DARPA’s Manta Ray UUV 'Underwater Drone' Could Transform the U.S. Navy

DARPA has successfully completed the first in-water testing of the Manta Ray uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) prototype, developed by Northrop Grumman.

by Peter Suciu

May 2, 2024


Summary: DARPA has successfully completed the first in-water testing of the Manta Ray uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) prototype, developed by Northrop Grumman. This testing phase, conducted off the coast of Southern California, confirmed the UUV's hydrodynamic capabilities and operational readiness through various propulsion and steering methods.

-The Manta Ray is designed for extended, autonomous missions in remote oceanic environments, featuring modular construction for easy transport and field assembly. Its efficient buoyancy-driven propulsion and multiple payload bays make it adaptable for diverse naval missions.

-The U.S. Navy sees the Manta Ray as a potential game-changer for long-duration undersea operations, including mapping, mine detection, and surveillance, enhancing security for both military and commercial maritime activities.
DARPA's Manta Ray UUV Prototype Triumphs in Initial Sea Trials

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has moved forward with its Manta Ray uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) prototype and completed the first in-water testing. The Manta Ray, which was built by defense giant Northrop Grumman, completed full-scale, in-water testing off the coast of Southern California earlier this year. The tests demonstrated at-sea hydrodynamic performance, including submerged operations using all of the vehicle’s modes of propulsion and steering: buoyancy, propellers, and control surfaces.

“Our successful, full-scale Manta Ray testing validates the vehicle’s readiness to advance toward real-world operations after being rapidly assembled in the field from modular subsections,” said Kyle Woerner, DARPA program manager for Manta Ray. “The combination of cross-country modular transportation, in-field assembly, and subsequent deployment demonstrates a first-of-kind capability for an extra-large UUV.”

Like a Fish in Water

As previously reported, the Manta Ray’s design was modeled on the aquatic creature, and it is reported to be outfitted with two rear propellers for movement, while it was also designed to operate for extended periods in oceanic environments inaccessible to humans. The UUV was developed in partnership with Seatrec—a renewable energy company—to enhance the understanding of marine environments and operate independently for extended periods.

The prototype was shipped in subsections from the build location in Maryland to its test location in California. The demonstrated ease of shipping and assembly supports the possibility of rapid deployment throughout the world without crowding valuable pier space at naval facilities.

“Shipping the vehicle directly to its intended area of operation conserves energy that the vehicle would otherwise expend during transit,” said Woerner. “Once deployed, the vehicle uses efficient, buoyancy-driven gliding to move through the water. The craft is designed with several payload bays of multiple sizes and types to enable a wide variety of naval mission sets.”

Northrop Grumman completed the assembly of the Mantra Ray earlier this year.
Long-Haul UUVs

The United States Navy aims to develop and demonstrate a new class of long-duration, long-range, payload-capable UUVs ready for persistent operations in dynamic maritime environments. DARPA is engaging with the sea service on the next steps for testing and transition of this technology.

According to Northrop Grumman, the Manta Ray is “payload-capable to support a variety of missions,” while it can operate without the need for on-site human logistics. It can anchor to the seafloor and hibernate in a low-power state, while it is also modular, which could allow for different mission-specific components.

The U.S. Navy hasn’t disclosed exactly what roles the UUV could be employed in, nor have the Manta Ray’s dimensions been disclosed. However, it is apparently large enough that it could serve as a mother ship for smaller UUVs. It was designed for easy transport and assembly on-site from five standard shipping containers, so it could likely be launched from a dock or even a ship at sea.

There has been speculation that the Mantra Ray could be outfitted to conduct undersea mapping, mine detection, and passive surveillance. In the latter role, it could be utilized to monitor for underwater threats to a carrier strike group or even aid in protecting commercial shipping.

Northrop Grumman was awarded a Phase 2 contract in 2021 to continue work on the Manta Ray program that began a year earlier. Phase 2 called for North Grumman Systems Corporation and Martin Defense Group to each build a full-scale tech demonstrator. It now appears the tests are well underway with the demonstrator.

