tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76642172024-03-13T19:24:43.967+08:00BolehTalk® ... Speak Your Mind!BolehTalk® is an Open Commentary Forum on Malaysian Affairs:: OBJECTIVE – Progressing the Society & Rendering better Governance :: PHILOSOPHY - Free for All & Fair to All :: PARTICIPATION – Contribution and distribution are encouraged, please email KTemoc at <a href="mailto:ktemockonsiders@gmail.com">ktemockonsiders@gmail.com</a>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.comBlogger1051125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-33372393062164552152024-02-10T06:07:00.001+08:002024-02-10T06:07:04.979+08:00KEONG HEE HUAT CHYE to everyone<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><img border="0" height="399" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqBjWHbrNYCB1F9629OeoTkwgUAlMFF9sOfxWjaARF8GpEHd7D_emxgwMG8W1Ote9wDgwSq_CeBNfv8zjn_q2g6SRD3FlXggQhkHFMUgV0by8eQMjvEZmme5V_7r9cPcGiDGRSwrsuOEU8673tn8jPtYS88KSof_pPo-bfUTfMg4iH-2m-tVN_vA/w640-h399/CNY%203.jpeg" width="640" /></div><br /><p><br /></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-22502495661842902792024-01-24T23:17:00.003+08:002024-01-24T23:17:17.703+08:00Happy Thaipusam mateys<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiHQtGaQzI9Is8iOH09X2zIHCMsl_aZoyLa4Xaqbyjrym1m-ryKgSB8QeySPjXR1YYMP6oG8I08JMzS_dNgCDbg6k8EtqECnk5tBiZPQmvwfyDVXTb3nKtK3ZoDojgl53SstiDlCFenFozuK9glwtk0NrXx0eQxUvvp_z5I8YDQcsdrIAcKmYHOw/s225/Thaipusam%205.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="224" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiHQtGaQzI9Is8iOH09X2zIHCMsl_aZoyLa4Xaqbyjrym1m-ryKgSB8QeySPjXR1YYMP6oG8I08JMzS_dNgCDbg6k8EtqECnk5tBiZPQmvwfyDVXTb3nKtK3ZoDojgl53SstiDlCFenFozuK9glwtk0NrXx0eQxUvvp_z5I8YDQcsdrIAcKmYHOw/w637-h640/Thaipusam%205.jpeg" width="637" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-33786570461432082782023-12-24T03:57:00.008+08:002023-12-24T03:58:22.815+08:00It's Christmas! Is the war over?<p><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;">This year in lieu of Christmas greetings I invite you to view the video below.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: large;">It's non-religious and very relevant during this troubling time where genocide is happening in Gaza.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: large;">In past years I played this song near New Year's end every Year, and never failed to shed tears when I listen to the message from John Lennon and Yoko. </span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: verdana;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/yN4Uu0OlmTg" width="320" youtube-src-id="yN4Uu0OlmTg"></iframe></span></div><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-43193630996189067532023-11-11T20:23:00.006+08:002023-11-11T20:23:54.488+08:00Happy Deepavali to all Malaysians<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgejo4b1i4FE8FiRHJIoVM-CNKakXuObSo4YiiB1j8hRo8uCy6GswR_PeHp8UllQUuQwvLiEJJTQKV7qfexxLoGsCG6-zR8PISTiQnrftfmjXMsSx5KnwYqc53xvxkexXQrB4onDXPMTu_17nFzjUQXLQNewGKsnaX1To-hQQOmDXwsRC2ilDU8nQ/s300/deepa%2005.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgejo4b1i4FE8FiRHJIoVM-CNKakXuObSo4YiiB1j8hRo8uCy6GswR_PeHp8UllQUuQwvLiEJJTQKV7qfexxLoGsCG6-zR8PISTiQnrftfmjXMsSx5KnwYqc53xvxkexXQrB4onDXPMTu_17nFzjUQXLQNewGKsnaX1To-hQQOmDXwsRC2ilDU8nQ/w557-h358/deepa%2005.jpeg" width="557" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-34464944484640444972023-06-29T08:24:00.003+08:002023-06-29T08:24:19.633+08:00Selamat Hari Raya Aidiladha!<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaI3YA-4ckta6aCRT0hXBB0k-5lciUy-frw7ubSxlTJr5OLqyzA7PB3GkSP3K4NP1-ns5hF_lrblVsGVX-EjftRXxmaLqfOsFL4LtkJpLIb2yxCrUPAOTBgftj_yXlUaxdlxfyjFlAKjo3fyiT5GH96Q-pxeeBT9NpcoUZJd5_jmfv4EftgRQLDg/s691/q1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="691" data-original-width="691" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaI3YA-4ckta6aCRT0hXBB0k-5lciUy-frw7ubSxlTJr5OLqyzA7PB3GkSP3K4NP1-ns5hF_lrblVsGVX-EjftRXxmaLqfOsFL4LtkJpLIb2yxCrUPAOTBgftj_yXlUaxdlxfyjFlAKjo3fyiT5GH96Q-pxeeBT9NpcoUZJd5_jmfv4EftgRQLDg/w400-h400/q1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-39688750262248394802023-05-19T08:06:00.000+08:002023-05-19T08:06:08.808+08:00Earth-sized alien planet gripped by widespread volcanism<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /> <a href="https://www.malaymail.com/"><img height="44" src="https://www.malaymail.com/theme_malaymail/images/logo.svg" width="200" /></a><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/malaymaildotcom"></a> <br /><br /><a href="https://www.malaymail.com/news/life/2023/05/18/earth-sized-alien-planet-gripped-by-widespread-volcanism/69760" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Earth-sized alien planet gripped by widespread volcanism</span></b></a><br /><br /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="359" src="https://cdn4.premiumread.com/?url=https://malaymail.com/malaymail/uploads/images/2023/05/18/114784.JPG&w=800&q=100&f=jpg&t=2" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">An exoplanet called LP 791-18 d, an Earth-size world about 90 light-years away, is seen in an undated artist's rendering. — Nasa Goddard Space Flight Center/Chris Smith (KRBwyle)/Handout via Reuters<br /><br />Thursday, 18 May 2023 7:23 AM MYT</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">WASHINGTON, May 18 — An Earth-sized planet orbiting a dim star in our galactic neighbourhood is offering some of the best evidence to date of volcanism beyond our solar system, with observations suggesting a rugged and rocky world tormented by constant eruptions.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Scientists said yesterday the planet, the third detected orbiting this particular star, is likely covered with volcanoes — similar to Jupiter’s moon Io, the most volcanically active body in our solar system. In our solar system, Earth and Venus are volcanically active, as are some of Jupiter’s moons.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The planet’s volcanism was not directly observed but rather inferred due to its significant gravitational interaction with the larger of the two other planets orbiting the dim star. The gravitational tug from the larger planet may squeeze and flex the newly identified one, heating up its interior and causing surface volcanic activity, similar to Io, the researchers said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Planets beyond our solar system are called exoplanets.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“There is not yet any direct observational evidence of exoplanet volcanism, but this planet is a particularly likely candidate,” said University of Kansas astronomy professor Ian Crossfield, one of the authors of the research published in the journal Nature.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is a planet that does not rotate — with one side perpetually in daylight and the other in darkness.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“On the dayside, it is too hot for liquid water, so it is likely very dry and hot — likely a desert. On the night side, there is possibly a large icy glacier,” said study co-author Björn Benneke, head of the astronomy group at the University of Montreal.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The most interesting region is near the terminator region where the day and nightside meet. Here, water from the nightside glacier can melt and possibly form liquid surface water. In addition, there is likely volcanism all around the planet, even under the ice on the nightside and possibly under the water near the terminator,” Benneke said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The planet is located in the Milky Way about 86 light-years away from our solar system in the direction of the constellation Crater. A light year is the distance light travels in a year, 5.9 trillion miles (9.5 trillion km).</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is slightly larger than Earth and orbits very close to a red dwarf star — a type much smaller than our sun, with relatively low mass and temperature — completing its elliptical journey around it in only 2.8 days.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Its surface temperature appears to be slightly warmer than Earth. It is situated on the inner edge of what is called the habitable zone, or Goldilocks zone, around the star — not too hot and not too cold, perhaps able to maintain liquid water on the surface and harbour life.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I imagine a rugged, young surface for the planet after many millions of years of constant volcanic activity. Since the gravitational effects don’t care about day and night side, I also suspect the volcanic activity to be evenly spread over the planetary surface,” said University of California, Riverside planetary astrophysicist and study co-author Stephen Kane.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Since the planet is so volcanically active, it is still contributing gases to the atmosphere from the interior. As such, the planet probably still has an atmosphere. The planet is unlikely to be habitable, however, since the total amount of energy makes for a quite hostile environment. Who knows? Life may find a way,” Kane added.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Its orbit is sandwiched between the two other planets — the innermost one about 20 per cent bigger than Earth and the outermost one about 250 per cent the size of our planet.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The researchers spotted the planet using Nasa’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) and the now-retired Spitzer Space Telescope, as well as some ground-based observatories.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“There are still many unknowns regarding volcanism and how long a planet can maintain outgassing processes,” Kane said, referring to the release of trapped gas that occurs with eruptions. “We only recently confirmed that Venus, Earth’s twin planet, is volcanically active.” — Reuters</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-27706688150413403532023-05-03T21:03:00.004+08:002023-05-03T21:03:54.370+08:00Peace be with you - Wesak Day greetings<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><img border="0" height="402" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiq17fdMd2P1uqcyXjzW2_a4yLx0CrE9zJ2OKOatjZvxtZSWwFTDqirqvAGFl5TCuWVGfVA1EN8mz1Sr46Z_oJozSIPkWcMxITyvZ1HSM582Onrj9rnsJoOZv9-vnQK2iy_FAN1eST_nhSunEQw9YMmmZJ-RU22IBhVHisqNxL4M78RsVHGhyM/w640-h402/vesak%20day.jpg" width="640" /></div><br /> <p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-15623070141028960112023-04-23T18:24:00.000+08:002023-04-23T18:24:06.534+08:00World’s ‘oldest’ tree able to reveal planet’s secrets<span style="font-size: large;"><br /> <a href="https://www.malaymail.com/" style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="48" src="https://www.malaymail.com/uploads/logo/21-04-2023-164646.png" width="200" /></a><br /><br /><br /><a href="https://www.malaymail.com/news/life/2023/04/23/worlds-oldest-tree-able-to-reveal-planets-secrets/66026" style="font-family: verdana;" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">World’s ‘oldest’ tree able to reveal planet’s secrets</span></b></a><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="426" src="https://cdn4.premiumread.com/?url=https://malaymail.com/malaymail/uploads/images/2023/04/23/109039.jpg&w=800&q=100&f=jpg&t=2" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">View of the "Alerce Milenario" at the Alerce Costero National Park in Valdivia, Chile, taken on April 10, 2023. — AFP pic<br /><br />Sunday, 23 Apr 2023 9:51 AM MYT</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">VALDIVIA (Chile), April 23 — In a forest in southern Chile, a giant tree has survived for thousands of years and is in the process of being recognised as the oldest in the world.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Known as the “Great Grandfather,” the trunk of this tree measuring four meters (13 feet) in diameter and 28 meters tall is also believed to contain scientific information that could shed light on how the planet has adapted to climatic changes.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Believed to be more than 5,000 years old, it is on the brink of replacing Methuselah, a 4,850-year-old Great Basin bristlecone pine found in California in the United States, as the oldest tree on the planet.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“It’s a survivor, there are no others that have had the opportunity to live so long,” said Antonio Lara, a researcher at Austral University and Chile’s centre for climate science and resilience, who is part of the team measuring the tree’s age.