Well Prepared

 

We Were Ocean Dwellers in Early Life

By studying the genetic tree of life, scientists have determined that the first life on Earth may have lived underwater, where it would be shielded from harmful ultraviolet light from the sun.

The origin of life on Earth remains a mystery, but scientists are slowly putting together genetic puzzle pieces to learn more about how the first life on Earth lived, between 2.5 and 4 billion years ago. Now, scientists from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the University of California, Riverside, have used machine learning to trace the evolutionary development of a protein-based molecule called rhodopsin back to some of the most ancient microbial life-forms to have existed on Earth. The results may also inform the search for life beyond Earth, the scientists argue.

"It's like taking the DNA of many grandchildren to reproduce the DNA of their grandparents," astrobiologist Edward Schwieterman of the University of California Riverside, a co-author on the new research, said in a statement(opens in new tab).

The researchers suspect that rhodopsin provided the battery power for early life, turning light from the sun into energy. On modern Earth, rhodopsin can absorb blue, green, yellow and orange light. (It is also tangentially related to the light-absorbing rods and cones that our eyes use to see the world.)

Schwieterman and his colleagues began by using machine learning to look for the genes that control rhodopsin in as wide a swathe of life on Earth as possible, then identifying those genes that had the longest lineages.

This analysis suggested that ancient rhodopsin absorbed just blue and green light. This reduced capability makes sense in a scenario in which early life may have originated in the ocean, where blue and green wavelengths of light penetrate deeper into a column of water than other optical wavelengths: Being able to absorb these wavelengths to derive energy would have been vitally important.  READ MORE...

Playful Cub

 

Room Temperature Superconductivity

Less than two years after shocking the science world with the discovery of a material capable of room-temperature superconductivity, a team of UNLV physicists has upped the ante once again by reproducing the feat at the lowest pressure ever recorded.

In other words, science is closer than it's ever been to a usable, replicable material that could one day revolutionize how energy is transported. UNLV physicist Ashkan Salamat and colleague Ranga Dias, a physicist with the University of Rochester, made international headlines in 2020 by reporting room-temperature superconductivity for the first time. To achieve the feat, the scientists chemically synthesized a mix of carbon, sulfur, and hydrogen first into a metallic state, and then even further into a room-temperature superconducting state using extreme pressure—267 gigapascals—conditions you'd only find in nature near the center of the Earth. Fast forward less than two years, and the team is now able to complete the feat at just 91 GPa—roughly one-third the pressure initially reported. The new findings were published this month as an advance article in the journal Chemical Communications.

A super discovery
Through a detailed tuning of the composition of carbon, sulfur, and hydrogen used in the original breakthrough, scientists are able to produce a material at a lower pressure that retains its state of superconductivity.

"These are pressures at a level difficult to comprehend and evaluate outside of the lab, but our current trajectory shows that it's possible achieve relatively high superconducting temperatures at consistently lower pressures—which is our ultimate goal," said study lead author Gregory Alexander Smith, a graduate student researcher with UNLV's Nevada Extreme Conditions Laboratory (NEXCL). "At the end of the day, if we want to make devices beneficial to societal needs, then we have to reduce the pressure needed to create them."  READ MORE...

Several Ideas

 

Elephants Walking Up a Creek

 

USA Makes Discovery Then Gives It To China

The former UniEnergy Technologies office in Mukilteo, Wash. Taxpayers spent $15 million on 

research to build a breakthrough battery. Then the U.S. government gave it to China

When a group of engineers and researchers gathered in a warehouse in Mukilteo, Wash., 10 years ago, they knew they were onto something big. They scrounged up tables and chairs, cleared out space in the parking lot for experiments and got to work.

They were building a battery — a vanadium redox flow battery — based on a design created by two dozen U.S. scientists at a government lab. The batteries were about the size of a refrigerator, held enough energy to power a house, and could be used for decades. 

The engineers pictured people plunking them down next to their air conditioners, attaching solar panels to them, and everyone living happily ever after off the grid.

"It was beyond promise," said Chris Howard, one of the engineers who worked there for a U.S. company called UniEnergy. "We were seeing it functioning as designed, as expected."

But that's not what happened. Instead of the batteries becoming the next great American success story, the warehouse is now shuttered and empty. All the employees who worked there were laid off. 

And more than 5,200 miles away, a Chinese company is hard at work making the batteries in Dalian, China.     READ MORE...

Our Universe

 

Restoring Cell & Organ Function After Death

Illustration of organ perfusion and cellular recovery with OrganEx technology. 

The cell-saving blood analog is delivered to vital organs one hour after death. 

Credit: Marin Balaic

Yale-developed technology restores cell and organ function in pigs after death, a potential organ transplant breakthrough.

