Massive Otodus megalodon sharks the oceans largest meat-eaters ever ran hot. It now appears that their rise (and fall) may have been tied to their warm-bloodedness.



Chemical measurements on fossil O. megalodon teeth suggest the sharks had higher body temperatures than surrounding waters. Analyses of carbon and oxygen in the teeth revealed that the giant sharks body temperature was about 7 degrees Celsius (13 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than seawater temperatures at the time.





Lets learn about sharks



That warm-bloodedness may have been a double-edged sword. The trait may have helped megalodons become swift, fearsome apex predators. Those are hunters at the top of the food chain. O. megalodon grew up to 20 meters (66 feet) long. That makes it one of Earths biggest carnivores ever. But the sharks voracious appetite also may have spelled the species doom.



A creatures metabolism is the set of chemical reactions needed to sustain life. Gigantic bodies require a lot of food to power their metabolisms, notes Robert Eagle. A marine biogeochemist, he studies the chemistry of ocean ecosystems. Massive sharks may have been particularly vulnerable to extinction when food became scarce, he says. Eagle was part of a team that studied fossils of O. megalodon and its living and extinct kin to learn about the animals metabolisms.



Game over for megalodons



Mammals can boost their metabolisms and maintain their body heat, even in colder environments. This trait is called endothermy or warm-bloodedness. Some families of fish, both living and extinct, can do something similar. They can keep some body parts warmer than the surrounding water. This is known as regional warm-bloodedness. Many modern sharks belonging to the group that includes great white sharks have this ability.



Jacking up the temperatures of some body parts is one way some sharks evolved to be giant, says Jack Cooper. A paleobiologist, he studies ancient life at Swansea University in Wales. He did not take part in the new study. Filter feeding offers another path to getting large, Cooper points out. Gentler giants, such as whale sharks, use this strategy when they gulp lots of water and eat the tiny creatures within.



Scientists have long thought megalodon was regionally warm-blooded, Eagle says. Estimates of this beasts body shape, swimming speeds and energy needs point to some warm-bloodedness. The shark also was known to hunt in both colder and warmer waters. That suggests it had some control over its body temperature.





The question, Eagle says, isnt really whether O. megalodon was warm-blooded. Its how warm-blooded. His team wondered how the megasharks internal temps compared to one of its major competitors: the great white shark.



O. megalodon evolved around 23 million years ago. It went extinct sometime between 3.5 million and 2.6 million years ago. Great white sharks emerged late in megalodons reign, roughly 3.5 million years ago. They competed for food with their massive cousins.





Some scientists suspect this competition helped drive O. megalodon to extinction, especially when food became scarcer. The climate changed during the Pliocene Epoch, which spanned 5.3 million to 2.6 million years ago. That led to a sharp drop in the numbers of marine mammals. They were a primary food source for both sharks.



But the great whites stuck around when O. megalodon died out, Eagle says. Being the much smaller of the two, they likely needed less food to maintain their metabolism.



Ancient temperature check



To study the ancient sharks body temperatures, the team turned to the only fossils left by these sharks: their teeth.



Fossilized teeth can say a lot about the bodies they came from. A tooths enamel contains isotopes, heavier and lighter forms of a chemical element. Eagles team examined chemically bonded forms of heavier-than-usual carbon and oxygen. The technique acted as a kind of ancient thermometer. The abundance of bonds between these isotopes is only affected by body temperature, Eagle says.



Explainer: What are chemical bonds?



The team used this technique on teeth from great whites and megalodons. They also used it on other animals who lived at the same time. Mollusks are entirely cold-blooded; they cant control their body temperature. Analyzing ancient mollusks revealed the oceans water temperature.



Great whites and megalodons were at least somewhat warm-blooded, the team found. A megalodons body was warmer than the water around it. It also was warmer than the bodies of great white sharks. Neither shark, however, was as warm-blooded as marine mammals, such as whales.



