A Brazilian government agency released video of an indigenous tribe that researchers say lives in complete isolation in the thick of the Amazon jungle after they first made contact with the group in June. The group lives in a jungle area near the border of Peru in the Amazonian state of Acre in northwestern Brazil.Brazil's National Indigenous Foundation (Funai) said it has been monitoring the group since 2008, but direct contact was not made until June.
Researchers from Funai, the Front for Ethno-Environmental Protection and members of neighbouring tribes say they are working to contain the group and protect their integrity and environment.
Sea snails and electric flame scallop. Part 17 of my documentary, "Mucky Secrets", about the fascinating marine creatures of the Lembeh Strait in Indonesia.
As we continue to examine molluscs (mollusks, Mollusca) in this documentary series, we take a quick look at the electric flame scallop (Ctenoides ales), otherwise known as the "disco clam", "fire clam" or "electric clam". The flame scallop is a type of bivalve (Bivalvia). It appears to emit luminescent electrical pulses, but actually it is rolling and unrolling the edges of its mantle, revealing special particles that simply reflect light. The display is thought to attract phytoplankton as food and perhaps frighten off predators like crabs and shrimps.
We then turn our attention to sea snail (gastropods, Gastropoda). The grey bonnet (Phalium glaucum) is a typical sea snail. It has a protective, coiled shell that it can withdraw its entire body into. It glides over the substrate on its large, muscular foot, and at the rear we see the operculum, a hard lid that is used to close the opening of the shell after the snail withdraws into it. Two simple eyes peer out from under the front of the shell, and important sensory feedback also comes from the two tentacles. To one side is the inhalent siphon, a tube that the sea snail uses to draw in water for respiration.
The anatomy of another gastropod, the vomer conch (Euprotomus vomer), is different. Its mouth is much more obvious, at the end of a long protrusion called a proboscis. It is strictly a herbivore, and it uses the proboscis for locating and eating algae growing in the sand. It's eyes are much more prominent too, at the end of long stalks, and jutting out from these stalks are two highly sensitive tentacles. Rather than gliding, it uses its operculum to drag itself along the bottom in a lurching motion.
Conchs are a popular food, and their shells have symbolic and religious significance in some cultures. They have been used for everything from musical instruments, to weapons, to ink holders.
We then encounter a whitespotted hermit crab inhabiting an empty cone shell. The main sensory device of cones like the ivory cone (Conus eburneus) is the siphon itself which contains highly sensitive chemoreceptors. If it detects suitable prey the cone will unleash a harpoon from its proboscis containing a highly venomous neurotoxin, powerful enough to kill humans.
There are English captions showing either the full narration or the common and scientific names of the marine life, along with the dive site names.
"Mucky Secrets" is being serialised weekly on YouTube. Please subscribe to my channel to receive notifications of new episodes as I release them. The series will feature a huge diversity of weird and wonderful marine animals including frogfish, nudibranchs, scorpionfish, crabs, shrimps, moray eels, seahorses, octopus, cuttlefish etc..
Thanks to Kevin McLeod of http://www.incompetech.com for the music track, "Scheming Weasel (slower version)", which is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license.
Thanks to the staff and keen-eyed divemasters of Two Fish Divers (http://www.twofishdivers.com), for accommodation, diving services and critter-spotting.
The video was shot by Nick Hope with a Sony HVR-Z1P HDV camera in a Light & Motion Bluefin HD housing with Light & Motion Elite lights and a flat port. A Century +3.5 diopter was used for the most of the macro footage.
Analysis: Islamic State advertises war crimes in video
By THOMAS JOSCELYNJuly 29, 2014
The Islamic State, an al Qaeda offshoot that controls significant territory in both Iraq and Syria, has posted an extremely brutal video. While most Muslims were celebrating the end of Islam's holy month, the Islamic State is celebrating mass executions.
Warning: Some of the images below are graphic.
The Long War Journal is posting these images because they highlight the depravity of the Islamic State and its followers. The Islamic State likely believes that these images will help intimate its opposition into submission and earn new recruits, especially among young jihadists and sympathizers who are mesmerized by the orgy of killings. This will work with a certain segment of the jihadists' recruiting pool.
