Sewing any garment by hand is tedious work, and it requires a tremendous amount of skill as well. But we don't sew clothes by hand anymore, because we have sewing machines. It may seem trivial for anyone who isn't interested in embroidery or sewing, but the things needed in order to make invent sewing machines was actually remarkable.

When I was a kid, my grandmother had a sewing machine in her room, and my cousins and I would often visit her room and play with the sewing machine, not knowing exactly how the machine worked. We would often just step on the pedal and the machine would start, and the sound that it made was like music to our ears.

The sewing machine was invented in the 1850s, although it's unclear who exactly was the first to do so, as there were many competing claims. However, in order for the sewing machine to work, there were three main innovations that had to be established before we got to a prototype of the modern sewing machine.

First of all, inventors needed to think of a different way of sewing. Instead of having to manually flip over the needle from one side to the other, Charles Wiesenthal invented a needle that was sharp on two edges. That removes the need for flipping. But then a second problem presented itself.

Even though the needle could now go through the fabric on both sides, there was no way of tangling the thread onto the fabric. That's when the chain stitch was conceptualized. Although the chain stitch solved the problem of the thread staying on the fabric, if the thread were to come loose, then the whole seam would come apart as well.

So, inventors devised a solution called the lock stitch, which held the thread in place by using two different spools of thread which will be interlocked in the middle of the fabric to keep it in place. This brought about several changes to the sewing machine integrating that innovation.

The last piece of the puzzle was how to move the fabric without having to do it by hand. And thus came the feed dog, which is the part of the sewing machine that automatically moved the fabric after every stitch.

Once all the pieces had been acquired, we finally got the modern sewing machine. With all of these different parts, Isaac Singer, a businessman, thought of commercializing the sewing machine. He bought the patents for all the different innovations and made the manufacturing of the sewing machines more efficient, so that it can be sold to households instead of corporations.

This brought the price of the sewing machine down to one-tenth of its original price of $100. And that's how our grandmothers were able to have this nifty machine that can make clothes in half an hour in their rooms.

(Video credit: Veritasium/Youtube)

The first instance of animation was produced was in 1833 with the invention of the phenakistiscope, which is a device that produced the illusion of motion. You probably have seen those rotary devices which have a sequence of drawings inside that, when you spin it, will make it look like the drawings are moving.

From that point, we fast-track to the early 20th century, when some of the more familiar animated scenes like Little Nemo and Gertie the Dinosaur appear. Although it wasn't until the debut of Steamboat Willie that animation would begin its rapid rise and development into more advanced technologies.

Walt Disney, obviously, had a huge hand in putting animation into the forefront with dozens of short animated features and full-length feature films like Snow White and the Seven Dwafs. From the 1930s until the 1960s, Disney was prolific, churning out classics such as Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan.

For much of animation's history, they have mostly been hand-drawn or stop-motion, until the advent of computer-generation 3D animation, which now dominates much of the animated film industry. And so with the short video above, let's look through the evolution of animation from its earliest beginnings to what it has become today.

(Video credit: The Solomon Society/Youtube)

When we think about embroidery, we often imagine an old lady hunched over a piece of fabric, needling through it with a thread. But, Isabella Rosner has recently published a book titled Stitching Freedom: Embroidery and Incarceration, which explores the history behind embroidery and its popularity with prisoners as a pastime.

Rosner wanted to dispel the notion that embroidery is an old woman's hobby. That is, she wanted to bring a new side, separate from the connotations brought about by that notion - that it's a hobby made for people who have the privilege of time, resources, and even status on their hands.

She started off with Mary, Queen of Scots who had been placed on some kind of house arrest for almost 18 years. Throughout that time, Mary had used embroidery as an outlet for her indignation over her situation. Imagine, she had been Queen of Scotland for 25 years, and then, was forced to abdicate because she was accused of murdering her husband Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley.

Truly, as much as embroidery is seen as therapeutic by some, an introspective activity, it can also be a means of releasing all the violent emotions that a person has kept within. One can look at embroidery as the act of stabbing a fabric with a small, sharp object. And perhaps that's why a lot of incarcerated people have developed a fondness for the activity.

