on sea life.

Specifically, they found catastrophic damage to the birds’ tubular glands, which produce mucus to provide a protective barrier for the inside of the stomach, as well as hydrochloric acid, which digests food. Without these key secretions, Lavers says, birds “also can’t digest and absorb proteins and other nutrients that keep you healthy and fit. So you’re really prone and susceptible to exposure to other bacteria, viruses, and pathogens.”

Scientists call this a “sublethal effect.” Even if the ingested pieces of plastic don’t immediately kill a bird, they can severely harm it. Lavers refers to it as the “one-two punch of plastics” because eating the material harms the birds outright, then potentially makes them more vulnerable to the pathogens they carry.

A major caveat to today’s paper—and the vast majority of microplastics research—is that most scientists haven’t been analyzing the smallest of plastic particles. But researchers using special equipment have recently been able to detect and quantify nanoplastics, on the scale of millionths of a meter. These are much, much more numerous in the environment. (This is also why the finding that there are 11 billion pounds of plastic floating on the ocean’s surface was probably a major underestimate, as that team was only considering particles down to a third of a millimeter.) But the process of observing nanoplastics remains difficult and expensive, so Fackelmann’s group can’t say how many might have been in the seabirds’ digestive systems, and how they too might influence the microbiome. 

It’s not likely to be good news. Nanoplastics are so small that they can penetrate and harm individual cells. Experiments on fish show that if you feed them nanoplastics, the particles end up in their brains, causing damage. Other animal studies have also found that nanoplastics can pass through the gut barrier and migrate to other organs. Indeed, another paper Lavers published in January found even microplastics in the flesh-footed shearwaters’ kidneys and spleens, where they had caused significant damage. “The harm that we demonstrated in the plasticosis paper is likely conservative because we didn’t deal with particles in the nanoplastic spectrum,” says Lavers. “I personally think that’s quite terrifying because the harm in the plasticosis paper is quite overwhelming.”

Now scientists are racing to figure out whether ingested plastics can endanger not only individual animals, but whole populations. “Is this harm at the individual level—all of these different sublethal effects, exposure to chemicals, exposure to microbiome changes, plasticosis—is it sufficient to drive population decline?” asks Lavers. 

The jury is still out on that, as scientists don’t have enough evidence to form a consensus. But Lavers believes in the precautionary principle. “A lot of the evidence that we have now is deeply concerning,” she says. “I think we need to let logic prevail and make a fairly safe, conservative assumption that plastics are currently driving population decline in some species.”

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A mosquito known only by its scientific name, Culex lactator, is the latest to establish in the Sunshine State, according to a new study published in the Journal of Medical Entomology by faculty at the UF/IFAS Florida Medical Entomology Laboratory (UF/IFAS FMEL).

This species was first discovered in Miami-Dade County in 2018 by UF/IFAS faculty while they hunted for other nonnative mosquitoes. Since then, thriving populations have been recorded in Miami-Dade, Collier, and Lee counties. Scientists are concerned there hasn’t been enough research on the species and their potential disease risk.

“There are about 90 mosquito species living in Florida, and that list is growing as new mosquito species are introduced to the state from elsewhere in the world,” said Lawrence Reeves, lead author of the study and an assistant professor and mosquito biologist at the UF/IFAS research center in Vero Beach.

Mosquitoes are among the most studied insects because they can transmit diseases. However, there are large gaps of knowledge, said Reeves.

Lawrence Reeves collecting mosquitoes from a trap in South Florida. Credit: UF/IFAS

 

“That’s particularly true for species from the tropical forests, where mosquitoes are diverse and understudied,” he said. “Introductions of new mosquito species like this are concerning because many of our greatest mosquito-related challenges are the result of nonnative mosquitoes, and in a case like this, it’s difficult to anticipate what to expect when we know so little about a mosquito species.”

Globally, there are more than 3,600 types of mosquitoes. When a new mosquito is found in Florida, it could be any of these species. Reeves and his team used DNA analysis and other tools to not only discover they had found a new mosquito species, but to identify it as Culex lactator.

Culex lactator is found in Central America and northern South America and is a member of the Culex group of mosquitoes. This group includes important species that transmit the West Nile and St. Louis encephalitis viruses, but it is unclear whether Culex lactator will contribute to the transmission of these viruses in Florida.

