NFL World Reacts To The Roger Goodell Salary News

Tzvi Machlin - 

Back in 2020, Roger Goodell chose to take no salary due to the uncertainty of what was to come in the COVID-19 pandemic. Fast-forward to 2022 and Goodell is being rewarded... by getting all of that money he gave up back.


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ATLANTA, GA - JANUARY 30: NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell speaks during a press conference during Super Bowl LIII Week at the NFL Media Center inside the Georgia World Congress Center on January 30, 2019 in Atlanta, Georgia. (Photo by Mike Zarrilli/Getty Images)

According to Daniel Kaplan of The Athletic, Goodell wound up making $63.9 million during the 2020-21 fiscal year. It was the same amount he had made in the previous fiscal year.

The obvious conclusion was that the NFL had rewarded Goodell by giving him a bonus that was identical to what he would've made in salary. The end result was record compensation.

Some fans are ripping Goodell for being terrible and are frustrated with how easily he gets away with things like this. Others can't help but admire Roger Goodell for his ability to always get his money, no matter what he does.

Roger Goodell has been a controversial figure among NFL fans for a long time. Many can't stand how much money he makes on the backs of players who may not get as much as they deserve.

Goodell has also received plenty of criticism for his handling of various controversies through the years.

Deflategate, CTE, domestic violence, team relocations, sponsorships, partnerships and toxic workplace allegations are just a few of the wide-ranging controversies that Goodell has been at the center of.

But he's consistently pleased the one group of people that matter most - the NFL owners. And so long as he has their stamp of approval, he'll get their money too.

Israeli museum finds sketches hidden in Modigliani painting

By ILAN BEN ZION

yesterday

Amadeo Modigliani's 1908 "Nude with a Hat," is hung upside down because another painting by him, "Maud Abrantes," on the reverse side of the same canvas is oriented correctly, while on display at Haifa University's Hecht Museum in Haifa, Israel, June 28, 2022. Curators at the museum using x-ray technology have discovered three previously unknown sketches by the celebrated 20th century artist hiding beneath the surface of the painting. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)

HAIFA, Israel (AP) — Curators at an Israeli museum have discovered three previously unknown sketches by celebrated 20th-century artist Amedeo Modigliani hiding beneath the surface of one of his paintings.

The unfinished works by Modigliani, an Italian-born artist who worked in Paris before his death in 1920, came to light after the canvas of “Nude with a Hat” at the University of Haifa’s Hecht Museum was X-rayed as part of a sweeping forensic study of his work for an upcoming exhibit in Philadelphia.

Inna Berkowits, an art historian at the Hecht Museum, said it was “quite an amazing discovery.”

“Through the X-rays, we are really able to make this inanimate object speak,” she told The Associated Press.

Modigliani is considered one of the 20th century’s great Modernist artists. His lived a short, turbulent, Bohemian life in France, where his nude paintings were controversial. His work is typified by slender, elongated necks and faces, a signature style influenced by African and Cycladic Greek art that was just starting to arrive in France in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The Jewish artist died aged 35, penniless.

One of his paintings, “Reclining Nude,” fetched over $170 million when it was sold at auction in 2015, making it one of the most expensive paintings ever sold. Another was sold in 2018 for $157 million at auction.

The high demand for authentic Modigliani works has generated a thriving market for fakes and forgeries.

The last time Italy staged a big Modigliani show, a 2017 exhibit at Genoa’s Palazzo Ducale, museum officials closed the show early after experts alleged that many of the works on display were fakes. A criminal trial has been underway for over a year.

In 2018, X-ray technology revealed a previously unknown Modigliani portrait beneath one of his paintings at London’s Tate Gallery.

Modigliani’s 1908 “Nude with a Hat” is already an unusual painting. Both sides of the canvas have portraits that are painted in opposite directions. Visitors entering the Hecht Museum’s galleries are met by an upside down nude portrait. A likeness of Maud Abrantes, a female friend of the artist, on the reverse side is right-side up.

