Gleanings of the Week Ending April 20, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Tax Burden by State – A comparison done by WalletHub that compared the 50 states on 3 types of taxes - property taxes, individual income taxes, and sales and excise taxes - as a share of total personal income in the state.

See a Restored Ancient Roman Helmet—and Two Shiny New Replicas – 2,000-year-old helmet made of silver-gilded iron.

Solar Savings in the US – Looking at the numbers….

Feral Hogs to Be Removed from Congaree National Park – My husband and I visited Congaree in 2008 and I vividly remember the feral hogs. Evidently action is being taken to remove them. They have become a pervasive problem to both the park and surrounding landowners, routinely causing widespread damage to land and water resources both within and outside of the park. Recent observations have shown that they have begun to cause more extensive damage to areas near the Harry Hampton Visitor Center, including areas where synchronous fireflies are active and where restoration of longleaf pine is ongoing.

What four decades of canned salmon reveal about marine food webs - The cans contained fillets from four salmon species, all caught over a 42-year period in the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay. Researchers dissected the preserved fillets from 178 cans and counted the number of anisakid roundworms -- a common, tiny marine parasite -- within the flesh. The parasites were killed by the canning process but still visible… counting them is one way to gauge how well a marine ecosystem is doing.

Texas Solar Power Growth Changing the Shape of Daily Electricity Supply in ERCOT – Looking at the changes between 2022 and 2023…easy to see graphically.

Functional capacity in old age is like an ecosystem that may collapse when disrupted - In old age, a tighter interlinkage between different domains of functional capacity may indicate a loss of system resilience. When functional capacity domains are tightly interconnected, a disruption in one domain can affect others and lead to a collapse in functioning.

Ming Dynasty Tomb Found in China's Xinfu District – Part of excavations before nearby highway construction begins.

I spy with my speedy eye: Scientists discover speed of visual perception ranges widely in humans - The rate with which we perceive the world is known as our "temporal resolution." Though our visual temporal resolution is quite stable from day to day in general, a post-hoc analysis did suggest that there may be slightly more variation over time within females than within males.

Study Reveals Vast Networks of ‘Ghost Roads’ in Asian Rainforests - An extensive analysis of satellite imagery has uncovered thousands of miles of unmapped roads slicing through Asia’s tropical rainforests - “ghost roads” may be laid down by miners, loggers, poachers, drug traffickers, and land grabbers, often illegally.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 30, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Floating Solar Array Is Designed to Take the Rough Stuff - Rich opportunities for solar co-location with offshore wind. By combining floating solar with offshore wind farms and thereby leveraging the same energy infrastructure and export cables, the resulting energy production capacity per used area could be drastically improved. Prototype has been developed…should be in the water by June 2024.

Lessons In Rewilding the Scottish Highlands – Working with nature…increasing biodiversity…reducing monoculture.

Five Shocking Animal Hybrids That Truly Exist in Nature, From Narlugas to Grolar Bears to Coywolves – I’ve heard about a few of these…the pictures were interesting.

Pregnancy advances your ‘biological’ age — but giving birth turns it back - Brewing a baby leads to changes in the distribution of certain chemical markers on a pregnant person’s DNA — changes similar to those that are a hallmark of getting older. But new research shows that, several months after a person gives birth, the chemical patterns revert to an earlier state.

Did You Know Sandhill Cranes Dye Their Feathers? – The birds rub iron rich mud onto their feathers…staining them. And some trivia about sandhill cranes at the Platte River (Nebraska) in the early spring:

• The birds find a lot of waste corn in farm fields, as well as small invertebrates in marshes near the river. A crane can add 20 percent to its weight during two or three weeks in the area.

• At night, the cranes move to the Platte River for safe roosting in the shallow water.

• Sandhill cranes are the most numerous of the world’s crane species.

• In the Central Flyway, more than 500,000 cranes – more than 80 percent of their population.

The heat index -- how hot it really feels -- is rising faster than temperature - Researchers looked at Texas's summer 2023 heat wave and found that the 3 degree F rise in global temperatures has increased the state's heat index as much as 11 degrees F on the hottest days! Arizona's most populous county, covering most of Phoenix, reported that heat-associated deaths last year were 50% higher than in 2022, rising from 425 in 2022 to 645 in 2023. Two-thirds of Maricopa County's heat-related deaths in 2023 were of people 50 years or older, and 71% occurred on days when the National Weather Service had issued an excessive heat warning. With climate change, the relative humidity remains about constant as the temperature increases, which reduces the effectiveness of sweating to cool the body.

158 Cherry Blossom Trees Will Be Cut Down in D.C. in Effort to Withstand Sea-Level Rise – Part of the project to reconstruct a seawall around the Tidal Basin.

Landscape Architecture Strategies Reduce Impacts of Dangerous Extreme Heat – And these apply to what we do in our yard too!

• Increase tree percentage in parks and green spaces

• Provide shade on sites

• Use plant materials and water instead of hardscape

• Switch to green ground cover, including grasses and shrubs

Plastics Contain Thousands More Chemicals Than Thought, and Most Are Unregulated – Scary! The report also highlights 15 chemical priority groups of concern. These include phthalates, which are used to make plastics more durable and have been found to affect the reproductive systems of animals, as well as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which break down very slowly over time and have been linked to health issues including reproductive and developmental problems and increased cancer risk.

Only seven nations meet WHO air pollution standards – The US is not one of the seven: Australia, Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Iceland, Mauritius and New Zealand. Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Tajikistan and Burkina Faso were the top five most polluted countries in 2023 with PM2.5 levels nine to 15 times higher than the WHO's standard. Columbus, Ohio, was the most polluted major city in the United States, while Las Vegas was the cleanest and Beloit, Wisconsin polluted U.S. city overall.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 16, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Heat Pumps Are Still a Good Investment Even If Your Grid Is Powered By Coal - If every American home with gas, oil, or inefficient electric resistance heating swap those things out for heat pumps, the emissions of the entire U.S. economy would shrink by 5% to 9%. That’s how powerful a decarbonizing tool heat pumps are.

