December 11, 2022 - Making U.S. Fire Departments More Diverse and Inclusive

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Making U.S. Fire Departments More Diverse and Inclusive Ninety-six percent of U.S. career firefighters are men and 82% are white. What’s the path for departments achieving more diversity? And if they do so, will their members embrace how it improves their organization? Research and interviews with department leaders finds that, while outreach to minority candidates and affinity groups can help, true diversity will only come when department leaders embrace inclusion. This comes from understanding and rewarding the skills successful firefighters need that go beyond physical strength, a stereotypically masculine trait — they also need intellectual, social, and emotional skills required to deliver medical emergency aid, support each other through traumatic experiences, and engage intimately with the communities they serve. Continued here

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Durban coastline: sewage polluted beaches pose threat to holiday makers and the environment Large numbers of businesses in eThekwini on South Africa’s eastern seaboard – which includes the port city of Durban – rely heavily on tourism. It’s a popular holiday destination, only six hours by road from Johannesburg. Millions of people living inland head to the warm coastline over the country’s extended December/January school holiday break. But maybe not this year. As Anja du Plessis explains, many of the beaches along the Durban coastline aren’t safe to swim in. She explains what’s happened, and why. The city’s beaches are facing an ongoing sewage crisis. Many have been closed along the Durban coastline. Continued here

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Gigaelectronvolt emission from a compact binary merger - Nature Nature volume 612, pages 236-239 (2022)Cite this article An energetic γ-ray burst (GRB), GRB 211211A, was observed on 11 December 20211,2. Despite its long duration, typically associated with bursts produced by the collapse of massive stars, the observation of an optical-infrared kilonova points to a compact binary merger origin3. Here we report observations of a significant (more than five sigma) transient-like emission in the high-energy γ-rays of GRB 211211A (more than 0.1 gigaelectronvolts) starting 103 seconds after the burst. After an initial phase with a roughly constant flux (about 5 × 10−10 erg per second per square centimetre) lasting about 2 × 104 seconds, the flux started decreasing and soon went undetected. Our detailed modelling of public and dedicated multi-wavelength observations demonstrates that gigaelectronvolt emission from GRB 211211A is in excess with respect to the flux predicted by the state-of-the-art afterglow model at such late time. We explore the possibility that the gigaelectronvolt excess is inverse Compton emission owing to the interaction of a late-time, low-power jet with an external source of photons, and find that kilonova emission can provide the seed photons. Our results open perspectives for observing binary neutron star mergers. Continued here

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A signalling pathway for transcriptional regulation of sleep amount in mice - Nature Nature (2022)Cite this article In mice and humans, sleep quantity is governed by genetic factors and exhibits age-dependent variation1,2,3. However, the core molecular pathways and effector mechanisms that regulate sleep duration in mammals remain unclear. Here, we characterize a major signalling pathway for the transcriptional regulation of sleep in mice using adeno-associated virus-mediated somatic genetics analysis4. Chimeric knockout of LKB1 kinase—an activator of AMPK-related protein kinase SIK35,6,7—in adult mouse brain markedly reduces the amount and delta power—a measure of sleep depth—of non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREMS). Downstream of the LKB1-SIK3 pathway, gain or loss-of-function of the histone deacetylases HDAC4 and HDAC5 in adult brain neurons causes bidirectional changes of NREMS amount and delta power. Moreover, phosphorylation of HDAC4 and HDAC5 is associated with increased sleep need, and HDAC4 specifically regulates NREMS amount in posterior hypothalamus. Genetic and transcriptomic studies reveal that HDAC4 cooperates with CREB in both transcriptional and sleep regulation. These findings introduce the concept of signalling pathways targeting transcription modulators to regulate daily sleep amount and demonstrate the power of somatic genetics in mouse sleep research. Continued here

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If humans survive for a million years, this is what the world might look like Most species are transitory. They go extinct, branch into new species, or change over time due to random mutations and environmental shifts. A typical mammalian species can be expected to exist for a million years. Modern humans, Homo sapiens, have been around for roughly 300,000 years. So what will happen if we make it to a million years? Science fiction author H.G. Wells was the first to realize that humans could evolve into something very alien. In his 1883 essay, “The Man of the Year Million,” he envisioned what's now become a cliche: big-brained, tiny-bodied creatures. Later, he speculated that humans could also split into two or more new species. Continued here

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Australia announces 'Magnitsky' sanctions against targets in Russia and Iran. What are they and will they work? Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong chose Human Rights Day to announce Magnitsky-style sanctions against 13 Russian and Iranian individuals and two entities, in response to egregious human rights abuses. Wong has described these sanctions as a means of holding human rights abusers to account, in situations where dialogue has proven ineffective. Continued here