But over-the-top violence of this sort can also have the opposite effect, as it turns some potential recruits and supporters into foes. In this regard, the Islamic State is repeating the same mistakes made by its predecessors, al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) and the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), in the past. The indiscriminate violence carried out by these organizations alienated many Iraqis and sowed the seeds of their initial demise.
The military prowess of the Islamic State is formidable and the organization will not be easily defeated any time soon. The Islamic State has managed to achieve remarkable successes on the battlefields in both Iraq and Syria. Yet its brand of jihad creates an opportunity for its opponents to marshal forces against it. This was the linchpin of the strategy previously employed by American forces in Iraq during the height of the "surge." Therefore, while these images will further the Islamic State's cause in some circles, they can also help to discredit it in others.
Whether the Iraqi government, which is in disarray, or its allies can take advantage of this strategic liability in the Islamic State's operations remains to be seen, however. Keep in mind that the United States military and government were crucial to organizing the Awakening, the tribal resistance to al Qaeda in Iraq, as well as bolstering the Iraqi military during the surge, which began in 2007. Additionally, more than 130,000 US troops, supported by American airpower, intelligence, and logistics, partnered with the Awakening and Iraqi security forces to conduct nearly two years of concurrent military operations throughout Iraq in order to beat back al Qaeda and its allies by the end of 2008.
Graphic images from Islamic State's video celebrating end of Ramadan
The images below appear to cover incidents that have occurred since early June. Some of these events were previously promoted by the group.
A few of the Islamic State's victims await their death after others perished in a mass killing:
The Islamic State's victims are marched to their death:
The Islamic State's executioners spray their captives with bullets:
A gunman makes sure the prisoners are dead by shooting them once again:
The Islamic State's victims are carted to their death:
A line of victims is funneled to a killing spot on what appears to be a river:
One by one the victims are shot in the head at the killing spot, which is stained with blood, and their corpses are then dumped into the water:
Εντοπισμός θολωτού τάφου των μυκηναϊκών χρόνων στην Άμφισσα
Πρόκειται για ένα ιδιαίτερα σημαντικό μνημείο
Ένα ιδιαίτερα σημαντικό μνημείο αποκαλύφθηκε πρόσφατα κοντά στην Άμφισσα στο πλαίσιο της επίβλεψης των εκσκαφών του έργου «Αρδευτικό έργο ελαιώνα Άμφισσας, Π.Ε. Φωκίδας». Συγκεκριμένα, εντοπίστηκε θολωτός τάφος των μυκηναϊκών χρόνων, ο οποίος διαθέτει τα χαρακτηριστικά των μνημείων της κατηγορίας, δηλαδή μακρύ δρόμο με κτιστές τις πλευρές μήκους 9 μέτρων, βαθύ προθάλαμο και κυκλικής κάτοψης ταφικό θάλαμο, ο οποίος έχει εσωτερική μέγιστη διάμετρο 5,90 μέτρων. Η ανωδομή της θολωτής οροφής, η οποία είναι κτισμένη με αργούς λίθους, είχε καταρρεύσει, ωστόσο τα τοιχώματα του θαλάμου διατηρήθηκαν σε ύψος σχεδόν 3 μέτρων.
Ο τάφος δεν έχει συληθεί, τουλάχιστον σε μεγάλο μέρος του, και τα κτερίσματα που βρέθηκαν στο δάπεδο επιτρέπουν τη διαχρονική χρήση του από τον 14ο αιώνα π.Χ. έως και τα τέλη του 12ου αιώνα π.Χ.. Άξια ιδιαίτερης μνείας είναι τα σαράντα τέσσερα αγγεία με γραπτή διακόσμηση, δύο χάλκινα αγγεία αποσπασματικά σωζόμενα, δαχτυλίδια χρυσά, από τα οποία ένα με έγγλυφη διακόσμηση στη σφενδόνη, και χάλκινα, κομβία και ψήφοι από ημιπολύτιμους λίθους, δυο χάλκινα εγχειρίδια, γυναικεία και ζωόμορφα ειδώλια, και μεγάλος αριθμός σφραγιδόλιθων με ζωικά, φυτικά και γραμμικά μοτίβα. Στο τέλος του δρόμου αποκαλύφθηκε αποθέτης με άφθονη την παρουσία κεραμικής που προέρχεται πιθανώς από αγγεία πόσεως, κρατήρες, υδρίες, αμφορείς.Ο θολωτός τάφος της Άμφισσας είναι ένα μοναδικό εύρημα, το πρώτο αυτού του είδους που αποκαλύπτεται στη Φωκίδα και ένα από τα ελάχιστα στη Στερεά Ελλάδα. Η επιστημονική δημοσίευσή του αναμένεται να προσφέρει σημαντικά στοιχεία τόσο για την εγκατάσταση στην περιοχή της Άμφισσας κατά την μυκηναϊκή περίοδο αλλά και για την ιστορική εξέλιξη της ευρύτερης περιοχής και μάλιστα του ιερού των Δελφών.
