#Science Advances

[xtruss]

Archaeology: How Asia’s First Nomadic Empire Broke the Rules of Imperial Expansion

Ancient China’s mobile neighbors built an empire that’s attracting scientific scrutiny

Xiongnu Herders in what’s now Mongolia, portrayed in this painting, followed their own rules in building a multiethnic empire and advancing iron-making technology starting around 2,200 years ago, new studies indicate. Flickr (CC0 1.0)

— By Bruce Bower | July 2, 2023

In an age that spawned the ancient Roman and Egyptian Empires, Mongolia’s Xiongnu Empire broke the rules of imperial expansion.

Long before the Mongol Empire arose, Asia’s first nomadic empire, horse-riding Xiongnu people, conquered ethnic groups across the continent’s northeastern and central expanses (SN: 1/29/10). A common political system headed by Xiongnu imperial rulers formed about 209 B.C. and lasted for roughly 300 years. Unlike in Rome or Egypt, mobile groups of Xiongnu animal herders accomplished this feat without building cities, forming central bureaucracies, devising a writing system or mobilizing masses of farmers to produce food.

Today, remnants of Xiongnu culture largely consist of more than 7,000 tombs, some heavily looted and many yet to be excavated, in Mongolia and nearby parts of China and Russia. In the last decade, geneticists and archaeologists have ramped up efforts to study these sites and ancient records to decipher the Xiongnu Empire’s political organization and technological achievements.

Starting from a heartland in what’s now central Mongolia, the Xiongnu Empire (brown) spread across a large part of northern Asia, taking hold around 2,200 years ago. Naturalearthdata.Com/Wikipedia (CC0 1.0)

A few ancient Chinese chronicles include descriptions of the Xiongnu political system. These accounts portray the Xiongnu as predatory raiders who belonged to a “simple” confederation of herding groups run by a few nomadic alpha males. Even so, warfare with mounted Xiongnu warriors equipped with bows, arrows and metal weapons had inspired Imperial Chinese leaders to construct their Great Wall.

Some researchers have argued that Xiongnu people formed a lesser, “shadow empire” alongside Imperial China. But that view is giving way to a picture of the Xiongnu Empire as a different, not lesser, type of ancient state, says Yale University archaeologist William Honeychurch.

In this view, nomadic Xiongnu elites developed a flexible system of political power that connected mobile groups with different genetic and cultural ancestries spread across extensive grasslands and forests. “Elite lineages were not only an important part of a multiethnic Xiongnu state, but members of these lineages were sent to peripheral areas as part of state integration,” Honeychurch says. One new study, for example, indicates that Xiongnu women from elite lineages in central Mongolia served as “princess” emissaries to the empire’s frontier, assuming political power in distant territories populated by various ethnic groups.

“This must have been an empire organized around moving populations,” says archaeologist Bryan Miller of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. “Xiongnu elites were savvy politicians who delegated power to keep the empire together.”

In another recent development, excavations in Central Mongolia point to Xiongnu people as early ironworking innovators whose advances spread to their regional neighbors. These discoveries, and others, highlight the unappreciated complexity and the ongoing mystery of how Xiongnu society worked, researchers say.

The Xiongnu Dispatched Frontier ‘Princesses’

Initial insights into the Xiongnu people’s diverse genetic origins were first published in 2020. DNA extracted from remains of 60 individuals excavated at 27 Xiongnu sites indicated that two genetically distinct populations of Mongolian herders had coalesced to become the Xiongnu people around 2,200 years ago. One population descended from several western Mongolian cultures and the other from a couple of eastern Mongolian cultures.

Additional genetic contributions to the Xiongnu mix then came from farther away, most likely a culture near present-day Ukraine as well as Imperial China, reported archaeogeneticist Choongwon Jeong of Seoul National University in South Korea and colleagues.

Building on those findings, Jeong’s team then examined DNA of 17 individuals from elite and low-status graves at two Mongolian cemeteries on the Xiongnu Empire’s western frontier. Central Mongolia’s Xiongnu heartland lay around 1,200 kilometers to the east.

The six largest and richest tombs contained women whose genetic ancestry traced back to central Mongolia, the scientists reported in April in Science Advances. These women rested in wooden coffins placed in square tombs. Items found in these tombs included gold sun and moon emblems of Xiongnu imperial power, glass beads, silk clothes and Chinese mirrors.

Gold Sun and Moon Emblems of Imperial Xiongnu power were found among other elite items in a woman’s tomb on the western edge of the ancient nomadic empire. DNA evidence indicates the woman was related to ruling families in the empire’s Mongolian heartland. © J. Bayarsaikhan

One woman was buried with horse-riding equipment, a gilded iron belt clasp and a Chinese lacquer cup. These objects have previously been found in graves of male horse-mounted warriors. But such items signal that a deceased person had been powerful, not necessarily a warrior, says Miller, a study coauthor.

Miller and his colleagues suggest that the women had been sent to the frontier to maintain Xiongnu traditions and nurture contacts with Silk Road trade networks (SN: 3/8/17). Preliminary signs of genetic relatedness among individuals interred at one of the cemeteries suggest that some elite Xiongnu “princesses” also cemented power by marrying into local families.

The elite women’s graves were flanked by simple graves of adult men, and of girls and boys ranging from babies to adolescents. These commoners possessed greater genetic diversity than the female big shots. If the men were retainers or servants of female elites, they had come from distant parts of the Xiongnu Empire or possibly beyond, the researchers say.

Male Rulers Were Homebody ‘Princes’

Like these female elites, premier Xiongnu rulers had common roots in central Mongolia while their followers had diverse geographic origins, another team reports in the June Archaeological Research in Asia. But rather than being sent to the far reaches of the empire, these rulers stayed close to home.