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The institutions forging the strongest innovation links The 2022 Nature Index Innovation supplement ranks the top 500 institutions in the Nature Index by a normalized metric on patent influence. The first three charts here show the top institutions in three sectors on this metric. The last chart shows the leading academic–corporate collaborations in the Nature Index. Academic institutions with the highest score for patent influence tend to be universities specializing in certain areas of science, such as The Rockefeller University in the United States, which focuses mainly on the medical and biological sciences. Continued here

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40 years ago, one woman changed the video game industry forever Innovation is rare. Making the attempt is not. Just look at electric cars, Indian food, and the Power Glove to see how our efforts to innovate don't always pan out the way we’d expect. Conversely, sometimes innovation happens organically. This was the case 40 years ago when Activision’s Carol Shaw changed gaming forever. River Raid for the Atari 2600 doesn't look like much these days (what does after 40 years?). But it was a million-selling success for one of the first women in game development and made top-down shooters into a genre of their own. How? An astonishing amount of programming skill crammed into a 4KB game that offered endless hours of entertainment. Continued here

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Elon Musk Sent an Email to Employees. It's a Masterclass In How Not to Motivate Your Team This is not how you get people to do what you want. Continued here

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How new tools like DALL-E could spread misinformation online Type “teddy bears working on new AI research on the moon in the 1980s” into any of the recently released text-to-image artificial intelligence image generators, and after just a few seconds, the sophisticated software will produce an eerily pertinent image. Seemingly bound by only your imagination, this latest trend in synthetic media has delighted many, inspired others, and struck fear in some. Continued here

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Genetic diversity fuels gene discovery for tobacco and alcohol use - Nature Carousel with three slides shown at a time. Use the Previous and Next buttons to navigate three slides at a time, or the slide dot buttons at the end to jump three slides at a time. Nature (2022)Cite this article Continued here

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Mosquito meals and mysterious ant ‘milk’ Blood from a mosquito’s most recent meal contains antibodies from the person or animal the insect feasted on.Credit: Claude Nuridsany & Marie Perennou/SPL Blood-sucking mosquitoes have their uses. An innovative approach that analyses their last blood meals can reveal evidence of infection in the people or animals that the flying insects feasted on. Continued here

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Oldest DNA reveals 2-million-year-old ecosystem DNA recovered from ancient permafrost has been used to reconstruct what an ecosystem might have looked like two million years ago. Their work suggests that Northern Greenland was much warmer than the frozen desert it is today, with a rich ecosystem of plants and animals. Why low levels of ‘good’ cholesterol don’t predict heart disease risk in Black people, and how firework displays affect the flights of geese. Continued here

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A kilonova following a long-duration gamma-ray burst at 350 Mpc - Nature Nature volume 612, pages 223-227 (2022)Cite this article Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are divided into two populations1,2; long GRBs that derive from the core collapse of massive stars (for example, ref. 3) and short GRBs that form in the merger of two compact objects4,5. Although it is common to divide the two populations at a gamma-ray duration of 2 s, classification based on duration does not always map to the progenitor. Notably, GRBs with short (≲2 s) spikes of prompt gamma-ray emission followed by prolonged, spectrally softer extended emission (EE-SGRBs) have been suggested to arise from compact object mergers6,7,8. Compact object mergers are of great astrophysical importance as the only confirmed site of rapid neutron capture (r-process) nucleosynthesis, observed in the form of so-called kilonovae9,10,11,12,13,14. Here we report the discovery of a possible kilonova associated with the nearby (350 Mpc), minute-duration GRB 211211A. The kilonova implies that the progenitor is a compact object merger, suggesting that GRBs with long, complex light curves can be spawned from merger events. The kilonova of GRB 211211A has a similar luminosity, duration and colour to that which accompanied the gravitational wave (GW)-detected binary neutron star (BNS) merger GW170817 (ref. 4). Further searches for GW signals coincident with long GRBs are a promising route for future multi-messenger astronomy. Continued here

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Edward Lewis: Essence Magazine ^ 318115 Essence, the first magazine aimed at African-American women, was created by four, young, Black entrepreneurs in the aftermath of massive racial and political upheaval in the United States in 1968. The venture was a financial, branding and cultural success. By 2005, the company was sold to Time Warner, Inc, the largest magazine publisher in the world at that time, for the highest price ever paid for a single-title magazine company. However, there is still debate about whether the last remaining co-founder, Edward Lewis, jeopardized the iconic Black brand by selling it to a white-owned company. Continued here

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Author Correction: Decade-long leukaemia remissions with persistence of CD4+ CAR T cells - Nature Nature (2022)Cite this article Correction to: Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-04390-6 Published online 2 February 2022 Continued here

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The sneaky economics of Ticketmaster It was the type of disaster that made Americans reconsider the concept of live music sales.  An iconic female artist, whose popular love songs delighted multiple generations, announced a national tour for the first time in many years. Countless fans cleared their schedules to buy tickets the moment they went on sale. Continued here