Every year, Florida faces challenges from mosquito-transmitted diseases like West Nile virus, eastern equine encephalitis virus, dengue virus, chikungunya virus and others, explained Reeves.

Reeves collects mosquitoes with an aspirator from a site in Florida. Credit: UF/IFAS

 

“It’s too early to know whether Culex lactator will exacerbate these challenges, but the implications are often difficult to predict because not all mosquito species are equally capable of transmitting a particular virus or other pathogen,” said Reeves.

Each mosquito-borne virus is transmitted by only certain mosquito species, said Reeves.

“We need to be vigilant for introductions of new mosquito species because each introduction comes with the possibility that the introduced species will facilitate the transmission of a mosquito-transmitted disease,” he said.

The initial specimens of Culex lactator were collected in 2018 from rural sites in southern Miami-Dade County, south of Florida City, followed by additional adult and immature specimens collected through 2022 in the same locations. Each set of mosquitoes were collected from traps set by associate professor Nathan Burkett-Cadena, doctoral student Kristin Sloyer and Reeves while looking for other recently introduced mosquitoes.

In 2022, scientists with the Collier Mosquito Control District and Lee County Mosquito Control District found Culex lactator in their counties, indicating that Culex lactator has likely spread from its initial point of introduction.

Currently, Culex lactator is known to live in Collier County – south and east of Naples – Lee County, west of Fort Myers, and in the Homestead area of Miami-Dade County, though it may have also spread elsewhere in the state, said Reeves.

“Culex lactator is physically similar to mosquito species already known from Florida. It looks like other more common mosquito species,” said Reeves. “Because of that similarity, the presence of Culex lactator in an area can be easy to miss.”

Reeves and his team stress it’s important to monitor for Culex lactator as it is likely to spread within the state into areas that are environmentally suitable.

Florida’s proximity to the tropics and climate conditions make it ideal for nonnative mosquito species. Scientists are concerned about the rate and frequency of new species establishing in Florida. As many as 17 nonnative mosquito species are established in the state.

Researchers stress that the detections of nonnative mosquito species are increasingly frequent, with 11 of 17 nonnative species first reported in the past two decades, and six of these 17 detected in only the past five years, said Reeves.

The mosquitoes Aedes aegypti, Aedes albopictus, and Culex quinquefasciatus – among the most important disease vectors in the United States – like Culex lactator, are nonnative species, introduced from the tropics.

“Climate change may improve the chances of tropical mosquito species becoming established once they make it to Florida if the state becomes warmer,” adds Reeves. “Increasing storm frequency and intensity could also blow in more mosquitoes and other species from the Caribbean, Central America, and elsewhere.

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Steel is a crucial material in our daily lives, playing a significant role in the automobiles we drive, the structures we reside in, and the transportation infrastructure that connects us. However, it also contributes to 7% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. In recognition of this, 45 nations made a pledge in 2021 to strive towards nearly zero-emission steel production within the next ten years.

However, the question remains, how is it possible to produce the steel required for society with zero emissions?

A new study focused on the Japanese steel industry shows that if we are truly committed to reaching zero emissions, we must be prepared for a scenario where the amount of steel we can produce is lower. Japan has set a target for a 46% reduction in emissions from steel by 2030, and zero emissions by 2050. So far, the roadmap for achieving this relies heavily on future innovations in technology. Hope is held out for developments in carbon capture and storage (CCS) and hydrogen-based technologies.

In the study, Dr. Takuma Watari, a researcher at the National Institute for Environmental Studies, Japan, currently working with the University of Cambridge, argues that there is no silver bullet. He says that current plans to cut carbon emissions underestimate how difficult it will be to develop CCS and hydrogen technologies and deploy them widely: “These technologies still face serious technical, economic, and social challenges, and have yet to be implemented at scale. And importantly, it is highly uncertain whether there will be sufficient non-emitting electricity to use these technologies.”

We need to confront the possibility that technological innovations might not be ready in time to allow us to maintain current levels of steel production whilst cutting emissions to zero.

The research involved mapping the current flows of steel in Japan’s industry and using a model to explore how the industry might change if a strict carbon budget were applied in future. Dr. Watari explains that with current practice, the quantity and quality of steel produced would dramatically decrease under a zero-emission carbon budget.

