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[Summary] Chickens outnumber all other species of birds by an order of magnitude and they are humanity's single largest source of animal protein. Yet for 2 centuries, biologists have struggled to explain how the chicken became the chicken. Now, the first extensive study of the bird's full genome concludes that people in northern Southeast Asia or southern China domesticated a colorful pheasant sometime after about 7500 B.C.E. People then carried the bird across Asia and on to every continent except Antarctica. The research team also found that the modern chicken's chief ancestor is a subspecies of red jungle fowl named...

Greece-based Celestyal Cruises on Tuesday became the first significant cruise operator to cancel all remaining sailings for the year. It said it wouldn’t resume service until March 6, 2021. The two-ship line, which specializes in Eastern Mediterranean voyages, is making the move in the wake of signals from European Union officials that American travelers may not be able to enter Europe for many months. Celestyal relies on a significant number of Americans and other international travelers to fill its ships. Celestyal’s announcement came the same day the European Union confirmed that American travelers would be banned from Europe until further...

The University of Victoria paleoanthropologist Genevieve von Petzinger explains that a DNA test, which would reveal genetic mutations due to evolution, could help pinpoint the time period a painting was made and may help determine if the art was actually the handiwork of humans or Neanderthals — who lived about 130,000 to 40,000 years ago. "It would just be so fascinating to see the identity. The million dollar question is, did Neanderthals paint?" There is already some indication, according to von Petzinger, that this extinct species was, in fact, artistic. Von Petzinger said that a few years ago, some of...

A new study of the microbial settlers on old paintings, sculptures, and other forms of art charts a potential path for preserving, restoring, and confirming the geographic origin of some of humanity's greatest treasures. Genetics scientists with the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), collaborating with the Leonardo da Vinci DNA Project and supported by the Richard Lounsbery Foundation, say identifying and managing communities of microbes on art may offer museums and collectors a new way to stem the deterioration of priceless possessions, and to unmask counterfeits in the $60 billion a year art market... The genetic detectives caution that additional...

The lake is home to at least one crannóg -- an artificial island used as dwellings and defense mechanisms in prehistoric Ireland. Crannóg's are the oldest dwellings in prehistoric Ireland. There are additionally at least seven ringforts surrounding the town of Lisacul. Eileen McDonagh, Cathal's mother, told the Irish Independent that he was supposed to be doing his homework when he made the discovery. She said that her son became bored with his schoolwork and went for a walk down to the lake, where he paddled up to his ankles in a pair of wellington boots. It was there that...

Reservoirs in the heart of an ancient Maya city were so polluted with mercury and algae that the water likely was undrinkable. Researchers from the University of Cincinnati found toxic levels of pollution in two central reservoirs in Tikal, an ancient Maya city that dates back to the third century B.C. in what is now northern Guatemala. UC's findings suggest droughts in the ninth century likely contributed to the depopulation and eventual abandonment of the city. "The conversion of Tikal's central reservoirs from life-sustaining to sickness-inducing places would have both practically and symbolically helped to bring about the abandonment of...

Villagers in what is today Israel were the first to cultivate olive trees, an international study that pooled data from countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea has concluded. This start of olive domestication apparently began in the Galilee around 7,000 to 6,500 years ago, the team estimates. Olives and especially olive oil were staples of ancient economies around the Mediterranean Basin: The oil was used for cooking, lighting as well as medicinal and ritual purposes. But so far there has been little agreement among researchers as to where and when people first domesticated the plant. Dating estimates have ranged from more...

Scientists in the United Kingdom have discovered a rare bone, called the os cordis, in chimpanzees with a common heart condition. The implications of this finding could extend to humans, who share a close genetic relationship to chimps. Cattle, buffalo, and sheep have it. So do otters, camels, and dogs. Primates, not so much—at least that’s what scientists thought. The os cordis, a small bone found in the hearts of certain animals, is also present in some chimpanzees, according to research published today in Scientific Reports. It’s the first time os cordis has been detected in a great ape species....

I’ve been sick the last couple of weeks, and have had energy for the absolutely necessary – and the nice distractions! I thought I’d share with you some of the things that have distracted me from my personal issues, and from the larger issues that most of us are facing. I guess it isn’t a surprise that I’ve been drawn, for distraction, to people and places who aren’t really dealing with all the cr*p that many of us are. One of the websites I’ve greatly enjoyed has been ‘Whippoorwill Holler’, offered by Mr. and Mrs. Brown in Northeast Arkansas. Lately,...