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Can the world save a million species from extinction? Indonesia’s bleeding toad (Leptophryne cruentata) is critically endangered.Credit: Pepew Fegley/Shutterstock One-quarter of all plant and animal species are threatened with extinction owing to factors such as climate change and pollution. Starting this week, negotiators and ministers from more than 190 countries are meeting at a United Nations biodiversity summit called COP15 in Montreal, Canada, to address the emergency. Continued here

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The Indonesia Strategy Case: Confidential Instructions for Joanna ^ INS978 This is a multi-issue one-on-one internal negotiation between a recently promoted boss, Joanna, and an older-than-her employee, Rupert, who is disgruntled at having been passed over for promotion. Joanna needs his advice to design the new strategy for the Indonesia operations, which she must present to the board soon. Continued here

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Should Local Police Departments Deploy Lethal Robots? Last month, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted in favor of allowing that city’s police department to deploy robots equipped with a potential to kill, should a situation—in the estimation of police officers—call for lethal force. With that decision, the board appeared to have delivered the city to a dystopian future. The vote garnered a loudly negative response from the public, and this week the supervisors reversed course and sent the policy back to committee. But the fact that the decision initially passed—and may yet pass in some form—should not have been surprising. Police departments around the country have been acquiring robotic devices for decades. Most are used for what have become routine policing activities, such as surveillance and bomb disposal. But some can be outfitted with other capabilities, such as to fire 12-gauge shotgun rounds, and in Dallas, in 2016, the police used a bomb-disposal robot to detonate an explosive device, in order to kill a suspected sniper who had shot twelve officers, killing five. The San Francisco Police Department has seventeen robots, twelve of which are functional, and among that number are bomb-disposal units that can be repurposed to deliver an explosive device. (They, too, can be outfitted to fire 12-gauge rounds.) Since 1997, when the National Defense Authorization Act sanctioned the transfer of surplus Department of Defense matériel to local police departments, ostensibly to shore up their defenses for the war on drugs, law-enforcement agencies around the country have been stockpiling the weapons and equipment of war. An earlier program that enabled police departments to buy military surplus at a discounted rate was given a boost after 9/11, when grants from the Department of Homeland Security enabled local forces to purchase armored personnel carriers, tactical gear, sound cannons, drones, and other accoutrements of modern warfare. According to the Law Enforcement Support Office, which oversees the weapon transfers, more than seven billion dollars’ worth of equipment has been transferred to more than eight thousand police departments since the program began. Continued here