This is because of a lack of resources and the practice of downcycling, in which scraps of steel containing impurities are used to make new products. It is difficult to remove these impurities, so the new products have different quality and functionality from the original steel.

According to Dr. Watari, “zero-emission steel production is possible by 2050, but in limited quantity and quality compared to current total production. This is due to the limited availability of zero-emission compatible resources and downcycling practices of scrap steel.”

The research indicates that with a carbon budget of zero emissions, the production of steel goods would be dramatically restricted compared to today, reaching about half the current levels at best. In this case, higher-quality steel production (e.g., sheet steel) would be especially hard hit.

The implication is clear. It is not enough to rely on a technological silver bullet materializing to transform the supply of steel. We also need to look seriously at strategies to reduce demand by shifting our culture of steel use and improving our material efficiency. We also need to pursue upcycling to produce high-grade steel from scrap steel.

This will require collaboration from those who use steel as well as those who produce it. Steel products could be made more resource efficient if they are designed to last longer or to be lightweight. Once steel products reach the end of their life, upcycling could be achieved through advanced sorting and shredding to remove impurities from scrap steel. As a society, Japan may also have to become less steel-dependent and shift to a model of ‘service use’ rather than ownership of products. Unlike today, when steel is abundant and cheap, a net-zero future will require us to use scarcer, more expensive steel resources with greater efficiency.

Dr. Watari concludes that we do need to invest in technological innovations, but we cannot simply wait for them to appear. Instead, steel users need to prepare for a world where there is less steel available: “We do not deny the need to invest in innovative production technologies. Rather, what we want to highlight is that we should look for far more strategic options, instead of simply relying on silver bullet production technologies. Placing material efficiency and upcycling at the heart of decarbonization plans can reduce the over-reliance on innovative production technologies and prepare for the risk that these technologies may not scale up sufficiently in time.”

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North Korea is flexing its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) capabilities again with a new nuclear-armed underwater drone and nuclear-capable subsonic cruise missiles.

Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that North Korean leader Kim Jong Un presided over tests of a new nuclear-armed underwater drone. This test demonstrated the weapon infiltrating enemy waters and then detonating to create a radioactive tsunami to destroy enemy ports and ships.

The WSJ report mentions that photos released by North Korea show Kim Jong Un smiling next to a torpedo-shaped object and an explosion over water.

CNN reports that the torpedo-shaped drone, dubbed “Haeil,” cruised in waters off North Korea’s eastern coast from March 21-23, running in figure-eight and oval patterns at 82 to 150 meters for 60 hours before detonating.

The Haeil has been under development since 2012, with 50 tests carried out over the past two years to test the weapon’s reliability, safety and lethality, according to North Korean state media.

However, the CNN report cites analysts that view the Haeil skeptically, as North Korea is well-known to exaggerate its military capabilities for deterrent effect.

North Korea also tested nuclear-capable subsonic cruise missiles around the same time as the Haeil test, with four missiles reportedly hitting targets in the Sea of Japan after flying figure-eight patterns of 1,500 and 1,800 kilometers.

The tests aimed to familiarize strategic cruise missile units to carry out tactical-level nuclear attacks, North Korean state media said.

North Korea’s Haeil is in philosophical line with Russia’s Poseidon nuclear-armed underwater drone, which Asia Times noted in July 2022 is designed as a second-strike weapon against coastal population centers, major cities and industrial centers by triggering devastating radioactive tsunamis.

Moreover, the Haeil may be used against South Korea’s future carrier battlegroups.

North Korean state media says leader Kim Jong Un “personally guided” a test of a simulated underwater nuclear strategic weapon on March 21, according to KCNA. Image: Screengrab / CNN

As with Russia’s Poseidon drone, observers and analysts will likely perceive North Korea’s Haeil in three ways.

First and foremost, observers may dismiss the weapon as pure propaganda given the paucity of accurate and verifiable information on North Korea’s nuclear program. The Haeil may thus be a prop meant to keep US and South Korean defense planners on edge by enhancing the strategic ambiguity surrounding North Korea’s capabilities.

Asia Times noted in December 2022 that North Korea uses weapons tests to attract attention to itself amidst intensifying global conflicts such as the Ukraine war and tensions in the Taiwan Strait. North Korea’s recent missile tests, including the Haeil and cruise missile tests, may thus signal North Korea’s intent to stay relevant in the global arena.