In 2010, the museum’s curator noticed the eyes of a third figure peeking from beneath Abrantes’ collar. But only this year was the hidden image brought into focus.

“When we decided to do the X-ray, we were only looking to learn a little bit more about the hidden figure underneath Maud Abrantes,” Berkowits said. In addition to a hidden woman wearing a hat, they found two more portraits on the opposite side that were completely invisible to the naked eye: one of a man, and another of a woman with her hair pulled up in a bun.

The “Nude with a Hat” dates from early in Modigliani’s career, not long after he moved to Paris from Italy, when he was struggling to find buyers for his art. The painting was purchased by the museum’s founder in 1983.

The canvas is now known to contain five of his paintings, likely painted one atop the other out of necessity to save money on new canvases. X-ray photography and other noninvasive technologies have found hidden works by other artists such as Degas and Rembrandt.

Berkowits called the artwork “a sketchbook on a canvas,” showing Modigliani’s repeated tries and “never-ending search for artistic expression.” She said there is “no doubt at all” that the painting is authentic.

“He was one of the very first multicultural artists who pulled inspiration from different sources,” said Kenneth Wayne, director of the Modigliani Project, an organization that is working to compile an authenticated collection of the artist’s works. He cited Modigliani’s contemporaries Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse as other examples.

Modigliani sought “an air of the strange and beauty” and achieved that through the incorporation of those foreign styles in his art, Wayne added. Wayne and his colleagues use scientific methods and art expertise to weed out fakes.

The X-ray photography was conducted ahead of a sweeping exhibition of Modigliani’s works at the Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia.

Wayne said a growing number of technical studies like that by the Barnes Foundation have increased confidence in confirming genuine Modiglianis.

The foundation museum said the exhibit opens Oct. 16 and will explore the artist’s working methods and materials based on forensic study of dozens of Modigliani’s paintings and sculptures loaned from collections around the world.

Cost-of-living crisis to hit women hardest, report says

yesterday

FILE - Workers set the stage prior to the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, in Davos, Switzerland, Sunday, May 22, 2022. The World Economic Forum reported on Wednesday, July 13, 2022, that the cost-of-living crisis, sparked in part by higher fuel and food prices, is expected to hit women the hardest. 

(Gian Ehrenzeller/Keystone via AP, File)

GENEVA (AP) — A cost-of-living crisis sparked in part by higher fuel and food prices is expected to hit women the hardest, the World Economic Forum reported Wednesday, pointing to a widening gender gap in the global labor force.

The Geneva-based think tank and event organizer, best known for hosting an annual gathering of elites in the Swiss Alpine town of Davos, says a hoped-for recovery from a ballooning gender gap hasn’t materialized as expected as the COVID-19 crisis has eased.

The forum estimates that it will now take 132 years — down from 136 — for the world to reach gender parity, which the organization defines around four main factors: salaries and economic opportunity, education, health, and political empowerment.

A breakdown by country gave top marks to Iceland, followed by several Nordic countries and New Zealand, as well as Rwanda, Nicaragua and Namibia. Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, came in 10th place in the report of 146 countries. Further down the list were the world’s biggest economies: the U.S. was at No. 27, China at No. 102 and Japan at No. 116.



Saadia Zahidi, managing director at the forum, say women have been disproportionately affected by the cost-of-living crisis following labor market losses during the pandemic and insufficient “care infrastructure” — such as for the elderly or children.

“In face of a weak recovery, government and business must make two sets of efforts: targeted policies to support women’s return to the workforce and women’s talent development in the industries of the future,” she said. “Otherwise, we risk eroding the gains of the last decades permanently and losing out on the future economic returns of diversity.”

The report, now in its 16th year, aims to track shocks to the labor market that can impact the gender gap.

LGBTQ+ harassment, slurs abound on social media, report says

By AMANDA SEITZ

yesterday


WASHINGTON (AP) — Social media platforms including Facebook and TikTok are failing to stop hate and threats against LGBTQ users, a report issued Wednesday from advocacy group GLAAD found.