A second Manta Ray performer, PacMar Technologies, is continuing testing of its full-scale energy harvesting system.

Author Experience and Expertise: Peter Suciu

Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer. He has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites with over 3,200 published pieces over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu. You can email the author: Editor@nationalinterest.org.

  

Wally, the emotional support alligator once denied entry to a baseball game, is missing

By CNN

May 3, 2024

Emotional support animals registrations in the United States reached 115,832 last year, by an industry group's count.

But in the eyes of reptile rescuer Joie Henney, there's only one:

"Wally Gator" - his "gentle" certified emotional support alligator.

And now, Wally has gone missing – far from home.

Joie Henney, 65, sits with his emotional support alligator, Wally, at his home in York Haven, Pennsylvania in 2019. The gator was just a year old and 50cm long when he took him in. (Heather Khalifa/AP via CNN)

While Henney, of northeast Pennsylvania, was visiting Brunswick, Georgia, on April 21, Wally disappeared from his outdoor pen, according to the Wallygator Facebook page.
A Georgia Department of Natural Resources "permitted trapper responded to a nuisance alligator call in Brunswick on 4/21," the agency confirmed to CNN in a statement.

The creature was secured and "later released in a remote location", the department's Wildlife Resources Division spokesperson Melissa Cummings said.
"The agent trapper's handling of a nuisance alligator was appropriate and routine," she told CNN.
The department "routinely" gets calls about "nuisance alligators", she said, and refers callers to a permitted alligator agent trapper, per its protocols.
Whether the animal released after the April 21 call was Wally, however, remains an open question: The Georgia Department of Natural Resources has no information to confirm it – nor any further information about Wally's whereabouts, Cummings said.
Still, the search is on.
A GoFundMe campaign Henney organised to cover travel, advising and possible legal and veterinary costs to "Bring WallyGator Home!!" is nearly a third of way to its $30,000 goal.
Henney did not immediately respond to CNN's request for comment on Wally's disappearance.
Wally, for his part, is no stranger to public attention, usually interacting with fans at events in his home state, as well as being the subject of popular TikTok and Instagram accounts organised by Henney.
Wally is often shown letting others pet and hold him, with Henney telling CNN in 2022, "He doesn't show anger. He doesn't show aggression. He hasn't since the day he was caught. We never could understand why."
Henney has had Wally since the reptile was a little over a year old and just 50 centimetres long.

Wally wanders around Love Park in Philadelphia. (Halle Sivalingam via CNN)

He got the critter from Florida, where there is an "overabundance of alligators" and they are considered nuisances and often euthanised or put in captivity, he told CNN.
Even so, Henney often has gotten criticism over Wally, he said, because people "don't know the story behind everything".
In fact, Wally has provided companionship and support through Henney's radiation treatments for cancer.
"He's just loveable," Henney said.
"He sleeps with me, steals my pillows, steals my blankets. He's just awesome."
Pennsylvania has no law barring alligators as pets: The state Fish and Boat Commission does "not regulate possession of non-native species of reptiles and amphibians", its website states.
Georgia law, however, lets "only licensed or permitted individuals … retain alligators in captivity," Cummings said.
"Most native species of wildlife cannot be held without permits or licenses. These licenses are not issued for the purpose of having native wildlife as pets."
And the Peach State isn't the only place Wally hasn't exactly been welcome.
His fame reignited last year when the alligator was denied entry to a Philadelphia Phillies game.
According to Citizens Bank Park, any animals – excluding service dogs – are prohibited.
"Wally has been into other baseball games, so we assumed that it was OK," Henney said.
"We never asked or checked with it, but they only allow service animals, such as dogs and horses, into the stadium, not (emotional support) animals."
Similarly, the US Department of Transportation in 2020 announced airlines "are not required to recognise emotional support animals as service animals".
The latter is "a dog … trained to do work or perform tasks for the benefit of a qualified individual with a disability", while emotional support animals are prescribed by mental health professionals to provide their owners with comfort and support but don't have to be trained in specific tasks.
Henney at the time of the Phillies rejection made clear: "There was no disagreement, there was no arguing, there was no conflict at all. It was all good."

