Mexico arrests Army general in students’ disappearance

MEXICO CITY — Mexico has arrested an Army general accused of involvement in the deaths of the 43 students who disappeared on their way to a demonstration in 2014, authorities said, a crime that shocked the country but remains unsolved.


Mexico arrests Army general in students’ disappearance© Claudio Cruz/AFP/Getty Images

Gen. José Rodríguez Pérez is the latest in a series of officials arrested for allegedly participating in or covering up the abduction of the teachers’ college students from the rural town of Ayotzinapa eight years ago this month. The remains of three of the students have been recovered.

Jesús Murillo Karam, Mexico’s former attorney general, was arrested last month for his alleged role in a coverup. Taken together, the arrests show a rare effort by the government of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador to hold security officials accountable for human rights abuses in Mexico.Mexico arrests former attorney general in kidnapping of 43 students

Rodríguez Pérez is the highest-ranking military officer arrested in the case. Warrants for three others also were issued this week, according to Mexico’s deputy security minister. Two of them were detained; one remains a fugitive.

“Four arrest warrants have been issued against members of the Mexican Army,” Assistant Public Safety Secretary Ricardo Mejía told reporters Thursday. “There are three people arrested, among them the commander of the 27th infantry battalion when the events took place in Iguala in September 2014.”

Rodríguez Pérez, who was a colonel at the time of the students’ disappearance, is accused of playing a significant role.

Six of the disappeared students “were turned over to the colonel,” Alejandro Encinas, Mexico’s undersecretary for human rights, said at a news conference last month.

Encinas said the six were “killed and disappeared on orders of the colonel, allegedly the then-Colonel José Rodríguez Pérez.”

The students were commandeering buses, a local custom, to travel to the demonstration in Mexico City. Encinas said they probably unwittingly stole a bus loaded with drugs or money.

Local law enforcement officials forced them off the vehicles. It’s unclear what happened next, but Encinas has said that state and federal officials neglected to stop the kidnapping and rescue the students, though they could have.Mexico putting civilian-led national guard under military control

The disappearance of 43 students shocked Mexico, but under former Mexican president Enrique Peña Nieto, no serious attempts were made to solve the crime. Instead, officials shielded the role that federal officials played in the disappearance.

López Obrador now appears to be pursuing the federal officials that his predecessor would not. That effort has been seen as a positive development by the victims’ families and human rights advocates. But some analysts have questioned whether López Obrador is motivated primarily by the opportunity to criticize Peña Nieto.

López Obrador’s decision to arrest a senior member of the military — one of the country’s most powerful institutions — does carry some political risk. He has leaned on the military for a range of objectives, from deploying soldiers across the country in a domestic security initiative to constructing a 900-mile train in southern Mexico. That reliance on the armed forces has raised concerns among human rights advocates.

Mexico’s attorney general’s office has issued more than 80 arrest warrants in the case.

Alejandra Ibarra Chaoul contributed to this report.

Mexican authorities arrest general in case of missing students

Mexican authorities have arrested a general and two other members of the army for alleged connection to the disappearance of 43 students in southern Mexico in 2014, the government announced Thursday.


Family members and friends march seeking justice for the missing 43 Ayotzinapa students in Mexico City on Aug. 26. (Marco Ugarte / Associated Press)© (Marco Ugarte / Associated Press)

Assistant Public Safety Secretary Ricardo Mejía said that among those arrested was the commander of the army base in Iguala, Guerrero, in September 2014, when the students from a radical teachers' college were abducted. Mejía said a fourth arrest was expected soon.

Mejía did not give names of those arrested, but the commander of the Iguala base at that time was José Rodríguez Pérez, then a colonel. Barely a year after the students' disappearances and with the missing students' families already raising suspicions about military involvement and demanding access to the base, Rodríguez was promoted to brigadier general.

Last month, a government truth commission reinvestigating the case issued a report that named Rodríguez as being allegedly responsible for the disappearance of six of the students.

Interior Undersecretary Alejandro Encinas, who led the commission, said last month that six of the missing students were allegedly kept alive in a warehouse for days, then turned over to Rodríguez, who ordered them killed.

The report had called the disappearances a “state crime,” emphasizing that authorities had been closely monitoring the students from the teachers’ college in Ayotzinapa from the time they left their campus through their abduction by local police in the town of Iguala that night. A soldier who had infiltrated the school was among the abducted students, and Encinas asserted the army did not follow its own protocols and try to rescue him.

“There is also information corroborated with emergency 089 telephone calls where allegedly six of the 43 disappeared students were held during several days and alive in what they call the old warehouse and from there were turned over to the colonel,” Encinas said. “Allegedly the six students were alive for as many as four days after the events and were killed and disappeared on orders of the colonel, allegedly the then-Col. José Rodríguez Pérez.”

Numerous government and independent investigations have failed to reach a conclusive narrative about what happened to the 43 students, but it appears that local police pulled the students off several buses in Iguala that night and turned them over to a drug gang. The motive remains unclear. Their bodies have never been found, though fragments of burned bone have been matched to three of the students.