Those are some of the internet’s most vulnerable users, with a majority of LGBTQ people saying they’ve faced menacing posts or comments when they’re scrolling through social media. But it’s unclear how social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube are handling those threats.

Instead of protecting their users, GLAAD says in the report, the tech companies are safeguarding information about how they respond to those attacks, revealing few details about how often they take down posts or accounts that push hate speech or harass LGBTQ users.

“The reality is, there’s very little transparency and very little accountability,” said Jenni Olson, GLAAD’s director for social media safety and author of the report. “And people feel helpless.”

Los Angeles resident Peter Sapinsky, a gay musician who said he has faced harassment in the online gaming community, shared screenshots with The Associated Press of dozens of messages he’s sent to YouTube about users and videos that use racist and homophobic slurs. YouTube has responded to only some of the messages, he said.

Sapinsky, 29, said some use YouTube to livestream themselves harassing people at Pride parades. They quickly delete those live videos once they’ve wrapped to evade being detected by YouTube for violating its policies against hate speech, he said. He listed a series of homophobic slurs he’s heard in videos posted by users who are still operating on the site.

“YouTube doesn’t do anything about it,” Sapinsky said. “For someone who says they don’t allow hate on the website, they sure do.”

Hateful or violent speech directed at members of the LGBTQ community is prohibited on the platform, YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon said.

“Over the last few years, we’ve made significant progress in our ability to quickly remove hateful and harassing content,” Malon said. “This work is ongoing, and we appreciate the thoughtful feedback from GLAAD.”

A Twitter spokesperson said in a statement that the company was discussing the report’s findings with GLAAD. A statement from TikTok did not directly address the report but said the company is working to create an “inclusive environment.”

GLAAD recommended that the platforms start releasing the training methods for content moderators as well as the number of accounts and posts the companies remove for violating rules designed to protect LGBTQ users.

GLAAD’s report examines the policies and actions Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and Twitter have implemented around LGBTQ issues.

All of the social media platforms have outlined policies that are designed to prevent LGBTQ users from being harassed, threatened or discriminated against by other users because of their identity.

Twitter and TikTok also have specific policies against intentionally misgendering, using the wrong pronoun to describe someone, for example, or deadnaming, which involves reviving a transgender person’s name from before the person transitioned to a new identity. Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said it removes similar posts upon request.

Some users bully LGBTQ people on social media by misgendering or deadnaming them. One example came last month, when a conservative social media pundit sent a swarm of Twitter users to harass transgender actor Elliot Page with the wrong pronoun and name. That Twitter user was suspended under the company’s hateful conduct policy.

“The idea that these figures with millions of followers are bullying and harassing trans people, for being trans, is just wrong,” Olson said.

___

Follow AP’s coverage of social media platforms at https://apnews.com/hub/social-media.

___

This story has been corrected to show TikTok, not only Twitter, also has a policy against intentionally misgendering.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M
U.S. charges 2 bankers in sprawling $1.2B Venezuela laundering conspiracy

July 13 (UPI) -- Federal prosecutors have charged two financial asset managers with aiding in the laundering of $1.2 billion embezzled from Venezuela's state-owned and controlled energy company.

The Justice Department announced in a statement that an indictment was returned Tuesday in the Southern District of Florida, charging Ralph Steinmann, 48, of Switzerland, and Luis Fernando Vuteff, 51, of Argentina, with one count each of money laundering.

Prosecutors said the pair conspired with others to launder the ill-gotten proceeds taken from Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. through the U.S. financial system via international bank accounts from December 2014 to at least August 2018.

"Steinmann, Vuteff and others allegedly discussed and agreed to create the sophisticated financial mechanisms and relationships required to launder more than $200 million related to the scheme as well as open accounts for or on behalf of at least two Venezuelan public officials to receive their bribe payments related to the scheme," the Justice Department said.

The charging document states the money they were laundering was from a foreign currency exchange scheme that involved the bribery of Venezuelan officials.

In 2018, the Justice Department charged several others involved in the currency exchange scheme that was concocted to embezzle $1.2 billion from PDVSA that was obtained through bribery and fraud.

