Gleanings of the Week Ending April 26, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Liberation of Bergen-Belsen: how a lack of protective clothing cost lives – Typhus was rampant when the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp was liberated by British troops on April 15, 1945. Anne Frank had died there just a few weeks before. What happened in the immediate aftermath of liberation is described.

How climate change is supercharging pollen allergies – Longer growing season….and extreme allergy events where trillions of pollen particles, sucked up into the clouds as the storm formed, splintered by rain, lightning and humidity into ever-smaller fragments – then cast back down to Earth for people to breathe them in. In one such event in Australia - emergency rooms saw eight times as many people turning up with breathing problems as they would normally expect. Nearly 10 times as many people with asthma were admitted to hospital. 10 people died. It’s been called ‘thunderstorm asthma.’ In the US, pollen levels are expected to be higher than average in 39 states…with worse symptoms.

Colorful city birds – Brown shades are more common in natural environments than in cities. Successful urban bird species have more elaborate colors in their plumage, which is especially true for females. Cities seem to favor more colorful birds -- probably because there are fewer predators in urban areas and 'being seen' poses a lower risk than in rural areas.

See the Titanic in Remarkable Detail With a 3D Scan – From National Geographic. …a digital reconstruction of the wreck.

Royal Meteorological Society Celebrates 10 Years of Incredible Weather Photography – Great photographs an interview with Kirsty McCabe, UK's Royal Meteorological Society’s senior broadcast meteorologist and editor of their MetMatters blog.

Odd-Looking Blue Creatures Are Washing Up in Large Groups on California’s Beaches Once Again –The jellyfish-like creatures in this post are Velella velella – thin, oval shaped blue or purple that usually are 3-4 inches long. They use their stinging blue tentacles to prey on plankton.

Meet Four Amazing Endemic Parrots from New Zealand – They are quite different from each other…and the parrots we see in zoos.

Why you should avoid lotions and creams that contain 'fragrance' – Avoiding fragrance is easy enough…but other things are harder to detect and avoid.

Six immersive experiences for more joy – The 6 seems reasonable to me…most of them I had derived for myself already!

Ten National Wildlife Refuges That Need Our Support Most – All the wildlife refigures I have visited over the past few years have unmet maintenance needs. Funding for materials, equipment and staff has been too low for some time. There are Friends organizations that try to address some of the needs…but it is never enough. Some of the places that became refuges because they are very special are suffering now…maybe being irrecoverably harmed.

Illustrations in Children’s Books – Soviet Union 1980s

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I browsed 36 children’s books in February – published in the Soviet Union during the 1980s. Some were clearly for export – in Hindi or English or Tamil or Bengali or Kannada. The text was not the draw for me; I was browsing for the illustrations. I’ve always enjoyed the artwork in books intended for children. It entices young readers…often colorful, sometimes whimsical. The books are freely available on Internet Archive. Enjoy a sample image from each below(click on the image to see a larger version)….then follow the link see more of the book!

The Guttapercha Boy In Hindi

Grishka And The Astronaut In Hindi

Stories for Children

The Little Hen or The Underground People - A fairy Story for Children

Yellow Beak

Bumpy

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 19, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Survey: US Public Spaces Not Meeting Community Needs – Funding for maintenance and basic improvements seems to be the key issue.

I tested some of the most popular ways of meeting new people. Here's what I found – The author engaged in 4 ‘hobbies’ and assessed their effectiveness in fostering social connection: team sports, bouldering, creative writing sessions, and a life drawing course. Evidently, they all worked for her! For me – my volunteer activities (with Missouri Master Naturalist and my county’s Friends of the Library) are the way I meet new people; I tend to like the triadic interactions (attention both to each other, and to an object or activity of mutual interest) that volunteering provides.

These Unassuming Artifacts from King Tut’s Tomb Could Tell a Remarkable Story – Originally the 4 small unbaked earthen dishes were thought to be stands for the nearly four-foot high gilded wooden staffs…but a new study proposes that the clay troughs would have held libations, most likely of water, aimed at the purification and rejuvenation of Tutankhamun in the afterlife, a rite known as the Awakening of Osiris.

Cuts to the National Weather Service May Have Serious Impacts on National Parks – And for everywhere else too. Weather impacts everybody.

New research boosts future whooping cough vaccines – My father – now in his 90s – almost died from whooping cough as a young child. Deaths have become less common since the vaccine although they are still in the double digits in the US. In 2024, several outbreaks left public health officials and hospitals scrambling to accommodate a sudden influx of patients, primarily infants, who are often too young to be vaccinated and suffer the most severe symptoms. I’m glad that a new vaccine may be more effective and longer lasting than the one we have now.

Study Reveals Mercury-Poisoned Industrial Age Child – A three- to four-year-old child died in France sometime in the 18th or 19th century. The youngster suffered from rickets and scurvy likely caused by poor living conditions during the Industrial Revolution. But there were also high levels of mercury in his bones and teeth. The study ruled out sources of mercury contamination and concluded that the child had been administered the toxic metal as a cure for his ailments, which ultimately killed him.

At 97, Endangered Tortoise Becomes Oldest First-Time Mom of Her Species with Four New Hatchlings – Four Galapagos tortoise hatchlings at the Philadelphia Zoo!

Celebrating Seeds – From The Prairie Ecologist. So many obstacles must be overcome for a seed to become a mature plant producing seeds….continuing the cycle of the species.

Antarctic Sea Ice Plunged in Summer 2025 - In 2025, summer sea ice in the Antarctic tied for the second-lowest minimum extent ever recorded in the 47-year satellite record. It’s not yet clear whether the Southern Hemisphere has entered a new norm with perennially low ice or if the Antarctic is in a passing phase that will revert to prior levels in the years to com

Global Economy More Vulnerable to Warming Than Previously Thought - By rattling supply chains, future storms and heat waves will also send ripples throughout the global economy, inflicting costs far higher than models currently show. No country is immune.