Asian Elephants Bury Their Dead - In India, five dead elephant calves were found buried on their backs in irrigation ditches, with evidence that multiple herd members had participated in the burials. Are there more examples? It doesn’t seem likely that elephants would be able to move an adult elephant like they did the calves. Do they do something else with the carcass rather than burial?

COVID-19 virus can stay in the body more than a year after infection – So – if it persists in blood, should these people not be donating blood? Does this mean that people could get COVID from a blood transfusion?

Archeoastronomy uses the rare times and places of previous total solar eclipses to help us measure history – What we learn from historical eclipses….a timely history lesson with the 4/8 total eclipse that will be visible from much of the US coming soon.

An Eruption for Galápagos Iguanas – The La Cumbre volcano is erupting in the Galapagos. Some satellite views from NASA including a description of the instrumentation available to monitor this eruption.

An obsessed insect hunter: The creepy-crawly origins of daylight savings – We did it again last weekend…changed to daylight savings time. I wish we could stop (don’t care whether we stay permanently on standard or daylight savings…just that we don’t change) but we don’t seem to be able to stop. This post is about George Hudson…and his desire for more daylight after work to study insects! I’ll browse some of his books on Internet Archive.

Solar Accounted for More Than Half of New Power Installed in U.S. Last Year - Solar accounted for most of the capacity the nation added to its electric grids last year. That feat marks the first time since World War II, when hydropower was booming, that a renewable power source has comprised more than half of the nation’s energy additions. Texas and California led a solar surge driven mostly by utility-scale installations, which jumped 77 percent year-over-year to 22.5 gigawatts. The residential and commercial sectors also reached new milestones. The biggest open question is how quickly projects can connect to the grid.

An inside look at Beech tree disease – A fast spreading disease….killing another tree species. It hasn’t been that long ago that Emerald Ash Borer wiped out the ash trees. We were just noticing sickly beeches in Maryland before we moved…realizing that the forests would be profoundly changed without beech trees.

Professional Photographer Shares How to Photograph the Great North American Solar Eclipse Safely – Time to start preparing for 4/8/2024!

America’s Sinking East Coast – There are multiple reasons that areas are sinking faster than melting ice and thermal expansion from climate change would cause.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 24, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Surprisingly vibrant color of 12-million-year-old snail shells – Polyenes (includes carotenoids) preserved almost unchanged…and found in fossils.

Asbestos: The strange past of the 'magic mineral' – Asbestos was woven into textiles fit for kings and used for party tricks. One 18th-Century philosopher even slept in a night-cap made from it. It was also used to make the funerary shrouds for monarchs; because it didn't burn, it helped to keep their ashes separated from the rest of the pyre. An account from Ancient Greece describes a golden lamp made for the goddess Athena, which could reportedly burn for a whole year without going out and had a wick made from "Carpathian flax" – thought to be another name for asbestos. In 1899, an English doctor recorded the first confirmed case of a death linked directly to the material – a 33-year-old textile worker who had developed fibrosis of the lungs. In the UK, all asbestos was banned in 1999, but much of the asbestos added before this date remains in place – as buildings degrade, it is posing a significant health risk.

Rise of Peru’s Divine Lords – Hilltop sites in the Andes…early examples of divine lordship - a form of leadership that would endure in Peru for more than 1,000 years.

Amid Record Drop in Fossil Power, Europe Sees Wind Overtake Natural Gas - The E.U. power sector is undergoing a monumental shift - fossil fuels are playing a smaller role than ever as a system with wind and solar as its backbone comes into view. Coal generation fell by 26 percent, while gas generation fell by 15 percent.

Student Design Competition: Integrating Solar and Agriculture - Some 2.8 gigawatts of agrivoltaics exist across the U.S. Many combine solar energy with pollinator habitat and sheep grazing. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is looking for new design proposals from graduate and undergraduate landscape architecture students to push the agrivoltaics envelope!

The Moon Is Shrinking, Causing Moonquakes at a Potential NASA Landing Site - Researchers examined data on moonquakes detected by lunar seismometers, which have been on the moon since Apollo program astronauts left them there more than 50 years ago. They also used mapping data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to identify the telltale creases on the moon. Through modeling, they linked these faults to seismic activity.

Texas Reservoirs Reach Dangerous Lows - In Corpus Christi, on the south Texas coast, authorities last month stopped releasing water aimed at maintaining minimum viable ecology in the coastal wetlands, even as oil refineries and chemical plants remain exempt from water use restrictions during drought. On the lower Texas coast, the Rio Grande has not been flowing consistently, and Colorado River water releases have been minimal as that river faces shortages farther upstream.

Extreme Birding: Gull Watching at the Landfill - You can find gulls around North America (and many parts of the world), including in interior states. At least 28 gulls can be seen in North America, with additional vagrant species showing up from time to time. Individual species look different depending on age and other factors. A gull goes through three feather molts in its first year.

Poisonous Seed Stash Discovered in the Netherlands – Black henbane contained in a hollow goat (or sheep) thigh bone sealed with a plug of black birch bark…from AD 70-200.

Ocean Sponge Skeletons Suggest a More Significant History of Global Warming Than Originally Thought - An analysis of six sea sponges—centuries-old creatures with an internal chemistry that holds secrets about climate history—points to global temperatures already having increased by 1.7 degrees Celsius due to human activity --- that’s more than scientists currently agree upon….so there is a flurry of activity to corroborate the finding.

Gleanings of the Week Ending September 23, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

As the Mississippi Swerves, Can We Let Nature Regain Control? - After the lower Mississippi began pouring through and enlarging Neptune Pass in 2019, sediment began flowing into a sand-and-silt-starved Delta Bay. Now the Army Corps of Engineers — breaking with tradition — is considering letting at least part of the river have its way…..a change from always ‘filling the breach’ strategy of years past that has had positive economic impacts but caused environmental problems. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, since 1932, more than 2,000 square miles of land in the Mississippi Delta have disappeared under water.

Babcock Ranch: Florida's first hurricane-proof town - When Hurricane Ian made landfall on the southwest Florida coast, it brought 150 mph winds, 17 inches of rain within 24 hours, and storm surges of up to 18 ft. It was the costliest hurricane in Florida's history, causing more than $112 billion  in damage – and at least 150 deaths. Babcock Ranch is an 18,000-acre development that was sitting in the eye of the storm on the southwest of the state just north of Fort Myers. Built to withstand powerful storms, the town came out relatively unscathed. Is this type of development going to be the only kind economically viable for states like Florida in the future?

