French bakers unable to earn their crust protest energy price hikes

Issued on: 24/01/2023 

AFP - THOMAS SAMSON

A protester holds a cardboard cutout of a coffin with the words "Artisan baker killed by France" during a march in Paris on January 23, 2023. 

Text by: Amanda Morrow with RFI

French bakers on Monday staged an angry march through the streets of Paris to demand the government step up financial support to compensate for hikes in electricity bills and the cost of raw materials such as flour, sugar and butter.

Bakers are among the small French businesses not protected by government-imposed tariff caps on energy prices. As a result they complain their months bills have multiplied by up to 10 times the normal amount.

Calling for "tariff caps for all", the Collective for the Survival of Bakers and Crafts led a procession of bakers from Place de la Nation, in the east of the capital, to the Finance Ministry in Bercy.

"There have been significant increases in the cost of raw materials since September, while electricity bills have already closed down the most fragile businesses," co-founder of the collective, Frederic Roy, told Sud Radio.

Roy wants bakers to benefit from the same 15 percent tariff cap the government has granted to individual households.

Businesses battling

Bakers say they’ve been forced to drastically reduce their margins, laying off staff and putting up the price of baguettes in order to cope.

While the government has put in place various aid packages for the country’s 33,0000 bakers, those in the industry say most are missing out because the process of accessing aid is too complicated.

Catherine Maillard, who managers a bakery in the upmarket Paris suburb of Levallois-Perret told Europe 1 radio that 80 percent of bakers were not even eligible for aid. How an African pastry chef brought Chadian chic to Paris

Meanwhile Vincent Chartier, a baker from the north-western town of Mayenne, said passing on huge prices increases to customers would be detrimental to the business.

"If we doubled the price of a baguette, we would sell fewer baguettes - and if we sell fewer baguettes we need fewer employees," Chartier told France Bleu.

Without the usual margins, Chartier said his business could not invest in new equipment, upgrade existing machines or buy new molds.

Union steps in

According to a report by RMC, the CGT energy union in the southern city of Marseille has been providing bakers in distress with 60 percent cheaper electricity.

Conceding the practice of "manipulating the meter" fell foul of the law, the union said the move remained "completely moral" even if it was "completely illegal".

Despite widespread anger from bakers in regions across France, the president of the National Confederation of French Bakeries, Dominique Anract, confirmed he was not among those protesting.France’s bakers to get tax leeway to offset soaring energy bills

French bakers enjoyed more government support than bakers elsewhere in the world, Anract told Ouest-France.

"We are working with the presidents of our 96 federations to explain the aid, the terms and conditions, everything we can do," Anract said, adding that negotiations with the government were still ongoing.

"People have the right to demonstrate, but many of them are not informed and think it is complicated. It's case by case."

UK
Security guards to join huge day of strikes

Feb 1

Alan Jones, PA Industrial Correspondent
Wed, 25 January 2023 at 1:45 am GMT-7

Security guards are the latest group of workers planning to strike next week on what will be the biggest day of industrial action in decades.

Members of the IWGB union working for contractors at London university UCL will walk out on February 1 as part of a campaign for a wage rate of £15 an hour.

On the same day, teachers, train drivers, civil servants and university lecturers will be on strike in worsening disputes over pay, jobs and conditions.


The TUC is also organising nationwide events on February 1 to protest against the Government’s controversial planned law on making unions agree to provide minimum levels of service during industrial action.

Unions believe the planned legislation would lead to workers being sacked even if they had lawfully voted to strike.

Industrial unrest has been growing for months across the country involving rail workers, nurses, other NHS staff, teachers, civil servants, council workers and others.

Some union leaders have been pressing for co-ordinated action to try to break deadlocked disputes and believe that February 1 could be the start of a wave of different groups of workers going on strike on the same day.


Unions involved in next week’s walkouts are the National Education Union, the Public and Commercial Services union, the University and College Union, the Rail, Maritime and Transport union, and Aslef.

The Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) has announced that its members working as outsourced security guards at UCL will also strike on February 1.

Henry Chango Lopez, general secretary of IWGB said: “UCL’s use of outsourcing is outdated and exploitative.

“Workers face systemic discrimination in the form of poor pay and treatment from their subcontractors, and are ignored and belittled when they demand change.”

NHS pay dispute shows no sign of ending as North West ambulance workers strike

Ella Pickover, PA Health Correspondent
Tue, 24 January 2023

NHS pay dispute shows no sign of ending as North West ambulance workers strike

Almost 2,000 ambulance staff have embarked on another day of strike action as the bitter dispute over pay for NHS staff shows no sign of being resolved.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on Monday that he is not able to “wave a magic wand” and that giving pay rises to striking staff would lead to money being taken away from “elsewhere in the NHS budget”.

But he insisted that the Government would continue to “engage in dialogue with the unions”.

It comes as almost 2,000 ambulance workers in the North West of England have begun a fresh strike.

The GMB union said that paramedics, emergency care assistants and call handlers began their 24-hour walkout just after midnight on Tuesday morning.

“North West ambulance workers are angry,” said GMB representative and North West Ambulance Service paramedic Paul Turner.

“Instead of talking about pay for this year to resolve this dispute, ministers are demonising us and belittling our efforts to save lives.

“The NHS is collapsing, yet we have been waiting two weeks today for another meeting with ministers.

“The only way to solve this dispute is a proper pay offer. We are waiting.”

It is the second day of strike action for ambulance staff in the region after members of the Unison and Unite unions walked out on Monday.