Για την προστασία του μνημείου, καθ' όλη τη διάρκεια της έρευνας, η Εφορεία με επικεφαλής την Προϊσταμένη αρχαιολόγο κ. Αθανασία Ψάλτη μερίμνησε για την παρουσία αρμοδίων υπαλλήλων σε εικοσιτετράωρη βάση, ενώ διαρκής ήταν και η μέριμνα στης Αστυνομικής Διεύθυνσης Φωκίδας.
A British biomechanist believes he can help ease the strain on the shins of walkers and soldiers trekking for many miles while wearing heavy loads on their backs with a new type of footwear. Can a spring change the way we walk? Jim Drury looks at the product's first steps.
In hammer villa of Pink Floyd Rhodes instead of 1 million. She wants to buy Ronaldo (photo)
Surrounded by trees is built the legendary luxury villa of Pink Floyd guitarist David Gilmour, Lindos in Rhodes, which comes under the hammer instead of 1 million.
The total area is 575 sq.m. and was for many years a holiday home of the famous musician who adored Greece. It has even been declared an honorary citizen Castelorizo and also wrote the song Castellorizon who in 2006 was nominated for a Grammy best instrumental rock song.
The Gilmour in Lindos
The Lindos villa consists of 6 separate compartments and has a total of 9 bedrooms, in a wooded plot of 10 acres. It has a huge swimming pool 120 m² and is strategically located in Lindos, 5 minutes from the beach.
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The interior of the house is decorated with heavy wooden furniture and gold, while the exteriors are reminiscent of exotic hotel.
The sale ad states that the villa has been designed with unique art deco style and noted that the famous footballer Rinaldo interested to buy, having left fascinated by the journey of the enchanted island to Irina Sykes, a week ago.
According to reports in this house guitarist inspired many of the tracks the band. In fact in 2006 there was recorded the disc "On an Island".
Ο πρωθυπουργός της Τουρκίας πέτυχε τρία γκολ (σε 15 λεπτά) σε εγκαίνια γηπέδου στην Πόλη
Το κατόρθωμά του θα ζήλευαν πολλοί ποδοσφαιριστές, αλλά κυρίως και πολλοί πολιτικοί! Για λόγους επικοινωνιακούς, βέβαια. Με ένα χατ τρικ μέσα σε μόλις 15 λεπτά ο πρωθυπουργός της Τουρκίας Ρετζέπ Ταγίπ Ερντογάν εγκαινίασε το στάδιο Φατίχ Τερίμ στην Κωνσταντινούπολη, ενώ ταυτόχρονα πέτυχε να προβάλει με έναν διαφορετικό τρόπο την υποψηφιότητά του για την προεδρία της χώρας, εν όψει των εκλογών του Αυγούστου.
Η φανέλα με το 12
Σύμφωνα με τα τουρκικά μέσα ενημέρωσης, ο Ερντογάν -που παλιότερα έπαιζε ερασιτεχνικά στην Κασίμπασα- φόρεσε τη φανέλα με το νούμερο 12, κάνοντας σαφή αναφορά στην ελπίδα του να γίνει ο 12ος πρόεδρος της Τουρκίας τον επόμενο μήνα, ενώ συμπαίκτες του με την πορτοκαλί ομάδα στην οποία αγωνίστηκε ήταν, μεταξύ άλλων, ο δήμαρχος της Κωνσταντινούπολης Καντίρ Τοπμπάς, ο πρώην ποδοσφαιριστής Ριντβάν Ντιλμέν, ο πρώην παίκτης του NBA Χινταγέτ Τούρκογλου, ο γιος του Ερντογάν, Μπιλάλ Ερντογάν κ.ά. Ο Τούρκος πρωθυπουργός έβαλε το πρώτο γκολ τη δεύτερη φορά που ακούμπησε την μπάλα, ενώ ολοκλήρωσε την... ποδοσφαιρική παράστασή του με άλλα δύο γκολ, μέσα σε διάστημα 15 λεπτών. Πάντως, δεν έλειψαν οι χρήστες του twitter που είπαν ότι το παιχνίδι ήταν «στημένο» για να βάλει γκολ ο Ερντογάν.