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The Great Grandfather lies on the edge of a ravine in a forest in the southern Los Rios region, 800 kilometres (500 miles) to the south of the capital Santiago.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is a Fitzroya cupressoides, a type of cypress tree that is endemic to the south of the continent.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="369" src="https://www.malaymail.com/malaymail/uploads/images/2023/04/23/109040.jpg" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">In a forest in southern Chile, protected from fires and logging that decimated the species, a giant alerce tree has survived for thousands of years. — AFP pic</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In recent years, tourists have walked an hour through the forest to the spot to be photographed beside the new “oldest tree in the world.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Due to its growing fame, the national forestry body has had to increase the number of park rangers and restrict access to protect the Great Grandfather.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">By contrast, the exact location of Methuselah is kept a secret.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Also known as the Patagonian cypress, it is the largest tree species in South America.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It lives alongside other tree species, such as coigue, plum pine and tepa, Darwin’s frogs, lizards, and birds such as the chucao tapaculo and Chilean hawk.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">For centuries its thick trunk has been chopped down to build houses and ships, and it was heavily logged during the 19th and 20th centuries.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Excitement in scientific community</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Park warden Anibal Henriquez discovered the tree while patrolling the forest in 1972. He died of a heart attack 16 years later while patrolling the same forest on horseback.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“He didn’t want people and tourists to know (where it was) because he knew it was very valuable,” said his daughter Nancy Henriquez, herself a park warden.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Henrique’s nephew, Jonathan Barichivich, grew up playing amongst the Fitzroya and is now one of the scientists studying the species.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In 2020, Barichivich and Lara managed to extract a sample from the Great Grandfather using the longest manual drill that exists, but they did not reach the centre.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="429" src="https://www.malaymail.com/malaymail/uploads/images/2023/04/23/109041.jpg" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Detail of the "Alerce Milenario" at the Alerce Costero National Park in Valdivia, Chile, taken on April 10, 2023. — AFP pic</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They estimated that their sample was 2,400 years old and used a predictive model to calculate the full age of the tree.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Barichivich said that “80 per cent of the possible trajectories show the tree would be 5,000 years old.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He hopes to soon publish the results.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The study has created excitement within the scientific community given that dendrochronology — the method of dating tree rings to when they were formed — is less accurate when it comes to older trees as many have a rotten core.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>‘Symbols of resistance’</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">This is about more than just a competition to enter the record books though, as the Great Grandfather is a font of valuable information.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“There are many other reasons that give value and sense to this tree and the need to protect it,” said Lara.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">There are very few thousands-years-old trees on the planet.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The ancient trees have genes and a very special history because they are symbols of resistance and adaptation. They are nature’s best athletes,” said Barichivich.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“They are like an open book and we are like the readers who read every one of their rings,” said Carmen Gloria Rodriguez, an assistant researcher at the dendrochronology and global change laboratory at Austral University.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Those pages show dry and rainy years, depending on the width of the rings.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Fires and earthquakes are also recorded in those rings, such as the most powerful tremor in history that hit this area in 1960.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The Great Grandfather is also considered a time capsule that can offer a window into the past.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“If these trees disappear, so too will disappear an important key about how life adapts to changes on the planet,” said Barichivich. — AFP</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-38535026426465878212023-04-21T21:54:00.003+08:002023-04-21T21:54:22.196+08:00Selamat Hari Raya Adil Fitri<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><img border="0" height="406" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0ryq2Jxyn0kVrpKePiOMmVNXQ6MRfuDBc2j1IqW8ZKWppQ1XEfvohSocQ3TeEg0u6Ns54C-_W57rS7y9IykFdWwx9XMj8neflP6C1VVR8zap2HcnVtxXCpbgSSS7tHIGAz3HvCjHY5jQkaELDA1v6g_tVfIk8EKEAEmE4C5qMf9iAA4RHn0Y/w640-h406/raya%203.jpg" width="640" /></div><br /> <p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-25649745435102568022023-03-18T00:01:00.009+08:002023-03-18T00:02:19.655+08:00New giant dinosaur makes giraffe look tiny<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><a href="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/"><img height="37" src="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/logo1.png" width="200" /></a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/new-giant-dinosaur-makes-giraffe-look-tiny/" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">New giant dinosaur makes giraffe look tiny</span></b></a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/author/nury-vittachi/">BY NURY VITTACHI</a></span><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><img height="347" src="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/dinosaur.jpg" width="640" /><br /><a href="https://www.fridayeveryday.com/new-giant-dinosaur-makes-giraffe-look-tiny/#"></a><br /><br />A HUGE DINOSAUR that makes a giraffe look small roamed northwest China 160 million years ago, scientists said yesterday.<br /><br />The massive beast had an enormous neck and would have weighed about 70 tons.<br /><br />The news came from a new analysis of bones found in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in 1987. Scientists realized they were from the skull and neck of a large dinosaur.<br /><br />The beast has been given the scientific name Mamenchisaurus sinocanadorum—and was probably just one of many super-size beasts roaming the area at that time, scientists said.<br /><br />The discovery was revealed in the latest edition of the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology.<br /><br />The long neck would have enabled it to get found food sources while minimizing the need to carry its huge body around too far. While the neck and head parts look too heavy to carry, the creature had hollow bones for lightness, and had even evolved the equivalent of ribs for its neck.<br /><br />China, Africa, and parts of the United States have proved a treasure trove for scientists searching for dinosaurs.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-39528785512491132402023-01-21T23:02:00.003+08:002023-01-21T23:02:14.599+08:00Keong Hee Huat Chye 2023<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><img border="0" height="399" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyu8-CFUWi4aq40DwiHKsThil7NdgzaxZeIFQQzfh3Kb6CKXM2FW4jznKxjT4XRW6UYmHg-owPBNwW3vsoWFnBPYdkO90KYp29QhupuZ974D3o672I-gyscR9pqONNOh4T6Cb3vIOvT-lKMYsVwfMASTz1nClpcjrbGKdnu7xmPjIW-Yg1-lo/w569-h399/chinese-new-year-image-04.jpeg" width="569" />\</div> <p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-59974698670548439192022-12-24T19:19:00.002+08:002022-12-24T19:19:17.711+08:00Merry Christmas & Happy New Year<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_nGcUtWX-ZirxJpOv3iY_N7wUyWZK_mv88-6c2pPShUKveN3LqdLMg4AmMns5Ca2mOCBHxU_mmq5POOO__FuM3eybW1nJDO6k8wRviEtV3h9tPUBxUlEsKh81_wkLfZvX20txKH1rdZ4gpDLEUeQhzo7mNy56OC8frIkl-rpgPJcqWH0ANwU/s600/Xmas3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="500" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_nGcUtWX-ZirxJpOv3iY_N7wUyWZK_mv88-6c2pPShUKveN3LqdLMg4AmMns5Ca2mOCBHxU_mmq5POOO__FuM3eybW1nJDO6k8wRviEtV3h9tPUBxUlEsKh81_wkLfZvX20txKH1rdZ4gpDLEUeQhzo7mNy56OC8frIkl-rpgPJcqWH0ANwU/w534-h640/Xmas3.jpg" width="534" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-53599984375968052012022-11-14T15:30:00.001+08:002022-11-14T15:30:27.142+08:00Bar-tailed godwit sets world record with 13,560km continuous flight from Alaska to southern Australia<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/oct/27/bar-tailed-godwit-sets-world-record-with-13560km-continuous-flight-from-alaska-to-southern-australia" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Guardian</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Bar-tailed godwit sets world record with 13,560km continuous flight from Alaska to southern Australia</b><br /><br />Satellite tag data suggests five-month-old migratory bird did not stop during voyage which took 11 days and one hour to reach Tasmania<br /><br /><br /><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/83dc4e8d76d15663d7572d5482f9d3717f4c9f16/0_0_4256_2832/master/4256.jpg?width=465&quality=85&dpr=1&s=none" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">A juvenile bar-tailed godwit has flown from Alaska in the US to Tasmania in Australia, covering a record 13,560kms without stopping. Photograph: Johnny Madsen/Alamy</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">A juvenile </span><a href="https://birdlife.org.au/bird-profile/bar-tailed-godwit" style="font-family: verdana;">bar-tailed godwit</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> – known only by its satellite tag number 234684 – has flown 13,560 kilometres from Alaska to the Australian state of Tasmania without stopping, appearing to set a new world record for marathon bird flights.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The five-month-old bird set off from </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/alaska" style="font-family: verdana;">Alaska</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> on 13 October and satellite data appeared to show it did not stop during its marathon flight which took 11 days and one hour.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Tagged in Alaska, the bar-tailed godwit, Limosa lapponica, flew at least 13,560km (8,435 miles) before touching down at Ansons Bay in north-east </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/tasmania" style="font-family: verdana;">Tasmania</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">.</span><br /><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/5b228441524e7af7b4085addf269b568b041c668/183_97_3259_1955/master/3259.jpg?width=460&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=6ddc49f9a95988cb328108a014e46189" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></a></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">'Jet fighter' godwit breaks world record for non-stop bird flight<br /></span></b></i><br /></a><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The </span><a href="https://www.birdingwire.com/releases/0d5396dd-2ce9-4115-a912-957f0a5b9d26" style="font-family: verdana;">previous record was held by</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> an adult male of the same species – 4BBRW – that flew 13,000km (8,100 miles) last year, </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/13/jet-fighter-godwit-breaks-world-record-for-non-stop-bird-flight" style="font-family: verdana;">beating his own previous record of 12,000km</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> the year before.