title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: A number of Velcro Corporation products were displayed at a fashion show at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in New York in 1959, and the fabric got its first break when it was used in the aerospace industry to help astronauts maneuver in and out of bulky space suits. However, this reinforced the view among the populace that hook-and-loop was something with very limited utilitarian uses. The next major use hook-and-loop saw was with skiers, who saw the similarities between their outerwear and that of the astronauts, and thus saw the advantages of a suit that was easier to don and doff. Scuba and marine gear followed soon after. Having seen astronauts storing food pouches on walls, children's clothing makers came on board. As hook-and-loop fasteners only became widely used after NASA's adoption of it, NASA is popularly – and incorrectly – credited with its invention.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: By the mid-1960s hook-and-loop fasteners were used in the futuristic creations of fashion designers such as Pierre Cardin, André Courrèges and Paco Rabanne.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: In 1978 de Mestral's patent expired, prompting a flood of low-cost imitations from Taiwan, China and South Korea onto the market. Today, the trademark is the subject of more than 300 trademark registrations in over 159 countries. George de Mestral was inducted into the USA's National Inventors Hall of Fame for his invention.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Various constructions and strengths are available. Fasteners made of Teflon loops, polyester hooks, and glass backing are used in aerospace applications, e.g. on Space Shuttles. The strength of the bond depends on how well the hooks are embedded in the loops, how much surface area is in contact with the hooks, and the nature of the force pulling it apart. If hook-and-loop is used to bond two rigid surfaces, such as auto body panels and frame, the bond is particularly strong because any force pulling the pieces apart is spread evenly across all hooks. Also, any force pushing the pieces together is disproportionately applied to engaging more hooks and loops. Vibration can cause rigid pieces to improve their bond. Full-body hook-and-loop suits have been made that can hold a person to a suitably covered wall.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: When one or both of the pieces is flexible, e.g., a pocket flap, the pieces can be pulled apart with a peeling action that applies the force to relatively few hooks at a time. If a flexible piece is pulled in a direction parallel to the plane of the surface, then the force is spread evenly, as it is with rigid pieces.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Shoe closures can resist a large force with only a small amount of hook-and-loop fasteners. This is because the strap is wrapped through a slot, halving the force on the bond by acting as a pulley system (thus gaining a mechanical advantage), and further absorbing some of the force in friction around the tight bend. This layout also ensures that the force is parallel to the strips.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Hook-and-loop fasteners are safe and maintenance free. There is only a minimal decline in effectiveness even after many fastenings and unfastenings. The tearing noise it makes can also be useful against pickpockets. This loud noise can also prove to be a liability, in particular on military attire such as the United States Army's Army Combat Uniform, where it can attract unwanted attention in a battlefield environment.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: There are also some deficiencies: it tends to accumulate hair, dust, and fur in its hooks after a few months of regular use. The loops can become elongated or broken after extended use. The hooks often become attached to articles of clothing, especially loosely woven items like sweaters. This clothing may be damaged when one attempts to remove the hook-and-loop, even if the sides are separated slowly. It also absorbs moisture and perspiration when worn next to the skin, which means it will smell if not washed.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Because of their ease of use, hook-and-loop fasteners have been used for a wide variety of applications where a temporary bond is required. It is especially popular in clothing where it replaces buttons or zippers, and as a shoe fastener for children who have not yet learned to tie shoelaces. Hook-and-loop fasteners are used in adaptive clothing, which is designed for people with physical disabilities, the elderly, and the infirm, who may experience difficulty dressing themselves due to an inability to manipulate closures such as buttons and zippers.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Hook-and-loop-fastener (USA Patent No.: US8,469,996 B2) is used in humans as a temporary fascia expander prostheses to treat the abdominal compartment syndrome and when multiple abdominal entries are necessary to control and eliminate intra-abdominal pathology. Hook-and-loop fasteners held together a human heart during the first artificial heart surgery. It is used in nuclear power plants and army tanks to hold flashlights to walls. In cars, hook-and-loop fasteners are used to bond headliners, floor mats and speaker covers. It is used in the home when pleating draperies, holding carpets in place and attaching upholstery. Closures on backpacks, briefcases and notebooks often make use of hook-and-loop fasteners. Cloth diapers often make use of hook-and-loop fasteners. It is an integral part of games such as tag rugby and flag football, and is used in surfboard leashes and orthopaedic braces.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: NASA makes significant use of hook-and-loop fasteners. Each Space Shuttle flew equipped with ten thousand inches of a special fastener made of Teflon loops, polyester hooks, and glass backing. Hook-and-loop fasteners are widely used, from the astronauts' suits, to anchoring equipment. In the near weightless conditions in orbit, hook-and-loop fasteners are used to temporarily hold objects and keep them from floating away. A patch is used inside astronauts' helmets where it serves as a nose scratcher. During mealtimes astronauts use trays that attach to their thighs using springs and fasteners. Hook-and-loop fasteners are also used aboard the International Space Station.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: The Slidingly Engaging Fastener was developed to address several problems with common hook-and-loop fasteners.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Heavy-duty variants (such as "Dual Lock" or "Duotec") feature mushroom-shaped stems on each face of the fastener, providing an audible snap when the two faces mate. A strong pressure sensitive adhesive bonds each component to its substrate.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Velcro jumping is a game where people wearing hook-covered suits take a running jump and hurl themselves as high as possible at a loop-covered wall. The wall is inflated, and looks similar to other inflatable structures. It is not necessarily completely covered in the material—often there will be vertical strips of hooks. Sometimes, instead of a running jump, people use a small trampoline.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Television show host David Letterman immortalized this during the February 28, 1984 episode of Late Night with David Letterman on NBC. Letterman proved that with enough of the material a man could be hurled against a wall and stick, by performing this feat during the television broadcast.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: Jumping went beyond David Letterman, with amusement companies renting walls and jumpsuits for $400-$500 a day. It was also done on a regular basis in pubs in both New York and New Zealand, where it is a competition to see how high a person can get their feet above the ground. Jeremy Bayliss and Graeme Smith of the Cri Bar and Grill in Napier, New Zealand, started it after seeing American astronauts sticking to walls during space flights. They created their own equipment for the "human fly" contests, and sold it to several others in New Zealand.