One other individual that featured in Rosner's book was Annie Parker. Nobody knew what Annie Parker looked like, but with the pieces of embroidery she left behind, we can imagine what she must have gone through. She even used locks of her hair as substitute for thread.

Through her research, Rosner found out that Parker had given birth to four children in prison, who all died. She was most likely abused by her husband as well. Records say that she was imprisoned for drunkenness, and others mention her violent behavior, breaking windows, and committing robbery.

While the cause for all of this is unfortunately unknown or uncertain, what we do have as her legacy are her famed works of hair embroidery. And for Rosner, it feels as though Parker was reaching out a hand to any who would grab it. She might have been putting all of her regret, frustration, longing, dedication, and sorrow over her situation in her artwork.

An especially poignant story is that of Rada Nikolić who had stitched a message on her handkerchief telling her family to remember her. Nikolić had been arrested by the Nazis, who charged her for involvement in anti-fascist activities. As she awaited her execution, she chose to write to her family and used embroidery as the means of conveying her message.

So yes, as much as embroidery is a nice, quiet pastime, it has also been used by people throughout history to express the depths of their sorrow, anger, frustration, and hope.

As much as any piece of art can be used in such manner, embroidered art feels more personal as we can examine and try to understand exactly what the maker must have been thinking or feeling while they were stitching.

(Image credit: Nathana Rebouças/Unsplash)

A new Netflix series, based on the sci-fi trilogy of Chinese writer Liu Cixin, has recently been released and it's called 3 Body Problem. The title is based on the n-body problem which was initially tackled by Isaac Newton in his seminal work Principia in 1687. He specifically tried to find a solution to the problem of the movements of three bodies subject to their gravitational attractions.

Without really trying to get into all the complicated science of the issue, we can first look at the two-body problem and how, by using the two objects' center of gravity as a reference point, we are able to clear away all the uncertain variables and equations, making it easier to predict the orbits of the two masses.

Our solar system is a relatively stable orbital system because the sun is fixed, and all the planets orbiting around it follow a fixed direction. But if a rogue star were to come careening into our solar system, that would throw the whole system into chaos because the interactions between the gravitational forces of the different bodies will be too unpredictable.

And that is why the new Netflix series was named after the problem in question. The story posits a technologically advanced alien civilization that, for billions of years, has been struggling with the three-body problem in real-time. Although it's not chaos all the time, as the aliens experience long periods of stability, there comes a point when that order will be thrown into chaos because of the reaction of the two suns.

The unpredictability of the chaotic era of the Trisolarans was the central focal point of the plot (spoiler alert). Currently, the first season of the series is done with eight episodes, which adapted the first book of Liu's trilogy. That will then spin off into a different direction before setting up book two.

Thankfully, the series itself doesn't focus too much on the science as much as they do the characters and how they deal with the issues presented by the aliens spying on Earth.

(Video credit: TED-Ed/Youtube)

We have previously looked at bats and their immunity toward viruses of almost all kinds, and why bats don't get sick from them. But even though bats are immune, they are still carriers, and they can cause some of the deadliest disease outbreaks in history.

Oftentimes, when we look at pandemics and try to figure out how to stop them, we always look for a cure. But a consortium of scientists and researchers including ecologists, infectious disease experts, and policymakers, have recently conducted a broad study on the system-wide complex interactions between wildlife, habitat, climate, and people to determine what could be the best solution to preventing pandemics from happening in the first place.

It's not an isolated phenomenon, they argue. That is, we cannot merely study the bats' physiology, genetics, or behavior to figure out how to kill viruses or produce a cure for the diseases they cause. The best way is to look at the bigger picture, and understand why and how these disease-carrying creatures like bats, rats, birds, and apes, spread diseases in the first place.

In the case of bats, Raina Plowright, an infectious disease ecologist, says that they often shed or release viruses into the environment whenever they get stressed. And the primary stressors for bats is the lack of native food.

Bats often feed on nectar, and for some species, they can eat insects. Generally, bats like the black flying foxes in Australia, look to flowers for nourishment. When natural lands are transformed for agriculture or mining, these bats lose their source of food, and they start looking for them elsewhere.