The role of the army in the students’ disappearance has long been a source of tension between the families and the government. From the beginning, there were questions about the military’s knowledge of what happened and its possible involvement. The students’ parents demanded for years that they be allowed to search the army base in Iguala. It was not until 2019 that they were given access along with Encinas and the truth commission.

Shortly after the truth commission's report, the attorney general’s office announced 83 arrest orders, 20 of which were for members of the military. Then federal agents arrested Jesús Murillo Karam, who was attorney general at the time.

Doubts had been growing in the weeks since the orders were announced because no arrests had been reported. The administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has also formed a closer public bond with the military than any in recent memory.

The president pushed to shift the newly created National Guard under full military authority, and his allies in congress are trying to extend the time for the military to continue a policing role in the streets to 2028.

On Thursday, Mejía also dismissed any suggestion that José Luis Abarca, who was mayor of Iguala at the time, would be released from prison after a judge absolved him of responsibility for the students' abduction based on a lack of evidence. Even without the aggravated kidnapping charge, Abarca still faces other charges for organized crime and money laundering, and Mejía said the judge’s latest decision would be challenged. The judge similarly absolved 19 others, including the man who was Iguala’s police chief at the time.

The Miguel Agustin Pro Human Rights Center and other nongovernmental organizations that have supported the families of the students said in a joint statement Thursday that the government had so far not notified the families of the case against Rodríguez nor the charges he would face.

They said that if the prosecution of Rodríguez did advance on “solid evidence,” it could be very relevant for holding the military accountable. The statement noted that there was “abundant” evidence about the collusion of soldiers from the Iguala base with organized crime.

The organizations also called on authorities to appeal the judge’s decision absolving Abarca and others. They said the ruling was the result of poor work by the attorney general’s office that originally brought the charges, including the extensive use of torture, which led much of the evidence to be excluded.

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times.

What is aconite poisoning? 'Highly toxic' substance was behind mass poisoning at Ontario restaurant

Asymina Kantorowicz
·Writer
Wed, September 14, 2022 

Aconite, or aconitum napellus, is a perennial herb that is native to western and central Europe. The blue/dark purple flower is also known as monkshood or wolfsbane.

(Photo via Getty Images)

A Toronto doctor says the substance behind a mass poisoning in Ontario is highly toxic.

Twelve people became sick and were hospitalized, four of whom required intensive care, after dining at Delight Restaurant & BBQ in Markham on Aug. 28.

York Region Public Health confirms the cause behind the aconite poisoning, which is a type of food poisoning, was a contaminated batch of Mr. Right brand Keampferia Galanga Powder (sand ginger powder). Health Canada has recalled the product and recommends individuals and businesses dispose of the product out of an abundance of caution. The health authority says the powder was sold in Ontario, Quebec, Alberta and British Columbia, and may have been distributed in other parts of the country as well.

Mr. Right brand Keampferia Galanga Powder (sand ginger powder) has been recalled after a mass poisoning at an Ontario restaurant. (Photo via Health Canada)

Although aconite poisoning is rare, Dr. Prateek Lala, an assistant professor and associate director of the University of Toronto’s applied clinical pharmacology program, says knowing the signs and symptoms of it can help when seeking treatment.

What is aconite poisoning?

Aconite, or aconitum napellus, is a perennial herb that is native to western and central Europe. The blue/dark purple flower is also known as monkshood or wolfsbane.

Every part of the plant, especially the root, contains toxins. The deadliest of those toxins is aconite. In raw form, aconite plants are extremely poisonous. It can be neutralized by boiling or steaming the plant.

Lala says the plant can cause problems if it’s not processed properly.

“These compounds, aconitine, the toxic compound found in these plants, is very poisonous and if you have a pure amount of aconitine, as little as two milligrams is thought to be enough to kill an average adult, so it takes very little,” he says.

Aconite poisonings don’t happen often in Canada.

The most recent one happened in B.C. earlier this year when a group of people ended up in hospital with aconite poisoning after eating a meal made with sand ginger powder.

Aconite is often used in traditional Chinese medicine

Along with Asian cuisine, aconite is also used in traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurvedic Indian medicine. Its alleged therapeutic purposes include joint and muscle pain.

Lala says in these practices it’s processed in a way that “theoretically should neutralize the toxic compounds,” but in some cases, it doesn’t always work.

“Part of the issue in those circumstances is that there's very little quality control and regulatory oversight when it comes to the production of those kinds of medicinal products, so you never really know what you're getting,” he explains. “There may be residual poisonous compounds left in those substances.”

Lala acknowledges there’s an increasing interest in alternative forms of medicine and says he wouldn’t be surprised to see more cases of aconite poisoning in the future.

“People should use the larger and more well-known companies that produce these products rather than individual people who might be producing and selling them on their own,” he advises.

The aconite plant is used in traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurvedic Indian medicine. 

(Photo via Getty Images)

Signs and symptoms of aconite poisoning

People can experience symptoms anywhere from a few minutes up to one hour after ingesting aconite.

Symptoms of aconite poisoning can include numbness and tingle on the lips, tongue, face and extremities, diarrhea, stomach pain, vomiting, arrhythmia and heart-related complications.

