cyanic-selkie/wikianc huggingface dataset:
SponsorBlock
SponsorBlock is a free and open-source browser extension that skips segments of YouTube videos. Users make them, which other users can vote on. It is recommended on Firefox's add-on store. , it has over 175,000 downloads on Firefox and over 600,000 downloads on Google Chrome.
History
Only sponsorships could be skipped until more categories (such as self-promotion or intermissions) were added in June 2020. An update in January 2022 added support for marking whole videos as sponsorships.
Usage
Users submit segments of videos and choose a category for them. Those segments are automatically skipped. When a segment is skipped, a small pop-up appears for a few seconds to allow the user to vote on it or "unskip" it. The number of segments each user has submitted and skipped is tracked.
Reception
The extension was on Mozilla's Extension Spotlight on July 21, 2020, and is the highest rated recommended Firefox extension.
Manga Kenchogokuryu
Manga Kenchuugokuryu (Anti Chinese wave) is a manga written by Sharin Yamano, Japanese comic artist. Kenchuugokuryu, means "Anti-China" or "Anti-Chinese wave". As the title says, China is the target of criticism. Kenchogokuryu was published by Shinyusha. ISBN 9784883808038.
La Bouilladisse
La Bouilladisse is a commune of 4,904 people (1999). It is found in the region Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur in the Bouches-du-Rhône department in the south of France.
Buzz Aldrin
Dr. Edwin Eugene "Buzz" Aldrin, Jr., retired Colonel (born January 20, 1930) is an American pilot and astronaut. He was one of the Apollo 11 astronauts and the second person to have ever walked on the moon.
Early life
Aldrin was born in Glen Ridge, New Jersey. He earned a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from the military academy West Point in 1951. After postgraduate studies, he received a ScD in Aeronautics and Astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1963.From his earlier activity as a fighter pilot in the Korean War he won several medals, including the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal.
Apollo 11 mission
Aldrin was the second person in history to set foot on the Moon (after Neil Armstrong, during the Apollo 11 mission).
The Lunar Lander Module landed on the Moon on July 20, 1969.
He was 39 when he set foot on the moon.
He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the NASA Exceptional Service Medal. After the death of Michael Collins in 2021, Aldrin became the last surviving member of the Apollo 11 crew.
Later life
Aldrin left NASA in March 1972. He has been married four times: to Joan Archer, to Beverly Zile, and to Lois Driggs Cannon and to Anca V Faur. He had three children with Joan, named James, Janice and Andrew. He married Cannon on Valentine's Day, 1988. He is the oldest contestant on the television series Dancing with the Stars. He competed in 2010.
Saw
A saw is a tool used to cut things.
Hand saws
Or hand powered saws. These use the motion of a person's arm to make a cut.
Push saws
Many saws are designed to cut on the push stroke (when the saw is pushed forward).
Pull saws
The Japanese saw (鋸) is a type of saw used in woodworking. These saws typically cut on the pull stroke (when the saw is pulled backwards).
Power saws
There are several kinds of mechanically powered saws. Some are powered by electricity from a wall socket. Others are powered by batteries. Still others can be powered by Internal combustion engines, steam, or water power.
Chain saw
A saw designed to cut down trees or cut branches from trees is a chainsaw. A chainsaw is named for the row of teeth attached to a flexible chain. The cut is often very rough and often has splinters.
Circular saws
Circular saws use a round blade, usually between 7 and 10 inches. They are often very powerful and can cut through hard or soft wood. They use interchangeable round blades. The blade can be designed to cut any of a number of kinds of materials from steel, to wood, to masonry.
Jig saws
Jig saws move the blade up and down to cut through materials. The stroke (or up and down movement) is usually less than one inch (25.4 mm). These saws are very good for making curved cuts. Jig saws use a variety of interchangeable blades for cutting different materials. Some blades make very smooth cuts.
