Saturday, August 20
Self Sustaining Nuclear Fusion
Scientists have confirmed that last year, for the first time in the lab, they achieved a fusion reaction that self-perpetuates (instead of fizzling out) – bringing us closer to replicating the chemical reaction that powers the Sun.
However, they aren't exactly sure how to recreate the experiment.
Nuclear fusion occurs when two atoms combine to create a heavier atom, releasing a huge burst of energy in the process.
It's a process often found in nature, but it's very difficult to replicate in the lab because it needs a high-energy environment to keep the reaction going.
The Sun generates energy using nuclear fusion – by smashing hydrogen atoms together to create helium.
Supernovae – exploding suns – also leverage nuclear fusion for their cosmic firework displays. The power of these reactions is what creates heavier molecules like iron.
In artificial settings here on Earth, however, heat and energy tend to escape through cooling mechanisms such as x-ray radiation and heat conduction.
To make nuclear fusion a viable energy source for humans, scientists first have to achieve something called 'ignition', where the self-heating mechanisms overpower all the energy loss.
Once ignition is achieved, the fusion reaction powers itself.
In 1955, physicist John Lawson created the set of criteria, now known as the 'Lawson-like ignition criteria', to help recognize when this ignition took place. READ MORE...
Native American Mound Builders
NATIVE AMERICAN CULTURES IN THE REGION OF THE GREAT LAKES, THE OHIO RIVER VALLEY, AND THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER VALLEY, CONSTRUCTED LARGE CHARACTERISTIC MOUND EARTHWORKS OVER A PERIOD OF MORE THAN 5,000 YEARS IN THE UNITED STATES.
19th century academics theorised that the Native Americans were too primitive to be associated with the mounds, instead, implying that they belonged to a lost culture that disappeared before the arrival of Columbus in 1492.
One of the earliest theories suggested that the mound builders were Norse in origin, who settled in the Americas and migrated south to become the Toltecs in Tula, Mexico. Later theories have connected them with descendants of the Israelites, the Ancient Egyptians, Welsh, Irish, Polynesians, Greeks, Chinese, Phoenicians, and even crossing into the realm of pseudo-science by implying an association with the lost continent of Atlantis.
Proper academic studies have shown that the mounds were built by Native American cultures over a period that spanned from around 3500 BC to the 16th century AD, that includes part of the Archaic Period (8000 to 1000 BC), Woodland Period (1000 BC to AD 1000) and the Mississippian Period (800 AD to 1600 AD).
One of the earliest mound complexes was built at Watson Brake in Louisiana around 3500 BC during the Archaic Period. The site was developed over centuries by a pre-agricultural, pre-ceramic, hunter-gatherer society, who occupied the site on a seasonal basis. The builders constructed an arrangement of eleven earthwork mounds around 7.6 metres in height, connected by ridges to form an oval shaped complex. READ MORE...
Friday, August 19
Ancient Writing Finally Deciphered
(photo credit: ITSIK MAROM)
The ancient language of Linear Elamite may have finally been deciphered, according to a peer-reviewed paper recently published in the journal Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie (Journal of Assyriology and Near Eastern Archaeology).
The findings, based on a set of ancient silver vessels, propose a new method for decoding Linear Elamite's symbols, according to the Smithsonian magazine.
“This is one of the major archaeological discoveries of the last decades,” said Massimo Vidale, an archaeologist at the University of Padua who was not involved in the research. “It was based on the same approach of Champollion’s breakthrough – identifying and reading phonetically the names of kings.”
The language originates in the 5000-year-old city of Susa, in what today is southwestern Iran. An ancient urban oasis and the capital of Elam, Susa was one of the first places to use written symbols in its bustling society.
French archeologists in the early 20th century uncovered the first evidence of a writing system nearly as old, or older, than Sumerian cuneiform that used a different set of symbols.
The system appeared to have fallen out of use, but after a few hundred years a new written language popped up which scholars have named Linear Elamite. The previous Elamite writing system was called Proto-Elamite. READ MORE...
