There are a lot of things you’ve probably been told to be careful about so as to avoid getting skin cancer. Don’t stay out too long, stay in the shade, wear sunscreen, wear a big floppy hat, don’t go crazy with the tanning booth, etc. Of all the things you’ve heard to help avoid skin cancer, it’s highly doubtful that one of them was ever “Stay away from those grapefruits.” But if someone had told you that, they may not be as crazy as you think. A new study suggest that there’s a surprisingly large correlation between consuming citrus fruits and melanoma, the deadliest form of skin cancer. Specifically, that frequent consumption of citrus fruits and juices lead to a 36% higher risk of eventually developing melanoma. The study was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology and utilized lead researchers from Brown University.
What Went On During This Study?
The study ultimately involved over 100,000 adult individuals (63,810 women and 41,622 men) through a span that lasted from 1984 to 2010. Of these people, 1,840 would go on to develop melanoma at some point. Once the researchers had kept tabs on them for up to 10 years, a pattern began to emerge regarding a correlation between citrus and melanoma, in particular grapefruit and orange juice. Those who had an overall form of citrus 1.6 times or more a day were 36% more likely to develop the cancer than those who consumed less than two per week. For a potential link between large consumption of citrus and melanoma, people in this study who had at least three full grapefruits a week had a 41% increased risk of skin cancer compared to those who didn’t eat grapefruit at all.
What Could Cause This?
The possible correlation between citrus fruits and melanoma could seem baffling at first. Senior author Dr. Abrar Qureshi attributes it to large amounts of photoactive compounds called furocoumarins that are prevalent in the pulp of the most common citrus fruits, oranges and grapefruits. Lead author Shaowei Wu also noted that while orange juice doesn’t have quite as many furocoumarins as whole oranges, the mass consumption of orange juice in given populations could also be a factor. They also preached caution, and not to assume that there’s a guarantee in the link between citrus and melanoma. Further investigation is still essential to finding out how serious this correlation is.
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Researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography found that fish diversity increased after the mass extinction of dinosaurs. This research has concluded that the end of an era for dinosaurs and most marine reptiles signified the dawn of the “new age of fish” resulting in the wide variety of fish species today.
Fish Diversity Expanded at the end of the Mass Extinction
Marine paleontologist researchers from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography combed the seafloor of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans to find evidence of when fish diversity expanded so rapidly.
Their conclusions, published at the end of June in PNAS, revealed that sometime after the mass extinction event between 75 million and 45 million years ago, ray-finned fishes exploded in terms of diversity. They did so to fill different ecological niches that were left vacant from the many species that had died off.
Mass Extinction Said Goodbye Dinosaurs, Hello Fish Diversity
At the end of the Cretaceous period, a mass extinction decimated the dinosaur population, also knocking off many large marine reptiles and ammonites. However, it was the same event that allowed a new opportunity for other species to flourish, expanding their evolutionary success to reach great diversity.
One such group that made the most of the opportunity was ray-finned fishes. What’s a ray-finned fish? Basically any fish in the ocean with the exception of sharks and rays. Ray-finned fishes are so diverse, they make up half of all vertebrate species today.
Though it was a devastating event for the hundreds of species that were picked off the Earth, for ray-finned fishes, the end-Cretaceous mass extinction led the way for them to become major players in the evolutionary chain of events.
Fish Teeth Compared to Scale Count Shows Fish Diversity Explode
Led by Elizabeth Sibert and Richard Norris, marine paleontologists from the research team drilled into Italian limestone in two oceans to gather fossils of fish teeth and scales for analysis.
The samples of teeth from ray-finned fishes and scales from sharks and rays spanned from the late Cretaceous period to the mid-Eocene period. The researchers noted that scale count and teeth count were consistent before the mass extinction, but only the teeth count increased after the event.
Although less than a third of sharks and rays went extinct during the event, their numbers seemed to keep at a base level. In contrast, the ray-finned fishes population grew rapidly. The researchers theorized that many ecological niches needed to be filled after so many species of dinosaurs and over 90 percent of plankton species died off.