title: Hook-and-loop fastener

text: The game moved to the U.S. after Sports Illustrated published a story on it in 1991. Adam Powers and Stephen Wastell of the Perfect Tommy's bar in New York city read of the game, and soon became the United States distributor of Human Bar Fly equipment. By 1992, wall-jumping was practiced in dozens of New Zealand bars and was said to be one of the favorite bar activities there at the time.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Catacombs of Rome () are ancient catacombs, underground burial places in and around Rome, of which there are at least forty, some rediscovered only in recent decades. Though most famous for Christian burials, either in separate catacombs or mixed together, Jews and also adherents of a variety of pagan Roman religions were buried in catacombs, beginning in the 2nd century AD, occasioned by the ancient Roman ban on burials within a city, and also as a response to overcrowding and shortage of land. The most extensive and perhaps the best known is the Christian Catacomb of Callixtus located near the Park of the Caffarella, but there are other sites, both Christian and not, scattered around the city, some of which are now engulfed by modern urban sprawl.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Christian catacombs are extremely important for the history of Early Christian art, as they contain the great majority of examples from before about 400 AD, in fresco and sculpture, as well as gold glass medallions (these, like most bodies, have been removed). The Jewish catacombs are similarly important for the study of Jewish culture at this early period.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The word "catacombs" comes from the Latin root word "catatumbas" meaning either “among the tombs” or, according to other translations from the original Late Latin, “next to the quarry”. The later translation stems from the first excavations done to create the catacombs system, which was conducted outside of Rome near the quarry.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Etruscan civilization dominated a territory including the area which now includes Rome from perhaps 900 to 100 BC. Like many other European peoples, it had buried its dead in excavated underground chambers, such as the Tomb of the Capitals, and less complex tumuli. In contrast, the original Roman custom had been cremation of the human body, after which the burnt remains were kept in a pot, urn, or ash-chest, often deposited in a columbarium or "dovecote". Rome faced two problems in the 2nd century CE: overpopulation and a lack of land. The city was growing, and many of the buildings were four or five stories tall. Since burials were not allowed inside the city walls, and early Christians did not agree with the pagan practice of cremating their dead, communal underground cemeteries provided a practical alternative. From about the 2nd century AD, inhumation (burial of unburnt human remains) became customary, either in graves or, for those who could afford them, in sarcophagi, often elaborately carved. By the 4th century, burial had overtaken cremation as the usual practice, and the construction of tombs had grown greater and spread throughout the empire. Jews and Christians preferred burial due to the idea of preserving the dead body for the resurrection. Considerable tracts of the ancient roads leading out of Rome and other Roman cities, like the Via Appia to this day, had monumental tombs running alongside them. These would inevitably cost a fortune to construct, whereas clearly in digging out of the catacombs would be less expensive.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Despite widespread popular modern ideas, these tunnels were probably not used for regular worship at first, but simply for burial. However, extending pre-existing Roman customs, memorial services, and celebrations of the anniversaries of Christian martyrs took place there. There are sixty known subterranean burial chambers in Rome. They were built outside the walls along main Roman roads, like the Via Appia, the Via Ostiense, the Via Labicana, the Via Tiburtina, and the Via Nomentana. Names of the catacombs – like St Calixtus and St Sebastian, which is alongside Via Appia – refer to martyrs that may have been buried there. However, about 80% of the excavations used for Christian burials date to after the time of the persecutions.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Through research, it has been found that the population's diet consisted of freshwater fish. Sample D9-W-XVI-8, considered to be a two-year-old child, shows that children in Ancient Rome were breastfed and this child, in particular, had not yet been weaned off its mother. This results from the fact that the δ15N values had not begun to decline.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Fish had intertwined secular and religious aspects in Roman society. For one thing, it was a staple of the daily diet. It also had a variety of significance for Christians, for whom it was not only a common food, as for other Romans, but featured as a symbol in Christian iconography and was consumed at meals held to commemorate the dead.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Roman law forbade burial places within city limits and so all burial places, including the catacombs, were located outside the walls of the city. The first large-scale catacombs in the vicinity of Rome were dug from the 2nd century onwards. They were carved in ""tufa"" (tuff), a type of volcanic rock which is relatively soft to dig into but subsequently hardens.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Christian catacombs existed as a burial ground for early Christians accompanied by inscriptions and early wall art. Although catacombs were of Jewish origin in the first century, by the end of the sixth century there were over 60 Christian catacombs. These catacombs served as a connector for various Christian communities through the underlying concepts of socio-economic status shown within the art. Additionally, the art showed a story of how Christians in the first couple of centuries viewed the world and their idealistic view of how it should be.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: According to L. Michael White, the catacombs of Rome have a place in the romantic historiography of how early Christianity developed. This is because it has often been said those catacombs were good hiding places, and that when Christians were persecuted by the Roman Empire, they would go there to hold their worship.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: However, White believes Christians did not use the catacombs of Rome to secretly hold their worship during times of persecutions. He says that they did not do so, first because Christians were not persecuted on a regular basis by the Roman Empire. Second, because the larger rooms or chambers within the catacombs were not used for regular worship, eucharist or assembly by Christians. White says that those catacombs' larger rooms, which had some benches along their walls and were appropriate to hold eucharistic assemblies, were in fact used by Christians to "hol[d] meals for the dead." He states such "funerary meals" were practised among most families of the city of Rome. Therefore, he explains, Christians, in their everyday life, regularly went down into the catacombs of Rome, not to hold assemblies or eucharist but, "to hold memorial meals with dead members of their families, just like their pagan neighbors." V. Rutgers considers that "[r]esearchers have long debunked the myth that Christians used the catacombs as hiding places in times of persecution", because when those persecutions took place, the exact locations of the catacombs of Rome were widely known. Frank K. Flinn considers that during the period of Christian persecutions and shortly after it, Christians held "memorial rites and Eucharist" near the graves of the more famous Christian martyrs. He adds that "[c]ontrary to novel and movie lore," the catacombs of Rome "were not used as hiding places for Christians." Author J. Osbourne says that "nothing could be further from the truth." when discussing the idea that Christians inhabited the Catacombs during the period of persecution.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Christian art in the catacombs is split into three categories: iconographic, stylistic, and technical. From the first to the sixth century, the art in Roman Christian catacombs progressively went into phases as well: an early phase, an Old Testament phase, and a New Testament phase.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Excavators (fossors) built vast systems of galleries and passages on top of each other. They lie below the surface in an area of more than . Narrow steps that descend as many as four stories join the levels. Passages are about . Burial niches (loculi) were carved into walls. They are high and long. Bodies were placed in chambers in stone sarcophagi in their clothes and bound in linen. Then the chamber was sealed with a slab bearing the name, age, and the day of death. The fresco decorations provide the main surviving evidence for Early Christian art, and initially show typically Roman styles used for decorating homes – with secular iconography adapted to a religious function. The catacomb of Saint Agnes is a small church. Some families were able to construct "cubicula" which would house various loculi and the architectural elements of the space would offer support for decoration. Another excellent place for artistic programs were the arcosolia.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The complex system of tunnels that would later be known as the catacombs were first excavated by the Etruscan people that lived in the region predating the Romans. These tunnels were first excavated in the process of mining for various rock resources such as limestone and sandstone. These quarries became the basis for later excavation, first by the Romans for rock resources and then by the Christians and Jews for burial sites and mass graves.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: In 380, Christianity became a state religion. At first, many still desired to be buried in chambers alongside the martyrs. However, the practice of catacomb burial declined slowly, and the dead were increasingly buried in church cemeteries. After the Edict of Milan in 313, many Roman Christians flocked to the catacombs in order to find relics from the martyrs, and would pillage through the remains. Due to this, vandalism became rampant in the catacombs. In the 6th century, catacombs were used only for martyrs’ memorial services, though some paintings were added as late as the 7th century, for example, a "Saint Stephen" in the Catacomb of Commodilla. Apparently, Ostrogoths, Vandals and Lombards that sacked Rome also violated the catacombs, presumably looking for valuables. By the 10th century, catacombs were practically abandoned, and holy relics were transferred to above-ground basilicas.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: In the intervening centuries they remained forgotten until they were accidentally rediscovered in 1578, after which Antonio Bosio spent decades exploring and researching them for his "Roma Sotterranea" (1632). Archeologist Giovanni Battista de Rossi (1822–1894) published the first extensive professional studies about catacombs. In 1956 and 1959 Italian authorities found more catacombs near Rome. The catacombs have become an important monument of the early Christian church.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Responsibility for the Christian catacombs lies with the Holy See, which has set up active official organizations for this purpose: the Pontifical Commission of Sacred Archaeology (Pontificia Commissione di Archeologia Sacra) directs excavations and restoration works, while the study of the catacombs is directed in particular by the Pontifical Academy of Archaeology. The administration of some sites is entrusted on a day-to-day basis to local clergy or religious orders who have an activity on or adjacent to the site. The supervision of the Catacombs of St. Callixtus by the Salesian Fathers is well known. In the last years, with the growth of the internet, updated information is often available online, with an indication of a current street address, opening hours, fees, availability of guides in the different languages, size of groups permitted, and public transport. Like other historical sites in Italy, the catacombs are often not accessible at certain times of the day or on certain days of the week and may require online pre-booking. There are currently only 5 Catacombs open to the public; San Sebastiano, San Callisto, Priscilla, Domitilla, and Sant'Agnese.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Roman catacombs are made up of underground passages ("ambulacra"), in the walls of which horizontal niches ("loculi") were dug. These "loculi", generally laid out in sequences ("pilae") one above the other from floor or waist level, could each contain one or more bodies. When placed inside of loculi, bodies were usualy covered in a shroud and often covered in lime, which helped to cover the smell of the decaying process. In order to make more money, fossores would often sell occupied loculi to other people. A "loculus" large enough to contain two bodies were referred to as a "bisomus". Another type of burial, typical of Roman catacombs, was the "arcosolium", consisting of a curved niche, enclosed under a carved horizontal marble slab. "Cubicula" (burial rooms containing "loculi" all for one family) and "cryptae" (chapels decorated with frescoes) are also commonly found in catacomb passages. When space began to run out, other graves were also dug in the floor of the corridors – these graves are called "formae".


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Roman catacombs, of which there are forty in the suburbs or former suburbs, were built along the consular roads out of Rome, such as the "Via Appia", the "Via Ostiensis", the "Via Labicana", the "Via Tiburtina", and the "Via Nomentana". With the exception of the "Via Ostiensis" ("Italian:" Via Ostiense), these ancient Latin terms are also the current Italian names for these roads.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: These catacombs are situated on the ancient Via Labicana, today Via Casilina in Rome, Italy, near the church of Santi Marcellino e Pietro ad Duas Lauros. Their name refers to the Christian martyrs Marcellinus and Peter who, according to tradition, were buried here, near the body of St. Tiburtius.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Close to the Catacombs of San Callisto are the large and impressive Catacombs of Domitilla (named after Saint Domitilla), spread over of caves.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: In the beginning of 2009, at the request of the Vatican, the Divine Word Missionaries, a Roman Catholic Society of priests and Brothers, assumed responsibility as an administrator of St. Domitilla Catacombs.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: These catacombs, on the Via Ostiensis, contain one of the earliest images of a bearded Christ. They originally held the relics of Saints Felix and Adauctus. Excavations on the Commodilla were conducted by Franciscan archaeologist Bellarmino Bagatti (1933–34).


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Located on the Campana Road, these catacombs are said to have been the resting place, perhaps temporarily, of Simplicius, Faustinus and Beatrix, Christian Martyrs who died in Rome during the Diocletian persecution (302 or 303).


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: These are found along the via Appia and were built at the end of the 2nd century. They consist of a vast underground burial area, at first in pagan then in Christian use, housing various tombs of Christian martyrs. In the oldest parts of the complex may be found the "cubiculum of the coronation", with a rare depiction for that period of Christ being crowned with thorns, and a 4th-century painting of Susanna and the old men in the allegorical guise of a lamb and wolves.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Catacomb of Priscilla, situated at the Via Salaria across from the Villa Ada, probably derives its name from the name of the landowner on whose land they were built. They are looked after by the Benedictine nuns of Priscilla.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Sited along the Appian way, these catacombs were built after AD 150, with some private Christian hypogea and a funeral area directly dependent on the Catholic Church. It takes its name from the deacon Saint Callixtus, proposed by Pope Zephyrinus in the administration of the same cemetery – on his accession as pope, he enlarged the complex, that quite soon became the official one for the Roman Church. The arcades, where more than fifty martyrs and sixteen pontiffs were buried, form part of a complex graveyard that occupies fifteen hectares. The Catacombs of San Callisto are around 90 acres large, 12 miles long, contains 4 levels, and spans more than 20 meters underground. Because of the high volume of popes buried inside the catacombs, it is often called the "Little Vatican".