Year-round school: Difference-maker or waste of time? – No conclusion in this article….evidently there is renewed interest in the idea in the Southeast. But – the concept is not what most people probably assume. The implementation does not involve more days in school for students and often makes childcare more difficult!

What Are Heat Pump Air Conditioners? - Modern heat pumps are superefficient and can deliver heat down to -15 degrees Fahrenheit…but I had to look to find that they can deliver cool air up to 115 degrees which should have been in the article since it was about air conditioning!

Controversial dwarfism drugs spur growth — but do they improve health? – Hard choices.

Microplastics infiltrate all systems of body, cause behavioral changes – Especially in older mice…behaviors akin to dementia in humans. The changes became more profound in older animals. The microplastics in the study were delivered orally via drinking water…and not in high doses.  It’s scary to think about how microplastics might be impacting humans too.

Can California Cropland Be Repurposed for Community Solar? – Evidently the current farming practices are not sustainable, and some farmland needs to be retired. The idea is that the already disturbed land could be repurposed for new community solar projects. I wondered where the food we now are getting from California will be grown in the future…how robust is the US food production system?

TB research shows a good diet can cut infections by nearly 50% - Improved nutrition in family members of patients in India with lung TB reduced all forms of TB by nearly 40%, and infectious TB by nearly 50%. And…for the patients: An early weight gain in the first two months was associated with 60% lower risk of TB mortality. The other benefits were higher treatment success and better weight gain. During the six-month follow-up period, a remarkable treatment success rate of 94% was achieved.

Top 10 Things You Didn’t Know About Wind Power – How many of these 10 did you know already? I knew 4 of the 10…and knew a little about several others. It’s good to see the progress being made. Kudos to Iowa and South Dakota where over 50% of their electricity generation is from wind energy.

Soils forming on the branches of trees are an overlooked forest habitat – This was a study of a tropical forest in Costa Rica, but it reminded me of a tree along a field trip hiking route in Maryland that I always pointed out to students. It was an old maple that had an indention in its trunk that contained soil about 6 feet above the base of the tree. The tree had grown some roots into that soil and there was moss there. Spider webs filled in. Once we found a shed snakeskin hanging from the area!

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 19, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Risk of fatal heart attack may double in heat wave and high fine particulate pollution days – A study from China that included 202,000 heart attach deaths.

July Was Likely Earth’s Hottest Month on Record – The last sentence of the article: ‘Well, this is probably one of the coolest summers you’ll ever see in your life.’ ... It is quite scary to put it this way.

Climate Change Temperatures Killing Death Valley's Bristlecones – 70% mortality rate over the past decade.

The Australian town where people live underground – Coober Pedy…where most of the people live underground in abandoned opal mines or intentionally excavated spaces!

Looking Down on the Andes – Pacific Ocean, Atacama Desert, Andes…Chile, Argentina, and Bolivia. Image taken from the International Space Station.

Supermarkets to the Rescue — Coles Joins Virtual Power Plant – A grocery chain in Australia. Maybe some supermarkets (and other big box stores) in the US will do similar things.

In a Chilean Forest Reserve, the Remarkable Darwin’s Frog Endures – The endangered frog is a smallish leaf mimic with a pointy nose. Males whistle to attract mates. After females lay their eggs on the ground, males swallow them, holding them in their vocal sac as the young metamorphose. Six to eight weeks after hatching, small adults make their exit through the males’ mouths!

Moths With 11-Inch Tongues? - More than 150,000 recognized moth species, though likely another 150,000 or so, give or take, remain undescribed. Many of these species feed birds and bats like some form of “aerial plankton.” Out of the hundreds of caterpillars one moth might produce, few survive to metamorphose into moths. But those that do provide a critical service both as food for nighttime predators and as pollinators, often evolving to be the only ones that can get the job done. Every species of yucca in North America, including the famous Joshua Tree, requires pollination exclusively from yucca moths.

Spooky, stealthy night hunters: revealing the wonderful otherworld of owls - Owls occur across all continents other than Antarctica, spanning an environmental gradient from the freezing Arctic (home of the stunningly beautiful snowy owl, of Harry Potter fame) to the hottest deserts (home of elf owls).

What to know about beech leaf disease, the 'heartbreaking' threat to forests along the East Coast – I remember this entering into Master Naturalist conversations in Maryland before the COVID-19 pandemic…but the cause was a total mystery at that point. It was interesting to get an update. There is still no known way to control or manage disease, but progress has been made; large numbers of foliar nematodes cause the disease (the interfere with chlorophyll production and the trees starve). It hasn’t been that long ago that the Emerald Ash Borer killed almost all the ash trees…before that wooly adelgid killed the Eastern Hemlocks….and earlier, in the mid-1900s, the American Chestnut succumbed to blight. The eastern US forests are very different than they were 100 years ago and the pace of diseases seem to be increasing.

Gleanings of the Week Ending July 8, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Air Pollution Causes 1 In 6 Human Deaths – Deaths from modern pollution risk factors, which are the unintended consequence of industrialization and urbanization, have risen by 7% since 2015 and by over 66% since 2000. Unfortunately, little real progress against pollution can be identified overall, particularly in the low-income and middle-income countries, where pollution is most severe. It is increasingly clear that pollution is a planetary threat, and that its drivers, its dispersion, and its effects on health transcend local boundaries and demand a global response.

Opioids no more effective than placebo for acute back and neck pain – The study was done in Australia but, hopefully, will lead to stepping away from opioids for back/neck pain. How many became addicted to opioids via doctors writing prescriptions trying to relieve their patient’s back pain?

Antimicrobial Resistance: The Silent Pandemic – The first accounts of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) occurred 2 years after Alexander Fleming warned about it in his 1945 Nobel speech. AMR is now responsible for nearly 700,000 deaths worldwide each year, and it is projected to kill 10 million per year by 2050.

Early Women Were Hunters, Not Just Gatherers – My favorite statement from the article: “Grandmas were the best hunters in the village.”

