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Mysterious Amazonian ‘ghost dog’ caught on camera
Hidden deep in the forests of Bolivia and Peru is a species so mysterious it has been dubbed the “ghost dog.” The short-eared dog (Atelocynus microtis) has been deemed one of the region’s least-known carnivores, if not one of the world’s least-known canids, period.
After almost a quarter-century of work, researchers finally have gathered new data on this highly cryptic wild dog. Their results, published in the journal Neotropical Biology and Conservation, shed light on the short-eared dog, revealing something particularly unexpected.
“The most surprising aspect of the results was that despite being an almost mythical beast, short-eared dogs are much more abundant than we had imagined,” the team said in a statement, though they still don’t qualify as “common.”
Researchers carried out 34 intensive camera-trap surveys throughout the lowland regions of Bolivia and Peru for over 25 years. This yielded 594 individual photographs, revealing the ghost dog’s large head, small round ears, short legs, long bushy tail, and a dark coat swinging from reddish-brown to blackish gray. The little dog also has partially webbed paws, which isn’t seen in other amazonian canids.
Based on camera-trap data, the team estimates they have a population density of 15 dogs per 38.61 square miles. This indicates that they are not as sparse as researchers had anxiously theorized. The species is likely more abundant than larger carnivores in the area such as jaguars, but there are less of them than medium-sized carnivores such as ocelots (Leopardus pardalis).
This study is a “wonderful example of how conservation technology and remote sensing – in this case the intensive use of camera traps—can provide substantial data on one of the least known species of the Amazonian rainforests,” said Robert Wallace, a conservation scientist at the Wildlife Conservation Society and lead-author of the study. He and his colleagues also found that the species is most active between 6 a.m. and noon.
While the dog’s webbed toes might make you think of an aquatic animal, the species is a “true forest specialist,” according to the statement, demonstrating a significant preference for upland forests far from rivers. Their preference for these dense habitats is a significant reason why humans see so few of these wild dogs—in addition to their secretive nature and excellent hearing and sense of smell, which has allowed them to stay away from people.
As always in conservation, the more scientists learn about a species, the better equipped they are to protect them. According to the paper, the relative abundance of short-eared dogs was higher in national protected areas and overlapping Indigenous territories, as opposed to unprotected areas. The creation and successful management of protected areas is exceedingly important for the conservation of the species.
The post Mysterious Amazonian ‘ghost dog’ caught on camera appeared first on Popular Science.
How blue whales became Earth’s largest creature—ever
Think of the largest elephant you can. Now multiply that by 30. That’s the size of a blue whale, the largest animal to exist, ever. The ocean-going mammals weigh up to 330,000 pounds and can stretch over 100 feet, the length of a Boeing 737. Even the biggest dinosaur only weighed something like 75 tons, less than half the weight of a blue whale.
But what caused blue whales to grow to such an extraordinary size? It all comes down to living in water and feeding on tiny shrimp-like creatures called krill.
The constraints of gravityOn land, the maximum size mammals can reach is limited by gravity. Large land mammals have huge bones, massive blood vessels, and strong legs to support their weight.
As animals get bigger, their weight increases much faster than the strength of their bones. At a certain point, an increase in size would lead an especially large animal’s legs to collapse under the weight of gravity.
In water, gravity doesn’t have the same effect. Instead, the buoyancy of water helps support the weight of aquatic mammals: a key factor in how blue whales reached their enormous size.
The energy sweet spotBut there is more to the story of how blue whales got so dang big.
Craig McClain, a professor of biodiversity at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, compared almost 7,000 living animals and fossils to analyze factors that affect size. He discovered that water doesn’t just reduce the force of gravity, it pushes warm-blooded mammals to grow.
Water conducts heat away from the body much faster than air so mammals need to be larger otherwise it’s impossible to stay warm. At the same time, as bodies increase in size, the energy needed to fuel them rises.
“What we found is that aquatic mammals are drawn toward an optimal body size, because of energetic tradeoffs,” he says. Their ideal size is a careful balance between how much energy they use weighed against how fast they feed. It’s not simply becoming as big as possible. “The ‘sweet spot’ is where [energy] income comfortably exceeds costs.” An aquatic mammal can only become huge if it feeds on enough food to offset the demands of a larger body.
Eating dense swarms of krill has led blue whales to become largerBlue whales are able to grow much larger than other aquatic mammals because they feed on krill.
Krill are only about 2 inches long and swim slowly in tightly packed swarms. To take advantage of this, blue whales have developed huge mouths and a highly expandable throat pouch beneath their skin, so they can lunge forward and swallow enormous amounts of krill in one gulp. They’re capable of eating up to 794 pounds of krill in one mouthful. That’s the equivalent to roughly 16 vending machines.
The pouch is formed by deep folds that stretch from the bottom of their jaw to their navel, creating a stretchy extension of their mouth that balloons out to accommodate such a large intake.
Blue whales are able to eat the equivalent of 16 vending machines worth of krill in a single gulp. Video: See Blue Whales Lunge For Dinner in Beautiful Drone Footage, National GeographicBut lunging for food takes a lot of energy. “This feeding strategy only becomes energetically worthwhile at large body sizes,” says Elliott Hazen, an ecologist at NOAA Fisheries. “Blue whales survive on tiny prey because they have developed one of the most efficient bulk feeding systems in the natural world.”
To test how efficiently they can feed, Jeremy Goldbogen, a professor of oceans at Stanford, used motion recording sensors to measure the swimming speed, dive patterns, and acceleration of 256 blue whales as they lunged toward their prey.
When Goldbogen modeled the energy cost of each lunge against the energy gained from krill, he found that a single mouthful of krill can give blue whales more than 200 times as much energy as they use. That’s a really good payoff.
Blue whales are built for migrationBut the whales’ size doesn’t just help as they feed, it also allows them to travel long distances. Krill can only be found in large numbers in isolated areas of the ocean so blue whales journey thousands of miles between their feeding and breeding grounds.
Their massive bodies means they can store huge amounts of energy as fat even when they’re not feeding. So even though blue whales end up using more energy than smaller animals, they burn it more slowly, at least relative to their size. This gives them even greater endurance.
A streamlined shape also reduces drag so they can move through the oceans with minimal energy.
Whales weren’t always giantsBlue whales haven’t always been so big. Fossil records show their ancestors, the Pakicetus, were wolf-sized land mammals that were only three to six feet long. This ancient ancestor actually lived on land and hunted in shallow water.
When the first whales appeared in the ocean around 40 million years ago, they were also a relatively modest size. For instance, one of the earliest known whales, Mystacodon selenensis, was only around 13 feet long, roughly the same size as a bottlenose dolphin.
Then, around 3 million years ago, the oceans changed. As massive ice sheets spread across the earth, temperatures dropped and wind patterns increased. This led to an increase in upwelling, a process where strong winds cause nutrient-rich water to rise up from the deep ocean. The extra nutrients led krill to cluster in dense swarms along coastlines favoring animals that could feed in bulk and travel long distances.
“Blue whales did not just get big because they could,” says McClain. “They got big because the ocean started serving food in a way that rewarded giants.”
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Could whales get even bigger?Blue whales are now close to the limit of how large they can grow. As animals get bigger, their heart works harder to pump blood to the extremities, oxygen delivery becomes more difficult, and reproduction slows down.
In a 2019 study, researchers measured the heart rate of a blue whale using a small heart monitor. Whales can’t breathe as they dive so they slow their heart to reduce the oxygen they use and increase the time they can stay underwater. During deep dives the whale’s heart rate slowed to as low as two beats per minute, the minimum needed to keep vital organs alive.
Bigger blue whales would also demand more krill and at some point the energy cost would become unsustainable. They wouldn’t be able to consume enough krill to get the energy they needed.
“Although the ocean allows whales to become larger than any land animal in Earth’s history, biology and physics likely place an upper limit on how large they can evolve to be,” says Hazen.