“You can get very fast rhythms that can cause significant problems in terms of circulation because the toxin itself, the aconitine, is both a neurotoxin as well as a cardiac toxin so you sometimes get seizures, people falling into comas if there’s enough of a dose,” Lala tells Yahoo Canada.

The pharmacology professor says if someone dies from the poisoning, it typically happens from highly irregular heart rhythm or respiratory paralysis.

A person with a pre-existing heart condition may also be predisposed to more severe health effects. However, even healthy people who have no outstanding health problems can die from a large enough dose, Lala says.
What does treatment for aconite poisoning look like?

There is no antidote for aconite poisoning.

Lala says treatment is most often supportive. For example, if a person has an unusual heart rhythm or low blood pressure, then a doctor can give them medicine to help correct those issues.

The professor also notes that the sooner someone gets medical help after experiencing symptoms of aconite poisoning, the better they can be treated.

“If people go to the hospital early enough, within an hour of ingesting the poison, you can sometimes treat the patient with oral activated charcoal to try and inactivate the poison before it gets absorbed into the system,” he says. “After that period of time, there's not much you can do once it's already been absorbed.”

Hubble Telescope Captures What Might Be Prettiest Spiral Galaxy Ever

Amanda Kooser -  CNET

Like dogs, all galaxies are good galaxies, even the funky ones. But there's something about a spiral galaxy that gladdens my heart. Maybe it's the swirling sense of symmetry. Maybe it's because our own home Milky Way is a spiral. A new Hubble Space Telescope image of spiral galaxy NGC 1961 is giving me all the feels.


Spiral galaxy NGC 1961 positively glows in this Hubble Space Telescope image. NASA, ESA, J. Dalcanton (University of Washington), R. Foley (University of California - Santa Cruz); Image processing: G. Kober (NASA Goddard/Catholic University of America)© Provided by CNET

The scenic spiral is far away at a distance of 180 million light-years in the constellation Camelopardalis, also known as the Giraffe.

Here's the full Hubble view:



NGC 1961 in all its glory. NASA, ESA, J. Dalcanton (University of Washington), R. Foley (University of California - Santa Cruz); Image processing: G. Kober (NASA Goddard/Catholic University of America)© Provided by CNET

NASA shared the Hubble image on Wednesday. "Glittering, blue regions of bright young stars dot the dusty spiral arms winding around the galaxy's glowing center," the space agency said, showing a flair for poetic language.

There are different kinds of spiral galaxies. NASA classifies NGC 1961 as an intermediate spiral galaxy. The intermediate designation puts it in a gray area between spiral galaxies that have a notable bar of stars at their centers and those that don't. Check out this example of a barred galaxy appropriately called the Great Barred Spiral Galaxy.
Hubble and James Webb Space Telescope Images Compared: See the Difference



More stars. More galaxies. More data on exoplanets. Deeper into the history of the universe. The James Webb Space Telescope rocked astronomy with its first major image release on July 11, 2022. Comparisons between Hubble Space Telescope and Webb views of the same cosmic targets show just have far we've come.Webb launched over three decades after Hubble and represents the advancements in space telescope technology that have happened over that time. Webb is not here to steal Hubble's thunder. It's here to see the universe in a new way. This is what the James Webb Space Telescope looked like during a test deployment of its primary mirror in March 2020. We don't have any glorious space shots of Webb out in orbit. This mirror selfie will have to suffice. The telescope -- the subject of a controversy over its name -- uses a collection of gold-plated hexagonal mirrors and sees the universe in infrared light.


NASA has specifically called Webb the "successor" to Hubble and not its replacement. The Hubble Space Telescope launched in 1990 and has been operating in the challenging conditions of space for over 30 years, a remarkable lifespan. Hubble mainly sees in optical (visible) and ultraviolet wavelengths, so its "eyes" work differently from Webb, which sees in infrared. Infrared helps Webb gaze through dusty regions of space that Hubble can't penetrate.Webb's mirror is also much bigger than Hubble's. "This larger light collecting area means that Webb can peer farther back into time than Hubble is capable of doing," said NASA.© Provided by CNET


In 2012, a decade before Webb's first images came out, the Hubble team delivered the deepest view of space we'd ever seen, known as the eXtreme Deep Field (XDF). It was a new version of part of the telescope's older Ultra Deep Field image. The XDF showed about 5,000 galaxies with some of them reaching back to 13.2 billion years ago. NASA and the European Space Agency released a series of Hubble Deep Fields over the years. They're still beautiful, but they also highlight just how powerful Webb is by comparison.© Provided by CNET


The first major Webb image arrived with much fanfare on July 11, 2022. It represents the deepest infrared view of our universe yet. The area in the view is called SMAC 0723 and it's home to a huge galaxy cluster. The pointed objects are stars, while everything else is a galaxy. The image is called Webb's First Deep Field, which hints at much more to come. "Webb's image covers a patch of sky approximately the size of a grain of sand held at arm's length by someone on the ground -- and reveals thousands of galaxies in a tiny sliver of vast universe," said NASA.The clarity is astounding. It's like a time machine, showing SMAC 0723 as it looked 4.6 billion years ago.Check out a full breakdown on the first Webb images here.© Provided by CNET