Overdose deaths involving street xylazine surged years earlier than reported – Drug death data is gathered and analyzed slowly…not so long ago, it appeared that illicit xylazine use was still largely concentrated in the mid-Atlantic states and the Northeast….but it is not showing up in street samples all across the US and surging in the South and West. US drug deaths hit a new record last year with roughly 110,000 fatal overdoses nationwide from fentanyl and increasingly complex street drug cocktails.

U.S. Wind and Solar Overtake Coal for the First Time - In the first five months of 2023, wind and solar produced 252 terawatt-hours, while coal produced 249 terawatt-hours, according to preliminary government figures. The decline in coal is happening faster than anyone anticipated.

Largest-ever atlas of normal breast cells brings unprecedented insights into mammary biology – 12 major cell types, 58 biological states…differences based on ethnicity, age, and the menopause status of healthy women.

Why our voices change with age – Lots of reasons the sounds we make can change. One habit suggested from the article that I am considering: “Singing or reading out loud daily can give the vocal cords sufficient exercise to slow their decline.”

Cedar Breaks Wildflower Festival Starts Friday – Hmmm…maybe I should look for wildflower festivals (along with birding) when I plan our vacations.

Meltwater is hydro-fracking Greenland’s ice sheet through millions of hairline cracks – destabilizing its internal structure - Earth’s remaining ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are far more vulnerable to climate warming than models predict, and that the ice sheets may be destabilizing from inside. Recent studies have shown that:

• Warming ocean currents are intruding into the Antarctic and Greenland coastlines, flowing under the ice shelves to undercut outlet glaciers and destabilize their calving fronts.

• Increasing rainfall across the Greenland ice sheet not only depletes snow accumulation, it also accelerates surface melting and ice flow.

• Algae and microbes, along with surface snowpack melt, darken the ice sheet surface, absorbing more solar radiation, which also accelerates ice melt.

• Superimposed ice slabs within the snowpack are forming across the accumulation zone, forming an impermeable barrier that depletes meltwater retention and drives extraordinary runoff.

• Water at the base of the ice sheet thaws and softens the frozen bed, thereby triggering basal sliding and accelerating interior ice sheet flow to the margins.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 24, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A New Day for the Ancestors’; Mounds - Archaeology Magazine – An Ohio Supreme Court ruling in December 2022 increases access to the earthworks. Soon, the mounds will cease to be part of the golf course at Moundbuilders Country Club!

How ‘tornado alley’ is changing - BBC Future – Tornado Alley is widening. Large tornado outbreaks have become most common in Alabama, Tennessee, and Kentucky rather than Texas and Oklahoma where the term ‘tornado alley’ was invented in the 1950s.

Knit One, Purl Two - Archaeology Magazine – Patterned silk stockings from the 17th century. Volunteers in the Netherlands tried to recreate them. It turned out to be exhausting and highly complex….and required hundreds of hours!

Rooftop Solar Grew Nearly 50 Percent Globally Last Year - Yale E360 – Great progress…the challenge remaining is to be able to use it when we need it. Upgrading electricity and storage infrastructure must keep pace.

50 Years of the Endangered Species Act: A Gulf Coast Success Story • The National Wildlife Federation Blog – The story of the recovery of the Brown Pelican. Now they are easy to see again!

The Fastest-Warming Continent, Europe Has Already Heated by More Than 2 Degrees C - Yale E360 – In 2022 Europe experienced 16,000 heat related deaths and $2 billion weather-related economic damages. With climate change, it is warming faster than any other inhabited continent.

What the Largest-Ever Study of Primate DNA Reveals About Ourselves | Smart News| Smithsonian Magazine – Evidently most primate species have more genetic diversity than humans do. However – primates at risk of going extinct are not helped by that diversity; their trajectory toward extinction is happening too rapidly.

Photography In the National Parks: Photo Documentation – Some tips on how to take pictures that help others recognize a special place/feature, understand a concept, or grasp the mechanics of how something happens.

Divers Are About to Pull a 3,000-Year-Old Shipwreck from the Depths | Smart News| Smithsonian Magazine – Pieces of wood…hand-sewn together. 23 feet of the 39 feet vessel are in very good condition.

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 10, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

In 2050, over 800 million people globally estimated to be living with back pain: Analysis also dispels common back pain myth -- ScienceDaily – Attributable to occupational factors, smoking and being overweight. More common among older people and women. Current clinical guidelines for back pain treatment and management do not provide specific recommendations for older people. Low back pain continues to be the greatest cause of disability worldwide.

Why Are Some Wolves Black? The Answer Will Surprise You - Cool Green Science – There are more black-colored wolves in the southern Rocky Mountains…more gray coated wolves everywhere else. The black is from dogs that traveled with humans across the Bering Strait around 10,000 years ago, and those genes also make the black-colored wolves more resistant to distemper (which came with the conquistadors to South America).

We now know exactly what happens in nature when we fell forests -- ScienceDaily – When agriculture replaces forestry…a detailed study done in the Azores…substantiates the advise to plant native trees and flowers…stop mowing the lawn!

The viruses that helped to make you human - BBC Future – About 8% of the human genome comes from viruses but, curiously, there is not evidence of new endogenous retroviruses (ERVs) entering the human genome in the last few 1000 years (Koalas are being invaded by koala retrovirus with the viral DNA found in some populations but not others). The most studied human ERV is HERV-W; first described in 1999; genes that are essential for the placenta to form.

Algae in the Andes – Bursts of phytoplankton are not unusual in oceans, seas, gulfs, and canals. Now they are in lakes too….and potentially hazardous.

New Low Cost High Performance Perovskite Solar Cells – It appears that solar cells are on track to get better and better!

Communities should reconsider walking away from curbside recycling, study shows -- ScienceDaily – Maybe the trend of towns and cities across the US cancelling or scaling back recycling programs due to rising costs needs to keep recycling but focus on recycling materials with the greatest market value (newspaper, cardboard, aluminum/steel cans, HDPE/PET plastic bottles) and highest potential for carbon offset.