So the next time you spot something moving through the waves, consider how the blue whale became a giant: an ocean changed by ice, a body shaped by water, and a feeding strategy built around swallowing tiny krill. Together those factors produced an animal whose size surpasses all other creatures on earth.
In Ask Us Anything, Popular Science answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.
The post How blue whales became Earth’s largest creature—ever appeared first on Popular Science.
The Promise of Polymath LLMs
I have long associated with smart nerdy folks with broad interests, especially re tech/future. Groups like “extropians”, “rationalists” and “effective altruists”. While there are many smart nerdy amateur groups who focus on rather concrete topics, like old cars or poker, the folks I’ve like have had a “taste for abstraction”. They like more to reason abstractly, and so over time have collected many abstractions to help them reason. This seems to me a key common element across the diverse topics they like.
When such people are nearer to academia, they tend more to learn established abstractions from academic disciplines. Others tend more to collect abstractions from online thinkers, who more often invent their own new abstractions, instead of using established ones. Such novel abstractions are generative, adding to our innovation in abstractions. But they also tend to be less reliable, leading such thinkers more often astray. Academics, in contrast, are slower to adopt new abstractions, as they hold new proposals to higher standards.
This is my main criticism of the communities collected around these online thinkers. I like them personally, but think they too often go wrong by inventing new abstractions, and then overly trusting these due to their trusting folks inside their community much more than outsiders. In particular, I think such folks have been led astray by new abstractions re AI risk; they’d do better with vetted abstractions from biology, culture, or economics.
I’m now an academic, though I was once an amateur. Over my lifetime, I have been tempted into many diverse topic areas, due to their immediate interest to me. This induced me to learn many new-to-me-but-standard abstractions. As a result I’ve stumbled into a polymath lifetime strategy: the more fields I learn, the more intersections I find where I can apply the tools of one field to the problems of another.
As a result my productivity has increased over time, even though I’m getting old; knowing N fields empowers me to look for N(N-1)/2 intersections between fields. Most of my contributions have been applying stuff we know in some areas to other areas. And note how this approach allows you to be a pretty reliable contrarian. Contrary approaches within a discipline tend to be wrong more often than just applying established abstractions from other disciplines to this one. As folks inside each discipline tend to resist accepting corrections from other disciplines, that will make you a contrarian, at least for a time.
Oddly, few people plan when young to adopt such a polymath life strategy. I think this is in part because we find it hard to believe that other fields besides where we started actually know a lot. When we feel that our intuitions seem adequate to guide practical action in an area of life like romance or physics, we find it hard to see that there could be that much to learn about it. I have been surprised by just how powerful are the abstractions that I’ve learned from areas outside my early life focus areas, and how much more productive I’ve become by learning them.
Academia neglects interdisciplinary work that combines insights from multiple areas. Each field has expert versions which experts use among themselves, and public versions seen by outsiders, and people in field B won’t accept your using the expert version of A if that differs from the non-expert version of A that B folks have in mind. Also, if you hold an academic event on the topic of A intersect B, you’ll usually invite the most prestigious people you can get in A, and in B, but you won’t usually invite people who have specialized in A intersect B, as they will tend to be as prestigious.
Thus humanity’s beliefs on many important topics have long been just inconsistent and incoherent across disparate fields of inquiry. Creating a huge opportunity to learn lots of big stuff fast: search for more contradictions between fields, and resolve them. And as humans have long neglected this opportunity, this may now be a promising option for LLMs, who seem to know quite a lot on a very wide range of topics.
Thus we might get a huge burst of progress soon if only we could get LLMs to look carefully at pairs of distant areas, ask if what they know about those two areas are in conflict, and if so substitute new more consistent views. Use the new better consensus views to lather, rinse, and repeat. Of course I’m sure there will be many obstacles to making this work in practice. Maybe LLMs just aren’t able to reason well enough yet in such cases. But maybe we should try?
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8 captivating photos of Delaware Bay’s annual horseshoe crab spawn
Few creatures wear the mantle of deep time as visibly as Limulus polyphemus, better known as the Atlantic horseshoe crab. To walk through the gravelly shores of the Delaware Bay or the back-bay shallows near Ocean City, New Jersey during the high spring tides of June is to witness a gathering unchanged since the Triassic.
Horseshoe crabs draw tracks in the sand with their six pairs of legs. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Here, the ancient arthropods—who have existed for roughly 445 million years—assemble for their great spawning. Under the gravitational pull of the full moon, king tides cue the helmet-shaped crabs to emerge from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean. The females, robust and broad-carapaced at nearly two feet in length, plow into the damp sand at the water’s edge. They then deposit thousands of eggs beneath the slurry of the surf.Each tiny, colorful orb is barely larger than a mustard seed.
Horseshoe crabs deposit their egg clusters in the sand, but disturbances from waves, shorebirds and crawling crabs bring loose eggs to the surface where they become easy picking for migratory shorebirds. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.The process works like a precise biological clock, and at dawn, the cycle shifts away from the horseshoe crabs and to the daytime feeders. As the crabs deposit millions of these fatty and nutritious eggs, thousands of migratory shorebirds arrive from the sky. Many of these birds have flown thousands of miles up from the southern tip of Patagonia, only to touch down upon these precise Northeast shorelines. Among them is the Rufa red knot (Calidris canutus rufa), a master of the air executing an annual 9,000-mile odyssey to its Arctic breeding grounds.
A red knot in breeding plumage stalks the shoreline as crabs crawl ashore to spawn. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Throughout their long journey, red knots can remain airborne for up to a week straight, burning stored energy and losing nearly half of their body mass in the process. The tiny horseshoe crab eggs are an immediate, vital fuel source, allowing the knots to double their weight in a matter of days.
Developing eggs become translucent before the larvae hatch into miniature versions of the adults minus the telson. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Over the past eight years, New Jersey photographer Susan Allen has captured these spawnings. “The quiet Delaware Bayshore becomes globally significant to the survival of many species each spring,” Allen tells Popular Science. “Hopefully this natural wonder will continue to happen.”
One female crab can be surrounded by a dozen males trying to spawn with her. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Yet, this ancient convergence faces immediate threats. Climate change is warming bay waters and intensifying storms. In some years, the warmer water has prompted horseshoe crabs to spawn earlier in the season, throwing off the timing that red knots depend on when they arrive to feed on crab eggs.
Red knots stopover at the Delaware Bay during horseshoe crab spawning season to refuel on eggs and hopefully double their weight. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.At the same time, horseshoe crabs have faced mounting pressure from commercial harvest. They are widely used as inexpensive bait in whelk and eel fisheries, and are also collected for the pharmaceutical industry. During the 1990s, harvest numbers surged: in just five years, annual take rose from about 100,000 crabs to 2.5 million.
Horseshoe crabs use their telson to flip themselves over when they get turned upside down. A spiral was drawn by this unsuccessful crab before it perished. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.But against these modern pressures, the endurance of this bird-arthropod partnership remains a profound marvel of prehistoric connection, forged over hundreds of millions of years. The bay is still coming alive as ancient crabs meet the arriving birds in the middle of their long migration.
Just like scorpions, horseshoe crabs exhibit biofluorescence under UV light. They also have blue blood that is capable of detecting bacterial contamination. Their blood is harvested by the biomedical industry to test for contamination in vaccines and medical devices, but a synthetic alternative has been developed. Eli Lily has transitioned to using the synthetic alternative for 80 percent of its endotoxin testing. Image: Susan Allen/ @what.sue.seas.The post 8 captivating photos of Delaware Bay’s annual horseshoe crab spawn appeared first on Popular Science.
8 captivating photos of Delaware Bay’s annual horseshoe crab spawn
Few creatures wear the mantle of deep time as visibly as Limulus polyphemus, better known as the Atlantic horseshoe crab. To walk through the gravelly shores of the Delaware Bay or the back-bay shallows near Ocean City, New Jersey during the high spring tides of June is to witness a gathering unchanged since the Triassic.