Three male nobles interred in large underground tombs at one of the largest Xiongnu cemeteries, Gol Mod 2, spent most or possibly all their lives in the Khanuy Valley where they were buried, say archaeologist Ligang Zhou of Henan Provincial Institute of Cultural Heritage and Archaeology in Zhengzhou, China and colleagues.

Meanwhile, at least four of eight individuals buried in some of the many small satellite graves situated near the nobles’ tombs had spent much of their lives in distant places before settling in or near the Khanuy Valley, measurements of different forms of the element strontium in individuals’ teeth and bones indicate. Diet-related strontium signatures, which vary from one region to another, signal where a person spent early and later parts of their lives.

The identities of those in satellite graves, who were apparently killed to form entourages of followers that accompanied deceased nobles, are unclear. They include children and adults, Zhou says. Some were buried with metal weapons or luxury objects such as jewelry.

Genetic and strontium findings suggest that “Xiongnu political organization in central and western Mongolia was highly similar,” Zhou says. Then, as the empire expanded, rulers in the Xiongnu heartland sent select members of their extended families, such as high-ranking women, to new territories in order to replicate the imperial power structure.

Seen from above, a Xiongnu noble’s tomb, left, lies near a set of small tombs that contained his followers to the afterlife. Xiao Ren, Henan Provincial Institute of Culture Heritage an Archaeology

Iron Innovations Bolstered the Xiongnu Empire

From the start, Xiongnu imperial power depended on a ready supply of iron weapons and other gear that enabled horse-mounted warfare. Researchers who view the Xiongnu Empire as a faint version of Imperial China argue that the nomads’ power depended on importing crops and borrowing iron-making techniques, or simply trading for iron products, from the Chinese.

But new findings suggest that Central Mongolian metallurgists launched a regional boom in iron production around the time the Xiongnu Empire originated, says archaeologist Ursula Brosseder of the University of Bonn in Germany.

At a riverbank site, Brosseder and colleagues have excavated five iron smelting installations that contain by-products of iron making and burned wood. Radiocarbon dates of that material extend to as early as around 2,200 years ago, when the Xiongnu Empire arose.

That makes these finds, each of which consists of two pits connected by a tunnel, the oldest Xiongnu iron smelting kilns by at least 100 years, the researchers reported in March in Asian Archaeology.

Earlier research had established that people living just north of Xiongnu territory in southern Siberia started producing iron as early as around 2,800 years ago. Based on comparisons of finds in the two regions, Xiongnu metallurgists not only learned about iron making from their neighbors but also invented tunnel furnaces, the investigators say. Eastern Asian groups outside the Xiongnu sphere began making and using tunnel furnaces over the next couple of centuries.

Discoveries by Brosseder’s group “show that metallurgy reached the Xiongnu in Mongolia from southern Siberia, not China,” says archaeologist Nikolay Kradin, director of the Institute of History, Archaeology and Ethnology at the Far-Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Vladivostok. Craftspeople at several iron-making centers, some slightly younger than Brosseder’s discoveries and others yet to be found, must have managed that technological transition, hypothesizes Kradin, who did not participate in the new research.

Brosseder suspects the Mongolian site she’s studied hosted a major iron-making operation. Four iron-making furnaces excavated near the other five have not yet been dated. And ground-based remote sensing equipment has revealed signs of at least 15, and possibly 26, more iron smelting kilns still covered by sediment.

“We can expect more findings of Xiongnu iron smelting centers considering the demand for iron horse gear, arrowheads, carts and other material by the empire’s large army,” Brosseder says.

No reliable estimates exist for the size of that army, or for the overall number of Xiongnu people, says Michigan’s Miller. Xiongnu herders, who also occasionally cultivated a grain called millet, moved across the landscape in relatively small groups that must have been greatly outnumbered by Imperial China’s estimated 60 million citizens.

The Capital Was a Seasonal Seat of Power

In the same valley where Brosseder’s group discovered the oldest known Xiongnu iron smelting kilns, Mongolian researchers have uncovered remains of what was probably a Xiongnu political center, or perhaps even its capital, called Longcheng in 2020. Consistent with everything else about the Xiongnu Empire, “this was a capital of a different kind,” says Miller.

Longcheng excavations so far have focused on a large building that may have hosted important gatherings.

Roof tiles on that structure bear an inscription in ancient Chinese characters that reads “Son of Heaven Chanyu.” Chinese records refer to the supreme Xiongnu ruler as “chanyu.” That royal inscription, the only one found within the Xiongnu realm, identifies Longcheng as a seat of power, Miller says.

Rather than a permanent site, Longcheng, like several excavated Xiongnu villages and walled compounds in central Mongolia, served as a seasonal stopover or temporary meeting place, Miller suspects (SN: 11/15/17). “We don’t know if those other sites were separate political capitals for the Xiongnu,” he says. Top Xiongnu honchos gathered for part of the year at Longcheng before packing up and moving elsewhere, he speculates. Xiongnu herders, regardless of political status, navigated animals to seasonal grazing spots. Staying in one place throughout the year was not an option.

Having a flexible, mobile system of rule appears to have kept the nomadic realm rolling for a few hundred years before the Xiongnu Empire rapidly disintegrated about 1,900 years ago. Why it did so is an enduring mystery. Perhaps the empire succumbed to combined attacks by Imperial China and other groups or, in true nomadic fashion, Xiongnu people reorganized on a smaller scale and moved to safer areas.

Still, “the Xiongnu had created a massive imperial network in Asia,” Miller says. “Their ways of life didn’t go away overnight.” For instance, Xiongnu-mediated trading by groups situated along Central Asia’s Silk Road routes continued despite military defeats in the empire’s central Mongolian heartland. Only further archaeological and genetic discoveries can clarify how Xiongnu people in the imperial core responded to those setbacks.

Whatever happened, Asia’s first nomadic empire can likely be counted on for a few more surprises.