This Hubble view of the northwest corner of the Carina Nebula was released in 2008. This area of the nebula is nicknamed the Cosmic Cliffs. It's quite a sight to behold, but it's also less clear than Webb's view. Webb's infrared eyes help reveal previously invisible areas of star birth that Hubble couldn't capture.© Provided by CNET


Hello, new computer wallpaper. One of the most eye-catching new James Webb Space Telescope images is this mounding mass of star birth in the Carina Nebula. "The blistering, ultraviolet radiation from the young stars is sculpting the nebula's wall by slowly eroding it away. Dramatic pillars tower above the glowing wall of gas, resisting this radiation," said ESA.Take note of how many stars you can see in this image. The entire landscape almost looks like it's in 3D.© Provided by CNET


The Southern Ring Nebula is also known as the Eight Burst Nebula thanks to its figure-8 appearance as seen by some telescopes. Hubble's 1998 look at the nebula is lovely, showing diffuse shades of blue, yellow and brownish-red. It has a bit of a blob-like, milky look to it. Buckle up for Webb's version next.© Provided by CNET


Holy details, Batman. Webb's view of the Southern Ring Nebula (formally known as NGC 3132) revealed new information about it. "The dimmer star at the center of this scene has been sending out rings of gas and dust for thousands of years in all directions, and NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has revealed for the first time that this star is cloaked in dust," said NASA.It shows just how beautiful dying stars can be.© Provided by CNET


NASA shared two different Webb perspectives on the Southern Ring Nebula. "The stars -- and their layers of light -- are prominent in the image from Webb's Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) on the left, while the image from Webb's Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) on the right shows for the first time that the second star is surrounded by dust," said NASA.© Provided by CNET


Stephan's Quintet -- formally known as Hickson Compact Group 92 (HCG 92) -- is a group of five galaxies, four of which are busy interacting with each other. The group is in the constellation Pegasus. The lighter-colored galaxy to the left is actually closer to us and isn't a part of the in-crowd of the other four. Hubble's vision of the quintet from 2009 is plenty ethereal. Webb took a fresh look in 2022.© Provided by CNET


The James Webb Space Telescope's view of Stephan's Quintet took quite an effort to put together. It's made from nearly 1,000 separate image files. "With its powerful, infrared vision and extremely high spatial resolution, Webb shows never-before-seen details in this galaxy group," said NASA. "Sparkling clusters of millions of young stars and starburst regions of fresh star birth grace the image."© Provided by CNET


Let's wind the clock back to 1990 when the Hubble Space Telescope was still the new kid in the cosmos. To show how advanced Hubble was, NASA released a comparison of stars. The image of stars on the left came from a ground-based telescope in Chile while the image on the right was Hubble's much sharper "first light" view of the same stars. Hubble is now on the other end of the comparison as Webb delivers sparkling new images. It's the natural path of things when it comes to the onward march of space technology. Hubble has weathered many technical glitches over the decades, but NASA expects it will continue to serve the astronomy community for years, not in Webb's shadow, but as a venerated elder that's still delivering quality science.© Provided by CNET

NGC 1961 is also an active galactic nuclei (AGN) galaxy. "AGN galaxies have very bright centers that often far outshine the rest of the galaxy at certain wavelengths of light," said NASA. "These galaxies likely have supermassive black holes at their cores churning out bright jets and winds that shape their evolution."

But back to why I'm so enamored of this galaxy. It's the glow, the glitter, the slight angle, the swirls, like a cosmic Charybdis posing for a glamor shot. It's a dream-like image showing how a telescope can deliver a work of art every bit as moving as a fine painting. In short, it's just beautiful.

Fossilized Barf From 150 Million Years Ago Reveals Ancient Meal

Amanda Kooser - 1h ago

Around 150 million years ago in what's now Utah, an animal chowed down on a small frog and a salamander. It then lost its lunch. Fast forward to modern times, when a team of paleontologists identified and investigated the fossilized vomit, unraveling a mystery along the way.


The fossilized vomit contains the bones of small amphibians. John Foster/Adrian Hunt/James Kirkland© Provided by CNET

The researchers published a study on the puke in the journal Palaios late last month. The scientists found frog bones, including some that likely came from a tadpole, and bits from a salamander. "Aspects of this new fossil, relating to the arrangement and concentration of the bones in the deposit, the mix of animals, and the chemistry of the bones and matrix, suggested that the pile of bones was regurgitated out by a predator," Utah State Parks said in a statement on Tuesday.



This delightful illustration shows two fish, one in the act of hunting and the other puking up its prey. Brian Engh© Provided by CNET

Whose puke was it? The vomit dates back to the Late Jurassic, a time when dinosaurs like the jumbo-size Brachiosaurus and armored Stegosaurus still roamed. Shoutout to ReBecca Hunt-Foster, a paleontologist at Dinosaur National Monument in Utah, for coining the phrase "Jurassic Barf." However, the vomit didn't come from a dino.