Science of Terra Nova British Antarctic Expedition

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The Terra Nove expedition took place between 1910 and 1913. It was led by Captain Robert Falcon Scott who died after making a last entry in his diary on March 29, 1912; his death along with the men in his party, overshadowed the scientific contributions at first.

The 12 scientists who participated—the largest Antarctic scientific team of its time—made important discoveries in zoology, botany, geology, glaciology, and meteorology. Volumes 4-8 of the Natural History Reports from the expedition were published between 1917 and 1924; they are my free eBooks selections for this week…freely available on Internet Archive.

 Natural History Reports / British Antarctic ("Terra Nova") Expedition, 1910-13 V4

Natural History Reports / British Antarctic ("Terra Nova") Expedition, 1910-13 V5

Natural History Reports / British Antarctic ("Terra Nova") Expedition, 1910-13 V6

Natural History Reports / British Antarctic ("Terra Nova") Expedition, 1910-13 V7

Natural History Reports / British Antarctic ("Terra Nova") Expedition, 1910-13 V8

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 12, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Doctor shortages have hobbled health care for decades − and the trend could be worsening – It does seem like it is getting harder and harder to make an appointment with my doctor…and I have yet to see the same doctor twice for my annual checkup since we moved to Missouri. This article provides some background into why the US is increasingly short of doctors.

Your neighborhood might affect your risk of dementia - Most studies of risk factors for Alzheimer's disease focus on the individual level, not the community level. Of course, intervening at the community level is challenging, but prioritizing disadvantaged communities may be an effective way to mobilize resources for older adults and provide avenues for reducing the risk of dementia for the overall community.

Mangrove Pioneers - On the ground, a team surveying tidal marshes near the Florida–Georgia border in 2024 found red mangroves (Rhizophora mangle) and black mangroves (Avicennia germinans) growing 50 miles (80 kilometers) and 14 miles (23 kilometers) farther north, respectively, than their previously documented range. Landsat and other satellite imagery are valuable for monitoring marsh-to-mangrove transitions over larger areas and longer time frames. Conditions along the U.S. East Coast are conducive to mangrove territory expansion - less-frequent extreme cold events and rising winter temperatures in the region as contributing factors to the trees’ survival.

These Carnivorous Snails Slurp Earthworms Like Spaghetti – Snails in New Zealand….the short video is worth watching!

Why Norway is restoring its Cold War military bunkers - Norway is a land with many bunkers. At the peak of the Cold War, the sparsely populated, mountainous country had around 3,000 underground facilities where its armed forces and allies could hide and make life difficult for any invader. Norway is reactivating two of their most iconic underground structures of the Cold War. The role of the reactivated base which has had structural and equipment upgrades is to help the "resilience and survivability" of Norway's F-35s in the face of a Russian attack.

Are Hairstyles the Key to Unlocking Art History’s Most Famous Portraits? - Hairstyling has always been a way that women exacted agency over their self-presentation.  Paintings and sculptures can be rare visual records of these carefully chosen, and ephemeral, hairdos—which, unlike fashion garments, can’t survive and be passed down. (Although some historic wigs and clip-ins have stood the test of time and made it into museum collections.)

Making Sense of Butterfly Declines - Over the past two decades, the total number of butterflies across 554 species has plummeted by 22%. That means a loss of about one butterfly out of every five observed since 2000. This alarming trend underscores the severity of the decline, with many species experiencing drastic reductions in their populations. Three ways to help butterflies: plant native, plant native milkweed (i.e. native host plants), don’t spray.

2,000-Year-Old Wooden Houses Found in China - Houses in Shaoxing, Zhejiang, that date to the Warring States period (475–221 b.c.). The stilted and terraced wood-frame structures would have been covered with reeds and bamboo. The walls, made of interwoven wooden posts and thatch, retain numerous small holes, which archaeologists believe were left by grass ropes used to bind the structure together. Artifacts recovered from the site included primitive porcelain cups, red pottery tripods, ceramic urns, bronze drill bits, and plentiful remains of domestic animals as well as marine resources.

Retreating Arctic Glaciers Have Exposed 1,500 Miles of Coastline - Scientists tracked the movement of 1,500 coastal glaciers from 2000 to 2020, finding that retreating ice had unveiled hundreds of miles of coastline, largely in Greenland - revealing stores of precious metals…. but they warn that newly exposed coastline, which has not been cemented with ice, is vulnerable to erosion and landslides.

Listen to the First Known Recording of Shark Sounds, a ‘Weird’ Audio Clip Captured at a Marine Lab in New Zealand – Sounds from a rig shark…when it was handled between tests in the lab.

Life Magazine from 1937

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Internet Archive has digitized versions of many Life Magazines. I have been browsing through them – slowly since there was an issue for each week. As I looked at the issues from 1937, I thought about my parents; they started school that year. They were probably still very focused on things going on within their family and small community rather than the broader world…but the world was heading into a time of turmoil. Looking at the way Life was covering those events seems relatively naïve now! The sample images (one from each weekly magazine) show a variety of topics the Life editors chose to cover over the course of the year. Most of the ‘color’ pages of the magazine were advertisements.

Life Magazine 1937-01-04 – a lot of public works projects in the past 4 years

Life Magazine 1937-01-11  - Margaret Sanger and birth control

Life Magazine 1937-01-18 – Chinese farmer in California

Life Magazine 1937-01-25 – US Army planes

Life Magazine 1937-02-01 – Roosevelt’s second inauguration  - a rainy day

Life Magazine 1937-02-08 – Mississippi flooding; levee dynamited at Cairo, Illinois

Life Magazine 1937-02-15 – US Supreme Court’s new building

Life Magazine 1937-02-22 – Marian Anderson

Life Magazine 1937-03-1 – Building the Golden Gate Bridge (accident)

Life Magazine 1937-03-8 – Sun Valley sky lifts

Life Magazine 1937-03-15 – British crown

Life Magazine 1937-03-22 – Irving parachute

Life Magazine 1937-03-29 – Palm Springs

Life Magazine 1937-04-05 – HMS Glorius in winter maneuvers

Life Magazine 1937-04-12 – Mussolini in North Africa…a Roman city in the sand

Life Magazine 1937-04-19 – Queen Mary with 3 grandchildren…Elizabeth II as a young girl