— Science New, July 02, 2023, By Bruce Bower

[thepastisalreadywritten]

Neanderthals hunted, butchered massive elephants: study

By Lucie Aubourg and Chris Lefkow

Agence France-Presse, 2 February 2023

WASHINGTON, United States - Neanderthals may have lived in larger groups than previously believed, hunting massive elephants that were up to three times bigger than those of today, according to a new study.

The researchers reached their conclusions, published in the journal Science Advances on Wednesday, based on examinations of the 125,000-year-old skeletal remains of straight-tusked elephants found near Halle in central Germany.

The bones of around 70 elephants from the Pleistocene era were discovered in the 1980s in a huge coal quarry that has since been converted into an artificial lake.

Elephants of the time were much larger than the woolly mammoth and three times the size of the present day Asian elephant, and an adult male could weigh up to 13 metric tons.

"Hunting these giant animals and completely butchering them was part of Neanderthal subsistence activities at this location," Wil Roebroeks, a co-author of the study, told AFP.

"This constitutes the first clear-cut evidence of elephant hunting in human evolution," said Roebroeks, a professor of archeology at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

The study suggests that the Neanderthals who lived in the area for 2,000 to 4,000 years were less mobile and formed social units "substantially larger than commonly envisaged."

"Neanderthals were not simple slaves of nature, original hippies living off the land," Roebroeks said.

"They were actually shaping their environment, by fire... and also by having a big impact on the biggest animals that were around in the world at that time."

'Calorie bombs'

The researchers determined the elephants had been hunted -- and not just scavenged -- because of the age and sex profile of the remains found in the quarry.

Most of them were males and there were few young or old ones.

"It's a typical selection made by hunters who went for the biggest prey," Roebroeks said.

Adult male elephants would have been easier to hunt than females, who tend to move in herds protecting their young.

"Whereas adult males are solitary animals most of the time," Roebroeks said. "So they are easier to immobilize, driving them into mud and pit traps.

"And they are the biggest calorie bombs that are walking around in these landscapes."

The researchers said the Neanderthals were able to preserve the huge quantities of food provided by a single elephant and it would sustain them for months.

"An average male elephant of about 10 tons would have yielded something like, minimally, 2,500 daily portions for an adult Neanderthal," Roebroeks said.

"They could deal with it, either by preserving it for longer time periods -- that is already something that we didn't know -- or simply by the fact that they lived in much, much larger groups than we commonly infer."

Cut marks 

The researchers said the Neanderthals used flint tools to butcher the animals, which left clear traces on the well preserved bones.

"They are classical cut marks that are generated by cutting and scraping off the meat from the bones," Roebroeks said.

Traces of charcoal fires used by the Neanderthals were also found, suggesting they may have dried meat by hanging it on racks and building a fire underneath.

Roebroeks said that while the study provides evidence the Neanderthals lived in large social units, it is difficult to estimate exactly how large those groups actually were.

"But if you have a 10-ton elephant and you want to process that animal before it becomes rotten you need something like 20 people to finish it in a week," he said.

la-cl/dw

© Agence France-Presse

[kuramirocket]

Mexican scientist, Gerardo Ceballos, winner of the 16th edition BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Awards in Ecology and Conservation Biology

The BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Ecology and Conservation Biology has gone in this sixteenth edition to two Mexican scientists who have documented and quantified the scale of the Sixth Mass Extinction, that is, the massive loss of biodiversity brought about by human activity. Gerardo Ceballos (National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM) and Rodolfo Dirzo (Stanford University) are hailed by the committee as “trailblazing researchers in ecological science and conservation,” whose joint work in Latin America and Africa “has established that current species extinction rates in many groups of organisms are much higher than throughout the preceding two million years.” In effect, by documenting losses of animals and plants in some of the Earth’s most biodiverse habitats, both have contributed to showing that today’s biodiversity crisis is, as the citation states, “an especially rapid period of species loss occurring globally and across all groups of organisms, and the first to be tied directly to the impacts of a single species, namely, us.”

The two awardee ecologists have catalyzed the global study of “defaunation,” a term Dirzo coined to describe the alterations causing the disappearance of animals in the structure and function of ecosystems. His research, says the citation, has revealed how the elimination of a single species can trigger pernicious “cascading effects” by disrupting the web of interactions it maintains with other organisms. This, in turn, has adverse effects on human wellbeing through the reduction of the goods and services they perform. His work has helped provide the “necessary scientific basis” to further the adoption of evidence-led conservation measures.

“The experimental work done by professors Ceballos and Dirzo has led the way in quantifying the extent of species loss,” explains a Research Professor in the Department of Integrative Ecology at Doñana Biological Station (CSIC) and secretary of the award committee. “And what is truly shocking about their results is that this species extinction rate, or ‘defaunation process’, as it is known, is advancing today at a speed several orders of magnitude above the rate recorded over the last two million years. This shows that we are up against a truly intimidating challenge; one that these two researchers have documented and assessed across thousands of vertebrate, invertebrate and plant species.”

Another committee member, a Research Professor in the Department of Biogeography and Global Change at the National Museum of Natural Sciences (CSIC) in Madrid, uses an analogy to highlight the importance of the awardees' work: “Imagine we are flying in a plane sitting next to the window. And looking out, we see bits of the plane falling off. It may not nosedive straight away, but the first thought that crosses the passenger’s mind is: how long can this plane keep flying without its component parts? Something similar occurs with ecosystems. As they lose their “parts'' or species, they also lose vital functions, and it is these functions that provide essential services. The work of Dirzo and Ceballos is a valuable addition to the understanding of how such losses affect the resilience and sustainability of our ecosystems, shedding light on the urgent need for conservation actions to preserve the integrity of these systems that are critical to our survival.”