Horseshoe crabs draw tracks in the sand with their six pairs of legs. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Here, the ancient arthropods—who have existed for roughly 445 million years—assemble for their great spawning. Under the gravitational pull of the full moon, king tides cue the helmet-shaped crabs to emerge from the depths of the Atlantic Ocean. The females, robust and broad-carapaced at nearly two feet in length, plow into the damp sand at the water’s edge. They then deposit thousands of eggs beneath the slurry of the surf.Each tiny, colorful orb is barely larger than a mustard seed.
Horseshoe crabs deposit their egg clusters in the sand, but disturbances from waves, shorebirds and crawling crabs bring loose eggs to the surface where they become easy picking for migratory shorebirds. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.The process works like a precise biological clock, and at dawn, the cycle shifts away from the horseshoe crabs and to the daytime feeders. As the crabs deposit millions of these fatty and nutritious eggs, thousands of migratory shorebirds arrive from the sky. Many of these birds have flown thousands of miles up from the southern tip of Patagonia, only to touch down upon these precise Northeast shorelines. Among them is the Rufa red knot (Calidris canutus rufa), a master of the air executing an annual 9,000-mile odyssey to its Arctic breeding grounds.
A red knot in breeding plumage stalks the shoreline as crabs crawl ashore to spawn. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Throughout their long journey, red knots can remain airborne for up to a week straight, burning stored energy and losing nearly half of their body mass in the process. The tiny horseshoe crab eggs are an immediate, vital fuel source, allowing the knots to double their weight in a matter of days.
Developing eggs become translucent before the larvae hatch into miniature versions of the adults minus the telson. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Over the past eight years, New Jersey photographer Susan Allen has captured these spawnings. “The quiet Delaware Bayshore becomes globally significant to the survival of many species each spring,” Allen tells Popular Science. “Hopefully this natural wonder will continue to happen.”
One female crab can be surrounded by a dozen males trying to spawn with her. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.Yet, this ancient convergence faces immediate threats. Climate change is warming bay waters and intensifying storms. In some years, the warmer water has prompted horseshoe crabs to spawn earlier in the season, throwing off the timing that red knots depend on when they arrive to feed on crab eggs.
Red knots stopover at the Delaware Bay during horseshoe crab spawning season to refuel on eggs and hopefully double their weight. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.At the same time, horseshoe crabs have faced mounting pressure from commercial harvest. They are widely used as inexpensive bait in whelk and eel fisheries, and are also collected for the pharmaceutical industry. During the 1990s, harvest numbers surged: in just five years, annual take rose from about 100,000 crabs to 2.5 million.
Horseshoe crabs use their telson to flip themselves over when they get turned upside down. A spiral was drawn by this unsuccessful crab before it perished. Image: Susan Allen/@what.sue.seas.But against these modern pressures, the endurance of this bird-arthropod partnership remains a profound marvel of prehistoric connection, forged over hundreds of millions of years. The bay is still coming alive as ancient crabs meet the arriving birds in the middle of their long migration.
Just like scorpions, horseshoe crabs exhibit biofluorescence under UV light. They also have blue blood that is capable of detecting bacterial contamination. Their blood is harvested by the biomedical industry to test for contamination in vaccines and medical devices, but a synthetic alternative has been developed. Eli Lily has transitioned to using the synthetic alternative for 80 percent of its endotoxin testing. Image: Susan Allen/ @what.sue.seas.The post 8 captivating photos of Delaware Bay’s annual horseshoe crab spawn appeared first on Popular Science.
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Why summer flies by as an adult—but lasted forever when you were 10
Do you remember the last day of school before summer break? The clock ticking down to the end of the day, and then that wild, wonderful feeling of freedom? You have all summer to do literally anything you want.
Cut to summers in adulthood, where you blink and suddenly there are Halloween decorations up. What gives? Why do summers seem to last forever when you’re growing up but only a couple of days as an adult? Well in a new episode of Popular Science’s Ask Us Anything podcast, we explore just that.
Ask Us Anything answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions—from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. So, yes, there’s a reason you can’t remember being a baby, and no, venomous dinosaurs likely weren’t a thing. If you have a question for us, send us a note. Nothing is too silly or simple.
This episode is based on the Popular Science article “Why did childhood summers feel endless?”
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Full Episode TranscriptSarah Durn: What’s your favorite memory of summer breaks growing up?
Alex: My favorite childhood memory of summer was doing a slip and slide at summer camp. It was an epic, epic hill, and it was really fun.
Katie: I will always remember going to the library with my mom every single day as a kid in the summer. And I think after one summer of that, I had read every single Mary-Kate and Ashley chapter book in the library.
Max: We would go to Europe for a week or two. We had a family friend who had a big house in France, so I spent a lot of my years learning to swim in a big pool in a house in France. Honestly, summer holidays felt endless to me. They went on and on, and then suddenly they stopped.
SD: Welcome to Ask Us Anything from the editors of Popular Science, where we answer your questions about our very weird world, from “What is storm chasing really like?” to “Why can’t we remember being babies?” No question is too offbeat or banal. I’m Sarah Durn, an editor at Popular Science.
Annie Colbert: And hello, I’m editor-in-chief Annie Colbert.
SD: Here at PopSci, we’re always pondering the weirdest, quirkiest questions.
AC: And this week, we’re going back in time. So Sarah, please tell us, what’s with those seemingly never-ending summer break vibes when we were kids, and why do summers seem to whiz by now that we’re adults?
SD: Well, the short answer is your brain is kind of playing tricks on you.
AC: Ugh, rude.
SD: I know, but it’s not totally in a bad way. Scientists say childhood summers may have felt longer because your brain was literally experiencing time differently.
AC: Okay, hold on. Are we talking nostalgia? Like, things felt better when I was 10 and covered in sunscreen and popsicle juice?
SD: No, not just nostalgia.
This is actually about memory, novelty, and the fact that when you’re a kid, almost everything is happening for the first time.
AC: Hmm. Okay, so first bike ride, first summer camp crush, first gross encounter with a public pool bathroom.
SD: Exactly. For good and for bad.
AC: Yes.
SD: And weirdly, all those firsts may have stretched summer in your memory.
AC: So you’re telling me that adulthood feels faster because I’ve simply seen too many Tuesdays.
SD: Yeah, kind of. We’re gonna get into why summers seem to vanish once you grow up, and whether there’s actually anything we can do to make it feel a little slower again.
AC: Yes, please. I would like August to stop arriving in like seven minutes.
SD: I know. Very much same.
Now, before we time travel back to summer vacation, we want to hear from you. What questions are keeping you curious? Is there something weird, wonderful, or wildly specific you’ve always wanted to know?
Submit your question by clicking the “Ask Us” link at popsci.com/ask. Again, that’s popsci.com/ask, and you want to click the “Ask Us” link.
AC: Yes, send us your wildly specific questions.
SD: And with that, we’ll be right back after a quick break to talk about why time starts zooming the moment you become responsible for buying your own sunscreen.
Welcome back. Okay, Annie, before we get into the science, I feel like we have to start at the beginning. What’s your favorite childhood summer memory?
AC: I definitely had a very ’90s kid summers of watching “The Price Is Right.” I would be running free in the neighborhood, eating whatever snacks I could find in our kitchen. We are not a snacks household, so it was a lot of, like, saltines and peanut butter.
And I remember one summer that my brother and I found Pong buried in our basement. Pong, of course, being one of the first video games, and he beat me something like 74 games in a row because, one, he’s six years older than I am, but also, two, I’m terrible at video games.
But it was a really fun summer. I got to hang out with him. I was free. We just did whatever we wanted.
SD: Aw. Yeah, I mean, very similar. Also love “The Price Is Right.” I would watch it all the time with my grandmother right at 11:00 a.m.. Also too, I have the same experience of playing Halo one-on-one against my brother.
AC: Yes.
SD: I’d always wanna play campaign, but he’d wanna play against me, and he’d always kill me in, like, three seconds.
AC: Yep.
SD: It was fun for him, but not so fun for me.
AC: It was just fun to be there.
SD: Yeah. I think for me, like, what I remember is less one thing. It’s more, like, the feeling of summer break.