 

UN: Hundreds of thousands of people forced to scam

Cambodia and Myanmar are the epicenters of a new human trafficking scourge in Southeast Asia, report says.

By Alex Willemyns for RFA
2023.08.29

Barbed wire rings a shuttered Great Wall Park compound in Sihanoukville, Cambodia, where authorities said they found evidence of human trafficking, kidnapping and torture, Sept. 21, 2022.

 Cindy Liu/Reuters

Hundreds of thousands of people across Southeast Asia have been enslaved and forced to carry out online scams worth billions of dollars, a new U.N. report says, with Cambodia and wartorn Myanmar the worst affected and Thailand serving as a major trafficking hub.

The report from the U.N. human rights office notes the latest scourge of human trafficking to hit Southeast Asia is markedly different from the type that historically impacted the region: outflows of uneducated and poor citizens for forced sex work and manual labor elsewhere.

Instead, the new multi-billion dollar trafficking industry that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic has been marked by inflows of foreign citizens – some even with higher educations – for scamming.

The report says “many of the victims are well-educated, sometimes coming from professional jobs or with graduate or even postgraduate degrees, computer-literate and multi-lingual” and are being recruited by traffickers “under the pretence of offering them real jobs.”

Many come from other Southeast Asian countries, but there are also many victims from China, South Asia, East Africa and the Middle East, it says. They often arrive in one country, such as Thailand, expecting to work there, but are then surreptitiously ferried into a second country, such as Myanmar or Cambodia, where their passports are taken.

There, the U.N. says, they are kept under the watch of armed guards and forced to work in industrial-scale online scam operations, using elaborate scripts – and posing as romantic flames or investors – to trick people in wealthy countries to send money back to their captors via trusted cryptocurrency platforms like Binance or Coinbase. 

“The scams are often sophisticated; fake websites are built to showcase fraudulent data in order to convince the target that there are significant profits to be made,” the report says. “People who are targeted can also receive small amounts of money to convince them of the legitimacy of the platform. The scam is usually a long process in which targets are approached for weeks or months to build trusted relationships.”

A victim of a Chinese scamming gang shows a scar on his leg after being tortured, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Sept. 27, 2022. (AFP)

The carefully prepared scripts are used to target people on popular services including Facebook, Grindr, Hinge, Instagram, Line, LinkedIn, Meet Me, Muslima, OkCupid, TikTok, Tinder, WeChat and WhatsApp, among other online-dating and social-networking platforms.

Victims who don’t comply, or don’t meet revenue targets, are tortured, it says. Many are told they are working off a debt incurred to transport them to the country in the first place. The debt increases when they are “sold” to new captors, and their families often extorted to free them. 

Cambodia and Myanmar

Online-scam slave compounds are believed to have generated at least $7.8 billion in revenue globally in 2021, the U.N. says, with “billions” of that arriving in Southeast Asia, thanks to the region’s many casinos and “special economic zones,” where law enforcement can be lax.

Exact figures about such trafficking are “difficult to estimate because of its clandestine nature and gaps in the official response,” it notes. But “credible estimates” indicate at least 120,000 people have been held in scam compounds in Myanmar and 100,000 more in Cambodia, where the problem is centered on the coastal casino town of Sihanoukville.

A combination of weak government institutions, rampant corruption and visa-free travel across the region have all conspired to make the region vulnerable to scam slavery, the U.N. report says, with traffickers also becoming adept at seamlessly shifting operations across borders.