An accelerating extinction rate driven by our own species

Ceballos and Dirzo's endeavors have advanced in tandem through most of their professional careers, with results in many cases complementing one another’s. But the origin of their collaboration lies back in the early 1980s, when both were studying at the University of Wales (United Kingdom), Dirzo pursuing his doctorate courses and Ceballos completing his master’s degree. They first connected over their shared concern at the increasingly evident impact on nature of human activity. “We started having conversations not just on scientific matters, but about how worried we were about the anthropogenic impact on the natural world we were seeing all around us,” Dirzo recalls.

Further ahead, Ceballos turned his research attention to the study of wildlife and the magnitude of the advancing extinction, while Dirzo centered his efforts on ecological interactions between plants and animals, and the consequences of this extinction.

Ceballos’ work on assessing current rates of extinction led him to explore comparisons with the rates of the past. “Evolution operates as a process of species extinction and generation,” he relates. In normal periods, more species appear than disappear, such that diversity gradually expands. There have been five mass extinction events in the last 600 million years, the last of which brought the demise of the dinosaurs. All had in common that they were catastrophic – wiping out 70% or more of the world’s species – had their origins in natural disasters, like a meteorite collision, and were extremely rapid in geological terms, lasting hundreds of thousands or millions of years.”

After a detailed analysis of numerous species, a research team led by Ceballos concluded – in a paper published in Science Advances in 2015 – that vertebrate extinction rates are from 100 to 1,000 times greater than those prevailing over the last few million years. “What this means is that the vertebrate species that have died out in the past 100 years should have taken 10,000 years to become extinct. That is the magnitude of the extinction,” he explains. His work pointed one way only; to the fact that the sixth mass extinction was already upon us, a scenario that for Ceballos has three major implications: “The first is that we are losing all that biological history. The second is that we are losing living creatures that have accompanied us through time and have been key in driving forward human evolution. And the third is that all these species are assembled in ecosystems that provide us with the environmental services that support life on Earth, like the right combination of gases in the atmosphere, drinking water, fertilization… Without these environmental services civilization as we know it cannot be sustained.”

The grave impact of extinction on ecosystem services

Species extinction is the last stage in the process, but Ceballos insists that population extinction is no less worrying, since it is these populations that provide environmental services on a local or regional scale. He gives an example: “It doesn’t matter if there are jaguars in Brazil if they have died out in Mexico, because the environmental services they performed in Mexico will have disappeared with them.”

Ceballos and his colleagues explored this concept in a study of prairie dog populations, which in the 1990s were thought to be pests and were the target of eradication campaigns. Through this study, published in 1999 in the Journal of Arid Environments, they were able to prove that, rather than pests, they actually play a vital role in maintaining their ecosystem, the grasslands of the southwest of the United States and north of Mexico.

“We found that prairie dogs were essential to the upkeep of ecosystem services, because if they are lost it sets off a chain of extinctions across the many other species who depend on them.” With these rodents gone, the soil becomes less fertile, erosion increases and the scrubland advances, wiping out the plants that serve as forage for livestock. “The impact on environmental services is colossal,” he affirms.

For the Mexican ecologist, the biodiversity crisis we are experiencing is of a magnitude similar to the crisis of climate change and both problems are closely interrelated: “We have to couple the issue of species extinction with the issue of climate change, and understand that it is a threat to humanity’s future.”

From deforestation to “defaunation”: the “cascading effect” of species loss

Rodolfo Dirzo states, "I was soon asking myself: these fascinating things I study, the ecology and evolution of plants and animals and their interactions, may not be around to study in future if we don’t start to do something about what is happening to natural systems.” This concern, which he shares with Ceballos, has guided Dirzo’s steps throughout his career, from Mexico to the United States.

By analogy with deforestation, he came up with the term “defaunation” to refer to the imbalance entailed by the absence of animals. “Everyone has a mental picture when they hear the word deforestation. They understand that what they are seeing is a problem, the erosion of ecosystems due to loss of vegetation. And it occurred to me that the word “defaunation” could be a way to highlight that, just as Earth’s ecosystems face a serious problem of deforestation, another serious threat lies in the depletion and possible extinction of animal species.”

The scientist began studying the effects of this phenomenon and published his findings in a chapter of the book Plant-Animal Interactions: Evolutionary Ecology in Tropical and Temperate Regions in 1991.

“Species do not live in an ecological vacuum,” he points out, insisting that it is not just species disappearances we have to worry about, but the extinction of species populations and, above all, species interactions, which should accordingly be a core focus of conservation actions.

Elephant poaching and the risk of pandemics

These effects, Dirzo explains, give rise to a phenomenon that he refers to as “winners and losers.” When these large animals die out locally, they are evidently losers, while smaller animals like rodents take advantage of their absence and therefore become winners. But these smaller animals also carry pathogens like Leptospira, Leishmania and even the bacteria that causes bubonic plague. So if populations of these pathogen-carrying animals increase, there is a greater chance that they will transmit diseases to humans. “We could be put at risk of suffering a new pandemic,” he affirms, “given the proliferation of these diseases and the current mobility of human beings.”

The researcher has verified these effects through experiments carried out in Africa. He and his team installed electrified fences in some very well-conserved parts of the savannah to stop large animals from entering. They then left other areas unfenced, so they could compare two identical ecosystems, one with large wildlife and one without. “We found that when an area is closed off to these animals, the savannah vegetation changes dramatically.” Further, the rodent population triples, as does the risk of diseases that can be transmitted to humans. In this way, he says, we get “a cascade that runs from elephant poaching to the real risk of a new human pandemic.”

In fact, it is not even necessary for a whole local population to die out for it to pose an ecological problem. If there are not enough individuals to maintain viable populations, the species in question can no longer interact with other organisms and fulfill its ecosystem function. It becomes what is known, says Dirzo, as a “living dead species.”