North West Ambulance Service said that “resources will be severely restricted” as it urged the public to only call with life-threatening emergencies.

On Monday, the Prime Minister told ITV News: “Taking a step back, of course it would be lovely to be able to wave a magic wand and just give everyone what they were demanding when it came to pay.

“But my job as Prime Minister is to make the right decisions for the country, and they are, more often than not, not easy decisions.

“But that’s my job, and that’s what I will always do in this job, and… when you think about this, how would we pay for these things? Where’s the money going to come from?

“Actually, it’s probably going to have to come from elsewhere in the NHS budget, and that means fewer nurses, fewer doctors, fewer MRI scanners and CT scanners that are diagnosing people with cancer or indeed fewer mental health ambulances that we’re announcing today that are going to save people from going to A&E.

“My job is to balance all of those things and do what I believe is right for the country.”

But he said the Government would continue talks with unions.

(PA Graphics)

It follows a day of strikes by thousands of ambulance workers across England and Wales on Monday.

Combined walkouts in early February could lead to the biggest walkouts the NHS has ever experienced.

Thousands of nurses and ambulance workers are due to stage walkouts on February 6 if no deal has been reached by then.

And as nurses take strike action on February 7, they will be joined by midwives in Wales.

Members of the Royal College of Midwives in Wales are to stage an eight-hour walkout from 8am to 4pm but will provide “bank holiday cover” for women in labour.

Health Secretary Steve Barclay has described “constructive talks with unions about this coming year’s pay process for 2023/24”, but unions have been calling for the 2022/23 pay award to be reviewed.

Teacher strikes: How do teachers' salaries compare across Europe?

Servet Yanatma

Tue, 24 January 2023 

Teachers are often hailed as heroes that are to be celebrated, but in many countries across Europe, they're feeling undervalued and are even taking to the streets.

Thousands of schools in England and Wales are set to close in February after teachers' unions voted to strike.

In Hungary, thousands of teachers marched in Budapest late last year, calling for higher salaries and urgent reforms from the government following strikes in September. Around 50 teachers have even been fired for "civil disobedience" after staging walkouts.

It's part of a wider picture of malaise in education, with a growing teacher shortage spreading across Europe. In France, there are currently 4,000 vacancies, with the latest estimates in Germany suggesting a shortfall of 25,000 teachers by 2025.

• Which countries have the most strikes in Europe and what is the impact on the economy?

The situation is largely due to working conditions, including stagnant wages that are being exacerbated by the cost of living crisis.

So, how much are teachers paid in Europe? Which countries pay teachers the most and the least? And how much have teacher salaries changed in the last decade?

There are significant differences in teacher salaries across European countries.

The official annual gross starting salaries in public schools in lower secondary education (ISCED 2) ranged from around €4,233 in Albania to €69,076 in Luxembourg in 2020/2021, according to country data compiled by the European Commission/EACEA/Eurydice.

The average pay for teachers across European Union (EU) countries is €25,055.

Teachers in France and Italy earn half what they do in Germany

Leaving aside Luxembourg, the annual starting salary was above €50,000 in just two countries, namely Switzerland (€66,972) and Germany (€54,129).

The annual salary in France and Italy was less than half the German figure.

Bulgaria had the lowest annual starting teacher salary among EU countries, at €7,731. The figure is also below €10,000 in several other EU countries such as Latvia, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Poland.

The purchasing power standard (PPS) is “an artificial currency unit” defined by Eurostat, where one PPS unit can theoretically buy the same amount of goods and services in each country. Looking at salaries in PPS irons out some of the cost of living differences between countries, but there are still wide disparities.

• Doctors' salaries: Which countries pay the most and least in Europe?

• UK nursing strikes: Which countries pay nurses the most and the least in Europe?

Teacher salaries seen through this lens ranged from 7,824 PPS in Albania to 50,357 PPS in Germany. While the annual gross starting salary of teachers is generally between 20,000 and 30,000 PPS, it is still below 20,000 PPS in 10 EU countries: Estonia, Malta, Czechia, Romania, Greece, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, Latvia and Slovakia respectively.

The Balkan countries Montenegro and North Macedonia, which are outside the EU, have higher teacher salaries in PPS than several EU countries. Surprisingly, Turkey ranks significantly better in PPS (28,455) than in nominal salary (€8,330): while it ranked 28th out of 36 countries in nominal figures, it came 11th in PPS.

How do European teachers’ salaries compare to the minimum wage?

The ratio of teacher salaries to minimum wage shows how much teachers earn compared to the minimum wage in each country. The ratio is calculated by dividing the gross teacher salary by the gross minimum wage.

That ratio is the highest in Germany, with 2.8, whereas Poland has the lowest ratio with 1.1.

In other words, the starting salary of teachers in Poland is very close to the minimum wage, while teachers starting in German state schools earn nearly three times the minimum wage.

The average ratio across 21 EU countries is 1.86 while it is just 1.4 in France and Greece.

In most European countries, teachers who start working in state schools also earn, on average, significantly less than the national gross domestic product (GDP) per capita.

Their annual gross statutory starting salary was higher than the GDP per capita in just seven out of 36 countries. The highest ratio of salary to GDP per capita was recorded in North Macedonia with 1.28, whereas it was the lowest in Ireland with 0.45.

While Germany is one of the countries with the highest GDP per capita in Europe, the ratio is 1.26, meaning that junior teachers still earn more than the average GDP per capita. In contrast, this ratio is just 0.71 in France.

How have teacher salaries changed in the last decade?