AC: Mm.
SD: Like, school would end, and suddenly life would seem different. One day you’re doing worksheets, and then the next day, you know, total liberation.
AC: The vibes shift immediately.
SD: Immediately. Suddenly you’re sleeping in, running around outside, eating popsicles at weird hours. I remember summer just feeling huge, like I had endless time.
I’d get my summer reading list and think, “Oh, I have forever to do this.”
AC: Oh, the optimism of June.
SD: Yeah, exactly. And then August would roll around, and I’d be panic-reading some deeply boring assigned novel thinking, “Wow, nothing stretches time quite like terrible summer reading.”
AC: Yes. Honestly, reading one chapter of required summer reading felt like surviving an entire fiscal quarter now.
SD: Right?
AC: Yeah.
SD: But here’s the weird thing. As adults, summer suddenly feels absurdly short. Like, you blink and it’s somehow already Halloween.
AC: Yes. Every year I’m like, “Wait, didn’t summer just start?”
SD: Exactly. And according to researchers, this isn’t just nostalgia messing with us. Our brains genuinely experience time differently as a kid.
AC: Okay, but how? Because this all feels deeply unfair.
SD: I know. So the short answer is memory. According to time perception researcher Dr. Marc Wittmann, our sense of how long a period of time lasts mostly comes down to how much we actually remember.
AC: Wait, so childhood summers felt long because we remember more of them?
SD: Exactly. Your brain is kinda doing a retrospective highlight reel, and when you look back on a stretch of time, your brain asks, “How much happened here?” And in childhood, the answer is a ton. You know, almost everything is new. First beach trip, first sunburn, first time discovering your neighborhood ice cream truck schedule like you’re 007.
And novelty matters because new experiences are much more likely to get stored in your memory. Dr. Whitmann basically says childhood is one long parade of firsts. When something surprises us or feels emotionally meaningful, the brain flags it like, “Okay, this matters. Save this.”
AC: Hmm. So if you’re a kid, summer isn’t just long because you have time off. It feels long because your brain is recording everything.
SD: Exactly. And there’s another layer to this. Kids’ brains are actively changing while all of this is happening. Dr. Whitmann points out that every year of childhood is wildly different developmentally. You’re growing physically, emotionally, cognitively.
His point is basically every year a child is kind of becoming a new person.
AC: Which totally tracks. I look at middle school photos of myself and I’m like, “Who is she?”
SD: Oh, I know. Completely. She’s an enigma.
AC: Yes.
SD: So your childhood summers aren’t just packed with novelty, they’re happening inside a rapidly changing brain that’s super primed to encode memories, which makes those seasons feel fuller and richer in hindsight.
AC: Okay, that all makes sense, but I have to ask about the theory everyone says online, the whole, well, when you’re five, a year is 1/5th of your life, but when you’re 50 it’s 1/50th.
SD: Yeah, yeah, the math explanation. Dr. Whitmann basically says that doesn’t totally track. While it sounds intuitively satisfying, he says there’s no evidence your brain is doing that calculation.
AC: Got it.
SD: Instead, the better explanation seems to be adulthood gets repetitive. We’ve seen summers before. You know the drill, work, vacation, barbecue, suddenly September.
AC: Rude, but fair.
SD: Yeah, and because fewer experiences feel truly novel, your brain stores less information. So when you look back, there’s just less there to mark the passage of time.
The summer didn’t vanish, it just left behind fewer memory breadcrumbs.
AC: Wow. That’s kind of existential.
SD: Yeah, and it gets slightly more existential.
AC: Ooh, fantastic.
SD: I know. So Dr. Whitmann’s newer research found something surprising when he looked at memory and aging. Older adults didn’t actually describe memories as blurrier or less vivid.
In some cases, memories felt richer and more emotional. What changes is the brain becomes worse at encoding the ordinary everyday stuff.
AC: Like Tuesday.
SD: Exactly. And apparently this decline can start surprisingly early, around our 30s, and gradually ramps up, which might help explain why people suddenly wake up and go, “Wait, how has it been 10 years?”
AC: No, I reject this information.
SD: Yeah, you and me both. But there is good news.
AC: Please tell me the good news.
SD: Researchers think we can kind of hack this effect, or at least slow it down.
AC: Okay. Everybody lean in. I want to hear it.
SD: Yeah, me too. Dr. Whitmann says what matters is novelty. New places, new people, new experiences, even tiny ones.
Take a different walking route, try a weird hobby, go somewhere unfamiliar. Eat at a restaurant you keep saying you’ll try. Basically, give your brain more material.
AC: So you’re saying I just need to do more new things.
SD: Basically, but with one caveat. Dr. Whitmann warns against turning this into a to-do list. Don’t schedule every second of your Saturday trying to maximize memories, because if you’re sprinting between activities, time weirdly speeds up again. He basically recommends staying open to what comes, like wake up, pay attention to how you feel, and just kind of see where the day goes.
AC: Okay. Unexpected science-backed permission to wander around aimlessly and get iced coffee. This is actually how I’ve been navigating New York City for years, so I am glad that it is helping my memory.
SD: There you go. You’re already way ahead of the game.
Honestly, my favorite quote from Dr. Whitmann in our story was, “Emotions are basically the glue for memory.” The more emotionally meaningful something feels, the more likely it sticks.
So maybe the goal isn’t recreating childhood summers, maybe it’s making more room for experiences that feel important enough to remember, even if it’s just, you know, reading in a park.
AC: That’s beautiful.
SD: I know. Thank you, neuroscience.
AC: I’m feeling inspired to go outside and find something new.
SD: Same. And with that, we’ll be right back after this quick break.
You know, Annie, this whole conversation about memory actually reminded me of a story you recently edited by Jordan Burchette about documenting everything.
AC: Ah, yes. A story that forced me to confront the fact that my phone contains approximately 30,000 photos, many of which are screenshots I was absolutely convinced I would need later.
SD: And have you ever looked at them again?
AC: No. No. No, not really. That’s future Annie’s problem when I run out of storage.
SD: Yes. Well, according to Jordan’s reporting, psychologists actually have a name for this whole phenomenon, right?
AC: Yes, they do. It’s called cognitive offloading, which sounds like something you would do after a stressful meeting.
But really it just means using external tools to help your brain remember things.
SD: So kinda like iCalendar or Outlook remembering your appointments and meetings?
AC: Yes, absolutely. So cognitive offloading is basically letting technology act as a second brain.
SD: Which sounds kind of good?
AC: Yes. Honestly, sometimes it is.
Researchers say it can free up mental bandwidth. Instead of spending energy remembering a dentist appointment three weeks from now, your brain can focus on whatever’s happening right in front of you.
SD: Okay, so my phone is helping me become a more evolved human?
AC: No, no, no. Let’s not get carried away. Yes. Because Jordan’s story also gets into the downsides. If your brain knows information has been safely stored somewhere else, it may put less effort into remembering it.
SD: Okay, so when I take 75 photos of a concert—
AC: Yeah, your brain may decide, “Great, the camera’s got this. I’m heading out.”
Researchers even have a term for this. It’s called digital amnesia. The basic idea is that when we know the information is saved somewhere, we’re often less likely to remember it ourselves.
SD: Okay, so all those screenshots I save and never revisit might actually be making me worse at remembering things?
AC: Potentially. Although, I think the bigger issue here is that someday archaeologists are going to uncover your camera roll and wonder why humans are so obsessed with recipes they never cooked.
SD: Yes. Honestly, that’s very fair.
AC: And the experts Jordan spoke with aren’t saying that we should stop using technology. The point is that there’s a trade-off. You gain convenience and accuracy, but sometimes it’s at the cost of your own recall.
SD: Okay, so maybe the move is not documenting literally every second of our lives.
AC: Exactly. One of the researchers even suggested that a lot of us probably over-document. Sometimes it’s okay to take fewer photos, put the phone away, and just be present for the thing that’s happening.
SD: Which feels weirdly connected to everything we talked about today.