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Built into the hill beside San Lorenzo fuori le Mura, these catacombs are said to have been the final resting place of St. Lawrence. The church was built by Pope Sixtus III and later remodeled into the present nave. Sixtus also redecorated the shrine in the catacomb and was buried there.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Established underneath the San Pacrazio basilica which was built by Pope Symmachus on the place where the body of the young martyr Saint Pancras, or Pancratius, had been buried. In the 17th century, it was given to the Discalced Carmelites, who completely remodeled it. The catacombs house fragments of sculpture and pagan and early Christian inscriptions.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: One of the smallest Christian cemeteries, this has always been one of the most accessible catacombs and is thus one of the least preserved (of the four original floors, the first is almost completely gone). On the left-hand end of the right-hand wall of the nave of the primitive basilica, rebuilt in 1933 on ancient remains, arches to end the middle of the nave of the actual church, built in the 13th century, are visible, along with the outside of the apse of the Chapel of the Relics; whole and fragmentary collected sarcophagi (mostly of 4th-century date) were found in excavations. This is where the martyrs Sebastian and Eutychius were buried.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Via a staircase down, one finds the arcades where varied cubicula (including the cubiculum of Giona's fine four stage cycle of paintings, dating to the end of the 4th century). One then arrives at the restored crypt of S. Sebastiano, with a table altar on the site of the ancient one (some remains of the original's base still survive) and a bust of Saint Sebastian attributed to Bernini. From here one reaches a platform, under which is a sandstone cavity ad catacumbas which once may have been named "ad catacumbas", thus giving this and all other tombs of this type their name. 3 mausolea of the second half of the 2nd century (but also in later use) open off the platform. The first one on the right, decorated on the outside with paintings of funereal banquets and the miracle of the calling out of Cerasa's demons, on the inside contains paintings (including a ceiling painting of a Gorgon's head) and inhumation burials and has a surviving inscription reading "Marcus Clodius Hermes", the name of its owner. The second, called by some "tomb of the Innocentiores" (a burial club which owned it), has a refined stucco ceiling, Latin inscriptions in Greek characters, and a graffito with the initials of the Greek words for "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour". On the left is the mausoleum of Ascia, with an exterior wall painting of vine shoots rising from kantharoi up trompe-l'œil pillars.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: A room called the "Triglia" rises from the platform, roughly in the middle of the basilica and cut into from above by the present basilica. This covered room was used for funereal banquets; the plastered walls have hundreds of graffiti by the devotees at these banquets, carved in the second half of the 3rd to the beginnings of the 4th century, with appeals to the apostle's Peter and Paul. From the "Trigilia" one passed into an ancient ambulatory, which turns around into an apse: here is a collection of epitaphs and a model of all the mausolei, of the "Triglia" and of the Constantinian basilica. From here one descends into the "Platonica", construction at the rear of the basilica that was long believed to have been the temporary resting place for Peter and Paul, but was in fact (as proved by excavation) a tomb for the martyr Quirinus, bishop of Sescia in Pannonia, whose remains were brought here in the 5th century. To the right of the "Platonica" is the chapel of Honorius III, adapted as the vestibule of the mausoleum, with interesting 13th-century paintings of Peter and Paul, the Crucifixion, saints, the Massacre of the Innocents, Madonna and Child, and other subjects. On the left is an apsidal mausoleum with an altar built against the apse: on the left wall, a surviving graffito reading "domus Petri" either hints at Peter having been buried here or testifies to the belief at the time the graffito was written that Peter was buried here.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: These catacombs were dedicated to Saint Valentine. In the 13th century, the martyr's relics were transferred to Basilica of Saint Praxedes.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Built for the conservation and veneration of the remains of Saint Agnes of Rome. Agnes' bones are now conserved in the church of Sant'Agnese fuori le mura in Rome, built over the catacomb. Her skull is preserved in a side chapel in the church of Sant'Agnese in Agone in Rome's Piazza Navona.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: On the via Salaria, the Catacombs of via Anapo are datable to the end of the 3rd or the beginning of the 4th century and contain diverse frescoes of biblical subjects.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: There are six known Jewish catacombs in Rome, two of which are open to the public: Vigna Randanini and Villa Torlonia.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The Jewish catacombs were discovered in 1918, and archaeological excavations continued for twelve years. The structure has two entrances, one on via Syracuse and the other inside Villa Torlonia. The catacombs extend for more than , and date back to the period between the 2nd and 3rd centuries, and possibly remained in use until the 5th century. There are almost a century of epitaphs, but these do not show any examples of a particular belief, beyond some rare frescoes showing the classic Jewish religious symbols. Jewish Catacombs are distinguished from their Christian counterparts by various signs as well as the fact that Jewish people did not visit the dead in the Catacombs. Parts of the Old Testament and the symbol of a candlestick with seven-branches have been spotted on the walls of Jewish Catacombs.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: Due to high levels of humidity and temperature, bone preservation has been negatively affected in the catacombs. Scientists are unable to identify the sex of the dead due to the lack of preservation in the bones.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: The other catacombs are not open to the public because of the instability of their structure and the presence of radon.


title: Catacombs of Rome

text: In the Catacombs of Rome, there are many different pieces of artwork. Most artworks are religious in nature some depicting important Christian rites such as baptism, or religious scenes and stories such as the story of "The Three Hebrews and the Fiery Furnace" or biblical figures such as Adam and Eve.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Mary Eno Pinchot Meyer (; October 14, 1920 – October 12, 1964) was an American painter who lived in Washington D.C. She was married to Central Intelligence Agency official Cord Meyer from 1945–1958, and became involved romantically with President John F. Kennedy after her divorce from Meyer.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Pinchot Meyer was murdered on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal towpath in Washington D.C. on October 12, 1964. A suspect, Ray Crump, Jr., was arrested and charged with her murder, but he was ultimately acquitted. Beginning in 1976, Pinchot Meyer's life, her relationship with Kennedy, and her murder became the subjects of numerous articles and books, including a full-length biography by journalist Nina Burleigh.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Pinchot was born in New York City, the elder of two daughters of Amos and Ruth (née Pickering) Pinchot. Amos Pinchot was a wealthy lawyer and a key figure in the Progressive Party who had helped fund the socialist magazine "The Masses". Her mother Ruth was Pinchot's second wife and was a journalist who wrote for such magazines as "The Nation" and "The New Republic". Mary was also the niece of Gifford Pinchot, a noted conservationist and two-time Governor of Pennsylvania. Pinchot and her younger sister Antoinette (nicknamed "Tony") were raised at the family's Grey Towers home in Milford, Pennsylvania. As a child, Pinchot met such left-wing intellectuals as Mabel Dodge, Louis Brandeis, Robert M. La Follette, Sr., and Harold L. Ickes. She attended The Brearley School and Vassar College, where she became interested in Communism. She started dating William Attwood in 1935 and, while with him at a dance held at Choate, first met John F. Kennedy.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: After her graduation from Vassar in 1942, Meyer became a journalist, writing for the United Press and "Mademoiselle". As a pacifist and member of the American Labor Party, she came under scrutiny by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Pinchot met Cord Meyer in 1944 when he was a Marine Corps lieutenant who had lost his left eye because of shrapnel injuries received in combat. The two had similar pacifist views and beliefs in world government and married on April 19, 1945. That spring they both attended the UN Conference on International Organization in San Francisco, during which the United Nations was founded, Cord as an aide of Harold Stassen and Pinchot as a reporter for a newspaper syndication service. She later worked for a time as an editor for "Atlantic Monthly". Their eldest child Quentin was born in November 1945, followed by Michael in 1947, after which Pinchot became a homemaker, although she attended classes at the Art Students League of New York.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Cord Meyer became president of the United World Federalists in May 1947 and its membership doubled. Mary Meyer wrote for the organization's journal. In 1950, their third child, Mark, was born and they moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Meanwhile, her husband began to re-evaluate his notions of world government as members of the Communist Party USA infiltrated the international organizations he had founded. In 1951, Cord joined the Central Intelligence Agency after being recruited by Allen Dulles.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: With her husband's CIA appointment, they moved to Washington D.C. and became highly visible members of Georgetown society. Their acquaintances included Joseph Alsop, Katharine Graham, Clark Clifford, and "Washington Post" reporter James Truitt and his wife, noted artist Anne Truitt. Their social circle also included CIA-affiliated people such as Richard M. Bissell, Jr., high-ranking counter-intelligence official James Angleton, and Mary and Frank Wisner, Meyer's boss at the CIA.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In 1953, Senator Joseph McCarthy publicly accused Cord Meyer of being a Communist and the Federal Bureau of Investigation was reported to have looked into Mary's political past. Allen Dulles and Frank Wisner aggressively defended Meyer and he remained with the CIA. However, by early 1954, Cord Meyer had become unhappy with his CIA career. He used contacts from his covert operations in Operation Mockingbird to approach several New York publishers for a job but was rebuffed.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In the summer of 1954, John F. Kennedy and his wife Jackie Kennedy bought the house in McLean, Virginia next door to the Meyers'; at some point Pinchot Meyer and Jackie Kennedy became acquainted and eventually, after both had moved back to Georgetown, "they went on walks together." By the end of 1954, Cord Meyer was still with the CIA and often in Europe, running Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and managing millions of dollars of U.S. government funds worldwide to support progressive-seeming foundations and organizations opposing the Soviet Union.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: One of Pinchot Meyer's close friends was a fellow Vassar alumna, Cicely d'Autremont, who married James Angleton. In 1955, Meyer's sister Antoinette (Tony) married Ben Bradlee, who was then Washington bureau chief of "Newsweek". On December 18, 1956, the Meyers' middle son Michael, aged nine, was hit by a car near their house and died. Although this tragedy brought Mary and Cord Meyer closer for a time, Mary filed for divorce in 1958.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: After the divorce, Pinchot Meyer and her two surviving sons moved to Georgetown. She began painting again in a converted garage studio at the home of her sister Tony and Tony's husband, Ben Bradlee. She also started a close relationship with abstract-minimalist painter Kenneth Noland and became friendly with Robert F. Kennedy, who had purchased his brother's house, Hickory Hill, in 1957. Nina Burleigh, in her book "A Very Private Woman", writes that after the divorce Pinchot Meyer became "a well-bred ingenue out looking for fun and getting in trouble along the way."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Counter-intelligence official James Angleton told Joan Bross, the wife of John Bross, a high-ranking CIA official, that he had begun tapping Pinchot Meyer's telephone after she left her husband. Angleton often visited her Georgetown home and took her sons on fishing outings. Pinchot Meyer visited John F. Kennedy at the White House in October 1961 and their relationship became sexually intimate. Pinchot Meyer told Anne and James Truitt she was keeping a diary.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: More than ten years after Pinchot Meyer’s death, rumors of her affair with Kennedy began to circulate. In 1976, they were confirmed first by the "National Enquirer", then by "The Washington Post". Nineteen years later, "Post" editor Ben Bradlee went into great detail about his sister-in-law Pinchot Meyer’s life and murder in his autobiography "A Good Life".


