Astrophysicists at the University of Toronto have solved a mystery: why Earth's day lengthens gradually under the influence of lunar tides, while the Earth's day lengthening pauses for more than a billion years. Their research shows that from about 2 billion years ago to 600 million years ago, sun-driven atmospheric tides counteracted the moon's influence, maintaining Earth's rotation rate and stabilizing the duration of the day at 19.5 hours.

Research by a team of astrophysicists suggests that from about 2 billion years ago to 600 million years ago, atmospheric tides driven by the Sun counteracted the moon's influence, keeping Earth's rotation rate steady and day length at a constant 19.5 hours. Source: Kevin M. Gill

Without the billion-year pause in slowing Earth's rotation, our current 24-hour day would stretch to more than 60 hours.

The study describing the results was recently published in the journal Science Advances. Using geological evidence and atmospheric research tools, scientists have shown that the tidal deadlock between the sun and the moon is the result of an accidental but hugely influential link between the temperature of the atmosphere and the speed of the Earth's rotation.

The authors of the paper include Norman Murray, A theoretical astrophysicist at the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics (CITA) at the University of Toronto, Hanbo Wu, a graduate student at the Canadian Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics and the Department of Physics at the University of Toronto, and David A. Christine Menou, Department of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Dunlap, and Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences, University of Toronto, Garborough; Jeremy Laconte of the Astrophysics Laboratory in Bordeaux and a former CITA postdoctoral fellow; And Christopher Lee of the physics Department at the University of Toronto.

Power spectrum of the Earth's atmosphere. The X-axis is the wavelength, for example, 5 means a wavelength propagating from west to east that is one-fifth of the Earth's circumference, and -5 means a wavelength propagating from east to west that is one-fifth of the Earth's circumference. The Y-axis is frequency, in units of one cycle per day, for example 2 means two cycles per day, or 12 hours. Thin brown horizontal lines indicate one, two, three etc cycles per day (24 hour, 12 hour, 8 hour cycles, and so on). Source: Sakazaki & Hamilton

When the moon first formed about 4.5 billion years ago, a day lasted less than 10 hours. But since then, the moon's gravitational pull on Earth has slowed the Earth's rotation, causing the days to get longer and longer. Today, it is still lengthening at a rate of about 1.7 milliseconds per century.

The moon slows Earth's rotation by pulling on its oceans, creating tidal bulges on either side of the planet that we experience as high and low tides. The moon's gravitational pull on these bulges, combined with the friction between the tides and the seafloor, acts as a brake on our spinning planet.

"Sunlight also creates atmospheric tides with the same type of bulge," Murray said. The sun's gravity pulls on these atmospheric bulges, creating torque on the Earth. But instead of slowing down the Earth's rotation like the moon does, it speeds it up."

For most of Earth's geological history, lunar tides outperformed solar tides by about ten times; As a result, the Earth's rotation slows down and the days lengthen. But about 2 billion years ago, the atmospheric bulge was larger because the atmosphere was warmer then and because the atmosphere's natural resonance - the frequency at which waves move through the atmosphere - matched the length of the day.

Like a clock, the atmosphere's resonant frequency is determined by a variety of factors, including temperature. In other words, the speed at which waves - such as those produced by the massive eruption of Krakatoa in Indonesia in 1883 - pass through the atmosphere is determined by its temperature. The same principle explains why a clock always makes the same sound at a constant temperature.

Murray and his collaborators relied on geological evidence in their study, such as these samples from tidal estuaries, which reveal cycles of spring and low tides. Source: G.E. Williams

For most of Earth's history, atmospheric resonance has been out of sync with the Earth's rotation rate. Today, it takes 22.8 hours for two atmospheric "tides" to circle the Earth; Because the resonance is out of sync with Earth's 24-hour rotation period, atmospheric tides are relatively small.

But during the billion years studied, the atmosphere was warmer and the resonance period was about 10 hours. In addition, at the time of that epoch, the Earth's rotation was slowed by the moon to 20 hours.

As the atmospheric resonance and day length become even -10 and 20 hours - the atmospheric tides are strengthened, the bulge grows larger, and the tidal pull of the sun becomes strong enough to counteract the lunar tides.

"It's like pushing a child on a swing," Murray said. If your thrust is out of sync with the swing's cycle, the swing won't go very high. But if they are synchronized, and you are pushing the swing exactly when it stops at one end of its journey, then the push will increase the swing's power and it will swing farther and higher. This is what atmospheric resonance and tides do."

In addition to geological evidence, Murray and his colleagues used global Atmospheric circulation models (GCMs) to predict atmospheric temperatures during this period to arrive at their findings. Global atmospheric circulation models are the same ones climatologists use to study global warming. Murray thinks it's a big takeaway that these

models worked so well in the team's study.

"I've talked to climate change skeptics who don't believe the global circulation models that tell us we're in a climate crisis," Murray said. I told them we used these global circulation models in our research and they were correct."

Despite its distance from geological history, the results add a new perspective to the climate crisis. Since atmospheric resonance changes with temperature, Murray notes that our currently warming atmosphere could have an effect on this tidal imbalance.