Oπως και να 'χουν τα πράγματα, από προχθές ξεκίνησαν να ψηφίζουν για τις προεδρικές εκλογές στη χώρα οι Τούρκοι που ζουν στο εξωτερικό. Στελέχη της εκλογικής επιτροπής άνοιξαν 42 εκλογικά τμήματα σε σημεία χερσαίας διέλευσης, αεροδρόμια και λιμάνια που θα παραμείνουν ανοιχτά για τους ψηφοφόρους έως τη 10η Αυγούστου, την ημερομηνία δηλαδή κατά την οποία οι εκλογείς οι οποίοι ζουν στη χώρα θα κληθούν να προσέλθουν στις κάλπες για τον πρώτο γύρο των προεδρικών εκλογών .
An amazing sculpture is made by pouring molten aluminum into a fire ant colony. The resulting cast is huge, weighing 17.9 lbs. and reaching a depth of 18 inches.
These are the red imported fire ants which are harmful to the environment and their nests are exterminated by the millions in the United States using poisons, gasoline and fire, boiling water, and very rarely molten aluminum.
From Wikipedia: "Researchers have also been experimenting with extreme temperature change to exterminate RIFAs [red imported fire ants], such as injecting liquid nitrogen or pressurized steam into RIFA nests. Besides using hot steam, pouring boiling water into ant mounds has been found effective in exterminating their nests."
I recently did a casual survey and found that I have at least 120 of these colonies within an area of approximately three acres.http://www.anthillart.com/info/fire-a...
“This is all the space for you and your three closest friends,” says Brad Holcomb, a project manager at Lockheed Martin’s Exploration Development Laboratory in Houston, as I settle into the commander’s seat on the low-fidelity mockup of the Orion capsule. Having clambered my six-foot-three-inch frame down through the hatch opening (an isosceles trapezoid, with black-and-yellow caution tape along the top so visitors don’t smack their heads), grabbed a handy yellow strap as I reclined, and swung my legs into a flexed, upright position, I couldn’t imagine working, or driving anything. However normal this position may seem in space, here it felt unsettling.Holcomb is in the same position in a seat a few feet away. Speaking with him—the first interview I have ever conducted on my back—I cannot shake the feeling you get when you climb into a new car with a salesman: resting your hands on the wheel, puzzling out the unfamiliar dashboard, shifting your lumbar region against leather. In this case, however, the seats are severely unaccommodating machined aluminum (the operational version will be upholstered); the windows, shaped roughly like a pair of Aviator shades turned upside down, are above my head; and do not go looking for any cup-holders—though there are other nifty features, like space-saving foldaway seats. While not what you would call expansive, Orion is roomier than the three-astronaut Apollo command modules were. Like a third row seat added to a minivan, the extra 135 cubic feet of habitable volume in Orion is enough to carry a fourth astronaut. In this “mid-fidelity” mockup, the interior is white and spare, and rather than a complicated instrument panel with a hundred switches poking out of it, the cockpit will feature three touchscreens, placed at eye level.
Orion spent years in a high-flying theoretical orbit, and has so far survived the punishing turbulence of reentry into fiscal realities and shifting political desires. In 2006, NASA awarded Lockheed Martin Space Systems $6.1 billion to build spacecraft for the far-ranging Constellation program of human exploration. After the program’s cancellation, Lockheed Martin began work on a contract, extended to 2020, to build spacecraft for three missions. The first flightworthy capsule is being readied (in June, technicians at Florida’s Kennedy Space Center mated the crew and service modules) for its uncrewed 3,600-mile ride this December, after its launch atop a Delta IV Heavy rocket. Orion is the heart of NASA’s most ambitious crewed vehicle ever, a vessel that will carry the human space program for the next 30 years and could see everything from lunar exploration to a variety of still-unfolding asteroid recovery missions to, eventually, it is hoped, a mission to Mars.