The researchers shared their findings June 26 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.



It’s fantastic that we have more evidence for regional warm-bloodedness in megalodon, Cooper says. O. megalodons higher body temperature would have allowed it to swim further and faster, he says. That increased its chances of finding prey. But when the sharks prey dwindled some 3 million years ago, he says, megalodon may well have starved into extinction.



Eagles team is now exploring the chicken-or-egg question of which came first for megalodons: warm-bloodedness or apex-predator status. You need to be big to be a mega-predator. But its not clear whether carnivores need to be warm-blooded to become apex predators. Were hoping to fit it all together into an evolutionary story as to what drives what.

On Jupiter, lightning jerks and jolts a lot like it does on Earth. 



New views of storms on Jupiter hint that its lightning bolts build by lurching forward. Whats more, those staggering steps happen at a similar pace to lightning bolts on our own planet. 



Arcs of lightning on both worlds seem to move like a winded hiker going up a mountain, says Ivana Kolmaov. A hiker might pause after each step to catch their breath. Likewise, lightning on Earth and Jupiter both seem to build by one step, another step, then another, Kolmaov says. Shes an atmospheric physicist at the Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague. Her team shared the new findings May 23 inNature Communications.  





The discovery about Jupiters lightning doesnt just offer new insights into this gas giant. It could also help aid in the search for alien life. After all, experiments hint that lightning on Earth could have forged some of the chemical ingredients for life. If lightning works a similar way on other worlds, it might produce lifes building blocks on distant planets, too. 



Lightning, step by step 



Here on Earth, winds within thunderclouds whip up lightning. The winds cause many ice crystals and water droplets to rub together. As a result, those tiny bits of ice and water become electrically charged. Bits with opposite charges move to opposite sides of the clouds, building up charge on either end.  



Lets learn about lightning



When that charge buildup gets big enough, electrons are released the lightning takes its first step. From there, the surging electrons repeatedly rip electrons off molecules in new segments of air and rush into those segments. So the bolt of lightning leaps forward at tens of thousands of meters per second, on average. 



Scientists thought Jupiters lightningmight also form by ice crystals and water droplets colliding. But no one knew whether the alien bolts grew step by step, as they do on Earth, or if they took some other form. 



Views from Juno 



Kolmaovs group looked at data from NASAs Juno spacecraft. Specifically, they looked at pulses of radio waves given off by Jupiters lightning. The data included hundreds of thousands of radio wave pulses from lightning over five years. 



Radio waves from each lightning bolt seemed to happen about once per millisecond. On Earth, lightning bolts that stretch from one part of a cloud to another pulse at about the same rate.This hints that Jupiters lightning builds in steps that are hundreds to thousands of meters long, too. 







Step-by-step lightning is not the only possible explanation for what Juno saw, says Richard Sonnenfeld. Hes an atmospheric physicist who wasnt involved in the study. He works at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in Socorro.   



The radio pulses could have come from electrons running back and forth along bolts of lightning, Sonnenfeld says. On Earth, such currents cause some bolts to appear to flicker. Still, he says, stop-and-go lightning formation is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the data. 

Its common to hear the term chaos used to describe seemingly random, unpredictable events. The energetic behavior of kids on a bus ride home from a field trip might be one example. But to scientists, chaos means something else. It refers to a system that is not totally random but still cannot be easily predicted. Theres a whole area of science devoted to this. Its known as chaos theory.



In a non-chaotic system, its easy to measure the details of the starting environment. A ball rolling down a hill is one example. Here, the balls mass and the hills height and angle of decline are the starting conditions. If you know these starting conditions, you can predict how fast and far the ball will roll.





A chaotic system is similarly sensitive to its initial conditions. But even tiny changes to those conditions can lead to huge changes later. So, its hard to look at a chaotic system at any given time and know exactly what its initial conditions were.



For example, have you ever wondered why predictions of the weather one to three days from now can be horribly wrong? Blame chaos. In fact, weather is the poster child of chaotic systems.