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In Timothy Leary’s 1983 memoir titled "Flashbacks: A Personal and Cultural History of an Era", he claimed to have known Pinchot Meyer personally and said she influenced Kennedy's "views on nuclear disarmament and rapprochement with Cuba." In an interview with Nina Burleigh, Kennedy aide Myer Feldman said, "I think he might have thought more of her than some of the other women and discussed things that were on his mind, not just social gossip." Burleigh wrote, "Mary might actually have been a force for peace during some of the most frightening years of the Cold War ..."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In a 2008 interview with author Peter Janney for his book "Mary's Mosaic", journalist and Kennedy intimate Charles Bartlett emphasized the serious nature of Pinchot Meyer's romance with the late president, stating, "That was a dangerous relationship. Jack was in love with Mary Meyer. He was certainly smitten with her, he was heavily smitten. He was very frank with me about it." Pinchot Meyer was a guest at the intimate party hosted by Jacqueline Kennedy in honor of President Kennedy aboard the yacht "Sequoia" on his 46th and last birthday celebration, May 29, 1963.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In October 1963, one month before his assassination, Kennedy wrote a letter to Mary Pinchot Meyer, imploring her to join him for a tryst. The unsent letter, written on White House stationery and retained by Kennedy's personal secretary Evelyn Lincoln, sold in June 2016 at auction for just under $89,000. The letter reads: "Why don't you leave suburbia for once – come and see me – either here – or at the Cape next week or in Boston the 19th. I know it is unwise, irrational, and that you may hate it – on the other hand you may not – and I will love it. You say that it is good for me not to get what I want. After all of these years – you should give me a more loving answer than that. Why don't you just say yes." The letter is signed "J."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: On October 12, 1964, Pinchot Meyer finished a painting and went for her customary daily walk along the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal towpath in Georgetown. Mechanic Henry Wiggins was trying to fix a car on Canal Road and heard a woman cry out, "Someone help me, someone help me." Wiggins heard two gunshots and ran to a low wall looking upon the path where he saw "a black man in a light jacket, dark slacks, and a dark cap standing over the body of a white woman."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Pinchot Meyer's body had two bullet wounds, one in the left temple and one in the back. An FBI forensic expert testified at trial that "dark haloes on the skin around both entry wounds suggested they had been fired at close-range, possibly point-blank". The precision, placement and instantaneous lethality of the wounds suggested to the District of Columbia medical examiner that the killer was highly trained in the use of firearms.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Approximately forty minutes after the murder, Washington, D.C. Police Detective John Warner spotted a soaking-wet African American man named Ray Crump about a quarter of a mile from the murder scene. Crump wasn't running; "he was walking," Detective Warner testified at the murder trial. Crump was arrested at 1:15 pm near the murder scene based on car mechanic Wiggins' statement to police that Crump was the man he had seen standing over the victim's body as well as Crump's inability to give police a coherent explanation for his presence in the area. The day after the murder, a second witness, Army Lt. William L. Mitchell, came forward and told police that when jogging on the towpath the preceding day, he had seen a black man trailing a white woman he believed was Mary Meyer. Mitchell's description of the man's clothing was similar to the clothing Crump had been wearing that day. On the strength of the statements of these two witnesses, Crump was indicted without a preliminary hearing. No gun was ever found, however, and Crump was never linked to any gun of the type used to murder Mary Pinchot Meyer.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: The FBI Crime Report, withheld from the defense during the trial and published by Peter Janney in his book "Mary's Mosaic", documented that there was no forensic evidence linking Crump to the victim or murder scene. Despite the fact that Pinchot Meyer bled profusely from her head wound, no trace of her blood was found on Crump's person or clothing.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: A very short time after Pinchot Meyer’s brother-in-law Ben Bradlee finished eating lunch, hours before police identified the body, CIA official Wistar Janney placed a phone call to Bradlee. According to Bradlee’s account in his memoir "A Good Life", moments earlier Janney had heard a radio news report about the murder of a woman at the C&O Canal and she was not identified by name. Author Peter Janney, son of Wistar, has established that as of approximately 2:00 pm, when District of Columbia police had Ray Crump in custody at the station, they did not know the identity of the murder victim. This was because Pinchot Meyer had not carried identification or a purse while walking on the canal towpath. She owned a pocketbook that her brother-in-law Bradlee found, several hours after he identified her body at the morgue, in her art studio.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: According to Bradlee’s memoir, he did not listen to the radio before Wistar Janney phoned him about the radio news report of the anonymous murder victim. Bradlee was unaware a murder had taken place. The description of the woman in the radio news report made Janney think she was Bradlee’s sister-in-law, according to what he told Bradlee on the phone. Bradlee immediately left his workplace at the downtown Washington, DC office of "Newsweek" and went to his home in the Georgetown neighborhood. During his trip, he was uncertain as to who had been murdered; he arrived home and noticed the presence of several neighbors including his close friend Harry “Doc” Dalinsky, a pharmacist. Dalinsky accompanied a shocked and distraught Bradlee to the District of Columbia morgue where Bradlee identified his sister-in-law’s body.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: According to Cord Meyer’s account, immediately after Wistar Janney phoned Ben Bradlee about the radio news report, Janney then phoned him, notifying him that a murder had occurred on the C&O Canal towpath and that his ex-wife Pinchot Meyer was indeed the victim.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Both in Bradlee’s 1995 memoir and in a 2007 interview he did with Peter Janney, he did not voice suspicion about how Peter’s father Wistar had known the identity of the murder victim who had not carried any documentation of her name or home address. Peter Janney says that in 2007, Bradlee “had a hard time recollecting certain events.”


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Police identified the body after 3:45 pm. Wistar Janney had phoned Ben Bradlee “just after lunch” — Bradlee’s words in his memoir.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: When Raymond Crump came to trial in 1965, Judge Howard Corcoran ruled Mary Pinchot Meyer's private life could not be disclosed in the courtroom. Pinchot Meyer's background was also kept from Dovey Johnson Roundtree, Crump's lawyer, who later recalled she could find out almost nothing about the murder victim: "It was as if she existed only on the towpath on the day she was murdered." At trial, Roundtree demonstrated the porousness of the police dragnet and showed that Ray Crump was 50 pounds lighter and 5 inches shorter than the 5 feet 8 inch, 185 pound male that Henry Wiggins had described to police. Although Lt. William L. Mitchell estimated the height of the man he claimed to have seen trailing Pinchot Meyer at five feet 8 inches, Mitchell was not able to identify Ray Crump as that man when Mitchell testified at trial. Crump was acquitted of all charges on July 29, 1965, and the murder remains unsolved. Author Nina Burleigh has argued that Crump's post-trial criminal history indicates his capacity to murder Meyer. Defense attorney Roundtree, however, attributed Crump's post-trial violence to the trauma he suffered during his eight-month imprisonment while he awaited trial for Pinchot Meyer’s murder. Other post-trial revelations appear to corroborate his innocence in the Meyer murder, notably the likely presence of another black man at the crime scene and the fact that police dispatched a search for Crump’s jacket 15 minutes before his arrest. Crump's attorney Roundtree, in her autobiography "Mighty Justice", stated that Crump had an alibi witness in the person of the married woman with whom he was having a sexual encounter near the crime scene, that the woman's account squared with Crump's account that he gave Roundtree, but that she refused to testify out of fear of her husband and disappeared before Crump’s trial.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Ben Bradlee said in "A Good Life" that despite Raymond Crump’s acquittal on all charges, immediately thereafter District of Columbia police physically escorted him to the border of the District of Columbia and Virginia. Police told him never to set foot in the District of Columbia again. He was the father of six underage children who lived in the District of Columbia.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Cord Meyer left the CIA in 1977. In his 1982 autobiography "Facing Reality: From World Federalism to the CIA", he wrote, "I was satisfied by the conclusions of the police investigation that Mary had been the victim of a sexually motivated assault by a single individual and that she had been killed in her struggle to escape." He stated he rejected "journalistic speculation" that said he believed his former wife's death had some other explanation.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: The March 2, 1976, issue of the "National Enquirer" quoted James Truitt as stating Meyer had a two-year affair with John F. Kennedy and that they smoked marijuana in a White House bedroom. According to Truitt, their first rendezvous occurred after Meyer was chauffeured to the White House in a limousine driven by a Secret Service agent where she was met by Kennedy and taken to a bedroom. He stated that Meyer and Kennedy regularly met in that manner, sometimes two or three times each week, until his assassination. Truitt said the two would "usually have drinks or dinner alone or sometimes with one of the aides", and claimed that Meyer offered marijuana cigarettes to Kennedy after one such meeting on April 16, 1962. He said after they smoked three joints, she commented, "This isn't like cocaine. I'll get you some of that." According to the "Enquirer", Meyer also kept a diary of the affair. The publication quoted Tony Bradlee — Meyer's sister — as confirming the existence of the affair and the diary, stating that Bradlee found the diary in Meyer's studio after her death, then turned it over to James Jesus Angleton who subsequently burned it at CIA headquarters.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In an interview with a correspondent from "The Washington Post", Truitt confirmed the "Enquirer"s account, stated that Meyer had told him of the affair, and that he had kept notes about what he had been told. According to Truitt, Meyer and Kennedy met approximately 30 times — frequently when Jackie Kennedy was out of town — from January 1962 until the time of the President's death in November 1963. Truitt stated that the two would occasionally have drinks or dinner with one of Kennedy's aides, whom he identified as David Powers and Timothy J. Reardon Jr. Contradicting his earlier account with the "Enquirer", Truitt said Kennedy gave the marijuana to Meyer. Truitt acknowledged that he received payment from the "Enquirer", but did not disclose the amount of payment.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Truitt's allegations were denied by Kennedy aides Kenneth O'Donnell and Timothy Reardon, Jr., and Powers was unavailable for comment. Pinchot Meyer's sister Tony stated that the "Enquirer" had quoted her out of context to create the impression that she agreed with Truitt's allegations. The "Washington Post", Associated Press and United Press International printed a follow-up story that cited assertions by Truitt's physician and his former wife that his judgment was impaired by mental illness. However, Truitt's allegations regarding Pinchot Meyer's affair with the late President Kennedy and the existence of a diary in which she recorded the affair were confirmed in 1995 by her brother-in-law Ben Bradlee in his memoir "A Good Life".