“States may not have the necessary capacity in, or experience with, the types of investigative techniques required for the investigation and prosecution of allegations of human rights abuses in the context of organised crime and cross-border operations,” the report says.

At best, many officials may not be trained to recognize when foreigners are being trafficked into the country, and many victims furthermore have rights to visa-free entry into the countries, either under each country’s own immigration laws or under the ASEAN visa-free travel program, which waives visa requirements for citizens of the bloc.

But the report also notes the role that corruption plays, and the widespread pattern of officials either turning a blind-eye to – or even actively protecting – the scam compounds for a cut of proceeds.

That has made Myanmar, torn apart by conflict since the February 2021 military coup d’etat, particularly impacted by such trafficking.

“The military coup, ongoing violence and armed conflicts in Myanmar, and the resultant breakdown in the rule of law, have provided fertile ground for an exponential rise in criminal activity,” the report says.

“Following the coup, transnational organised criminal actors were able to widen their existing activities within the country by working with factions within the armed forces and various militia groups,” it says. 

“Many of the scam centres in Myanmar are located in weakly regulated – and often porous – border areas which are characterised by a lack of formal law enforcement structures, oversight and accountability.”

Fixing the problem

The emergence of scam compounds since the COVID-19 pandemic has become an increasing focus of world governments, given the transnational nature of its impacts, with victims on both ends of the scam coming from an increasing array of countries worldwide.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken in June awarded Cambodian journalist Mech Dara with a Hero Award for his groundbreaking work uncovering scam compounds in Sihanoukville and Phnom Penh.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken presents Cambodian journalist Mech Dara with the TIP Report Hero award in Washington, D.C., June 15, 2023. (Sarah Silbiger/Reuters)

But the problem keeps popping up in new places. This week, the mother of a teenage Laotian girl trapped in a scam compound in Myanmar told Radio Free Asia that her daughter said she would be beaten with a metal bar 50 times if found using a cellphone. 

To help end the problem, the U.N. report recommends that Southeast Asian governments focus on training immigration officials to better recognize trafficking of foreigners into their countries, and continuing to combat official corruption that has protected many scam compounds.

But it also says those who come forward about their time trapped in the scam compounds should not be punished for carrying out scams, or for being in the country “illegally” and for working without a labor permit. 

“A human rights-based approach to trafficking in persons works to avoid re-victimisation and thus recognises that punishing a victim of trafficking for unlawful acts committed as a consequence of their being trafficked is unjust and hinders the possibility of their recovery,” it says.

Forced to work as maids in Saudi Arabia, Cambodians beg to be repatriated

The women say they have been denied food and medicine while awaiting help from their embassy.

By RFA Khmer
2024.05.02

Dozens of Cambodian women trafficked to work as maids in Saudi Arabia are demanding their embassy arrange for their return home, seen here in an image posted on a Cambodian government telegram page, April 30, 2024.

Cambodia Government Spokesperson Unit

Dozens of Cambodian women trafficked to work as maids in Saudi Arabia are demanding that their embassy arrange for them to return home, saying that since authorities rescued them nearly two weeks ago, they have lacked access to adequate food and their health is rapidly deteriorating.

On April 18, Cambodia’s Ministry of Labor confirmed that 78 Cambodian migrant workers had been tricked into working in Saudi Arabia, but have now been rescued and placed in hotel rooms under the care of the Cambodian Embassy.

The ministry said 51 of the women are in the Red Sea port city of Jeddah, 15 in the capital Riyadh, and 12 in Dammam, on the coast of the Persian Gulf.

The Ministries of Labor and Foreign Affairs, along with the Cambodian Embassy, claimed to be purchasing flights for the victims to return to Cambodia, promising to return 29 on April 19, 27 on April 20, and the final 22 on April 21.

However, on April 27, RFA Khmer received videos from several of the victims in which they claimed to remain stranded in Saudi Arabia.

In the videos, the women call for help from former Prime Minister Hun Sen, his wife Bun Rany, and their son Prime Minister Hun Manet.