The origin of chaos theory



Mathematician Edward Lorenz developed modern chaos theory in the 1960s. At the time, he was a meteorologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. His work involved using computers to predict weather patterns. That research turned up something strange. A computer could predict very different weather patterns from almost the same set of starting data.



But those starting data werent exactly the same. Small variations in the initial conditions led to wildly different outcomes.



To explain his findings, Lorenz likened the subtle differences in starting conditions to the impacts of the flapping wings of some distant butterfly. Indeed, by 1972 he called this the butterfly effect. The idea was that the flap of an insects wings in South America might set up conditions that led to a tornado in Texas. He suggested that even subtle air movements such as those caused by butterfly wings could create a domino effect. Over time and distance, those effects might add up and intensify winds.



Does a butterfly really affect the weather? Probably not. Bo-Wen Shen is a mathematician at San Diego State University in California. This idea is an oversimplification, he argues. In fact, the concept has been generalized mistakenly, Shen says. Its led to a belief that even small human actions could lead to huge unintended impacts. But the general idea that tiny changes to chaotic systems can have huge effects still holds up.





Maren Hunsberger, a scientist and actress, explains how chaos is not some random behavior, but instead describes things that are hard to predict well. This video shows why.



Studying chaos





Chaos is difficult to predict, but not impossible. From the outside, chaotic systems appear to have traits that are semi-random and unpredictable. But even though such systems are more sensitive to their initial conditions, they do still follow all the same laws of physics as simple systems. So the motions or events of even chaotic systems progress with almost clock-like precision. As such, they can be predictable and largely knowable if you can measure enough of those initial conditions.



One way scientists predict chaotic systems is by studying whats known as their strange attractors. A strange attractor is any underlying force that controls the overall behavior of a chaotic system.



Shaped like swirling ribbons, these attractors work somewhat like wind picking up leaves. Like leaves, chaotic systems are drawn to their attractors. Similarly, a rubber ducky in the ocean will be drawn to its attractor the ocean surface. This is true no matter how waves, winds and birds may jostle the toy. Knowing the shape and position of an attractor can help scientists predict the path of something (such as storm clouds) in a chaotic system.



Chaos theory can help scientists better understand many different processes besides weather and climate. For instance, it can help explain irregular heartbeats and the motions of star clusters.

It sounds unbelievable, but scientists from Harvard University believe our entire universe may have been created in a lab by an advanced civilization with an immense knowledge of physics and how to control it.

A raremanuscriptco-authored byGerman-American physicistAlbert Einstein and Swiss-Italian engineer Michele Bessojust became themostexpensiveautographed scientific paper ever sold.The final price which added up to more than13.3 million euros ($15 million)with fees far exceededthe3.5 millionEuros ($3.9 million)expectedbyChristie's Auction House Parisoffice, which hosted the sale.

I heard a car pulling into the driveway. Soon enough, Adam, my Grandson, burst into my room, with a broad grin. Wow, you are right on time for my interview! I remarked cheerfully. Of course! I want top marks for this interview for my school science project! Adam replied ecstatically, So, lets start. Grandpa, please tell me the story of Covid-19 and how it changed your life! Well, as you know, I am a professor of biology. However, did you know that the pandemic fifty years ago was the reason I decided on that path? As I continued, I felt myself being pulled into the memories of 2020...

Our seemingly calm Sun can havea nasty temperthat comes in the form of powerful explosions. The star'sunpredictable outburstscandisruptsatellites in orbit andbe dangerous forastronauts.Though the flares are well-documented, researchers have never been able to pinpoint thecause of the erratic behavior. Now, the Sun'sincrediblemulti-staged "tantrum"may help scientists get closer to solving thelong-standing mystery.

If youre thinking of the Mesozoic Era the Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous periods you probably think DINOSAURS! Youre not wrong. That era, 252 million to 66 million years ago, was when dinosaurs evolved, reigned and died. But youd also be missing out on a lot of other amazing creatures, especially other reptiles.