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Ben Bradlee states in his 1995 memoir "A Good Life" that he and his wife Tony received an international phone call on the night of the murder from Pinchot Meyer's friend Anne Truitt in Japan, who was looking for James Jesus Angleton at the Bradlee house. Truitt advised all of them, including Angleton, of the existence of the Pinchot Meyer diary and the urgent need to retrieve it, given what Truitt said were its details of Meyer's affair with President Kennedy during the last two years of his life. A decision was then quickly made by Bradlee, his wife, James Angleton and his wife Cicely, and another friend present at the scene, to keep the diary's existence from authorities.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: According to Bradlee's 1995 account – one of at least four conflicting versions of the events surrounding the diary – the search at Pinchot Meyer's art studio behind the Bradlee house began the day after the murder. Bradlee says he and his wife arrived at the studio with tools to obtain entry, since they had no key, and upon arriving they found Angleton in the process of picking the lock with special tools he had for that purpose. "The fact that the CIA's most controversial counterintelligence specialist had been caught in the act of breaking and entering, and looking for her diary," Bradlee said, was not something he considered appropriate for public disclosure. With respect to the diary itself, he added, he and his wife, upon reading it and seeing that it revealed Pinchot Meyer's affair with the late President Kennedy, "concluded this was in no sense a public document, despite the braying of the knee jerks about some public right to know."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Bradlee's 1995 memoir account conflicted with the testimony he gave at the July 1965 trial of Ray Crump, the African-American laborer accused of Pinchot Meyer's murder, where he was asked by prosecuting attorney whether he had made any effort to gain entrance to his sister-in-law's art studio on the evening of the murder. Bradlee answered in the affirmative, but gave no indication of any difficulty in entering the padlocked premises, nor of the presence of anyone else accompanying him in this endeavor. Asked by prosecutor Alfred Hantman, "Now besides the usual articles of Mrs. Meyer's avocation, did you find there any other articles of her personal property?" Bradlee replied, "There was a pocketbook there," adding that it contained keys, a wallet, cosmetics, and pencils. He made no mention of the diary.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Upon learning years later of the existence, contents and alleged burning of the diary, prosecutor Alfred Hantman and defense attorney Dovey Johnson Roundtree, as well as D.C. Police Detective Bernie Crooke, stated that knowledge of that information at the time of the trial would have materially affected the proceedings. "I'd have been very upset at the time if I'd known that the deceased's diary had been destroyed," Crooke told author Ron Rosenbaum in 1976. In a 1991 interview with the late author Leo Damore, Hantman said that he had been "totally unaware of who Mary Meyer was or what her connections were," and that having that knowledge "could have changed everything." In her 2009 autobiography, "Justice Older than the Law" (reissued in 2019 as "Mighty Justice"), defense counsel Dovey Roundtree expressed shock at learning of the diary's significance from Bradlee's book. "How differently my line of cross-examination would have run had I been aware, on July 20, 1965, of the story Mr. Bradlee told thirty years later in his autobiography ... James Angleton's awareness of the diary's existence and his interest in finding it, reading it, and destroying it – all of that unsettled me deeply when I read Mr. Bradlee's 1995 account, as did his insistence that the diary was a private document ... Had I been aware of it, I would have felt compelled to pursue it."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Pinchot Meyer biographers Peter Janney and Nina Burleigh have both criticized Bradlee's omission of key information under oath. "Bradlee had excoriated Cord Meyer [Pinchot Meyer's ex-husband] for his 'derisive scorn' for the people's right to know in the 1960s, but the rules changed when the subject of a story was his sister-in-law," Burleigh says. "The First Amendment champion of the Watergate investigation admitted in his memoir that he gave Mary Meyer's diary to the CIA because it was 'a family document.'"


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: In his 1983 autobiography "Flashbacks", former Harvard University psychology lecturer Timothy Leary claimed to have met Pinchot Meyer several times. According to Leary, Pinchot Meyer first came to see him at Harvard to learn how to give LSD sessions. They used psilocybin together, and she warned him that there were "powerful men" in Washington who wanted to "use drugs for warfare, for espionage, for brainwashing" while she and a group of women wanted to use drugs "for peace, not war" by holding LSD sessions with powerful Washington figures to enlighten them.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Leary writes that Pinchot Meyer became afraid after one of the women she recruited for her plan to "turn on" powerful men in Washington "snitched" and she warned him that they were both in danger. Soon after JFK's assassination he received a phone call from a sobbing Pinchot Meyer in which she said, "They couldn't control him any more. He was changing too fast ... They've covered everything up."


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: After the 1976 publication of the "National Enquirer" article on James Truitt's claims, Leary realized Pinchot Meyer had been describing her affair and drug use with President Kennedy. He makes this claim in his 1983 memoir.


title: Mary Pinchot Meyer

text: Biographers of both Leary and Meyer have treated Leary's claims with dismissal or caution. Leary biographer Robert Greenfield believes that Leary did have contact with Pinchot Meyer but found no evidence that Pinchot Meyer had taken LSD with Kennedy and writes that "a good deal of what Tim reported as fact in "Flashbacks" is pure fantasy." Pinchot Meyer biographer Nina Burleigh also believes that Leary and Pinchot Meyer met, but writes that "No one has ever confirmed that Kennedy tried LSD with Mary." She notes, however, that "the timing of her visits to Timothy Leary do coincide with her known private meetings with the president."


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: "I'm Too Sexy" is a 1991 song by British group Right Said Fred, released as their debut single from their first album, "Up" (1992). It peaked at number two on the UK Singles Chart. Outside the United Kingdom, "I'm Too Sexy" topped the charts in seven countries, including Australia, Canada, Ireland, and the United States.


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: The idea for the song came about when the Fairbrass brothers were running a gym in London where, according to Richard, there was "lots of narcissism and posing". One day, he took his shirt off and started singing "I'm too sexy for my shirt" in front of a mirror as a joke. The band originally recorded it as an indie rock song.


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: It was rejected by multiple record companies before they played it to radio plugger Guy Holmes. He was initially unimpressed after playing it on his car stereo, but his passengers latched onto the song's "I'm a model, you know what I mean" hook and Holmes asked the band if they could rework it as a dance track.


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: DJ TommyD, an acquaintance of Richard Fairbrass, programmed electronics around the original vocal, whilst guitarist Rob Manzoli added a riff borrowed from the Jimi Hendrix song "Third Stone from the Sun".


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: The single was released on 15 July 1991. It equalled the record for the most weeks at number two on the UK Singles Chart without ever topping the chart, staying at number two for six weeks in a row while held back by Bryan Adams' "(Everything I Do) I Do It for You" (this equalled the previous record set by Father Abraham's 1978 hit "The Smurf Song").


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: In May 1992, the song was nominated for an Ivor Novello Award for Best Selling 'A' Side. "I'm Too Sexy" was the act's first of several hits, particularly in the United Kingdom. They went on to have a number one single on the UK Singles Chart with "Deeply Dippy" in April 1992.


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: AllMusic editor Stephen Schnee described the song as a "humorous yet misunderstood swipe at self centered male bodybuilders and models." David Taylor-Wilson from "Bay Area Reporter" called it "a campy send-up of the fashion world." In November 1991, Larry Flick from "Billboard" wrote, "Thoroughly fun and goofy ditty recently heated up international dance floors and radio airwaves. Fred cheekily boasts about his physical attributes over a festive pop/house groove, which should have no trouble duplicating its success here." Andy Kastanas from "The Charlotte Observer" stated, "This midtempo "techno/house" beat has a catchy hook and unusual deep male vocals (a la Elmer Fudd on steroids) that'll put a meltdown on any ladies in the vicinity. You'll dance whether you like it or not and the lyrics are sure to give you some chucks when you sing along (and you WILL sing along)... "I'm too sexy for my car, too sexy for your party, too sexy for this song, too sexy it hurts" and on and on." British magazine "Music Week" deemed it an "eccentric" and "amusingly muttered 121.7bpm pop rattler". Randy Clark and Bryan Devaney from "Cashbox" said, "Here is a fun, tongue-in-cheek dance tune that should get lots of club play." They concluded that the group "have put together a clever dance/club put-down of what could only be the whole fashion-model "poser" attitude that's so much in vogue." A reviewer from "People Magazine" described it as a "dopey dance tune mocking fashion models and voguers—but it'll keep you moving."


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: In April 2008, the song was rated No. 49 on "The 50 Worst Songs Ever! Watch, Listen and Cringe!" by "Blender".


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: In 2017, "BuzzFeed" ranked it No. 90 in their list of "The 101 Greatest Dance Songs of the '90s", adding, "Yes, this song is cheesy as hell, but it doesn't ever try to be anything other than what it is: a fun, catchy, campy dance song."


title: I'm Too Sexy

text: In 2019, "Billboard" listed the song at No. 210 in their ranking of "Billboard's Top Songs of the '90s".


title: Myopathy

text: In medicine, myopathy is a disease of the muscle in which the muscle fibers do not function properly. This results in muscular weakness. "Myopathy" means muscle disease (Greek : myo- "muscle" + patheia "-pathy" : "suffering"). This meaning implies that the primary defect is within the muscle, as opposed to the nerves ("neuropathies" or "neurogenic" disorders) or elsewhere (e.g., the brain). Muscle cramps, stiffness, and spasm can also be associated with myopathy.


title: Myopathy

text: Capture myopathy can occur in wild or captive animals, such as deer and kangaroos, and leads to morbidity and mortality. It usually occurs as a result of stress and physical exertion during capture and restraint.


title: Myopathy

text: Muscular disease can be classified as neuromuscular or musculoskeletal in nature. Some conditions, such as myositis, can be considered both neuromuscular and musculoskeletal.


title: Myopathy

text: Myopathies in systemic disease results from several different disease processes including endocrine, inflammatory, paraneoplastic, infectious, drug- and toxin-induced, critical illness myopathy, metabolic, collagen related, and myopathies with other systemic disorders. Patients with systemic myopathies often present acutely or sub acutely. On the other hand, familial myopathies or dystrophies generally present in a chronic fashion with exceptions of metabolic myopathies where symptoms on occasion can be precipitated acutely. Most of the inflammatory myopathies can have a chance association with malignant lesion; the incidence appears to be specifically increased only in patients with dermatomyositis.


title: Myopathy

text: The Food and Drug Administration is recommending that physicians restrict prescribing high-dose Simvastatin (Zocor, Merck) to patients, given an increased risk of muscle damage. The FDA drug safety communication stated that physicians should limit using the 80-mg dose unless the patient has already been taking the drug for 12 months and there is no evidence of myopathy.


title: Myopathy

text: Because different types of myopathies are caused by many different pathways, there is no single treatment for myopathy. Treatments range from treatment of the symptoms to very specific cause-targeting treatments. Drug therapy, physical therapy, bracing for support, surgery, and massage are all current treatments for a variety of myopathies.


title: Chalcogen

text: The chalcogens (ore forming) ( ) are the chemical elements in group 16 of the periodic table. This group is also known as the oxygen family. Group 16 consists of the elements oxygen (O), sulfur (S), selenium (Se), tellurium (Te), and the radioactive elements polonium (Po) and livermorium (Lv). Often, oxygen is treated separately from the other chalcogens, sometimes even excluded from the scope of the term "chalcogen" altogether, due to its very different chemical behavior from sulfur, selenium, tellurium, and polonium. The word "chalcogen" is derived from a combination of the Greek word () principally meaning copper (the term was also used for bronze/brass, any metal in the poetic sense, ore or coin), and the Latinized Greek word , meaning "born" or "produced".