Alleged Mafia Gambling Hangout
Sal's Shoe Repair in Merrick, New York, was doing more than fixing heels and worn soles.
The Genovese organized crime family operated an illegal gambling operation out of the shop, generating "substantial revenue," which was then laundered through cash transfers, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said.
Nine purported members and associates of the Genovese and Bonanno organized crime families were charged Tuesday with racketeering and illegal gambling offenses for running gambling parlors out of other legitimate-seeming establishments in Queens and on Long Island, including a coffee bar and La Nazionale Soccer Club.
Salvatore Rubino, 58, known as "Sal the Shoemaker," was among those arrested, prosecutors said.
A Nassau County police detective, Hector Rosario, is also among the defendants. He allegedly accepted money from the Bonanno family in exchange for offering to arrange police raids of competing gambling locations, according to the indictment. He is charged with obstructing a grand jury investigation and lying to the FBI. READ MORE...
Thursday, August 18
Early Church by Sea of Galilee
The mosaic more than 1,500 years old cites the church’s donor and a plea for intercession that shores up the case of el-Araj as Bethsaida and the basilica as the Church of the Apostles
An inscription with a plea to St. Peter found at the archaeological site of el-Araj strongly supports the case that this is the lost city of Bethsaida and that the basilica there is the Church of the Apostles, a discovery likely to further buoy Christian tourism at the Sea of Galilee.
The mosaic was filthy, as is the case with inscriptions buried in silt for more than 1,500 years. Cleaning it off in the blistering heat of this summer’s excavation season at el-Araj – right by the Ottoman mansion Beit HaBek – was the season’s highlight, say archaeologists Prof. Mordechai Aviam and Prof. R. Steven Notley.
El-Araj is on the northern shore of the Sea of Galilee and isn’t the only candidate for the biblical village of Bethsaida on which the Roman polis of Julias arose.
The New Testament is inconsistent about the abode of Peter and his brother Andrew, but the evidence points to Bethsaida as their home, not the fishing village of Capernaum, many researchers say. READ MORE...
Red Star Betelgeuse Had Explosion
NASA Says Restless Red Giant Star Betelgeuse Had an Unprecedented Explosion
Its famous dimming event from a few years ago turns out to be evidence of a recent explosion rather than an imminent supernova.
Massive red supergiant star Betelgeuse is at the end of its life span, at least on cosmic timescales, but the gargantuan fireball is going out kicking and screaming.
Astronomers used NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and other observatories to determine that the senior star actually blew off part of its surface in 2019.
"We've never before seen a huge mass ejection of the surface of a star. We are left with something going on that we don't completely understand," Andrea Dupree, from the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, said in a statement.
"It's a totally new phenomenon that we can observe directly and resolve surface details with Hubble. We're watching stellar evolution in real time." READ MORE...
Prehistoric Grave Contains Gold Rings
ARCHAEOLOGISTS HAVE UNCOVERED A PREHISTORIC GRAVE CONTAINING 169 GOLD RINGS NEAR THE BIHARIA COMMUNE IN BIHOR COUNTY, CRIȘANA, ROMANIA.
The discovery was made during construction works for a new road that connects the city of Oradea with the A3 highway.
Excavations were conducted from march till the end of June by a multi-national team representing institutions from across Romania and Hungary, revealing three sites from the Neolithic Period, two from the middle to late Bronze Age, two from the Roman Period, and two sites from the Middle Ages.
In a press release announced by the Tarii Crisurilor Museum, archaeologists excavating near Biharia found the grave of a woman belonging to the Tiszapolgár culture.
The Tiszapolgár culture (4500–4000 BC), was an Eneolithic archaeological culture of the Great Hungarian Plain, the Banat, Crișana and Transylvania, Eastern Slovakia, and the Ukrainian Zakarpattia Oblast in Central Europe. READ MORE...
Wednesday, August 17
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