The latest Eurydice report also provides figures for the 2009/2010 period. At the time, the annual gross starting salaries of teachers varied from €2,743 in Romania to €63,895 in Luxembourg.

The average across 26 EU countries was €19,563 in 2009/2010. However, it was below €5,000 in six EU countries, namely Slovakia (€4,824), Poland (€4,462), Lithuania (€4,275), Latvia (€4,166), Bulgaria (€2,761) and Romania (€2,743).

In other EU countries, it generally ranged from €18,000 to €30,000 while starting salaries in Germany and Denmark were over €35,000.

The change in annual gross starting salaries of teachers between 2009/2010 and 2020/2021 was the highest in Lithuania, where wages rose by 269 per cent in those 11 years. Recent EU member states Romania and Bulgaria also saw dramatic increases in teacher salaries over the last decade, of 193 and 180 per cent respectively.

The starting teacher salary also rose by 42 per cent in Germany, which already had the second highest salary in the 2009/2010 period. The change was below 10 per cent in six EU countries - Cyprus, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Slovenia and Luxembourg.

Turkey is the only country on the list where starting teaching salaries decreased over the decade, falling by €876, or 10 per cent, likely due to the collapse of the Turkish lira in recent years.

In nominal terms, Iceland saw the annual gross starting salaries of teachers rise by €25,720 between 2009/2010 and 2020/2021, the highest increase among the countries studied, followed by Germany (€15,915) and Sweden (€15,135).

Starting salaries also rose by more than €10,000 in Austria, Lithuania and Denmark.

• Pension reform in France: Which countries have the lowest and highest retirement ages in Europe?

Are teachers satisfied with their salaries?

The short answer is no.

According to the Teaching and Learning International Survey (TALIS) in 2018, on average only 26 per cent of teachers in OECD countries and economies participating in TALIS thought their work was valued by society, and 39 per cent were satisfied with their pay.

How much have countries spent on education?

In 2020, general government expenditure on education in the EU amounted to €671 billion, or 5 per cent of GDP.

The EU countries spending the highest share of GDP on education were Sweden (7 per cent), Belgium and Estonia (6.6 per cent), followed by Denmark (6.4 per cent) in the EU.

Outside of the bloc, Iceland spent 7.7 per cent of its GDP on education. The lowest levels of expenditure on education as a share of GDP were seen in Ireland (3.1 per cent), Romania (3.7 per cent), and Bulgaria (4 per cent).

• Oxford topped the World University Rankings 2023. Where else in Europe made the cut?

How many pupils do teachers look after?

In the EU, the average number of pupils per teacher at primary level was 13.6 in 2020 but once again, there are significant country-by-country variations.

The lowest ratios - which some would call ideal - were registered in Greece (8.4), Luxembourg (8.9), and Hungary (10), whereas the United Kingdom (19.9), Romania (19.2) and France (18.4) had the highest average number of pupils per teacher.

The pupil-teacher ratio is calculated by dividing the number of full-time equivalent pupils by the number of full-time equivalent teachers.

A worrying shortage of teachers

Last but not least, there is a worrying shortage of teachers in European countries.

More than 30,000 teacher positions remained unfilled in Germany at the beginning of this academic year.

There is a shortage of 20,000 teachers in Poland and 16,000 in Hungary, and the French Ministry of Education stated that 4,000 of some 27,300 new teacher positions remain vacant.

Earth’s core might be reversing its spin. It ‘won’t affect our daily lives,’ expert says

Sergei Korsakov/AP

Brendan Rascius
Mon, January 23, 2023 

Earth’s inner core, a red-hot ball of iron 1,800 miles below our feet, stopped spinning recently, and it may now be reversing directions, according to an analysis of seismic activity.

The discovery indicates that the Earth’s center regularly pauses and reverses its rotation, researchers in China wrote in a study published Jan. 23 in the journal Nature Geoscience.

“We show surprising observations that indicate the inner core has nearly ceased its rotation in the recent decade and may be experiencing a turning back in a multidecadal oscillation, with another turning point in the early 1970s,” Dr. Yi Yang and Dr. Xiaodong Song, scientists at Peking University, wrote in the study.

Just as the Earth spins, the planet’s inner core turns, though not necessarily at the same speed, and some research indicates the core moves faster, according to the National Science Foundation. The inner core can spin independently because it is encased in a liquid outer core, similar to an egg yolk inside the more fluid egg white.


By analyzing earthquake data from across the globe over the last 28 years, researchers confirmed that the inner core’s rotation relative to the Earth’s mantle — the bulk of the planet’s interior between the core and the outer crust — had ceased around 2009, according to a story about the study in Nature Geoscience.

Additionally, their findings suggests the inner core may be in the process of reversing the direction of its spin, leading researchers to hypothesize a pattern.

“We infer the inner core rotation changes direction every 35 years,” Dr. Song told McClatchy News.

Why exactly this phenomenon occurs is not clear to researchers. The gravitational and magnetic forces that factor into the inner core’s movement are likely partly responsible, they said.

Importantly, their findings also imply a strong connection between the crust, the thin surface slice that we inhabit, and the deepest parts of the globe, researchers said.

The core’s multi-decade rotational pattern “coincides with several important geophysical observations,” researchers wrote, including changes in the magnetic field and the length of the day, meaning the inner workings of the planet could impact the duration of our days.

Still, we have no reason to be concerned, as these changes will not be noticeable to us, researchers said.

“The phenomenon does not affect our daily lives,” Dr. Song said.

Though more research is needed, these results represent another step in the process of unraveling the complex mechanisms of the inner Earth, an untraversable inferno that remains very difficult to study.