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">According to a </span><a href="https://www.facebook.com/437949496218757/posts/pfbid0yC5vdRppcoaCBEdD5ELn4R4eZgErNkee5p2Bctzd5ok4a7WE2QYwgVEXwDfMf4xTl/" style="font-family: verdana;">Facebook post from the Pūkorokoro Miranda Shorebird Centre</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> in New Zealand, 4BBRW’s record had been “blown out of the water by this young upstart”.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Scientists track the bird using a 5G satellite tag attached to its lower back.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">According to data from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology’s bird tracking project, the migratory bird took a route to the west of Hawaii, continuing over open ocean and flying over the Pacific island nation of Kiribati on 19 October.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">About two days later the bird would have seen land again, shooting over Vanuatu and continuing south taking a track about 620km east of Sydney and continuing between Australia’s east coast and New Zealand.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">On 23 October, the bird and any others flying with it took a sharp right and headed west to arrive at Tasmania on 25 October.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Sean Dooley, of BirdLife Australia, said: “The most amazing thing is that juveniles migrate separately to the adults. Adults take off from the Arctic sometimes up to six weeks earlier.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Juveniles would spend that time fattening-up for the long migration south. “That bird is likely to have been in a flock. This record is for continuous flying and it’s just incredible,” Dooley said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He said the birds were able to shrink their internal organs to make more space for fat stores.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The </span><a href="https://www.facebook.com/437949496218757/posts/pfbid0yC5vdRppcoaCBEdD5ELn4R4eZgErNkee5p2Bctzd5ok4a7WE2QYwgVEXwDfMf4xTl/" style="font-family: verdana;">Pūkorokoro Miranda Shorebird Centre</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> said it had produced souvenir tea towels for the previous record holder 4BBRW and may now have to have a new set made.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-35179126153064281782022-10-24T04:23:00.002+08:002022-10-24T04:23:13.176+08:00Happy Deepavali 2022<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9WGb4HXAOvfc64RJcq9OY7f_E2Vp9GJQ1jYcstwMWPvNOiKaOXh-jL7QN6E-pv_h2xGmEa4i_pzhFKmmyp6WdtvdIDbOH4LQVSH-IzDZ4J5epowsbkKpic0EFJ_SSbYuHEn2Fgj_BgwEeJyqSAvIUu5yqZJBAT5KDKVSBCAb5fjNOhwtUDnc/s300/deepavali2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="168" data-original-width="300" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9WGb4HXAOvfc64RJcq9OY7f_E2Vp9GJQ1jYcstwMWPvNOiKaOXh-jL7QN6E-pv_h2xGmEa4i_pzhFKmmyp6WdtvdIDbOH4LQVSH-IzDZ4J5epowsbkKpic0EFJ_SSbYuHEn2Fgj_BgwEeJyqSAvIUu5yqZJBAT5KDKVSBCAb5fjNOhwtUDnc/w640-h358/deepavali2.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-19028419761245864222022-10-16T08:26:00.000+08:002022-10-16T08:26:53.089+08:00Meet China’s shortest-reigning emperor, who was banished in life but dignified in death<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><b><br /><a href="https://www.scmp.com/news/people-culture/article/3194324/meet-chinas-shortest-reigning-emperor-who-was-banished-life?utm_medium=email&utm_source=cm&utm_campaign=enlz-focus_row_ru&utm_content=20221014&tpcc=enlz-focus_row&UUID=6bd20db1-9f25-4aa3-b56c-f5e7477f2298&tc=19&CMCampaignID=597aea120dd9cad2a0b08b57b32bf6ef" target="_blank">SCMP</a>:<br /><br />Meet China’s shortest-reigning emperor, who was banished in life but dignified in death<br /></b><br />Liu He ruled as emperor for just 27 days in 74BC, and he was banished as a commoner after being dethroned</span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But his tomb is full of treasures, and they offer an insight into one of the most successful periods of Chinese history</span><br /><br /><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Published: 6:00pm, 9 Oct, 2022</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="427" src="https://img.i-scmp.com/cdn-cgi/image/fit=contain,width=1098,format=auto/sites/default/files/styles/1200x800/public/d8/images/canvas/2022/09/30/52b9e33e-2312-45aa-a5c9-cd3c70ebf2e7_cc35c3ce.jpg?itok=SRNyfKZW&v=1664500300" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The tomb of Emperor Liu He during excavation. Photo: China Daily</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">When Liu He was deposed as emperor in 74BC, it is unlikely he imagined that he would set a record that would stand for nearly 2,100 years. Liu has regrettable stature as the Chinese emperor who ruled for the shortest time, lasting for just 27 days.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">When Liu was dethroned, </span><a href="https://www.scmp.com/video/china/3159914/emperors-tomb-northwestern-china-confirmed-belong-han-dynasty-ruler-emperor-wen?module=inline&pgtype=article" style="font-family: verdana;">he was stripped of his social status</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> and spent the rest of his life as a commoner. However, this punishment did not last into his death, and recent </span><a href="https://www.scmp.com/video/china/3172991/mysterious-tomb-han-dynasty-emperor-wen-among-chinas-top-10-archaeological?module=inline&pgtype=article" style="font-family: verdana;">excavations of his tomb</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> paint a picture that, in the afterlife, his name triumphed over his legacy.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">After his banishment, Liu was renamed Marquis of Haihun and would spend his remaining days living by a lake, and he would eventually receive a full-scale tomb after he died.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="320" src="https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2022/09/30/9dd5d744-f95e-4ade-a5f0-614c1b3be28f_4b963f71.jpg" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The tomb of Liu He, the shortest ruling emperor in Chinese history. Photo: People’s Daily</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Ironically, considering the brief nature of Liu’s reign, his tomb near Nanchang, the capital of Jiangxi province in southeastern China, is the best-preserved cemetery of an imperial figure from the </span><a href="https://www.scmp.com/topics/han-dynasty?module=inline&pgtype=article" style="font-family: verdana;">Western Han dynasty (206BC–9AD)</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">.</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the most recent announcement, archaeologists said they found what could be the oldest known painting of Confucius ever found in China. Around 5,000 bamboo slips with Confucius teachings were found in the tomb.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">That, along with bronze, gold and jade artefacts, makes it clear that Liu was not treated like a commoner in his death.</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The reason for the honour may be straightforward – Liu was the grandson of Emperor Wu of Han, one of the most influential leaders in Chinese history. Wu reigned for 54 years and helmed a period of significant territorial expansion. He also strengthened the central government and improved China’s status abroad.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The treasures left in Liu’s tomb indicated that the legacy of Emperor Wu was still a powerful force, and Yang Jun, a researcher at the Jiangxi Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, said in the press release that the tomb “shed light on the mightiness of the Han Dynasty”.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="284" src="https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2022/09/30/09d2d418-e4e8-45d4-95dd-b38a6eb27780_beaada16.jpg" width="640" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Liu He’s tomb revealed some of the most fantastic Han dynasty artefacts in China. Photo: People’s Daily</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">One specific example is five well-preserved horse-drawn chariots left in the tomb, the only example of these carriages being buried with a Han dynasty noble south of the Yangtze River. This indicates that the “owner was among the highest echelons of the Han dynasty.”</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Since 2015, Liu’s tomb has transformed into maybe the most important archaeological site to learn about Emperor Wu. Yang said that, before the discovery, there had been few artefacts that offered a direct means to study the respected leader.</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">So far, scientists have unearthed 4 million bronze coins, 480 pieces of gold - the largest single batch ever found in a Han dynasty tomb - along with thousands of bamboo slips of writing.</span><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">To elaborate on what Yang said about direct artefacts, the excavations confirmed that Han societies used a string with 1,000 coins strung together as a monetary unit.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-41302544937903492752022-09-26T13:47:00.001+08:002022-09-26T13:47:12.151+08:00Fishermen lament plunge in Scottish wild salmon catch<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><a href="https://www.malaymail.com/"><img height="44" src="https://www.malaymail.com/theme_malaymail/images/malaymail/logo.svg" width="200" /></a><br /><a href="https://www.facebook.com/malaymaildotcom"></a> <br /><br /><a href="https://www.malaymail.com/news/life/2022/09/26/fishermen-lament-plunge-in-scottish-wild-salmon-catch/30116" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Fishermen lament plunge in Scottish wild salmon catch</span></b></a></span><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="369" src="https://cdn4.premiumread.com/?url=https://malaymail.com/malaymail/uploads/images/2022/09/26/53032.jpeg&w=800&q=100&f=jpg&t=2" width="559" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">An angler casts his line on the opening day of the salmon fishing season on the River Tay at Kenmore in Scotland January 15, 2018. — Reuters file pic<br /><br />Monday, 26 Sep 2022 7:51 AM MYT</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">CHARLESTOWN OF ABERLOUR, Sept 26 — In the shimmering rapids of the River Spey that cuts through the Scottish Highlands, Ian Gordon casts his line with a languid swish and waits for a salmon to take the fly.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the early 1970s, when Gordon first fished the Spey as a “wee nipper”, it never took long to catch a bite. But things have changed.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I would say there are now 20 per cent, maximum, of what there were in the mid-80s,” Gordon told AFP on a stretch of the river near the town of Aberlour, where he runs a tourist fishing company.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Before the numbers started to fall in the 1980s and 90s, hundreds of thousands of young Atlantic salmon or smolts would migrate to sea from Scotland’s rivers.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">A quarter would return to their natal rivers to spawn. Today, only around 4 per cent return, according to the Spey Fishery Board.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In Scotland, where anglers abide by a “catch and release” conservation code, the rod catch of 35,693 in 2021 was the lowest number since records began.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The Scottish government, in a report in June, said the numbers were “consistent with a general pattern of decline in numbers of wild salmon returning to Scotland”.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Ecologists and fishermen say multiple factors are behind the decline, including the overfishing of herring and the effect of the warming climate on the salmon’s life cycle.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Herring used to be abundant around the coastline of the UK,” Gordon says.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“That was a species that all species relied on around the UK. Since the herring got fished out, so the salmon, which come into the ocean as little things, themselves become prey.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“It’s that cycle that gets upset when one species is taken out of the ecosystem.