The next best alternative are agricultural crops, fruits, and the like. So, bats travel to human populated areas to forage food, and when they interact with other creatures like cattle, horses, or sheep, the viruses which the bats carry get transferred from the bats to those animals, and it won't be long before humans get exposed to the viruses as well.

An example of this interaction, says Plowright, is the Hendra virus which spilled over from the flying foxes to horses, and then, it infected humans. Only seven people were infected by the Hendra virus, but four of those cases were fatal. This spillover effect is the main cause of pandemics.

Therefore, in the paper written by the researchers, they gave three recommendations which are quite simple: (1) ensure that the animals have enough to eat, (2) protect the places and spaces where the animals aggregate, and (3) keep people who are most at risk safe by educating them and providing the necessary equipment and gear for work, especially when they come in contact with other animals.

Simple and easy as they may seem, it can be quite difficult to communicate, impart, and apply. But when people are informed about these, they do shift their actions and behavior to make sure that they don't disturb the natural habitats of these animals. So, it would be in our best interest to be kinder to bats, and these other creatures.

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Albert Einstein is arguably one of the most prominent and influential figures of the 20th century. His general theory of relativity is still the description being used for gravitation in modern physics. Apart from his theory of relativity, he was awarded the Nobel Prize for his paper on the law of the photoelectric effect, which paved the way for the development of quantum theory.

Many of Einstein's personal effects and memorabilia today can be sold for thousands, if not millions, of dollars on the open market. For example, an original handwritten copy of his manuscript on the general theory of relativity fetched over $14 million.

Anything signed by Einstein himself, whether it be a postcard to a Japanese courier, or the famous photo with his tongue sticking out can go for at least six figures, if not a million. Collectors say that the important feature of these items is its content.

And so, that's why anything that includes his groundbreaking scientific discoveries sell for millions. A letter Einstein wrote to a fellow physicist which bears the famous equation "E=mc²" was valued at $1,243,000.

One of the lesser known theories that Einstein wrote was a three-page dissertation in which he tackled the idea of world peace and how it could be achieved. This he wrote in 1940, just as he had become a citizen of the United States, in the midst of war.

In the manuscript, he asserted the need for an international political organization, which will keep the balance of power in check. Five years later, the United Nations was founded, which is exactly what Einstein had written about.

Although most of his scientific manuscripts are highly valued, this one in particular was never considered for auction. Nevertheless, one can argue that is a historically significant manuscript from one of the greatest minds in history.

(Image credit: Alexander Bitar History)

Frontotemporal dementia, or FTD, is a group of disorders which result from damage to neurons in the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain. Whereas Alzheimer's disease is characterized by memory loss, FTD is often linked to behavioral changes and can affect one's personality and communication abilities.

Recently, the former talk show host Wendy Williams was revealed to be suffering from FTD. Bruce Willis is another celebrity who is known to have FTD. Usually, this disease affects people ages 45 to 64, and can often be misdiagnosed as early onset Alzheimer's, depression, Parkinson's disease, or some other psychiatric condition.

At the moment, there is no known cure or treatment for FTD, and the progression of the disease ranges from 2 to 20 years. Fen-Biao Gao, a researcher at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, is currently doing studies on the disease.

They have identified certain links between FTD and neurodegenerative diseases like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) or Lou Gehrig's disease. The laboratory where Gao works, in collaboration with neurologist Bruce Miller, has pinpointed that FTD patients had gene mutations in progranulin and C9orf72, both of which have been found to cause ALS.

There might be some connection between these genes and the pathology of FTD, and so Gao has been working with other researchers like cell biologist J. Paul Taylor who helped discover the modifier genes which function to transport molecules in and out of the nucleus of a neuron as well as genes that encode proteins which aid in repairing damaged DNA.

Potential treatments may include gene-silencing techniques which will target the specific modifier genes that cause the disease. At the moment, Gao and other scientists are still trying to map out the genes and proteins that may be responsible for causing FTD, so it might take some time before any treatment will be developed.