Earth's inner core may have started spinning other way: study

Daniel Lawler
Mon, January 23, 2023 


Far below our feet, a giant may have started moving against us.

Earth's inner core, a hot iron ball the size of Pluto, has stopped spinning in the same direction as the rest of the planet and might even be rotating the other way, research suggested on Monday.

Roughly 5,000 kilometres (3,100 miles) below the surface we live on, this "planet within the planet" can spin independently because it floats in the liquid metal outer core.

Exactly how the inner core rotates has been a matter of debate between scientists -- and the latest research is expected to prove controversial.

What little is known about the inner core comes from measuring the tiny differences in seismic waves -- created by earthquakes or sometimes nuclear explosions -- as they pass through the middle of the Earth.

Seeking to track the inner core's movements, new research published in the journal Nature Geoscience analysed seismic waves from repeating earthquakes over the last six decades.

The study's authors, Xiaodong Song and Yi Yang of China's Peking University, said they found that the inner core's rotation "came to near halt around 2009 and then turned in an opposite direction".

"We believe the inner core rotates, relative to the Earth's surface, back and forth, like a swing," they told AFP.

"One cycle of the swing is about seven decades", meaning it changes direction roughly every 35 years, they added.

They said it previously changed direction in the early 1970s, and predicted the next about-face would be in the mid-2040s.

The researchers said this rotation roughly lines up with changes in what is called the "length of day" -- small variations in the exact time it takes Earth to rotate on its axis.

- Stuck in the middle -

So far there is little to indicate that what the inner core does has much effect on surface dwellers.

But the researchers said they believed there were physical links between all Earth's layers, from the inner core to the surface.

"We hope our study can motivate some researchers to build and test models which treat the whole Earth as an integrated dynamic system," they said.

Experts not involved in the study expressed caution about its findings, pointing to several other theories and warning that many mysteries remain about the centre of the Earth.

"This is a very careful study by excellent scientists putting in a lot of data," said John Vidale, a seismologist at the University of Southern California.

"(But) none of the models explain all the data very well in my opinion," he added.

Vidale published research last year suggesting that the inner core oscillates far more quickly, changing direction every six years or so. His work was based on seismic waves from two nuclear explosions in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

That timeframe is around the point when Monday's research says the inner core last changed direction -- which Vidale called "kind of a coincidence".

- Geophysicists 'divided' -

Another theory -- which Vidale said has some good evidence supporting it -- is that the inner core only moved significantly between 2001 to 2013 and has stayed put since.

Hrvoje Tkalcic, a geophysicist at the Australian National University, has published research suggesting that the inner core's cycle is every 20 to 30 years, rather than the 70 proposed in the latest study.

"These mathematical models are most likely all incorrect because they explain the observed data but are not required by the data," Tkalcic said.

"Therefore, the geophysical community will be divided about this finding and the topic will remain controversial."

He compared seismologists to doctors "who study the internal organs of patients' bodies using imperfect or limited equipment".

Lacking something like a CT scan, "our image of the inner Earth is still blurry", he said, predicting more surprises ahead.

That could include more about a theory that the inner core might have yet another iron ball inside it -- like a Russian doll.

"Something's happening and I think we're gonna figure it out," Vidale said.

"But it may take a decade."

dl/gil

The mysterious iron ball at the center of the Earth may have stopped spinning and reversed direction


Chris Panella,Morgan McFall-Johnsen
Tue, January 24, 2023 

A 3D rendering of the Earth's layers, including its inner core.Getty Images

Earth's inner core may have paused and reversed its spin, a new study suggests.

Earthquakes and nuclear blasts can send seismic waves through the mysterious solid-iron core.

Those waves hint that the core changed direction in the 1970s, and may be undergoing another reversal today.

Living on Earth's surface, we only see about 0.5% of the planet. Deep below the crust, then the hot rock mantle, then the liquified outer core, lies one of our planet's biggest mysteries: the solid iron core at the center.

That iron ball — Earth's inner core — may have recently stopped rotating, then reversed direction for no apparent reason, a new study found.

That may sound apocalyptic, but don't worry. Scientists don't think it will significantly change life on the surface, except by befuddling them.

"It's probably benign, but we don't want to have things we don't understand deep in the Earth," John Vidale, a geophysicist at the University of Southern California, told The Washington Post.

Published in the journal Nature Geoscience on Monday, the peer-reviewed research suggests that the solid inner core of the Earth could experience changes in its rotation every several decades.

Clues from earthquakes and nuclear blasts hint at a change around 2009

The light from an atomic bomb test explosion is reflected in the waters of Enewetak Atoll on May 30, 1956.STR New / Reuters

Scientists can't look directly at the inner core, but they can get hints of its activities from powerful earthquakes and Cold War nuclear-weapons tests, which have sent seismic waves reverberating through the center of the Earth.

Those deep seismic waves have shown that the core is mostly composed of pure, solid iron and nickel, and that it may spin a little faster than the rest of the Earth.

If the inner core was inert, spinning in line with the outer layers of the planet, similar waves should travel similar paths through it. But over time, the movement of those waves changes, indicating that the core itself is changing. Spinning is one of the leading explanations for these seismic mismatches.

The new study throws a wrench in the core's spin. It looks closely at seismic waves from the 1960s to the present day. The researchers found a quirk starting in 2009: In the last decade, the paths of similar seismic waves did not change. That suggests the inner core may have stopped spinning around that time.