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5 Must-Read Football (or Soccer) Stories All eyes are on the World Cup matches in Qatar, but we’re here to remind you that soccer (or football, if you prefer) is a world that transcends the pitch. From the story of an openly gay Brazilian referee who became an icon on and off the field, to the tales of the archaeologists who are hunting for the origins of the modern game, here are some of our favorite Atlas Obscura stories about the beautiful game. Porto Alegre has two soccer teams—Sport Club Internacional and Grêmio Foot-Ball Porto Alegrense—and one of the best-known rivalries in Brazilian sports. So when a bridge built near Inter’s stadium appeared to celebrate the team’s crushing defeat in the 2010 Club World Cup, the conspiracy theories emerged. Was a Grêmio fan behind it? Continued here S43 6 Magic Phrases to Inspire Respect, Grounded in Emotional Intelligence Much of it comes down to this: People respect people who demonstrate self-respect. Continued here S47 A Supreme Court Case That Threatens the Mechanisms of Democracy Before last month’s midterm election, progressives—and centrists, and socialists, and anyone, really, who thought that it was a bad idea to put election deniers in charge of state elections—braced for a red wave. When it didn’t hit, many of those people, for a moment, felt something like relief. And yet, for anyone inclined to commemorate the dodging of one bullet by scanning the horizon for the next, there was still plenty of cause for concern. If the optimistic view was that the electorate had rebuked the MAGA agenda and saved democracy, a take offered by the political scientists Lynn Vavreck, John Sides, and Chris Tausanovitch was more sobering: voters’ identities have become so “calcified” that, no matter what happens (inflation, a global pandemic, an impeachment or two), party loyalists will still show up to vote for their side, or against the other. This is obviously not an ideal way to run a democracy. And that’s setting aside the most glaring reason for Democrats to worry: even if they could win a lasting majority and pass robust legislation, those achievements could be unwound by an increasingly emboldened and reactionary Supreme Court. The Court has had its relatively expansive eras, but it has not been a reliable engine of progress. Last year, in the Harvard Law Review, the law professor Nikolas Bowie called the Supreme Court “the ultimate source of antidemocracy in the United States”—and he was writing before the late-June bout of extraordinary (and extraordinarily unpopular) decisions, including the overturning of Roe v. Wade. This term, the Court seems prepared to curtail gay rights, to prevent President Biden from forgiving student debt, and to reverse decades of precedent regarding affirmative action. But the most ominous cases may be those concerning the mechanisms of democracy itself: how elections should be run and who should resolve the inevitable disputes that arise. Continued here S54 'The White Lotus' Season 2 finale trailer reveals a brutal final twist Everyone is vulnerable leading into the perilous season finale. The White Lotus Season 2 Episode 7 promises a shocking climax, as the identities of who will meet their fate in the waters of Sicily remain a tantalizing mystery. With all of the complexities and chaos running wild among the vacationers and locals, no one is safe. As the big finale approaches, here’s everything you need to know about White Lotus Season 2 Episode 7’s release date and time, plot, and a recap of what took place last week. Continued here S6 The Twisty History of Montreal's Outdoor Staircases When it comes to weather, winters in Montreal, Canada, are often brutal. By December, temperatures plummet below freezing and snow falls regularly. Streets frost over, while dagger-like icicles form along railings and rooftops. Although sidewalks can be slippery, there’s one type of local attribute that’s considered particularly precarious during winter months. Many Montrealers live on the upper stories of plexes—residential buildings with individual units stacked one on top of another, typically as duplexes and triplexes. It’s not the buildings themselves that are a cold-weather concern; it’s their defining feature that can be especially harrowing when it comes to snow and ice: external iron staircases that twist, turn, and climb steeply up the facade of each structure. Some consider them “deathtraps,” though they’re as much a part of the city’s fabric as Cirque du Soleil and bagels. Continued here S15 Overcoming the obstacles to invention Turning cutting-edge basic science into new technologies, medicines and other inventions that benefit our daily lives — while simultaneously bringing commercial rewards — is the foundation of a knowledge economy. Conventional wisdom dictates that the success of this strategy depends on strong public and private investment in research and development, excellent higher and technical education, and an openness to the exchange of ideas and people across borders. Some of these building blocks of innovation have come under severe strain during the past 15 years, first from the aftermath of the 2009 global recession, then a rise in geopolitical tensions and, most recently, the COVID-19 pandemic and economic impact of the war in Ukraine. In this supplement, we look at how countries and research institutions have been responding to these challenges to build the innovation economies that are set to thrive in the rest of the twenty-first century. It includes a focus on the emergency response to the pandemic and what lessons this might provide in the future for quickly bridging the gap between basic science and its application; a discussion on the importance of promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in modern innovation; and an analysis of innovation in China, where there are still ambitions to forge a stronger link between blue-sky research and commercial success. Continued here S51 50 clever ways to make your home way better for under $35 on Amazon Keeping up with home maintenance and improvement can feel like hard, costly work. After all, major overhauls like renovations and remodels can come with major price tags. Still, the desire to upgrade your space is only natural. Thankfully, there are ways to see big improvements by investing just a little