Hunting is just one human activity that can drive species populations totally or partially extinct and trigger such grave effects as a pandemic. Dirzo lists five key factors that drive defaunation: land use change for pasture or urban development; the overexploitation of resources; pollution – by anything from noxious chemical products to marine plastic waste; the introduction of non-native or invasive species in ecosystems where they don’t belong; and climate change. “But none of these five factors,” he adds, “operates in isolation: they are all interlinked, and this makes the challenge of dealing with biological extinction all the more complex.”

Laureate bio notes

Gerardo Ceballos (Toluca, Mexico, 1958) graduated in biology from the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Iztapalapa (Mexico) and went on to earn master’s degrees from the University of Wales (United Kingdom) and the University of Arizona (United States), where he received his PhD in 1988. The following year, he took up a position at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), where he is currently a Senior Researcher at the Institute of Ecology. He is the author of 55 books and numerous scientific papers, and some 200 applied studies in conservation and management that have featured in technical reports supported by institutions like the World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International Development or the State of Mexico Government. He is one of the forces behind Mexico’s endangered species legislation and the designation of over 20 natural protected areas covering more than 1.5 million hectares.

Rodolfo Dirzo (Cuernavaca, Mexico, 1951) completed a BSc in Biology at the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de Morelos (Mexico) then went on to obtain an MSc and PhD from the University of Wales (United Kingdom). Between 1980 and 2004 he held various teaching and research positions at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), serving as a professor, Director of the Los Tuxtlas Biological Station and Chair of the Department of Evolutionary Ecology. In 2004 he joined the faculty at Stanford University, where he is currently Bing Professor in Environmental Science, Professor of Earth System Science, Senior Fellow at the Woods Institute for the Environment and Associate Dean for Integrative Initiatives in Environmental Justice. Dirzo has also taught in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Nicaragua and Puerto Rico.

Nominators

A total of 47 nominations were received in this edition. The awardee researchers were nominated by Gretchen Cara Daily, Bing Professor of Environmental Science at Stanford University (United States) and 2018 Frontiers of Knowledge Laureate in Ecology and Conservation Biology.

[twitchywoman]

December Parkinson's News

2023 has been a good year for PD research. Here is a rundown of a few of the latest discoveries along with a few other important things. What I Didn’t Say – Ending Friday! If you haven’t had a chance to view this 2 person play about living with Parkinson’s, you need to watch it now. After Friday, December 15, it will no longer be available. Get rid of the styrofoam now! From Parkinson’s News…

[vln-vibes]

Bright Hope, Mighty Will

The Green Lantern Corps have lost many members over its years— a risk that came with maintaining the peace as told by the Guardians. Most of the rings reassigned to a new member of its given sector but on occasion there would come those that were so attached to its wielder that they would not accept another unless they resonated with their predecessors ideals.

It’s one such ring that had been on Oa with no new lantern to wield it. Or it had been.

The Blue Lanterns were still a growing group with whom the Corps had a close alliance thanks to their symbiotic relationship; after all a Blue power ring was at its highest potential when near a Green power ring and vice versa. So why not look for users together?

The rings were set off as a pair in an attempt to create a powerful Union and birthing the most powerful duo either Corps had ever seen.

Meanwhile in Sector 2814, on the third planet from its star— Earth, a small family from the Midwest were camping out in the woods after their youngest begged to see the shooting stars where they’d be the most visible. The oldest child explained to their parents that it was a good way to channel the younger’s passion for space and science much like their own. Everything had been well until the elder duo’s sensors brought up a strange signature from deeper in the wood— Ecto-entities or ghosts as they’d called them. Before being able to drag the children with them the youngest stood his ground and refused to be taken away from his stars, the elder assured that she could take care of her younger brother and that they’d be fine alone (they were alone even when in the same house more often than not)

The sun had since set, the telescope set up, blanket had been laid with snacks for them to consume as they sat in wait with jackets to help with the night chill. The duo sat near the campfire as the younger's anticipation grew but the thought of their parent's absences did as well. They'd been left home alone before but they were only 8 and 10 years old, in the middle of the wilderness with no way to guide them back home or even find where their parent's ghost hunting led them.

"Don't worry little brother, I'm sure mom and dad will be back soon"

"Ye-yeah! Besides mom knows how to kick butt, they'll be fine"

"Look!"

The duo took their gazes to the skies as the twinkling night was accompanied by steaks of white dashing by. The older grabbed her slightly old model camera and took photos of the unsuspecting boy's awe filled gaze before he could complain. He stuck his tongue out at her before turning to his telescope, doing his best to follow the streaks in the sky until no longer visible to him. The girl just took to taking some more photos to show their parents once they'd returned. It'd go on for a while like that, the stars as their only witnesses as they joked around.

"Hey that one's green! And that one's blue!"

She lifted her head from looking at her camera's saved photos to find the twin streaks flying together, a quick click of her camera to save such a strange occasion. She wasn't an astronomy expert but she didn't think shooting stars came in those colors. Taking her gaze off of the small screen and looking back up she noted the bigger size.

"Are they getting closer?"

"Maybe they'll land near here. How cool would it be to see them up close?!"

It was as though those words triggered something as the two stars seemingly stopped flying and began their rapid descent. Straight for them.

"They're headed right for us!"

"Run!"

The duo quickly picked up their discarded flashlights and began running away from the clearing their parents had chosen. No matter how fast or further away they got the stars still trailed towards them. The numerous twists and turns never deterring the streaks of light, even as the elder held the younger's hand in an iron grip to prevent them from losing each other or as the younger turned them around and took haphazard turns in an effort to get them away.

"Everything's gonna be alright!"

She panted as they approached another clearing, no idea where their own was but still looking and seeing the stars much closer to them, the lights were blinding. She felt her body get pushed aside and the roll of cold grass on her back, hair getting tangled with small twigs and a familiar but smaller body land on top of hers.

"Look out!"