Life Magazine 1937-04-26 – Neville Chamberlain as Chancellor of the Exchequer

Life Magazine 1937-05-03 – British rearmament

Life Magazine 1937-05-10 – Germans celebrate Hitler’s birthday

Life Magazine 1937-05-17 – Dionne quintuplets at 3

Life Magazine 1937-05-24 – Coronation Day at Buckingham Palace

Life Magazine 1937-05-31 – Golden Gate Bridge from one of the piers

Life Magazine 1937-06-07 – University of Virginia

Life Magazine 1937-06-14 – Washington DC from the air

Life Magazine 1937-06-21 – Dust Bowl

Life Magazine 1937-06-28 - Telephone

Life Magazine 1937-07-05 – River Jordan and Jewish farms

Life Magazine 1937-07-12 – Audubon Association protects birds

Life Magazine 1937-07-19 - British air fleet after rearmament

Life Magazine 1937-07-26 – Typical day for a 12-week-old baby

Life Magazine 1937-07-26 – US wheat belts

Life Magazine 1937-08-09 – Mapping the battle at dawn

Life Magazine 1937-08-16 – Wall Streeters commute by plane

Life Magazine 1937-08-23 – Niagara Falls

Life Magazine 1937-08-30 – Maine trotters

Life Magazine 1937-09-06 – Texaco advertisement

Life Magazine 1937-09-13 – Nephew of Geronimo

Life Magazine 1937-09-20 – Prime Minister’s Kitchen

Life Magazine 1937-09-27 – Nazi parades

Life Magazine 1937-10-04 – American Legion parade

Life Magazine 1937-10-11 – Joe Kennedy and merchant marine stagnation

Life Magazine 1937-10-18 – Armstrong Linoleum advertisement

Life Magazine 1937-10-25 – Natives of Northwest Canada

Life Magazine 1937-11-01 – Man O’ War…256 ‘children’

Life Magazine 1937-11-08 – 100-inch telescope for Mt. Wilson

Life Magazine 1937-11-15 – Flying Dreadnought

Life Magazine 1937-11-21 – America as an exporting nations: raw cotton, automobiles, fruits

Life Magazine 1937-11-29 – Nursery furniture

Life Magazine 1937-12-06 – Japanese depiction of dying afternoon of Manchu China and garish dawn of Westernized Japan

Life Magazine 1937-12-13 – Train engines (billions of dollars and millions of men)

Life Magazine 1937-12-20 – Christmas is in the air

Life Magazine 1937-12-27 - $300/minute to operate the set for MGM’s musical Rosalie

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 5, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What’s Hiding Inside This 2,200-Year-Old Pyramidal Structure in the Judean Desert? - Alongside Nahal Zohar, a stream in the southern Judean Desert, archaeologists are picking through a large building they believe was used as a stronghold for protecting the caravan route bringing bitumen and salt from the Dead Sea to Mediterranean ports. To date, researchers have found a new Dead Sea Scroll, excellently preserved ancient Roman swords, and a 10,000-year-old basket and lid.

Which Native Plant Are YOU? - Take a moment to enjoy a bit of playful anthropomorphism as you take a Native Plant Personality Quiz, to see which native plant YOU are most like!

Ecologists document Utah's bee species and say beehive state is rich in bee diversity - 1,167 bee species are documented in the state of Utah!

Mud, water and wood: The system that kept a 1604-year-old city afloat - The city, which turned 1604 years old on March 25, is built on the foundations of millions of short wooden piles, pounded in the ground with their tip facing downwards. These trees – larch, oak, alder, pine, spruce and elm of a length ranging between 3.5m (11.5ft) to less than 1m (3ft) – have held up stone palazzos and tall belltowers for centuries, in a true marvel of engineering leveraging the forces of physics and nature.

From Wasteland to Wonder – A free eBook by Basil Camu about trees and how each of us can improve the places we love. It includes QR codes for instructional videos about how to do things. One that I viewed and will apply immediately is how to prune shrubs in a way friendly to the plant…and results in less frequent pruning!

Renewables Accounted for More Than 90 Percent of New Power Globally Last Year - Still, growth is not on pace to meet a global goal to triple renewable capacity by the end of this decade. Continuing its clean-energy dominance, China installed more renewable power than all other countries combined last year.

7 Ways State Wildlife Action Plans Save Species – From the National Wildlife Federation.

Women Played a More Important Role in Producing Medieval Manuscripts Than Previously Thought - Female scribes were responsible for producing at least 110,000 handwritten manuscripts between 400 and 1500 C.E. in the “Latin West,” or the Roman Catholic parts of Europe, researchers find. That represents roughly 1.1 percent of the total 10 million manuscripts produced during that period….and that is likely an underestimate.

Jamestown is Drowning - Millions of artifacts have been excavated from the site over the last century, helping historians to understand much of what we know about this historic early settlement. But untold numbers of other artifacts may soon be lost forever because of increasing water levels, not just from flooding but also from rising groundwater and migrating wetland areas. Among the most profound known impacts are the loss of human remains. The average sea level has risen nearly 1.6 feet in the tidewater region of Virginia—a trend that is now accelerating. Studies predict that about 14 of Historic Jamestown’s 23 acres—or 60 percent—could be permanently underwater within the next 50 years.

These Are the 20 Happiest Countries in the World - The United States dropped to its lowest ranking yet in the annual report. This year, America came in 24th, down from its peak at 11th on the 2012 list.

eBotantical Prints – March 2025

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Twenty more books were added to my botanical print eBook collection in March - available for browsing on Internet Archive. This month includes 4 volumes of Dissertatio Botanica by Carl Peter Thunburg from the late 1700s and the first volumes of Recueil des plantes les plus usuelles peintes d'apres nature by Pierre de Savary (the second series will be continued in the April eBotanical Prints). My favorite image of the month is from the Album of Chinese flora executed by one or more Chinese artists for John Reeves (1774-1856).