The fossil site, famous for plant remains, was a pond long ago, home to amphibians and fish. The researchers worked out that a bowfin fish most did the vomiting. It's possible the ancient fish upchucked to distract a predator. Utah State Parks noted the paleontologists jokingly referred to the fossil find as the "fish-puked tadpole."

Despite having happened many millions of years ago, the vomit represents a familiar scene.

"There were three animals that we still have around today, interacting in ways also known today among those animals -- prey eaten by predators and predators perhaps chased by other predators," said study co-author John Foster, curator of the Utah Field House of Natural History State Park Museum. "That itself shows how similar some ancient ecosystems were to places on Earth today."

The researchers hope to find other, similar fossils within Utah's Morrison Formation, a layer of history that also preserves many dinosaur remains. Puke might not seem like the most glamorous paleontology subject, but it's a fascinating (and slightly gross) window into life long ago.

Scientists Discover 380-Million-Year-Old Heart, Stunningly Preserved

Leslie Katz - CNET


A 380-million-year-old fish heart found embedded in a chunk of Australian sediment has scientists' pulses racing. Not only is this organ in remarkable condition, but it could also yield clues about the evolution of jawed vertebrates, which include you and me.


Professor Kate Trinajstic inspects a fossil of an ancient fish at the Western Australian Museum. Curtin University© Provided by CNET

The heart belonged to an extinct class of armored, jawed fish called arthrodires that thrived in the Devonian period between 419.2 million and 358.9 million years ago -- and it's a good 250 million years older than the jawed-fish heart that currently holds the "oldest" title. But despite the fish being so archaic, the positioning of its S-shaped ticker with two chambers led researchers to observe surprising anatomical similarities between the ancient swimmer and modern sharks.

"Evolution is often thought of as a series of small steps, but these ancient fossils suggest there was a larger leap between jawless and jawed vertebrates," said Professor Kate Trinajstic, a vertebrate paleontologist at Australia's Curtin University and co-author of a new study on the findings. "These fish literally have their hearts in their mouths and under their gills -- just like sharks today," Trinajstic said.

The study appeared in the journal Science on Wednesday.

Scientists got an extra good look at the organ's exact location because they were able to observe it in relation to the fish's fossilized stomach, intestine and liver, a rare happening.

"I can't tell you how truly amazed I was to find a 3D and beautifully preserved heart and other organs in this ancient fossil," Trinajstic said.


The white ring shows the spiral valves of the intestine, but the heart isn't visible here. "I was totally blown away by the fact we could actually see the soft tissues preserved in such an ancient fish," says John Long, a professor of paleontology at Flinders University in Australia and co-author of a new study on the finding. "I knew immediately it was a very significant find." John Long/Flinders University© Provided by CNET

Paleontologists encountered the fossil during a 2008 expedition at Western Australia's GoGo Formation, and it adds to a trove of information gleaned from the site, including the origins of teeth and insights into the fin-to-limb transition. The GoGo Formation, a sedimentary deposit in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, is known for its rich fossil record preserving reef life from the Devonian period of the Paleozoic era, including relics of tissues as delicate as nerves and embryos with umbilical cords.



Anatomy of an arthrodire.© Provided by CNET

"Most cases of soft-tissue preservation are found in flattened fossils, where the soft anatomy is little more than a stain on the rock," said study co-author Professor Per Ahlberg of Sweden's Uppsala University. "We are also very fortunate in that modern scanning techniques allow us to study these fragile soft tissues without destroying them. A couple of decades ago, the project would have been impossible."

Those techniques include neutron beams and X-ray microtomography, which creates cross sections of physical objects that can then be used to re-create virtual 3D models.

Recent fish fossil finds have illuminated how "dinosaur fish," a critically endangered species, stand on their heads and how much the prehistoric fish lizard looked like Flipper the dolphin.

And study co-author Ahlberg has a reminder for those who might not consider such finds significant: that life is, at its most fundamental level, an evolving system.

"That we ourselves and all the other living organisms with which we share the planet have developed from a common ancestry through a process of evolution is not an incidental fact," Ahlberg said. "It is the most profound truth of our existence. We are all related, in the most literal sense."

CHINA WAS RIGHT
Lancet Report Claiming COVID Could Have Come From U.S. Lab Met With Uproar

Dan Ladden-Hall - 11h ago

A top medical journal at the heart of several pandemic-related controversies published a major COVID-19 Commission report Wednesday that concluded the deadly pathogen might possibly have leaked from a United States laboratory.


Maskot Bildbyrå© Provided by The Daily Beast

The eyebrow-raising suggestion—which was just a part of a 58-page analysis of the COVID pandemic and its origins—in The Lancet stated that it was “feasible” that the SARS-CoV-2 virus emerged either as a natural spillover event or as a leak from a lab. While the report mentions facilities in Wuhan, China, it also says that “independent researchers have not yet investigated” U.S. laboratories, adding that the National Institutes of Health has “resisted disclosing details” of its research on SARS-CoV-related viruses.

The report also called for new safeguards to be put in place to prevent future natural spillovers—in which an animal transmits a virus to a human, who then passes it to other humans—and research-related spillovers.