They said the companies that brought them to Saudi Arabia had “violated their contracts,” leaving them mired in legal issues surrounding their salaries and basic rights. They claim several of them were subjected to physical abuse by the households where they worked, including being denied food and sleep.

They singled out Saudi firm BAB, which places workers from Cambodia-based company Fatina Manpower, for allegedly threatening them and accusing them of working illegally in the country. Some of the victims said they were unable to leave the country because BAB had refused to terminate their contracts.

The women told RFA that since their rescue, some of them had been “confined” to their hotel rooms “without proper access to food,” and said they were appealing for help because they could “no longer wait for the government” to send them home.

According to Cambodia’s Ministry of Labor, nearly 1.4 million people were provided with employment opportunities to work abroad in 2023, more than 93% of which are in Thailand, while the remainder are in South Korea, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia.

Stranded in Saudi Arabia

RFA contacted one of the women, Thaing Sokyee, who said she had been forced to work as a maid in multiple homes each day without being provided enough food to eat before she was rescued, and is now suffering from health issues.

“I’ve called on the [labor] ministry and the embassy to find prompt solutions for us so that we may return to Cambodia,” she said. “We’ve faced mounting difficulties; our bodies have deteriorated as we were forced to work without food.”

Doeun Pheap, another victim who said she is sick as a result of her working conditions, told RFA that she has been confined to her room since her rescue and has not been permitted by embassy staff to go outside to purchase medicine.

She said the staff told her to wait for the government to send her home and that she was advised to record a video clip “saying that my health condition is getting better and that I have been provided with enough food to eat.”

“I still hurt all over my body – I’m able to stand up, but my waist and my back still hurt,” she said, adding that embassy staff had provided her with “rice, but not food.”

“I didn’t do it [record the video] because I was too hungry and exhausted; I couldn’t bear doing anything.”

Other victims claimed that Uk Sarun, Cambodia’s Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, had “threatened to abandon us if we continue to publicly call for help.”

Trafficking designation

On Monday, Ambassador Uk Sarun confirmed to RFA Khmer that only 16 of the 78 women had been returned home so far. He said that some of the women had faced a shortage of food due to the ongoing holy month of Ramadan, during which Muslims fast during the day and only eat at night.

He did not address claims by victims that he had threatened to withhold assistance if they continued to speak out about their situation.

The Khmer Times reported last week that 29 of the 78 had been safely repatriated as of April 19, while the rest were awaiting documentation to leave, but provided no attribution for the numbers.

The report said that the embassy was providing the victims with food and accommodation and cited Cambodian Ministry of Labor spokesman Katta Orn as saying that the ministry was conducting an investigation into the employment scam.

RFA spoke with Bun Chenda, a Cambodia-based anti-human trafficking officer for labor rights group CENTRAL, who said the women had been “exploited” when they were sent to Saudi Arabia without proper compliance with labor contracts.

“We are not sure if the government is treating their cases as human trafficking,” he said. “If they are being rescued as human trafficking victims, intervention would likely be easier and they wouldn’t be subject to legal action by a Saudi Arabian company.”

Translated by Yun, Samean. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

 

Seeing Red: Our Ancient Relationship With Ocher And The Color Of Cognition – Analysis

 May 3, 2024

By Irina Matuzava

Extensive ocher use reflects the culture and cognitive abilities of early humans, who inherited an affinity for red from primate ancestors.

Twenty-three million years ago, our distant ancestors gained trichromatic color vision through means of a random genetic mutation. Trichromatic color vision and trichromacy refer to the ability to perceive color through three receptors in the eye, known as cones, which are sensitive to different wavelengths of visible light.