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur has been known since antiquity, and oxygen was recognized as an element in the 18th century. Selenium, tellurium and polonium were discovered in the 19th century, and livermorium in 2000. All of the chalcogens have six valence electrons, leaving them two electrons short of a full outer shell. Their most common oxidation states are −2, +2, +4, and +6. They have relatively low atomic radii, especially the lighter ones.


title: Chalcogen

text: Lighter chalcogens are typically nontoxic in their elemental form, and are often critical to life, while the heavier chalcogens are typically toxic. All of the naturally occurring chalcogens have some role in biological functions, either as a nutrient or a toxin. Selenium is an important nutrient (among others as a building block of selenocysteine) but is also commonly toxic. Tellurium often has unpleasant effects (although some organisms can use it), and polonium (especially the isotope polonium-210) is always harmful as a result of its radioactivity.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur has more than 20 allotropes, oxygen has nine, selenium has at least eight, polonium has two, and only one crystal structure of tellurium has so far been discovered. There are numerous organic chalcogen compounds. Not counting oxygen, organic sulfur compounds are generally the most common, followed by organic selenium compounds and organic tellurium compounds. This trend also occurs with chalcogen pnictides and compounds containing chalcogens and carbon group elements.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen is generally obtained by separation of air into nitrogen and oxygen. Sulfur is extracted from oil and natural gas. Selenium and tellurium are produced as byproducts of copper refining. Polonium is most available in naturally occurring actinide-containing materials. Livermorium has been synthesized in particle accelerators. The primary use of elemental oxygen is in steelmaking. Sulfur is mostly converted into sulfuric acid, which is heavily used in the chemical industry. Selenium's most common application is glassmaking. Tellurium compounds are mostly used in optical disks, electronic devices, and solar cells. Some of polonium's applications are due to its radioactivity.


title: Chalcogen

text: Chalcogens show similar patterns in electron configuration, especially in the outermost shells, where they all have the same number of valence electrons, resulting in similar trends in chemical behavior:


title: Chalcogen

text: All chalcogens have six valence electrons. All of the solid, stable chalcogens are soft and do not conduct heat well. Electronegativity decreases towards the chalcogens with higher atomic numbers. Density, melting and boiling points, and atomic and ionic radii tend to increase towards the chalcogens with higher atomic numbers.


title: Chalcogen

text: Out of the six known chalcogens, one (oxygen) has an atomic number equal to a nuclear magic number, which means that their atomic nuclei tend to have increased stability towards radioactive decay. Oxygen has three stable isotopes, and 14 unstable ones. Sulfur has four stable isotopes, 20 radioactive ones, and one isomer. Selenium has six observationally stable or nearly stable isotopes, 26 radioactive isotopes, and 9 isomers. Tellurium has eight stable or nearly stable isotopes, 31 unstable ones, and 17 isomers. Polonium has 42 isotopes, none of which are stable. It has an additional 28 isomers. In addition to the stable isotopes, some radioactive chalcogen isotopes occur in nature, either because they are decay products, such as Po, because they are primordial, such as Se, because of cosmic ray spallation, or via nuclear fission of uranium. Livermorium isotopes Lv through Lv have been discovered; the most stable livermorium isotope is Lv, which has a half-life of 0.061 seconds.


title: Chalcogen

text: Among the lighter chalcogens (oxygen and sulfur), the most neutron-poor isotopes undergo proton emission, the moderately neutron-poor isotopes undergo electron capture or β decay, the moderately neutron-rich isotopes undergo β decay, and the most neutron rich isotopes undergo neutron emission. The middle chalcogens (selenium and tellurium) have similar decay tendencies as the lighter chalcogens, but their isotopes do not undergo proton emission and some of the most neutron-deficient isotopes of tellurium undergo alpha decay. Polonium's isotopes tend to decay with alpha or beta decay. Isotopes with nuclear spins are more common among the chalcogens selenium and tellurium than they are with sulfur.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen's most common allotrope is diatomic oxygen, or O, a reactive paramagnetic molecule that is ubiquitous to aerobic organisms and has a blue color in its liquid state. Another allotrope is O, or ozone, which is three oxygen atoms bonded together in a bent formation. There is also an allotrope called tetraoxygen, or O, and six allotropes of solid oxygen including "red oxygen", which has the formula O.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur has over 20 known allotropes, which is more than any other element except carbon. The most common allotropes are in the form of eight-atom rings, but other molecular allotropes that contain as few as two atoms or as many as 20 are known. Other notable sulfur allotropes include rhombic sulfur and monoclinic sulfur. Rhombic sulfur is the more stable of the two allotropes. Monoclinic sulfur takes the form of long needles and is formed when liquid sulfur is cooled to slightly below its melting point. The atoms in liquid sulfur are generally in the form of long chains, but above 190 °C, the chains begin to break down. If liquid sulfur above 190 °C is frozen very rapidly, the resulting sulfur is amorphous or "plastic" sulfur. Gaseous sulfur is a mixture of diatomic sulfur (S) and 8-atom rings.


title: Chalcogen

text: Selenium has at least eight distinct allotropes. The gray allotrope, commonly referred to as the "metallic" allotrope, despite not being a metal, is stable and has a hexagonal crystal structure. The gray allotrope of selenium is soft, with a Mohs hardness of 2, and brittle. Four other allotropes of selenium are metastable. These include two monoclinic red allotropes and two amorphous allotropes, one of which is red and one of which is black. The red allotrope converts to the black allotrope in the presence of heat. The gray allotrope of selenium is made from spirals on selenium atoms, while one of the red allotropes is made of stacks of selenium rings (Se).


title: Chalcogen

text: Tellurium is not known to have any allotropes, although its typical form is hexagonal. Polonium has two allotropes, which are known as α-polonium and β-polonium. α-polonium has a cubic crystal structure and converts to the rhombohedral β-polonium at 36 °C.


title: Chalcogen

text: The chalcogens have varying crystal structures. Oxygen's crystal structure is monoclinic, sulfur's is orthorhombic, selenium and tellurium have the hexagonal crystal structure, while polonium has a cubic crystal structure.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen, sulfur, and selenium are nonmetals, and tellurium is a metalloid, meaning that its chemical properties are between those of a metal and those of a nonmetal. It is not certain whether polonium is a metal or a metalloid. Some sources refer to polonium as a metalloid, although it has some metallic properties. Also, some allotropes of selenium display characteristics of a metalloid, even though selenium is usually considered a nonmetal. Even though oxygen is a chalcogen, its chemical properties are different from those of other chalcogens. One reason for this is that the heavier chalcogens have vacant d-orbitals. Oxygen's electronegativity is also much higher than those of the other chalcogens. This makes oxygen's electric polarizability several times lower than those of the other chalcogens.


title: Chalcogen

text: For covalent bonding a chalcogen may accept two electrons according to the octet rule, leaving two lone pairs. When an atom forms two single bonds, they form an angle between 90° and 120°. In 1+ cations, such as , a chalcogen forms three molecular orbitals arranged in a trigonal pyramidal fashion and one lone pair. Double bonds are also common in chalcogen compounds, for example in chalcogenates (see below).


title: Chalcogen

text: The oxidation number of the most common chalcogen compounds with positive metals is −2. However the tendency for chalcogens to form compounds in the −2 state decreases towards the heavier chalcogens. Other oxidation numbers, such as −1 in pyrite and peroxide, do occur. The highest formal oxidation number is +6. This oxidation number is found in sulfates, selenates, tellurates, polonates, and their corresponding acids, such as sulfuric acid.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen is the most electronegative element except for fluorine, and forms compounds with almost all of the chemical elements, including some of the noble gases. It commonly bonds with many metals and metalloids to form oxides, including iron oxide, titanium oxide, and silicon oxide. Oxygen's most common oxidation state is −2, and the oxidation state −1 is also relatively common. With hydrogen it forms water and hydrogen peroxide. Organic oxygen compounds are ubiquitous in organic chemistry.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur's oxidation states are −2, +2, +4, and +6. Sulfur-containing analogs of oxygen compounds often have the prefix "thio-". Sulfur's chemistry is similar to oxygen's, in many ways. One difference is that sulfur-sulfur double bonds are far weaker than oxygen-oxygen double bonds, but sulfur-sulfur single bonds are stronger than oxygen-oxygen single bonds. Organic sulfur compounds such as thiols have a strong specific smell, and a few are utilized by some organisms.


title: Chalcogen

text: Selenium's oxidation states are −2, +4, and +6. Selenium, like most chalcogens, bonds with oxygen. There are some organic selenium compounds, such as selenoproteins. Tellurium's oxidation states are −2, +2, +4, and +6. Tellurium forms the oxides tellurium monoxide, tellurium dioxide, and tellurium trioxide. Polonium's oxidation states are +2 and +4.


title: Chalcogen

text: There are many acids containing chalcogens, including sulfuric acid, sulfurous acid, selenic acid, and telluric acid. All hydrogen chalcogenides are toxic except for water. Oxygen ions often come in the forms of oxide ions (), peroxide ions (), and hydroxide ions (). Sulfur ions generally come in the form of sulfides (), sulfites (), sulfates (), and thiosulfates (). Selenium ions usually come in the form of selenides () and selenates (). Tellurium ions often come in the form of tellurates (). Molecules containing metal bonded to chalcogens are common as minerals. For example, pyrite (FeS) is an iron ore, and the rare mineral calaverite is the ditelluride .