Australian Defence Force
The Australian Defence Force (ADF) is the military organisation responsible for the defence of Australia. It is made up of the Royal Australian Navy, the Australian Army, the Royal Australian Air Force and a number of joint groups.
At first the Australian Government set up three separate armed services. In 1976, the government decided to have a single military headquarters. Over time, the three services have combined headquarters, logistics and training camps.
The ADF is small, but uses a lot of technology. With 53,000 full-time active-duty service people and 20,000 part-time reserve forces, it is the largest military force in Oceania. It is much smaller than most Asian military forces. The ADF does not have enough people in some highly skilled areas, but it is still able to send forces in many regions outside Australia.
Polonium
Polonium is a rare radioactive metalloid. It is chemical element 84 on the periodic table and its symbol is Po. It was discovered in 1898 by Marie and Pierre Curie.
Polonium is highly unstable, radioactive and toxic. This makes it difficult to handle. It can be dangerous, even in very small amounts. One gram of Po will self-heat to a temperature of about 500 °C. It also vaporizes easily.
Polonium has 33 isotopes, and all of them are radioactive. It is a very rare element in nature because of its short half-life. It is a breakdown product of uranium, so it is found in uranium ores.
Polonium is also very important because it the main element of nuclear bombs.
Pope Clement VI
Pope Clement VI (Clemens VI; 1291 – 6 December 1352), born Pierre Roger, was Pope of the Catholic Church from 7 May 1342 to his death in 1352. He was the fourth Avignon pope.
Clement reigned during the Black Death (1348–1350), during which he said all who died of the plague would not go to hell.
Noble gas
The noble gases are a group of elements that are all gases. These elements are all in group 18 of the periodic table. All of them are monoatomic, meaning each molecule is a single atom. They almost never react with other elements. This is because they have a full 8 electrons outer electron shell. There are six noble gases:
All of these gases are found in air. They make up around 0.96% of the atmosphere. Noble gas compounds can be formed from noble gases.
When the noble gases are used in cold cathode tubes to produce light, each of them has a different colour. Since Radon is radioactive, it is usually not used for lighting. Here are pictures of what the others look like:
Oganesson (element 118) is probably the next noble gas after Radon because it is the next box down in the same group. However it has a half life of 0.89 ms, after which it decays to Livermorium (Element 116). This means its use is probably limited.
Noble gases were discovered by Lord Rayleigh and Sir William Ramsay. Rayleigh won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1904 for his work on noble gas. Ramsay won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1904 for his work with noble gas.
Shinshi
Shinshi (神使) or "divine messengers," are animals in Japanese mythology that are believed to be associated with a kami, a divine being. These animals are also known as kami no tsukai or tsukawashime. In ancient texts such as Kojiki and Nihongi, there are tales of special animals that acted on behalf of the kami to transmit the divine will or to bear oracles.
As time passed, people started to connect certain animals with specific shrines. It became a custom to take care of these animals when they were found within the area of the shrine. Normally, each kami had only one animal familiar, but sometimes, there were some exceptions where a kami had more than one. Even some of the "Seven Lucky Gods" like Daikokuten (a mouse) and Benzaiten (a snake) had animal familiars.
In later years, the kami's animal familiar became a common symbol of the kami itself. For instance, the fox at Inari shrines was worshipped as a manifestation of the kami. These creatures were thought to be extraordinary spiritual beings, and this perception, combined with their relationship with the specific kami, likely gave rise to this phenomenon.
It is believed to have originated from shamanism, where animals aided shamans in traveling to the spirit world. Certain animals are associated with particular spirits, such as foxes with Inari and deer with Kasuga.
In the past, tribal communities considered their shaman's animal helper as an ancestor, and this may have influenced the connection between animals and spirits in Shinto. For example, the Kamo tribe believed that the Yatagarasu was their ancestor.