The European Union on Tuesday extended a ban on travelers from the United States and most other countries beyond July 1, citing epidemiological factors for the decision. Over the past month, the US has seen its number of cases steadily rise after most states eased lockdown measures. A lack of interstate coordination and an uneven response from the federal government has contributed to several new outbreaks across the country. Other countries whose travel restrictions were extended include Brazil, Russia and India, which have seen their number of positive cases surge in recent weeks. The US, Brazil, Russia and India are...

Video posted on Facebook over the weekend of a woman’s interaction with an Assateague wild pony is getting a lot of attention–and serves as a reminder that the island belongs to the ponies. The footage shows a pony nosing for food on a beach blanket with beachgoers nearby at Assateague Island National Seashore. A woman walks up behind the pony and hits it with a shovel, in what appears to be an attempt to shoo it away. When the pony is hit, it kicks the woman from behind. She does not appear to be seriously injured. The video went up...

With the latest suspension of most cruise lines through September 15, cruise fans are beginning to wonder if their favorite vacation will be taking place this year -- and depression is setting in. But what many cruisers don't realize is that the final determination of the measures that cruise ships need to restart service will come from the CDC. And the government agency has yet to put those in writing. After Norwegian announced its latest suspension, a prominent market analyst blamed the CDC for bias against the cruise industry. According to MarketWatch, Instinet analyst Harry Curtis told his clients that...

Airbnb co-founder and CEO Brian Chesky told Axios in an interview that global travel may never fully recover, and that he sees a future where people travel much more within their own countries, possibly for longer stays. Driving the news: "I will go on the record to say that travel will never, ever go back to the way it was pre-COVID; it just won't," Chesky told us by Zoom from his home in San Francisco. "There are sometimes months when decades of transformation happen."

The COVID-19 virus is remaking society in ways both large and small. Did we all shake our last hand in March, for example? How many people, now that their employers have them working from home, will be willing to endure the daily grind of a commute when they’ve seen how life is like away from the cubicle farm? Also, will we ever again be willing to join a long, tightly packed line or bunch up in front of a TSA security checkpoint? Let’s not forget, as well, the TSA security screening process, one in which you and your luggage may...

The object found was a large lead ingot or 'pig' (about half a metre long, weighing 63 kilograms). The 'writing' reported by Mr Jones was a cast Latin inscription confirming that it was Roman and about 2,000 years old... The exploitation of Britain's natural resources was one of the reasons cited by Roman authors for the invasion of Britain by the Emperor Claudius in AD 43... Lead ore or galena contains silver as well as lead, and both were valuable commodities for the Romans. Less than a hundred lead ingots of this type are known from the mines of Roman...

New emerging DNA evidence suggests that living Greeks are indeed descendants of the ancient Mycenaeans, who ruled mainland Greece and the Aegean Sea from 1,600 BC to 1,200 BC. The proof comes from a study in which scientists analyzed the genes from the teeth of 19 people across various archaeological sites within mainland Greece and Mycenae. A total of 1.2 million letters of genetic code were compared to those of 334 people across the world. Genetic information was also compiled from a group of thirty modern Greek individuals in order to compare it to the ancient genomes. This allowed researchers...

The whole story starts with a farmer. Specifically, the farmer at Jortveit farm in southern Norway. Around the beginning of the 1930s he decided to drain a wetland near the farm so he could cultivate new land. But while he was working on the deep drainage trenches, strange things started to crop up. Bones from a bluefin tuna and a killer whale. And huge fish hooks and harpoons made of bones. In the middle of the wetland! The tools eventually ended up in the University Museum of Antiquities in Oslo, where they were studied by archaeologists. The bones, on the...

A former Royal Navy diver and Dornoch native has discovered an almost completely intact 5500-year-old cup, hidden in the mud of a loch in the Outer Hebrides... on the Isle of Lewis on Friday... The location has been kept secret at this stage, but Mr Murray described it as "a beautiful example" of the Neolithic age and was the first person to drink from it in thousands of years. Mr Murray has also previously discovered similar bowls around mysterious man-made islands in the Outer Hebrides which have led to a "startling" re-writing of history. The structures - known as crannogs...

People in what is now Washington State were smoking Rhus glabra, a plant commonly known as smooth sumac, more than 1,400 years ago. The discovery, made by a team of Washington State University researchers, marks the first-time scientists have identified residue from a non-tobacco plant in an archeological pipe. Unearthed in central Washington, the Native American pipe also contained residue from N. quadrivalvis, a species of tobacco not currently grown in the region but that is thought to have been widely cultivated in the past. Until now, the use of specific smoking plant mixtures by ancient people in the American...