Expected life change

Expecting some life changed soon due too fact my wife Enid is in hospital due to stomach wounds infected since Wednesday last week .She has had three operations so far to remove infected skin and have a vacuum dressing out on.Possible may need to go to a nursing home for respite care for a couple of weeks or a couple days a week .It's the lonely feeling inside i find the hardest to deal with and empty space and quietness ,I dealing with the situation by living day by day .Today Tuesday 3 April 2018 is when I should know what is going to happen i feel edgy.let's hope for the best case scenario.

Schiaparelli: Mars probe 'crash site identified'

The gouge in the ground likely made by Europe's Schiaparelli probe as it hit the surface of Mars on Wednesday has been imaged by an American satellite.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) has identified a large dark patch in the robot's targeted landing zone consistent with a high-velocity impact.

Schiaparelli is widely thought to have crashed and been destroyed.

Data transmitted from the probe before it lost contact indicated that its descent systems did not work properly.

Its parachute was jettisoned too early and its retrorockets, designed to slow the robot to a hover just above the surface, fired only for a few seconds. They should have operated for half a minute.

The MRO imagery is not quite definitive because the resolution is low - just six metres per pixel. Its context is persuasive, however.

The roughly 15m by 40m dark patch, which is probably dust and rock fragments thrown out from the impact, is sited some 5.5km west of Schiaparelli's expected touchdown point in the equatorial Meridiani Plain.

Tellingly, the feature is not present in previous MRO pictures of the location.

The clincher, though, may be the artefact 1km to the south of the patch. This white blob looks to be Schiaparelli's 15m-wide parachute which would have floated down behind the probe. Again, this was not present in earlier pictures.-read more

Walking down the 21st Century Gin Lane

A new piece of art commissioned by the Royal Society for Public Health reimagines William Hogarth's classic 1751 cartoon Gin Lane.

It depicts a society preoccupied by junk food rather than gin.

The original showed the debilitating effects of a gin craze sweeping London and a population suffering from deadly infections common at the time.

In contrast, Thomas Moore's new picture shows how obesity and mental health issues are today's big health threats.-read more

Mid Ulster identified as 'giant hotspot' by scientists

An area in Northern Ireland has been identified as a "giant hotspot" by scientists studying a gene defect which causes people to grow abnormally tall.

One in 150 people in Mid-Ulster were found to carry the gene, compared to one in 1,000 in Belfast and one in 2,000 in the rest of the UK.

More than three-quarters of carriers will never develop health issues, but it can cause long-term problems and be potentially life-threatening for those that do.

Scientists hope the work will help find those at risk of passing on the gene.

The gene - called AIP, but known as the "giant gene" - can result in too much growth hormone, which is produced and released by the pituitary gland, a pea-sized gland just below the brain.

The excessive production occurs as the result of a non-cancerous tumour in the gland.-read more and see video

Ticks found on 'one third' of dogs, researchers say

Almost a third of dogs checked at random across the UK were found to be carrying a tick, researchers say.

The finding comes from the largest survey of ticks in dogs.

Researchers also found that the risk of an animal picking up a tick is as great in urban areas as in rural ones.

Ticks can carry a range of diseases including Lyme disease, and also a parasite discovered in the UK for the first time earlier this year that is potentially fatal to dogs.

Lyme disease has the potential to cause serious health problems, such as meningitis and heart failure.

In the most serious cases, it can be fatal.

Almost 15,000 dogs from across the UK were examined in the study, which was carried out by Bristol University last year.read more

Large blue butterfly thriving after reintroduction

A rare butterfly once declared extinct in the UK is now being seen in record numbers after being reintroduced.

Conservationists said there was a population of more than 10,000 large blue butterflies on reserves in Gloucestershire and Somerset.

The last large blue butterfly colony was on Dartmoor in Devon and it was declared extinct in 1979.

The population in the UK is now believed to be largest concentration of the species anywhere in the world.

The butterfly, with a wingspan of more than two inches, was brought back from the dead with the reintroduction of stock from Sweden in 1984 and has thrived since then.

The key to the success of the programme was an understanding of the butterfly's bizarre life-cycle which is similar to that of the cuckoo.