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According to Professor Doug Drury, the Head of Aviation at Central Queensland University in Australia, yes. Though the recent spate of flight incidents related to Boeing aircraft earlier this year may be a cause for concern, Drury says we shouldn't ring too many alarms over them.

Although the quality assurance protocols at Boeing will need to be investigated and carefully checked, the recent incidents that have happened, according to Drury, are not all completely Boeing's fault.

In fact, the five incidents wherein an engine caught fire, a tire fell off after takeoff, a plane skidded over grass, and rudder pedal was stuck, were mostly maintenance issues which would land outside the scope of the manufacturer's control.

The Alaska Airlines flight in which the door accidentally got ripped from the plane was most likely the fault of Boeing's manufacturing and quality assurance protocols. However, it was apparently a subcontractor, Spirit AeroSystem, who did not install and bolt the door properly causing the accident mid-flight.

Still, that is not to absolve Boeing of all responsibility over these incidents. The FAA will monitor Boeing's processes closely which should bring its priority back to quality over profit, a paradigm that shifted when Airbus became a major competitor in the early 2000s.

Moreover, since many employees had been laid off during the pandemic, the company is currently training new blood who will be replacing those who were retrenched. And it's going to take time to train this new staff of engineers and maintenance personnel.

At the moment, Boeing is in the midst of correction and a transition period. So, as Professor Drury states, there is no need to panic over Boeing planes as we can hope to see changes effected. Of course, for one's own safety, people can still choose not to fly on Boeing planes, which will be a sign to the company that they need to reconsider their policies and priorities.

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At the very least, that's what a research conducted by the Global Consciousness Project tried to determine. They wanted to know if collective thought and sentiment, expressed prior to a negative event, may actually point to the fact that a wider swathe of the population have a premonition about future, unpredictable events. Can we sense the future?

Presentiment or the "predictive physiological anticipation" effect is a phenomenon described by the way our bodies react before a certain unpredictable event happens. If there is any scientific basis to say that such an ability exists, then we might have to probe into the connection between human consciousness and the world around us.

We know that certain animals have a sense about them of impending danger, since they are able to notice changes in the environment, vibrations within the earth, or they have some kind of instinctive mechanism in their physiology that tells them that something wrong is about to happen.

Usually, such senses are felt moments before the actual event happens, and by then, it might be too late. So, the researchers at the GCP wanted to see if public sentiment days or weeks before a negative unpredictable event happens would correlate. And if so, then it might be a possible predictor for future events.

To be able to remove any biases that could distort the data, the team isolated incidents or events that were significantly more negative than other days, and separated events which come immediately after another negative event since they might have been affected by the first event. Also, they evaluated the events to see if they were truly unpredictable, and then compared tweets from two days to two weeks before the chosen events happened.

From their analysis, they found that preceding the events, general sentiment had followed a negative trend, which then culminated in the unforeseeable negative events. Now, whether these meant that humans could feel that an impending negative event was about to happen, much like animals could sense natural disasters, is uncertain at best.

There's a possibility that the downward trend in sentiment may not be related to any future events happening, but it could just point to the social or political climate at the time. This would require the selection of events to be truly independent of other factors that could have influenced people's sentiment for the results to be truly significant.

But the researchers believe that the study may suggest that the collective mood of society at present may be affected by the emotional reactions to a future event, in a sort of backwards ripple effect. Whether or not this is truly the case, we cannot say for certain.

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Culture can be defined as the set of learned behaviors, customs, or norms, that have been passed on through observation or instruction within a social group. Through thousands of years of iteration and incremental progress, humans have gone a long way in developing culture, passing it on from one generation to the next, and also changing parts of culture to keep up with the changing times.

Animals have been observed to have the capacity for culture as well, mostly seen in Japanese macaques, crows, and even sheep. But these are mostly vertebrate animals, and it was unthinkable or rather, it was assumed that this capacity was not present in invertebrates. It was thought that the behaviors exhibited by invertebrates like bees were innate or instinctive. However, a research has shown that there is a possibility that invertebrates like bees may have the capacity for culture.

It's the first step toward determining whether bees can develop their own culture. The first thing that the researchers needed to do was to design an experiment in which bees would have to solve a complex two-step puzzle. To any humans, such a feat may be simple, but to a bee, it is considered extremely difficult.