My list of eBotanical Prints books now totals 3,083 eBooks I’ve browsed over the years. The whole list can be accessed here.

Click on any sample image from March’s 20 books below to get an enlarged version…and the title hyperlink in the list below the image mosaic to view the entire volume where there are a lot more botanical illustrations to browse.

Enjoy the March 2025 eBotanical Prints!

Nova genera Plantarum  * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1781

Dissertatio Botanica V1 * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1781

Dissertatio Botanica V2 * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1782

Dissertatio Botanica V3 * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1782

Dissertatio Botanica V4 * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1782

Flora Japonica * Thunberg, Carl Peter * sample image * 1784

Flora Japonica sive Plantae * Siebold, Philipp Franz von * sample image * 1835

Album of Chinese flora executed by one or more Chinese artists for John Reeves (1774-1856) * Chinese School  * sample image * 1820

Icones selectae plantarum * Kaemper, Engelbert * sample image * 1791

Medical botany; or, history of plants in the materia medica of the London, Edinburgh and Dublin pharmacopoeias. Arranged according to the Linnaean system V1 * E. Cox and Son (publisher) * sample image * 1821

Medical botany; or, history of plants in the materia medica of the London, Edinburgh and Dublin pharmacopoeias. Arranged according to the Linnaean system V2 * E. Cox and Son (publisher) * sample image * 1822

Standardized products - a descriptive list of drug extracts standardized by chemical or physiological means * Parke, Davis & Company * sample image * 1911


A brief treatise on various ailments and their treatment by nature's remedies * Medical Institute (Bradford, West Yorkshire, England) * sample image * 1895

The new British domestic herbal * Waller, John Augustine * sample image * 1822

Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire des plantes * Dodart, Denis * sample image * 1676

Handbuch der pharmaceutischen Botanik. : Mit illuminirten Kupfern * Juch, Karl Wilhelp; Volckart, Johann Friedrich * sample image * 1804

The reformed practice of medicine * Rosen, Samuel * sample image * 1895

Recueil des plantes les plus usuelles peintes d'apres nature V3 * Savary, Pierre de * sample image * 1764

Recueil des plantes les plus usuelles peintes d'apres nature V4 * Savary, Pierre de * sample image * 1764

Recueil des plantes les plus usuelles peintes d'apres nature V5 * Savary, Pierre de * sample image * 1765

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 29, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How long will you live? New evidence says it’s much more about your choices than your genes - Environmental factors influence health and longevity to a far greater extent than genetics. Environmental factors had the greatest impact on lung, heart and liver disease, while genetics played the biggest role in determining a person’s risk of breast, ovarian and prostate cancers, and dementia. The environmental factors that had the most influence on earlier death and biological ageing included smoking, socioeconomic status, physical activity levels and living conditions.

'The ice melted beneath our feet': The huskies that revealed the rapid shrinking of Greenland's ice - Greenland experienced record ice loss in 2019, shedding a total of 532 billion tones from its giant ice sheet, according to a 2020 study. On average, Greenland loses 234 billion tons of ice per year. What's distinctive about Greenland is how much melting happens on the surface in the summer, because Antarctica doesn’t get anywhere near as much.

Humboldt Penguins on the Edge – Temperate penguins of Chile and Peru. They hunt in the cold, nutrient-rich waters of the Humboldt Current, the world’s largest marine upwelling, that flows a few miles offshore. They are excellent swimmers and deep divers in their pursuit of anchovies and other fish. Humboldt penguins have come back from the edge of extinction before—it will take the continued efforts of local communities, governments and partners to bring them back again.

Study: 'Sustainable intensification' on the farm reduces soil nitrate losses, maintains crop yields - A nine-year study comparing a typical two-year corn and soybean rotation with a more intensive three-year rotation involving corn, cereal rye, soybean and winter wheat, found that the three-year system can dramatically reduce nitrogen -- an important crop nutrient -- in farm runoff without compromising yield.

These Everyday Artifacts Tell the Story of Harriet Tubman’s Father’s Home as Climate Change Threatens the Historic Site – The site is in Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge – the first place I saw a bald eagle in the wild (in the early 1990s). My family visited there many times when we lived in Maryland, and we observed the transition of the marshes to ghost forests and then then open water over the next 30 years. The refuge is obviously changing with rising sea level.

Plastic recycling gets a breath of fresh air - The researchers used a molybdenum catalyst and activated carbon -- both of which are inexpensive, abundant and non-toxic materials. The mixture with PET was heated and, after a short period of time, the chemical bonds within the plastic broke apart. With the tiny bit of moisture from air, the material turned into terephthalic acid (TPA) -- the highly valuable precursor to polyesters. The only byproduct was acetaldehyde, a valuable, easy-to-remove industrial chemical.

This English Burial Site May Be Centuries Older Than Stonehenge - Flagstones, a burial site in Dorset, on the English Channel, may be the earliest known large circular enclosure in Britain. It is a perfectly circular ditched enclosure, with burials and cremations associated with it and may have even served as a prototype for later sites such as Stonehenge, which is located just 45 miles to the northeast. The ditched enclosure was created around 3200 B.C.E., with burials placed in it at that time. The scientists were also intrigued to find that a young man was buried under a large stone at the site fully a millennium later.

Climate change threatens future of banana export industry - It will be economically unsustainable by 2080 for many areas across Latin America and the Caribbean to continue growing bananas for export, because of rising temperatures caused by climate change.

Spring Spectacle: Thousands of Tulips Bloom at One of LA’s Top Gardens – Reminds me that I need to plan a visit to the botanical gardens near where I live in Missouri for tulips soon!

Portraits of women who 'shine a light': from an 'analog' astronaut to a watermelon farmer – Vignettes of women from around the world…what a range of activity!

Illustrations in Children's Books - Soviet Union 1980s

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Internet Archive has quite a collection of books for children published in the Soviet Union for export during the 1980s. I was very familiar with books for children published in the US during the same time because I was reading a lot of them with my young daughter in the early 1990s. The illustrations are the big draw – as the sample images from the books I browsed last January show. They are often colorful…sometimes artsy or whimsical…sometimes realistic. Enjoy browsing some children’s books!