At Ise Jingu, roosters roam around and are believed to be the assistants of the sun goddess, Amaterasu. They wake her up every morning, according to folklore. Some experts believe that the rooster may be the bird depicted on the torii, a gate that marks the entrance to a shrine.
Inari Okami's fox messengers are often identified directly with her Rice food sake and other offerings are given to them for her
History
The "Chujin Harai-kun," a book written in the 12th century, states that the kami's messenger is second only to the eight great kami and is subordinate to the 100,000 kami. Moreover, "Kitakami Yuki-fu," an essay written in the early 19th century, explains that a ritual called hanasui-iwai is held every year on January 15th. During this ritual, every new household is given a Shinshi.
François Couchepin
François Couchepin (19 January 1935 – 23 February 2023) is a Swiss lawyer and politician. He was a member of the Free Democratic Party of Switzerland (FDP). He was the 13th Chancellor of Switzerland from 1991 to 1999. Couchepin died on 23 February 2023, at the age of 88.
Boulbon
Boulbon is a commune of 1,510 people (1999). It is found in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in the Bouches-du-Rhône department in the south of France.
Dickson City, Pennsylvania
Dickson City is a borough in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, 4 mi north of Scranton. The population was 6,070 at the 2010 census.
Greek Orthodox Church
The Greek Orthodox Church is a Christian denomination. It is the largest one in Greece and among Greek people worldwide. It is Eastern Orthodox in doctrine. The Church of Greece is the Greek Orthodox church. Its head is the Archbishop of Athens. There are other Greek Orthodox churches in other countries.
20th meridian east
The 20th meridian east forms a great circle with the 160th meridian west.
Part of Namibia's borders with Botswana and South Africa are defined by the meridian. The boundary between the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean is defined by the meridian. The meridian defines the eastern limit of the New Swabia area in Queen Maud Land, Antarctica.
Archduchess of Austria
Archduchess of Austria was a title given to daughters of the Holy Roman Emperor or Austro-Hungarian Emperor, it is the Austrian version of princess. The male version was Archduke of Austria. Archduchess was a reformed version of the "Duchy of Austria."
Rudolf IV, Duke of Austria was the first person to call himself Archduke. The Holy Roman Emperor recognized the title in 1453.
Agalychnis spurrelli
The gliding leaf frog, gliding tree frog, Spurrell's tree frog, or pink-sided leaf frog (Agalychnis spurrelli) is a frog that lives in Colombia, Ecuador, Panama, and Costa Rica. Scientists have seen it between 70 and 1199 meters above sea level.
Appearance
Frogs that live in different places are different sizes: Adult male frogs from Costa Rica are 4.8 to 5.6 cm long from nose to rear end and the adult female frog is 6.0 to 7.2 cm long. The frogs that live in Panama are 6.7 to 7.6 cm long and 8.2 and 8.7 cm long. It has webbing on its feet and disks on its toes for climbing.
This frog is different colors during the day and at night: much of its back is light green during the day and dark green at night. This frog often has white spots with black outlines on its back. Some frogs have green stripes and yellow throats.
This frog hides during the day and looks for food at night. This frog climbs up vines by going hand over hand. It can jump and glide from tree to tree by spreading its webbed front and back feet.
Eggs and tadpoles
The female frog leaves 14-67 eggs at a time. She lays them on the upper side of a leaf hanging over a body of water that is not there all year. Sometimes a male frog will scrape them off the leaf. The eggs take six days to hatch. The tadpoles fall into the water and stay near the surface with their mouths facing up.
Predators
Dragonfly nymphs, beetles, and aphids, cicadas, and leafhoppers that live in the water eat the frog's eggs. Green kingfishers eat the tadpoles. Snakes that can climb trees eat the adult frogs.
Threats
The number of frogs living in the wild is going down but it is not endangered now. Scientists think its population is becoming smaller because of habitat loss and humans building farms and cutting down trees in the places this frog lives.