Dinosaurs are only one group of Mesozoic reptiles. Other land-dwellers included ancestors of modern-day crocodiles, called Batrachopus. Meanwhile, the air was ruled by pterosaurs.



Though pterosaurs often come in sets of play dinosaurs, they were only dinosaur relatives. Well-adapted for flying, they had hollow, air-filled bones, similar to modern birds. Their wings, though, were usually covered with thin membranes rather than feathers. (Some pterosaurs, though, may have been covered in fuzzy protofeathers.) Pterosaurs ranged in size. Some were as small as eagles. The largest known, Quetzalcoatlus, had a wingspan of some 10 meters (33 feet).



See all the entries from our Lets Learn About series





The Mesozoic seas were dominated by other non-dinosaur reptiles. These included the ichthyosaurs, or fish-lizards. Scientists have discovered fossils of more than 100 species of these animals. Among them are the remains of one unlucky reptile who likely died from trying to eat a meal as big as itself. Plesiosaurs had long necks with dozens of bones. Their giant flippers let them swim through the water like a penguin. Although big, plesiosaurs still had plenty of worries. These included giant mosasaurs that preyed on plesiosaurs. You might recognize those giant sea monsters from the aquatic show in Jurassic World.



While the Mesozoic Era is often called the Age of Reptiles, reptiles werent the only animals around, of course. Fish still swam the seas. Insects and other invertebrates were numerous. And mammals our ancestors were just getting their start.





Want to know more? Weve got some stories to get you started:



Thats no dino! Not all ancient reptiles were dinosaurs. Some soared, many swam the seas and still others looked like dinos but actually werent. (6/12/2015) Readability: 6.6



The real sea monsters No known dinosaurs lived in the oceans. But there were lots of big aquatic reptiles that were every bit as ferocious and awesome. (6/19/2015) Readability: 7.3



Early dino-era start for modern mammals Fossils of an extinct group of rodent-sized mammals suggest they were related to modern mammals. These ancient remains push back the origin of mammals by many millions of years. (10/1/2014) Readability: 7.3





Dinosaurs may get most of our attention, but there were plenty of other reptiles that roamed Earth during the Mesozoic the Age of Reptiles.



Explore more



Scientists Say: Jurassic



Explainer: How a fossil forms



Explainer: Understanding geologic time



Fossil hunting can start as childs play



These crocodile ancestors lived a two-legged life



These fuzz-covered flying reptiles had catlike whiskers



This ancient reptiles last meal may have truly been a killer



Activities



Word Find



Download and print Pterosaurs: A Card Game from the American Museum of Natural History. The game, based on the museums collections and exhibits, challenges players to gain points by building their own food chains and breaking their opponents.

Sea urchins are underwater lawnmowers. Their never-ending appetites can alter whole coastal ecosystems. Normally they eat algae and other underwater greenery. But these spiny invertebrates also will take a bite of something more meaty and dangerous. Thats the surprise finding of a new study.



In a first, researchers have seen urchins attacking and eating predatory sea stars. Normally starfish are the predators. Researchers describe this unexpected flip on who eats who in the June issue of Ethology. 



Jeff Clements is a marine behavioral ecologist. He now works for Fisheries and Oceans Canada in Moncton. But back in 2018 he worked at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim. For one project, he became part a team studying common sun stars in Sweden. At some point, Clements needed to separate one of the sun stars for a short while. So he placed it in an aquarium that already housed some 80 green sea urchins.



Starfish are predators of urchins, he recalls thinking. Nothings gonna happen. But the urchins (Strongylocentrotus droebachiensis) hadnt eaten a bite in two weeks. When Clements came back to the tank the next day, the sun star (Crossaster papposus) was nowhere to be seen. A group of urchins were piled on the side of the tank. Below them was something red. It was barely visible. When Clements pried the urchins off, he found the remains of the starfish.