"As the planet warms, the resonance frequency rises as well - the atmosphere gets further and further away from the resonance. As a result, the torque from the sun is reduced and, as a result, the length of the day is lengthened, faster than it would otherwise be."

Scientists studying a material that could help unlock the secrets of superconductors have accidentally discovered a "demon" particle that was first theorized nearly 70 years ago but never experimentally confirmed. It's a strange particle. As they pass through a solid, their interactions create collective excitations that behave like entirely new particles with different properties, called quasiparticles.

Scientists have discovered a long-rumored "demon" particle hidden in the plasma oscillations of a metal

Plasma oscillations produce a special form of quasiparticles, called plasmas, that have new charges and masses different from the electrons that make them up. However, it was thought that plasmas could not exist at room temperature because the energy levels were not sufficient for the mass needed to form plasmas.

But in 1956, theoretical physicist David Pines predicted an exception - electrons in multiple energy bands could clump together in out-of-phase patterns to form plasmons with no mass or charge. Without any mass, they can form at any energy level and therefore at any temperature. This theoretical particle is known as the "demon of the pine tree" and has eluded detection ever since, until now.

Now, for the first time, scientists at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Kyoto University have directly detected the particle in a metal called strontium ruthenate.

Peter Abbamonte, lead author of the study, said: "Most experiments use light to measure optical properties, but electrical neutrality means that the demon does not interact with light. We need to design a completely different kind of experiment."

Strontium ruthenate is an intriguing metal that has some of the properties of a high-temperature superconductor, even though it is not itself a high-temperature superconductor. The team hopes to find some clues about this valuable phenomenon by studying the material's electronic properties through a method called momentum-resolved electron energy loss spectroscopy. This involves bombarding the metal with electrons to observe its properties, including any quasiparticles that may form. In the process, the researchers discovered a puzzling massless plasma.

Ali Husain, co-author of the study, said: "At first, we had no idea what it was. As we started to rule out the possibilities, we began to suspect that we really had found the demon particle."

Scientists continue to explore the electronic structure of strontium ruthenate. Sure enough, the secret that had been hidden for 67 years finally came into view.

Edwin Huang, co-author of the study, said: "Pines' prediction of the devil requires quite special conditions, and it is not clear whether strontium ruthenate should have demon particles. We had to do microscopic calculations to figure out what was going on. When we did this, we found a particle consisting of two bands of electrons that oscillated out of phase with an almost equal amplitude, just as Pines described.

The team believes that demons may play a key role in the electronic behavior of a variety of metals.

The research is in the journal Nature.

Immunotherapy is a type of cancer treatment that harnesses the body's natural immune defense system to attack tumor cells. While there has been a lot of focus on getting T cells involved in fighting cancer, there has been less focus on directing the complement system to the tumor. The complement system is an important part of the innate immune system, helping to fight infections, heal damage and clear away dead cells. Although antibodies (proteins produced by immune cells) can activate the complement system, not all antibodies activate the complement system equally effectively.

The researchers developed a method using bispecific single-domain antibodies, known as BiCEs, which activate the complement system to target and kill cancer cells more effectively than current methods. This innovative approach can mobilize more immune responses in the body, thus revolutionizing cancer immunotherapy, and has clinical application potential.

In the new study, the researchers developed a way to activate the complement system using bispecific single-domain antibodies, called BiCEs. These antibodies can bind to two different targets simultaneously: a complement protein called C1q and a specific protein that exists on the surface of cancer cells.

By linking C1q and cancer cell proteins, the BiCE molecule strongly activates the complement system to specifically kill the target cancer cell.

Researchers at Commit Biologics, Kiel Christian-Albrechts University and Aarhus University have discovered a new way to boost the immune system. From left, Stephen Thiel, Annette G. Hansen, Dennis V. Pedersen, Nick S. Laursen, Heidi Gytz Olesen, Gregers R. Andersen, and Mikael B. L. Winkler. Source: Lisbeth Heilesen, Aarhus University

Compared to antibodies currently in clinical use, BiCE molecules are superior in activating the complement system and killing cancer cells. This new approach has several advantages over traditional cancer therapies, one of which is the potential to activate a broader immune response by harnessing the power of the innate immune system, including recruiting immune cells into the tumor microenvironment to enhance anti-tumor activity.

The findings not only highlight the innovative research carried out at Aarhus University, but also pave the way for further advances in the field of cancer immunotherapy. Going forward, the spin-off enterprise resulting from this collaboration aims to translate research findings into clinical applications.