But concerns have been raised about the commission’s chairman—prominent economist Jeffrey Sachs—and his previous comments about the origins of COVID.

Earlier this year, the Columbia University academic said he was “pretty convinced” the pathogen “came out of a U.S. lab of biotechnology, not out of nature.” When asked about the view, Sachs told Politico in July that he believed the virus “quite likely emerged from a U.S.-backed laboratory research program,” adding: “A natural spillover is also possible, of course. Both hypotheses are viable at this stage.”

The following month, Sachs appeared on a podcast hosted by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has become one of the internet’s leading anti-vaccine conspiracy theorists and caused outrage by comparing vaccine mandates to the Holocaust. Sachs’ appearance on Kennedy’s show came just days after Meta banned accounts led by Kennedy from Facebook and Instagram for spreading COVID misinformation.

“Sachs’ appearance on RFK Jr’s podcast… undermines the seriousness of the Lancet Commission’s mission to the point of completely negating it,” Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization in Canada, told the U.K.’s Telegraph newspaper.

“This may be one of the Lancet’s most shameful moments regarding its role as a steward and leader in communicating crucial findings about science and medicine,” Rasmussen said, adding that she’d been “pretty shocked at how flagrantly” the report had ignored important evidence about the origin of COVID.

Sachs told the outlet that he stood by his earlier comments, adding that all of the Lancet’s commissioners had signed off on the final wording of the report.

But Peter Hotez, a member of the Lancet Commission and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Texas (and a Daily Beast contributor), said there had been “diverse views” and that he had “pushed hard on removing” the references to American labs in the report because it was “a distraction.” He added that he was left “speechless” by Sachs’ appearance on Kennedy’s podcast.

Wednesday’s report is just the latest controversy surrounding The Lancet and the pandemic.

In February 2020, in the earliest days of the outbreak of the virus, The Lancet published a letter signed by 27 public-health scientists slamming “conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.” The Telegraph later reported that 26 of the 27 signatories had connections to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and the journal published a separate letter in 2021 that responded to the first by calling a research-related origin to the virus “plausible,” adding: “Research-related hypotheses are not misinformation and conjecture.”

The journal also notoriously retracted a major May 2020 article that had questioned the efficacy of using the drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine in treating COVID, which then-President Donald Trump had advocated. After pulling the paper over concerns about data used in the study, The Lancet updated its editorial and peer-review policies in order to reduce “risks of research and publication misconduct.”

And even before the coronavirus pandemic, The Lancet unwittingly played a central role in the formation of the modern anti-vaccine movement at the end of the 20th century. In 1998, the journal published an article by British former physician Andrew Wakefield linking the MMR vaccine with autism. The study was ultimately proved to be a complete fraud and was retracted in 2010, with Wakefield being barred from practicing medicine in the U.K. He has nevertheless been revered by anti-vaxxers, including the likes of RFK Jr., with his acolytes continuing to spread dangerous health myths to this day.

In a statement to The Daily Beast, a spokesperson for The Lancet said: “The Lancet COVID-19 Commission includes 11 Task Forces in areas ranging from vaccine development to humanitarian relief strategies, safe workplaces, and global economic recovery.

“Throughout the Commission’s two years of work, The Lancet, in collaboration with Commission Chair Professor Jeffrey Sachs, regularly evaluated the work of each Task Force as scientific evidence about COVID-19 evolved to ensure that the final peer-reviewed report will provide valuable new insights to support a coordinated, global response to COVID-19 as well as to prevent future pandemics and contain future disease outbreaks.”

NASA Traces Supernova Remains Back to the Middle Ages

Monisha Ravisetti - 

In the 14th century, while bloodshed from the Hundred Years' war spilled onto Earth, remnants of a dead star might have shone in the sky.


Three very strong telescopes combined to bring you this image of a supernova's graveyard.

 NASA© Provided by CNET

NASA announced Monday that three powerful telescopes -- the Hubble, the Spitzer and the Chandra X-Ray Observatory -- joined forces to study debris stemming from a white dwarf's death. Think of these stellar remains as the overall aftermath of the star's final moments, the environment in which it met its demise.

The astronomers who parsed all this cosmic data say they've managed to glean enough clues to decode an exquisite timeline of the destroyed star's violent detonation long, long ago.

"This data provides scientists a chance to 'rewind' the movie of the stellar evolution that has played out since and figure out when it got started," Chandra team members wrote in a statement. A preprint of these results can be seen here.

Eventually, this could elucidate when and where the stellar body might have blown up in the first place, but as the team began piecing together that story, it also realized something immensely fascinating about one particular part of the supernova's remains.

An aspect of the star's mortal evidence, located some 160,000 light-years away from Earth in a small galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud, might have emitted luminescence post-explosion that finally reached our planet during the Middle Ages. Yes, that means it decked the night sky within the same year we attribute to the apotheosis of the Ming Dynasty and most tragic point of the Black Plague.

The remnant is named SNR 0519-69.0, or SNR 0519 for short. (SNR stands for supernova remnant, as you might have guessed.)