In October of that year, Matthias Krull, a former managing director and vice chairman of a Swiss bank, was sentenced to 10 years in prison after pleading guilty to his role in the scheme.

According to federal prosecutors, Krull, a German national, admitted that the conspiracy started in December 2014 and that he and co-conspirators used Miami, Fla., real estate and false-investment schemes in an effort to launder the money that came from PDVSA.

If convicted, Steinmann and Vuteff each face up to 20 years' imprisonment.

Study suggests coronaviruses may survive in frozen meat for up to 30 days

By HealthDay News

A computer generated representation of COVID-19 virions (SARS-CoV-2) under electron microscope. Image by Felipe Esquivel Reed/Wikimedia Commons

Had COVID? You might want to clean your freezer out.

A new study suggests that cousins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus can survive on frozen meat and fish for up to 30 days

The research -- prompted by COVID outbreaks in Asia in which packaged meat was suspected as the virus' source -- was conducted on frozen chicken, beef, pork and salmon. The findings were published recently in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, a journal of the American Society for Microbiology.

"Although you might not store meat in the fridge for 30 days, you might store it in the freezer for that long," said first author Emily Bailey, assistant professor of public health at Campbell University in Buies Creek, N.C.

Her team conducted its research without use of the actual coronavirus that causes COVID-19. Instead, researchers relied on surrogate viruses with similar protein spikes.

These similar viruses were placed on frozen meat and fish, which was then stored in both refrigerator temperatures (39.2 degrees Fahrenheit) and freezer temperatures (-4 F.)

"We even found that the viruses could be cultured after [being frozen for] that length of time," Bailey said in a journal news release.

Researchers said their findings are significant because SARS-CoV-2 can reproduce in the gut, not just in the respiratory tract where most people feel its effects.

Three virus strains were used as surrogates in the study, including two animal coronaviruses. All three have been used as stand-ins in previous studies of SARS-CoV-2.

The researchers found that the viruses didn't fare as well in refrigerated temperatures as in freezer temperatures. The numbers also differed by food item.

They said this study underlines the importance of rigorous sanitation in the harvest, transport, packaging and distribution of food products.

"Continued efforts are needed to prevent contamination of foods and food processing surfaces, worker hands, and food processing utensils such as knives," the authors wrote, adding that the disinfection of foods prior to packaging also needs to be addressed.

More information

For more about keeping food safe during the COVID pandemic, visit the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

BIG BROTHER INC.
Amazon gave Ring camera footage to police without owners' consent

Amazon admits giving police Ring doorbell videos 11 times this year without owners' consent, according to a letter received by Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass. 

Photo courtesy of Ring.

July 13 (UPI) -- Amazon gave Ring doorbell camera footage, without owners' consent, to police at least 11 times this year, according to findings released Wednesday.

Amazon's admission was made in a letter the online retail giant sent to Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., on July 1 after he raised privacy issues over the doorbell cameras.

"Ring's surveillance system threatens the public in ways that go far beyond abstract privacy invasion," Markey wrote in June. "Individuals may use Ring devices' audio recordings to facilitate blackmail, stalking and other damaging practices."

Amazon, which runs Ring cameras, had previously said the footage is handed over to police only if it is demanded by a court order, if the owner gives their permission or if there is an "emergency." Amazon said the 11 instances halfway through 2022 were "emergency situations," which the company defined as "cases involving imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to any person."

"It's simply untrue that Ring gives anyone unfettered access to customer data or video, as we have repeatedly made clear to our customers and others," a Ring spokesperson told UPI in an email.

"The law authorizes companies like Ring to provide information to government entities if the company believes that an emergency involving danger of death or serious physical injury to any person, such as kidnapping or an attempted murder, requires disclosure without delay. Ring faithfully applies that legal standard," the company said.

Markey said the findings from his investigation into Amazon, which bought the doorbell company in 2018, highlights the "close relationship between Ring and law enforcement.

"As my ongoing investigation into Amazon illustrates, it has become increasingly difficult for the public to move, assemble and converse in public without being tracked and recorded," Markey said in a statement Wednesday.