Chestnut

is native to China, except Qinghai, Ningxia, Xinjiang, Hainan and other provinces and regions, widely spread in the north and south, often cultivated in low elevation of low mountains, hills, gentle slopes and river beaches and other areas. [16] Chestnut likes to grow in sunny, humid climate areas, belongs to the positive tree species, cold and drought tolerance, high soil requirements, sandy soil. [17] The propagation methods of chestnut mainly include cutting propagation, grafting propagation and sowing propagation, and generally adopt grafting propagation. [18]

Compendium of Materia Medica records the medicinal value of chestnuts: "Chestnuts salty, warm, non-toxic; Supplementing Qi, thick stomach, tonifying kidney qi, can treat broken bones, heart and abdomen evil qi, nourishing spleen, swelling pain and blood stasis; When you chew it raw, it makes you fat and healthy." [19] Chestnut nuts can be eaten raw or shelled to make pastries, tofu and other non-staple foods; Chestnut brown, sapwood color slightly light, straight texture, rough structure, hard, water and wet resistance, is a high-quality material, high economic value. [20] Many ancient sayings on chestnuts, such as " Xinyun Qiulin chestnuts more fat, back to the clouds to master Huang Xin chestnuts" and "mountain family steamed chestnuts warm fat, tender, warm, as long as the chestnuts, non-concious know", all express the characteristics of chestnut flesh fat.

Flax seed originated in China and is now mainly distributed in Gansu, Xinjiang, Qinghai and other places. It is suitable for mild, cool and humid climate with small temperature difference between day and night. From seedling to flowering, the rainfall is high, and the distribution is uniform, and the sunshine is weak. From flowering to maturity, there is less rainfall and sufficient light, which is conducive to the vegetative growth and fiber development of hemp stems. It is usually propagated by sowing seeds. [4]

Compendium of Materia Medica says: "Taking flax for a hundred days can remove all chronic diseases; Eating flax for a year, the body and face clean and not sick; Eating flax for two years, white hair back to black; After eating flax for three years, I lost my teeth." Studies have also found that it can also improve kidney function and constipation. It can be seen that its medicinal value. In addition, flaxseed can also be used to press oil, its oil after the waste still contains a lot of protein, can be used as livestock feed, its roots or textile fiber raw materials, so flaxseed also has a high economic value.

Wolfberry is mainly distributed in Shaanxi, Ningxia, Gansu, Qinghai, Xinjiang and Tibet provinces in China, and also in Central Asia, Europe and other countries. [9] Wolfberry loves light, is resistant to salt and alkali, is resistant to drought, has strong adaptability and vitality, and often grows in saline-alkali land, salinized sandy land, along rivers and lakes, dry river beds or roadside. [10] The propagation methods of Wolfberry include cutting, sowing and tillering. [11]

Black fruit wolfberry can treat heart fever, heart disease, menstrual disorders and other diseases. [12] Wolfberry contains protein, vitamins, minerals and other nutrients, and has high edible value. Its fruits are also rich in anthocyanins, which have antioxidant and anti-allergic functions, enhance human immunity and improve sleep. [13] The nutritional value of black fruit wolfberry is higher than that of ordinary wolfberry, and corresponding health drinks and foods can be developed. [14] In terms of ecological value, Wolfberry can also improve soil, prevent wind and fix sand.

At the end of the 20th century, it began to spread across the country and became a classic snack at street beer stalls on summer nights. The lobster used in the main ingredient is originally from North America, introduced to Japan by the United States in 1918, and then introduced to China by Japan in 1929, growing in the rivers and lakes of southern China.

Production process

1. Keep the lobster in clean water for at least one to two days to let the shrimp expel the mud from its body. Use a discarded toothbrush to clean the lobster, especially where the head meets the body, which is dirty;

If necessary, consider removing the lobster's head and cutting a slit on the back of the tail to remove the black line.

1. Put the oil in the pot, the oil is hot, put the shrimp in the oil, do not put salt at this time, until the surface of the shrimp is red, quickly remove the reserve, start the pot;

2. Put an appropriate amount of vegetable oil in the pan, saute garlic and ginger in the pan over medium heat to produce fragrance, put the shrimp, star anise and cinnamon in the pan with appropriate amount of water and cook over high heat

3. After boiling the water for 3 minutes, pour the prepared red pepper, refined salt, soy sauce, vinegar and other ingredients into it properly, and simmer for a while;

4. Turn the heat to medium, put the appropriate amount of cooking wine, add water to half of the main ingredients, cover the pot, medium heat for 10 minutes, until the water boils into thick juice, add scallion out of the pot and bowl.

Like to eat spicy mouth can be appropriate to add the spicy sauce containing black beans, the taste is more spicy and rich!

Soul trick: Small stove

Small stove barbecue, refers to each table has an independent small oven charcoal barbecue, this barbecue is also called "live barbecue". General city to eat barbecue, are the skewers baked on the table, that is, both food barbecue. Authentic Zibo barbecue, each table must have a small stove, the meat skewers on the table has been roasted to half cooked, the fire is controlled by the diners themselves.

Three-piece set: small cake, spring onion, sauce

Take two strings of sizzling meat skewers, first wrapped in dipping material, and then spread on the small cake, palm hold the small cake will meat skewers tightly, pull back a stick, a few pieces of meat is so completely wrapped in the small cake inside, and then put a section of green onion or green white, such a roll, the achievement of a unique small cake.

Feeling the wheat flavor of the small cake, the dip of peanuts and sesame seeds mixed with the freshly roasted meat, the small cake makes the slightly salty meat become palatable, the dip provides enough flavor, and the spring onion is a good offset the greasy meat skewer, the king and the minister complement each other.