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“That of course is affected by the climate, there’s no doubt.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Trees and weirs</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Further north, outside the town of Bonar Bridge, Andrew Graham-Stewart stands on a bridge surveying a stream.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“We’ve got a real problem happening at sea,” says Graham-Stewart, who is the director of the Wildfish Scotland charity and has fished the local waters since he was a boy.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Climate change is obviously the primary factor, and there is very little we can do about that.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“But when fish go out to sea, they are clearly not finding all the food that they need to find.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">One factor is the loss of trees around the headwaters of Scottish rivers.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Scotland has lost “probably about 95 per cent” of its tree cover over the last few centuries due to agriculture, industry and wars, Graham-Stewart said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Trees, apart from providing shade for marine life, slow the release of water from the hills, which provides more constant flows through the year.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“With tree cover and reasonable flows, water remains relatively cool, and salmon need cool in order to survive and thrive,” the charity director said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Some fisheries boards have already taken action including on the River Dee, which runs along the royal family’s Balmoral estate, where Queen Elizabeth II died on September 8.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The Dee District Salmon Fishery Board and River Dee Trust have planted more than 200,000 native trees along the river banks since 2013.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The aim is to plant a million trees by 2035 to restore water retention and protect salmon and other river species.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">On the River Carron in 2019, local groups removed a concrete weir built more than half a century ago to improve water flow and allow salmon a trouble-free journey.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Farm lice</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">For Graham-Stewart, salmon farming in the western Highlands and islands of Scotland has played a “massive” role in the fall in numbers, by spreading sea lice to wild salmon.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Millions of fish in a concentrated area act as a breeding ground for parasites, he says.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">When the sea lice enter the farm they multiply exponentially and are passed on to passing juvenile wild salmon.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Once that happens, the salmon are eaten alive by the lice.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The damage they (fish farms) are doing to wild fish and the environment, in general, is massive,” he said, calling for tighter regulations on salmon farms.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Fish farms emphatically deny the allegations, saying that protecting the environment and health of fish are fundamental to their business.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">At the Spey River, Gordon exits the water without having caught a fish.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He slides out of his waterproof waders and fixes his rod to the roof of his car.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Salmon, he believes, are a valuable indicator for the health of humanity as a species.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“It gives us an indication on whether the sea is in a good state or not,” he says.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Right now, they are saying: wait a minute, guys -- something’s wrong.” — AFP</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR1Za5XUNShYJV3gwsulcgyDsf33QVnoWUqeKCeXj36b3iPP4yc0H-p0NzrFqcv5fNq-98WK1U3rkfmPNdzGSn9HY5ufUFqsFH2N2aDS1L6IGo20tASpnwfP6GR74vX40gSvASngKFGrpTcS8dmeHvkIEHKbWOmKdbD5myCJaV2MizWPQl7_4/s1024/salmon1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="576" data-original-width="1024" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR1Za5XUNShYJV3gwsulcgyDsf33QVnoWUqeKCeXj36b3iPP4yc0H-p0NzrFqcv5fNq-98WK1U3rkfmPNdzGSn9HY5ufUFqsFH2N2aDS1L6IGo20tASpnwfP6GR74vX40gSvASngKFGrpTcS8dmeHvkIEHKbWOmKdbD5myCJaV2MizWPQl7_4/w640-h360/salmon1.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2ycdcDk4VWD7iidLIuKA0D-D8HPDZPdK1fsV6wr9w9l3RYykv_cuZGGPZsdNRWua2yCXNZYN1d_NHhTSvF6lvFFmqFCleKmiDNT3D5q9sirY7el9GZT_0ZPWsnk6ECjfvPIXJVF4dNKyjCNo6R_DQqvK2YNLmuMhTwJMg5VcV6QEYJhYan6Y/s640/salmon2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="419" data-original-width="640" height="420" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2ycdcDk4VWD7iidLIuKA0D-D8HPDZPdK1fsV6wr9w9l3RYykv_cuZGGPZsdNRWua2yCXNZYN1d_NHhTSvF6lvFFmqFCleKmiDNT3D5q9sirY7el9GZT_0ZPWsnk6ECjfvPIXJVF4dNKyjCNo6R_DQqvK2YNLmuMhTwJMg5VcV6QEYJhYan6Y/w640-h420/salmon2.jpeg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXprbR7Q7-snBDU7aFuwDE14sP90j7Bj5EdjH05d2zM_9-jidadaiTbPK2SlAZBSFB4-f8hAJNHCfmdbg6wvomUztAmA-6zj9zqitcv3cctrDnWx1Tp5CQn4qh16aW72TjtecfzbN1EhB3qOxpzI73hnMxrrMIa5_LFw-as91bG-7_-uecYFU/s620/salmon3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="388" data-original-width="620" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiXprbR7Q7-snBDU7aFuwDE14sP90j7Bj5EdjH05d2zM_9-jidadaiTbPK2SlAZBSFB4-f8hAJNHCfmdbg6wvomUztAmA-6zj9zqitcv3cctrDnWx1Tp5CQn4qh16aW72TjtecfzbN1EhB3qOxpzI73hnMxrrMIa5_LFw-as91bG-7_-uecYFU/w640-h400/salmon3.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2U2xa_xDJ0fS_69O6W2OFQMBnI-c-JPqPKkT21CMf3RvIiyrX-qlr7wDADjVgKQ30oiynIJUIii8iiDz_xZRaOKgVgkalxVTE4WSLrSwjtWgGlYTPY-7DU_KZSzh0Gx2xtDIVn5xYeDPB4wHp_aoFwqyYF3_9QemwFUFDrSjtvOl4rwLEmT4/s612/salmon4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="415" data-original-width="612" height="434" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2U2xa_xDJ0fS_69O6W2OFQMBnI-c-JPqPKkT21CMf3RvIiyrX-qlr7wDADjVgKQ30oiynIJUIii8iiDz_xZRaOKgVgkalxVTE4WSLrSwjtWgGlYTPY-7DU_KZSzh0Gx2xtDIVn5xYeDPB4wHp_aoFwqyYF3_9QemwFUFDrSjtvOl4rwLEmT4/w640-h434/salmon4.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhujyLjRBEH8YnDwgKiMVeCqoEQdTkoHXCr7IJowjFZb0aywHfZDka5dhowXu32T12LDd9oQKlj8TQ0f1299XLjDgw3qCCOtkBzruKZceH-khlevb0j5Q8oJcWc9e9lZAbrcxGYLPUuKRv6yjS7KLSrRp0AYF2eppQKkHkVU-1380VlLLFKm5Q/s1186/salmon5.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="791" data-original-width="1186" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhujyLjRBEH8YnDwgKiMVeCqoEQdTkoHXCr7IJowjFZb0aywHfZDka5dhowXu32T12LDd9oQKlj8TQ0f1299XLjDgw3qCCOtkBzruKZceH-khlevb0j5Q8oJcWc9e9lZAbrcxGYLPUuKRv6yjS7KLSrRp0AYF2eppQKkHkVU-1380VlLLFKm5Q/w640-h426/salmon5.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-38189841060221413032022-09-17T19:49:00.009+08:002022-09-17T19:49:46.364+08:00India welcomes back cheetahs, 70 years after local extinction<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><b><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/17/india-welcomes-back-cheetahs-70-years-after-local-extinction" target="_blank"><span style="color: #2b00fe;">al Jazeera</span></a>:</b></span><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><b><br />India welcomes back cheetahs, 70 years after local extinction<br /></b><br />Arrival of eight big cats from Namibia coincides with the 72nd birthday of Indian Prime Minister Modi who released the first into a wildlife park.</span><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><br /><img height="374" src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Cheetah-1.jpg?resize=770%2C513" width="563" /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">A cheetah is seen after Prime Minister Narendra Modi released it into Kuno National Park on Saturday [India's Press Information Bureau via Reuters]</span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br />Published On 17 Sep 202217 Sep 2022</span></b></i><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><a href="https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2Fbz66vj"></a><a href="https://twitter.com/share?text=India%20welcomes%20back%20cheetahs%2C%2070%20years%20after%20local%20extinction&source=sharethiscom&related=sharethis&via=AJEnglish&url=https%3A%2F%2Faje.io%2Fbz66vj"></a></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Eight Namibian cheetahs have arrived in India in an ambitious project to reintroduce the spotted creatures that has divided wildlife experts after the big cats’ local extinction decades ago.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Officials say the project is the world’s first intercontinental relocation of cheetahs, the planet’s fastest land animal. The five females and three males were moved from a game park in Namibia on board a chartered Boeing 747 dubbed “Cat Plane” for an 11-hour flight.</span><br /><br /><br /><b><i><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">KEEP READING</span></i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><b><i><br /></i></b></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/8/south-africa-is-sending-cheetahs-to-india-and-mozambique"><b><i>South Africa is sending cheetahs to India and Mozambique</i></b></a></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Prime Minister Narendra Modi presided over the release on Saturday at Kuno National Park, a wildlife sanctuary 320km (200 miles) south of New Delhi selected for its abundant prey and grasslands.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><span style="background-color: #ffe599;">“Today the cheetah has returned to the soil of India,”</span> Modi said in a video address after their arrival, which coincided with the leader’s 72nd birthday.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The nature-loving consciousness of India has also awakened with full force. We must not allow our efforts to fail.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Each of the animals, aged between two and five and a half, was fitted with a satellite collar to monitor their movements. They will initially be kept in a quarantine enclosure for about a month before being released in the open forest areas of the park.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><b>Grow the population</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Critics have warned the creatures may struggle to adapt to the Indian habitat. A significant number of leopards are present in the park, and conservation scientist Ravi Chellam said cubs could fall prey to feral dogs and other carnivores.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Under the government’s current action plan, “the prospects for a viable, wild and free-ranging population of cheetahs getting established in India is bleak”, he said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The habitats should have been prepared first before bringing the cats from Namibia. It is like us moving to a new city with only a sub-optimal place to stay. Not a nice situation at all.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But organisers were unfazed.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Cheetahs are very adaptable and [I’m] assuming that they will adapt well into this environment,” said Laurie Marker, founder of the Namibia-based charity Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), which has been central to the project logistics. “I don’t have a lot of worries.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Another 12 cheetahs are expected to join the fledgling Indian population next month </span><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/8/south-africa-is-sending-cheetahs-to-india-and-mozambique" style="font-family: verdana;">from South Africa</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">As India gathers more funding for the 910 million rupee ($11.4m) project, largely financed by the state-owned Indian Oil, it hopes to eventually grow the population to about 40 cats.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Habitat loss and hunting</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">India was once home to the Asiatic cheetah but it was declared extinct in the country by 1952.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The critically endangered subspecies, which once roamed across the Middle East, Central Asia and India, are now only found, in very small numbers, in Iran.