The urchins had just ripped it apart, he says.





No fluke



Clements and his colleagues realized no one had ever described this urchin behavior. To test whether it was a freak occurrence, the team ran two trials. Each time, they placed a single sun star in the urchin tank. Then they watched. 



One urchin would approach the starfish. It would feel around. Eventually it attached itself to one of the sun stars many arms. Other urchins would soon do the same. They quickly covered the sun stars arms. When the team removed the urchins after about an hour, they found tips of the starfishs arms had been chewed off. So had its eyes and other sensory organs that reside on those arms.



This aspect of the sun stars anatomy may pose a risk. 



[The tips] are the first part of the sun star that the urchin is going to encounter as it approaches, explains Clements. So if the urchin consumes those first, the sun star is going to be less effective at escaping the attacks.



The team calls this tactic urchin pinning.



Green sea urchins (Strongylocentrotus droebachiensis) took only minutes to glom onto this sun stars arms. They pinned the bigger animal in place while they gnawed at its sensitive, eyed arm tips.Jeff Clements



Do urchins play defense or offense



Its possible the urchins are acting in self-defense. They may be disarming literally a predator in their midst. But the urchins hunger might also explain their attacks, says Julie Schram. Shes an animal physiologist at the University of Alaska Southeast in Juneau. In crowded lab conditions with limited food, urchins can switch up their diet in surprising ways, she notes. Some species, for instance, have been seen cannibalizing each other.   



This would suggest to me that when starved, adult urchins will seek out alternate food sources, she says. 



The urchins capacity to feed on predatory sea stars had been hinted at before. Sea stars have turned up in urchin stomachs, notes Jason Hodin. Hes a marine biologist at the University of Washington in Friday Harbor. But this dining turnabout often was interpreted as scavenging. For instance, the urchins might have just finished off the remains of someone elses dinner.



Actively attacking starfish for dinner is a more interesting possibility, he says. And, he adds, Its satisfying to see that possibility confirmed, at least in the lab.



If urchin attacks also occur in the wild, Clements thinks there could be some interesting impacts on kelp forests. When overabundant, urchins can overgraze kelp forests,  leaving behind barrens. If urchins are able to survive by eating other animals, they may not die off when the kelp is gone. This could keep urchin numbers high and delay the recovery of these kelp forests, says Clements.



Such discussions are premature, argues Megan Dethier. Such ideas are making way too much out of a peculiar lab situation, says this marine ecologist. She works at the University of Washington Friday Harbor Laboratories. After all, Dethier notes, such attacks havent been documented even in urchin barrens, where food is scarce,



And the urchin attacks cant be intentional, she adds, since the animals dont have a brain or central nervous system. It makes no sense, she says, that urchins could mount a coordinated predatory attack.



Such mob attacks may be based on chemicals released into the water by feeding, Clements counters. Once the first urchin starts chewing on a starfish, the other urchins may start recognizing the chemical scent of sea stars as food. Clements wants to run new tests to see what levels of hunger and crowding density might affect urchin appetites for sun stars. 

Image credit Pixabay/CC Father's Day In The Year Of The Pandemic by Karuna Lohmann, 13 Sunday, 6/21/2020, is the day I remember best during the COVID-19 pandemic. I was twelve years old, standing with my parents in a park, my shoes tapping out a rapid beat. I was holding my speech in my hands, rereading it to pass time. The breeze whooshed and the pages fluttered like a butterfly flapping its wings, trying to fly. I remember playing with my mask while waiting for people to arrive. Soon a small group formed a circle around me. I thanked everyone for coming. Yet at the same time, a small bit of...

Some artistsseem toexcel at impressingthe world with artworkthat can only be called unusual at best. First, there wasMaurizio Cattelan'sComedian,a series of threesculptures each comprising a single banana affixedto a wall withduct tape that soldfor$120,000 apiece in 2019. Now,contemporary Italian artistSalvatore Garauhas managed to sellan immaterial, or imaginary,masterpiece to an anonymous buyer for an astonishing 15,000 euros (about $18,000)!

