Latest news with #IFLScience
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Heartbreaking Video Shows Fish Fleeing Huge Nets
David Attenborough has become the voice we associate with all things beautiful in nature, but he's never shied away from showing the harrowing destruction that humans visit upon our planet. This, however, might be the biggest gut-punch he's delivered yet. In his latest documentary "OCEAN," Attenborough presents us with unique footage showing the devastating effects of bottom trawling on the seafloor, right where the action is happening. The filmmakers placed a camera underwater, showing us the actual view of the trawl net as it sweeps up countless poor sea creatures, who desperately try to out-swim their doom. It's an unprecedented look — but it doesn't make for easy viewing. "I have seen the bycatch on the deck of trawlers, but like everybody else, I had never seen what the trawl does underwater," Enric Sala, a marine ecologist who served as executive producer and scientific advisor on Ocean, told IFLScience in a recent interview. "Being at the level of the net and seeing all these poor creatures trying to escape the net, that's something that nobody else had seen." Bottom trawling is a widely used method of fishing that involves dragging an enormous net across the seafloor, ensnaring hundreds if not thousands of aquatic creatures in a single sweep. It's a blunt approach that doesn't discriminate between species. Most of the fish that get caught aren't even what the fishermen are looking for, but they perish anyway. "Over three-quarters of a trawler's catch may be thrown away," Attenborough narrates in the documentary. "It's hard to imagine a more wasteful way to catch fish." Trawling also ravages the seafloor itself, as the heavy chain or beam that keeps the net open smashes into any rock or aquatic fauna in its path, while dredging up literal tons of sediment. "The trawlers tear the seabed with such force, that their trails of destruction can be seen from space," Attenborough says. It gets worse. As the seabed is thrown up, so are the vast stores of carbon it harbored. A massive 2024 study estimated that some 370 million metric tons of carbon dioxide is released by bottom trawling every single year. That puts it "on the scale of global aviation," Sala said, which produces nearly a billion tons annually. In terms of both the greenhouse impact and the sweeping scale of the damage wreaked to local habitats, it's the ocean's equivalent to deforestation. One study estimated that bottom trawlers scrape 1.9 million square miles of seafloor per year, roughly equivalent to 1.3 percent of the entire ocean. "It's happening everywhere around the ocean, including in many of our protected areas," Toby Nowlan, the director and producer on OCEAN, told IFLScience. "The difference being that this is as destructive as bulldozing your local ancient woodland, or the Amazon rainforest." "If my local ancient woodland, Leigh Woods, was just bulldozed, the entire city would be up in arms, but this is what's happening underwater," Nowlan added. "The whole reason [people aren't up in arms about trawling] is that it's remained hidden from view." Not anymore. More on the ocean: Benevolent Orca Pods Are Adopting Baby Pilot Whales in an Apparent Effort to Clean Up the Species' Image
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Health
- Yahoo
Experts celebrate as trail camera captures rare footage of elusive species not seen in decades: 'Such a large and striking animal'
A researcher has made history after securing the first-ever scientific observation of an animal that had eluded scientists for decades. During a six-month expedition on the island of Papua New Guinea, František Vejmělka, a doctoral candidate from the Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences and the University of South Bohemia, spotted the Mallomys istapantap, also known as the subalpine woolly rat. As IFL Science noted, Vejmělka documented the sighting in a study published in the journal Mammalia According to New Atlas, the woolly rat is one of the largest murine rodents in the world, and the study said it is the largest rodent of the Australian and Oceanian zoogeographic regions. Murine rodents are a large group of "Old World" rats and mice that comprises over 500 species, per Animal Diversity Web. As one of the largest murine rodents, the woolly rat had never been scientifically discovered in the wild since the species was first described in 1989 using a historic specimen from a museum. Vejmělka utilized camera traps and help from indigenous hunters to obtain the rare footage of the woolly rat. "The combination of modern and traditional detection methods enriched by the immense traditional hunting knowledge of Indigenous communities resulted in the first specimen records of this remarkable rodent in over 30 years and the first scientific observations of living animals," the study read, per IFL Science. In a statement, Vejmělka acknowledged the significance of the discovery and the importance of research ventures. "It's astonishing that such a large and striking animal has remained so poorly studied," Vejmělka said. "How much more is there to discover about the biodiversity of tropical mountains?" Thanks to trail cameras, many research expeditions can obtain vital information that not only captures rare sightings but also helps gauge the health and function of secluded ecosystems and habitats. This can go a long way in studying delicate food chains without interfering or interacting with nearby wildlife. Do you think more places of worship should embrace clean energy? Yes — it sets a positive example Only if it saves money No opinion Absolutely not Click your choice to see results and speak your mind. Conservation efforts can significantly impact our well-being by preserving natural resources and promoting healthy ecosystems. Conservationism can also directly benefit human health by ensuring healthy food chains. Join our free newsletter for good news and useful tips, and don't miss this cool list of easy ways to help yourself while helping the planet.