"Increasing law enforcement reliance on private surveillance creates a crisis of accountability, and I am particularly concerned that biometric surveillance could become central to the growing web of surveillance systems that Amazon and other powerful tech companies are responsible for," Markey added.

Amazon has repeatedly stated that police cannot view recordings unless clips are posted publicly or shared directly with police. Wednesday's letter is the first time the tech giant has confirmed it has handed over this information without an owner's consent.

Amazon's app called Neighbors allows users to post Ring camera footage and leave comments. Amazon currently has agreements with 2,161 police departments across the country allowing officers to use the app.

While Markey and others have raised privacy concerns, others say the cameras are useful crime-fighting tools that help police keep neighborhoods safe.

"In numerous property crimes, we have utilized the Ring portal and video received from it," Omaha Police Captain Steve Cerveny told KETV. "It's routinely used in those investigations and has proved useful recently in identifying suspects."

Voice modification a key piece of transgender care

By Cara Murez, HealthDay News

Graduate programs are now more commonly offering curriculum that includes gender-affirming voice therapy. File Photo by Bill Greenblatt/UPI | License Photo

About eight months after Ari Toumpas, a transgender woman, began the process of transitioning both socially and medically, she began to think about her voice.

A language teacher and graduate student at Ohio State University, Toumpas had been trying some vocal feminization exercises she had discovered online, but was not having success.

A referral from her primary care doctor led Toumpas to Anna Lichtenstein, a gender-affirming voice modification therapist at the university's Wexner Medical Center, which offers a wide range of gender-affirming healthcare services.

"It's been a process of just changing various little things and big things about my life to just make me feel more comfortable living as a human being with a body, and part of that was my voice," said Toumpas, who is 25.

RELATED BYU stops voice adaptation services for transgender clients

After 12 weeks of work with Lichtenstein and more practice at home, "I have a lot of comfort with my voice," said Toumpas. "I know what I'm doing with it. It's kind of effortless. I come to my voice each day when I wake up in the morning ... I get in front of my class and I teach, and it's comfortable."

Voice modification is just one piece of gender-affirming care that can help transgender individuals feel more aligned with their bodies.

Lichtenstein said, "We use our voice throughout the day to communicate and as a speech pathologist all my training is in helping people to communicate within the world, with more confidence, more efficiently, feeling successful."

RELATED Feminizing facial surgery boosts mental health of transgender patients

Communication has a lot of gendered aspects to it, Lichtenstein noted, and the transgender, non-binary, gender-nonconforming patients who Lichtenstein sees in her work come to her for a variety of reasons and with an array of goals.

Some are seeking to not have people identify them as transgender in their community, sometimes because they're concerned about safety. Others want a better sense of control and understanding of their voice. At the same time, some transgender people are not interested in vocal changes. They identify with how they sound, Lichtenstein said.

"But it is definitely within the scope of gender-affirming care, and it's important because gender-affirming care in general can be really lifesaving for people, depending on where they live and what healthcare that they need or are seeking," Lichtenstein said.

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Speech language pathology and voice therapy is itself a very diverse field, encompassing everything from working with pediatric patients who need help with articulation and language fluency to adult patients in acute care as part of stroke recovery.

In Lichtenstein's case, she gradually began adding more transgender adults and youths to her caseload before this work became her primary focus.

'The voice is really personal'

"I really found this interest in providing gender-affirming care and wanted to be the very best, most competent provider that I could be in this area of health for this patient population," Lichtenstein said.

Although Lichtenstein thinks it is not as common for speech therapists to focus on gender-affirming care, there are more speech therapists beginning this work around the United States by adding transgender patients to their existing caseloads.

Graduate programs are now more commonly offering curriculum that includes gender-affirming voice therapy. Specialty trainings also exist for professionals, she added.

It's rare, but possible, to pair voice therapy with surgery. Such surgery can shorten and change the shape of the vocal cords.

But first, the process for voice modification therapy begins with a meeting with a laryngologist to assess a patient's vocal health.

