There is an emergency going on in the world’s oceans that most of us know nothing about: as certain species of fish that are overfished or stressed due to pollution or changes in water temperature become drastically reduced in number, this changes the whole balance of the ocean ecosystem, causing more species to go extinct, etc. Since many societies in the world rely on fish to eat, this is a disaster in the making.
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Here at unknowncountry.com, we sometimes like to investigate strange smells. Scientists are people who like to ask questions about things that the rest of us take for granted?like WHY do things start to smell when they decay?
Microbes compete with large animal scavengers by producing repugnant chemicals that make the food sources they invade stink, in order to deter higher species from consuming them first. Biologist Mark Hay says, “Microbes that can hold onto these resources and use them for their own growth would be advantaged over microbes that could not prevent their resource from being consumed by animals.” Hence the stench.
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As hard as it may be to believe, slavery is still going on in the world. Angela Robson reports in the Independent that it is definitely still practiced in rural villages in Africa.
Robson writes, “Trokosi is a traditional practice of slavery still seen as normal in parts of Ghana, Togo and Benin. Girls as young as two are offered to a?priest as a way of appeasing the gods for a relative’s transgression, past or present. The word trokosi comes from the Ewe words ‘tro,’ meaning deity, and ‘kosi’ meaning female slave. The tradition, which has been part of the Ewe culture for centuries, requires a girl to spend the rest of her life as a “wife of the gods.” This religion has the same origins as voo doo, which is still practiced in places like Haiti.
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Over the years, we?ve regularly reported on the progress of every woman?s dream: a birth control pill for men. This new day may be dawning soon.
Jeanna Bryner writes in LiveScience.com that researchers have discovered that male mice that have been bred without a certain protein, which is also found in human males, have reduced fertility. There is hope that this discovery could lead to a non-hormonal birth control pill for men. Let?s just hope they don?t treat men who want the pill as badly as they treat women!
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