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Draper made a robotic insect that can fly. 🦋🐝🐞 - they call it the DragonflEye | #djiphantom4 #djiglobal #uav #gopro #3drobotics #djiinspire1 #quadcopter #miniquad #djiphantom3 #robotics #robot #aerialphotography #fpv #drones #hexacopter #octocopter #tricopter #djiphantom #arduino #hobbyking #drone #multirotor #dronephotography #rcplane #spacex #sparkfun #adafruit #nasa #raspberrypi #mavicpro (at West Hollywood, California)

Bats from a single cave in China have all the building blocks of a SARS epidemic

When it struck, the contagion spread fiercely. The deadly severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) outbreak in South China in 2002 infected thousands, and ultimately killed nearly 800 people.

But where did this lethal strain come from? We may now have our answer, with a study showing bats living in a single cave in China possess all the building blocks of the deadly SARS coronavirus – and potentially the means to create a new one.

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences spent five years analysing SARS viruses found in multiple species of horseshoe bats nesting in a cave in China’s Yunnan Province.

In all, the team identified 11 new strains of SARS virus carried by the bats, and a genomic analysis of these – along with strains from the same cave identified in previous research – revealed something interesting.

Previous research had suggested bat viruses could have been responsible for SARS, but scientists had never uncovered evidence of a direct ancestor to the human-infecting coronavirus in bat strains.

In the new research, that held true again – none of the viruses from the cave by themselves displayed the genetic traits of the SARS coronavirus that spread to humans, infecting more than 8,000 people during the 2002-2003 emergency.

But together, it was a different story. In this one cave, there were enough genetic ingredients among the strains to build the virus that kills humans.

“Importantly, all of the building blocks of SARS-CoV genome, including the highly variable S gene, ORF8 and ORF3, could be found in the genomes of different SARSr-CoV strains from this single location,” the researchers explain in their paper.

Hypothetically speaking, the team suggests it’s possible – even probable – that if the right strains mixed with one another in the cave, you’d end up with the direct ancestor of a virus that can infect and kill people.

The findings are reported in PLOS Pathogens.

If you want to study better and learn faster or even teach, using the Feynman Technique is good starting point!

Also Today in Godsmack History: The Enemy

“The Enemy” is the last single from the album IV released on October 31, 2006; six years to the day after the release of their album Awake. The song landed a spot on the Mainstream Rock Tracks at number four, just like Godsmack’s previous single “Shine Down”. “The Enemy” is performed at almost every show on the band’s “IV Tour”, and was also the official theme song for WWE’s 2006 SummerSlam PPV. This song was also included on the THQ video game, WWE SmackDown vs. Raw 2007. “The Enemy” is Jason MacDonald’s most recent entrance theme in UFC Championship.

According to lead singer Sully Erna, the song is about a guy who was his friend. When Godsmack became popular, the guy was going with Erna to clubs and parties. They quit hanging out as much but the guy continued to go out to places where people knew that he knew the band. He would hang out in the VIP rooms and tell people that Godsmack was coming. Toward the end of the night, he would make up an excuse as to why Godsmack wasn’t showing up. Sully Erna felt betrayed by somebody using his name and image to acquire their own fame.

https://www.youtube.com/embed/aF_unlvjccA?feature=oembed&enablejsapi=1&origin=https://safe.txmblr.com&wmode=opaque

Christopher Columbus: What Really Happened

Biggest collection of dinosaur footprints found on Australian coast

Paleontologists have published a description of one of the best collections of dinosaur footprints on Earth from a stretch of beach on the northern coast of Western Australia. They include one of the largest dinosaur footprints known, as well as the first fossil evidence of stegosaurs in Australia.

Dinosaur footprints exposed on a Western Australia beach prove to be part of the most abundant track sites on Earth. Some are among the largest ever found.

Image by Steven Salisbury et al.

Outrage after Kyrgyzstan reburies its only ancient mummy

Scientists have called for Kyrgyzstan’s only mummy to be immediately dug back up after the 1,500-year-old relic was taken from a museum and hastily reburied on the eve of a presidential election in a decision celebrated by self-professed psychics.

The female mummy was put back in the ground in mid-October in the same dusty corner of southern Kyrgyzstan where it was discovered in 1956 after a sudden ruling by a state commission.

The decision was made despite strong opposition from the only archaeologist on the commission and culture minister Tugelbai Kazakov, who played the decisive role in the call, resigned on Saturday. 

Kazakov said the mummy had been largely neglected by scientists and the country lacked the finances to keep it in good condition. Read more.