Jean-Michel Savéant
Jean-Michel Savéant (September 19, 1933 – August 16, 2020) was a French chemist. His works focused in electrochemistry. He was elected member of the French Academy of Sciences in 2000. He was foreign associate of the National Academy of Sciences in 2001.
Ambiga Sreenevasan
Ambiga Sreenevasan (born 1956) is a lawyer and human rights advocate from Malaysia. In 2009, she received the International Women of Courage Award.
Life
Sreenevasan went to high school at Convent Bukit Nanasin Kuala Lumpur. in 1979, she got a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) from the University of Exeter in England. She became a lawyer in 1980. She worked in two London law firms, then she became a member of the Malaysian Bar in 1982. In July 2011, she received an Honorary Doctorate in Law (LLD) from the University of Exeter in England.
Work
Sreenevasan was the president of the Malaysian Bar Council from 2007 to 2009. She was also the head of Bersih, an NGO for free and fair elections.
Because Sreenevasan wanted to help with problems between ethnic groups, she received hate mail and death threats. Hundreds of people from religious groups and conservative members of government protested against Sreenevasan at the Bar Council building and called for her arrest.
In 2008, as President of the Malaysian Bar she helped start LAWASIA, the International Bar Association's Human Rights Institute and Transparency International-Malaysia, to study abuses of power.
Bersih demonstration
Sreenevasan was head of Bersih 2.0, the organisation behind the July 2011 demonstration in Kuala Lumpur. There were 20,000 people at the demonstration. Sreenevasan said the main problems for Malaysia were "unhappiness... in the Sarawak [election], unhappiness about corruption, [and] unhappiness about the lack of independence of our institutions."
We Can Work It Out
"We Can Work It Out" is a song by English rock band the Beatles. It was released as a double A-side single on 3 December 1965 on the same day as Rubber Soul. This was the first time a single was released with two A-sides in the United Kingdom. The single was number 1 in the United Kingdom. It was the seventh highest selling single of the 1960s in the UK. It was written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
Personnel
According to Walter Everett, the line-up of musicians on the Beatles' recording was as follows:
MacDonald said that some sources say the tambourine part was played by Harrison, but he thought thay Starr had probably played it. Everett said Harrison played it, as it was recorded at the same time as the other instruments. Guesdon and Margotin also said Harrison played it.
A Midsummer Nights Dream (1959 movie)
A Midsummer Night's Dream is a 1959 Czechoslovak animated puppet movie directed by Jiří Trnka. It is based on the Shakespeare play of the same name. It was entered into the 1959 Cannes Film Festival. An English language version was made with narration by Richard Burton. The movie won several awards including the Prize of the Technical Committee in Cannes and an Honourable Medal at the Venice Film Festival.
Parking lot
A parking lot (or car park) is an area where cars and other vehicles are parked and left temporarily. Parking lots are usually flat. The surface is usually made of asphalt, concrete, or gravel. Some lots may be bare earth. The paving material in a parking lot can heat quickly in the sun. A parked car can get hot, too. Children, older people, and animals such as dogs and cats should not be left in a parked car. They can die in a hot car.
Lines are put on paved lots to create the outlines of parking spaces. People leave their cars in these spaces while they go shopping, go to work, or do errands. Some spaces are set aside for disabled drivers or disabled passengers. These spaces are clearly marked. A disabled driver needs a special badge or insignia issued by the government to use these spaces. Disabled spaces are usually close to the front of a lot. Drivers who are not disabled can be fined or their cars towed if they use these spaces.
Parking lots are usually near businesses, hospitals, government buildings, schools, hotels, zoos, etc. If many people go to these places, then the parking lots will be large. If not too many people go to these places, then the parking lots will be small. Small lots are usually unsupervised. Large lots are usually supervised by an attendant stationed in a small booth at the lot's entrance. He may issue a pass to a vehicle's driver that is stamped with the vehicle's arrival time. He will collect a fee from the driver when the vehicle leaves the lot. Some hotels provide free parking and those parking lots are big enough with lot of entrance.