Raggity and the Cloud

Sun Sews a Shirt

Fly away, seagull, fly away

My first book

Little Arthur's Sun Two Armenian Stories

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 22, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

In This Storied Egyptian City, Rising Seas are Causing Buildings to Crumble – Alexandria, Egypt. Since 2001, 290 building have collapsed as the rising water table weakens soil and erodes foundations. There are other historic coastal cities with the same problem.

Astronomers Discover 128 New Moons Orbiting Saturn, Cementing the Planet’s Title of ‘Moon King’ – The total number of moons of Saturn is now 274….almost twice as many as all the rest of the moons in our solar system combined.

Microplastics could be fueling antibiotic resistance - Microplastics -- tiny shards of plastic debris -- are all over the planet. They have made their way up food chains, accumulated in oceans, clustered in clouds and on mountains, and been found inside our bodies at alarming rates. Scientists have been racing to uncover the unforeseen impacts of so much plastic in and around us. One recent discovery: bacteria exposed to microplastics became resistant to multiple types of antibiotics commonly used to treat infections. They say this is especially concerning for people in high-density, impoverished areas like refugee settlements, where discarded plastic piles up and bacterial infections spread easily.

How the Development of the Camera Changed Our World - From glass plates to paper prints to digital photograph imaging, the photo revolution's intention remains the same—to immortalize our world.

Alphonse Mucha Helped Define Art Nouveau. A New Show Explores His Lasting Influence – Mucha was undeniably revered in his day, when his posters and advertisements were widely disseminated. His posters lined the streets, and his illustrations graced the covers of major magazines. And to feed the public demand for his work, Mucha even produced smaller posters printed in publications, allowing people to bring his ornately detailed lithographs home without having to rely on the luck of finding one in the wild. The special exhibit will be at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 4525 Oak Street, Kansas City, Missouri, April 11–August 30, 2026….maybe I will plan a road trip for next spring!

'You look up and see light coming through': The divers venturing under the ice in the name of science - In a remote corner of Lapland, northern Finland…a lake with 28 in. layer of ice with a hole cut in it. Divers are tethered to the surface using a safety rope, with a handler on the surface communicating with the diver via rope signals. The training here on the frozen lake is practice for work that will be done out on the sea ice of the Arctic and Antarctic, where there are added dangers – large seals sometimes gather at the dive holes, preventing divers from leaving the water. In 2017, Alf Norkko, a professor of marine research at the University of Helsinki, and his team discovered big changes on the seafloor under Antarctic sea ice since their previous diving expedition in the same area in 2009.  "There was a remarkable increase in the abundance of life," he says. Norkko says that he and his fellow scientists are so dedicated to this work because they are aware of the urgency of climate change. At present, there is a race afoot to understand it, and to respond to it.

Grave of Roman Twins Excavated in Croatia – Twins that died between birth and 2 months…placed face to face. Suffered malnutrition before birth. Infant mortality was as high as 30% in Roman societies.

Particulate matter levels in air exceed WHO limits in majority of world's big cities - Fewer than one in five global cities met World Health Organization air pollution standards (for PM2.5) in 2024 with Central and South Asia accounting for the nine most polluted metropolitan areas on Earth. Los Angeles and Ontario, California are the most polluted in the US.  Mayaguez, Puerto Rico had the cleanest air of any metro area around the world. Man-made activities such as fossil fuel burning for transportation, generating electricity and domestic heating, industrial processes, fireworks and smoking were the largest sources of pollutant PM2.5, but that natural sources including wildfires, dust, pollen and dirt also contributed to particulate loads in the air.

China’s First Domestic Cats Took the Silk Road 1,400 Years Ago, New Study Finds - The Tang Dynasty (618–907 C.E.), from which the oldest cat in the study hails, saw peak activity along the legendary trade network, which boosted the exchange of goods and ideas between China, India, and Persia. It’s not improbable that merchants from the West could have carried cats on their journey to East Asia.

Can Toxic Mining Waste Help Remove CO2 from the Atmosphere? - On the coast of Newfoundland, waste from a shuttered asbestos mine has been a troubling source of contamination for decades. Now, a company plans to process the waste to draw CO2 from the air — one of several projects worldwide that aim to turn this liability into an asset. A 2022 report by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory estimated that existing asbestos tailings in Canada and the United States could remove up to 750 million tons of CO2 in total — while also removing an environmental health hazard.

The Craftsman (magazine)

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I browsed 24 months of The Craftsman magazine from the early 1900s back in December. They are available from The University of Wisconsin-Madison digital library. They are a way to understand the way people were living at the time – a time when my grandparents were born. Some of the styles look “heavy” by today’s standards…but they were built to last from daily use. Some would still fit into a home today. Click on any of the sample images below to see a larger version…and use the links to browse the whole magazine.

 The craftsman Vol. I, No. 1 October 1901

The craftsman Vol. I, No. 2 November 1901

The craftsman Vol. I, No. 3 December 1901

The craftsman Vol. I, No. 4 January 1902

The craftsman Vol. I, No. 5 February 1902

The craftsman Vol. I, No. 6 March 1902

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 15, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The Largest Harbor in Ancient Greece Is Centuries Older Than We Thought - A discovery of lead pollution and 5 lumps of brown coals were carbon dated to the days of the Bronze Age.

When This Brilliant Author Died, She Left Behind a Legacy of Grief, Haunting Poetry and Surprising Resilience – I remember reading Silvia Plath books as a teenager.

Maple seeds’ unique spinning motion allows them to travel far even in the rain, a new study shows – Autorotation keeps the seeds in the air for longer, so they travel farther. The researchers studied how raindrops that hit the seeds reduce the time they are in the air. The next part of the study will look at rolling samaras (from tulip poplar and ash trees).