The next meeting is with the speech pathologist, to talk about quality of life and goals.

After that, there are typically 10 (give or take a few) 30- to 45-minute sessions. Lichtenstein works with her patients on understanding and controlling airflow, inflection patterns, pitch, resonance and location of sound.

"I approach it with this scientific vocal health standpoint and work from sound level to word level to sentence level, to reading and conversation," Lichtenstein said.

"And I provide a lot of support for the patients along the way," Lichtenstein continued. "What we're doing is really personal. The voice is really personal. It's very tied to sense of self and sense of identity."

Gender-affirming voice therapy is more frequently sought out by people who are trans-feminine than those who are trans-masculine, Lichtenstein noted.

The reason is because the testosterone taken to transition from feminine to masculine thickens the vocal cords, which can alter and lower the voice. That does not happen when taking female hormones such as progesterone and estrogen.

However, Lichtenstein does see trans-masculine patients who opt out of hormone therapy and want to learn how to use their changing voices or have other issues arise.

A matter of safety

For Toumpas, the decision to do voice therapy was both aesthetic and for safety reasons. She didn't want to experience discrimination or abuse by transphobic people. Her goal was not to be in one of the higher-resonating ranges, but to sound like Greek female singers whose voices she admired.

"I had a lot of aesthetic thoughts about my gender and how I wanted to play with my voice and Anna was very cool in working on those things on the fly," Toumpas said.

A lot of transgender and non-binary people have the shared experience of feeling like their bodies are not truly theirs, said Olivia Hunt, policy director for the National Center for Transgender Equality, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy organization that works to make the United States a safer and friendlier place for transgender people.

For many who pursue medical transition, aligning their body with how they view themselves is a crucial part of living their lives, Hunt said.

It's a matter of dignity and self-actualization, but also an issue of personal safety, Hunt added.

The organization's 2015 survey found that nearly half of all transgender people in America reported being discriminated against, harassed or treated with violence.

"Having other ways to protect yourself to not be outed, not have your transgender status revealed to people that you're interacting with on a casual basis, it can be a safety concern because if your voice is outing you while you're out at the store buying groceries that can lead to completely unnecessary harassment from total strangers who decided that they just want to make life difficult for the trans person," Hunt said.

Hunt also noted that transgender individuals have higher than average unemployment rates, which can also mean lack of access to insurance or limited insurance, making it harder to pay for gender-affirming care, including voice therapy.

Lichtenstein said she always tries to ensure her patients have all the resources they need in place for other gender-affirming services they need, depending on where they're at in their journey, as well as to help them navigate insurance.

She bills to insurance for her sessions, but how well the therapy is covered varies widely by plan and policies that insurance companies make about what care they'll cover. That's an issue the Ohio State team tries to change directly by approaching companies to offer presentations detailing the care and the need for it.

Proposed laws may also affect this type of healthcare for those who need it. Ohio, for example, has two bills proposed in its legislature that would affect the LGBTQ community, including one that would prevent transgender minors from accessing any gender-affirming healthcare if it passes.

"I have teenagers on my caseload who come to me for voice every week and they are who they say they are and all the healthcare services that they are seeking out are services that they need," Lichtenstein said. "So, I think it is very scary that that could potentially become something that is illegal in Ohio."

More information

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association has more on gender-affirming voice therapy.

Copyright © 2022 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

Canadian Astronomers detect fast radio burst with rare heartbeat-like pulse


The CHIME telescope, located in British Columbia, first detected a rare heartbeat-like fast radio burst called FRB 20191221A in 2019. 

File Photo courtesy of the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment

July 13 (UPI) -- Astronomers have detected a fast radio burst billions of light-years from Earth that is 1,000 times longer than average and has a periodic, repeating pattern akin to a heartbeat, according to a study published Wednesday.

Scientists first discovered the radio burst -- officially dubbed FRB 20191221A -- in 2019 using the Canadian Hydrogen Intensity Mapping Experiment interferometric radio telescope in British Columbia.