Does the roar of rocket launches harm wildlife? These scientists seek answers – Launches at Vandenberg have increased from 5-15 rockets per year to 50-100. There are biodiversity hotspots near launch sites in California, Texas, and Florida; the study at Vandenberg is intended to provide more insight about how launches impact wildlife. The study is funded for 3 years but may need a decade to understand some of the impacts.

Remains of Child Mill Workers Examined in Northern England - Archaeology Magazine – A study of 150 remains from a churchyard cemetery…many were young people between the ages of 8 and 20. They were pauper apprentices and their bones showed signs of stunted growth, malnutrition, rickets, and tuberculosis.

Turmeric: here’s how it actually measures up to health claims – Many of the health claims have only been proved in the lab or in animals. There are studies that show that turmeric has a modest benefit for pain compared to a placebo – but the studies are often on small populations and there is a wide variation in the amount of turmeric participants were given. There is not enough research to firmly support any of the claims…although it is a great spice (flavor and color).

Gleanings of the Week Ending May 20, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

These four challenges will shape the next farm bill – and how the US eats – Thought provoking. Will the author’s dream priorities for investment (organic agriculture as a climate solution, infrastructure to support vibrant local and regional markets and shift away from an agricultural economy dependent on exporting low-vale crops; and agricultural science and technology research aimed at reducing labor and chemical inputs and providing new solutions for sustainable livestock production) be funded….or will Congress stay entrenched in continuing agriculture as it is today.

The Energy Revolution in 5 Charts – 1. The energy transition is a technology revolution (it’s not a brown to green caterpillar…it is a caterpillar to a butterfly; we are moving from a commodity (fossil fuel) to technology-based system). 2) The renewable revolution is exponential, not linear (and we are at or past the knee in the curve). 3) The renewable revolution is led by China (with the US and Europe recently enacting policies to compete). 4) This is the decade of change (exciting times for heat pumps, electric vehicles, solar, and wind). 5) By 2030, the debate will be very different with the renewable revolution obvious to all.

National Park waterfalls being honored on US Postage Stamps – Beautiful places. Would like to see (and photograph) more of them!

The Camouflaged Looper: This Inchworm Makes Its Own Flower “Costume” – Another reason to take a closer look at flowers….the small creatures that might we living (and munching) there!

Our tropical fruits are vulnerable to climate change. Can we make them resilient in time? – The work to help our food plants tolerate and thrive with climate change. The post is specific to Australia but has applicability elsewhere. Techniques have already been successfully applied to chickpeas to make them more drought resistant, survive higher temperatures, and produce better yields!

Commercial Rooftop Solar on Warehouses Could Power All of Them – Commercial rooftop solar on America’s warehouses could provide 185 TWh of clean renewable energy every year. Hurray! Power produced near population centers where it is used….and avoiding taking farmland for solar panels (unless the plan is to grow crops under the panels).

Water arsenic including in public water is linked to higher urinary arsenic totals among the U.S. population – Not good…and water pitcher type filters do not remove it…..it takes reverse osmosis, activated alumina, or ion exchange (anion) resins to do that.

Fashion World Remembers Mary Quant, the Miniskirt Pioneer – I was old enough in the ‘60s to remember wearing Mary Quant type dresses!

How do you stay optimistic in spite of it all? 6 hopeful souls share their secrets – Thought provoking…maybe we all need to think about the ways keep ourselves positive….not let the pessimism around us overcome us.

The clean energy milestone the world is set to pass in 2023 - Greenhouse gas emissions from the power sector, the largest source of the world's emissions, are expected to fall for the first time!

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 22, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Home Electrification Incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act – Now to decide what to do first….

How mobile phones have changed our brains – Some research about the impact phones have on our focus.

Drug overdose fatalities among U.S. older adults has quadrupled over 20 years, research finds – Overdose is a problem across the lifespan. Most deaths are unintentional.

Macro Photography Captures the Delicate Dance of Mantises in Malaysia – Wonders of the insect world. We have mantises in North America…but not as colorful as these Malaysian species.

A Plateau in the Heart of Texas – The Edwards Plateau…one of the geologic features of Texas that makes for scenic drives.

The Shaman’s Secrets – A 9,000-year-old burial of 2 people (one adult, one very young child) with 100s of ritual objects. The grave was first excavated in the 1930s…and assumptions were made…the adult was a man, blond hair, blue eyes. But modern analysis tells a different and more complete story.

Winter Rains Bring Mushroom Boom in California – Extra rain….and there are a lot more mushrooms!

Protecting Nēnē, The Threatened State Bird of Hawai'i – We didn’t see in nēnē when we went to Volcanoes National Park in 2015….it was good to see pictures of them.

Want to Improve Your Outdoor Recreation? Try Birding. – Yes! It has certainly been true for my husband and me. There are so many good resources about birding (festivals, birding trails, apps)!

A must-see sunset spectacle at Monument Valley – Wow! We visited in 2013 at midday. Next time I’ll plan to go in late March or mid-September…and stay until sunset.

Older adults with dementia but without close family: Who are they? And who cares for them? – Thought provoking.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 18, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A mixture of trees purifies urban air best – Conifers do a better job at gaseous components of pollution…and they do it all year round; this is particularly important since pollution can be at its highest in winter. Broadleaved trees are more efficient at cleaning the air particles, perhaps because of their larger surface area.

Once the Callery pear tree was landscapers’ favorite – now states are banning this invasive species and urging homeowners to cut it down – Back in the 1980s, the neighborhood I lived in organized to plant Branford pears along our streets. The neighborhood I moved to in the mid-1990s had mature Bradford pears; they were knocked down by Hurricane Isabel in 2003 (the trunk of the one in our neighbor’s yard broke close to the ground with a loud crack) and not re-planted. My neighborhood in Missouri was built in the late 1990s and there are some mature trees near the entrance.

Assessing the risk of excess folic acid intake – Too much or too little of a good thing (folic acid) may not be such a good thing.

School choice proposals rarely go before voters – and typically fail when they do – Public schools have been the backbone of American greatness. How do parents make choices to do otherwise? I suspect that sometimes a Charter School that looks great turns out to be something completely opposite because it is so difficult for individuals to gather enough information to evaluate a school. So - why are legislatures keen to support non-public schools?