cash. In fact, sometimes the best way to elevate the feel of your home is with practical solutions to everyday problems, like nabbing some furniture that doubles as storage or making your morning routine easier with a mirror that won’t fog up. Sometimes a bit of thoughtful decor can do the trick, like brightly patterned serving bowls or chic-looking appliances that make your kitchen pop. Whatever you’re searching for, this list offers up plenty of ways to make your home look better for $35 or less. Continued here S42 Berkeley Researchers Just Discovered 3 Secrets to Waking Up Refreshed and Staying Alert All Day Happy people are also more bright-eyed, it turns out. Continued here S19 NASA’s Orion spacecraft prepares for blazing return to Earth NASA’s Orion capsule is on a path back to Earth, slated to splash down off the coast of Baja California, Mexico, on 11 December.Credit: NASA/Liam Yanulis Over the past three weeks, NASA’s Orion capsule has flown to the Moon and most of the way back, in a near-flawless test of a new spaceship. It now faces its biggest challenge since launching atop a massive rocket as part of the Artemis I mission — surviving a fiery re-entry through Earth’s atmosphere and splashing down in the Pacific Ocean on 11 December. In the process, it will test a re-entry manoeuvre that has never been used by a passenger spacecraft. Continued here S12 Dinosaurs bashed each other with built-in tail clubs Zuul crurivastator had both armoured plating and a sledgehammer-like tail weapon. Credit: Royal Ontario Museum The ankylosaurid dinosaurs had stiff tails ending in massive bony knobs, which were long thought to be defensive weapons for warding off tyrannosaurs and other predators. But today’s most impressive animal weapons — antlers in the deer family, horns in the sheep family — are used mainly for battles with members of the same species over mates. Continued here S58 18 Destructive Habits Holding You Back From Success Habits are the foundation of our everyday lives. We build our daily practices, and eventually our habits and routines shape us. We either build good habits that support us as we move toward our goals or bad ones that undermine our ability to achieve and succeed. One thing is for certain: it's going to be difficult to reach your dreams if you are living with a slew of bad habits. Continued here S61 Seeing Earth From Space Will Change You When he first returned from space, William Shatner was overcome with emotion. The actor, then 90 years old, stood in the dusty grass of the West Texas desert, where the spacecraft had landed. It was October 2021. Nearby, Jeff Bezos, the billionaire who had invited Shatner to ride on a Blue Origin rocket, whooped and popped a bottle of champagne, but Shatner hardly seemed to notice. With tears falling down his cheeks, he described what he had witnessed, his tone hushed. “What you have given me is the most profound experience I can imagine,” Shatner told Bezos. “It’s extraordinary. Extraordinary. I hope I never recover from this.” The man who had played Captain Kirk was so moved by the journey that his post-touchdown remarks ran longer than the three minutes he’d actually spent in space. Shatner appeared to be basking in a phenomenon that many professional astronauts have described: the overview effect. These travelers saw Earth as a gleaming planet suspended in inky darkness, an oasis of life in the silent void, and it filled them with awe. “No one could be briefed well enough to be completely prepared for the astonishing view that I got,” Alan Shepard, the first American in space, wrote in 1962, after he’d made the same trip that Shatner later took. Continued here S66 Why We Buy What We Do This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning. “I don’t like to shop, but I do like to buy,” Frances Taylor wrote in The Atlantic in 1931. In an essay called “Who Wants My Money?,” Taylor laments how inconvenient the process of shopping is. “I am a business woman working on commission, and I make money which I like to spend,” she writes, but going to stores is “a time-wasting and nerve-racking performance.” Continued here S55 'Rick and Morty's Season 6 finale will finally make Morty's wish come true The season finale is here, but not without some final, Christmas-themed chaos. However, knowing how things typically play out for the characters in the twisted sci-fi series, Rick and Morty Season 6 Episode 10 certainly won’t be your typical joy-spreading holiday special. Here’s everything you need to know about Rick and Morty Season 6 Episode 10, including the release date, time, plot, and trailer. Continued here S64 Zero COVID’s Failure Is Xi’s Failure For three years, China’s leader, Xi Jinping, fought a remorseless battle against COVID-19. He called it a “people’s war”—a national struggle to defeat an unseen foe and save lives. The contest locked families in their homes for weeks, strangled the economy, and closed the country to the world. Other governments that failed to contain the pandemic may be indifferent to death and suffering, the message was, but not the Chinese Communist Party, which cares about life above all else. “Zero COVID,” the policy that mandated all of the stringent lockdowns and rigid quarantines, is dead. Officially, the Chinese government will never admit that. The party paints itself as infallible and won’t acknowledge that it erred. The government insists that the fight against COVID is not over. But the new approach, announced on Wednesday, is no longer fixated on suppressing infections to nil—and may not be able to contain them at all. The public quickly realized that, reached its own conclusion about the risk of an explosive outbreak, and began panicked purchases of at-home COVID tests and flu medications. Continued here S52 Oldest cooked food ever found upends the "Paleo" theory of ancient human diets We humans can’t stop playing with our food. Just think of all the different ways of serving potatoes — entire books have been written about potato recipes alone. The restaurant industry was born from our love of flavoring food in new and interesting ways. My team’s analysis of the oldest charred food remains ever found shows that jazzing up your dinner is a human habit dating back at least 70,000 years. Continued here S63 We’re All Capable of Going ‘Goblin Mode’ The Oxford Word of the Year tells a concise story about