The experiment was designed by UK behavioral ecologist Alice Bridges who was curious about the concept of culture in invertebrates being innate. She wanted to see if there was a possibility that bees could learn socially how to solve this complex problem by observation and demonstration.

First, they had to train some bees to solve the problem, which admitted required a lot of time for trial and error. It required several intermediate rewards so that the bees may figure out the solution. But in time, it became like clockwork for the trained bees.

The next step was to put another bee, which hadn't seen the puzzle and hadn't been trained to solve it, along with the trained bee. This was when the social gears of bees starting turning, and their team found that the bees had the ability to learn and pass on information in similar fashion as other animals that exhibit a capacity for culture.

However, the only issue for bees is that they have a relatively short lifespan, and so being able to pass on knowledge or information may be difficult if, after one generation is born, the previous one dies out right away. Then, it would be quite challenging to develop culture that lasts more than one generation.

Bridges and her team are hopeful, however, that this proves that this kind of socially learned behavior and culture is not exclusive to humans or vertebrates, but that invertebrates may also have the capacity.

(Video credit: nature video/Youtube)

That's right. You read that correctly. Perrikaryal has successfully been able to beat video games with just her mind. She's neither a psychic nor a telepath. She uses Emotiv's EEG headset to record her brain activity and programmed the patterns being picked up by the interface to certain actions or commands.

Originally, the Twitch streamer's dream was to perform stand-up, but because facing a crowd of people on stage was a bit daunting, a friend suggested that she try out streaming first which is akin to a performance but in front of your monitor. And having a master's in psychology, most of the games she played initially were those that had a unique psychological perspective like Superliminal, The Closing Shift, and Detroit: Become Human.

Later on, she was able to buy an Emotiv EEG, which gave a depiction of what was happening inside her brain while she played certain games like horror titles with jumpscares. But as she continued with this gimmick, she discovered that the device had an interesting feature to it.

She found that she could program the interface to detect certain brainwaves or patterns and associate those with command inputs. But it wasn't an easy thing, as she recounts how it took a massive amount of time for trial and error to figure out which specific visualizations could be used for certain actions.

At some point, it took her 600 to 700 times in order to program a certain command input only to find out in the end that it was unreliable, so she had to start all over. However, with enough patience and effort, she was able to map out the right visual prompts to consistently churn out certain commands, and she found herself beating games without using a controller.

First, she practiced with Minecraft, and she found that there were certain visualizations and thought patterns that could be reliably used to make characters do certain actions. Then, she amped up the complexity by trying out different games that have more difficult controls.

That led her to Elden Ring, which is infamous for being one of the most difficult games to beat. But she spent a lot of time training the EEG's interface, and with enough game time, she was able to beat the first boss of the game, Margit the Fell Omen.

She continued upping the complexity and training the interface until such time that she was playing hands-free and beating the hardest bosses of the game, eventually even toppling the most agonizing one, Melania Blade of Miquella.

Since then, she has tried out playing other games like Palworld, Smash Bros., and even Pac-Man, by just simply using her brain as the controller with the help of the EEG.

Not everybody thinks she was actually playing with just her mind, but that encouraged her because she believes that these negative comments only happen because people don't understand the technology and the processes behind her playstyle. But once the information began to spread and people learned more about it, people's perspectives started to shift.

This can be a great means for accessibility in the future. People who may not be able to play using traditional controllers or peripherals will have a chance of playing even the most complicated games through the EEG device or even voice commands and eye-tracking. It's only the beginning.

(Video credit: Perrikaryal/Youtube)

Whether you believe or not in the existence of psychic powers, paranormal experiences, or ESP, we cannot deny that there are certain things that, as of yet, we do not have the capability or technology to explain.

Many people claim to have supernatural abilities or encounters, and we generally dismiss them as being insane or fraudulent. Certainly, we have come to the belief that anything which cannot be scientifically proven or tested, must be fake, a hoax, or nonexistent. And that's just the effect of culture veering away from the mythical to the natural.