AC: It does. If childhood summers felt long because they were packed with memorable experiences, maybe we don’t need to spend every moment recording life. Maybe we need to spend a little more time actually living it.
SD: Okay. Wow. This episode has been so profound.
AC: I contain multitudes.
SD: And so many screenshots.
AC: So very many screenshots.
And that’s it for this episode. But don’t worry, we’ve got more episodes of Ask Us Anything live in our feed right now. Follow or subscribe to Ask Us Anything by Popular Science wherever you enjoy your podcasts. And if you like our show, leave a rating and a review.
SD: Do you have a favorite summer camp memory?
Let us know in the comments. Our producer is Alan Haburchak. This week’s episode was based on articles written for Popular Science by Jennifer Byrne and Jordan Burchette, and you’ll find links to read those stories in the show notes.
AC: Thank you, team. Thank you, summer camp. Thank you, “The Price is Right.” And thank all of you for listening.
SD: And one more time, if you want something you’ve always wondered about explained on a future episode, go to popsci.com/ask and click the “Ask Us” link. Until next time, follow the vibes to something unexpected or, you know, iced coffee.
AC: Iced coffee and Bob Barker. That’s my dream summer now. Little Jerry Springer sprinkled in. Boop, ba-da-boop, boop, boop.
The post Why summer flies by as an adult—but lasted forever when you were 10 appeared first on Popular Science.
Why summer flies by as an adult—but lasted forever when you were 10
Do you remember the last day of school before summer break? The clock ticking down to the end of the day, and then that wild, wonderful feeling of freedom? You have all summer to do literally anything you want.
Cut to summers in adulthood, where you blink and suddenly there are Halloween decorations up. What gives? Why do summers seem to last forever when you’re growing up but only a couple of days as an adult? Well in a new episode of Popular Science’s Ask Us Anything podcast, we explore just that.
Ask Us Anything answers your most outlandish, mind-burning questions—from the everyday things you’ve always wondered to the bizarre things you never thought to ask. So, yes, there’s a reason you can’t remember being a baby, and no, venomous dinosaurs likely weren’t a thing. If you have a question for us, send us a note. Nothing is too silly or simple.
This episode is based on the Popular Science article “Why did childhood summers feel endless?”
Subscribe to Ask Us AnythingListen and follow Ask Us Anything on your favorite podcast platform:
Spotify | Apple Podcasts | YouTube | Or wherever you get your podcasts.
Full Episode TranscriptSarah Durn: What’s your favorite memory of summer breaks growing up?
Alex: My favorite childhood memory of summer was doing a slip and slide at summer camp. It was an epic, epic hill, and it was really fun.
Katie: I will always remember going to the library with my mom every single day as a kid in the summer. And I think after one summer of that, I had read every single Mary-Kate and Ashley chapter book in the library.
Max: We would go to Europe for a week or two. We had a family friend who had a big house in France, so I spent a lot of my years learning to swim in a big pool in a house in France. Honestly, summer holidays felt endless to me. They went on and on, and then suddenly they stopped.
SD: Welcome to Ask Us Anything from the editors of Popular Science, where we answer your questions about our very weird world, from “What is storm chasing really like?” to “Why can’t we remember being babies?” No question is too offbeat or banal. I’m Sarah Durn, an editor at Popular Science.
Annie Colbert: And hello, I’m editor-in-chief Annie Colbert.
SD: Here at PopSci, we’re always pondering the weirdest, quirkiest questions.
AC: And this week, we’re going back in time. So Sarah, please tell us, what’s with those seemingly never-ending summer break vibes when we were kids, and why do summers seem to whiz by now that we’re adults?
SD: Well, the short answer is your brain is kind of playing tricks on you.
AC: Ugh, rude.
SD: I know, but it’s not totally in a bad way. Scientists say childhood summers may have felt longer because your brain was literally experiencing time differently.
AC: Okay, hold on. Are we talking nostalgia? Like, things felt better when I was 10 and covered in sunscreen and popsicle juice?
SD: No, not just nostalgia.
This is actually about memory, novelty, and the fact that when you’re a kid, almost everything is happening for the first time.
AC: Hmm. Okay, so first bike ride, first summer camp crush, first gross encounter with a public pool bathroom.
SD: Exactly. For good and for bad.
AC: Yes.
SD: And weirdly, all those firsts may have stretched summer in your memory.
AC: So you’re telling me that adulthood feels faster because I’ve simply seen too many Tuesdays.
SD: Yeah, kind of. We’re gonna get into why summers seem to vanish once you grow up, and whether there’s actually anything we can do to make it feel a little slower again.
AC: Yes, please. I would like August to stop arriving in like seven minutes.
SD: I know. Very much same.
Now, before we time travel back to summer vacation, we want to hear from you. What questions are keeping you curious? Is there something weird, wonderful, or wildly specific you’ve always wanted to know?
Submit your question by clicking the “Ask Us” link at popsci.com/ask. Again, that’s popsci.com/ask, and you want to click the “Ask Us” link.
AC: Yes, send us your wildly specific questions.
SD: And with that, we’ll be right back after a quick break to talk about why time starts zooming the moment you become responsible for buying your own sunscreen.
Welcome back. Okay, Annie, before we get into the science, I feel like we have to start at the beginning. What’s your favorite childhood summer memory?
AC: I definitely had a very ’90s kid summers of watching “The Price Is Right.” I would be running free in the neighborhood, eating whatever snacks I could find in our kitchen. We are not a snacks household, so it was a lot of, like, saltines and peanut butter.
And I remember one summer that my brother and I found Pong buried in our basement. Pong, of course, being one of the first video games, and he beat me something like 74 games in a row because, one, he’s six years older than I am, but also, two, I’m terrible at video games.
But it was a really fun summer. I got to hang out with him. I was free. We just did whatever we wanted.
SD: Aw. Yeah, I mean, very similar. Also love “The Price Is Right.” I would watch it all the time with my grandmother right at 11:00 a.m.. Also too, I have the same experience of playing Halo one-on-one against my brother.
AC: Yes.
SD: I’d always wanna play campaign, but he’d wanna play against me, and he’d always kill me in, like, three seconds.
AC: Yep.
SD: It was fun for him, but not so fun for me.
AC: It was just fun to be there.
SD: Yeah. I think for me, like, what I remember is less one thing. It’s more, like, the feeling of summer break.
AC: Mm.
SD: Like, school would end, and suddenly life would seem different. One day you’re doing worksheets, and then the next day, you know, total liberation.
AC: The vibes shift immediately.
SD: Immediately. Suddenly you’re sleeping in, running around outside, eating popsicles at weird hours. I remember summer just feeling huge, like I had endless time.
I’d get my summer reading list and think, “Oh, I have forever to do this.”
AC: Oh, the optimism of June.
SD: Yeah, exactly. And then August would roll around, and I’d be panic-reading some deeply boring assigned novel thinking, “Wow, nothing stretches time quite like terrible summer reading.”
AC: Yes. Honestly, reading one chapter of required summer reading felt like surviving an entire fiscal quarter now.
SD: Right?
AC: Yeah.
SD: But here’s the weird thing. As adults, summer suddenly feels absurdly short. Like, you blink and it’s somehow already Halloween.
AC: Yes. Every year I’m like, “Wait, didn’t summer just start?”
SD: Exactly. And according to researchers, this isn’t just nostalgia messing with us. Our brains genuinely experience time differently as a kid.
AC: Okay, but how? Because this all feels deeply unfair.
SD: I know. So the short answer is memory. According to time perception researcher Dr. Marc Wittmann, our sense of how long a period of time lasts mostly comes down to how much we actually remember.
AC: Wait, so childhood summers felt long because we remember more of them?
SD: Exactly. Your brain is kinda doing a retrospective highlight reel, and when you look back on a stretch of time, your brain asks, “How much happened here?” And in childhood, the answer is a ton. You know, almost everything is new. First beach trip, first sunburn, first time discovering your neighborhood ice cream truck schedule like you’re 007.