It has been assumed that primates ancestral to humans had two cones at the start of their lineage; the duplication and modification of genes coding for one of the two created another distinct, separate cone. Gaining a third cone allowed for the perception of red and other colors with long wavelengths in addition to the two preexisting receptors for blues and greens with shorter wavelengths—red was entirely unknown to primate species before this mutation, and the ability to see red remains rare among other mammals. Exceptions to mammalian dichromacy, the state of having two cones, are uncommon. Some primates lost one of their cone receptors, becoming monochromats. Having a single cone, monochromats like the nocturnal owl monkeys (genus Aotus) perceive light intensity in shades of gray without the ability to differentiate color values. Others, including the ancestors of modern apes, monkeys, and humans, happened to gain a third cone.

Michael H. Rowe, professor emeritus of neuroscience at Ohio University, confirms that random processes were involved in the evolution of primate trichromacy in his study of the underlying neurophysiological mechanisms, and outlines the two dominant theories for the maintenance of a third cone among primates. One longstanding theory is that of enhanced fruit detection among diurnal primates, who are most active during the daytime. According to this theory, improved discernment of red fruits against green foliage led to a direct increase in efficiency when foraging for nutritious food.

The second theory, however, suggests it was the consumption of leaves rather than fruit that more strongly influenced routine trichromacy. This alternate “young leaf” hypothesis emphasizes the importance of enhanced color vision when selecting nutritious leaves over their less beneficial counterparts, especially at times when fruit is scarce and surviving off of leaf consumption becomes critical. Rowe’s findings and the newer “young leaf” theory also align with the later evolution of trichromatic vision in the howler monkey, a New World primate.

New World primates like the howler monkey and Old World primates, which include humans and apes, are two major groups within the order Primates that differ in anatomical features and geographic distribution. Since their last common ancestor did not have trichromatic vision, the trait evolved in both Old and certain New World species through convergent evolution. This occurs when similar traits evolve among distantly related species, usually due to similar environmental pressures and advantages to the trait.

Further down the evolutionary timeline, rocks and minerals became the cornerstones of technological advancement among hominins. Within the range of widely accessible raw materials, one pigment stands out with its broad spectrum of color: ocher. Ocher varies in shade depending on its chemical and structural composition, appearing from light yellows and rusty browns to deep red-purple hues. Red ocher, for example, gains its color from an abundance of an iron oxide called hematite.

Known evidence for processing and crushing ocher pieces by early humans in Africa dates as far back as the Early Stone Age. In a 2022 article published by the Journal of World Prehistory, researchers Rimtautas Dapschauskas and his co-authors compared the frequency of ocher use over time between over 100 African archaeological sites. They found that ocher, particularly of the hematite-rich variety, grew in geographical distribution and frequency of use from 500,000 y.a. (years ago) and became part of the cultural behaviors habitual to site inhabitants as early as 160,000 y.a. Over a third of sites included in this study that were used at or after this date contained various forms of the material. Notable ocher finds from Early to Late Stone Age African sites include two intentionally shaped pieces of red ocher from 307,000 y.a. at the Olorgesailie basin in Kenya, as well as a workshop at Blombos Cave, South Africa, for processing ocher 75,000-100,000 y.a. Several of the Blombos Cave specimens display patterns of wear suggesting their use on hard surfaces in the same manner one would use a crayon today.

Ocher pervaded early human history, with many instances of use appearing throughout the archaeological record in accompaniment to technological/utilitarian developments and ritualistic behavior. A few utilitarian applications of ocher include its use in hide-processing, as a skin protectant to guard against mosquitos and excessive sun exposure, and in compound adhesives for tool making. The latter is considered to be one of the best pieces of evidence for advanced cognitive abilities in early humans.

Processing ocher is not unique to Homo sapiens, either, and was a practice shared by other members of the Homo genus. A 2024 study conducted by scientists Patrick Schmidt, Radu Iovita, and their colleagues investigates the use of ocher-based compound adhesives for Middle Paleolithic cutting and scraping tools crafted by Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis) at Mousterian rock shelters in France. The researchers found that the adhesive’s ratio of ocher to bitumen was optimal and exact—bitumen loses adhesive properties when mixed with ocher, but the ratio used by Neanderthals creates a mass malleable enough to be formed yet sticky enough to adhere stone tools to handles. The glue’s formula is presumed to be a result of experimentation and costly investments of time and labor, akin to the behaviors and thought patterns of early Homo sapiens in Africa.

