Marine archaeologist Corey Malcom has found pine cones, tree branches and charred limbs off Key West that are about 8,400 years old. This is especially important because previous estimates suggested that sea levels had risen far less than this in the past 8,400 years, meaning there might be more extensive human remains underwater worldwide than has been previously thought.
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Two Australian scientists say they’ve found evidence of a parallel universe within our own Solar System. When the Near-Shoemaker space probe landed on the Eros asteroid, scientists could see craters where it had been hit by “mirror matter.” Mirror matter is a hypothetical “reflection” of normal matter that may be necessary to keep the Universe in balance. In our world, nature has a left-right symmetry, meaning elementary particles display a preference for left over right, and scientists think a parallel universe must exist where matter works the opposite way.
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While Congress and the administration have avoided signing the Kyoto Treaty or taking action against global warming, states are taking matters into their own hands and have enacted state laws to fight climate change. More than half the states have voluntary or mandatory programs for reducing carbon emissions. Fifteen states have legislation requiring utilities to increase their use of renewable energy sources such as wind power. “The trend is unmistakably towards more states taking an active role in climate change,” says environmentalist Barry G. Rabe.
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Doctors in Detroit recently amputated the toes of a 40-year-old woman who was not responding to antibiotics and discovered she was infected with a virulent new strain of staph bacteria. The new bacteria became totally resistant to all antibiotics by stealing genetic material from another bacteria. Dr. Fred Tenover of the CDC says, “This is an organism that could cause very serious disease if it was in the community.” Experts think that eventually so many bacteria will develop resistance that antibiotics won’t work any more, and hospitals will be filled with people dying from what used to be curable infections.
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