During the height of the pandemic, there were little to no cruise ships sailing the world’s waters, which presented a unique opportunity for whale scientists. Whale researchers installed additional hydrophones (underwater microphones) to listen to whales and observe how they react to a quieter ocean. Whales use sound to communicate and to hunt their prey, so the researchers seized the opportunity to formulate solutions against underwater noise pollution. Read full article here
Oddities
The Curious Case of the Ancient Brain
In 2008, archaeologists examining the University of York discovered something strange: the decapitated head of an Iron Age man and his very shrivelled but very much intact brain. How a centuries-old brain was preserved is still unknown, but research suggests that it could have been because of brain diseases like dementia. The Yorkshire man’s brain’s proteins were bunched up together, much like how dementia causes brain proteins to bunch up into plaques. This bunching up, or aggregation, could continue even after death, turning regions of the brain into hard masses. Read full article here
Merv
September 30, 2022