A tiny mantis shrimp found off the Pacific coast of South and Central America has inspired a new robot that somersaults and rolls as well as a circus acrobat or Disney sidekick.





Forty years ago, Roy Caldwell documented the somersaulting mantis shrimp in his lab.Credit: Roy Caldwell



Wen-Bo Li is a mechanical engineer exploring how to design soft robots that move by rolling. He works at Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China. Not long ago, he came across a description from more than 40 years ago of how a mantis shrimp navigated beaches.



Roy Caldwell is an ecologist at the University of California, Berkeley. Back in 1979, he published a report in Nature about a mantis shrimp known as Nannosquilla decemspinosa. The tiny crustacean looks a bit like a cross between a caterpillar and a lobster. Caldwell watched as the animal walked underwater. But when waves pulled back, beaching the critter on wet sand, it no longer used its legs. The animal continues in a series of backward somersaults, generally moving in a straight line until it encounters an obstacle or water suffiently deep for swimming, or until it becomes fatigued,” he wrote. He described this as a unique form of locomotion.





Intrigued, Li searched for more detailed information. I found that it could move by a series of backward somersaults for as far as 2 meters [79 inches]. Along the way, it might do 20 to 40 consecutive, dynamic rolls, he learned. It can even mount an incline.





Wen-Bo Li used video footage to analyze the movement of his teams novel robot.Credit: Wen-Bo Li



His team set to work. “After figuring out this fascinating mechanism, Li says, we started to design a soft robot to emulate the somersaulting.” They made the robots body in a series of segments, similar to those in a mantis shrimp. We used 11 chambers. The shape is the same as the flat dorsal [backside] surface of the animal. That makes it stable.



Before it moves, the robot called SomBot stretches out straight. Suction-cup action holds it to the floor. As the researchers push air through long thin tubes attached to one end, the suction releases. This causes the robots torso to bend into a circle and roll.



SomBot can roll pretty quickly up to 9.2 body lengths per second. Li says that the suction combined with the somersault is the key to that speed. With the help of the controllable anchoring, the curling body can be converted into fast movement, he says.



The team described its design in the April 2021 issue of IEEE Xplore.



The rolled-up shape of the ocean dwelling N. decemspinosa (left) and the soft-robot SomBot (right) look similar. Inspired by the mantis shrimp, engineers built their segmented soft robot to scoot faster than other soft robots.R. Caldwell; W.-B. Li



Soft versus hard robots



Daniela Rus is a robotics engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. She designed a soft-fish robot called SoFi. Hard-bodied robots are made of materials such as hard plastics and metal, she notes. Often large and heavy, these can be dangerous to be around, she explains. Thats why many robot designers prefer softer materials. These robots will end up closer to real organisms in softness.



Engineers often choose soft robots for missions where they need to protect soft organisms around them such as people or other animals. Rus says that this new tech would not only be safer but also more capable of a wide range of motions than hard-bodied robots.



For its new robot, the Shanghai team used an elastomer. Its a polymer a material made from a long chain of repeating units. The same rubbery elastomer is sometimes used in shoe soles and car tires. After molded into a desired shape, it stays elastic. Rus describes this as being compliant. That flexibility, she says, should allow it to withstand force and to move as needed.





A need for speed



Lis group had started with one big goal: make SomBot faster than earlier types of soft robots. Its somersaulting action appears to have helped them succeed. The team tested SomBots speed against a rigid-but-soft robot inspired by a cheetahs spine. That soft-rolling robot looks like a caterpillar. It was designed to move much like human fingers. SomBot beat it by more than three body lengths per second.



But while SomBots speed is impressive, Li and his team have not yet gotten full control of its rolling action. They are beginning to consider giving it a closed-loop design. This may be something like a doughnut or perhaps the mythical snake that bites its own tail.