Data from two pairs of nuclear blasts hint at a similar pause around 1971, with the core spinning eastward afterwards, leading the researchers to believe that the inner core may pause and reverse its spin about every 70 years.

The theory is that Earth's magnetic field pulls the inner core and causes it to spin, while the gravitational field of the mantle creates a counter force, dragging on the inner core. Every few decades, one force may win out over the other, changing the spin of the great iron ball.

The inner core is a major mystery, and we may never solve it

An artist's conception of the different layer's of our planet, including the crust, mantle, and inner and outer cores.Getty

Explaining these quirks in the seismic record is difficult, and involves speculation, since there is so little information about the inner core.

Another explanation is that the surface of the inner core is changing over time, rather than the whole iron ball spinning. Lianxing Wen, a seismologist at Stony Brook University, discussed this theory in a 2006 paper and still stands by it today. He told The Washington Post that would explain the pauses in 1971 and 2009.

"This study misinterprets the seismic signals that are caused by episodic changes of the Earth's inner core surface," Wen told the Post.

The new study may help shed further light on the mysterious nature of the inner core and how it interacts with Earth's other layers. It could be a long time before scientists piece together the full picture, though — if they ever do.

"It's certainly possible we'll never figure it out," Vidale told The New York Times.

An illustration of Earth's core.Getty

Still, he said, "I'm an optimist. The pieces are going to fall into place someday."

Until then, Vidale and his colleagues will just keep listening to seismic waves that travel from one side of the planet to the other, straight through the iron core that the 

3,600-year-old hoards may contain the earliest silver currency in Israel and Gaza

Tom Metcalfe
Mon, January 23, 2023 




The hacksilver hoard from Tell el-ʿAjjul in Gaza is the earliest known example of silver used as currency by weight in the region, about 3,600 years ago.

Ancient silver hoards from Israel and Gaza, which contain not coins but irregularly cut pieces of the precious metal, may be the earliest known silver currency in the region and likely came from the faraway regions of what is now Turkey and Europe, a new study suggests.

These newly analyzed hoards date to about 1550 B.C., hundreds of years earlier than other discoveries of silver currency in what is now Israel and Gaza, the researchers said. However, not everyone agrees that this is a new finding, with some experts noting that other research has already found that silver currency was being used during the Middle Bronze Age in this region.

The practice of using cut silver as currency may be a sign that administrators in the region — part of the "southern Levant" — were more numerically literate than their predecessors, which enabled them to accurately measure the weight of silver when making payments.

"We know that the Middle Bronze Age is a period of [making] large ramparts and fortifications," Tzilla Eshel, an archaeologist at the University of Haifa, told Live Science. "But how do you pay your workers?"

It's possible that workers would have been paid an agreed-upon weight of silver, following the practice already in use in the northern Levant, a region now covered by Lebanon and Syria, Eshel and her colleagues reported in the new study, published in the January issue of the Journal of Archaeological Science.

The practice of exchanging silver by weight for other objects of value was also common during the Viking Age in Europe, where silver for this purpose came to be known as "hacksilver" (or "hacksilber").

"The use of silver as currency [in the southern Levant] came in this period because it was needed," Eshel said, "[and] there was a big enough organization that could manage it."

Related: 10 dazzling gold and silver treasures dug up in 2022

Ancient silver

Eshel and her colleagues studied 28 pieces of silver from four hoards found at Bronze Age archaeological sites: one from Gezer in the Judaean Mountains, one from a tomb at Megiddo in northern Israel, one from Shiloh in the West Bank, and one from Tell el-ʿAjjul in Gaza.

The authors reported that the silver hoards from Gezer, Shiloh and Tell el-ʿAjjul were not found alongside silversmith tools — a fact that they interpreted as evidence that the hoards were being used only for exchange, and not to create other silver objects.

That indicated that weights of silver had been used as a currency in the region since at least the approximate date of those hoards, which span from 1600 B.C. to 1550 B.C., Eshel said.

"There would have been different means of exchange, which is always true," she said. But "silver was the means of reference … so if you wanted to value your wheat, or to value your textiles, you would have valued them in silver shekels." A shekel was an ancient measurement of weight, in use since Mesopotamian times, that was equal to just over a third of an ounce, or about 9.6 grams.

Silver sources

Eshel and her colleagues also attempted to determine the origins of the silver in the hoards by studying their chemical impurities and isotopes — variations in the number of neutrons in the nuclei of particular elements, which change over time at known rates due to radiation.

The analysis revealed signs of a widespread transition between sources in about 1200 B.C., possibly from silver mined in Anatolia — now Turkey — to silver mined in southeastern Europe, which was then brought to the Levant by long-distance trade.

The silver of later origin was surprisingly similar to silver found in famous graves from the Bronze Age Mycenaean culture in Greece; these burials might have the same silver source as the hoard from Tell el-ʿAjjul, the researchers said.

Related stories

—3,000-year-old Canaanite temple discovered in buried city in Israel

—Ancient Egyptian hoard of counterfeit 'dirty money' unearthed

—King Solomon's mines were abandoned and became a desert wasteland. Here's why.

"As the silver items from Tell el-ʿAjjul are isotopically similar to silver from the [Mycenaean] Shaft Graves, it is possible that both contemporaneous assemblages originated from the same source," the authors wrote in their study.

Raz Kletter, an archaeologist at the University of Helsinki who has studied ancient economies and silver hoards from the Levant but was not involved in the new research, told Live Science in an email that the new study "advances our knowledge." However, he said scholars had pointed out 20 years ago that silver must have been used for weight economy since the late Middle Bronze period in the southern Levant, based on studies of the same hoards.