Rare Footage Shows Baby Polar Bears Emerging from Their Den in the Arctic - At birth, polar bears are blind, nearly hairless and weigh just over a pound—about the same as a loaf of bread. But they spend their first few months snuggled inside a snowy den, fattening up on their mother’s milk. By the time they emerge in the spring, the cubs are covered in fluffy white fur and weigh 22 to 26 pounds. Scientists have managed to capture rare footage of a polar bear mother and her cubs leaving their den in the Arctic for the first time.

Summer Heat Wave in South America - In February 2025, an area of high pressure parked over the southern Atlantic Ocean, causing temperatures to soar in parts of South America. As of February 27, Argentina noted that six provinces were under a red-level (very dangerous) alert for extreme heat.

The world's strongest ocean current should be getting faster – instead, it is at risk of failing – The Antarctic Circumpolar Current - five times stronger than the Gulf Stream and more than 100 times stronger than the Amazon River. Fresh, cool water from melting Antarctic ice is diluting the salty water of the ocean, potentially disrupting the vital ocean current.

More Than 1,500 Sandhill Cranes Killed by Bird Flu in Indiana - In recent weeks, biologists with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources have counted hundreds of dead sandhill cranes statewide. At least 500 of the birds were found dead in Jackson County, in the south-central part of the state, in early January. So far, no sick or dead cranes have been reported in Nebraska.

Inside the Clear Waters of England’s Ancient Chalk Streams - A globally rare type of waterway found almost exclusively in England—these rivers’ specific features both create rare biodiverse habitats and make them uniquely vulnerable. Burbling up from aquifers formed in chalk layers that date back to the Cretaceous Period, these rivers exist only where chalk sits close to the Earth’s surface. That’s why of the 200-odd identified chalk streams in the world, nearly all of them are found in England, where 66 million years ago a shallow seabed collected the skeletons of aquatic creatures—the makings of chalk. Ideal habitat for trout and Atlantic salmon.

How our lungs back up the bone marrow to make our blood - Researchers at UCSF found hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) in human lung tissue that make red blood cells, as well as megakaryocytes, which produce the platelets that form blood clots.

Gold Jewelry Found at Karnak Temple - Karnak was the largest and one of the most important religious sites in ancient Egypt. An Egyptian-French team was investigating the northwest sector of the precinct when they uncovered a ceramic vessel that contained a collection of gold jewelry and statuettes dating to the 26th Dynasty (664–526 b.c.). One of the statuettes depicts the Theban triad of gods: Amun, his wife Mut, and their son Khonsu. Archaeologists also discovered several mudbrick buildings dating to the same era that were likely used as workshops or storage facilities connected to the Karnak temples.

Francois Le Vaillant’s Birds

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The week’s eBook pick is the six volumes of Francois Le Valllant’s Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique published between 1796 and 1808 and available from Internet Archive. The illustrations of birds were created from his collection of skins preserved with arsenic soap that were stuffed and mounted in near lifelike positions. He was one of the first to use color plates in his books about birds and was a keen observer of bird behavior. Enjoy the sample images….and browsing the whole volumes!

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 1

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 2

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 3

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 4

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 5

Histoire naturelle des oiseaux d'Afrique T. 6

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 8, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Whorls of White off Greenland – A satellite image (from the Terra satellite), captured on February 24, 2025, shows the southern part of Greenland, from its snow-topped ice sheet and glaciers to the sea ice swirling along its coasts. When this image was acquired, the sea ice extent along Greenland’s East Coast was about average. However, Arctic-wide, sea ice in late February was exceptionally low for the time of year due to a warm winter.

The baby boom in seven charts - The US baby boom is typically defined as the time period between 1946 and 1964. But – it appears that the increase in birth rate began earlier…in the late 1930s. And it happened in many countries at the same time. This common trend across many countries suggests that the baby boom was driven by shared societal shifts rather than isolated national circumstances. The baby boom was also surprising because it happened alongside rising levels of women’s education and workforce participation — changes that now often coincide with falling birth rates.

Cheap Chinese Panels Sparking a Solar Boom in the Global South - A surge in solar installations in parts of the developing world. The glut of cheap solar means poorer countries can speed their shift away from fossil fuels while shoring up their supply of energy.

Following Frogs into the Flames – The tree frogs are using the trees all the way up to 40 feet, up to the crown of the tree, as a safe place during fires, and also for several weeks after the fire, when the ground is still somewhat inhospitable.

Brewing tea removes lead from water – Brewing black tea in cellulose tea bags works best for removing lead…longer steeping removes more.

Where California’s Land Is Sinking and Rising – Analysis of vertical land motion between 2015 and 2023. Areas of sinking land in coastal California cities and in parts of the Central Valley are caused by factors like soil compaction, erosion, and groundwater withdrawal.

Oldest Section of China’s Great Wall Uncovered - The recent excavations occurred around what is known as the Qi Wall, which was already considered to be the oldest in existence. New dating, however, suggests that the wall’s construction originates to the late Western Zhou Dynasty (ca. 1050–771 BC) and the Spring and Autumn Period (770–ca. 475 BC), making it 300 years older than previously thought.

What happens when a diet targets ultra-processed foods? - The findings suggest that people can reduce their ultra-processed food intake, if given the proper tools, and that they will be enthusiastic about interventions designed for this purpose. The results also suggest that reducing UPF intake will lead to meaningful health improvements -- such as weight loss and better mood -- in as short as eight weeks.

Glass fertilizer beads could be a sustained nutrient delivery system - Excessive and inefficient use of agricultural fertilizers can present an environmental threat, contaminating waterways and generating greenhouse gases such as nitrous oxide. Now, researchers have addressed those challenges with glass fertilizer beads. The beads control nutrient release….releasing fertilizer over a longer time period.

Historic Frank Lloyd Wright Home Gifted to Chicago University – The last remaining example of Wright’s prairie-style designs. When the Bach residence was completed in 1915, it boasted walnut furnishings throughout and a clear view of Lake Michigan from its rear porch.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 1, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Scientists Investigate Smell of Egyptian Mummies – A systematic study of the smells of 9 Ancient Egyptian mummified bodies. Odors are from pine, cedar, juniper, frankincense and myrrh.