They closed their eyes and braced for impact feeling a sudden breeze and a slight shake but nothing else. Until they heard different voices echo. Looking gazes and noticing the glowing eyes the other had they sat up--- only to be met by glowing, floating ----rings?

[Sentience located]

[Daniel James Fenton of Earth, you have been chosen]

[Jasmine Dahlia Fenton of Earth, you have been chosen]

[You have the ability to Overcome great fear]

[You have the ability to instill great Hope]

[Welcome to the Green Lantern Corps]

[Welcome to the Blue Lantern Corps]

A bright flash of blue and green surrounded the duo, hands still clasped and feeling a tug on their unoccupied hands, the warmth traveling on their bodies before disappearing altogether.

"Jazz what are you wearing?"

"What am I wearing!? What are you wearing Danny? Is that your old astronaut costume?"

Jazz noted the blue ring on top of her opera gloved right hand, also clenching the handle of a blue lit lantern? She could feel her knee length puffy blue dress move with the night breeze but didn't feel cold. White boots with blue bottoms kicked a pebble to the side, hearing it hit the nearby lake. Given the full moon she took a gaze at her reflection, finding her usual teal ribbon replaced by a giant blue bow at the back of her head and her eyes glowing a brilliant blue.

Danny was busy looking at his green suit, looking much like the costume he wore in a near daily basis when he was five until he started school. His own white gloves had puffier cuffs which reminded him of the astronaut costumes he and Tucker had looked at online for Halloween the year before, green ring also on his right, shaking the green weird lamp in the process. He pulled at the black suspenders before joining Jazz at the lake. His raven locks now had a single green streak near his bangs and icy blues now a vivid green.

"Cool"

Jazz was panicking, wondering what this could mean; what was a Blue Lantern anyway? Why did it choose her? And why was Danny green?

"Whoa!" Her glowing eyes turned to Danny but couldn't find him, hearing the sudden clatter of something falling on the floor and seeing the lantern rolling on its side, had he fallen in the water?!

"Danny!"

"Up here!" her eyes widened as he little brother flew above her, laughing as he looped around in the air, "C'mon Jazz!"

"How did you do that?" her eyes never leaving the faintly green glowing boy, "Can I do that?"

[You can. Just have Hope]

Trusting the voice in her head she reassured herself that they would be fine before feeling the ground disappear from under her feet and got closer to Danny, dropping her own lantern next to Danny's. She felt her surprise turn into a smile before doing a cartwheel in the air and the giggles escape from her.

Neither took track of time as they flew above the clearing before Danny had the idea to race above the lake, streak of blue and green reflected on its surface as it rippled from their speed. It wasn't until they flew back to the clearing that they remembered--- they had no idea where they ran off to. There hadn't been a lake where they'd set up camp.

"Mo-mom and dad will find us Danny! We'll be okay" They had to be okay, they would be fine. The idea of flying above the trees to look for their clearing was tempting but she had no idea how long it would take; did these things run on batteries? Would the power run out soon? Can they even take off these outfits? It'd be weird to be stuck like this for forever. If mom and dad find them what will they think of the glowing? It reminded her a bit too much of how the ectoplasm in the basement glowed whenever she or Danny were dragged downstairs and the substance covered near all the surfaces (that's when they'd know dad was making them clean up)

Whilst Jazz marinated in her thoughts and worries Danny couldn't help but think if there was a way to ask for help, though even if they had phones he doubted they'd even have service or know how to guide help towards them.

[Activating Emergency Beacon for Sector 2814]

"Huh? Emergency beacon?"

"What was that Danny?" Jazz snapped out of her thoughts as she heard his confusion, noting the slight pulsing now coming from his ring.

"I-I think my ring asked for help?"

"...Let's hope that's a good thing "

The brother-sister duo took to sitting by the lake once more, still viewing the stars above and keeping an ear out for any sign of their parents--- they were never quiet for too long. Especially when 'ghost-hunting', not that ghosts actually existed.

They were starting to get hungry again, having not touched their assorted snacks before the whole fiasco began when a steak of green, followed by another, approached the horizon. The first stopped, the second following suit... Were they like them? It looked like two people flying now that they weren't moving so fast. They were too far to properly see but it looked like they were searching for something.

Danny's ring flared up in quick brilliant flash before going back to its blinking; it seemed that was the cue the two in the sky were looking for as they made their way towards them.

"I think that's our ride Jazzy"

The duo finally hovered above the lake shore, the surprise clear on their faces even as one had a mask on.

"Hello, I am Green Lantern John Stewart of Sector 2814" the first man with matching vivid green eyes like Danny elbowed the man next to him.

"Uhh and I'm Green Lantern Hal Jordan of Sector 2814" he said sheepishly, running his white gloved hand through brown locks of hair. "You're the ones who send the distress call, what sector are you from?"

"Sector?" the duo looked at each other confused before Jazz remembered what the rings had said. "I- I think they said 2814?"

The duo looked surprised, disbelief easily conveyed even though Mr. Jordan's mask, actually he seemed more surprised than Mr. Stewart. "I'm sorry but what planet are you from?"

"Earth? I mean its not like--- Are aliens real!?" Danny's wariness disappeared and hovered in the air as he said it, "That's so cool!"

"You two are Earth children then" Mr. Stewart's eyes gained a dark look as he said so, "How long have you had the rings?"

"Umm I'm not really sure" Danny turned to his sister for guidance only to find her rubbing her arm nervously "Maybe an hour or two?"

Mr. Jordan's look matched Mr. Stewart's, like they were mad but they didn't seem mad at them like the teachers would when they caught him and Tucker talking during class. It was like whenever mom and dad's inventions malfunction and they'd go to school with bruises. (Those days mom and dad would mention their teachers calling them, they were always busy with the portal and never answered)

"Do you know what those are?" Mr. Jordan bent down to Danny's level, pointing at the matching green ring. Danny looked at his and wiggled his fingers.