Not that astronauts would be expected to log that flight in the Orion command module; for a Mars voyage, a larger habitation module would be attached. There is even talk of having habitation modules stocked with supplies and waiting in space at crucial junctures, like highway rest stops.
Car metaphors may be trite, but while I walk around Lockheed’s laboratory, in a sprawling office park not far from the Johnson Space Center, they keep coming up. (And after all, Lockheed designers did get advice on the capsule’s seat-restraint systems from seat designers for NASCAR.) To explain the difference between a spacecraft designed for a Mars mission and one for low Earth orbit, for example, Linda Singleton, Lockheed’s Orion program integration manager, reaches for the RV comparison: “If you have a car and an RV, you’re not going to run to the grocery store in your RV to get milk,” she says. By contrast, sleeping in the “car” might be acceptable for a one-week jaunt to the moon, but for a nine-month Martian road trip you will want some of the creature comforts of a Winnebago (i.e., a habitation module). Of the spacecraft being developed by companies NASA has hired to ferry people and things to the International Space Station, she says “we kind of call them taxis.” As opposed to the 20,000-mph, 4,000-degree, 12-G reentry that Orion will eventually experience from a deep space jaunt, “the low Earth orbit is a Sunday drive,” Holcomb notes. As we walk around the capsule exterior, I point out to the Lockheed team that, as with the anthropomorphic headlights and grills of most car designs, the front of Orion has a “face.” Purely unintentional, they tell me. Squint a bit and you almost see a less-threatening version of a stormtrooper helmet from Star Wars.
The last time humans left Earth orbit, cars ran on leaded gas, few models had power steering, in-car entertainment was an AM radio, cruise control was a novelty, and air bags were unheard of. So how has something as representative of the Space Age as a space capsule changed in that time? As NASA prepares to launch a vehicle that someday, according to the agency’s “road map,” will go farther into space than any before it, I wanted to look under the hood of this new-model capsule and understand how the agency has designed for distance.
***
If you were around for Apollo, you’ll recognize Orion. Its conical form comes deep out of Apollo aerodynamic studies and tapers from its base to its lopped-off apex with a barely perceptible 2.5-degree change in the angle that defined the Apollo capsules. When Cleon Lacefield, Lockheed vice president and Orion’s program manager (a former NASA flight director in the space shuttle program), tells me Orion is using the same Avcoat-clad heat shield as Apollo (besting some eight rival materials), I ask how much the 1960s material has evolved. “Not much!” he says, adding that the heat shield is a testament to the engineering ingenuity of the Apollo program. In addition, he notes, since Orion designers were trying to take so many things to the next level, “where we didn’t have to take something to the next level, we tried not to.” Still, Lacefield points out, a “lot of work” was done to improve Avcoat’s thermal properties and strength so that it will withstand the higher reentry loads Orion will experience.
Like the honeycombed Avcoat surface, the resemblance between Apollo and Orion is skin deep. Josh Hopkins is a Lockheed Martin engineer who leads a team designing the concepts for missions that Orion will some day fly. He says that while some may have wanted a next-generation crewed spacecraft to look more next-generation, another mindset is “Hey, the Apollo design worked, and physics hasn’t changed in that time, so let’s start with that approach.”
There are obvious differences: Orion is 30 percent larger in diameter to accommodate longer missions. Internally, says Hopkins, “you have twice the volume. There’s room to put things like a toilet. On Apollo, they had plastic bags. On a two-week trip that could be tiresome.”