Daily Record
01-05-2025
- Science
- Daily Record
Huge Chinese construction project is so large it is lengthening our day
The enormous construction project has had a surprising effect on the Earth If you ever feel you don't have enough time in the day, you are not alone. Between washing up after kids, working long hours, and making time for hobbies and past-times, it might seem time is constantly running away with you. But what if the day was made longer, even if just by a few microseconds? Well, it turns out a huge man-made project in China is so large that it is affecting the Earth's rotation - and increasing the 24 hours we have to play with. Construction on China's Three Gorges Dam, the world's largest hydroelectric power station, began in 1994 and was completed over nine years with a price tag of around £29billion. It has since had a surprising effect on the Earth. The colossal structure is situated in Hubei province and spans the Yangtze River, which is the longest river in Eurasia. Towering at 181 metres tall and stretching 2,335 metres across, the dam can hold a mind-boggling 27.2million cubic metres of water and boasts a maximum capacity of 22,500 megawatts. At peak performance, it has the potential to supply electricity to 5.4million homes for a month, utilising the immense water flow from the neighbouring gorges Qutangxia, Wuxia, and Xilingxia. It was the devastating Boxing Day earthquake and tsunami in 2004 that first prompted NASA scientists to explore whether such seismic events could influence the Earth's rotation due to mass redistribution. According to IFL Science, the concept of the 'Moment of Inertia' in physics refers to how mass distribution on Earth can slightly impact how hard it is to spin the planet on its axis. The tectonic activity during an earthquake, particularly the one in 2004, caused a shift in the Earth's mass distribution, leading to a decrease in the length of a day by 2.68 microseconds. In a 2005 post, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center geophysicist Dr Benjamin Fong Chao explained that the massive amount of water displaced to fill the Three Gorges Dam could have a similar effect. He determined that this mass shift would extend the length of a day by 0.06 microseconds and alter Earth's pole position by approximately two centimetres. While this effect may prove inconsequential to our daily lives, it could cause confusion for highly precise time-keeping devices like atomic clocks. This issue has prompted some scientists to suggest that we may need to account for a negative leap second – such as a minute with only 59 seconds – within the next ten years. "For reference, this amounts to a bit more than three days over the entire age of the universe," Dr Chao explained. "Any time you shift mass around, you change the Earth's rotation. The effect is very small, but measurable." During the construction of the Three Gorges Dam, a total of 1.3million people were relocated as their towns and villages became submerged. The dam, besides generating electricity, is designed to enhance the Yangtze River's shipping capacity and decrease the risk of downstream floods by providing flood storage space. The government views the project as a historic achievement in engineering, social, and economic terms, featuring state-of-the-art large turbines and a commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The dam's construction has not been without controversy - valuable archaeological and cultural sites were flooded. Other critics argue that the dam has significantly impacted the environment and increased the risk of landslides. The project utilised 27.2million cubic metres of concrete, a whopping 463,000 tonnes of steel (equivalent to constructing 63 Eiffel Towers) and shifted approximately 102.6million cubic metres of Earth. Join the Daily Record WhatsApp community! Get the latest news sent straight to your messages by joining our WhatsApp community today. You'll receive daily updates on breaking news as well as the top headlines across Scotland. No one will be able to see who is signed up and no one can send messages except the Daily Record team. All you have to do is click here if you're on mobile, select 'Join Community' and you're in! If you're on a desktop, simply scan the QR code above with your phone and click 'Join Community'. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you don't like our community, you can check out any time you like. To leave our community click on the name at the top of your screen and choose 'exit group'.