'Healthy' vitamin B12 levels not enough to ward off neuro decline – The conclusion: “we need to invest in more research about the underlying biology of B12 insufficiency, since it may be a preventable cause of cognitive decline.”

Rethinking Fire-Resistant Landscaping: Which Trees Should We Plant? – After the recent wildfires across Southern California - Experts recommend replacing highly flammable trees with fire-resistant alternatives such as oak, sycamore, toyon, lemonade berry, and lilac. While the idea of removing iconic palm trees may be met with resistance, fire safety advocates argue that proactive changes in landscaping are necessary to adapt to the increasing wildfire risks in California.

Floods Swamp Tennessee – Satellite image from February 17 of the flooding after the February 15-16 storm. The area of western Kentucky to the north had more severe flooding….but clouds prevented a similar image on the 17th.

Learn COVID pandemic lessons — before it’s too late - “The science will deliver if we have a new emerging infectious disease,” says Joanne Liu, a pediatric emergency-medicine specialist at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, and a former international president of the medical-aid organization Médecins Sans Frontières (also known as Doctors Without Borders). “I think it will be the people who aren’t going to deliver…..None of us thought about the case scenario in which we would have leaders and a large part of the population that do not believe in science.” Yet that scenario is here. It means that researchers in public health and infectious diseases must work closely with social scientists who have been studying how another disease — misinformation — spreads and how best to counter it.

In many countries, people breathe the cleanest air in centuries. What can the rest of the world learn from this? – Lots of graphs….focused on sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions….and the relationship to coal and catalytic converters.

The Science of Snakehead Slime - One of this fish’s most reported habits is its ability to move about on land. The answer, according to new research, may lie at least in part with another of the snakehead’s infamous features: its slime.

Wide-Eyed Fly Wins the 2024 Royal Entomological Society Photography Competition – Macro photography of insects…great work my amateur photographers. My favorite was the ladybird larva feeding on a colony of aphids.

How much protein do you really need to get strong? – A concerning take away: In 2018, a nonprofit group called the Clean Label Project, based in Broomfield, Colorado, released a report about toxins in popular brands of protein powders in the US. Researchers screened 134 products for 130 types of toxins and found that many protein powders contained heavy metals (lead, arsenic, cadmium and mercury), bisphenol-A (or BPA, which is used to manufacture plastic), pesticides, or other contaminants with links to cancer and other health conditions. Interestingly, one certified "organic" product had twice the contaminants of non-certified ones. Plant-based protein powders were the most contaminated, while egg and whey-based powders were found to be the cleanest.

Dust from Car Brakes More Harmful than Exhaust – Brake dust evidently causes greater injury to lung cells than diesel exhaust. Brake pads on the market now include copper which can aggravate asthma when inhaled. Note: the shift to electric vehicles could curb pollution from brake pads. Most electric cars use regenerative braking that limits the need for conventional brake pads.

Victorian Decorative and Applied Arts

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The Journal of Design and Manufactures was published between 1849 and 1852. Henry Cole and Richard Redgrave were the editors; both were active in British design education reform of the period. The University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries has 6 volumes (36 monthly issues) in their Digital Library for the Decorative Arts and Material Culture. The volumes include many illustrations, plates, plans, and mounted samples. Enjoy browsing them!

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. I 1849

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. II 1850

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. III 1850

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. IV 1851

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. V 1851

The journal of design and manufactures Vol. VI 1852

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 22, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A Five-Pound Hunk of the World’s Oldest Known Synthesized Pigment Was Found in Nero’s Palace – Egyptian Blue. The pigment is a synthetic pigment produced by firing a mixture of silica, limestone and minerals containing copper and sodium carbonate at high temperatures. The Roman architect Vitruvius recorded the recipe in his treatise De Architectura in the first century B.C.E., reflecting how the color spread through the Mediterranean world. Archaeologists discover traces of Egyptian blue that are all but imperceptible to the human eye. For instance, with the help of microscopes and luminescent imaging, researchers at the British Museum discovered that Egyptian blue once adorned the Parthenon marbles.

See the First Stunning Images Taken by the Blue Ghost Lunar Lander on Its ‘Scenic Route’ to the Moon – It still has a few months before reaching the moon….lots of Blue Marble views.

Changing cholesterol over time tied to risk of dementia – Interesting result. I wondered if cholesterol fluctuation is more concerning that merely being high….that there in an underlying reason for the fluctuations that indicates a problem that is not being directly addressed by the medications that generally are trying to lower cholesterol.

Astronomers have spied an asteroid that may be heading for Earth. Here’s what we know so far – On December 22, 2032,  the asteroid 2024 Y04 might collide with Earth. It was first detected on December 27, 2024 and will continue to be observed until it will be lost to our telescopes until we will see it again in 2028 and refine what we know….be able know for sure whether there will be a collision and where on earth the collision will be. In just the past few years, we have discovered 11 asteroids before they hit our planet. In each case, we have predicted where they would hit, and watched the results. We have also, in recent years, demonstrated a growing capacity to deflect potentially threatening asteroids.

An Arctic 'beyond recognition' by 2100 - Under 2.7 degrees Celsius of warming, the Arctic region is likely to experience the following effects:

  • Virtually every day of the year will have air temperatures exceeding pre-industrial temperature extremes.

  • The Arctic Ocean will be free of sea ice for several months each summer.

  • The area of the Greenland Ice Sheet that experiences more than a month of surface temperatures above 0 degrees Celsius will quadruple compared with pre-industrial conditions, causing global sea levels to rise faster.

  • Surface-level permafrost will decrease by 50 percent of pre-industrial levels.

Study Highlights Challenges to The Electrification Of Homes In The US - Solar powered homes demonstrated impressive resilience during summer heat waves. However, they proved remarkably vulnerable during winter storms. In fact, fully electrified homes were nearly three times more vulnerable to winter outages, compared to those drawing power from mixed energy sources. The integration of distributed energy resources such as solar and battery storage has emerged as a critical factor in household resilience.

