Posted on 10/20/2020 9:33:20 PM PDT by BenLurkin
A team of geologists at the University of Houston College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics believes they have found the lost plate in northern Canada by using existing mantle tomography images—similar to a CT scan of the earth's interior. The findings, published in Geological Society of America Bulletin, could help geologists better predict volcanic hazards as well as mineral and hydrocarbon deposits.
"Volcanoes form at plate boundaries, and the more plates you have, the more volcanoes you have," said Jonny Wu, assistant professor of geology in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. "Volcanoes also affect climate change. So, when you are trying to model the earth and understand how climate has changed since time, you really want to know how many volcanoes there have been on earth."
Wu and Spencer Fuston, a third-year geology doctoral student, applied a technique developed by the UH Center for Tectonics and Tomography called slab unfolding to reconstruct what tectonic plates in the Pacific Ocean looked like during the early Cenozoic Era. The rigid outermost shell of Earth, or lithosphere, is broken into tectonic plates and geologists have always known there were two plates in the Pacific Ocean at that time called Kula and Farallon. But there has been discussion about a potential third plate, Resurrection, having formed a special type of volcanic belt along Alaska and Washington State.
Using 3-D mapping technology, Fuston applied the slab unfolding technique to the mantle tomography images to pull out the subducted plates before unfolding and stretching them to their original shapes.
(Excerpt) Read more at phys.org ...
Here, they allow one other person to accompany the client/patient, which is good for morale!
While I was out picking up a prescription for nitro-lingual spray, I stopped at Lin’s to see if they had anything good.
They did! A package of chicken cordon bleu containing two portions, which I got and which are currently cooking and making the place smell spectacularly delicious! As soon as they are done, I’ll take my pills. Linner!
DP had some frozen bacon-wrapped chicken recently. It smelled good.
Received the package! Thanks!
Vlad said, “Cat, rat, bat, bureaucrat.”
Yes, in this case, it was chicken wrapped smoked ham with lots of Swiss cheese tucked inside. Not only smelled good but was tasty as well!
Way cool about the package!
I thought they were quite a bit different than the usual depictions, and thought maybe you’d feel the same way. ;o]
My F-I-L teaches the NYS required pre-licensing course. They go over such things as why you wear your seat-belt and why you don’t drink even one drink before you drive and such-like. They also cover that driving can kill you.
Anyway, back when Governor Super-Flirt wasn’t sure exactly who was kicking back how much to his campaign so they could re-open and the DMV definitely was NOT on that list, the DMV decided to allow internet pre-licensing classes. My F-I-L is constantly asking if I want to share the road with someone who took that course over the Internet?
I haven’t the heart to tell him that I think a 5 hour class changes the way a 15-y-o kid drives not 1% of 1%. Everyone knows that drinking impairs OTHER people. OTHER people need to wear seatbelts. Driving is dangerous for OTHER people. I just have to sit through this course without my tuckus falling asleep and I get my certificate.
Of the four, there’s only 1 I wouldn’t want to spend any more time with than absolutely necessary.
And it took more than one syllable to say.
James and Vlad will be taking driver training later in the month on Zoom. It will take all day for two weekends.
Thank you.
G’deve, y’all.
You’re welcome. And hi! I hope you are well!
Kitteh conquers teh globe!
Brave kitteh!
Strong kitteh!
Good morning.
I slept in again.
I also took Firefox off my laptop to see if it improved the performance. I’ll know by the end of the day.
I need to get Charlie’s letter written so it can go out today. I hate to have him look forward to it on Monday and be disappointed. Everyone around him is dying, these days.
I’ve missed my morning dose of tea, but will double the dose this afternoon. I don’t like to, but I have no choice as there is only a week left in this cycle.
Happy Friday, everyone.
May your worst problem today be no worse than trying to balance on top of a ball.
Good morning. I’m cold. I think I’ll take a shower before I write the daily Animal Friend. The sun is shining.
Kathleen is going to the dentist this afternoon, and the high school boys have Envirothon.
Today’s special animal friend is the blue-ringed octopus, the genus Hapalochlaena. There are four listed species of this extremely venomous octopus living in coral reefs and tidal pools in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. An additional six possible species are being studied. These may prove to be distinct species, or they may be individuals of the known species, some of which are only slightly “known”: one, Hapalochlaena nierstraszi, has been observed only twice in the Bay of Bengal, once in 1938 and once in 2013.
Blue-ringed octopi are from 5 to 8 inches long and weigh a couple of ounces. They hide in crevices in rock or coral, sometimes using their tentacles to pile rocks at the entrance for additional protection. Their skin in normally yellowish to grayish, with darker mottled patterns making very effective camouflage. They eat small crustaceans or fish, especially ill or injured fish, which they seize with their arms, bite with a strong beak, and inject with venom which paralyzes the prey.
Their eponymous blue rings become visible only when the octopus is agitated or threatened. In less than one second, their skin becomes brighter, often yellow, and the dark patches become darker, while the bright blue rings are revealed. These rings are normally concealed by skin due to contractions of the octopus’s muscles; that is, the appearance of the rings is not a skin color change but a shift in the musculature. The rings of the greater blue-ringed octopus, Hapalochlaena lunulata, have multi-layered light reflectors called iridophores, which reflect blue-green light over a wide viewing area.
The venom of the blue-ringed octopus is called tetrodotoxin or TTX. It is a neurotoxin (affecting the nervous system) that is also found in pufferfish, porcupinefish, and several other animals. The toxin is produced by bacteria such as Pseudoalteromonas, Pseudomonas, and Vibrio, which either infect that animal or coexist in symbiosis. This chemical is a “sodium channel blocker,” which causes paralysis of muscles by blocking electrical transmission through the nervous system. The mechanism was identified by researchers at Duke University in 1964.
Despite the extreme toxicity of the blue-ringed octopus’s bite, human deaths are very rare. People are very unlikely to encounter it in the wild; the most likely victims of bites are research biologists or specimen collectors. Although there is no antivenin, treatment such as CPR can keep a bite victim alive until the venom is metabolized and excreted, usually within 24 hours.
Happy Friday to you, and thanks for the good wishes.
Life with FRiends is so much better!
I got rid of Firefox and there was the library site, willing to take care of my DVD requests! I’ll try FB and see what the task manager has to say.
Next, of course, will be studying up on Linux so I can learn something new. For a change.
LOL!
They need to ban rap music, not Dr Seuss!
Thanks!
That was really cool! That was pretty interesting about the tetrodotoxin. There is at least one episode of Death in Paradise where that toxin is used as the murder weapon.
Good one!
That sounds familiar. From a fish, right?
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