Kletter is also concerned that hoards found without metalworking tools were interpreted in the study as being only for exchange. "We cannot identify the owners," he said, "and the places where hoards are hidden ... do not necessarily tell us about their origins."

Stunning CT scans of 'Golden Boy' mummy from ancient Egypt reveal 49 hidden amulets

Jennifer Nalewicki
Mon, January 23, 2023 

A mummy wearing a gilded face mask.

Incredibly detailed computed tomography (CT scans) of the so-called "Golden Boy" mummy from ancient Egypt have revealed a hidden trove of 49 amulets, many of which were made of gold.

The young mummy earned its nickname because of the dazzling display of wealth, which included a gilded head mask found in the mummy's sarcophagus. Researchers think he was about 14 or 15 years old when he died because his wisdom teeth had not yet emerged.

The Golden Boy was originally unearthed in 1916 at a cemetery in southern Egypt and has been stored in the basement of The Egyptian Museum in Cairo ever since. The mummy had been "laid inside two coffins, an outer coffin with a Greek inscription and an inner wooden sarcophagus," according to a statement.

While analyzing the scans, the researchers found that the dozens of amulets, comprised of 21 different shapes and sizes, were strategically placed on or inside his body.

Those included "a two-finger amulet next to the [boy’s] uncircumcised penis, a golden heart scarab placed inside the thoracic cavity and a golden tongue inside the mouth," according to the statement.

Related: Ancient Egyptian mummification was never intended to preserve bodies, new exhibit reveals

The mummy was also wearing a pair of sandals, and a garland of ferns was draped across his body, according to the statement.

"This mummy is a showcase of Egyptian beliefs about death and the afterlife during the Ptolemaic period," Sahar Saleem, the study's lead author and a professor of radiology at the Faculty of Medicine, Cairo University in Egypt, told Live Science in an email.

While researchers aren't sure of the mummy's true identity, based on the grave goods alone, they think he was of high socioeconomic status.

The amulets served important roles in the afterlife.

A series of images, including CT scans of a mummy.

"Ancient Egyptians believed in the power of amulets … and they were used for protection and for providing specific benefits for the living and the dead," Saleem said. "In modern science, this is explained by energy. Different materials, shapes and colors (e.g. crystals) provide energy with different wavelengths that could have [an] effect on the body. Amulets were used by ancient Egyptians in their lives. Embalmers placed amulets during mummification to vitalize the dead body."

For example, the teenage mummy's tongue was capped in gold "to enable the deceased to speak" and the sandals "were to enable the deceased to walk out of the tomb in the [afterlife]," Saleem said.

However, one amulet in particular stood out to Saleem: the golden heart scarab placed inside the torso cavity. She wound up creating a replica of it using a 3D printer.

"It was really amazing especially after I 3D printed [it] and was able to hold it in my hands," Saleem said. "There were engraved marks on the back that could represent the inscriptions and spells the priests wrote to protect the boy during his journey. Scarabs symbolize rebirth in ancient Egyptians and [were] in the form of a discoid (disc-shaped) beetle."

RELATED STORIES

—Hundreds of mummies and pyramid of an unknown queen unearthed at Saqqara

—Gold tongues found in 2,000-year-old mummies in Egypt

—7 famous mummies and secrets they've revealed about the ancient world

She added that the heart scarab measured about 1.5 inches (4 centimeters) and was inscribed with verses from "The Book of the Dead," an important ancient Egyptian text that helped guide the deceased in the afterlife.

"It was very important in the afterlife during judging the deceased and weighing of the heart against the feather of Maat (the goddess of truth)," Saleem said. "The heart scarab silenced the heart [on] judgement day so not to bear witness against the deceased. A heart scarab was placed inside the torso cavity during mummification to substitute for the heart if the body was ever deprived [of] this important organ for any reason."

The findings were published Jan. 24 in the journal Frontiers of Medicine.

Maybe rats didn't spread the Black Death after all, new evidence suggests


Samuel Cohn

THE CONVERSATION
Tue, January 24, 2023

A large number of black rats swarming all over each other.

The Black Death ravaged Europe between 1347 and 1353, killing millions. Plague outbreaks in Europe then continued until the 19th century.

One of the most commonly recited facts about plague in Europe was that it was spread by rats. In some parts of the world, the bacterium that causes plague, Yersinia pestis, maintains a long-term presence in wild rodents and their fleas. This is called an animal "reservoir."

While plague begins in rodents, it sometimes spills over to humans. Europe may have once hosted animal reservoirs that sparked plague pandemics. But plague could have also been repeatedly reintroduced from Asia. Which of these scenarios was present remains a topic of scientific controversy.

Our recent research, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), has shown that environmental conditions in Europe would have prevented plague from surviving in persistent, long-term animal reservoirs. How, then, did plague persevere in Europe for so long?

Our study offers two possibilities. One, the plague was being reintroduced from Asian reservoirs. Second, there could have been short- or medium-term temporary reservoirs in Europe. In addition, the two scenarios might have been mutually supportive.

However, the rapid spread of the Black Death and subsequent outbreaks of the next few centuries also suggest slow-moving rats may not have played the critical role in transmitting the disease that is often portrayed.

European climate

To work out whether plague could survive in long-term animal reservoirs in Europe, we examined factors such as soil characteristics, climatic conditions, terrain types and rodent varieties. These all seem to affect whether plague can hold on in reservoirs.