And novelty matters because new experiences are much more likely to get stored in your memory. Dr. Whitmann basically says childhood is one long parade of firsts. When something surprises us or feels emotionally meaningful, the brain flags it like, “Okay, this matters. Save this.”
AC: Hmm. So if you’re a kid, summer isn’t just long because you have time off. It feels long because your brain is recording everything.
SD: Exactly. And there’s another layer to this. Kids’ brains are actively changing while all of this is happening. Dr. Whitmann points out that every year of childhood is wildly different developmentally. You’re growing physically, emotionally, cognitively.
His point is basically every year a child is kind of becoming a new person.
AC: Which totally tracks. I look at middle school photos of myself and I’m like, “Who is she?”
SD: Oh, I know. Completely. She’s an enigma.
AC: Yes.
SD: So your childhood summers aren’t just packed with novelty, they’re happening inside a rapidly changing brain that’s super primed to encode memories, which makes those seasons feel fuller and richer in hindsight.
AC: Okay, that all makes sense, but I have to ask about the theory everyone says online, the whole, well, when you’re five, a year is 1/5th of your life, but when you’re 50 it’s 1/50th.
SD: Yeah, yeah, the math explanation. Dr. Whitmann basically says that doesn’t totally track. While it sounds intuitively satisfying, he says there’s no evidence your brain is doing that calculation.
AC: Got it.
SD: Instead, the better explanation seems to be adulthood gets repetitive. We’ve seen summers before. You know the drill, work, vacation, barbecue, suddenly September.
AC: Rude, but fair.
SD: Yeah, and because fewer experiences feel truly novel, your brain stores less information. So when you look back, there’s just less there to mark the passage of time.
The summer didn’t vanish, it just left behind fewer memory breadcrumbs.
AC: Wow. That’s kind of existential.
SD: Yeah, and it gets slightly more existential.
AC: Ooh, fantastic.
SD: I know. So Dr. Whitmann’s newer research found something surprising when he looked at memory and aging. Older adults didn’t actually describe memories as blurrier or less vivid.
In some cases, memories felt richer and more emotional. What changes is the brain becomes worse at encoding the ordinary everyday stuff.
AC: Like Tuesday.
SD: Exactly. And apparently this decline can start surprisingly early, around our 30s, and gradually ramps up, which might help explain why people suddenly wake up and go, “Wait, how has it been 10 years?”
AC: No, I reject this information.
SD: Yeah, you and me both. But there is good news.
AC: Please tell me the good news.
SD: Researchers think we can kind of hack this effect, or at least slow it down.
AC: Okay. Everybody lean in. I want to hear it.
SD: Yeah, me too. Dr. Whitmann says what matters is novelty. New places, new people, new experiences, even tiny ones.
Take a different walking route, try a weird hobby, go somewhere unfamiliar. Eat at a restaurant you keep saying you’ll try. Basically, give your brain more material.
AC: So you’re saying I just need to do more new things.
SD: Basically, but with one caveat. Dr. Whitmann warns against turning this into a to-do list. Don’t schedule every second of your Saturday trying to maximize memories, because if you’re sprinting between activities, time weirdly speeds up again. He basically recommends staying open to what comes, like wake up, pay attention to how you feel, and just kind of see where the day goes.
AC: Okay. Unexpected science-backed permission to wander around aimlessly and get iced coffee. This is actually how I’ve been navigating New York City for years, so I am glad that it is helping my memory.
SD: There you go. You’re already way ahead of the game.
Honestly, my favorite quote from Dr. Whitmann in our story was, “Emotions are basically the glue for memory.” The more emotionally meaningful something feels, the more likely it sticks.
So maybe the goal isn’t recreating childhood summers, maybe it’s making more room for experiences that feel important enough to remember, even if it’s just, you know, reading in a park.
AC: That’s beautiful.
SD: I know. Thank you, neuroscience.
AC: I’m feeling inspired to go outside and find something new.
SD: Same. And with that, we’ll be right back after this quick break.
You know, Annie, this whole conversation about memory actually reminded me of a story you recently edited by Jordan Burchette about documenting everything.
AC: Ah, yes. A story that forced me to confront the fact that my phone contains approximately 30,000 photos, many of which are screenshots I was absolutely convinced I would need later.
SD: And have you ever looked at them again?
AC: No. No. No, not really. That’s future Annie’s problem when I run out of storage.
SD: Yes. Well, according to Jordan’s reporting, psychologists actually have a name for this whole phenomenon, right?
AC: Yes, they do. It’s called cognitive offloading, which sounds like something you would do after a stressful meeting.
But really it just means using external tools to help your brain remember things.
SD: So kinda like iCalendar or Outlook remembering your appointments and meetings?
AC: Yes, absolutely. So cognitive offloading is basically letting technology act as a second brain.
SD: Which sounds kind of good?
AC: Yes. Honestly, sometimes it is.
Researchers say it can free up mental bandwidth. Instead of spending energy remembering a dentist appointment three weeks from now, your brain can focus on whatever’s happening right in front of you.
SD: Okay, so my phone is helping me become a more evolved human?
AC: No, no, no. Let’s not get carried away. Yes. Because Jordan’s story also gets into the downsides. If your brain knows information has been safely stored somewhere else, it may put less effort into remembering it.
SD: Okay, so when I take 75 photos of a concert—
AC: Yeah, your brain may decide, “Great, the camera’s got this. I’m heading out.”
Researchers even have a term for this. It’s called digital amnesia. The basic idea is that when we know the information is saved somewhere, we’re often less likely to remember it ourselves.
SD: Okay, so all those screenshots I save and never revisit might actually be making me worse at remembering things?
AC: Potentially. Although, I think the bigger issue here is that someday archaeologists are going to uncover your camera roll and wonder why humans are so obsessed with recipes they never cooked.
SD: Yes. Honestly, that’s very fair.
AC: And the experts Jordan spoke with aren’t saying that we should stop using technology. The point is that there’s a trade-off. You gain convenience and accuracy, but sometimes it’s at the cost of your own recall.
SD: Okay, so maybe the move is not documenting literally every second of our lives.
AC: Exactly. One of the researchers even suggested that a lot of us probably over-document. Sometimes it’s okay to take fewer photos, put the phone away, and just be present for the thing that’s happening.
SD: Which feels weirdly connected to everything we talked about today.
AC: It does. If childhood summers felt long because they were packed with memorable experiences, maybe we don’t need to spend every moment recording life. Maybe we need to spend a little more time actually living it.
SD: Okay. Wow. This episode has been so profound.
AC: I contain multitudes.
SD: And so many screenshots.
AC: So very many screenshots.
And that’s it for this episode. But don’t worry, we’ve got more episodes of Ask Us Anything live in our feed right now. Follow or subscribe to Ask Us Anything by Popular Science wherever you enjoy your podcasts. And if you like our show, leave a rating and a review.
SD: Do you have a favorite summer camp memory?
Let us know in the comments. Our producer is Alan Haburchak. This week’s episode was based on articles written for Popular Science by Jennifer Byrne and Jordan Burchette, and you’ll find links to read those stories in the show notes.
AC: Thank you, team. Thank you, summer camp. Thank you, “The Price is Right.” And thank all of you for listening.
SD: And one more time, if you want something you’ve always wondered about explained on a future episode, go to popsci.com/ask and click the “Ask Us” link. Until next time, follow the vibes to something unexpected or, you know, iced coffee.
AC: Iced coffee and Bob Barker. That’s my dream summer now. Little Jerry Springer sprinkled in. Boop, ba-da-boop, boop, boop.
The post Why summer flies by as an adult—but lasted forever when you were 10 appeared first on Popular Science.
Raccoons might be spreading diarrhea-causing bacteria in Japan
Raccoons are cute and curious creatures, but frequently carry infectious diseases. This poses serious problems for humans, especially when evidence indicates the animals are increasingly accustomed to more populated areas including cities and farms. Researchers at Japan’s Osaka Metropolitan University (OMU) say that the omnivores are now vectors for an emerging bacterium called Escherichia albertii, that’s already responsible for multiple severe outbreaks of food poisoning. However, monitoring raccoons isn’t enough. To formulate the best public health policies, experts should also focus on rivers, according to a study published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.