how many of us are doing these days. The people have spoken about what the people have spoken: The 2022 Oxford Word of the Year, chosen for the first time ever by public vote, went to goblin mode by a 93 percent majority. Oxford defines goblin mode as “a type of behavior which is unapologetically self-indulgent, lazy, slovenly, or greedy, typically in a way that rejects social norms or expectations.” It’s a gloriously evocative phrase—and it tells a concise story about how many of us are doing these days. Continued here S39 Jack Welch's Approach to Leadership The late Jack Welch CEO of General Electric from 1981 to 2001, probably isn’t the ideal model for 21st-century executives. However, three aspects of his leadership remain relevant today. First, get people decisions right. Welch was passionate about putting the right people in the right roles. Second, speak with candor. He always asked probing questions and delivered frank feedback. Third, be insatiably curious. Welch always had a hunger to learn. These are principles that can work for today’s managers as well as they did for him. Continued here S28 20 years ago, Star Trek's biggest flop set up a massive comeback On December 9, 2002, Star Trek: Nemesis became the last movie to star the Next Generation crew, and the last Trek movie set in the original timeline. Derided as an unfitting sendoff, time has revealed that Nemesis laid the bedrock that Trek’s later shows and reboots would build on. Backward letters and melting senators might be a weird way to begin a movie, but Nemesis decided to follow political assassinations with a hilarious wedding, all crammed into the first five minutes. Although there are plenty of criticisms one could make, calling Nemesis “slow” would be inaccurate. It starts at warp speed and doesn’t slow down, making even introspective character development moments feel rushed. And yet the shocking number of overlapping storylines are clear; in all of 21st-century sci-fi, Nemesis might be the most convoluted film that doesn’t actually ask much of its audience. Continued here S23 Bill Cummings: The Cummings Way ^ 619038 Buy books, tools, case studies, and articles on leadership, strategy, innovation, and other business and management topics Continued here S65 ‘Biological Strip Malls’ Have Taken Over the Planet This story originally appeared in bioGraphic, an independent magazine about nature and regeneration powered by the California Academy of Sciences. On a toasty morning in March, a steady stream of hikers trudges up the steep road leading into Torrey Pines State Natural Reserve. Many seek out this popular park just north of San Diego for the expansive views of the sparkling Pacific Ocean and the gnarled, endangered pine trees that lend the reserve its name. But a slender woman in a panama hat and an orange safety vest ignores the views. Instead, she lingers along the road’s dusty shoulder, staring intently at a patch of black sage that bursts with petite lilac flowers. Continued here S14 Oldest-ever DNA shows mastodons roamed Greenland 2 million years ago The northern tip of Greenland was once home to mastodons, reindeer and lush forests, reveal 2-million-year-old DNA sequences.Galen Rowell/Mountain Light/Alamy The northeastern tip of Greenland is a lonely, barren place, home to the odd hare and musk ox, and few plants. Two-million-year-old DNA sequences — the oldest ever obtained — recovered from frozen soil suggest that the region was once home to mastodons and reindeer that roamed a forested ecosystem unlike any now found on Earth. Continued here S31 'Star Wars Jedi Survivor's Cameron Monaghan reveals Cal's "terrifying" fear Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, the sequel to EA’s 2019 game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, finds our hero Cal Kestis in unenviable circumstances. Five years after the events of the first game, the rogue Jedi is on the run from the Galactic Empire, and the plucky resolve we saw from him in the first game is wavering a bit. Cal has has grown a bit more world-weary, he has a bit of a darker outlook and edge to him,” Cameron Monaghan, who plays Cal in both games, tells Inverse. “His cause is becoming seemingly more and more hopeless with each day passing. So he's trying to fight against it in any way he can. But how do you fight something that is so large and overpowering?” Continued here S34 What Christmas tree is best for the environment? Here’s what forestry experts say you should buy The debate rears its head every holiday season: Should I get a real tree or an artificial one? Which one is better for the environment? Artificial trees have been growing in popularity in recent years, but Americans still love the real deal. 26 million Christmas trees were sold in 2019. Continued here S67 Remembering Grant Wahl, a Champion of American Soccer This is an edition of The Great Game, a newsletter about the 2022 World Cup—and how soccer explains the world. Sign up here. Twenty years ago, when I first called the soccer writer Grant Wahl, he was an exotic species. In those days, most writing about American games existed in niche magazines with low production values and even lower circulations. Grant was the rare domestic journalist covering soccer who had begun to break free from this constricted corner. Where the other American writers rendered the game esoteric and remote—a precious foreign import that only connoisseurs could appreciate—Grant made it appealingly accessible. Continued here S56 75 cheap, clever gifts on Amazon that'll impress the hell out of people Usually, a little retail therapy is an easy way to boost your mood — especially if you’re shopping for other people. Nothing brightens my day like watching a loved one’s face light up when they open a gift I’ve bought for them; the only trick is finding stuff that’s sure to impress. Luckily for both of us, I’ve put together this list of clever gifts that even the pickiest recipients are sure to appreciate. And since sticking to a budget is never a bad idea, I’ve also made sure that each item you’ll find below is just as affordable as it is impressive. That means you can grab something for your significant other, cousins, nephews, and even your grandparents — all without breaking the bank. Continued here S3 The Race to Make Alternative Lobster Bait This article is republished from Hakai Magazine, an online