The Haeil’s showcasing may also aim to demonstrate the resilience of Kim Jong Un’s regime under dire economic straits and UN sanctions.

Second, observers might conclude that North Korea does indeed have the technology and wherewithal to build an armed underwater drone. However, they may also conclude it lacks the capability to produce an apocalyptic radioactive tsunami as claimed.

In this case, it is more plausible that North Korea plans to build an underwater drone that has enough explosive firepower to destroy South Korea’s vital naval facilities and warships at a port by infiltrating the latter’s naval bases. Such a drone may be reminiscent of one possible method that was used to blow up the Crimea Bridge in October 2022.

An October 2022 article by private intelligence firm Molfar notes that an explosives-laden underwater drone may have been responsible for that attack. Before the blast, video cameras spotted an underwater white object moving behind the bridge pillars.

Such a weapon is suited for North Korea’s asymmetric strategy against the US and South Korea. The latter may aim to fight a guerilla war at sea involving fast attack craft, mini-submarines, naval mines, shore-based anti-ship missiles and possibly underwater suicide drones.

Third, observers may conclude that North Korea’s Haeil is real, the country has successfully miniaturized nuclear warheads and that the US and South Korea may initiate efforts to counter such a weapon.

If so, it could provide new impetus to South Korea’s drive to have its own nuclear arsenal. This January, Asia Times reported that South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol stated that his country might consider building tactical nuclear weapons in response to North Korea’s nuclear program. He also mentioned the possibility of allowing the US to place its tactical nuclear weapons on South Korean soil in response to North Korea’s behavior.

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol is weighing his nuclear options. Image: CNN / Screengrab

Asia Times reported in July 2022 that South Korea might be planning to develop nuclear-powered submarines after the US and South Korea signed a technology-sharing deal for small modular nuclear reactors, a crucial step in that direction, in the previous month.

The move may be driven by South Korean perceptions that the US may not fully have its back in a conflict scenario and would lessen Seoul’s dependence on Washington’s security guarantees.

But Seoul’s doubtful need for force projection beyond the Korean Peninsula, coupled with practical and technical constraints in building nuclear submarines, raise hard questions about its possible quest of nuclear submarines.

At the same time, the potential marginal military value, including slow speed, loud acoustic signature allowing for easy detection and catastrophic implications of having a nuclear-armed underwater drone may ultimately deter North Korea from building it in the first place.

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There’s no better way to show your respect for a long-dead ruler than by mummifying the head of an animal, and the ancient Egyptians were the masters of this strange form of reverence. Further proof of this remarkable tradition has recently been uncovered at the temple of King Ramesses II, where archaeologists have announced the discovery of more than 2,000 mummified ram heads.

Led by researchers from the University of York, the excavation also unearthed mummified dogs, goats, sheep, cows, deer, and mongooses. Announcing the discovery, the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities explained that the ram heads were probably used as votive offerings and were associated with “an unprecedented worship of rams” during the Ptolemaic period.

Ramesses II was the third ruler of the 19th Dynasty of Ancient Egypt, and lived from roughly 1303 to 1213 BCE. Also known as Ramesses The Great, he is widely regarded to have been one of the most influential pharaohs of the New Kingdom of Ancient Egypt, when the empire was at its most powerful.

The Ptolemaic era encompassed the 33rd and final Dynasty, and lasted from 305 to 30 BCE. That such offerings were being made to Ramesses II more than a millennium after his death provides an indication of just how much he was admired in Ancient Egypt.

One of the mummified ram heads. Image credit: Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities

Located in Abydos – one of the oldest cities in Egypt – the temple was originally discovered more than 150 years ago, yet has never been fully explored. In addition to the mummified animal remains, researchers also succeeded in excavating part of the temple’s northern wall. 

According to the Ministry, these excavations will help Egyptologists to gain a more accurate picture of the structure’s design and challenge certain assumptions that have been held since the temple was first described.

A separate “huge building” dating back to the Sixth Dynasty was also found at the site. Lasting from 2345 to 2181 BCE, the Sixth Dynasty fell under the Old Kingdom and predated the rise of Ramesses II by roughly 1,000 years. Within this structure, the team found the remnants of ancient clothes, leather shoes, fragments of statues and papyri, and even tree parts.

The Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities says these artifacts could help generate new theories “about the activities and architecture of the Old Kingdom in Abydos.”