The teams led by OMU veterinary scientist Atsushi Hinenoya recently conducted an extensive survey of both the wild raccoons and waterways in southern Japan’s Osaka Prefecture, which is known for its high concentration of the sneaky omnivores. They flagged the presence of E. albertii in 77 percent of water samples across six of the eight rivers examined,but only during the late spring, summer, and fall. Any negative samples were otherwise collected during the winter and early spring,when infected raccoon numbers are known to decline.
Moreover, Hinenoya’s team identified E. albertii upstream from populated areas and in water sources far removed from places like neighborhoods and recreational parks. Because riverborne bacteria typically accumulate downstream, this further supports the theory that wildlife—not humans—are responsible for the contamination.
From there, researchers studied 122 wild raccoons and discovered 56-percent were carrying E. albertii. Subsequent whole-genome analysis confirmed an array of bacterial strains, many aligning with those found in the water samples. This means that E. albertii was already entrenched in the ecosystem instead of starting from one outbreak. These also appeared remarkably similar to the strains documented in human patients which can cause severe diarrhea and vomiting sometimes requiring hospitalization.
“These findings are strong indicators that these [variants] pose a potential risk to public health,” Hinenoya said in a statement.
If E. albertii can survive for prolonged periods of time in both rivers and in wildlife, then that may significantly increase the risk of repeated exposure. This would make future outbreaks much harder to trace.
So what can be done about it? Hinenoya and the team emphasize the importance of adopting a “One Health” strategy that doesn’t only track human infections, but also the interconnected ecological, agricultural, and wildlife systems. From here, researchers intend to focus on more specific contamination routes that involve the raccoons, local farms, food products, and waterways. They also add that the approach will hopefully be applied to other diseases.
“We hope to expand this research toward the development of comprehensive strategies for infectious disease control,” said Hinenoya.
The post Raccoons might be spreading diarrhea-causing bacteria in Japan appeared first on Popular Science.
Raccoons might be spreading diarrhea-causing bacteria in Japan
Raccoons are cute and curious creatures, but frequently carry infectious diseases. This poses serious problems for humans, especially when evidence indicates the animals are increasingly accustomed to more populated areas including cities and farms. Researchers at Japan’s Osaka Metropolitan University (OMU) say that the omnivores are now vectors for an emerging bacterium called Escherichia albertii, that’s already responsible for multiple severe outbreaks of food poisoning. However, monitoring raccoons isn’t enough. To formulate the best public health policies, experts should also focus on rivers, according to a study published in the journal Applied and Environmental Microbiology.
The teams led by OMU veterinary scientist Atsushi Hinenoya recently conducted an extensive survey of both the wild raccoons and waterways in southern Japan’s Osaka Prefecture, which is known for its high concentration of the sneaky omnivores. They flagged the presence of E. albertii in 77 percent of water samples across six of the eight rivers examined,but only during the late spring, summer, and fall. Any negative samples were otherwise collected during the winter and early spring,when infected raccoon numbers are known to decline.
Moreover, Hinenoya’s team identified E. albertii upstream from populated areas and in water sources far removed from places like neighborhoods and recreational parks. Because riverborne bacteria typically accumulate downstream, this further supports the theory that wildlife—not humans—are responsible for the contamination.
From there, researchers studied 122 wild raccoons and discovered 56-percent were carrying E. albertii. Subsequent whole-genome analysis confirmed an array of bacterial strains, many aligning with those found in the water samples. This means that E. albertii was already entrenched in the ecosystem instead of starting from one outbreak. These also appeared remarkably similar to the strains documented in human patients which can cause severe diarrhea and vomiting sometimes requiring hospitalization.
“These findings are strong indicators that these [variants] pose a potential risk to public health,” Hinenoya said in a statement.
If E. albertii can survive for prolonged periods of time in both rivers and in wildlife, then that may significantly increase the risk of repeated exposure. This would make future outbreaks much harder to trace.
So what can be done about it? Hinenoya and the team emphasize the importance of adopting a “One Health” strategy that doesn’t only track human infections, but also the interconnected ecological, agricultural, and wildlife systems. From here, researchers intend to focus on more specific contamination routes that involve the raccoons, local farms, food products, and waterways. They also add that the approach will hopefully be applied to other diseases.
“We hope to expand this research toward the development of comprehensive strategies for infectious disease control,” said Hinenoya.
The post Raccoons might be spreading diarrhea-causing bacteria in Japan appeared first on Popular Science.
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Long-lost World War II ‘Hellship’ may have finally been found
After over 80 years, a team of marine archeologists and historians believe that they’ve uncovered a lost piece of World War II history. The remains of the Japanese freighter Hōfuku Maru were spotted off of the western coast of the Philippines. But the Hōfuku Maru was not just a run of the mill military vessel. The freighter was called a Hellship.
Hellships were requisitioned merchant ships that the Japanese Navy used to transport prisoners of war during WWII in horrific conditions. Inmates died from thirst, heat, beatings, and executions—as well as inadvertent Allied attacks. Hellships traveled within military convoys, and the Allies didn’t know they were transporting prisoners of war. Historians estimate that 20,000 of the over 125,000 Allied prisoners that traveled on Hellships died onboard.
Plaque dedicated to the POWs who died aboard the Hōfuku Maru from the Hellships Memorial, Subic Bay, Philippines. Image: Discovery’s Expedition Unknown.The remains of Hōfuku Maru were discovered off the coast of the Philippines’ Zambales province. On September 21, 1944, more than 1,000 Allied servicemen died aboard the Hōfuku Maru, when it sank in less than three minutes.The ship had up to 1,000 British and Dutch prisoners in its holds, but the shipwrecks’ identity and location was forgotten.
In both American and Japanese military archives, the Hellships Memorial Foundation found documents claiming that the Hōfuku Maru sank over 30 miles away from where it was assumed to have gone down..
“We were absolutely stunned that Japanese sources had information on where the convoy was attacked and what ships were hit – this was a smoking gun,” retired Naval Officer Randy Anderson and Hellships Memorial Foundation founder, said in a statement.
Photogrammetry of the wreck newly identified as the Hōfuku Maru. Image: Evan Kovacs, Marine Imaging Technologies, LLCThus a team, including imaging specialist Evan Kovacs, maritime archaeologist Calvin Mires, and TV presenter/explorer Josh Gates, came together to track down the mysterious shipwreck. Sonar imaging verified the presence of an uncharted wreck in the area they were investigating, and then identified the wreck during deepwater dives. The team also found human remains.
The available evidence points to the Hōfuku Maru. Various elements align perfectly with the vessel’s blueprints, and the wreck is broken into two parts, which matches descriptions by both Americans and Japanese. The remains of the vessel lay beneath over 160 feet of water.
“The pieces all fit,” said Tim Beckensall, a researcher at the Hellships Memorial Foundation, “the vessel is the right size, in the right place and from the correct period. I am convinced this is the Hōfuku Maru.”
The findings will feature in the two-part premiere of Discovery’s Expedition Unknown airing on June 24th.
“The story of the Hellships is a chapter in the history of WWII that demands to be brought to light,” highlighted Gates. “The research and dives that led to this groundbreaking discovery can hopefully offer closure to the families of more than a thousand servicemen who made the ultimate sacrifice. It’s a privilege to work alongside the Hellships Memorial Foundation to honor their memories; they are lost no more.”
The post Long-lost World War II ‘Hellship’ may have finally been found appeared first on Popular Science.
Long-lost World War II ‘Hellship’ may have finally been found
After over 80 years, a team of marine archeologists and historians believe that they’ve uncovered a lost piece of World War II history. The remains of the Japanese freighter Hōfuku Maru were spotted off of the western coast of the Philippines. But the Hōfuku Maru was not just a run of the mill military vessel. The freighter was called a Hellship.