For example, high concentrations of some elements in soil, including copper, iron, magnesium, as well as a high soil pH (whether it is acidic or alkaline), cooler temperatures, higher altitudes and lower rainfall appear to favour the development of persistent reservoirs, though it is not entirely clear why, at this stage.

Based on our comparative analysis, centuries-long wild rodent plague reservoirs were even less likely to have existed from the Black Death of 1348 to the early 19th century than today, when comprehensive research rules out any such reservoirs within Europe.

This contrasts sharply with regions across China and the western US, where all the above conditions for persistent Yersinia pestis reservoirs in wild rodents are found.

In central Asia, long-term and persistent rodent reservoirs may have existed for millennia. As ancient DNA and textual evidence hints, once plague crossed into Europe from central Asia, it appears to have seeded a short- or medium-term reservoir or reservoirs in European wild rodents. The most likely place for this to have been was in central Europe.

However, as local soil and climatic conditions did not favour long-term and persistent reservoirs, the disease had to be re-imported, at least in some instances. Importantly, the two scenarios are not mutually exclusive.
Radical difference

To go deeper into the role of rats in spreading plague in Europe, we can compare different outbreaks of the disease.

The first plague pandemic began in the early sixth century and lasted until the later eighth century. The second pandemic (which included the Black Death) began in the 1330s and lasted five centuries. A third pandemic began in 1894 and remains with us today in places such as Madagascar and California.

These pandemics overwhelmingly involved the bubonic form of plague, where the bacteria infect the human lymphatic system (which is part of the body’s immune defences). In pneumonic plague, the bacteria infect the lungs.

The plagues of the second pandemic differed radically in their character and transmission from more recent outbreaks. First, there were strikingly different levels of mortality, with some second pandemic outbreaks reaching 50%, while those of the third pandemic rarely exceeded 1%. In Europe, figures for the third pandemic were even lower.

Young steppe marmot in natural reserve

Second, there were different rates and patterns of transmission between these two plague epochs. There were massive differences in the frequency and speed of transporting goods, animals, and people between the late middle ages and today (or the late 19th century). Yet the Black Death and many of its subsequent waves spread with astonishing speed. Over land, it raced almost as fast each day as the modern outbreaks do over a year.

As described by contemporary chroniclers, physicians, and others – and as reconstructed quantitatively from archival documents – the plagues of the second pandemic spread faster and more widely than any other disease during the middle ages. Indeed they were faster than in any period until the cholera outbreaks from 1830 or the great influenza of 1918-20.

Regardless of how the various European waves of the second pandemic began, both wild and non-wild rodents – rats, first and foremost – move much slower than the pace of transmission around the continent.

Third, the seasonality of plague also shows wide discrepancies. Plagues of the third pandemic (except for the rare ones, principally of pneumonic plague) have closely followed the fertility cycles of rat fleas. These rise with relatively humid conditions (although lower rainfall is important for plague reservoirs to first become established) and within a temperature band between 10°C and 25°C.

By contrast, plagues of the second pandemic could cross winter months in bubonic form, as seen across the Baltic regions from 1709-13. But in Mediterranean climes, plague from 1348 through the 15th century was a summer contagion that peaked in June or July – during the hottest and driest months.

This deviates strikingly from plague seasons in these regions in the 20th century. Because of the low relative humidity and high temperatures, these months were then the least likely times for plague to break out among rats or humans.

These differences raise a crucial question about whether the bubonic form of the plague depended on slow-moving rodents for its transmission when instead it could spread much more efficiently directly, from person to person. Scientists have speculated that this could have occurred because of ectoparasites (fleas and possibly lice), or through people’s respiratory systems and through touch.

Questions such as the precise roles played by humans and rats in past plague pandemics need further work to resolve. But as shown by this study, and others, major steps forward can be made when scientists and historians work together.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Bigger population, smaller carbon footprint: Can Canada have both?

Having more people means more heating, lighting, and general demand for energy

Jeff Lagerquist
Tue, January 24, 2023

Experts hope immigration-fuelled population growth will create economies of scale for Canada's energy transition. (GETTY)

Canada's population is rising at the quickest pace since the height of the post-war baby boom as Ottawa targets almost 1.5 million new permanent residents by the end of 2025. That's good news for a nation with an aging workforce and stubbornly-tight labour market. But what about reaching net-zero by 2050? Can a larger Canada achieve meaningfully lower emissions?

Simple math suggests more people means more heating, lighting, and general demand for energy. Owing partly to its large geography, dispersed population, and wide range of temperatures, Canada had the worst per-capita lifestyle-related carbon emissions record by far in a recent analysis of 10 economies spanning various income levels.

At the same time, the nation's population is booming. Statistics Canada data show Canada is growing at the fastest clip since the second quarter of 1957. International migration accounted for 94 per cent of the 362,453-person increase seen in the third quarter, according to the agency. This sent the national population above 39 million for the first time.

Growth is set to pick up in the coming years. Ottawa's annual immigration plan released in November calls for 465,000 permanent residents in 2023, 485,000 in 2024, and 500,000 in 2025 to counter "critical labour market shortages causing uncertainty for Canadian businesses and workers."

"I think the government's preference is to think about immigration to enhance the economy, and then enable green investment," Bruce Newbold, a professor at McMaster University's School Of Earth, Environment & Society, said in an interview. "There are challenges, yes, in terms of that relationship between immigration and energy use."

Andrew Leach, an energy and economics professor at the University of Alberta, says it's essential to consider both sides of the supply-demand equation when it comes to Canada's immigration-fuelled population growth. Immigrants add to the labour supply, but also push up demand through increased consumption.