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A new estimate suggests that the world’s population will likely peak in the next few decades and will decline significantly by the end of the century, perhaps slumping as low as 6 billion people. If the work is correct, this will be the first time the global population has seen a decline since the Black Death in the mid-14th century.

The world’s population recently tipped over 8 billion. In their latest working paper, researchers underline two hypothetical scenarios that explain how the next chapter of global population change might pan out.

Under the “Giant Leap” scenario, significant improvement in economic development, education, and health will see the population peak at 8.5 billion people around 2040 before declining to around 6 billion people by 2100.

Alternatively, under the “Too Little Too Late” scenario, the world continues to develop economically in a similar way to the last 50 years, resulting in the global population peaking at 8.6 in 2050 and then declining to 7 billion in 2100.

The report comes from the Club of Rome, a collective of intellectuals who are well-known for their controversial 1972 publication “Limits to Growth.” Using computer models, they speculated that civilization will be threatened with collapse if it continues to undergo exponential economic and population growth with a finite supply of resources. 

Their new estimate – called the Earth4All model – is substantially lower than other population estimates, including those of the United Nations and another influential paper published in the Lancet in 2020 (see graph below).

Comparing five population scenarios to 2100 (United Nations, Wittgenstein, Lancet, Earth4All – Too Little Too Late, Earth4All – Giant Leap). Image credit: Callegari B., Stoknes P.E., People and Planet: 21st century sustainable population scenarios and possible living standards within planetary boundaries.

The estimates ultimately hinge on how many people are lifted out of poverty, which they see as a vital factor in global population change. 

Significant parts of the world, notably certain nations in Africa and Asia, are currently experiencing rapid population growth. When and how this tapers off, they argue, depends on how they grapple with economic development. If wealth is disturbed fairly and economic growth is widely benefited,  then we can expect these populations to peak sooner rather than later.

“We know rapid economic development in low-income countries has a huge impact on fertility rates. Fertility rates fall as girls get access to education and women are economically empowered and have access to better healthcare,” Per Espen Stoknes, Earth4All project lead and director of the Centre for Sustainability at Norwegian Business School, said in a statement. 

As well as looking at factors like women’s education and access to contraception, they also take into account the disruption of natural resources, food production, and the use/abuse of the environment. 

Crucially, they are keen to highlight that global well-being isn’t held back by the number of people on the planet; overpopulation isn’t the issue. Instead, it’s the sky-high material footprint levels among the world’s richest 10 percent that threaten to destabilize the planet. 

“Humanity’s main problem is luxury carbon and biosphere consumption, not population. The places where population is rising fastest have extremely small environmental footprints per person compared with the places that reached peak population many decades ago.” added Jorgen Randers, one of leading modelers for Earth4All and co-author of The Limits to Growth.

“A good life for all is only possible if the extreme resource use of the wealthy elite is reduced,” concludes Randers.

The full report and summary can be read here [PDF].

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We know there is water on the Moon. Several missions in the last few decades have shown that our natural satellite is not as dry as previously thought. Apart from the region in eternal shadow, water evaporates from the soil during the long lunar day. This suggests that something in the soil holds enough water to keep this cycle going. And now, researchers are confident they know what it is: glass.

Not just any glass, glass formed by the impacts of meteorites. This idea has been floating about for a while, but strong supporting evidence has come from the Chang’e 5 mission. The Chinese mission was the country's first lunar sample-return mission and it brought back to Earth about 1.7 kilograms (3.7 pounds) of lunar material, including some collected from 1 meter (3 feet) deep in the soil.

Analysis of these samples has unveiled how rich in water the glass beads are. These little structures are found everywhere in the lunar regolith (the soil of the Moon) and they act like sponges absorbing water. The research estimates that the impact glass is made up of 0.2 percent water.

"These findings indicate that the impact glasses on the surface of the Moon and other airless bodies in the solar system are capable of storing solar wind-derived water and releasing it into space," senior author Professor Hu Sen, from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said in a statement.

The work was led by graduate researcher He Huicun and it suggests that impact glass beads could harbor between 300 billion and 270 trillion kilograms (660 billion to 590 trillion pounds) of water. The upper limit is equivalent to about half the mass of the water in Lake Erie in North America.