Yahoo
15-04-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Scientists Found a 444-Million-Year-Old Inside-Out Fossil With Its Guts Perfectly Intact
Discovered 25 years ago, a 444-million-year-old marine arthropod fossil stumped paleontologists, as they couldn't identify its exact species. Sarah Gabbot, who originally discovered the specimen, realized that the fossil had been preserved inside-out, meaning its muscles, tendons, and guts were exquisitely preserved while its limbs, carapace, and even head had dissolved away. Gabbot named the specimen Keurbos susanae—nickname 'Sue'—in honor of her mother, whom she said always supported her love of paleontology. Arthropods are the most successful animal group on the planet. These varying invertebrates make up roughly 85 percent of all animal life on the planet, and they have one of the most extensive and well-preserved fossil records of any animal group, with examples dating back some 518 million years ago to the Cambrian era—a.k.a. when complex life really boomed for the first time. Fast forward some 73 million years to the end of the next geologic period (the Ordovician), and life meets its first bust. The first of five (or possibly six) mass extinctions in Earth history, the Late Ordovician mass extinction wiped out roughly 85 percent of all life on Earth, making it the second most deadly (after the Permian extinction—you don't get the nickname 'The Great Dying' for nothing). It was during this tumultuous biological period, that a certain arthropod met its end, eventually becoming entombed and fossilized in Soom Shale—a band of silts and clays located 250 miles north of Cape Town, South Africa. Although intense glaciation laid waste to the planet, this small pocket of the world continued to thrive even under icy threat. Some 444 million years later, paleontologists unearthed this particular specimen, but it's appearance didn't match anything in the fossil record. That is, until Sarah Gabbott, a lead author on a study published in the journal Paleontology detailing this new species (named Keurbos susanae after the lead author's mother, Sue), made the surprising discovery—the fossil was actually preserved inside-out. ''Sue' is an inside-out, legless, headless wonder,' Gabbott said in a press statement. 'Remarkably her insides are a mineralised time-capsule: muscles, sinews, tendons and even guts all preserved in unimaginable detail. And yet her durable carapace, legs and head are missing—lost to decay over 440 million years ago.' Although this fossil's resting place included an anoxic environment (a necessary ingredient for fossilization to occur), it also contained hydrogen sulphide dissolved in the water. The researchers believe this chemistry likely dissolved away the carapace. Yet the mineral that perfectly preserved the marine arthropods insides—calcium phosphate—is the same mineral found in our bones and teeth. Gabbott told IFLScience that she's still trying to work out the exact details of how this strange inside-out preservation took place. Although 'Sue'—not to be confused with another famous fossil of the T. Rex persuasion—provides an incredible glimpse at the organs and guts of an ancient arthropod, it's difficult to know where to place the specimen on the tree of life—even 25 years after Gabbott first discovered it. 'This has been an ultramarathon of a research effort,' Gabbott said in a press statement. 'In a large part because this fossil is just so beautifully preserved there's so much anatomy there that needs interpreting. Layer upon on layer of exquisite detail and complexity.' While the mystery remains, the naming of the species at least checks off one to-do on Gabbott's list: 'Recently my mum said to me 'Sarah if you are going to name this fossil after me, you'd better get on and do it before I am in the ground and fossilized myself.'' You Might Also Like The Do's and Don'ts of Using Painter's Tape The Best Portable BBQ Grills for Cooking Anywhere Can a Smart Watch Prolong Your Life?