At a rural event such as a county fair, concert, auction, barn sale, corn maze, or pick-your-own strawberry patch, a parking lot may be nothing more than a large area of bare earth or a meadow that has been mowed for parking. Ropes or bales of hay may be used to mark the area for parking. An attendant may or may not be present. If present, he or she will advise a driver where to park in the lot and may or may not collect a fee.
Parking lots can be dangerous, especially at night. Some lots are poorly supervised and dimly lit. Persons intent on mischief such as tire-slashers or criminal activity such as prostitutes, burglars, thieves, rapists, and drug dealers can operate without being easily seen. Anything valuable such as money, weapons, packages, children, or animals should never be left alone in a parked car. These will tempt thieves and child or animal snatchers. Broken glass, rusty nails, potholes, and rats can be parking lot hazards to people and their vehicles.
Automated Parking System
The automated parking system works with a combination of conveyance devices, software technology, and a mobile app for the best user experience. The system consists of an array of electro-mechanical infrastructure and computer-controlled robots. The conveying devices are capable of vertical and horizontal movement and used to store/retrieve vehicles to/from available multi-depth parking positions without human intervention. The very first automated parking garage was built in 1905: Garage Rue de Ponthieu in Paris, France.
Claus von Stauffenberg
Claus Philipp Maria Justinian Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (15 November 1907 – 21 July 1944) was a German army officer and Catholic aristocrat.
Stauffenberg was a leader of the failed 20 July plot of 1944 that aimed to kill the German dictator, Adolf Hitler, and to remove the Nazi Party from power in Germany. With Henning von Tresckow and Hans Oster, Stauffenberg was one of the central figures of the German resistance within the Wehrmacht.
For his involvement in the plot to kill Hitler, Stauffenberg was executed, as were many other German resistance members.
Billie Piper
Billie Paul Piper (born  Leian Paul Piper, 22 September 1982, in Swindon, Wiltshire) is an English singer and actress.
She began her career in the late 1990s as a pop singer. Later on, she moved to acting. Her most famous role is as Rose Tyler, a companion to the Doctor in the television series Doctor Who. She played this role from 2005 to 2006, and also reprised it in 2008 and 2010.
Music
Piper's first chance in the entertainment world came when she was a teenager, when she was selected to appear on the Saturday morning kids' television show Scratchy and Co. Piper later got a role in a television commercial promoting the pop magazine Smash Hits. In 1996 she sang on a backing song Nobody's Business. It was a dance track by h20. Soon after she was offered a record deal at the age of fifteen, and in 1998 became the youngest artist ever to start at number one in the UK Singles Chart with "Because We Want To", released under the artist name "Billie". Her follow-up single "Girlfriend" also started at number one and her first album, Honey to the B (released immediately afterwards) started at Number 14 in the UK album charts. She released two further singles off the album, "She Wants You" and "Honey to the B"; both songs started at Number 3.
Piper then took a year to record her second album. She decided to release more records under her full name, Billie Piper. She returned to the Singles Chart in May 2000 with a new, sexier sound. She hit the Number 1 spot with "Day & Night", but her success was not to carry on. She waited until the following September to release "Something Deep Inside". That reached Number 4 in the UK Singles Chart. In October 2000, Piper released her second album, Walk of Life, which reached Number 14 in the UK Album Chart. The song "Walk of Life", the last single off this album, was released in December 2000 and reached Number 25 in the UK Singles Chart.
In 1999, Piper was nominated for two BRIT Awards and was named Best Female Star at the Smash Hits Poll Winners' party, although at the latter ceremony she began crying after being nastily booed by jealous fans of Ritchie Neville, member of boyband Five, whom she was dating at the time.
