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In the early 1900s, Antarctica became a hot spot for explorers embarking on adventurous but dangerous journeys.
Polish explorer Sir Ernest Shackleton and his crew of 27 men set out on board the HMS Endurance in 1914. But Endurance was trapped in the ice, documented in dramatic images by the crew’s official photographer.
The crew set up a “ground station” and watched as the ice slowly pushed and sank. The men swam on an ice floe and used lifeboats to reach uninhabited Elephant Island.
Shackleton and several crew members then embarked on a perilous journey over hundreds of miles of violent seas to the island of South Georgia in search of rescuers. After receiving help from a whaling station, Shackleton returned to his men. He refused to give up.
The crew all survived despite the dangerous incident that ended in 1916. Although the trip was unsuccessful, the safe return of the crew was a big news.
A search expedition found the wreck of HMS Endurance in 2022, and now another part of Shackleton’s legacy has been recovered.
Secrets of the sea
An international team of experts using sonar has located the exploration ship Quest, once captained by Shackleton, off the coast of Canada.
The explorer was on board the ship, attempting his fourth trip to Antarctica, when he died of a heart attack in January 1922 aged 47.
After his death, the vessel went on more adventures before sinking in 1962, and researchers think there may be artifacts on board with a story to tell about the ship’s voyages.
A remotely operated vehicle will be deployed on an expedition to explore the interior of Trath na Keist later this year.
Inquiries
The late physicist Freeman Dyson theorized in 1960 that if there were advanced civilizations of alien life, they could devise a way to harness star power as an energy solution.
His idea of these amazing megastructures, which inspired science fiction, led to a concept called Dyson spheres, and he thought they might be detectable in infrared light.
Although the identification of sources of infrared radiation would not be direct evidence of extraterrestrial intelligence, the renowned scientist said he also hoped the search would lead to the discovery of new types of celestial objects.
Now, new research has found seven potential stars in the Milky Way that could host Dyson fields, and the result is shaking up the astronomical community in more ways than one.
Wild kingdom
Like humans, wild African elephants may use individual personal calls such as names to address and recognize each other, according to a new study.
The scientists analyzed recordings of different types of rumbles, or sounds used by female elephants and their calves. And after they heard the playback, the strongest elephants responded to the calls that were originally intended for them.
“That means a certain capacity for abstract thought – they have to be able to learn this random sound and associate it with other individuals and basically call each other by name,” the animal behaviorist said. Mickey Pardo, postdoctoral fellow at Cornell University.
Long long ago
For years, the myth that it was over young girls who were ritually sacrificed remained in the ancient Maya city of Chichén Itzá – but new evidence suggests that another part of the population played a role in the deadly rituals.
An analysis of the many skeletons buried in a sacred sink in the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico showed that the victims were young boys between 3 and 6 years old. Many of them were related, including a few who were twins.
The reason for their sacrifice remains unknown, but the revelation adds another layer of complexity to the ancient Mayan ritual calendar, the researchers said.
Other life
An orbiter orbiting Mars has spied frost forming on top of the red planet’s volcanoes for the first time.
The equatorial region of Mars contains some of the tallest volcanoes in the solar system, with a few peaks towering above the height of Mount Everest.
“It’s significant because it shows us that Mars is a dynamic planet, but also that water can be found almost everywhere on the Martian surface,” said Adomas Valantinas, a postdoctoral researcher at Brown University.
In addition, a major solar storm hit Mars in May, and NASA missions captured stunning auroras on the planet and other surprising views of the event.
Discoveries
Dive deep into these new discoveries:
— A vegetarian piranha seems unlikely to be related to human teeth, but it is a newly discovered Amazonian species that researchers have named after a villain from the series “The Lord of the Rings”.
– Recent excavations have yielded artifacts such as pottery and coins that show how the Romans integrated with local communities in southern England thousands of years ago.
— A farmer and amateur paleontologist has discovered the fossil of a previously unknown pterosaur species that rose high above the sea that covered part of Australia 100 million years ago.
— A botanist saw a tiny species of plant that was no longer known to science but growing in an unlikely place on the slopes of the Andes.
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