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Efforts to reintroduce the animals to India </span><a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/7/20/soon-african-cheetahs-in-india-after-deal-with-namibia" style="font-family: verdana;">gathered pace in 2020</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> when the Supreme Court ruled that African cheetahs, a different subspecies, could be settled in India at a “carefully chosen location” on an experimental basis.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They are a donation from the government of Namibia, one of a tiny handful of countries in Africa where the magnificent creature survives in the wild.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Cheetahs became extinct in India primarily because of habitat loss and hunting for their distinctive spotted coats.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">An Indian prince, the Maharaja Ramanuj Pratap Singh Deo, is widely believed to have killed the last three recorded cheetahs in India in the late 1940s.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">One of the oldest of the big cat species, with ancestors dating back about 8.5 million years, cheetahs once roamed widely throughout Asia and Africa in great numbers. But today only about 7,000 remain, primarily in the African savannas.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The cheetah is listed globally as “vulnerable” on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. In North Africa and Asia, it is “critically endangered”.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="346" src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/000_Del6118848.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C490" width="555" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b>Some Indian scientists say modern India presents challenges not faced by the animals in the past [File: Noah Seelam/AFP]</b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><b>Controversy</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Some Indian scientists say modern India presents challenges not faced by the animals in the past.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">A single cheetah needs a lot of space to roam. A 100-square-kilometre (38-square-mile) area can support six to 11 tigers, 10 to 40 lions, but only one cheetah.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Once the cheetahs move beyond Kuno’s unfenced boundaries, “they’ll be knocked out within six months by domestic dogs, by leopards”, said wildlife biologist Ullas Karanth, director of the Centre for Wildlife Studies in Bengaluru. “Or they’ll kill a goat and villagers will poison them [in response].”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Poaching fears stymied another project that involved a 2013 Supreme Court order to move some of the world’s last surviving Asiatic lions from their only reserve in the western Indian state of Gujarat to Kuno. Now, the cheetahs will take over that space.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Cheetahs cannot be India’s burden,” said Chellam, an authority on Asiatic lions. “These are African animals found in dozens of locations. The Asiatic lion is a single population. A simple eyeballing of the situation shows which species has to be the priority.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Other conservation experts say the promise of restoring cheetahs to India is worth the challenges.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Cheetahs play an important role in grassland ecosystems,” herding prey through grasslands and preventing overgrazing, said Marker.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">She and her collaborators will help monitor the cats’ settlement, hunting and reproduction in coming years.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Modi called for people to be patient as the cats adjust. “For them to be able to make Kuno National Park their home, we’ll have to give these cheetahs a few months’ time.”</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="362" src="https://www.aljazeera.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/Cheetah.jpg?w=770&resize=770%2C513" width="559" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;">A cheetah rests after being prepared for its translocation to India from Otjiwarongo, Namibia [Cheetah Conservation Fund via Reuters]</span></b></i></div><div><span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">SOURCE: NEWS AGENCIES</span></span></div></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-1644316690066027882022-05-26T22:29:00.002+08:002022-05-26T22:29:30.362+08:00Ancient cypress in Chile may be the world’s oldest tree<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/may/26/worlds-oldest-tree-cypress-chile" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Guardian</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Ancient cypress in Chile may be the world’s oldest tree, new study suggests</b><br /><br />The tree, in Chile’s Alerce Costero national park, is known as the Great-Grandfather and could be more than 5,000 years old<br /><br /><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/a2965c83c677c9ff208a4f44d952fa381702b9fd/0_0_6016_3609/master/6016.jpg?width=465&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=3b11586c409dc6b7b8bee07e7e164858" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Fitzroya cupressoides with moss and lichens in Patagonia, Chile. Photograph: Harald von Radebrecht/Getty Images/imageBroker RF</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Scientists in </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/chile" style="font-family: verdana;">Chile</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> believe that a conifer with a four-metre-thick trunk known as the Great-Grandfather could be the world’s oldest living tree, beating the current record-holder by more than 600 years.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">A new study carried out by Dr Jonathan Barichivich, a Chilean scientist at the Climate and Environmental Sciences Laboratory in Paris, suggests that the tree, a Patagonian cypress, also known as the alerce milenario, could be up to 5,484 years old.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Maisa Rojas, </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/05/we-need-politicians-and-experts-maisa-rojas-how-chile-putting-climate-crisis-first" style="font-family: verdana;">who became Chile’s environment minister in March</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> and is a member of the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, hailed the news as a “marvellous scientific discovery”.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Known in Spanish as the alerce, the Patagonian cypress, Fitzroya cupressoides, is a conifer native to Chile and Argentina that belongs to the same family as giant sequoias and redwoods.</span><br /><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/05/we-need-politicians-and-experts-maisa-rojas-how-chile-putting-climate-crisis-first"><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/7a599b20c41f143dc21c5ce5fdc83f65a23d39e3/0_192_5760_3456/master/5760.jpg?width=460&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=480a8955b23d2da0331d3d191ce077fe" /></span><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;"><br /></span></b></i></a></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/05/we-need-politicians-and-experts-maisa-rojas-how-chile-putting-climate-crisis-first"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">‘We need politicians and experts’: how Chile is putting the climate crisis first</span></b></i><br /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They grow incredibly slowly and can reach heights of up to 45 metres (150ft).</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In 2020, Barichivich took a bore sample from the Alerce Milenario, a tree he would visit as a child, but the tool he used was not able to reach its core. He then used computer models to factor in environmental factors and random variation to pinpoint its age.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">As he has not yet carried out a full count of its growth rings, Barichivich has not formally published his estimate in a journal, although he hopes to do so in the coming months.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">If his findings are proven, the Alerce Milenario would outstrip a 4,853-year-old bristlecone pine in California known as Methuselah, and now thought to be the oldest tree, by 600 years.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The Great-Grandfather towers over a cool, humid valley in the Alerce Costero national park, its gnarled crevices sheltering mosses, lichens and other plants.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Visitors are still able to circle its base, which according to Barichivich is causing harm to the tree, along with climate change drying out the area.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Logging plantations cover more than 2.3m hectares of southern Chile, according to the country’s forestry institute, and cellulose production is a major industry for the country.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Thirsty non-native pine and eucalyptus plantations make up 93% of this total area, threatening Chile’s native species.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Between 1973 and 2011, more than 780,000 hectares of native forest were lost in Chile, and the forestry commission estimates that over the last two decades, between 60,000 and 70,000 hectares or native woodland has been destroyed each year.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-47822042201032802772022-05-01T23:34:00.001+08:002022-05-01T23:34:32.212+08:00SELAMAT HARI RAYA AIDIL FITRI<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinikbaKRLyW2nDOA6EOQyx2AzwrMdYuwnHkSBit3Mf9YSkZ-vKjfTkIkpnrKPnfZfRM52vq_Yx8aiAvSWa72AOP73d12E03X-y_5YbgNLEWlmhe7NR_WKmhO6w4PYtyaJpgR_hRz8YXGysvKEHAW8RwOjnVeZqTg9xCtLu_OmDpa8YvkYElgI/s840/AIDILFITRI%205.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="593" data-original-width="840" height="407" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinikbaKRLyW2nDOA6EOQyx2AzwrMdYuwnHkSBit3Mf9YSkZ-vKjfTkIkpnrKPnfZfRM52vq_Yx8aiAvSWa72AOP73d12E03X-y_5YbgNLEWlmhe7NR_WKmhO6w4PYtyaJpgR_hRz8YXGysvKEHAW8RwOjnVeZqTg9xCtLu_OmDpa8YvkYElgI/w535-h407/AIDILFITRI%205.jpg" width="535" /></a></div><br /><p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-53720233298443694592022-03-15T18:03:00.004+08:002022-03-15T18:03:46.927+08:00Japanese school girls banned from sporting ponytails or pigtails over worry revealed neck area would excite boys<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">MM</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Japanese school girls banned from sporting ponytails or pigtails over worry revealed neck area would excite boys<br /></b><br /><img height="587" src="https://media2.malaymail.com/uploads/articles/2022/2022-03/japan_school_110322.jpg" width="639" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Japanese school girls are banned from keeping ponytails or pigtails as the sight of neck would sexually excite boys. ― AFP pic<br /></span></b></i><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">KUALA LUMPUR, March 11 ― From the length of students’ socks to the colour of their underwear, schools in Japan are notorious for their strict ruling on what children can wear to school.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">One rule that stands out is girls are disallowed from keeping ponytails or pigtails to schools as the sight of the neck area may excite boys.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiFOrjPRuydI0t9fKhwVS4eSSeDqn-VWatP6Ub0SJGTURsmBDQQjnRUaOL9KvmC8IK0JxBvWy-_8xiiTO-P-L-z0fdjh6x0AlZd_wC74P5RpjlBnYIBNi5DpOtmUBFCzOsR0-KwaObFffUfKIRN2PNCglEMsHOLjxcDOm_ifqoSc4EmfowNxc8=s320" /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">A former middle school teacher Motoki Sugiyama told Vice that the ruling came about as administrators are worried that hairstyle would expose the neck area thus causing male students to get sexually excited.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“They are worried boys will look at girls, which is similar to the reasoning behind upholding a white-only underwear colour rule,” Sugiyama reportedly said, referring to the ruling where most schools require girls to wear white undergarments so that they won’t show through their uniforms.