On 15 January 2007, BBC Radio 1 DJ Chris Moyles started a campaign to get "Honey to the B" back into the Top 100 on download sales as a way of testing out new chart rules that favour download sales. The campaign was highly successful, with "Honey to the Bee"re-entering the official UK singles chart at No. 17, eight years after it was first released.
Piper prefers lip singing during performances. She backs this up with the reason that she is afraid she would not be able to sing live. However, in 1999 she decided to try actually singing during her tour in America. The audience loved it, but Piper said it made her too nervous to do it in Britain, where she had many more fans.
Television
After an extended break, Piper decided to end her pop career in 2003 and return to her first ambition, acting. She took acting lessons while living in London. Piper gained very good reviews for these appearances and critics said that she was a far better actress than she was a singer.
In 2004, Piper appeared in the movies The Calcium Kid, as the romantic interest of Orlando Bloom's character, and Things to do Before You're Thirty. Shortly before starting work on Doctor Who, she was one of the main characters in the horror movie Spirit Trap alongside Russian pop star Alsou, released in the summer of 2005 to bad reviews.
In May 2004, it was announced that Piper was to play the character Rose Tyler, companion to The Doctor, played by Christopher Eccleston, in the long-running BBC television series Doctor Who, beginning in 2005. Piper won the Most Popular Actress category at the 2005 and 2006 National Television Awards for her work on Doctor Who. BBC News named Piper as one of its "Faces of the Year" for 2005, primarily due to her success in Doctor Who. At The South Bank Show Awards on 27 January 2006 Piper was awarded The Times Breakthrough Award for her successful transition from singing to acting. In March 2006, the Television and Radio Industries Club named Piper as best new TV talent at their annual awards ceremony. In September 2006, Piper was named Best Actress at the TV Quick and TV Choice Awards.
After the completion of the very successful first series of the revamped Doctor Who, the British media regularly released conflicting reports about how long Piper would be staying with the programme. In March 2006, she claimed that she would continue on Doctor Who into its third season in 2007. On 10 May 2006, however, she was reported to be considering quitting the series, although she did express an interest in playing a female version of the Doctor in the future (possibly related to a proposed Doctor Who spin-off series about Rose which was later dropped). On 15 June 2006, the BBC announced that she was to depart in the final episode of the second series, "Doomsday". Piper's decision to leave had been taken a year previously, but remained a secret until news of her departure became public.
On 27 November 2007, the BBC confirmed that she would return her role as Rose Tyler in the fourth series for three episodes. Later, it was confirmed by Russell T Davies in Doctor Who Magazine that this return had been planned since she left. It was also revealed in the Turn Left Doctor Who Confidential that Billie had made arrangements to return as Rose since she decided to leave.
The series began in April 2008, and after several cameo appearances, Piper made her official return as Rose in the series four final episodes Turn Left, The Stolen Earth and Journey's End. She has not said whether she will be reprising the role again, although on Doctor Who Confidential she said that she thinks "It's never really the end for the Doctor and Rose" but it probably was "for the foreseeable future".
In November 2005, Piper starred as Hero in a BBC adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing, updated for the modern day like in Canterbury Tales series in which she featured, with Hero now being a weather presenter in a television station.
Piper has provided voiceovers for various television commercials, including one for Comfort Fabric Softener airing in June 2007.
Piper stars in Secret Diary of a Call Girl, an ITV2 version of Belle de Jour's The Intimate Adventures of a London Call Girl, a memoir detailing the life of a high-class prostitute. The series, which aired from 27 September 2007, saw Piper in several semi-nude scenes, including a lesbian romp and one scene featuring her saddling a client and riding him like a horse. A second series, with Piper in the starring role, started filming in May 2008, during which two body doubles were hired in order to effectively hide Piper's pregnancy.
Theatre
Piper made her first stage appearance in a touring production of Christopher Hampton's play Treats, which opened in early 2007 in Windsor. Treats was to have ended its tour in the West End, at the Garrick Theatre, starting on 28 February 2007 with previews from on 20 February. The play-officially finished as of 26 May.