But there are people out there who are determined to unravel the truth behind these claims through scientific methods and rigorous experimentation. If those who claim to have psi abilities vehemently stress the reality of such paranormal events, then there must be some way of finding out the truth behind it.

Scientific research is often characterized by three things. They have to be observable, measurable, and replicable. It's the foundation of empirical methods which is what modern science is founded on. And with regard to parapsychology and the supernatural, some scientists have focused on designing methods and experiments that can truly test such claims from psychics, mediums, and espers.

People like Professors Dick Bierman and Suitbert Ertel have worked on the fields of physics and psychology, respectively, for most of their lives and have also looked into the subject of parapsychology and psi phenomena.

And they have approached James Randi, the stage magician and skeptic who was famous for his Million Dollar Challenge which aimed to test the claims of psi-gifted people, as Ertel calls them. Dr. Dean Radin, an educational psychologist and investigator of parapsychological phenomena, also applied for the challenge.

Much controversy has surrounded James Randi's Million Dollar Challenge as well as the organization that conducts it, the JREF (James Randi Educational Foundation), as many who have looked at the rules of the challenge point out that the rules are heavily disadvantageous to applicants, and can be seen as a crusade and polemic against the subject of parapsychology and any who seriously research it.

Instead of a sincere curiosity and interest in learning about the truth of the matter, and looking for scientific analysis of robust data and rigorous experiments that can advance such efforts, proponents say that James Randi's challenge is simply designed to ensure that any applicants fail in order to protect the prize money. It's no earnest quest of testing whether there is some truth to the claims of the existence of psi phenomena.

In this, Mitch Horowitz, a historian and writer of metaphysical themes, criticizes James Randi's brand of skepticism, citing sociologist Marcello Truzzi who called it a form of pseudoskepticism, the objective of which is to lambaste any serious attempt at a scientific inquiry of psi phenomena.

Though there are con artists and frauds who claim they can see the future or communicate through telepathy, there are those with more valid claims and are willing to undergo experimentation to prove them. The research of people such as Radin, Ertel, Schwartz, and Bierman, aim to understand the true nature of these claims, what their connections are to reality, and whether they are replicable.

It has been three years since the death of James Randi, and the Million Dollar Challenge was discontinued in 2015. But as Horowitz says, in today's world, there is a need for healthy skepticism and for the restoration of sound practices when it comes to dealing with contentious topics in science or any field. - via The Daily Grail

(Image credit: James Randi Education Foundation/Wikimedia Commons)

Subscribing to a high-speed internet plan may be all well and good, but it won't matter that much if there are places in your house where you can't get any WiFi signal at all. WiFi behaves similarly to radio or light waves which means obstructions like walls or floors can affect the strength of the transmission as well as its reach.

Generally, to boost your WiFi signal, your ISPs might suggest buying a WiFi extender which will increase the coverage of your WiFi. However, those devices aren't cheap, and if you have a big space, you may need to fork out a significant amount of cash to reach every nook and cranny of your home.

Now, there is this nifty tech hack which may solve your WiFi problems without having to hurt your wallet. Some tech experts suggest using aluminum foil to direct your WiFi signal and increase its signal strength to those areas of your home which the WiFi cannot reach.

The setup is simple. You get a sheet of aluminum foil, curve it so that it looks like a C-shape, and then place it behind your router. Make sure that the shiny side of the aluminum foil faces inward toward the router as it will be the part that reflects the WiFi signal's beams. Point it toward the direction of the dead zone in your home, and see the tech magic unfold.

Apparently, aluminum foil isn't the only material that can have this effect. James McQuiggan, a tech expert, suggests that you can also use soda cans and beer cans as well as other metals like copper baking sheets. As long as the curved, shiny part of the material is faced toward the direction you want to boost the wireless signal, it should work.

You might be wondering if this is a myth or not, and that's understandable. Researchers from Dartmouth University actually tested the hack, and they found that it helped boost their wireless signals by up to 55.1% in certain spots. Just as much as the aluminum foil hack boosted the signal toward the direction it was pointed, it also reduced the signal strength by up to 63.3% in the areas where the signal was redirected from.