SomBots suction also works best on smooth surfaces. However, most natural ones are fairly coarse. “Anchoring by suction won’t work on rough and uneven surfaces,” such as sidewalks, Li admits.



The new robots style of moving is something that Disneys animators appreciate, too. In their new animated film, Raya and the Last Dragon, the sidekick who transports the warrior princess also relies on rolling locomotion. One of the movies producers has described that sidekick named Tuk Tuk as part armadillo, part pillbug and part pug (a type of dog). Two of those can roll into a ball. In the movie, Tuk Tuk somersaults across the Asian landscape, speeding Raya from one site to another.

Since being introduced to chess at the tender age of six, Tanitoluwa"Tani" Adewumihas had one goal. He wants to become the world's youngest-ever Grandmaster the highest title a chess player can achieve. The record is currently held by Russian chess player Sergey Alexandrovich Karjakin, who qualified for the title in 2002 at the age of 12 years and seven months.

A burnt orange sky greeted San Franciscos early risers for several days in November 2018. The California citys residents usually enjoy good air quality. For nearly two weeks in a row, however, the air quality ranged from unhealthy to very unhealthy. The cause: a raging wildfire some 280 kilometers (175 miles) away. A new report now links pollution from that Camp Fire to flareups of eczema. This itchy skin condition affects almost one-in-three Americans, mostly children and adolescents.



More worrisome, polluting wildfires are likely to become even more of a problem in the future as Earths climate continues to warm.



The Camp Fire was Californias deadliest and most destructive. It started on November 8, 2018 and lasted 17 days. Before it was over, it destroyed more than 18,804 buildings or other structures. It also left at least 85 people dead.



Explainer: What are aerosols?





But the infernos health effects ranged far beyond the 620 square kilometers (153,336 acres or about 240 square miles) that burned. The fire emitted high levels of aerosols that polluted the air. These far-flung particles are so small they can be breathed deeply into the lungs. A large share of these aerosols were just 2.5 micrometers in diameter or smaller. Such tiny bits can inflame airways, harm the heart, alter brain functions and more.



Even from miles away, smoke from wildfires can make people feel awful.



Some people will be coughing, says Kenneth Kizer. Hes a medical doctor and public health expert with Atlas Research. Its based in Washington, D.C. Whats more, he notes, The eyes burn. The nose runs. Even your chest may hurt as you breathe irritants into your lungs.



A former firefighter, Kizer chaired a committee that considered what Californias wildfires might mean for health, communities and planning. The National Academies of Science and Medicine published that programs report last year.



But it wasnt quite complete. This past April 21, researchers also linked pollution from the Camp Fire to eczema and itchy skin.





Irritated and inflamed



The new study looked at cases of such skin disease not only during and after the Camp Fire, but also before it. Normal skin acts as a good barrier to the environment. Thats not true in people with eczema, explains Maria Wei. Their skin can be sensitive from head to toe. Blotchy, bumpy or scaly rashes may break out.



Wei is a dermatologist at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF). Eczemas itch can be very life-altering, Wei says. It affects peoples moods. It may even cause people to lose sleep, she notes.



Wei and others looked at visits to UCSF dermatology clinics over an 18-week period, starting in October 2018. The team also reviewed data for the same 18 weeks starting in October 2015 and October 2016. There were no large wildfires in the area at those times. In all, the team reviewed 8,049 clinic visits by 4,147 patients. The researchers examined data for fire-related air pollution during the study period, too. They also looked at other factors that can affect skin sensitivity, such as temperature and humidity.



Eczema can affect up to roughly one in five children and teens worldwide, Swedish researchers reported in 2020.-aniaostudio-/iStock/Getty Images Plus



The surprise finding, Wei reports: A very short-term exposure to air pollution causes an immediate signal in terms of skin response. For instance, clinic visits for eczema went up in all age groups. This started the second week of the Camp Fire. It kept up for the next four weeks (except for the week of Thanksgiving). Thats in comparison to clinic visits before the fire and after December 19.