The caterpillar tricks red ants into believing it is one of their own grubs and is carried underground.

It feeds on the larvae around it until it emerges 10 months later to live for just a few weeks as a butterfly.

Conservationists said the story of the large blue showed that the decline of globally threatened species could be reversed

US skydiver jumps without parachute into net from 25,000ft

American Luke Aikins has become the first person to jump from 25,000 ft (7,620m) without a parachute, landing safely in a net.

Mr Aikins - who has more than 18,000 jumps under his belt - fell dead centre into the 100x100ft net in Simi Valley, southern California.

During the two-minute fall aired live on Fox television, the 42-year-old reached the speed of 120mph (193km/h).

To loud cheers, he climbed out of the net and hugged his wife and young son.-read more see video

Exhibition features 1966 World Cup Memorabilia

Memorabilia from the 1966 World Cup including shirts and boots worn by the England team have gone on show at an exhibition at The National Football Museum in Manchester.

Other items include the Jules Rimet Trophy and Pele's training kit.

Dr Kevin Moore, from the museum, said England's victory was about "far more than simply football".

Curator Andy Pearce said: "We have really uncovered some fascinating stories."

Shirts worn by Roger Hunt and hat-trick hero Geoff Hurst are being displayed along with boots worn by Hurst, skipper Bobby Moore and West Germany's Franz Beckenbauer and Uwe Seeler from the final, in which England beat the Germans 4-2.

Winning eleven

Photographs, memories and memorabilia from people including a ball boy to a photographer have also been documented and collected.

The museum has also unveiled its new Walk of Fame of 25 of the game's best players according to a online poll, including England's World Cup winning eleven.

The exhibition runs until April and will be partly displayed at Wembley next month.-read more

Lasers could 'cloak Earth from aliens'

We should shine lasers into space if we want to hide our presence from aliens, two US-based astronomers suggest.

The beams could compensate for the dip in light the Earth creates when it passes in front of the Sun, as viewed from far-off worlds, they contend.

A number of researchers have questioned the wisdom of advertising our existence to the galaxy.

They fear that if aliens did visit us they might not be very friendly, and could introduce disease.

The analogy is Europeans arriving in the Americas in the 15th and 16th centuries. The contact wrought havoc in the health of indigenous populations.

David Kipping and Alex Teachey from Columbia University in New York say that if we are fearful of a similar outcome from an alien encounter then lasers offer a solution.

The team has calculated what would be required to cloak the Earth and published the concept in a paper in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.read more on bbc link=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-35938886

Big vacuums could combat 'hairy panic' in Australia city

A rural Australian city is considering vacuuming away "hairy panic" tumbleweed that is clogging up homes.

Substantial rainfall followed by dry conditions has caused a "hairy panic explosion" in Wangaratta, Victoria.
Frustrated residents say they have spent hours each day clearing the weeds, with piles at times reaching roof height.
Now the council says it is considering attaching large vacuums to street sweepers to deal with the problem.READ AND SEE VIDEO =http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-35609602

Fungi from goats' guts could lead to better biofuels

The legendary abilities of goats and sheep to digest a wide range of inedible materials could help scientists produce cheaper biofuels.

Researchers say fungi from the stomachs of these animals produce flexible enzymes that can break down a wide variety of plant materials.
The scientists say that in tests, the fungi performed as well as the best engineered attempts from industry.
The study has been published in the journal, Science.

Fuel from food

Environmentalists have long criticised the current generation of biofuels that are produced from crops, such as maize, as they believe that using land for fuel instead of food drives up prices and impacts the poor.
Researchers have had some success making usable fuel from food and animal waste. But, so far, the ability to efficiently use the vast majority of cheap, waste organic material has eluded them.
The problem with turning wood chips and grasses into fuel is the matrix of complex molecules found in the cell walls of these tough materials.
Industrial attempts to break these down into the type of sugars that can be refined for fuel often require preheating or treatment with chemicals, which add to the complexity and the cost.read more =http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-35612554

Gravitational waves: Numbers don't do them justice

"It's astonishing; it really is." Jim Hough can't stop repeating the phrase.