"Not really? The voice said welcome to the Green Lantern cops?"

"Close, little man" Mr. Jordan chuckled, "My friend and I are part of the Green Lantern Corps. We help protect the universe, pretty much space cops if ya ask me"

"You get to travel into space! Awesome!" Danny literally brightened as his green glow intensified. "But why isn't hers green?"

"Your friend is actually part of the Blue Lantern Corps. They're a little different from us but we work together from time to time. They like to spread hope throughout the universe"

"Hope. It said I had the power to instill great hope. But why me? And why did they choose him?" her voice wavered as she turned to Mr. Stewart with a grave lookin his eyes.

"That... That is something neither of us can answer for you" he admitted, a solemn lookin his eyes as he placed a hand on her shoulder, "But we'll do our best to help you two with this"

"Its unprecedented for either Corps to choose children" Mr.Jordan frowned before looking towards Danny again, "What are you two doing in the middle of the woods?"

"I wanted to see the stars" Danny admitted sheepishly, all of this started from his request to their parents. They wouldn't be in this mess if he just watched from home like always, heck Mr. and Mrs.Foley had offered to take Danny and Tucker camping once school let out if he wanted to (but no he couldn't wait a month, he needed them now). "So mom and dad brought us camping but then the stars--- the rings started chasing us and we got lost"

"That must of been scary huh guys?" Mr.Jordan gave a look to Mr.Stewart and the man walked away a bit, placing a finger into his ear and whispering. How weird.

"So you guys are siblings?" he turned to Jazz, she just nodded slowly, took a deep breath and looked him in the eyes. She kept rubbing the blue ring on her hand as she did. "Do you guys mind telling me your name?'

Jazz still had that worried look in her eyes, like when she knew the turkey would come back to life in any second but mom kept saying it'd be fine. (Jazz was always right, it was always the same every Christmas). His sister liked to think she was a grown up and didn't get nervous talking with strangers but she was still a kid like him. He would be brave for Jazz!

"I'm Danny and that's my big sis Jazz"

"Its nice to meet you two, or well at least know your names now?"

"Jordan"

"Hold right there"

The two adults just kept talking in whispers, looking back at them every few seconds, Jazz wasn't sure what to make of them but they were the ones who knew the most about the situation. Danny also had a pretty good sense for people and they seemed friendly but she also knew better than to trust complete strangers. Stranger danger was very much ingrained to them at a young age. Jazz knew it was rude but couldn't help but hear Mr.Jordan's outburst of "Seriously, nothing? Its been hours"

It seemed like forever before the adults came back and gave them strained smiles in turn.

"Well kids we're going to help you guys find your camp and make sure you get back to your parents" Mr.Jordan winked.

"We'll also explain more about the rings and what they mean while we wait. Sounds like a plan?" Mr. Stewart made sure to look at them in the eyes and didn't move until they both nodded in agreement.

"Okay"

The brother-sister duo didn't know what they were getting into when they went camping that day but everything was in motion, a new path diverging in time to create a brilliant new future; tragedy, love, and courage would always be on their path no matter how much he'd tried to avoid, it was inevitable. He could only witness as they embarked on this journey together and bring about the Rebirth with allies at their sides.

And he couldn't wait to meet them again, in due time.

[mindblowingscience]

Those of you following the Advanced Composite Solar Sail System may have heard that its booms and sail are now deployed. It is receiving light pressure from the Sun to propel it through the Solar System. Like a test pilot in a new aircraft, NASA are now testing out just how it handles. Before deployment, the spacecraft was slowly tumbling and now the controllers will see if they can get it under control and under sail power. The reflectivity of the sail means it's an easy spot in the night sky, just fire up the NASA app to find out where to look.

Continue Reading.

[vharzo]

Halsin with his hair down looks feral, so I gave him two swords

[squided]

I don't know if someone posted this a long time ago and that's why I know about it or it was cause I researched it myself but I haven't seen it around so I'm gonna post The Worlds Stinkiest Molecule

[unbfacts]

[the-physicality]

thinking this labor day about all the athletes in women's sports who didn't have a stable league, who were only making decent money from a spot on their national team, who had to fight to get even a fraction of what they deserve. who spent their prime without a club league or the infrastructure to propel the sport. who came of age after title 9 in the usa [forcing schools to fund women/girls’ sports], the ones who fought for cbas and are only seeing big change at the end of their careers or after their careers concluded. who didn't have the media attention before, but are now showing just how much they can sell out stadiums and arenas. the players who played year round because overseas teams paid athletes what they were worth. athletes who endured and reported harassment but the league never took appropriate action. athletes who never had the media attention or ability to monetize their talent but who had careers that were just as impressive as the stars of today. who did it without the help of the science, technology, and medicine we have today. who set records with less support and fewer games in a season, which will be broken by kids who have had personal trainers since high school. athletes who played great games that are no long available to view, their talent no longer archived and accessible for young or new fans. athletes who still don't have a league or are just getting one in 2024. athletes who took it upon themselves to create change for which they will never reap the full rewards.

[spaceadvances]

Most galaxies don't have any rings of stars and gas -- why does M94 have two? First, spiral galaxy M94 has an inner ring of newly formed stars surrounding its nucleus, giving it not only an unusual appearance but also a strong interior glow.

A leading origin hypothesis holds that an elongated knot of stars known as a bar rotates in M94 and has generated a burst of star formation in this inner ring. Observations have also revealed another ring, an outer ring, one that is more faint, different in color, not closed, and relatively complex. What caused this outer ring is currently unknown. M94, pictured here, spans about 45,000 light years in total, lies about 15 million light years away, and can be seen with a small telescope toward the constellation of the Hunting Dogs (Canes Venatici).

📷: Brian Brennan

[reasonsforhope]

Paywall free version! LEGALLY paywall free version, even!