Analysis of the water in this sample points to its origin in the solar wind. This stream of particles from the Sun hits the lunar surface when the Moon is exposed to our star. The solar wind is mostly made of protons, which are just hydrogen atoms without electrons. As they hit the lunar regolith, they can interact with the material forming water, which can stay trapped in the soil thanks to these glass beads.

Based on the distribution of water within the beads, the team believes that water can accumulate in this glass in just a matter of years. This is thanks to a process called diffusion. And, the water can be equally rapidly released, another essential factor suggesting that these glass beads could be crucial players in the lunar water cycle.

Water trapped in glass beads could be useful during future exploration as it is easy to extract. And it might not be a lunar exclusive. Other airless bodies in the solar system might also have such glass beads, rich in water. 

The study is published in Nature Geoscience.

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Producing meat pollutes and requires a lot of space and resources (water, grains…). To protect the planet, we must therefore find new sources of protein. One of the solutions is to replace, at least partially, meat by insects.

The problem is that insects, as a food, are rejected by Europeans and North Americans as inedible, dirty and disgusting. Yet, 2 billion humans (in Asia, Africa, South America) eat them regularly. The most commonly consumed in the world are beetles such as beetles, mainly in larval form (like the mealworm), lepidopterans (caterpillars) and hymenopterans (bees, wasps and ants).

Insects are interesting because they pollute less and require less water and food than cows or pigs. They also need less space to be raised and are rich in protein.

For a few years, researchers have been studying how to get adults in the West to accept insects, but few children. So we confronted children with edible insects to study their reactions.

Bugs with ketchup or chocolate?

Children may indeed play an important role in the introduction of entomophagy (eating insects) in a country like France for three reasons.

First, eating habits within a culture evolve over generations, so that young consumers may adopt new practices that they will then pass on to their children.

Second, childhood is a very important period, as food preferences learned early in life persist into adulthood. Finally, children also influence what their family and friends eat. By consuming insects themselves, they may inspire them to eat insects.

We interviewed 43 French children between the ages of 8 and 13 about their thoughts on eating insects. In a first study, they were asked to describe a child who eats insects (what he or she looks like, where he or she lives, etc.), and then to express how they felt about pictures of whole insects (grasshoppers, crickets, mealworms), ketchup- or chocolate-flavoured insects, shortbread cheese, and a chocolate cake containing powdered insects.

In a second study, children were interviewed in groups of two or three. This time we showed them real dried mealworms and a plain cake containing powdered mealworms. They also watched excerpts from the TV show Top Chef in which crickets and ants were cooked and eaten.

Children are curious but need to be reassured

The results of these studies show first of all that children think, like adults, that insects are not edible in our culture. According to them, insect eaters live in distant countries or do so to survive. Otherwise, eating insects is associated with filth or disgusting challenges on shows like Fort Boyard or Koh-Lanta.

Before being exposed to insects in the study, most children spontaneously indicate that they would refuse to eat them because they are disgusted by them. They imagine an unpleasant taste and sensation in their mouth. When we show them insects in pictures or in real life, they are more attracted to small insects like mealworms, which are easier to swallow than crickets or grasshoppers.

Insects flavoured with ketchup or chocolate are a little more accepted because these are tastes they know and like. But the foods they prefer are those in which the insect is hidden, such as cake, because it looks like a “normal cake.”

Another important result is that the children change their attitude during the study. Observing, handling and smelling real dried mealworms reduces their disgust and arouses their curiosity.

On the other hand, the children interviewed in small groups of two or three influenced each other. Some finally agreed to eat insect cake because their friends had tasted it. The children were also more willing to taste whole insects after watching the TV show Top Chef with well-cooked insects.

This study shows that children in France can finally get used to the idea of eating insects quite quickly. They are disgusted by whole insects but curious about them. Their interest may increase if insects are associated with familiar tastes or foods, and if they are eaten in a reassuring situation, such as with family, or in a fun situation, such as during a challenge with friends.

Céline Gallen, Professeur des Universités en Sciences de Gestion, IAE Nantes, NANTES Université, Université de Nantes; Gaëlle Pantin-Sohier, Professeur des universités en science de gestion, IAE Angers - Université d'Angers, and Valérie Hémar-Nicolas, Professeure des universités en sciences de gestion et du management - Consommation alimentaire et durabilité, Université Paris-Saclay

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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