The East Coast Whale Die-Offs: Unraveling the Causes – There have been headlines on this as a new challenge; this article includes some data collected so far. There have been periodic whale strandings earlier (back in 2016-2017) too. Almost all the carcasses this winter in New York and New Jersey had clear signs of vessel strike and many were juveniles. It appears that the feeding areas for whales have shifted due to warmer water and that shift has put them in areas with more ships (i.e., ports of New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia).

Mary Wollstonecraft: an introduction to the mother of first-wave feminism – A little history…but not just about feminism. “Liberation from oppression means being able to define ourselves and the direction of our lives. And this requires access to the intellectual resources and knowledge needed to develop independence of mind. This is Wollstonecraft’s most important message, and one that should speak to everyone regardless of gender.”

Cornell Study Finds Solar Panels Help Crops Grow & Crops Help Solar Panels Last Longer – Not all crops can grow under solar panels but enough of them do (like tomatoes and soybeans) that there is no reason for solar panels to reduce farmland!

Global warming is changing Canada’s boreal forest and tundra – It’s complex. In general, as temperatures warm, trees will colonize further north…but not at uniform rates in all regions.

Greater gender equity helps both women and men live longer – The study looked at 156 countries between 2010 and 2021 to assess the gender gap in life expectancy around the globe. The three dimensions included in the study were political, economic, and educational. Of the three, education has the strongest association with longer life expectancy. The study authors summarize: “the evidence demonstrates that enhancing women's representation across multiple sectors contributes to wealthier and, hence, healthier societies for all."

Less Than 1 Percent of People Globally Breathing Safe Levels of Pollution, Study Finds – Focusing on particulate pollution: particulate pollution has fallen in Europe and North America over the past two decades, but risen in sub-Sharan Africa, India, China, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Latin America, and the Caribbean. (see Lancet article with maps here).

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 11, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

800-year-old hoard unearthed in northern Germany – The picture of the earrings made me wonder how they were worn…and what stones once were held in the empty enclosures.

Firewood theft: The forests where trees are going missing – Evidently it is happening around the world…maybe caused by increasing heating costs and/or other fuels not available after a disaster or during a war.

Bald Eagles aren’t fledging as many chicks due to avian influenza – Oh no! I had gotten used to seeing bald eagles frequently near where I lived in Maryland. I had assumed that I didn’t see as many in Missouri because I didn’t know where to look – but it could have been that there are fewer birds to see anywhere.

New thought on Chaco Canyon Construction – A demonstration of how the timbers for building the complex structures at Chaco Canyon could have been carried the 60 miles from where the trees grew.

Sustainable process to produce vanillin from lignin makes further progress – Making the popular flavoring agent from lignin (a waste product from the wood pulping industry) rather a chemical process using petroleum.

Quilts from the Second World War tell the stories of the Canadian women who sewed them – A little Canadian history…the spirit of giving during a stressful time…sending artful warmth. Quilts have always appealed to me because they are functional art. My great-grandmother (in the US) made wedding quilts with/for her 5 daughters in the 1930s and 1940s…and now one of my sisters is talking about quilting being something she plans to do when she retires.

More Than Half Of New US Electricity Generating Capacity In 2023 Will Be Solar – Good! Evidently California and Texas are the states adding the most solar capacity.

Archaeologists Find Elite Residences at Mexico’s Chichén Itzá – Prior to this discovery, experts didn’t know any residential structures! What they found was a complex…two houses and a palace.

Air pollution speeds bone loss from osteoporosis – A study of a diverse cohort of over 160,000 postmenopausal women. The study found that nitrogen oxides are a major contributor to bone damage and that the lumbar spine is one of the most susceptible sites to this damage. This is another reason to improve air quality!

Photography In the National Parks: Capturing Atmospheric Phenomena – Being in the right place…noticing atmospheric phenomenon…and capturing the image. It reminded me of a trip we made back in 2007 to Cumberland State Park in Kentucky where we saw a moonbow; maybe we should go again!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 4, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Can clothes ever be fully recycled? – Evidently a lot of progress has been made in the past few years – translating processes from small to large scale production. But recycling is not the only thing that needs to change about the fashion industry. ‘Fast fashion’ is cannot the future!

A simple thing you can do to benefit backyard birds and bees – Wait until it is 50 degrees to do spring cleaning around your yard. Those leaves and dead stalks harbor insects….and birds need insects, particularly when they are raising their young! I have a big tuft of ornamental grass which I am waiting to cut. Last summer it was full of insects and I except some eggs/larvae are there now.

An incredible journey – Chinook making their way up the Klamath River in the spring and fall. (infographic)

Nearly 30 dangerous feedback loops could permanently shift the Earth’s climate - A change….triggering more change…a cycle. Our planet is full of complex connections that are often not well understood.

As Millions of Solar Panels Age Out, Recyclers Look to Cash In – Hopefully solar panels, and a lot of other end-of- life products, can become part of the ‘circular economy’ rather than going to landfills.

See Thousands of Sandhill Cranes Gather in Nebraska – Maybe next year we’ll plan to go to Nebraska to see the crane migration!

The beautiful flowers that bees can’t use – Nectar deficient hybrids (like double petal petunias) or non-native plants often don’t provide food for pollinators…even though people find bigger, brighter flowers appealing. The article also provides a link to a free book: Pollinator-Friendly Parks which might be useful for homeowners who want to support pollinators.

Anti-dust tech paves way for self-cleaning surfaces – Wouldn’t this be nice…my computer screens seem to attract dust!

'The Great Displacement' looks at communities forever altered by climate change – A book review that documents people surviving a hurricane in the Florida Keys or a big fire in California (and other climate change related disasters) and making decisions in the aftermath. A quote from the author, Jack Bittle: "In the United States alone, at least twenty million people may move as a result of climate change, more than twice as many as moved during the entire span of the Great Migration."

A Long Low Tide Dries Up Venice’s Smaller Canals – Wow…we usually think of Venice being more prone to flooding.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 25, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The ancient diseases that plagued dinosaurs – Interdisciplinary teams are re-looking at dinosaur bones and comparing anomalies to diseases visible in modern bones….finding examples of dinosaurs with malignant bone cancer, septic arthritis, and airsacculitis. And it seems that there is a lot more to discover with the technologies now available to look at the fossils more closely and collaborating with vets (particularly vets that work with birds and reptiles).