title: Chalcogen

text: Although all group 16 elements of the periodic table, including oxygen, can be defined as chalcogens, oxygen and oxides are usually distinguished from chalcogens and chalcogenides. The term "chalcogenide" is more commonly reserved for sulfides, selenides, and tellurides, rather than for oxides.


title: Chalcogen

text: Except for polonium, the chalcogens are all fairly similar to each other chemically. They all form X ions when reacting with electropositive metals.


title: Chalcogen

text: Chalcogens also form compounds with halogens known as chalcohalides, or chalcogen halides. The majority of simple chalcogen halides are well-known and widely used as chemical reagents. However, more complicated chalcogen halides, such as sulfenyl, sulfonyl, and sulfuryl halides, are less well known to science. Out of the compounds consisting purely of chalcogens and halogens, there are a total of 13 chalcogen fluorides, nine chalcogen chlorides, eight chalcogen bromides, and six chalcogen iodides that are known. The heavier chalcogen halides often have significant molecular interactions. Sulfur fluorides with low valences are fairly unstable and little is known about their properties. However, sulfur fluorides with high valences, such as sulfur hexafluoride, are stable and well-known. Sulfur tetrafluoride is also a well-known sulfur fluoride. Certain selenium fluorides, such as selenium difluoride, have been produced in small amounts. The crystal structures of both selenium tetrafluoride and tellurium tetrafluoride are known. Chalcogen chlorides and bromides have also been explored. In particular, selenium dichloride and sulfur dichloride can react to form organic selenium compounds. Dichalcogen dihalides, such as SeCl also are known to exist. There are also mixed chalcogen-halogen compounds. These include SeSX, with X being chlorine or bromine. Such compounds can form in mixtures of sulfur dichloride and selenium halides. These compounds have been fairly recently structurally characterized, as of 2008. In general, diselenium and disulfur chlorides and bromides are useful chemical reagents. Chalcogen halides with attached metal atoms are soluble in organic solutions. One example of such a compound is . Unlike selenium chlorides and bromides, selenium iodides have not been isolated, as of 2008, although it is likely that they occur in solution. Diselenium diiodide, however, does occur in equilibrium with selenium atoms and iodine molecules. Some tellurium halides with low valences, such as and , form polymers when in the solid state. These tellurium halides can be synthesized by the reduction of pure tellurium with superhydride and reacting the resulting product with tellurium tetrahalides. Ditellurium dihalides tend to get less stable as the halides become lower in atomic number and atomic mass. Tellurium also forms iodides with even fewer iodine atoms than diiodies. These include TeI and TeI. These compounds have extended structures in the solid state. Halogens and chalcogens can also form halochalcogenate anions.


title: Chalcogen

text: Alcohols, phenols and other similar compounds contain oxygen. However, in thiols, selenols and tellurols; sulfur, selenium, and tellurium replace oxygen. Thiols are better known than selenols or tellurols. Thiols are the most stable chalcogenols and tellurols are the least stable, being unstable in heat or light. Other organic chalcogen compounds include thioethers, selenoethers and telluroethers. Some of these, such as dimethyl sulfide, diethyl sulfide, and dipropyl sulfide are commercially available. Selenoethers are in the form of RSe or RSeR. Telluroethers such as dimethyl telluride are typically prepared in the same way as thioethers and selenoethers. Organic chalcogen compounds, especially organic sulfur compounds, have the tendency to smell unpleasant. Dimethyl telluride also smells unpleasant, and selenophenol is renowned for its "metaphysical stench". There are also thioketones, selenoketones, and telluroketones. Out of these, thioketones are the most well-studied with 80% of chalcogenoketones papers being about them. Selenoketones make up 16% of such papers and telluroketones make up 4% of them. Thioketones have well-studied non-linear electric and photophysic properties. Selenoketones are less stable than thioketones and telluroketones are less stable than selenoketones. Telluroketones have the highest level of polarity of chalcogenoketones.


title: Chalcogen

text: There is a very large number of metal chalcogenides. There are also ternary compounds containing alkali metals and transition metals. Highly metal-rich metal chalcogenides, such as LuTe and LuTe have domains of the metal's crystal lattice containing chalcogen atoms. While these compounds do exist, analogous chemicals that contain lanthanum, praseodymium, gadolinium, holmium, terbium, or ytterbium have not been discovered, as of 2008. The boron group metals aluminum, gallium, and indium also form bonds to chalcogens. The Ti ion forms chalcogenide dimers such as TiTlSe. Metal chalcogenide dimers also occur as lower tellurides, such as ZrTe.


title: Chalcogen

text: Elemental chalcogens react with certain lanthanide compounds to form lanthanide clusters rich in chalcogens. Uranium(IV) chalcogenol compounds also exist. There are also transition metal chalcogenols which have potential to serve as catalysts and stabilize nanoparticles.


title: Chalcogen

text: Compounds with chalcogen-phosphorus bonds have been explored for more than 200 years. These compounds include unsophisticated phosphorus chalcogenides as well as large molecules with biological roles and phosphorus-chalcogen compounds with metal clusters. These compounds have numerous applications, including organo-phosphate insecticides, strike-anywhere matches and quantum dots. A total of 130,000 compounds with at least one phosphorus-sulfur bond, 6000 compounds with at least one phosphorus-selenium bond, and 350 compounds with at least one phosphorus-tellurium bond have been discovered. The decrease in the number of chalcogen-phosphorus compounds further down the periodic table is due to diminishing bond strength. Such compounds tend to have at least one phosphorus atom in the center, surrounded by four chalcogens and side chains. However, some phosphorus-chalcogen compounds also contain hydrogen (such as secondary phosphine chalcogenides) or nitrogen (such as dichalcogenoimidodiphosphates). Phosphorus selenides are typically harder to handle that phosphorus sulfides, and compounds in the form PTe have not been discovered. Chalcogens also bond with other pnictogens, such as arsenic, antimony, and bismuth. Heavier chalcogen pnictides tend to form ribbon-like polymers instead of individual molecules. Chemical formulas of these compounds include BiS and SbSe. Ternary chalcogen pnictides are also known. Examples of these include POSe and PSbS. salts containing chalcogens and pnictogens also exist. Almost all chalcogen pnictide salts are typically in the form of [PnE], where Pn is a pnictogen and E is a chalcogen. Tertiary phosphines can react with chalcogens to form compounds in the form of RPE, where E is a chalcogen. When E is sulfur, these compounds are relatively stable, but they are less so when E is selenium or tellurium. Similarly, secondary phosphines can react with chalcogens to form secondary phosphine chalcogenides. However, these compounds are in a state of equilibrium with chalcogenophosphinous acid. Secondary phosphine chalcogenides are weak acids. Binary compounds consisting of antimony or arsenic and a chalcogen. These compounds tend to be colorful and can be created by a reaction of the constituent elements at temperatures of .


title: Chalcogen

text: Chalcogens form single bonds and double bonds with other carbon group elements than carbon, such as silicon, germanium, and tin. Such compounds typically form from a reaction of carbon group halides and chalcogenol salts or chalcogenol bases. Cyclic compounds with chalcogens, carbon group elements, and boron atoms exist, and occur from the reaction of boron dichalcogenates and carbon group metal halides. Compounds in the form of M-E, where M is silicon, germanium, or tin, and E is sulfur, selenium or tellurium have been discovered. These form when carbon group hydrides react or when heavier versions of carbenes react. Sulfur and tellurium can bond with organic compounds containing both silicon and phosphorus.


title: Chalcogen

text: All of the chalcogens form hydrides. In some cases this occurs with chalcogens bonding with two hydrogen atoms. However tellurium hydride and polonium hydride are both volatile and highly labile. Also, oxygen can bond to hydrogen in a 1:1 ratio as in hydrogen peroxide, but this compound is unstable.


title: Chalcogen

text: Chalcogen compounds form a number of interchalcogens. For instance, sulfur forms the toxic sulfur dioxide and sulfur trioxide. Tellurium also forms oxides. There are some chalcogen sulfides as well. These include selenium sulfide, an ingredient in some shampoos.


title: Chalcogen

text: Since 1990, a number of borides with chalcogens bonded to them have been detected. The chalcogens in these compounds are mostly sulfur, although some do contain selenium instead. One such chalcogen boride consists of two molecules of dimethyl sulfide attached to a boron-hydrogen molecule. Other important boron-chalcogen compounds include macropolyhedral systems. Such compounds tend to feature sulfur as the chalcogen. There are also chalcogen borides with two, three, or four chalcogens. Many of these contain sulfur but some, such as NaBSe contain selenium instead.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur has been known since ancient times and is mentioned in the Bible fifteen times. It was known to the ancient Greeks and commonly mined by the ancient Romans. It was also historically used as a component of Greek fire. In the Middle Ages, it was a key part of alchemical experiments. In the 1700s and 1800s, scientists Joseph Louis Gay-Lussac and Louis-Jacques Thénard proved sulfur to be a chemical element.


title: Chalcogen

text: Early attempts to separate oxygen from air were hampered by the fact that air was thought of as a single element up to the 17th and 18th centuries. Robert Hooke, Mikhail Lomonosov, Ole Borch, and Pierre Bayden all successfully created oxygen, but did not realize it at the time. Oxygen was discovered by Joseph Priestley in 1774 when he focused sunlight on a sample of mercuric oxide and collected the resulting gas. Carl Wilhelm Scheele had also created oxygen in 1771 by the same method, but Scheele did not publish his results until 1777.


title: Chalcogen

text: Tellurium was first discovered in 1783 by Franz Joseph Müller von Reichenstein. He discovered tellurium in a sample of what is now known as calaverite. Müller assumed at first that the sample was pure antimony, but tests he ran on the sample did not agree with this. Muller then guessed that the sample was bismuth sulfide, but tests confirmed that the sample was not that. For some years, Muller pondered the problem. Eventually he realized that the sample was gold bonded with an unknown element. In 1796, Müller sent part of the sample to the German chemist Martin Klaproth, who purified the undiscovered element. Klaproth decided to call the element tellurium after the Latin word for earth.