Yahoo
11-02-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Experts Think This Haunting Ghost Story Could Be the Result of a Strange Geologic Phenomenon
A railroad track in South Carolina is reportedly haunted by the 'Summerville Ghost'—a ghastly apparition that appears as balls of light. A new study from a seismologist from the U.S. Geological Survey may have solved the mystery. The light is likely caused by a gaseous emission from the Earth itself, possibly as a result of earthquakes. Nearly every town in America has its local legends—the scary stories told at sleepovers or around campfires that someone's friend or cousin always swears they totally saw for real one time. In the town of Summerville, South Carolina, they have the tale of the 'Summerville Ghost.' The story involves a man who either worked for the railroad or simply walked along the tracks every day, depending on which version of the story you hear. (It's been told since the 1950s, so some details vary over time.) One day, that man was struck by a train coming down the tracks that ran between Charleston and Summerville, and in some versions of the story, was even decapitated. But the Summerville Ghost isn't the spirit of the headless man who died on the tracks. Instead, it's supposedly the man's wife. As the blog South Carolina Haunted Houses summarizes: 'In life, the woman would meet her husband every night and the two of them walked back to their house by lamp light{...} Unable to process his death, she continued her ritual of waiting at the train tracks. It is said that her ghost emits a green light that hovers above the road. Some witnesses claimed the light followed them, while others admitted to an overwhelming feeling of sorrow and despair.' Believable or not, there are thousands, maybe millions of these stories across the country and around the world. But what sets Summerville apart is that, according to seismologist Susan Hough, there might be some truth to this one. As reported by IFLScience, Hough—who works at the US Geological Survey (USGS)—has developed a theory to explain not just the lights that define the sightings of the Summerville Ghost, but also the other supposed signs of hauntings that have been reported in the area 'such as cars shaking, doors slamming, and whispered voices being heard without a source.' As you might have guessed, given that Hough is a seismologist for the USGS, the study she and her team recently published in Seismological Research Letters chalks the haunting up to a geological phenomenon—specifically, tremors and earthquakes. Hough attributes the cars shaking to 'earthquakes with a shallow source,' while the whispered voices were likely 'high-frequency shaking noises resulting from tremors,' because 'sound waves at frequencies of 20–200 Hz are within the audible range.' But what about the ghostly lights? That, Hough suggests, could have a few causes. One possibility is a gaseous release from within the earth: 'The gas release hypothesis involves two possible mechanisms,' Hough explained to IFLScience. 'As an inert gas, radon will not ignite, but could potentially be associated with a glow discharge phenomenon, whereby electrons move to an excited state and then fall back to their ground orbital shell. This usually happens at low temperatures, close to the freezing point. [The study] Enomoto (2024) presents other ideas, involving gamma rays in the atmosphere, and radon or radon/methane gas release.' Of course, there's also the possibility that it is an ignited gas, lit by sparks emitted from the train on the tracks. 'But the association could have a different explanation,' Hough notes, '…for example the tendency of railroads to follow corridors that were carved out by faults.' Hough's study was motivated by more than just a desire to be the X-Files' Dana Scully of the geological world, of course: 'The study felt too frivolous for words when I started, but could actually help address a difficult and important problem: which of the many preexisting faults in the east (and elsewhere) are active? Are there more potential seismic zones than the small handful that have produced large earthquakes during the short historic record?' 'My hope,' she concludes, 'is that ghost stories might provide a useful target for investigations, both to understand earthquake lights, and to identify shallow active faults in eastern North America.' You Might Also Like The Do's and Don'ts of Using Painter's Tape The Best Portable BBQ Grills for Cooking Anywhere Can a Smart Watch Prolong Your Life?