Within just minutes of the final heartbeat, a cascade of biochemical events triggered by a lack of blood flow, nutrients, and oxygen begins to destroy a body’s cells and organs. However, a team of researchers at Yale University has discovered that massive and permanent cellular failure doesn’t have to happen so quickly.

Using a new technology the scientists developed that delivers a specially designed cell-protective fluid to organs and tissues, the team restored blood circulation and other cellular functions in pigs a full hour after their deaths. They report their findings in the August 3 edition of the journal Nature.

Their results may help extend the health of human organs during surgery and expand the availability of donor organs, the authors said.

“All cells do not die immediately, there is a more protracted series of events,” said David Andrijevic, associate research scientist in neuroscience at Yale School of Medicine and co-lead author of the study. “It is a process in which you can intervene, stop, and restore some cellular function.”  READ MORE...

Dogs in Snow

 

Ending Medicare

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) has suggested that Social Security and Medicare be eliminated as federal entitlement programs, and that they should instead become programs approved by Congress on an annual basis as discretionary spending.

Those who work in the United States pay Social Security and Medicare taxes that go into federal trust funds. 

Upon retirement, based on a person’s lifetime earnings and other factors, a retiree is eligible to receive monthly Social Security payments. 

Similarly, Medicare is the federal health insurance program that kicks in for people 65 and older, or for others who have disabilities.

In an interview that aired Tuesday on “The Regular Joe Show” podcast, Johnson, who is seeking a third term in the Senate, lamented that the Social Security and Medicare programs automatically grant benefits to those who meet the qualifications — that is, to those who had been paying into the system over their working life.  READ MORE...

Needing to Stand

 

Anatomy of a Marriage

 

Before you start feeling too comfortable in your marriage, you ought to give it the once over...  or maybe the twice over...  actually, you better start paying attention to what is taking place before it is too late...

Whether you want to admit it or not, IN EVERY MARRIAGE, one spouse is always more dominant...  and I don't mean that in a sexual way but in a controlling way...

In other words, one spouse needs the other spouse more than the other spouse needs the one spouse.

It does not matter who this controlling person is as it can be either MALE or FEMALE...  it just depends on their personality.

If you are in a marriage where only the male is working as was the case with my parents...  then that male is usually the controlling one...  consequently, the wife needs the husband more than the husband needs the wife.

If both the male and the female are working, then the female is usually the controlling one, especially if she has fashion model beauty.  Another area that you should look at if the wife has incredible beauty is...  does she take sexual intercourse for granted...  in that does she try to screw your eyeballs out, or just lay there without doing much of anything...

I can just about guarantee that the female is dominant and controlling if she has to get on top of the male in order to orgasm...  that claim or assertion is simply not true, and she gets on top to show who is boss.  However, this is not true, if the male asks her to get on top.

A sure sign of dominance happens when the female says:  IF MOMMA AINT HAPPY THEN NOBODY IS HAPPY...

It is simply impossible for there to be two BOSSES in a marriage...  only one is boss...  and, once you have determined that...  then you can assume that the BOSS needs you less than you need the BOSS...  the BOSS may not articulate that sentiment, but that sentiment is inside their head and part of their personality and will surface if their position comes under scrutiny or if they feel threatened.

Make sure that everything that you own is JOINT PROPERTY regardless of whose name appears on the title or the legal documents.  JOINT PROPERTY is owned 50/50 in the eyes of the law.

In the past, this dominant person has been the MALE but with so many females entering the workforce and receiving a college education, and not having children, they are beginning to show their dominant sides, and believe me, they can get down in the gutter and be really dirty to protect their identities and power.

Especially dangerous are females who have been sexually abused and no longer trust any male, even the one they eventually marry.   Most of these women will not share their experiences with their spouses...

Sunday Morning

This is the first Sunday in August and we have 3 more of them just like this one...  but is Sunday the beginning or the ending of the week?  I guess it depends on one's upbringing...  my upbringing had Sundays ending the week but most of the Baptists here in East TN, see Sunday as the beginning of the week...  All in all, I am not sure if it really makes any difference at all, especially if you are retired like I am.

June and July went by really quickly so I am assuming August will follow suit and before long we'll be shoveling snow instead of shit like most of us do at work.

I know that Sundays should not be a day of worry especially since some of us have already turned over that task to God...  but, God cannot help us with China and China has got me really worried.

Their army is bigger than our army and they do not accept trans into the army.  Their navy is bigger than our navy and they are trying to build up their air force and supply of nuclear weapons...  however, I really don't think any leader is really going to use nuclear weapons unless it is Kim Jong Un in North Korea or what's his name in Iran.

Despite what you have heard or perhaps not heard, there are people in this country who believe that some of us can survive a nuclear attack.  That ability to survive will take place underground, and our government has already decided that only the ELITE AND SMART will be saved.