publication about science and society in coastal ecosystems. Read more stories like this at hakaimagazine.com. Imagine you’ve got a lobster in front of you, bright red and softly steaming. There’s a fish in that picture, too, though you can’t see it—the fish that was tucked into a trap to lure in the lobster that could end up on your dinner plate. Continued here S24 TerraCycle (B): A Million Tradeoffs ^ IMD706 Buy books, tools, case studies, and articles on leadership, strategy, innovation, and other business and management topics Continued here S21 Why do some dogs chase squirrels? Study finds genetic links to canine quirks Researchers have pinpointed genetic variants linked to different dog behaviours.Credit: Paul Bersebach/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register/Getty Is your dog scared by a plastic bag flapping in the wind? When a stranger comes to the door, does it bark, hide or look for you? Does it chase squirrels? Continued here S62 You Can’t Really Make a Feel-Good Body-Horror Movie The Whale aims for noble sentimentality, but Darren Aronofsky can’t stop turning pain into spectacle. From the first minute, The Whale is suffused with dread. The director Darren Aronofsky has long specialized in that type of atmosphere; even when working on the tiniest scale, he conjures mounting horror out of the mundane. His latest work closely echoes prior films such as π and Requiem for a Dream, both claustrophobic epics with thudding scores and dreary outlooks. But in The Whale, which is adapted from Samuel D. Hunter’s play, the sinister mood immediately feels at odds with the subject. The protagonist, Charlie (played by Brendan Fraser), is completely housebound and on the brink of death because of extreme binge-eating. His confinement is abject, but the source of his pain is deeply relatable: grief. Continued here S57 You need to watch the most disturbing crime thriller on Netflix ASAP It’s difficult to think about the current state of the film industry without bringing to mind Denis Villeneuve, who’s helmed some of the most acclaimed studio thrillers of the past decade. In 2021, he returned from a five-year break to release Dune: Part One, the first installment of his two-part adaptation of Frank Herbert’s sci-fi classic, which book readers long believed couldn’t be properly adapted for the big screen. Villeneuve wouldn’t have had the chance to prove those Dune fans wrong were it not for Prisoners. The 2013 thriller starring Hugh Jackman, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Paul Dano was Villeneuve’s first American film and, like so many of the movies he’s made since, it was a major critical and financial success. Had it flopped, it’s unlikely Villeneuve would have found himself behind the camera for major blockbusters like Dune and Blade Runner 2049. Continued here S49 You need to see 2022’s best meteor shower this week The Geminids tend to be one of the best and brightest meteor showers of the year. This year, they peak overnight on Tuesday, December 13 through Wednesday, December 14. While the Moon will be nearly full, it should set after midnight local time and allow you to catch quite a few meteors, as long as the skies are clear. Continued here S68 The Absurd Talent of Kylian Mbappé The French star player has already proved that he’s one of the best in the history of the game. This is an edition of The Great Game, a newsletter about the 2022 World Cup—and how soccer explains the world. Sign up here. Continued here S20 Leading as a First-Time, First-Generation Manager While there’s extensive research on the glass ceiling and how to break it, there’s less talk about its close relative, the “concrete wall” — a set of obstacles that keep BIPOC professionals, especially women, from securing high-level positions. So, what happens when you finally chip away at the wall and move into a managerial position for the first time? What should you do if you’re the first person in your family to navigate this new opportunity? Continued here S4 Podcast: Medfield State Hospital In this episode of The Atlas Obscura Podcast, we visit an abandoned hospital outside Boston, Massachusetts, that was originally conceived as a place to help people with mental health issues. But it wound up doing more harm than good. Our podcast is an audio guide to the world’s wondrous, awe-inspiring, strange places. In under 15 minutes, we’ll take you to an incredible site, and along the way you’ll meet some fascinating people and hear their stories. Join us daily, Monday through Thursday, to explore a new wonder with cofounder Dylan Thuras and a neighborhood of Atlas Obscura reporters. Continued here S30 'Armored Core VI' release window, trailer, platforms, and developer Before there was Dark Souls, FromSoftware was known for a little mech series called Armored Core. And now, we know the next game in the series is called Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon. It was revealed officially during The Game Awards 2022, alongside a CG trailer. While there isn’t much we know about the upcoming game, we do know it’s gearing up to launch sometime soon. But what can we expect from the next entry in the mech series? And when can we play it? Here’s what we know about Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon. During the reveal trailer at The Game Awards, FromSoftware and Bandai Namco Entertainment only confirmed that Armored Core VI will launch in 2023, with no specific date revealed. Continued here S59 How do floating wind turbines work? 5 companies just won the first US leases for building them off California's coast Northern California has some of the strongest offshore winds in the U.S., with immense potential to produce clean energy. But it also has a problem. Its continental shelf drops off quickly, making building traditional wind turbines directly on the seafloor costly if not impossible. Once water gets more than about 200 feet deep – roughly the height of an 18-story building – these “monopile” structures are pretty much out of the question. Continued here S35 5 iconic outfits from the Game Awards 2022 The Game Awards, which is basically gaming’s equivalent of the Oscars, has gotten some flack for how its presenters dress. People are apparently tired of the tech CEO t-shirt and blazer combo. Kotaku started some discourse about Game Awards fashion, enough that some people stepped up their game this year! Some of them would’ve been dressed to the 10s anyway, but still. Continued here S5 Robert Burns Ellisland Farm Robert Burns is lovingly considered the National Poet of Scotland. He wrote many original poems and also adapted folk stories. Burns is most famously known for his poem, Auld Lang Syne—sung throughout Scotland and the world. Born in Alloway, Burns lived across Scotland, but in 1788, moved to Ellisland Farm. This was his last home before moving to Dumfries where he passed.  