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I have always criticised these rules, but because there is such a lack of criticism and it has become so normalised, students have no choice but to accept them,” the now retired teacher said.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg5kfzbjSa_eVN19GqmHIJvVnJSEiMyhKuPr2qZMFSAjzI-slQDmR15epQjjY98k0glyzaC4RSrQz4GnpAQ6FR3bmC8DaGuPI_gcSk2YqyAFzu4Oias14sHFUJ92MCOmRXp_nZJ-GSvojy2xV_V0okx2-ZyEw8XAbfISDu_bvvWLCZe-t5Hzrk=w266-h400" width="266" /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">While there are no nationwide statistics on how many schools implemented the ponytail ban, a 2020 survey suggests that one in 10 schools in the southern prefecture of Fukuoka prohibited the hairstyle.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Sugiyama taught at five different schools during his 11 years in Shizuoka prefecture and all the schools banned ponytails.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEju9W9jRGgBOYk27BuvgxFB9vKtoGocXLKbLoJbT2aOr4PqusKLM5f3YxzIkxXltvUpQC8luB0EyUkIHmYtyWxEncjOm2HDsmjDMEOXMmuuhW0pGB8o5hd3IKC3NbfoUTrFRTsmEDFF_HsDiPoUXH8UorDAEz0ge7dlCktZ3RzhofXSl16iEsg=w266-h400" width="266" /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">He has since made it his personal mission to expose unreasonable demands on students, joining a growing call on schools to drop rules that are outdated, sexist or that inhibit a child’s self-expression.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In June last year, the Japanese government asked all prefectural boards of education to revise draconian school rules following complaints from students and parents.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><span style="font-size: large;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiADwM7ehuMBkOi7RsIV7T9WMLKmrPslFBD46DOD0GkTbQY7apsP-rasRWHUQZgyuBWmMoOvpzdviSsyg4j1IHi3vdHlA6JllENAGDnwd6bXc9IHt1mQJWtMnW8QTP0Xbr3fzQpKjeUUzxu2lTrQDknctaDrGiCDRyB7yNvevb8wqpBJX_gMA8=w295-h400" width="295" /></span><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-29066612783012842992022-03-07T22:22:00.007+08:002022-03-07T22:22:54.629+08:00Japan’s ‘killing stone’ splits in two, releasing superstitions amid the sulphur springs<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/07/japans-killing-stone-splits-in-two-releasing-superstitions-and-toxic-gases" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Guardian</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Japan’s ‘killing stone’ splits in two, releasing superstitions amid the sulphur springs</b><br /><br />Legend has it there is an evil spirit trapped in the Sessho-seki stone, so what happens now that the stone is broken?<br /><br /><img height="384" src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/ca4ade5a6a6dae000aaeecc98951078d1c0197e5/0_315_3450_2069/master/3450.jpg?width=465&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=179d9a9d1ca33152090e3da93c68385f" width="571" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Tamamo-no-mae is confronted by a warrior as she turned into an evil fox with nine tails in this woodblock art by Yashima Gakutei. The ‘killing stone’ said to contain her body in Japan has split.<br />Photograph: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. H. O. Havemeyer Collection<br /></span></b></i><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Predictions of dark forces being unleashed by an evil vixen hung over social media in </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/japan" style="font-family: verdana;">Japan</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> on Monday after a famous volcanic rock said to kill anyone who comes into contact with it was found split in two.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">According to the </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/folklore-and-mythology" style="font-family: verdana;">mythology</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> surrounding the Sessho-seki, or killing stone, the object contains the transformed corpse of Tamamo-no-Mae, a beautiful woman who had been part of a secret plot hatched by a feudal warlord to kill Emperor Toba, who reigned from 1107-1123.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Legend has it that her true identity was an evil nine-tailed fox whose spirit is embedded in the hunk of lava, located in an area of Tochigi prefecture, near Tokyo, famous for its sulphurous hot springs.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Its separation into two roughly equal parts, believed to have occurred within the past few days, has spooked online users who noted that, according to folklore, the stone continually spews poisonous gas – hence its name.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">While the stone was said to have been destroyed, and its spirit exorcised by a Buddhist monk who scattered its pieces across </span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/japan" style="font-family: verdana;">Japan</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">, many Japanese prefer to believe that its home is on the slopes of Mount Nasu.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Visitors to the area, a popular sightseeing spot, recoiled in horror at the weekend after witnesses posted photos of the fractured stone, a length of rope that had been secured around its circumference lying on the ground.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I feel like I’ve seen something that shouldn’t be seen,” one Twitter user </span><a href="https://twitter.com/Lily0727K/status/1499998963193499652" style="font-family: verdana;">said</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> in a post that has attracted almost 170,000 likes.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">While others speculated that the demon spirit of Tamamo-no-Mae had been resurrected after almost 1,000 years, local media said cracks had appeared in the rock several years ago, possibly allowing rainwater to seep inside and weaken its structure.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The stone, which was registered as a local historical site in 1957, was mentioned in Matsuo Basho’s seminal work The Narrow Road to the Deep North, and has inspired a Noh play, a novel and an anime film.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Masaharu Sugawara, the head of a local volunteer guide group, told the Yomiuri Shimbun it was a “shame” the stone had split because it was a symbol of the area, but agreed that nature had simply taken its course.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Local and national government officials will meet to discuss the stone’s fate, according to the Shimotsuke Shimbun. The newspaper quoted a Nasu tourism official as saying he would like to see the Sessho-seki restored to its original form – presumably with its demonic inhabitant sealed within.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-66444567154004923422022-02-21T14:05:00.000+08:002022-02-21T14:05:37.367+08:00The man who lived in a Singapore forest for 30 years<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-60284352" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">BBC</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>The man who lived in a Singapore forest for 30 years</b><br /><br /><img height="225" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/184D8/production/_123244599_06356687-079e-4705-b99f-ff97e7944af6.jpg" width="400" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Image caption,<br />Mr Oh outside the shelter he lived in for 30 years</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Singapore is known for being one of the world's most highly urbanised countries, with no lack of gleaming skyscrapers and luxury apartments. But for one man, that couldn't be further from the place he called home - a makeshift shelter in one of the country's forests.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">On meeting Oh Go Seng the first thing that strikes you is the glint in his eye.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He wears his 79 years very lightly, looking in far better shape than many people half his age.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Earlier this month, the story of Mr Oh living in a forest went viral in Singapore - with many across the country reacting with shock.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Some questioned why more help had not been given to him - and even more curiously, how he had managed to live this life unnoticed for 30 years.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Trouble at Christmas</b></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It all began on Christmas Day when Mr Oh was stopped by officials and found to be trading without a licence.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He was selling leafy vegetables and chillies he had grown - after the pandemic caused him to lose his job selling flowers at markets.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Oh believes he was reported by a disgruntled customer after a disagreement over the SG$1 (£0.55) he was charging for his goods.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">At that moment, a charity worker was passing, and noticed he was being spoken to by officials who had confiscated his vegetables.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Vivian Pan said she felt "angry" on his behalf, adding "I didn't want him to go home empty-handed that day".</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"But I understand that, in terms of the law, they can't sell on the street," she added.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">She filmed the incident and posted it on Facebook, where it quickly went viral - and Mr Oh's plight was eventually brought to the attention of a local member of parliament.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But then the MP, Liang Eng Hwa, soon discovered that there was far more to Mr Oh's story.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He had in fact been living unnoticed in a forest for 30 years.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>Living in the forest</b></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Oh grew up together with his family in Sungei Tengah - a local kampong - or village.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the 1980s however, these kampongs were knocked down, to make way for new high-rise buildings.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Most kampong residents were offered new homes by the government, but Mr Oh was unable to secure a place of his own.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">His brother however, did get a government flat and Mr Oh was invited to live there - but he eventually moved out as he said he did not want to impose on the family.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">So, he headed back to a forest close to where his old home once stood and started to spend nights in a makeshift shelter built from pieces of wood, bamboo and tarpaulin.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Upon approaching the shelter, you see ashes in the doorway from the open fire that Mr Oh would cook on. Piles of his belongings sit in the middle of the shelter, with the back of the tent used as his sleeping area.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The garden near his tent is where he would grow his own food. Clothes lines zig-zag between the trees and a fence protects the vegetable plot from intruders.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="225" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/15468/production/_123244178_38254e22-a55b-4b27-84b2-b666d4fd3638.jpg" width="400" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Image caption,<br />Mr Oh grows vegetables and chillies in his garden</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The towering jackfruit tree over his tent he says, provided ample shade, and he never felt uncomfortable - despite Singapore's sweltering tropical heat and humidity.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Loneliness was never a problem either, he says. He kept himself busy tending his garden, although that, he adds, was made easy by the good growing conditions.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The worst aspect of living in the forest, he says, was the mice. They would find their way into his shelter and chew holes in his clothes.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He also worked at various casual jobs when he could get them.