Hellships were requisitioned merchant ships that the Japanese Navy used to transport prisoners of war during WWII in horrific conditions. Inmates died from thirst, heat, beatings, and executions—as well as inadvertent Allied attacks. Hellships traveled within military convoys, and the Allies didn’t know they were transporting prisoners of war. Historians estimate that 20,000 of the over 125,000 Allied prisoners that traveled on Hellships died onboard.
Plaque dedicated to the POWs who died aboard the Hōfuku Maru from the Hellships Memorial, Subic Bay, Philippines. Image: Discovery’s Expedition Unknown.The remains of Hōfuku Maru were discovered off the coast of the Philippines’ Zambales province. On September 21, 1944, more than 1,000 Allied servicemen died aboard the Hōfuku Maru, when it sank in less than three minutes.The ship had up to 1,000 British and Dutch prisoners in its holds, but the shipwrecks’ identity and location was forgotten.
In both American and Japanese military archives, the Hellships Memorial Foundation found documents claiming that the Hōfuku Maru sank over 30 miles away from where it was assumed to have gone down..
“We were absolutely stunned that Japanese sources had information on where the convoy was attacked and what ships were hit – this was a smoking gun,” retired Naval Officer Randy Anderson and Hellships Memorial Foundation founder, said in a statement.
Photogrammetry of the wreck newly identified as the Hōfuku Maru. Image: Evan Kovacs, Marine Imaging Technologies, LLCThus a team, including imaging specialist Evan Kovacs, maritime archaeologist Calvin Mires, and TV presenter/explorer Josh Gates, came together to track down the mysterious shipwreck. Sonar imaging verified the presence of an uncharted wreck in the area they were investigating, and then identified the wreck during deepwater dives. The team also found human remains.
The available evidence points to the Hōfuku Maru. Various elements align perfectly with the vessel’s blueprints, and the wreck is broken into two parts, which matches descriptions by both Americans and Japanese. The remains of the vessel lay beneath over 160 feet of water.
“The pieces all fit,” said Tim Beckensall, a researcher at the Hellships Memorial Foundation, “the vessel is the right size, in the right place and from the correct period. I am convinced this is the Hōfuku Maru.”
The findings will feature in the two-part premiere of Discovery’s Expedition Unknown airing on June 24th.
“The story of the Hellships is a chapter in the history of WWII that demands to be brought to light,” highlighted Gates. “The research and dives that led to this groundbreaking discovery can hopefully offer closure to the families of more than a thousand servicemen who made the ultimate sacrifice. It’s a privilege to work alongside the Hellships Memorial Foundation to honor their memories; they are lost no more.”
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Rare dinosaur fossils finally returned to Mongolia 20 years after theft
Mongolia contains some of the most well preserved and diverse fossils in the world, but they attract more than paleontologists. Black market smugglers routinely rob both the East Asian country of its prehistoric heritage and the global scientific community of invaluable knowledge. Thanks to recent international recovery efforts, some of those stolen treasures have finally returned home nearly 20 years after their initial disappearance. According to officials at Mongolia’s new National Museum of Natural History, 29 sets of dinosaur fossils are now back in the capital of Ulaanbaatar—including a half-complete, extremely rare relative of Tyrannosaurus rex.
During a recent conference, Ulaanbaatar police spokesperson D. Munkhkhuyag said that smugglers absconded with the remains in 2006, “with the aim of making a profit.” It wasn’t until 2013 that French customs officials discovered some of the first specimens. Over the next two years, France worked with Mongolia under international illicit cultural heritage trafficking laws to repatriate the fossils.
French customs agencies confiscated the fossils between 2013 and 2015, and began returning them a year later. Credit: National Museum of Natural HistoryA formal handover ceremony took place in Paris in December 2025, where representatives from both countries highlighted the various dinosaurs included in the trove. The collection includes fossil fragments from theropods, ornithomimosaurs, and hadrosaurs that roamed what is now the Gobi Desert approximately 65 to 70 million years ago during the Late Cretaceous.
One of the most important specimens is an over-half-complete example of a Tarbosaurus bataar. Like many other dinosaur species, T. bataar remains are almost exclusively excavated around Mongolia and Central Asia. Although arid and cold today, the Gobi Desert was once a humid and diverse floodplain dotted by forests and intersected by river channels. T. bataar was the region’s undisputed apex predator, frequently preying on large dinosaurs like ankylosaurids. An adult could easily reach upwards of 33-feet-long, stand nearly 10-feet-tall, and weigh well over five tons. Although still officially its own species, some paleontologists argue that T. bataar so closely resembles T. rex that it actually warrants reclassification as an Asian variant of the North American Tyrannosaurus genus.
Now home, museum paleontologists will catalogue and clean the fossils before debuting them for public display.
“The dinosaur fossil is priceless and a unique piece of heritage,” museum director Manchuk Nuramkhan said during a recent news conference. “We are delighted that children and young people will have the opportunity to see Mongolia’s dinosaur heritage firsthand and learn from it.”
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Arizona students design app that calculates least-sweaty walking route
It’s not unheard of for standard navigation apps to map out a less-than-ideal pedestrian journey. You technically can walk under that bridge and cross that six-lane highway, but that doesn’t mean you want to. The app doesn’t take into account your safety, nor your comfort in steamy weather. Now, a team at Arizona State University (ASU) is developing a tool to tackle the latter aspect of the problem.
The aptly-called Cool Routes is an online navigation system that calculates sun exposure and mean radiant temperatures to suggest cooler (in the temperature sense) pedestrian routes. A radiant temperature measurement represents the total heat load one experiences in a particular spot. The measurement takes elements like sun exposure and reflected heat into account to better describe just how hot a space will be.
The mean radiant temperature in Phoenix in the sun can go over 150 degrees Fahrenheit, but decrease to under 100 degrees in the shade. Cool Routes updates its data hourly based on meteorological forecasts and also takes into account buildings and trees.
“Cool Routes is a website running on a server, and anybody can use it. A user can open it in a browser, pick where they want to start and where they want to go on the ASU Tempe campus, and see walking routes that account for heat exposure,” Ariane Middel, director of ASU’s SHaDE Lab, tells Popular Science. “It looks like a navigation map, but with a heat layer added. Instead of only asking, ‘What is the shortest way to get there?’ Cool Routes also asks, ‘What is the cooler way to get there?’”
To validate the predicted heat loads, researchers used MaRTy, a rolling instrument station that measures human thermal exposure and other meteorological data. Image: Ariane Middel/Arizona State University.During tests spanning 12 days and different seasons on ASU’s Tempe Campus, Cool Routes successfully found cooler routes over 70 percent of the time, including during mornings and evenings, when there’s usually less of a difference in heat loads between shaded and sunny areas. These paths decreased the perceived heat load by around 4.5 degrees on average.
To confirm Cool Route’s heat exposure estimates, the team also used a rolling instrument station that measures human thermal exposure among other data., Their results were significantly accurate. Middel and her colleagues describe their work in a study recently published in the journal Building and the Environment.
“One of the main things we found is that people often do not need to take a very large detour to reduce their heat exposure. In many cases, a slightly longer route can be substantially more shaded compared with the shortest route,” Middel explains.
“I would definitely walk 10 extra minutes to get more shade and protect myself from UV exposure. But everyone makes that decision differently,” says Waqar Khan, an ASU computer scientist and co-author of the study. “Some people may choose the cooler route, while others may prefer the shortest one. That is why, in our application, we show both the shortest and coolest routes, along with the route length, estimated walking time, and expected heat exposure.”
Cool Routes currently only works for ASU’s Tempe Campus, but the approach can be applied to identify pedestrian paths in other areas, including cities. What’s more, the researchers believe that Cool Routes data could help city planners find the best places for shade solutions, and even test out potential future cooling strategies via heat load simulations.
Moving forward, the team, including ASU computer science student and co-author Fletcher Emmott, aims to increase the tool’s accessibility with a Cool Routes mobile application as a part of Emmott’s honors thesis.
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