Childrens visits climbed by nearly 50 percent compared to the period before the fire. For adults, the rate rose by 15 percent. That trend wasnt surprising. When youre born your skin isnt totally mature, Wei explains. So eczema generally is more common in children than adults.



The team also saw a link or correlation between fire-related pollution and oral eczema medicines prescribed to adults. Those medicines often are used for severe cases where skin creams dont provide relief.



Smoke-related aerosols might affect the skin in different ways, Wei says. Some chemicals are directly toxic to cells. They may cause a type of cell damage known as oxidation. Others may set off an allergic reaction. Even stress about the wildfire can play a role, she adds.



Her team described its findings in JAMA Dermatology.



The study looked only for links to one wildfire. Its findings may not apply to other wildfires and other places, the team warns. Their study also looked only at data from one hospital system.



To Kizers knowledge, this paper is the first to link eczema and itch to pollution from a wildfire. He did not work on the study. But he did write a commentary about it in the same April 21 JAMA Dermatology.



Wildfires throughout California late last summer led to 17 consecutive days of unhealthy air around San Francisco. That topped the previous record from the 2018 Camp Fire.Justin Sullivan/Staff/Getty Images News



Wildfires on the rise



Spring in California is very dry this year. So experts expect the summer and fall of 2021 to see a severe wildfire season. And the wildfires are just going to layer on and add to the health burden of whatever air pollution is there already, Kizer says.



Since 2000, Californias wildfire season has gotten longer. It peaks earlier, too. Those findings come from graduate student Shu Li and environmental engineer Tirtha Banerjee. Theyre at the University of California, Irvine. They shared their work in Scientific Reports on April 22.



More work is needed before the findings by Weis team can be applied generally, Li says. Particles from extreme wildfires can be carried over great distances. However, she adds, their concentration can also be diluted. She would like to know how high the wildfire pollution has to be to trigger skin effects.



Large wildfires due to lightning and other natural causes are the main reason why more area is getting burned, Li and Banerjee found. But its the frequency of small human-caused wildfires that has gone up most rapidly. These smaller blazes burn through fewer than 200 hectares (500 acres).



Which [size fire] has a greater impact on human health? Li asks. Right now, no one knows.



And California isnt the only place that should worry. More urban areas across the western United States have had poorer air quality during the summer than in the past. Wildfires explain why, say researchers in Utah, Colorado and Nevada. They reported their findings April 30 in Environmental Research Letters.



What to do



Medicines can treat eczema and itch, Wei says. See a doctor if you want relief, she advises. Thats true whether its wildfire season or not.



Better still, take precautions, she says. If wildfire smoke pollutes your air, stay indoors. If you must go out, wear long sleeves and long pants. Moisturize your skin, too. That can provide an extra barrier to pollution.



Better planning can help communities prevent some wildfires, Kizer says. Longer term, people can cut down on greenhouse-gas emissions. Those reductions can rein in the impacts of climate change. However, some climate-change impacts are here to stay. This is part of the picture that the young people are going to have to live with, Kizer says. And its not a pleasant part of the future.

Geologists have long maintained that our Earth comprises four layers the crust, the mantle, the outer core, and, the deepest layer,theinner core. However, a team of scientists led by Jo Stephenson, a doctoral student in seismology at Australian National University in Canberra, now asserts thatour planet may be harboring a mysterious, fifth layer an"inner-inner" coreas well.

Those hoping for some respite from thepowerfulnor'easterthat is currentlypummeling the US East Coast and Mid-Atlanticwithheavy snow and near-blizzard conditions are in for a disappointment.On February2, 2021, aka Groundhog Day,legendary woodchuckPunxsutawney Phil observed his shadow.This according to folklore means that the frosty weather will remain with us for an additional six weeks.