Continued here S25 Thailand in May and June of 1997 ^ 398131 Buy books, tools, case studies, and articles on leadership, strategy, innovation, and other business and management topics Continued here S26 Strategy in a Hyperpolitical World ^ S22062 The assumption that business and politics can and even should be kept separate is no longer realistic, the authors write, and messaging from the corporate affairs department is insufficient to defuse political issues when they arise. Delta's troubles in Georgia and Disney's in Florida are among the examples they cite. To make and implement the best strategic choices in this environment, leaders will have to: (1) develop robust principles to guide strategic choices; (2) address ethical issues early; (3) consistently communicate and implement their choices; (4) engage with and beyond the industry to shape the context; and (5) learn from mistakes to make better choices in the future. Continued here S32 'Pinocchio' vs. 'Pinocchio': Guillermo del Toro exposes the hollow truth of Disney's remakes How this year's wildly different Pinocchio remakes represent the best and worst of the state of animation. The straight-to-Disney+ remake of the animated classic from the same studio was nearly a scene-by-scene rendition of its celebrated, golden era 1940s version. This insistence on sticking with the source material was, somehow, not an homage but instead a deeply offensive rip-off of the disruptive animation of the original (which, at the time and still to this day, features some of the most beautiful technical achievements Disney has ever produced). Continued here S2 Australian Standing Stones The Australian Standing Stones are an array of 38 standing stones that represent Celtic nations and are the Australian national monument to commemorate the involvement of the Celtic races in the building of the Australian nation. The first stone was raised in 1991. During the ceremony, emblems from the Celtic nations were placed on the site and it was officially opened in February 1992.  Continued here S33 You need to watch the wildest superhero movie on HBO Max ASAP Seven years after the 2006 cancelation of Teen Titans, the characters returned to television with Teen Titans Go! But the new show wasn’t quite what fans expected. Along with cartoonier animation, the show focused more on the Teen Titans getting into wacky shenanigans than on actual crime fighting. Teen Titans Go! had little appeal to old fans. Unlike the original show’s balance of goofy humor and darker elements, its childish antics and bathroom jokes seemed aimed at a younger age group. Continued here S60 Climate crisis in Africa exposes real cause of hunger – colonial food systems that leave people more vulnerable In the waning hours of the year’s biggest climate change conference – COP27 – we learned of a deal to create a loss and damage fund. This is essentially a source of finance to compensate poor countries for the pain they are incurring because of climate change. An often-cited example of such suffering is the ongoing drought in the Horn of Africa region, which has put some 22 million people at risk of severe hunger. While some have heralded this agreement as long overdue climate reparations, others point out that the loss and damage fund does nothing to address the root causes of climate change - fossil fuel emissions. Continued here S37 Are figs full of dead wasps? An entomologist reveals the answer If you don’t believe in soulmates, then the closest thing is the scientific notion of codependent evolution. (Very different from plain ol’ codependency.) This evolutionary kismet takes millions of years to develop, and perhaps nothing exemplifies this symbiosis better than the fig and the fig wasp. While figs are, for the most part, produced en masse via leaf cuttings, the itty-bitty fig wasp is the flower’s (yes, figs are inverted flowers) only way of sexually reproducing. These insects, all part of the parasitic Agaonidae family, can only carry out this task by living some or all their lives inside the flower — and they all die inside of it. Thus begs the question — are there legions of dead wasps in figs? Inverse has all the details on what’s true about this symbiosis, what’s a myth, and the scoop on that fig crunch. Continued here S38 Falcon Maritime India Private Limited (FMI): Hiring a CEO ^ A00063 The case deals with the hiring of a CEO for a newly established business by an existing group. The Chairman of the Group was of the view that the Group should hire stars from various multinational companies and raise its professional level, even if it required changing the culture of the Group. The case discusses the business plan and risk of business and an approach of linking the incentive system with the cash flow requirements and risks of the business. Continued here S29 DJI’s Mini 3 drone is its best value yet — even without 60 fps video After we got our hands on the Mini 3 Pro, we were waiting to see what a Mini 3 would look like. DJI is closing out the year by bringing yet another drone to market. The Chinese drone maker released the Mini 3, the more affordable, non-pro version of the Mini 3 Pro that was released in May. Continued here S36 This classic sci-fi movie on HBO Max popularized a futuristic technology — can science make it happen? “To boldly go where no man has gone before.” With a single phrase, Star Trek changed science fiction history and inspired a whole generation of physicists using the concept of the warp drive. The movie Star Trek: First Contact explores the genesis of this science fiction concept by introducing Zefram Cochrane, the inventor of the warp drive, which allows starships to travel faster than the speed of light by warping spacetime. But can you really traverse massive distances of space in a matter of minutes or hours? 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