“Nearly any material can be used to turn the energy in air humidity into electricity, scientists found in a discovery that could lead to continuously producing clean energy with little pollution.

The research, published in a paper in Advanced Materials, builds on 2020 work that first showed energy could be pulled from the moisture in the air using material harvested from bacteria. The new study shows nearly any material can be used, like wood or silicon, as long as it can be smashed into small particles and remade with microscopic pores. But there are many questions about how to scale the product.

“What we have invented, you can imagine it’s like a small-scale, man-made cloud,” said Jun Yao, a professor of engineering at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and the senior author of the study. “This is really a very easily accessible, enormous source of continuous clean electricity. Imagine having clean electricity available wherever you go.”

That could include a forest, while hiking on a mountain, in a desert, in a rural village or on the road.

The air-powered generator, known as an “Air-gen,” would offer continuous clean electricity since it uses the energy from humidity, which is always present, rather than depending on the sun or wind. Unlike solar panels or wind turbines, which need specific environments to thrive, Air-gens could conceivably go anywhere, Yao said.

Less humidity, though, would mean less energy could be harvested, he added. Winters, with dryer air, would produce less energy than summers.

The device, the size of a fingernail and thinner than a single hair, is dotted with tiny holes known as nanopores. The holes have a diameter smaller than 100 nanometers, or less than a thousandth of the width of a strand of human hair.

The tiny holes allow the water in the air to pass through in a way that would create a charge imbalance in the upper and lower parts of the device, effectively creating a battery that runs continuously.

“We are opening up a wide door for harvesting clean electricity from thin air,” Xiaomeng Liu, another author and a UMass engineering graduate student, said in a statement.

While one prototype only produces a small amount of energy — almost enough to power a dot of light on a big screen — because of its size, Yao said Air-gens can be stacked on top of each other, potentially with spaces of air in between. Storing the electricity is a separate issue, he added.

Yao estimated that roughly 1 billion Air-gens, stacked to be roughly the size of a refrigerator, could produce a kilowatt and partly power a home in ideal conditions. The team hopes to lower both the number of devices needed and the space they take up by making the tool more efficient. Doing that could be a challenge.

The scientists first must work out which material would be most efficient to use in different climates. Eventually, Yao said he hopes to develop a strategy to make the device bigger without blocking the humidity that can be captured. He also wants to figure out how to stack the devices on top of each other effectively and how to engineer the Air-gen so the same size device captures more energy.

It’s not clear how long that will take.

“Once we optimize this, you can put it anywhere,” Yao said.

It could be embedded in wall paint in a home, made at a larger scale in unused space in a city or littered throughout an office’s hard-to-get-to spaces. And because it can use nearly any material, it could extract less from the environment than other renewable forms of energy.

“The entire earth is covered with a thick layer of humidity,” Yao said. “It’s an enormous source of clean energy. This is just the beginning in making use of that.””

-via The Washington Post, 5/26/23

[coffinup]

I know I’m a bit late, but I wanted to say HAPPY PRIDE!

The deathcare profession is becoming a lot more diverse as more and more young people come into it, and it’a great to see. I personally work with several fellow lgbtqia+ people at my funeral home and it’s such a nice feeling of solidarity in an industry that is historically white, male and cisgendered.

Along with the progress though, I also think it’s very important to talk about what everyone can do to help protect themselves and their identities when their time comes.

I think of a case years back of a trans woman whose hair was cut and who was put in a suit by her family’s request for her visitation, because she’d passed away in an accident, and her parents were her next of kin, they completely disregarded and disrespected her identity after she died.

If you are a queer person, especially someone who identifies with a different gender than you were assigned at birth, and don’t feel comfortable with the idea of your family being in charge of your end of life care or funeral arrangements, there are a couple of things you can do:

-Fill out an Advance Directive. This is sometimes called a Durable Power of Attorney or a Living Will. This dictates that, should you be incapable of making your own medical decisions due to coma, illness, injury, etc, the person you ASSIGN is in charge of those decisions.

-Sign a Designee form. This is crucial if you want to designate a specific person to make decisions about your body disposition and funeral care. POWER OF ATTORNEY ENDS AT DEATH. Your power of attorney will NOT be able to make post-death decisions on your behalf. You need a Designee form for that!

Both of these forms can assign any willing person that you chose to be in charge of these decisions. This person does not have to be related to you, they could be a friend, roommate, non-married partner, metamore, in-law, whoever you feel the most comfortable with, and who is willing to sign the form.

You are NEVER too young to have these forms. If you are a young person, re-visit them every couple years and make sure the other person on them is still willing to be your POA/Designee. You can re-do these forms as many times as you need. In most states they should also be FREE and require only a notary public and witnesses!

Forms should be available on your state’s .gov websites!

I wish all of you a peaceful and happy pride season, and as always,

Memento Mori

[marlynnofmany]

I've been reading a lot of science fiction and fantasy stories lately, by a lot of different authors, and I've noticed an interesting trend. Not something that happens all the time by any means, but something that's more likely to happen in one over the other.

Magic fixes problems while science causes problems.

And it makes sense that it would be that way, because magic is something that we don't really have, and we can only imagine what we would do with it if we did. Magic is just altering reality in ways that logically shouldn't happen, given our current understanding of physics. If we could change reality with a snap of our fingers, oh man we would do so much good with it.

But science. We've seen what science can do. And before it can achieve the lofty goals that it sets out to do, it goes through any number of failures and setbacks. We've seen the mistakes. We've suffered through them. Then in fiction, we extrapolate what could happen with advancements that we haven't quite reached yet.

With science fiction, we tell cautionary tales of a that future could be. With fantasy, we tell fairy tales of a past that never was.

Not every time. But often enough to notice.

[spyglassrealms]

I spent 20 whole minutes on this, laughing like a maniac the whole time.