Daniele Michilli, a postdoctoral researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, said the FRB immediately drew his attention because of how unusual it was.

Michilli first led the discovery of the FRB while as a researcher at McGill University.

"This detection raises the question of what could cause this extreme signal that we've never seen before, and how can we use this signal to study the universe," said Michilli, one of the study's co-authors. "Future telescopes promise to discover thousands of FRBs a month, and at that point we may find many more of these periodic signals."

FRBs typically last a few milliseconds, but this one lasts up to 3 seconds and includes a burst of radio waves that repeat every 0.2 seconds in a pattern similar to a heartbeat.

Researchers wrote in their study -- published Wednesday in the journal Nature -- that it is the longest-lasting FRB with the clearest periodic pattern detected to date.

The source of FRB 20191221A is several billion light-years away from Earth, though researchers aren't sure where exactly it comes from. They believe it could be either a radio pulsar or magnetar, both types of neutron stars. Neutron stars are the dense, rapidly spinning, collapsed cores of giant stars.

"There are not many things in the universe that emit strictly periodic signals," Michilli said.

"Examples that we know of in our own galaxy are radio pulsars and magnetars, which rotate and produce a beamed emission similar to a lighthouse. And we think this new signal could be a magnetar or pulsar on steroids," Michilli said.

According to a news release from MIT, researchers hope to record more periodic signals from the source of the FRB as it moves away from Earth. Doing so could help astronomers better measure the rate at which the universe is expanding using the FRB as an astrophysical clock.

"This detection raises the question of what could cause this extreme signal that we've never seen before, and how can we use this signal to study the universe," Michilli said. "Future telescopes promise to discover thousands of FRBs a month, and at that point we may find many more of these periodic signals."

Survivors of mass shootings push for 'real change' in rally at U.S. Capitol

Families and survivors of mass shootings demonstrate outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., Wednesday in a March Fourth rally to ban assault weapons. Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo

July 13 (UPI) -- Families and survivors impacted by recent mass shootings across the country marched in Washington, D.C., Wednesday demanding a ban on assault weapons.

The group March Fourth, founded by survivors of the Highland Park, Ill., shooting on July 4, organized the peaceful march to the U.S. Capitol. Demonstrators cried as they walked together in bright orange shirts, in honor of gun violence awareness, chanting "enough is enough."

"I was tired of feeling helpless and trapped as an American citizen raising kids who aren't safe in schools, at concerts, at parades," said Kitty Brandtner, who founded March Fourth. "I just wanted to stand together and scream at the top of our lungs and beg for real change."

Family members and survivors of mass shootings, including the attack in Highland Park, where seven people were killed during a Fourth of July parade and Uvalde, Texas, where the gunman killed 19 children and two adults at an elementary school in May, took turns sharing their stories and demanding lawmakers ban assault weapons.

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"The majority of Americans don't believe civilians should have access to assault weapons. Why is it so hard to pass legislation on this?" Brandtner said to the crowd.

"If there is one question that should be on the forefront of law enforcement minds, what if the gunman never had access to an assault weapon?" said Kimberly Rubio, whose 10 year-old daughter was killed in the Uvalde shooting.

Organizers of March Fourth said the bipartisan Safer Communities Act, signed into law last month by President Joe Biden, does not go far enough. The law requires more in-depth background checks for gun buyers under age 21.

RELATED VP Kamala Harris calls on Congress to renew Clinton-era assault weapons ban

Ashley O'Brien, who works in Highland Park and traveled to Washington with family and friends, said she is not convinced lawmakers are willing to take action.

"It's simpler than they think. Ban assault rifles now. Pass universal background checks," O'Brien said. "It won't solve everything. But it is a big first step that has to happen, and it has to happen before more people need to experience the trauma of a mass shooting."

RELATED Senate advances bipartisan gun violence bill

March Fourth rally to ban assault weapons

A young girl participating in the March Fourth rally to ban assault weapons holds a "Uvalde Strong" sign outside the Senate office buildings at the Capitol in Washington, D.C., on July 13, 2022. 

Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo