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In this newsletter

• Plants losing appetite for carbon!

• Katy Perry heads to space in Bezos' rocket

• Woodhenge in Demark has a Stonehenge link?

• Volcano turned human brain into glass

Plants losing appetite for carbon!

A recently published study has revealed that Earth's plants and soils maximized carbon dioxide absorption in 2008 and the proportion of carbon they can sequester has been decreasing since. Moving beyond this limit heightens the probability of catastrophic climate disruption. 

While plants initially thrived with increased carbon dioxide and longer growing seasons due to warming, this advantage is now being reversed. Climate change-related disasters are hindering their carbon absorption capacity.

James Curran, former chief executive of the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and his son Sam, tracked atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. They found that plant carbon absorption peaked in 2008 and has since fallen by 0.25% annually. Curran warns that emissions must now decrease by 0.3% yearly just to maintain current levels, a challenging goal given the typical 1.2% annual increase. 

This escalating and harmful impact will exacerbate climate change, underscoring the critical link between the climate and biodiversity crises. Immediate and widespread efforts are essential to restore global biodiversity and its vital ecosystem services, such as natural carbon dioxide removal.

The findings were published in the journal Weather. 

Katy Perry heads to space in Bezos' rocket

This spring, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin will launch Katy Perry, Gayle King, Lauren Sánchez, and a group of women, including a former NASA scientist, on a New Shepard space mission from their West Texas base. The forthcoming mission will be Blue Origin’s 11th mission and its first with an all-female crew.

With the New Shepard's automated system, all passengers are designated as crew, as there are no pilots present. They will fly past the Kármán line, the international space boundary, during their 11-minute flight.

Blue Origin is attempting to catch up in the space industry, which is largely controlled by SpaceX, its competitor, which recently secured a $40 million NASA contract under CEO Elon Musk. Blue Origin returned to human spaceflight last month with a successful suborbital mission carrying six tourists, ending a nearly two-year pause caused by a 2022 failure, various media outlets reported.  

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Woodhenge in Demark has a Stonehenge link?

Archeologists have discovered a 4,000-year-old Woodhenge in the Danish town of Aars. It consists of a circle of spaced wooden pieces dating back to approximately 2000 BC. The pieces are spaced roughly 30 meters apart. The discovery raises questions about its potential relationship to Stonehenge.  

Ancient European societies used these henges for rituals related to sun worship and agriculture. From Britain to Russia, henges constructed of stone or wood have been discovered, indicating a widespread practice. These structures often involved the long-distance transport of building materials.

Contrary to prior beliefs, recent analyses suggest the central stone of Stonehenge was sourced from Scotland, not Wales. European population shifts led to Stonehenge's possible role in unifying ancient Britons after migration; similar henges may have served the same function elsewhere. 

Researchers at the Danish Woodhenge site are excavating for artifacts like flint arrowheads. This will help them  to better understand the builders and their potential link to other cultures across Europe, The Independent reported. 

Volcano turned human brain into glass

The 2020 discovery of a vitrified human brain was unprecedented, and new research has revealed that it resulted from exposure to extreme heat over 500°C. It was then followed by rapid cooling, which also preserved delicate brain structures. The volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE turned a man's brain into glassy fragments. They now appear as small, smooth, and shiny black pieces.

Protein analysis confirmed the glassy fragments were preserved brain tissue, and microscopic examination revealed the presence of neurons. To determine the formation conditions, researchers heated minuscule fragments of the vitrified brain in a lab. They aimed to find the temperature at which it transitioned from brittle to soft. According to the experiments, the brain fragments are indeed glass, resulting from a sudden cooling from temperatures exceeding 510 °C to room temperature.

Volcanic gases and ash caused brief, extreme heat, followed by pyroclastic flows and rapid cooling. The reason only this young man's brain vitrified remains unknown. Though his location within a building, unlike other fleeing residents, is a possible factor. 

Regardless of the cause, this vitrified brain is exceptional. While many ancient brains have been found, they're typically preserved by drying, freezing, or saponification, not vitrification. Research on the glassy brain fragments continues, with some remaining at the Herculaneum, the Roman city buried in ash. The others are being analyzed at universities, where researchers aim to study their proteins in greater detail. 

The findings were published by the journal Scientific Reports.

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Until next time,
Adya