Just as the most dramatic changes made in automobiles since the 1960s have been in passenger safety, one of the most significant areas of design evolution in Orion is crew safety. Much of the increased hardness (and weight) of the capsule, says Lacefield, is due to the requirement to make the craft able to withstand a launch failure. Orion, in the event of catastrophe on the launch pad, is rocketed away from its launcher and can be lifted “a mile up and a mile over,” says Lacefield, before it descends under a parachute. That abort system comes with a weight penalty—some 16,000 pounds, more than half the weight of the 22,000-pound crew capsule itself. The burden of weight—“Every pound you add in the weight means several pounds of fuel to get it up,” Lacefield says—is the reason designers scrapped the early idea of a terrestrial landing system, which would have required more cushioning to keep from crushing the humans inside—about 1,400 pounds more—than a water landing system. And yet because of Orion’s deeper journey, and its potentially rougher return ride, bulk had to be added nonetheless. On the space shuttle, Hopkins says, the “decision to deorbit would be made about an hour before landing, so they could essentially check the weather at the landing site.” But on a lunar mission, “you make a commitment to come home about four days before you actually land.” With cooperative weather a probability at best, “you have to be able to tolerate a wider range of weather conditions on landing.” Higher wave heights, for example, can make the landing more troublesome. “When the spacecraft comes down and touches the water, what it really wants to do is come in at an angle,” Hopkins says. “It doesn’t want to belly flop.” But higher waves make it harder for the capsule to make that slicing racing dive; imagine waterskiing across the wake of the boat’s waves versus calm water. Although engineers removed, through various iterations of the design, upward of 1,000 pounds from the Orion heat shield, the one place where structure was added was the part of the capsule that would land in the ocean “feet first” (the astronauts’ feet, that is).
On a deeper, longer mission, there are more chances for things to go wrong, more exposure to radiation and micrometeorites. Says Hopkins, “People on the ground, or astronauts on the space station, are protected from solar storms or galactic cosmic rays to some extent by the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field.” If a spacecraft is to push beyond that field, it will need more protection. This entails everything from better data (from high-powered computing) on where cosmic rays are penetrating a spacecraft to better sensors monitoring the radiation environment. “If it gets bad,” Hopkins says, “the astronauts can move some of the cargo around inside the spacecraft to create a ‘storm shelter’ in the spacecraft, a little bit like kids building a fort out of couch cushions.” Water, stored food, spacesuits—almost any supplies could be used. They help eliminate the need for (and the weight of) material with the single purpose of shielding the ship from radiation. (The service module structure is a radiation buffer on the ship’s blunt end.)
It’s not just astronauts that need shielding: Modern avionics, says Hopkins, have smaller circuits and are thus more vulnerable to radiation. “In modern electronics, as everything has gotten smaller and everything is closer together, there’s a smaller amount of electric current required to flip the switches in the circuit. It used to be that getting hit with a stray particle of radiation wouldn’t have had enough energy to damage big wires and vacuum tubes,” he says. “As things get smaller, it’s easier to flip a bit from a zero to a one or to damage the electrical circuitry. That’s one reason that spacecraft might not use the latest and greatest computer chips like your iPad might use.” So shielding and redundancy have been added.
Going long, the astronauts will depend on the Deep Space Network for communication and must be more self-reliant; there are fewer chances for help. “On [the space station] or shuttle,” says Hopkins, “if something goes wrong [like a sick astronaut], you have the option to come home pretty quickly.” So the Orion design includes many levels of redundancies and “down modes,” says Lockheed’s Lacefield. “We could lose [Orion’s main engine] on the other side of the moon,” he says, holding a model of the Orion and its Space Launch System rocket, “have a problem with our primary avionics, and have a hole in the cabin and still get the crew back.” Things learned with Apollo are reflected here: For example, because of the fire hazard of an all-oxygen cabin, the astronauts will breathe a mixture of gases, even in flight. The carbon dioxide “scrubbers,” whose pending failure was famously depicted in the film Apollo 13, have been replaced, Hopkins says, with a new system that can absorb carbon dioxide and release it later. When the reusable absorber becomes saturated, the astronauts will open a vent and the CO2 will be released overboard. This technology for keeping the air breathable has no time limit, and without it, humans would be restricted to short stays in space.
When the space shuttle was being designed, its creators believed that it would always operate as a pressurized vessel. Only after the Challenger disaster were the astronauts given full-pressure suits to wear during launch and reentry, and although switches and controls had been designed for spacegloved hands to manipulate, the astronauts had difficulty with them when their suits were pressurized. During the Columbia accident investigation, NASA determined that three astronauts weren’t wearing their gloves and one was not wearing a helmet.