One Fish, Two Fish, Extinct Fish, New Fish – Diversity Thrives
Researchers also showed that right after the extinction, there were changes in teeth sizes with larger teeth increasing in a spike for a few million years before vanishing. Theories indicate that these probably belonged to animals that didn’t stick around too long, a sort of evolutionary experiment.
However, what did stick around was the ray-finned group. They have established their place in evolutionary history thanks to the mass extinction that allowed the huge fish diversity to continue to thrive even today.
Dating in this day and age is hard, not to mention scary. After reading my last blog about the top 5 safe dating inventions, you should be armed and ready to go. Now is the time to get out on the field and start playing the game!
Meeting people is hard, but there’s a certain stigma that still follows online dating sometimes. However, it’s definitely diminished some over the last few years. Most people are intelligent enough now (when sober) to know that if you really want to meet a person that’s relationship material, it isn’t going to be in a bar. As adults, let’s be honest, work takes up most of our time. Rarely is there time for anything we’d actually like to be doing. The job is generally where people get introduced and end up dating. That’s not a bad thing by any means, but what if you work in a position where you can’t date a coworker? Or even worse–none of them are datable? Leave it the app industry to have your back!:
1. The Infamous Tinder
This app gets a great deal of attention, and we all know it by now, whether we use it or not. It seems it’s kind of gotten a bad wrap, but it really doesn’t have to be used as a hookup-only app. Its user-friendly interface and anonymity are a few of the reasons it’s so popular. It’s famous for it’s left and right swiping action, which is how you meet potential dates/hookups. If you both swipe right, Tinder will let you know that the feeling is mutual and you can take it from there! (Hopefully!) A positive thing about Tinder is the whole “rejection” issue. With Tinder, you don’t really know if you’re being rejected or not, only when there’s a match. Tinder has a 3.5 star average rating in the App Store with a wide variety of reviews. Make sure to check and see if this app might be right for you!
2. OkCupid
I have in fact used this app, and I actually really liked it. I met quite a few cool dudes who I hung out with occasionally, and the app itself matched me with people pretty accurately. The app has definitely upgraded since I’ve used it, following Tinder’s lead with the swiping of pictures. OkCupid provides you with a match percentage based on your information and questions you answered when signing up. My roommate and I had fun with OkCupid, and I think most people in my age group would (18-27.) This dating app has a 4.5 average rating in the App Store with the majority of reviews being positive.
3. Coffee Meets Bagel
This dating app is a new one for me. I honestly hadn’t heard of it, but when I started my research, this one popped up in many different articles. According to their website, they are “the Dating App That Women Love! Safe. Private. Fun.” It looks like the app does the majority of the work for you. At noon everyday, the app sends you a “bagel,” a match that shares mutual friends on Facebook. The hope for integrating Facebook into your dating apps is to cut out the creep factor for both men and women. It’s also to insure that you do in fact have people and interests in common to create more enjoyable experiences for you both. You can then like or pass on the person, teaching the app what your preferences are. If the two of you express interest in one another, the app will send you both to a private chat room where you can get to know each other better and make plans to meet. Coffee Meets Bagel also has a currency called “beans” that you can use those to buy viewing privileges of who your mutual friends are. I’m not a fan of the whole “beans” situation, but I do like the idea of seeing that you have mutual friends. It’s comforting to know that you can ask around about someone. Not just for information, but for safety purposes as well. This app also has an 4.5 average rating in the App Store with 208 5-star reviews.
4. Loveflutter
I personally love this app. It’s very creative in it’s process and I like that they stepped outside the box of the superficial dating profile experience to give you something a little more personal. For your profile picture, this dating app asks that you go with a unique fact about yourself. You then superimpose that fact over a blurred out image, which will then reveal more information if you stay on the profile. The creators really want people to meet based on their interests and personality, not by whether they took a great selfie that day. What I like most about Loveflutter is that it also suggests dates for you. Planning a date is nerve wracking! Now you have a little help in that department. Loveflutter has an average rating of 4.5 as well but only has a total of 17 reviews in the App Store.