Granted, the Dartmouth experiment was in a controlled environment, and they were able to match the specifications of the router and aluminum foil to the size of the room. So, results may vary for much less controlled environments. Things like the size of your space, the number and type of obstructions, as well as your internet plan can affect the effectiveness of this hack.

(Image credit: Mykola/Kolya Korzh; Misha Feshchak/Unsplash)

When we hear Antarctica, we probably think of igloos, glaciers, and blizzards. It's a cold and vast wilderness, but it's also a very important location for scientific research. At the moment, there are about 18 countries that operate in Antarctica all throughout the year.

During the Antarctic summers, there can be as many as 10,000 scientists and support staff working there and doing research. In the winter time, that number drops down to about 1,000. Currently, the Rothera Research Station, the largest British facility in Antarctica, is undergoing a construction project to upgrade their runway facilities.

The first thing on their to-do list was to upgrade the runway lighting so that it will be more energy efficient. Then, they proceeded to increasing the length of the runway which was initially at 17m to now 903m. They even added a turn pad. Apart from this, they also adjusted the curve of the runway's surface, to allow for water runoff once the snow thaws.

Despite the extreme weather conditions in Antarctica, scientists say that life can actually be quite comfortable. With the help of accurate weather forecasts, they can know when the snow comes, so that they can prepare for it, and adapt to the changing environment. Once the skies have cleared and the weather lightens up, they can go outside for some snowboarding or boat trips around the continent.

Jimmy Bellis, an engineer and lead project manager for the air infrastructure project with the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), says that there's a lot of things they can do for leisure to pass the time when it's impossible to go out as well. They have great food, a library, and board games.

For Anna Jones, an atmospheric chemist who has spent 30 years doing research on the interactions between the atmosphere, snow and ice, and is currently the director of science at BAS, Antarctica is a key element in understanding the earth's climate.

They do several projects on Rothera, like the Defiant project, which conducts experiments on measuring sea ice thickness, and the Southern Ocean Clouds project, which focuses on understanding cloud formation especially over the Antarctic.

(Image credit: Wikimedia Commons)

It would be nice to be able to travel to the past if only to experience what it was like to live in an era completely different than the one we're living in, but time-travel is mostly confined to the realm of science fiction. But there is one quite famous 20th-century story about two respected Oxford professors who claimed that they traveled back in time to late 18th century Versailles.

Those two professors published a book titled An Adventure which came out in 1911, under pseudonyms Elizabeth Morison and Frances Lamont. They recounted how, on a holiday from England, they went to the Palace of Versailles, and found themselves exploring a place unfamiliar to them, where they saw people wearing old-fashioned clothes and the locations of buildings apparently shifted.

They even claimed to have seen the Queen Marie Antoinette. It was such an extraordinary experience that the book became a sensational hit. However, due to the nature of their experience, they chose to hide their true identities. Despite that, people were still able to find out who they were, because they told their students about their experience.

Those two professors were Eleanor Jourdain and Charlotte Moberly of St. Hugh's College, University of Oxford. At the time, such claims of supernatural experiences had been examined, investigated, and perhaps, even debunked by an organization called the Society for Psychical Research. The main directive of the organization was to understand events and abilities commonly described as psychic or paranormal.

The SPR is dedicated to conducting scholarly research and are very thorough in scrutinizing any claims of supernatural events. However, when they were presented with Moberly and Jourdain's seemingly time-traveling exploits, the body never reached a consensus on its legitimacy. The skeptics proposed several possible explanations from a garden party to heat exhaustion, and even, double madness.

So, given the university's conservative leanings at the time, the women chose to keep their identities secret. The book stayed a hit and the professors continued with their careers. Several years later, Moberly retired as principal and Jourdain replaced her. Things weren't as smooth for Jourdain as she faced backlash from younger fellows who disliked her strictness.

Later on, many teachers resigned when Jourdain fired one of their fellows, with which the teachers disagreed. Jourdain would later suffer from a heart attack and die on April 6, 1924. Thirteen years later, Moberly also passed away. The two women both have massive portraits displayed at the college, although their book is rarely mentioned, if ever, on the St. Hugh's website.

(Image credit: Wikimedia Commons)