Sky skimmers: The race to fly satellites at the lowest orbits yet – A handful of pioneering companies have begun work on designs for satellites that may be able to orbit the planet at unusually low altitudes while simultaneously harvesting air and using it to make propellant – literally on the fly. This new generation of orbiters could enable ultra-high-definition surveillance of activities on the ground, or superfast satellite-based communications. The race is on. (I wondered if the US activities mentioned in the post are going to survive budget cuts.)

Low-level traffic air pollution linked to liver damage and fatty liver disease - When we inhale air pollution, the very tiny particles known as PM2.5 enter the bloodstream through the lungs. The liver, which filters toxins from the blood, then accumulates these substances, which can include heavy metals such as arsenic, lead, nickel and zinc. The study authors suggest avoiding peak hour traffic, taking less congested routes when walking or cycling or consider wearing a mask, and keeping car windows closed with air recirculation mode on while driving in heavy traffic.

Hitting Its Stride or Hitting a Wall? South Texas at a Watershed Moment - Between extreme heat, flooding, drought, and the vagaries of politics and international trade, there is a growing fear that the Valley’s boom times could come to a grinding halt — or worse, that the region will experience the same type of climate-related exodus that has pushed many of today’s current immigrants to its doorstep. An even bigger question is whether the region has become a harbinger of mounting international tensions over shrinking resources that are expected to play out with more frequency in coming years.

Searching the entire sky for the secrets to our universe - As soon as the end of February, NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory will launch a new telescope into orbit around the Earth. SPHEREx will join the ranks of other space telescopes, filling in a crucial gap by detecting infrared light with wavelengths too long to see with the naked eye. It's an important addition because no single instrument can fully perceive the universe and its contents. Infrared can also be used to detect the unique fingerprints of particular molecules in the universe, including the basic components of life — water and organic materials frozen in the ices of interstellar dust clouds where stars are born.

Images of the Middle East in the 1830s

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The New York Public Library Digital Collections has the lithographs from Léon de Laborde’s Journey through Arabia Petraea, to Mount Sinai, and the excavated city of Petra available online. There are 60+ plates to browse! I liked that almost all of them include people…providing scale to the monuments and landscapes depicted. How many of those places still exist…how many are rubble now because of the many wars that have happened in the years since 1830?

I’ve selected 4 sample images…click on the small image to see a larger version….then click on the link below to go the whole collection and view them as a book online.

Voyage de l'Arabie Pétrée par Léon de Laborde et Linant

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 15, 2025

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Archaeologists Unearth Ancient Footprints of People Fleeing Vesuvius Eruption – From 2,000 years before the eruption of the same mountain destroyed Pompeii.

Oldest Known Evidence of Lead Pollution Found in Ancient Greece - Scientists identified traces of lead contamination that date back more than 5,000 years by analyzing sediment cores from Greece’s mainland and the Aegean Sea. The lead emissions followed the development of smelting technologies, which produced metals like silver. A sharp increase occurred about 2,150 years ago, which coincides with the Roman conquest of the Greek peninsula in around 146 B.C.E. and drove demand for silver higher for currency and lead for construction/tableware.

Half a degree further rise in global warming will triple area of Earth too hot for humans - The amount of landmass on our planet that would be too hot for even healthy young humans (18-60-year-olds) to keep a safe core body temperature will approximately triple (to six percent) -- an area almost the size of the US -- if global warming reaches 2°C above the preindustrial average. Last year was the first calendar year with a global mean temperature of more than 1.5°C above the pre-industrial average, and at current rates of warming, 2°C could be reached by mid to late century.

How Tearing Down Small Dams Is Helping Restore Northeast Rivers - Restoring natural flows, improving habitat for aquatic life, and reopening thousands of river miles to migratory fish, from shad to American eels. I was aware of several dams being removed on the Patapsco River in Maryland before we moved to Missouri.

Yellowstone National Park: Where Geology Is on Display Nearly Everywhere – Maybe we should plan a trip Yellowstone; it’s been 20 years since we were there before. It would be a great capstone to the geology course I am taking this semester.

Restoring Appalachian Forests After a Legacy of Mining – It isn’t about returning land to some “pristine” past. It’s about creating a resilient future, a forest where native plants and wildlife can thrive. When mining companies left, following state and federal guidelines, they often replanted their sites with plants that would mainly reduce erosion. That sounds good in theory, but many of those plants were invasives like autumn olive and sericea lespedeza. Trees that thrived on such sites tended to be adaptable species. These former mine lands offered little habitat to wildlife and little value to carbon storage. The first step is to control the invasives, through mechanical clearing. And then bulldozers rip up the soil. Next came the planting, accomplished by crews hand planting trees on the site, a diverse mix of trees, grasses and wildflowers. Some native plants, their dormant seeds “freed” from compacted soil, return on their own. Wildlife begins using restored areas almost as soon as they’re established. It benefits popular game species like white-tailed deer, turkey and elk.

Vertical Farms Grow in Office Buildings - Vertical farming can make use of vacant office space and grow food where agricultural land might be scarce. One drawback: energy use. Vertical farms need a lot of electricity to run lighting and ventilation systems, smart sensors and automated harvesting technologies….so maybe clad the office buildings in solar panels and put batteries in the basement?

Not so snowy Alaska - A spell of unseasonably warm weather in winter 2024–2025 has meant less snow for parts of the normally frozen state of Alaska.  Images from the Moderate Resolution Image Spectroradiometer on NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites.

Colossal squid: The eerie ambassador from the abyss – The biggest invertebrate on Earth. One of the creatures was captured alive (briefly) off New Zealand 100 years ago. The first clues of their existence in the deep ocean was from occasional remains found in the bellies of whales that hunt them. It has swiveling hooks on its arms and a beak made out of protein similar to human hair and fingernails. The eyes are the largest eyes found in any animal yet discovered.

The Breathtaking Hermitage Museum, Filled with Treasures Like the Kolyvan Vase and the Peacock Clock, First Opened to the Public on This Day in 1852 – There are 6 main buildings and it has about 50 cats that keep it free of mice! It is the second largest museum in the world (the Louvre is the largest).