The veteran gravitational wave hunter from Glasgow University has come to the National Press Club in Washington DC to witness the announcement of the first direct detection of ripples in the fabric of space-time caused by the merger of two "intermediate-sized" black holes.

The numbers look bald on paper, but it's when you try to imagine the scenario being described in those numbers that you rock backwards.

Imagine two monster black holes spinning down on each other in space. One has a mass which is about 35 times that of our Sun, the other roughly 30. At the moment just before they coalesce, they're turning around each other several tens of times a second. And then, their event horizons merge and they become one - like two soap bubbles in a bath.

David Reitze, executive director of the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatories (LIGO), described it thus: "Take something about 150km in diameter, and pack 30 times the mass of the Sun into that, and then accelerate it to half the speed of light. Now, take another thing that's 30 times the mass of the Sun, and accelerate that to half the speed of light. And then collide [the two objects] together. That's what we saw here. It's mind boggling."=read more = bbc link=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-35553549

Mouse gets caught in 155-year-old trap in Reading museum

 A 155-year-old Victorian mouse trap on display at a museum sprung into action again to claim its latest victim.

Ollie Douglas, assistant curator at the Museum of English Rural Life, was baffled when he discovered the dead mouse in the trap, which was in a cabinet.

He said the rodent could have entered the trap to make a nest, but got stuck inside.

The trap is one of hundreds kept at the museum.

Mr Douglas said: "We think that the mouse chewed at the label and got interested in chewing at the string attached to the label."

'See-saw mechanism'=read more =bbc link=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-berkshire-35503613

London 'diverse' 2,000 years ago

A DNA study has confirmed that London was an ethnically diverse city from its very beginnings.

An analysis of 2,000 year old skeletons reveals what some of the very first Londoners looked like and where they came from.

Among them is a 14-year-old girl, that the museum curators have named "The Lant Street teenager". Analysis of her DNA and chemicals in her teeth show that she grew up in North Africa, but also had DNA that is common in southern and Eastern Europe.

The teenager had blue eyes and like many people living in the capital today, she was of mixed ancestry.

Dr Rebecca Redfern of the Museum of London gives more details of the young girl's skeleton and what she has learned.

The skull of the 'real' Winnie goes on display

The skull of the bear that inspired the Winnie-the-Pooh books is going to be put on public display for the first time, in a London museum.

Christopher Robin's teddy bear, which gave the name to AA Milne's books, was named after Winnie, a black bear he liked to visit in London Zoo.

Winnie died in 1934, and her skull was kept by the Royal College of Surgeons.

It was identified by curators in a review of the collection and will be exhibited at the Hunterian Museum.

The black bear had been something of a celebrity at London Zoo in the 1920s, a star attraction for visitors and known for her friendliness.

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BBC Radio 4's PM programme reports on how the skull of the real-life Winnie has been revealed after 80 years.

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AA Milne's son, Christopher Robin, was a regular visitor and was photographed inside Winnie's enclosure feeding her honey from a spoon.

An examination of the bear's skull has shown that she had lost most of her teeth in old age - and museum director Sam Alberti suggests that this could have been because of children feeding her honey or sticky buns.-READ MORE AND SEE VIDEO-BBC LINK-http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-34844669

Caffeinated plants give bees a buzz

A morning caffeine dose is something that so many of us find irresistible, and according to research, foraging bees seek a similar buzz.

Many plants produce caffeine, primarily as a naturally bitter deterrent against plant-devouring insects, like caterpillars.

But an experiment with caffeinated nectar has now shown bees are attracted to and even "drugged" by the compound.

The research is published in the journal Current Biology.

Prof Francis Ratnieks from the University of Sussex, a senior member of the research team explained that previous research had shown that caffeine boosted bees' memories of the location of a flower.

"So people [already] thought it would affect their perception of nectar," he told BBC News.

To find out if this was the case, the research team set up two artificial flowers for -READ MORE- BBC LINK-http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34532636

Ancestors 'had less sleep' than we do

Our ancestors may have got less sleep than we do, a study suggests.