5. How About We
This dating app has really gotten creative in finding its user’s matches. Instead of wading through tons of profiles, How About We has you describe the type of date you want to go on. Users can view other people’s date ideas and pick their matches accordingly. This will hopefully lead to someone who has similar interests (the whole point of the dating app game!) This dating app has an average rating of 2.5 in the App Store with almost 50 reviews posted on it. I still chose this app to talk about because I think it serve a small niche market in the dating world.
There are many other dating apps out there as I’m sure we could all name a few more, any number of which just might not be the right app for you. Play with them, experience what each has to offer and see what fits best for you! These are apps that I have personally had experience with, or know someone who has. These are great alternatives to buying a subscription to Match.com or eHarmony and are a little more laid back and less intimidating. These are FREE dating apps that let you play around with your profile and potentially meet the type of person you’ve been wanting to meet, but haven’t been able to leave the office to do so just yet! Now get out there and meet people!
Do you use a dating app? Tell me which one and how well it’s worked for you!
Newly discovered Hawaiian coral species can live up to 4,000 years!
Recently, scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural have discovered a new coral species in Hawaii. The species is a milestone discovery for one remarkable reason. Like with its ground-based alternative, trees, the measurement of age is based on the number of rings in the coral. The new species is the longest living marine creature that is known to science so far based on radiocarbon measurements on the growth rings- four thousand years.
The discovery hit the Hawaiian news yesterday afternoon
The species is known now as the Leiopathes annosa. The Latin name refers to the species’ longevity. The coral is found in the ocean depths of one thousand to one thousand six hundred feet in the Hawaiian Island area, the area of Papahanaumokuakea included.
The various depths of the world’s oceans are still quite unknown to us
This sentiment is shared by all who study these underground terrains, most especially when they continue to find new specimens unknown to science to log into the books. It also shows how much we have yet to understand about the environments in which we find these new species as well.
According to the news story, the new coral species was incorrectly identified as one that exists in the Mediterranean Sea, but upon further inspection the consensus was that it was unique. Researchers after the initial impressions were done with could see that this new coral species was different in its morphology in the comparisons of Hawaiian and Mediterranean specimens.
Want more info about the new coral species?
For more in-depth detail about the specimen, you can read it here in the ZOOTAXA article.
The specimens of the new coral species were collected by the Hawaii Undersea Research Lab for study then given to the National Musuem of Natural History in D.C and to the Bishop Musuem in Honolulu for further studies whenever feasible. Time will tell what further information can be revealed from this new coral species and also the underwater environment that houses the species.
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Human are unique from the animal kingdom for so many reasons, opposable thumbs being one of them. It is nothing new to know that birds are capable of mimicking speech, as seen in parrots and such. However recent studies by research on babbler birds in Australia have found that these particular birds can put together different sounds to create messages, just as we do.
Although, birds create sounds that essentially mean the same thing, the babbler bird strings together sounds with a specific meaning intended. The babbler bird is native to the Australian outback, with various different-colored crowns or different colors overall.
However the chestnut-crowned babbler is unique from others
This babbler bird is a cordial one and talks with new meaning in its speech by reordering the sounds in the calls it makes to reflect the new meaning. This complexity in the speech show that this bird does not sing by doing this. Usually, when birds ‘talk’ it is in song that does not differ in sounds too much and the meaning is never too different.
Sabrina Engesser, one of the researchers studying the bird, in a news release said, “In contrast to most songbirds, the chestnut-crowned babbler do not sing. Instead its extensive vocal repertoire is characterized by discrete calls made up of smaller acoustically distinct individual sounds.”
The findings about the babbler bird were published in the Public Library of Science Journal the other day with in-depth scientific detail about the behavior/speech phenomenon the babbler bird exhibits. A suggestion for this behavior is that it may be easier to rearrange the sounds the bird makes to create a new message or meaning instead creating a whole new sound or melody. A shortcut, so to speak.
Babble birds can differentiate the various sounds
Furthermore, the studies on the chestnut-crowned babbler bird show that the birds can tell the difference in the variety of sounds perfectly fine. Even chicks were observed to demonstrate the variations to convey feeding calls and the like. This rearrangement of sounds fascinating to observe outside the human species, and may help to understand how our own human speech evolved.