What that means is...  if you ever hear on the news that a nuclear bomb is headed towards the USA, then you better smoke your last joint because very shortly your ass and others are going to be blown to hell...  if you are not in that zone, then you have a few weeks before the radiation kills you...  and that death will not be pleasant.

But yes...  China worries me...  I guess that began when I heard that Xi Jinping wants to conquer the world before he dies...  He wants to conquer all the militaries and all the economies...  but, I think that first, he is going to dick around with Taiwan...  and, he will do this before the election in 2024 while Joe Biden is still President...  

I believe that Xi Jinping believes that Biden won't do shit if he starts dicking around with Taiwan.  I am not sure if its because Biden has connections with businesses in China...  but, I am sure it's because Biden is perceived as being a weak leader.

I am too old to learn Mandarin Chinese but I believe that you better look into it because if Xi Jinping takes over the USA, he ain't gonna want to speak English...

Incoming Wave

 

Karahan Tepe

KARAHAN TEPE, KNOWN LOCALLY AS “KEÇILITEPE”, IS A PREHISTORIC SITE IN AN UPLAND AREA OF THE TEKTEK MOUNTAINS IN THE SOUTHEASTERN ANATOLIA REGION OF TURKEY, KNOWN AS THE TAŞ TEPELER.

Taş Tepeler contains a collection of ancient monuments that includes the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Göbekli Tepe, for which Karahan Tepe is often referred to as its sister site.

Karahan Tepe was first discovered in 1997, but the first systematic survey was carried out in 2000 that revealed basin-like pools carved in bedrock, and a considerable number of chisels and adzes, beads, stone pot fragments, grind stones and pestles.

The discovery of arrowheads, scrapers, perforators, blades, and stone tools made from flint, or obsidian, suggests that the inhabitants mainly survived through hunter-gathering or animal husbandry, unlike most Neolithic settlements which relied on agriculture (evidenced by the lack of farmed vegetation in situ).

The finds also suggest that the site was active during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period (10,000 – 6,500 BC), corresponding with contemporary sites such as Sefer Tepe, 15km north, Sanlıurfa-Yenimahalle, 63km west, and Göbekli Tepe, 40km west.  READ MORE...

Classic Sunday Morning Newspaper Cartoons

 

Pinch Skin to See if Dehydrated

Your body offers all sorts of clues about what’s going on inside it — if you know where to look.

When it comes to being dehydrated, a quick skin pinch can be one way to find out if you’re losing more fluids than you’re taking in. 

That's a danger on scorching August days when huge parts of the country are under heat advisories. 

The heat index is expected to reach 100 degrees or more in Texas, Ohio, Oklahoma and several other states on Wednesday.

Dehydration means your body doesn’t have enough fluids to work properly, a potentially life-threatening condition, the National Library of Medicine warned.

It can sneak up on you, so a verified TikTok user who identifies himself as Dr. Karan Raj, a surgical doctor with the U.K.'s National Health Service, posted a video pointing to the skin pinch, or skin turgor test, as a way of checking.  READ MORE...

Making Art

 

Giant Dinosaurs Had Tiny Arms

An international team that includes a University of Minnesota Twin Cities researcher has 

discovered a new big, meat-eating dinosaur, dubbed Meraxes gigas (illustrated above), that 

provides clues about the evolution and anatomy of predatory dinosaurs such as the 

Carcharodontosaurus and Tyrannosaurus rex. Credit: Jorge A Gonzalez

Discovery provides insight into the evolution and anatomy of big, carnivorous dinosaurs.

Researchers discovered a new huge, meat-eating dinosaur, dubbed Meraxes gigas. The new dinosaur provides fascinating clues about the evolution and biology of dinosaurs such as the Carcharodontosaurus and Tyrannosaurus rex—particularly, why these creatures had such large skulls and tiny arms.

The study was co-led by University of Minnesota Twin Cities researcher Peter Makovicky and Argentinean colleagues Juan Canale and Sebastian Apesteguía and was published in Current Biology, a peer-reviewed scientific biology journal.


Initially discovered in Patagonia in 2012, scientists have spent the last several years extracting, preparing, and analyzing the Meraxes specimen. The dinosaur is part of the Carcharodontosauridae family. 

This group of giant carnivorous theropods also includes Giganotosaurus, one of the largest known meat-eating dinosaurs and one of the reptilian stars of the recently released “Jurassic World: Dominion” movie.

Though not the largest among carcharodontosaurids, Meraxes was still an imposing animal measuring around 36 feet (11 meters) from snout to tail tip and weighing approximately 9,000 pounds (4,000 kg). 

The researchers recovered the Meraxes, alongside other dinosaurs including several long-necked sauropod specimens, from rocks that are around 90-95 million years old.  READ MORE...