US researchers studied the sleeping patterns of traditional societies in Africa and South America, whose lifestyles closely resemble ancient hunter gatherers.

They monitored 98 people for 1,165 nights, and found that they slept for an average of 6.5 hours per night.

By comparison, the scientists said that most people in the US get about seven hours, according to a large sleep poll.

The new study, published in the journal Current Biology, also finds that temperature played a greater role than light in shaping sleeping patterns.

Prof Jerome Siegel, from the University of California, Los Angeles, said: "The issue is: what is the data on how sleep has changed?

When the temperature hits bottom, they wake up

Prof Jerome Siegel, UCLA

"And it occurred to me that these groups, which are rapidly disappearing, give the last opportunity to really know what human sleep was like before we all created our various civilisations.

"What is absolutely clear is that they don't sleep -READ MORE ON BBC LINK-http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34544394

Singapore's 1940s teenage weightlifting beauty queen

To be both a beauty queen and a champion weightlifter is not unheard of nowadays, but in 1940s Singapore it was a very unusual path for a young girl. Ho Lye Toh was a teenager who could lift weights of up to 100kg (220lb). Now 92, she might be Singapore's most famous nonagenarian after her remarkable life story surfaced in an article earlier this year and enraptured the city. Her father was Ho Peng Khoen, a school teacher and former Malayan weightlifting champion. In 1941, he made a decision that changed her life. "I was 14 and I fell sick quite often, sometimes so bad that I would pass out. So my father decided I should begin exercising to build body strength," Madam Ho said. "He was the reason I got started on weightlifting. He taught me how to press and pull weights and dumbbells and I did that every evening after I came back from school."READ MORE-http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-33750637

Why do wrestlers so often die young?

In today's Magazine

• Revealing the horror of Stalin
• Breaking the silence on Jewish suicide
• Caption Challenge: Er, what's all this about?
• 10 things we didn't know last week

Mr Perfect, The Ultimate Warrior and "Rowdy" Roddy Piper may sound like names from a comic book, but the cognoscenti will recognise them as former superstars of the world of professional wrestling. All of them also died unexpectedly and at a relatively young age.

Mr Perfect died in 2003 of acute cocaine intoxication at the age of 44. The Ultimate Warrior died last year of a heart attack, aged 54. Most recent to go was "Rowdy" Roddy Piper who died suddenly on 31 July of a heart attack. He was 61.

So do former wrestlers die younger than athletes who take part in other sports?

"Yes the statistical evidence is quite strong when we look at the mortality rate for wrestlers compared to other sports and the general population," says John Moriarty of Manchester University.

Wrestlers who competed in the 1970s and 80s were living and partying like rock stars

Eric Cohen, Wrestling journalist

Researchers like Moriarty face some difficulties getting hold of data, as no official body collects statistics about the deaths of those who have spent a career in the ring.

His approach has been to aggregate the findings of others who have studied the problem.

He points to research by academics at the University of Eastern Michigan who studied a group of 557 former wrestlers.

Of the 62 wrestlers in this group who died between 1985 and 2011, 49 died before -READ MORE -http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-33817959

Gordon the Gopher: Back from rehab

"Whatever happened to Gordon the Gopher" was the question that re-kindled Gordon's career. Ryan McDermott's Grandmother posed the question after finding a puppet of the 80s star in the loft during a clear-out. Inspired by the question, director Ryan and co-scriptwriter Adam Brown set about bringing Gordon back to the limelight. "There's this terrific back-story with Philip Schofield", said Ryan, "Gordon's thinking he should have been the star... He's the one who sold 300 thousand annuals. Adam explained the past few years have been tough for Gordon, with him developing an "ironic" addiction to gin, but that he is now "on the road to recovery" and ready to return to the spotlight. The new Gordon the Gopher pilot, starring Warwick Davies as the voice of Gordon, can be viewed on the BBC Comedy Taster site. This clip is originally from 5 live Breakfast on Friday 7 August 2015. Share this page Add "In Short, Gordon the Gopher: Back from rehab" to FavouritesAdd to Favourites Release date: 07 Aug 2015-FOLLOW LINK TO LISTEN -http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02z0pdq