A worthless life and the worthy death: euthanasia through the ages – The post is written from an Australian perspective and about Caitlin Mahar’s book: The Good Death Through Time. The topic is a thought provoking one….made more interesting with an overlay of history.  I wondered how much the growth of medical interventions has changed the way we envision ‘worthy death’ or is the phrase ‘death with dignity’ a better description now.

Residential solar advantages – 5 top benefits – This is something my husband and I plan to do…solar-plus-storage is our 1st choice. Residential solar also has advantages beyond the home itself: it can power your transportation home too!

Fructose could drive Alzheimer’s disease – More research is needed…but it is interesting that the fructose consumption has gone up in the US (in 1977-1978 it was 37 g/day….in a 2008 study, it was 54.7 g/day). Maybe reducing the risk for Alzheimer’s is another reason to eliminate ultra-processed foods that typically contain a lot of fructose from our diet.

High-paying jobs that don't need a college degree? Thousands of them are sitting empty – Making a career in the trades….and there is a lot of work available.

Why methane surged in 2020 – Interesting findings and how they were developed. The two main reasons: 1) heightened emissions from wetlands because of unusually high temperatures and rainfall and 2) decline in NOx due to COVID-19 lockdowns which broke the chemical reaction in the atmosphere that produces hydroxyl (OH) that serves to remove methane from the atmosphere.

Why aren’t energy flows diagrams used more to inform decarbonization? – Yes! These are easier to understand than a lot of other graphics. The ‘heating the UK with heat pumps or green hydrogen’ diagram caused a ‘learned something new’ moment for me!

Will we ever be able to predict earthquakes? – The answer might be ‘no’ – but there are still a lot of people trying. We can’t rely on predicting them to reduce the destruction in infrastructure and lives. Enforced building codes would reduce destruction and save lives since we already know the areas of high risk for earthquakes. It will be interesting to see an analysis of what the damage from the recent Turkey/Syria earthquake would have been if building codes would have been enforced (the ones that Turkey evidently instituted after the previous earthquake…and also if the ‘best in world’ standards has been enforced).

15th-Century Spices Identified in Royal Shipwreck – Analysis of plants from a 1495 shipwreck in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Sweden: nutmeg, cloves, mustard, dill, saffron, ginger, peppercorns, almonds, blackberries, raspberries, grapes and flax. The findings provide insight on cuisine and trade of the era.

Did you know pronghorns shed their horns? – No…but it a good piece of trivia. I remember seeing pronghorns in New Mexico – racing our vehicle during a guided tour of Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 14, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Study investigates source of Amazon’s “Dark Earth” – Created intentionally? It is less acidic than surrounding soils…probably from the addition of ash.

New York City Greenery Absorbing All Traffic Emissions on Many Summer Days – There is a lot more greenery that previously thought…looking beyond parks to modest backyards, shrubbery growing in vacant lots, and trees dotting city sidewalks. That’s good for the summer when everything is green and growing….but it also implies that winter air quality is problematic.

‘Stomp’ Performers Hang Up their Garbage Lids – After 3 decades off-Broadway. Watch the video!

Riddle solved: why is Roman concrete so durable? – It wasn’t just volcanic ash that made Roman concrete better…lime clasts play a self-healing role!

Why is every parking lot covered with solar panels? – Evidently Michigan State has done it…hopefully other universities and big box stores do similar projects. 

How the war in Ukraine is killing marine mammals – The dolphins that were washing up on the shore of the Black Sea prior to the war were few and usually had markings suggesting entanglement in fishing gear.  The theory about the increased number appearing now, without marks, is that the dolphins are experiencing acoustic trauma from the increased use of sonar by Russian submarines.

Climate impact labels on sample food menu had strong effect on food selection – A study done by Johns Hopkins. The result indicate that this kind of labelling could promote more sustainable choices….and have positive health benefits as well!

Aerial Photos Capture the Abstract Beauty of Salt Ponds – From a new book….with images and background about these man-made landscapes.

Great Salt Lake will disappear in 5 years without a massive ‘emergency rescue’ – My husband and I visited the lake back in 2008. The pictures in the article are so different that I needed the captions to recognize the place. The lake was already shrinking in 2008 but the shrinking has increased with long term drought and increased population diverting more water that would otherwise flow into the lake. Aside from the ecological collapse if the lake goes dry, the dust from the dry lakebed is kicked up by winds and can damage lungs/exacerbate other respiratory illness. This does not bode well for public health in Salt Lake City.

Painted skulls from Peru’s Chincha Valley analyzed – The red paint on the skulls was not all the same on all the skulls: some have iron-based ochres and others have mercury-based cinnabar….the red paint on one of the skulls was a combination of the two!

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 31, 2022

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Best of 2022 - A Fun Map Puzzle – There are parts of the world where political boundaries have changed a lot since my elementary school geography class. The MapPuzzle game is a fun way refresh (or relearn) countries/states/provinces.

The year in chemistry: 2022’s biggest chemistry stories – I like these summary articles…and think about which one of the stories will be the most impactful in 2023.

Top 7 Building Decarbonization Wins In 2022 – Finally….now to maintain the momentum of these ‘wins’ and more into 2023!

Ten Remarkable New Plants Discovered in 2022 – And one of them is the largest waterlily on Earth…from Bolivia.

Shrinking Pollinator Populations Could Be Killing 427,000 People Per Year – The world is losing 3-5% of its fruit, vegetable, and nut production because of shrinking pollinator populations and lower pollinator diversity. That translates into less healthy food available…and associated health conditions like diabetes and heart disease. In Honduras, Nepal and Nigeria, the pollination deficits are responsible for a reduction of 3-19% in crop yields. This highlights the importance of making changes to support pollinator populations such as limiting pesticide use, maintaining existing natural habitats, and restoring others, and planting more flowers and diverse plants.

Overlooked Gems of The National Park System – In the cold of winter…time to plan some trips to parks for the year…including a few of the overlooked gems highlighted in this article.

Snow Day in Delmarva – Reminder of the area where we enjoyed a lot of day trips while we were living in Maryland….