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A new record was set for the most time spent in space by a human being. Russian cosmonaut, Gennady Padalka, has spent a total of 803 days in space. Padalka is currently on his fifth trip into space and once he returns, on September 11, he will have spent 877 days in space.
During his time in outer space, he conducted experiments and went on numerous space walks. His days spent in space were not consecutive but envision what you could do in solitude for two years and four months, uninterrupted. Here are three things you could accomplish if you were in space for 803 days:
1. Practice Eccentric Skills
You will have so much free time to practice cool things you wouldn’t be able to do with the force of gravity surrounding you. You can become a Mortal Kombat character and work on your bicycle kicks. You can move on from your kiddie cartwheels and progress to full on back flips. And if you are one of those disgusting people that want to try to catching their spit in their mouth, you can do that too. But I don’t recommend it.
2. Catch Up On Your Reading
I don’t know about you, but I love reading. I’ve spent entire weekends doing nothing but drowning myself in a good book. Recently, I’ve been too busy to sit and read, or do anything fun, so I would jump at the chance to catch up on my favorite romance novel. You could teach yourself a new language and come back to earth more intelligent than you left. If I were in space for 803 days, reading would definitely be at the top of my list.
3. Self-Reflection
Being alone in space takes peace and quiet to a whole different level, I would suspect. The time you have secluded, without distractions can be used for self-reflection. You can learn new things about yourself and appreciate the characteristics you considered flaws. A lot of people don’t get the chance to reflect but with your time in space, you have a ton of chances.
In reality, you may never get the chance for complete isolation but you should definitely take a step back from the world. Continue to develop your skills and learn something new everyday. And when you think you’ve run out of things to learn, just think, what could I accomplish if I were in space for 803 days?
Definitely bring a notebook with you on this long, isolated journey. Moleskine has one for this very occasion:
We all remember the 90’s Hollywood apocalypse fads. Whether saved from it by Bruce Willis, or led to it in mass acquiescence by Morgan Freeman, death by dangerous asteroids was always the public’s favorite.
But according to Queen’s founding member, Brian May, who’s also an astrophysicist, it’s no laughing matter.
WAIT, WHAT?
Yes, Brian May was among many scientists who have urged the global powers at be to increase our efforts to locate and track asteroids that could pose a serious danger to us Earthlings. According to this amalgam of astrophysicists, the search for dangerous asteroids should be hastened a hundredfold, if we are to take our hopes of surviving an impact seriously.
WHAT ASTEROID DAY IS FOR
Not just scientists, but astronauts as well participate in a rather morbid holiday known as Asteroid Day, which is host to debates and lectures aimed at spreading awareness about the dangers of faster-than-sound giant rocks zipping and zapping through space. Basically Earth exists in an interstellar shooting range, and only a small percentage of the sky is regularly scanned for dangerous asteroids.
NON-ROCKSTARS ARE WORRIED, TOO
Among May’s ranks are Lord Rees, Peter Gabriel, Brian Cox, Richard Dawkins, Eileen Collins, and nearly one hundred thousand others who’ve called for world governments to take the threat of dangerous asteroids seriously.
THE 100X DECLARATION
Signatories of the declaration demand that available technology be used more fastidiously to detect and track near-Earth asteroids which pose a serious threat to human populations, so that we discover 100,000 annually over the next ten years. The signatories believe that the adoption of Asteroid Day is another way to spread awareness about this, and hopefully take steps toward this feasible goal.
EXCERPT FROM DECLARATION
“There are a million asteroids in our solar system that have the potential to strike Earth and destroy a city, yet we have discovered less than 10,000–just one percent–of them. We have the technology to change that situation.”
HISTORIC REVERBERATIONS
This Asteroid Day shares its anniversary with a major asteroid which struck in 1908 in Tunguska, Siberia. In that catastrophe, a 40-meter wide rock fell from space at about 33,500 miles per hour, exploding in midair and releasing the energy equivalent to a massive hydrogen bomb. Images of 2,000 square kilometers of flattened forest still send chills up one’s spine.
If a dangerous asteroid of similar proportions entered the Earth’s atmosphere over a populated area, it would literally be hell on Earth, causing humans to combust before it even makes landfall.
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