Here's a general idea of the thermonuclear explosion that led to the white dwarf star's Type 1a supernova, and eventual SNR. Chandra X-Ray Observatory© Provided by CNET

On the upper end of their estimate, the scientists believe the remnant's deep-space light might have appeared about 670 years ago. However, based on its space-borne trajectory, they say it's also likely "the material has slowed down since the initial explosion and that the explosion happened more recently than 670 years ago."

OK, but what am I looking at here?

In the striking image released alongside this discovery, SNR 0519 seems to be a translucent, magenta blob against the star-studded canvas of space.

What you're looking at is a conglomerate of the telescopes' observations, overlaid to create a full diagram of the stellar fragment. Let's break it down.


Whoever picked the color combination for this space pic is probably my hero. 

NASA© Provided by CNET

The strong, pinkish-red areas and white wispy trails come from Hubble optical data to indicate the SNR's outline. If you look closely, you'll also see some green splotches, blue marks and purple halo-like designs leaking from the two. Those are colorized X-Ray observations that represent, respectively, low, medium and high energies emitted. Some overlaps of Chandra observations also show up as white-ish areas, and the brightest regions of the image dictate the slowest-moving material.

If you're wondering about Spitzer, this machine was more of a behind-the-scenes helper. It provided lots of data integral to the timeline goal of the team's study.

Of note, Hubble images of SNR from 2010, 2011 and 2020, NASA says, also measured speeds of the material provoked by the explosion's blast wave. Put together, this led to the conclusion that the remnant spurted out within a whopping range of 3.8 million to 5.5 million miles per hour -- the higher end of that is the part that supports the team's 670 years estimation for the initial eruption.

But again, NASA urges that "these results imply that some of the blast wave has crashed into dense gas around the remnant, causing it to slow down as it traveled," deeming the other scenario to have a solid likelihood, too.

Long lost moon could have been responsible for Saturn's rings

AFP - 


Discovered by Galileo 400 years ago, the rings of Saturn are about the most striking thing astronomers with small telescopes can spot in our solar system.


Saturn, the sixth planet from the Sun© A. SIMON

But even today, experts cannot agree on how or when they formed.

A new study published Thursday in the prestigious journal Science sets out to provide a convincing answer.

Between 100-200 million years ago, an icy moon they named Chrysalis broke up after getting a little too close to the gas giant, they conclude.

While most of it made impact with Saturn, its remaining fragments broke into small icy chunks that form the planet's signature rings.

"It's nice to find a plausible explanation," Jack Wisdom, professor of planetary sciences at MIT and lead author of the new study, told AFP.

Saturn, the sixth planet from the Sun, was formed four and a half billion years ago, at the beginning of the solar system.

But a few decades ago, scientists suggested that Saturn's rings appeared much later: only about 100 million years ago.

The hypothesis was reinforced by observations made by the Cassini probe, which orbited Saturn from 2004 to 2017.

"But because no one could think of a way to make the rings 100 million years ago, some people have been questioning the reasoning that led to that deduction," said Wisdom.

By constructing complex mathematical models, Wisdom and colleagues found an explanation that both justified the timeline, and allowed them to better understand another characteristic of the planet, its tilt.

Saturn has a 26.7 degree tilt. Being a gas giant, it would have been expected that the process of accumulating matter that led to its formation would have prevented tilt.

- Gravitational interactions -

Scientists recently discovered that Titan, the largest of Saturn's 83 moons, is migrating away from the planet, at a rate of 11 centimeters a year.

This changes the rate at which Saturn's axis of tilt loops around the vertical -- the technical term is "precession." Think of a spinning top drawing circles.

Around a billion years ago, this wobble frequency came into sync with Neptune's wobbly orbit, creating a powerful gravitational interaction called "resonance."

In order to maintain this lock, as Titan kept moving out, Saturn had to tilt, scientists argued.

But that explanation hinged on knowing how mass was distributed in the planet's interior, since the tilt would have behaved differently if it were concentrated more at its surface or the core.

In the new study, Wisdom and colleagues modeled the planet's interior using gravitational data gathered by Cassini during its close approach "Grand Finale," its last act before plunging into Saturn's depths.

The model they generated found Saturn is now slightly out of sync with Neptune, which necessitated a new explanation -- an event powerful enough to cause the drastic disruption.

Working through the mathematics, they found a lost moon fit the bill.

"It's pulled apart into a bunch of pieces and those pieces subsequently get pulled apart even more, and gradually rolls into the rings."

The missing Moon was baptized Chrysalis by MIT's Wisdom, likening the emergence of Saturn's rings to a butterfly emerging from a cocoon.

The team thinks Chrysalis was a bit smaller than our own Moon, and about the size of another Saturn satellite, Iapetus, which is made entirely of water ice.

"So it's plausible to hypothesize that Chrysalis is also made of water ice, and that's what it needs to make the rings, because the rings are almost pure water.

Asked whether he felt the mystery of Saturn's rings stood solved, Wisdom replied, soberly, "We've made a good contribution."