"One of those demand items is also going to be energy. All else equal, more energy consumption will mean more emissions," he told Yahoo Finance Canada.

"But I think you need to include consideration of where we need to end up re: net-zero, which is rapid decarbonization of household and transportation energy use."

Last April, the Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC) released a report calling for swift action by world leaders to avoid the worst potential impacts of the climate crisis. Canada was identified as one of the highest per-capita emissions producers among developed countries, alongside Australia and the United States.

It’s going to take a lot more investment to meet these goals.Bruce Newbold, professor at McMaster University’s School Of Earth, Environment & Society

In late-2021, Royal Bank of Canada pegged the cost of transitioning Canada's economy to net-zero emissions at $2 trillion over the next 30 years. The bank's report calls the 13-digit sum "hefty," but "affordable." Of course, that was some time before widespread calls for a recession in 2023.

Among today's headwinds for Canada's economy is a persistent skilled labour shortage, which factors into scarce affordable housing in cities where new immigrants typically settle. The situation prompted the federal government last week to bolster a program for construction workers who have overstayed work permits or visas to become permanent residents.

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation figures released earlier this month show urban housing starts actually declined year-over-year in 2022. Meanwhile, Statistics Canada data show cities seeing their strongest population growth in over two decades.

Mike Moffatt, senior director of policy and innovation at the Smart Prosperity Institute, says building affordable urban density will help lower emissions through more efficient buildings and less reliance on cars.

"Size does matter," he said. "It's one of the reasons larger population cities tend to have a lower carbon footprint [per capita]."

On top of the housing supply issue, Moffatt says Canada lacks the labour capacity to hit ambitious green building retrofit targets set by Ottawa.

"If we do it right, bringing in more of a skilled workforce actually helps us make those investments," he said. "Adding more people doesn't necessarily make the situation better, but it provides the raw ingredients."

Moffatt says new residents in regions like Quebec, where electricity is virtually emissions-free and EVs are more popular than average, will be inclined to have a smaller carbon footprint. However, he also expects those who settle in areas where more fossil fuel is needed to play an important role.

"Let's say we had a bunch of people locate in rural Saskatchewan. Ironically, that actually might make it easier for Saskatchewan to make investments in new power generation, and close existing coal plants," he said. "The analysis gets kind of complex."

Leach sees climate-friendly economies of scale kicking in as Canada's population grows.

"As we move toward vehicle and home electrification, and decarbonization of our electricity supply, adding more people doesn't change the trajectory much," he said. "Insofar as we have more distributed energy storage, generation, and demand response, more people add more flexibility to our power systems."

Leach also notes that some of Canada's worst-emitting sectors, like oil and gas production, are export-oriented, and therefore subject to the whims of global markets more so than forces within Canada.

"More domestic immigration doesn't really change the global market for Canadian commodities," he said.

For McMaster professor Newbold, the correlation is clear. Canada's population must get bigger before its economy can become greener.

"If we don't have immigration, our economy is not going to prosper, and we're not going to be able to pay for those investments that we need in order to make a green economy," he said.

"It's going to take a lot more investment to meet these goals."

Jeff Lagerquist is a senior reporter at Yahoo Finance Canada. Follow him on Twitter @jefflagerquist.

NASA and DARPA will test nuclear thermal engines for crewed missions to Mars

The agencies hope to demonstrate the tech as soon as 2027.


NASA/DARPA


Kris Holt
·Contributing Reporter
Tue, January 24, 2023

NASA is going back to an old idea as it tries to get humans to Mars. It is teaming up with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to test a nuclear thermal rocket engine in space with the aim of using the technology for crewed missions to the red planet. The agencies hope to "demonstrate advanced nuclear thermal propulsion technology as soon as 2027," NASA administrator Bill Nelson said. "With the help of this new technology, astronauts could journey to and from deep space faster than ever — a major capability to prepare for crewed missions to Mars."

Under the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) program, NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate will take the lead on technical development of the engine, which will be integrated with an experimental spacecraft from DARPA. NASA says that nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) could allow spacecraft to travel faster, which could reduce the volume of supplies needed to carry out a long mission. An NTD engine could also free up space for more science equipment and extra power for instrumentation and communication.

As far back as the 1940s, scientists started speculating about the possibility of using nuclear energy to power spaceflight. The US conducted ground experiments on that front starting in the '50s. Budget cutbacks and changing priorities (such as a focus on the Space Shuttle program) led to NASA abandoning the project at the end of 1972 before it carried out any test flights.

There are, of course, risks involved with NTP engines, such as the possible dispersal of radioactive material in the environment should a failure occur in the atmosphere or orbit. Nevertheless, NASA says the faster transit times that NTP engines can enable could lower the risk to astronauts — they could reduce travel times to Mars by up to a quarter. Nuclear thermal rockets could be at least three times more efficient than conventional chemical propulsion methods.

NASA is also looking into nuclear energy to power related space exploration efforts. In 2018, it carried out tests of a portable nuclear reactor as part of efforts to develop a system capable of powering a habitat on Mars. Last year, NASA and the Department of Energy selected three contractors to design a fission surface power system that it can test on the Moon. DARPA and the Defense Department have worked on other NTP engine projects over the last few years.

Meanwhile, the US has just approved a small modular nuclear design for the first time. As Gizmodo reports, the design allows for a nuclear facility that's around a third the size of a standard reactor. Each module is capable of producing around 50 megawatts of power. The design, from a company called NuScale, could lower the cost and complexity of building nuclear power plants.