title: Chalcogen

text: Selenium was discovered in 1817 by Jöns Jacob Berzelius. Berzelius noticed a reddish-brown sediment at a sulfuric acid manufacturing plant. The sample was thought to contain arsenic. Berzelius initially thought that the sediment contained tellurium, but came to realize that it also contained a new element, which he named selenium after the Greek moon goddess Selene.


title: Chalcogen

text: Three of the chalcogens (sulfur, selenium, and tellurium) were part of the discovery of periodicity, as they are among a series of triads of elements in the same group that were noted by Johann Wolfgang Döbereiner as having similar properties. Around 1865 John Newlands produced a series of papers where he listed the elements in order of increasing atomic weight and similar physical and chemical properties that recurred at intervals of eight; he likened such periodicity to the octaves of music. His version included a "group b" consisting of oxygen, sulfur, selenium, tellurium, and osmium.


title: Chalcogen

text: After 1869, Dmitri Mendeleev proposed his periodic table placing oxygen at the top of "group VI" above sulfur, selenium, and tellurium. Chromium, molybdenum, tungsten, and uranium were sometimes included in this group, but they would be later rearranged as part of group VIB; uranium would later be moved to the actinide series. Oxygen, along with sulfur, selenium, tellurium, and later polonium would be grouped in "group VIA", until the group's name was changed to "group 16" in 1988.


title: Chalcogen

text: In the late 19th century, Marie Curie and Pierre Curie discovered that a sample of pitchblende was emitting four times as much radioactivity as could be explained by the presence of uranium alone. The Curies gathered several tons of pitchblende and refined it for several months until they had a pure sample of polonium. The discovery officially took place in 1898. Prior to the invention of particle accelerators, the only way to create polonium was to extract it over several months from uranium ore.


title: Chalcogen

text: The first attempt at creating livermorium was from 1976 to 1977 at the LBNL, who bombarded curium-248 with calcium-48, but were not successful. After several failed attempts in 1977, 1998, and 1999 by research groups in Russia, Germany, and the US, livermorium was created successfully in 2000 at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research by bombarding curium-248 atoms with calcium-48 atoms. The element was known as ununhexium until it was officially named livermorium in 2012.


title: Chalcogen

text: In the 19th century, Jons Jacob Berzelius suggested calling the elements in group 16 "amphigens", as the elements in the group formed amphid salts (salts of oxyacids. Formerly regarded as composed of two oxides, an acid and a basic oxide) The term received some use in the early 1800s but is now obsolete. The name "chalcogen" comes from the Greek words "χαλκος" (, literally "copper"), and "γενές" (, born, gender, kindle). It was first used in 1932 by Wilhelm Biltz's group at Leibniz University Hannover, where it was proposed by Werner Fischer. The word "chalcogen" gained popularity in Germany during the 1930s because the term was analogous to "halogen". Although the literal meanings of the modern Greek words imply that "chalcogen" means "copper-former", this is misleading because the chalcogens have nothing to do with copper in particular. "Ore-former" has been suggested as a better translation, as the vast majority of metal ores are chalcogenides and the word "χαλκος" in ancient Greek was associated with metals and metal-bearing rock in general; copper, and its alloy bronze, was one of the first metals to be used by humans.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen's name comes from the Greek words "oxy genes", meaning "acid-forming". Sulfur's name comes from either the Latin word "sulfurium" or the Sanskrit word "sulvere"; both of those terms are ancient words for sulfur. Selenium is named after the Greek goddess of the moon, Selene, to match the previously-discovered element tellurium, whose name comes from the Latin word "telus", meaning earth. Polonium is named after Marie Curie's country of birth, Poland. Livermorium is named for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.


title: Chalcogen

text: The four lightest chalcogens (oxygen, sulfur, selenium, and tellurium) are all primordial elements on Earth. Sulfur and oxygen occur as constituent copper ores and selenium and tellurium occur in small traces in such ores. Polonium forms naturally from the decay of other elements, even though it is not primordial. Livermorium does not occur naturally at all.


title: Chalcogen

text: Oxygen makes up 21% of the atmosphere by weight, 89% of water by weight, 46% of the earth's crust by weight, and 65% of the human body. Oxygen also occurs in many minerals, being found in all oxide minerals and hydroxide minerals, and in numerous other mineral groups. Stars of at least eight times the mass of the sun also produce oxygen in their cores via nuclear fusion. Oxygen is the third-most abundant element in the universe, making up 1% of the universe by weight.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur makes up 0.035% of the earth's crust by weight, making it the 17th most abundant element there and makes up 0.25% of the human body. It is a major component of soil. Sulfur makes up 870 parts per million of seawater and about 1 part per billion of the atmosphere. Sulfur can be found in elemental form or in the form of sulfide minerals, sulfate minerals, or sulfosalt minerals. Stars of at least 12 times the mass of the sun produce sulfur in their cores via nuclear fusion. Sulfur is the tenth most abundant element in the universe, making up 500 parts per million of the universe by weight.


title: Chalcogen

text: Selenium makes up 0.05 parts per million of the earth's crust by weight. This makes it the 67th most abundant element in the earth's crust. Selenium makes up on average 5 parts per million of the soils. Seawater contains around 200 parts per trillion of selenium. The atmosphere contains 1 nanogram of selenium per cubic meter. There are mineral groups known as selenates and selenites, but there are not many minerals in these groups. Selenium is not produced directly by nuclear fusion. Selenium makes up 30 parts per billion of the universe by weight.


title: Chalcogen

text: There are only 5 parts per billion of tellurium in the earth's crust and 15 parts per billion of tellurium in seawater. Tellurium is one of the eight or nine least abundant elements in the earth's crust. There are a few dozen tellurate minerals and telluride minerals, and tellurium occurs in some minerals with gold, such as sylvanite and calaverite. Tellurium makes up 9 parts per billion of the universe by weight.


title: Chalcogen

text: Polonium only occurs in trace amounts on earth, via radioactive decay of uranium and thorium. It is present in uranium ores in concentrations of 100 micrograms per metric ton. Very minute amounts of polonium exist in the soil and thus in most food, and thus in the human body. The earth's crust contains less than 1 part per billion of polonium, making it one of the ten rarest metals on earth.


title: Chalcogen

text: Livermorium is always produced artificially in particle accelerators. Even when it is produced, only a small number of atoms are synthesized at a time.


title: Chalcogen

text: Chalcophile elements are those that remain on or close to the surface because they combine readily with chalcogens other than oxygen, forming compounds which do not sink into the core. Chalcophile ("chalcogen-loving") elements in this context are those metals and heavier nonmetals that have a low affinity for oxygen and prefer to bond with the heavier chalcogen sulfur as sulfides. Because sulfide minerals are much denser than the silicate minerals formed by lithophile elements, chalcophile elements separated below the lithophiles at the time of the first crystallisation of the Earth's crust. This has led to their depletion in the Earth's crust relative to their solar abundances, though this depletion has not reached the levels found with siderophile elements.


title: Chalcogen

text: Approximately 100 million metric tons of oxygen are produced yearly. Oxygen is most commonly produced by fractional distillation, in which air is cooled to a liquid, then warmed, allowing all the components of air except for oxygen to turn to gases and escape. Fractionally distilling air several times can produce 99.5% pure oxygen. Another method with which oxygen is produced is to send a stream of dry, clean air through a bed of molecular sieves made of zeolite, which absorbs the nitrogen in the air, leaving 90 to 93% pure oxygen.


title: Chalcogen

text: Sulfur can be mined in its elemental form, although this method is no longer as popular as it used to be. In 1865 a large deposit of elemental sulfur was discovered in the U.S. states of Louisiana and Texas, but it was difficult to extract at the time. In the 1890s, Herman Frasch came up with the solution of liquefying the sulfur with superheated steam and pumping the sulfur up to the surface. These days sulfur is instead more often extracted from oil, natural gas, and tar.


title: Chalcogen

text: The world production of selenium is around 1500 metric tons per year, out of which roughly 10% is recycled. Japan is the largest producer, producing 800 metric tons of selenium per year. Other large producers include Belgium (300 metric tons per year), the United States (over 200 metric tons per year), Sweden (130 metric tons per year), and Russia (100 metric tons per year). Selenium can be extracted from the waste from the process of electrolytically refining copper. Another method of producing selenium is to farm selenium-gathering plants such as milk vetch. This method could produce three kilograms of selenium per acre, but is not commonly practiced.


title: Chalcogen

text: Tellurium is mostly produced as a by-product of the processing of copper. Tellurium can also be refined by electrolytic reduction of sodium telluride. The world production of tellurium is between 150 and 200 metric tons per year. The United States is one of the largest producers of tellurium, producing around 50 metric tons per year. Peru, Japan, and Canada are also large producers of tellurium.


title: Chalcogen

text: Until the creation of nuclear reactors, all polonium had to be extracted from uranium ore. In modern times, most isotopes of polonium are produced by bombarding bismuth with neutrons. Polonium can also be produced by high neutron fluxes in nuclear reactors. Approximately 100 grams of polonium are produced yearly. All the polonium produced for commercial purposes is made in the Ozersk nuclear reactor in Russia. From there, it is taken to Samara, Russia for purification, and from there to St. Petersburg for distribution. The United States is the largest consumer of polonium.


title: Chalcogen

text: All livermorium is produced artificially in particle accelerators. The first successful production of livermorium was achieved by bombarding curium-248 atoms with calcium-48 atoms. As of 2011, roughly 25 atoms of livermorium had been synthesized.


title: Chalcogen

text: Metabolism is the most important source and use of oxygen. Minor industrial uses include Steelmaking (55% of all purified oxygen produced), the chemical industry (25% of all purified oxygen), medical use, water treatment (as oxygen kills some types of bacteria), rocket fuel (in liquid form), and metal cutting.


title: Chalcogen

text: Most sulfur produced is transformed into sulfur dioxide, which is further transformed into sulfuric acid, a very common industrial chemical. Other common uses include being a key ingredient of gunpowder and Greek fire, and being used to change soil pH. Sulfur is also mixed into rubber to vulcanize it. Sulfur is used in some types of concrete and fireworks. 60% of all sulfuric acid produced is used to generate phosphoric acid. Sulfur is used as a pesticide (specifically as an acaricide and fungicide) on "orchard, ornamental, vegetable, grain, and other crops."