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Oh would sometimes use the money he earned to take a ferry to Batam, a small island in neighbouring Indonesia. It was there that he met Madam Tacih with whom he had a daughter.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Still, after his regular weekend visits to Batam, Mr Oh would return to his forest home in Singapore.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Like his family in Singapore, Mr Oh's wife and daughter, who is now 17, say they had no idea about how he lived.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He would always answer questions about where he lived by saying he "lived in a garden", a relative says.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Oh's trips to Batam stopped once the pandemic hit, with Singapore largely closing its borders and allowing travel only for those willing to pay for quarantine and Covid-19 tests.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">However, he still persisted in helping his family financially by sending them between S$500 - S$600 a month.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Homelessness is relatively rare in Singapore. The country has, on average, one of the wealthiest populations on Earth.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The city state's gross domestic product (GDP) per capita stands at almost $60,000 (£44,300), according to the latest figures from the World Bank.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Singapore also has an extensive public housing system, <span style="background-color: #ffe599;">with close to 80% of its residents living in property subsidised</span>, built and managed by the Housing Development Board (HDB).</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">However, although rough sleepers are not a common sight in the city <span style="background-color: #fff2cc;">it has been estimated that around 1,000 Singaporeans are homeless.</span></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><b>'I got to watch television for the first time'</b></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In February this year - on the first day of the Lunar New Year - with the assistance of his local MP's team, Mr Oh was given a new home to live in.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Liang said the team would continue "assisting Mr Oh, including seeking longer term social assistance [and assisting him in] reuniting with his wife and daughter in Indonesia".</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The one bedroom flat he now shares with another man, is small and sparsely furnished.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The few personal possessions in the flat have been supplemented by a fridge, television, kettle and water heater donated by well-wishers.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Mr Oh is particularly pleased with the water heater. He was accustomed to washing in water from the pond next to his shelter in the forest and found tap water too cold.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">He now works as a driver, transporting foreign workers from one job to another, and sometimes does gardening work, he says.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">His moving-in day was also the first time in more than three decades that he had celebrated the Lunar New Year with his family in Singapore.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"I ate so much! And there were many kinds of food I hadn't tasted in years!," he laughs.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"It was wonderful. I also got to watch television for the first time in more than 30 years. I enjoyed it so much."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;"><img height="225" src="https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cpsprodpb/833B/production/_123159533_6aeefcdc-5b4b-4f1a-9ec0-ff42b2b396f3.jpg" width="400" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Image caption,<br />Mr Oh in his new home</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">However, he clearly still misses the freedom of life in the forest, though he says he prefers living in a flat.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"I lived there for so many years, so yes naturally I do miss it," he said in Hokkien, a Chinese language.</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"Even now I return to the forest every single day. I wake up at 3 AM, get dressed and head out to check on my vegetables, all before my workday begins."</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-78135999364428191902022-02-12T22:28:00.004+08:002022-02-12T22:28:38.934+08:00Confirmed! Earth has a second Trojan asteroid lurking in its orbit<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2022-02-02/second-trojan-asteroid-confirmed-in-earth-orbit/100787264" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">ABC</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Confirmed! Earth has a second Trojan asteroid lurking in its orbit</b><br /><br />Posted Wed 2 Feb 2022<br /><br /><img height="299" src="https://live-production.wcms.abc-cdn.net.au/8d1521b8c82b8e4f5d7a13787d32b3ec?impolicy=wcms_crop_resize&cropH=2250&cropW=4000&xPos=0&yPos=0&width=862&height=485" width="541" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Trojan asteroids travel ahead or behind many planets as they orbit the Sun.(<br /><br />Supplied: NOIRLab (M. Zamani)/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva/Spaceengine)</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Astronomers have confirmed Earth has a second Trojan asteroid travelling ahead of it in its orbit around the Sun.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But there wasn't enough data at the time to confirm the asteroid, dubbed 2020 XL5, really was a Trojan, said Toni Santana-Ros of the University of Barcelona.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">Hints of the space rock were first detected in December 2020 in a survey of the sky by the Pan-STARRS telescope in Hawaii.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">So Dr Santana-Ros and an international team of astronomers scanned the sky between February and March last year with three different telescopes to see if they could detect the asteroid.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They also went back through 10 years of archives from sky surveys, discovering a faint speck buried in data going back to 2012.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Piecing together the information, they worked out the space rock's path and size.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"But when you link all the images from different years, you realise they are following an orbit."When you look at [a single image], you can have some doubts that this is really an object; it could be some kind of dust in your camera," Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"There is no doubt that this is our object and that it can not just be some blurry thing."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">And it's likely to be our celestial companion for the next 4,000 years or so, according to a new study published today in </span><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-022-27988-4" style="font-family: verdana;">Nature Communications</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><b>What are Trojans?</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Trojan asteroids travel either in front or behind a planet as it orbits the Sun.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They orbit a sweet spot, known as a Lagrange point, in the planet's orbit.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">There are five Lagrange points, but only L4 and L5 are able to draw in something wandering past and keep it captive for a while.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">That's because the gravity of the planet and Sun cancel each other out at these points, so they are relatively stable.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="295" src="https://live-production.wcms.abc-cdn.net.au/eb7dc47b5da57a7a72cda3d78fd867bb?src" width="559" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The L4 and L5 points are the most stable regions in Earth's orbit.(Supplied: NOIRLab (M. Zamani)/NSF/AURA/J. da Silva/Spaceengine)</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Whole swarms of Trojan asteroids (complete with names from Greek mythology such as Achilles and Menoetius) have been discovered around Jupiter.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Neptune has 22 companions, Mars has nine, and Venus and Uranus have one or two.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But Earth was a loner until the </span><a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-07-28/trojan-asteroid-discovered-in-earth-orbit/2814204" style="font-family: verdana;">first Trojan asteroid was discovered</a><span style="font-family: verdana;"> in 2011 orbiting the L4 point. Unlike its Jovian cousins, the space rock was given the less imaginative moniker of <span style="background-color: #fff2cc;">2010 TK7</span>. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The discovery of the first Trojan raised hopes Earth might have more companions. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But surveys of both Lagrangian points by NASA's OSIRIS-Rex spacecraft and the Japanese Hayabusa-2 spacecraft on their way out to other near-Earth asteroids drew a blank.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><b>What does this one look like?</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">While we don't know anything about the shape of the object or if it is spinning, measurements of its brightness show it is very dark, which suggests it could be a C-type asteroid —one of the most common types of asteroids packed with carbon. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Its colour also indicates it is about 1km in diameter (the less light something reflects the bigger it is).</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">While that makes it more than three times larger than the first Trojan discovered, it's pretty run of the mill as far as near-Earth objects go.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"It is nothing really impressive, but it is not bad for an asteroid," Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Dr Santana-Ros said the discovery of Earth's second Trojan asteroid orbiting the L4 point suggested there were probably many more out there to be found.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"This discovery confirms that the one we discovered 10 years ago is not the exception, it's not something weird," he said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"It is one more of the family of objects that we are going to discover in the next few years."</span><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Why are we only just discovering them?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Hunting for Earth Trojans is extremely challenging, Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"From the Earth, it is not easy to observe these objects."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">For a start they are relatively distant — the Lagrange points are as far away from us as the Sun is — so they are faint and can only be seen through large telescopes.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">They also appear very close to the Sun in our sky, so astronomers only have a short window of time in the twilight before the Sun rises to see anything around L4.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"If you want to see this asteroid, you only have 15-20 minutes before the Sun starts bothering you," Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is also only possible to see objects orbiting the Lagrange points between late October and March.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="267" src="https://live-production.wcms.abc-cdn.net.au/7517913c53d24bb7603c042deed1af7f?impolicy=wcms_crop_resize&cropH=854&cropW=1281&xPos=0&yPos=70&width=862&height=575" width="400" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">The astronomers observed the asteroid using three large telescopes, including the Southern Astrophysical Research Telescope in Chile.(Wikimedia Commons: Astronomy additions)</span></b></i><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">The team had to convince large telescopes around the world to take a risk in order to investigate the possible asteroid.