The Saturn satellite system still holds "a variety of mysteries," he added.

ia/dw

Mars rover sees hints of past life in latest rock samples

Issued on: 15/09/2022 - 

Percy cored two samples from a rock called "Wildcat Ridge," which is about three feet (one meter) wide, and on July 20 abraded some of its surface so it could be analyzed with an instrument called SHERLOC that uses ultraviolet light

 Handout NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS/AFP


Washington (AFP) – NASA's Perseverance Mars rover has detected its highest concentrations yet of organic molecules, in a potential signal of ancient microbes that scientists are eager to confirm when the rock samples are eventually brought to Earth.

While organic matter has been found on the Red Planet before, the new discovery is seen as especially promising because it came from an area where sediment and salts were deposited into a lake -- conditions where life could have arisen.

"It is very fair to say that these are going to be, these already are, the most valuable rock samples that have ever been collected," David Shuster, a Perseverance return sample scientist, told reporters during a briefing.

Organic molecules -- compounds made primarily of carbon that usually include hydrogen and oxygen, but also at times other elements -- are not always created by biological processes.

Further analysis and conclusions will have to wait for the Mars Sample Return mission -- a collaboration between NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) to bring back the rocks that is set for 2033.

Nicknamed Percy, the rover landed on Mars' Jezero Crater in February 2021, tasked with caching samples that may contain signs of ancient life, as well as characterizing the planet's geology and past climate.

The delta it is exploring formed 3.5 billion years ago. The rover is currently there investigating sedimentary rocks, which came about from particles of various sizes settling in the then watery environment.

Percy cored two samples from a rock called "Wildcat Ridge," which is about three feet (one meter) wide, and on July 20 abraded some of its surface so it could be analyzed with an instrument called SHERLOC that uses ultraviolet light.

The results showed a class of organic molecules called aromatics, which play a key role in biochemistry.

"This is a treasure hunt for potential signs of life on another planet," NASA astrobiologist Sunanda Sharma said.

"Organic matter is a clue and we're getting stronger and stronger clues...I personally find these results so moving because it feels like we're in the right place, with the right tools, at a very pivotal moment."

There have been other tantalizing clues about the possibility of life on Mars before, including repeated detections of methane by Perseverance's predecessor, Curiosity.

While methane is a digestive byproduct of microbes here on Earth, it can also be generated by geothermal reactions where no biology is at play.

© 2022 AFP

New UNICEF ambassador seeks to give louder voice to climate change victims

AFP - 

Ugandan climate activist Vanessa Nakate recently traveled to the drought-ravaged Horn of Africa to hear from children suffering from starvation. The next day she learned that one of the boys she met had died.


Ugndan climate activist Vanessa Nakate has been named UNICEF's new Goodwill Ambassador© Ed JONES

It is for such children, whose lives have been shattered by the global climate crisis, that Nakate, UNICEF's newest Goodwill Ambassador, has set out to make their voices heard.

"I'm hoping to continue doing the same thing to amplify, and really platform, the stories of the children ... that are suffering, because of the climate crisis," Nakate, who is 25, told AFP in an interview.

Inspired by Sweden's climate crusader Greta Thunberg, several years ago Nakate founded the Rise Up Climate Movement in her native Uganda and has spoken at prestigious international climate events.

On Thursday, she was appointed the newest Goodwill Ambassador for UNICEF, the United Nations' children's agency, joining recent high-profile supporters such as actor Priyanka Chopra Jonas, singer Katy Perry and Syrian refugee and education activist Muzoon Almellehan.



'It can be discouraging to see that the world is not paying the attention that it should to climate issues,' says Vanessa Nakate© Ed JONES

"In my journey of activism, I've always told myself, and I've always believed that every activist has a story to tell," Nakate said. "And every story has a solution to give and every solution has a life to change."

The activist says children and women suffer the most from global warming and her mission is make their voices heard -- but not to speak on their behalf.

"I cannot say that I can give a voice to anyone, because I believe everyone has their own distinct voice," she added.

"But the question is, who is listening to what we are saying? Who is paying attention?"

- 'Roof for all of us' -

Last week, Nakate visited UNICEF-run hospitals and nutrition centers in Turkana, a Kenyan region in the Horn of Africa hit by devastating drought.

There she witnessed the tragedy firsthand.

"I got to meet many children suffering from severe, acute malnutrition, because of this drought," Nakate said of the trip. "One of the children that I got to meet that day, I got to learn the following morning that he had passed."

UNICEF says about half of the world's children -- roughly 1 billion -- live in one of 33 countries classified as "extremely high risk" due to climate change impacts.

Scientists say that droughts, floods, storms and heat waves will only get stronger and more frequent due to global warming, and Nakate is frustrated that governments around the world, busy with the war in Ukraine and the Covid-19 pandemic, are not doing enough to save the planet.

"It can be discouraging to see that the world is not paying the attention that it should to climate issues, it can be very frustrating," said the activist.

"Leaders especially need to understand that Earth is a home for all of us, is like that roof for all of us. And we have to ensure that the entire roof is well and no part is leaking," Nakate said. "Because any leak in a part of a roof will eventually affect everyone in that house."

abd/ube/md/dw