Stunning Satellite Images of Our Changing Planet in 2022 – The before and after pictures have different elapsed times…be sure to read the captions.

22 Photos Honoring the Triumphs and Challenges That Face Wild Cats – A collection of pictures from Panthera, the world’s leading wildcat conservation organization.

Home Depot Does a Big Energy Deal, But It Does More Behind the Scenes – The Home Depot commitment is to produce or procure 100% renewable electricity equivalent to the needs of all its facilities by 2030 and they are taking actions to make it happen. Hope more big box stores will be taking similar actions.  

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 26, 2022

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Battle Over Bears Ears Continues in Utah – I am looking forward to visiting Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments and hope that their boundaries stay the way the tribes that have used the area for a very long time want. At some point Utah and the counties that are opposing the size will recognize the values of the tribes and country that want to preserve historical, paleontological, and geologic aspects of these places….and that the state benefits significantly from people visiting. The tourism $ may become more dependable and long term than other uses of the land.

Pyramid and Hundreds of New Kingdom Coffins Found in Egypt - An Old Kingdom pyramid, 300 New Kingdom coffins with well-preserved mummies with names of the deceased, and nearby a pyramid to Queen Neith…a previously unknown Queen.

Long-COVID clinics are wrestling with how to treat their patients – Frustrating situation.

Fenced In: How the Global Rise of Border Walls Is Stifling Wildlife – Border walls have increased since the end of the Cold War! This makes climate change an even bigger challenge to mammals…because they cannot move to better habitat if there is a border wall in the way.

Baby's vaccine responses linked to birth delivery method, study finds – Babies born via Caesarian section have lower antibody levels after vaccinations than babies born naturally.

Scientists Discover More Than 22,000 Endangered Manta Rays off Coast of Ecuador – Larger than any other Manta Ray population.

A Massive Freshwater River Is Flowing Under Antarctica’s Ice – It is flowing at 3 times the rate of the Thames. This finding helps understand some problems with existing models…hopefully it will allow for model updates to predict the impact of warming more accurately on Antarctica’s ice.

A Field Guide to Jackrabbits – Hard to see denizens of the western US (and Mexico).

France Looks to Mandate Solar Panels Over Large Parking Lots – Good idea…maybe it will begin to happen in the US even without a mandate.

Bright LEDs could spell the end of dark skies – Hope cities can learn to use LEDs like Tucson…not overuse bright white LEDs.

Gleanings of the Week Ending November 12, 2022

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

America’s largest transit bus charging station & microgrid open in Maryland – The headline caught my eye because I lived in Maryland for over 20 years – 8 of those in the county where this is happening! I hope other states have the same sorts of projects in the works.

NASA Finds More Than 50 Super-Emitters of Methane – Finding them is only the first step….how many of them will be situations we can reduce or stop the emission?

Iron induces chronic heart failure in half of heart attack survivors – This study prompted testing of iron chelation therapy to remedy or mitigate the effects associated with iron in hemorrhagic myocardial infarction patients.

Unique Bronze Age belt discovered near Opava – Half my ancestors came from the area that is now the Czech Republic…I am drawn to articles about the history of the region.  The belt is quite beautiful…but was it a practical item of apparel?  

What happens if our circadian rhythms are out of whack? – WHO has proclaimed that disrupted circadian rhythms are a probable carcinogen. The study discussed in this post was about the mechanism that circadian rhythm disruption triggers lung tumors.

View 16 Breathtaking Images from the Nature Conservancy’s Annual Photo Contest – Take a little break….look at awesome images of our world.

Mississippi River Basin adapts as climate change brings extreme rain and flooding – This year the stories about extreme weather seem to be more frequent – and wide ranging in terms of water. The Mississippi was low enough for barge traffic to be impacted because of drought…yet there were floods along part of the river just last summer.

Eye-opening discovery about adult brain's ability to recover vision – An unexpected success…opening new ways to treat a vision impairment (LCA) and maybe prompt a re-look about how the adult brain can re-wire itself relative to vision.

The World’s Whitest Paint May Soon Help Cool Airplanes and Spacecraft – A way of making paint that was previously too thick/heavy for things that move. The thicker version works for homes and buildings. We’ll need this technology to reflect heat without expending energy!

Greater cloud cover may be narrowing the gap between daily high and low temperatures – Simulating clouds explicitly. Trying to understand why nights are heating up faster than days across the globe.

Gleanings of the Week Ending October 15, 2022

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Previously deployed military personnel show retained dust in lungs – The lingering impact of deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq.

As Rio Grande shrinks, El Paso plans for uncertain water future – Preparing for a year when there is no river water. Elephant Butte Reservoir that stores water for Las Cruces NM and El Paso TX, where I went on a birding field trip in November 2016, is currently at 5.6% of its capacity. So far – nothing has resolved the water insecurity of the region into the future.

Watercolor seas in the wake of Hurricane Ian – The impact of water surging and running off…natural-color imagery from NASA’s Terra satellite. There is also an image from the European Space Agency’s Sentinel-2 satellite detailing the coastline near Fort Myers.

Solar Community Slammed by Hurricane Ian: “Our Lights Stayed On” – And another Hurricane story…this one from the ground – Babcock Ranch, about 2 miles from Fort Myers.

Pre-Hispanic images revealed on early convent walls in Mexico – Hmmm….the building was not always a Christian convent?

Has the pandemic changed your personality? – Declines in extroversion, openness, agreeableness, and conscientiousness among adults were measured…particularly in young adults (ages 18-25). I found myself wondering whether the political upheaval that was happening at the same time contributed to the finding; the collective stress levels were probably heightened by more than the pandemic.

A field guide to Jackrabbits – An animal to look for in the west….next time I travel there.

Multiple health benefits of b-type procyanidin-rich foods like chocolate and apples consumed in right amounts – The study showed that peak benefits are achieved at mid-range doses rather than high or low doses. But it is not clear how to get the mid-range dose through diet…which made this article interesting but not actionable.

How did Vikings make glass beads? – Evidently by salvaging Roman and Byzantine mosaics as their raw material!

Scientists are finding fungi in cancerous tumors – A surprise…and lots of research still to be done to understand if the fungi are a correlation or contributor to the tumor.