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"Astronomers like to point their telescope towards the night, we don't like to point towards the Sun," Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"Most of them said, 'This is a really interesting object, but we cannot take the risk to point that low and that close to the Sun.'"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">In the end, they used three telescopes, including the 4-metre Lowell Discovery Telescope in Arizona and the 4.1m Southern Astrophysical Research Telescope in Chile, to confirm the asteroid.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Data from the observations indicated the object had a very tilted and elongated orbit around the Lagrange point, and was largely in shadow. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Dr Santana-Ros said these may have been reasons why it wasn't previously picked up by spacecraft fly-bys.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"Maybe they were not lucky enough when scanning the L4 point, the object was out of this area of the scan."</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><b>Where did it come from?</b></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">This is unclear, but it may have been jostled out of the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">It is almost certainly a temporarily captured object, said Jonti Horner, an astronomer from the University of Southern Queensland not involved in the study.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"It's something that was moving through the inner Solar System minding its own business until gravitational nudges from all the other objects, Earth included, eased it into a Trojan orbit," Professor Horner said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">But this constant jostling in the inner Solar System affects the equilibrium of the Lagrange points, which means Trojans around Earth only hang around for a while before escaping.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"The Lagrange points of most of the planets are not as stable as those of Jupiter and Neptune," Professor Horner said.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="544" src="https://live-production.wcms.abc-cdn.net.au/886048e79e2aa39cba092e08da460ae6?src" width="543" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">Jupiter has about 5,000 Trojans divided into two camps: The Greeks (L4) and The Trojans (L5)(Wikimedia: mdf)<br /></span></b></i><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"Jupiter and Uranus's Lagrange points are so stable that they can hold on to vast numbers of Trojans on timescales comparable to, or longer than, the age of the Solar System."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Dr Santana-Ros said modelling of this asteroid's orbit indicates that it will stick with us for roughly the next 4,000 years before either jumping to the L5 point or being booted back out into space by interactions with other asteroids or planets that destabilise the Lagrange points.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"From time to time there is something called Venus coming close to the Earth," Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">"And if it is coming close to the Earth, it is coming close to this object as well."</span><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Could we visit it?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Visiting asteroids is "incredibly powerful" because they can tell us about the Solar System's past, Professor Horner said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Samples of rock returned from an asteroid between Earth and Mars by Japanese Hayabusa2 mission revealed </span><a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2021-12-21/first-look-at-ryugu-asteroid-samples/100705100" style="font-family: verdana;">Ryugu could be a source of very rare meteorites</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">A NASA mission will return rocks from Bennu, another asteroid in the same area, next year.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">These primordial asteroids are made from the same dust and dirt that swirled together to form the planets billions of years ago, and can provide clues about how our Solar System formed.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;">NASA has also launched the Lucy mission to fly by the Trojan asteroids around Jupiter.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Because the orbit of Earth Trojans is very tilted, it would be very costly to land on them to bring back rocks, but a fly-by could be possible, Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">And of the two Earth Trojans we now know of, the latest one would have a bigger launch window, according to calculations by the team.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">While the discovery of these temporary Trojans was important, the ultimate goal would be to find a Trojan around Earth like the primordial ones around Jupiter, Dr Santana-Ros said.</span><br /><br /><i><b><span style="font-family: georgia;"><blockquote>"[This new Trojan asteroid] is one step in the final goal to find a primordial Earth Trojan, because then we would really have a Rosetta Stone."</blockquote></span></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-8766722687936724552022-01-31T23:14:00.002+08:002022-01-31T23:14:12.015+08:00Gong Xi Fa Cai 2022<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKas2fsepZZLj_7y1Q5uhWpGis6TgyA86BVDQLn2KfoQIbZbRSt13XQmEhXvFd0NBMIsB23787oIE9KndAIXhshf2JCBSqTm2UAtdyHrDh5iuqQfEjriEhrL1Fg-udQ84b3HOQt4IuVENuax5iOIkcA38u_zYxFBxnWv2MI1KhjSWmW3uBKhQ=s800" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKas2fsepZZLj_7y1Q5uhWpGis6TgyA86BVDQLn2KfoQIbZbRSt13XQmEhXvFd0NBMIsB23787oIE9KndAIXhshf2JCBSqTm2UAtdyHrDh5iuqQfEjriEhrL1Fg-udQ84b3HOQt4IuVENuax5iOIkcA38u_zYxFBxnWv2MI1KhjSWmW3uBKhQ=w640-h640" width="640" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7664217.post-58818532118741248482022-01-29T01:45:00.034+08:002022-01-29T01:53:59.190+08:00Australian scientists discover ‘spooky’ object beaming out from space that flashes on and off<span style="font-family: verdana; font-size: large;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/jan/27/australian-scientists-discover-spooky-object-beaming-out-from-space-that-flashes-on-and-off" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: #2b00fe;">Guardian</span></b></a>:<br /><br /><b>Australian scientists discover ‘spooky’ object beaming out from space that flashes on and off</b><br /><br />Telescope pictures show the Milky Way with a bright dot marking the location of the object ‘in our galactic back yard’<br /><br /><img height="341" src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/90acb978e2976006b60a60506bc66848c2ef7e36/0_0_1024_614/master/1024.png?width=465&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=74b20f95ed8bd567319ba709ea0e28e8" width="573" /></span><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">View of the Milky Way from the Murchison Widefield Array. The star icon shows the position of the mysterious object. Photograph: Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker/ICRAR/Curtin University<br /></span></b></i><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I think it’s real,” Curtin University student Tyrone O’Doherty told his supervisors when he spotted the anomaly.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">And it was real, as it turns out. The object beaming out from space was also “spooky”, and “in our galactic back yard”.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">An Australian team studying the universe’s radio waves has discovered a new type of beam that comes and goes, one of the brightest radio sources in the sky. The details of the discovery were published in Nature on Thursday.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">When something in space switches on and off it’s called a “transient”. It might come from a pulsar, which flashes on and off in milliseconds or seconds. Or a supernova that might appear for a few days before disappearing again.</span><br /><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#" style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/b44fc9980428bb5ba20bdfb2c813919f6ff581fb/833_1410_4031_2419/master/4031.jpg?width=460&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=4130703ae5ff6dae6d1f7bf81a0f1e25" /><br /></a><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“What we found, though, is something that switches on and off every 20 minutes,” astrophysicist Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“It was kind of spooky for an astronomer because there’s nothing known in the sky that does that. And it’s really quite close to us – about 4,000 light years away. It’s in our galactic backyard.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Hurley-Walker is from the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research’s Curtin University node. She was also O’Doherty’s supervisor, and the lead author on the Nature article.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">She uses the Murchison Widefield Array in outback </span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/#" style="font-family: verdana;">Western Australia</a><span style="font-family: verdana;">, a radio telescope, to survey the sky. For his honours thesis, O’Doherty joined her team and had created some coding software to search through data for transients.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“He found something,” she said. Pictures from the array show the Milky Way, with a bright dot marking the location of the object. “Just to the right, there’s a source that is a supermassive black hole, throwing jets of radio waves into space at nearly the speed of light.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“Admittedly, it’s further away. But this radio transient that we saw is about as bright as that. So that’s really extreme. And we did not expect to find anything so bright.”</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /><img height="330" src="https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/1cb92531da6e36c86e528c7b0f89018f6ef5b72e/0_0_1024_614/master/1024.png?width=445&quality=45&auto=format&fit=max&dpr=2&s=66004a46108bd7f028f9eb13082527cd" width="558" /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: trebuchet; font-size: large;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><i><b><span style="font-family: trebuchet;">This image shows the Milky Way as viewed from Earth. The star icon shows the position of the transient object. Photograph: Dr Natasha Hurley-Walker/ICRAR/Curtin University<br /></span></b></i><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Using the frequencies of the radio waves, she worked out the object is not very far away – as space goes.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Its behaviour matches something that has been predicted to exist, but never observed – an “ultra-long period magnetar”, a type of slowly spinning neutron star. Or it could be that a collapsed star became a white dwarf pulsar, but that is very unlikely. Whatever it is, it’s “really extreme physics”, Hurley-Walker said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“And, of course, it could be something that we’ve never even thought of.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">For O’Doherty, creating the software was the thesis – actually using it to find the object was a bonus.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“In the closing weeks of the project I was going through them to see if I had anything real … I found this one candidate that looked real at first,” said O’Doherty, who is now doing his PhD.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“I kept doing more and more tests and it kept continuing to appear real, which was awesome. Then I detected it again. I 100% confirmed it was real and not just a one-off thing.”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">Hurley-Walker said the mission was now to try to find more of the objects. Meanwhile, the world’s largest radio telescope is being built, with the low-frequency part of it destined for the WA desert. That will mean far more data and more discoveries.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“We will be making new discoveries, things we didn’t predict, all the time,” Hurley-Walker said.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: verdana;">“The universe is full of wonders.”</span></span></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: verdana;"><br /></span></span></div>KTemochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09951253039042572381noreply@blogger.com0