Past ritual applications are evident through the intentional selection of ocher based on color. Despite the prevalence of other pigments such as yellow ocher or black manganese in local landscapes, the disproportionate abundance of processed red ocher in large artifact assemblages points to a strong preference for saturated red hues over any other pigment color. Having no obvious instrumental value and inexplicable from a utilitarian perspective, the prolonged repetition of color-driven ocher collection exemplifies ritual behavior.

Burial decoration was another ritual application of ocher. The deliberate burial of human remains appears in many well-established cases from the Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods throughout Europe and Asia. Burials often imply respect for the individual and adornment of the grave or deceased individual was sometimes used to honor the person’s social status or to enhance their appearance. Lawrence G. Straus and his collaborators describe a burial of “the Red Lady of El Mirón” in their 2015 Journal of Archaeological Science article. The “Red Lady,” found in a cave in northern Spain, gained her name from an abundance of red ocher that coats her remains in a bright red hue. Those who buried her used a form of ocher not found in local sources, suggesting it may have been collected elsewhere for special burial rites or preservative use. Another example is a discovery made at Sungir, northeast of Moscow, Russia, where a man and two young children were buried 27,000 years ago. Their grave contained objects including mammoth ivory spears, a variety of ornamental jewelry, and thousands of ivory beads. The burial was covered entirely in red ocher.

Researchers have suggested that the initial catalyst for ocher use may have been its colorful and aesthetic appeal, only later followed by practical applications. With this in mind, it is no surprise that ocher is one of the earliest natural pigments used for artistic expression, including bodily adornment and cave paintings. Two of the oldest known cave paintings are hand stencils in the Cave of Maltravieso of west-central Spain and painted stalactites, mineral formations that hang from cave ceilings, in the Ardales cave of northern Spain. The red pigment decorating these caves has been dated through uranium-thorium testing methods to at least 66,700 and 65,500 years ago, respectively. Today, artists primarily use a synthetic version of red ocher invented in the 18th century. Still, they carry on a very ancient legacy of using this pigment—to create meaningful symbols in meaningful places.

Red ocher has been heavily featured by people across time and continents compared to its undersaturated counterparts, and the color red continues to hold special significance on a global scale. In many East Asian cultures, red represents good fortune and is featured heavily during celebrations. In some Native American communities, red denotes courage and spiritual strength, while other groups associate life, vigor, passion, revolution, and other powerful concepts with the color. The power ascribed to red is also heavily reflected in language—different cultures group the visible light spectrum into categories of different sizes and names. However, an overwhelming majority have a designated word for red no matter how they differentiate between the rest of the rainbow.

Modern people with normal color vision may take the ability for granted, but the capacity to identify shades of red in natural settings served as a significant advantage for our diurnal primate ancestors in terms of survivability and evolutionary fitness. Whether color vision was upheld by the consumption of fruit, foliage, or a combination of both, a new array of visual cues meant new survival strategies and perceptions of the world. In this regard, trichromacy, an accidental evolutionary milestone, paved the way for the widespread cultural gravitation of people toward red and red ocher long before anatomically modern humans existed themselves.

Although past interpretations of ocher have been complicated by its duality in symbolic and practical uses, special attention toward the mineral grows alongside the number of excavated finds. Current research initiatives increasingly recognize the value of the material as a reflection and potential driving force of cognitive and cultural evolution in early humans.

• About the author: Irina Matuzava is a contributor to the Human Bridges project.
• Source: This article was produced by Human Bridges.

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Irina Matuzava

Irina Matuzava is a contributor to the Human Bridges project.