Nominations
(role in Doctor Who & ShakespeaRe-Told: Much Ado About Nothing)
Alina Janowska
Alina Maria Janowska-Zabłocka (16 April 1923 – 13 November 2017) was a Polish actress. She was known for her roles in Zakazane piosenki and in Samson (by Andrzej Wajda). From 1970 to 1974, she starred in the comedy series Czterdziestolatek.
Biography
Janowska was born in 1923 in Warsaw, Poland. She came from a wealthy family. She was arrested on the night of 23 April 1942 for helping a Jewish family. She was imprisoned for 7 months in Pawiak in Warsaw. She was a member of the Warsaw Uprising.
In 1963, she married fencer Wojciech Zabłocki.
Igbo people
The Igbo people (Igbo:  Ṇ́dị́ Ìgbò) are an ethnic group in West Africa. They are one of the largest ethnic groups in West Africa. The Igbo speak the Igbo language (Igbo: Ásụ̀sụ̀ Ị̀gbò). The Igbo people are found in Southeastern Nigeria, in an area referred to as Igboland (Igbo: Àlà Ị̀gbò). There are some Igbos in Cameroon and Equatorial Guinea.
There are major amounts of Igbo people found in other countries that are not in Africa. This is because some Igbos have moved to other countries and because they were forced to go to other countries by the Atlantic slave trade.
They are in countries such as the United States, Jamaica, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Barbados, Bahamas, and the United Kingdom. The most important crop of the Igbo people is the yam. In Nigeria, the Igbo have a lot of cities, like Onitsha and Enugu.
Zeb, Oklahoma
Zeb is a city in Oklahoma in the United States.
Hurricane Allen
Hurricane Allen was an extremely powerful hurricane in 1980. The storm smashed through the Caribbean, Mexico and South Texas in August 1980. Over 200 were killed and damages were $1 billion (1980 USD). The winds of this hurricane reached 190 miles an hour, tying Hurricane Camille for highest wind speeds in any Atlantic Tropical Cyclone. Allen was one of the most powerful Atlantic tropical storms in recorded history. The name Allen was later retired in Spring of 1981 and replaced with Andrew, which in turn was retired because of the destructive 1992 hurricane.
Scott County, Minnesota
Scott County is a county in the U.S. state of Minnesota. As of 2020, 150,928 people lived there. The county seat is Shakopee.
Zena, Oklahoma
Zena is a city in Oklahoma in the United States.
Rotifer
The rotifers are a phylum of tiny animals which are common in freshwater environments, such as ponds and puddles. Some rotifers are free swimming, others move by inching along, and some are fixed. A few species live in colonies.
History and taxonomy
About 2200 species of rotifers have been described. They are placed in the phylum Rotifera. This phylum is subdivided into three classes, Monogononta, Bdelloidea, and Seisonidea. The largest group is the Monogononta, with about 1500 species, followed by the Bdelloidea, with about 350 species. There are only two known species of Seisonidea.
Fossils of the species Habrotrocha angusticollis have been found in 6000 year old Pleistocene peat deposits. The oldest known fossil rotifers have been found in Eocene Dominican amber.
Appearance
The front has a ring of cilia circling the mouth. This gave the rotifers their old name of "wheel animalules". There is a protective lorica round its body, and a foot. Inside the lorica are the usual organs in miniturised form: a brain, an eye-spot, jaws, stomach, kidneys, urinary bladder.
Rotifers have a number of unusual features. Biologists suppose that these peculiarities are adaptations to their small size and the transient (fast changing) nature of its habitats.
Resisting drought
Rotifers are specialists at living in habitats where water dries up regularly.
The Monogononta, which have males, produce fertilised 'resting eggs' which can resist desiccation (drought) for long periods.
The Bdelloids, who have no males, contract into an inert form and lose almost all body water, a process known as cryptobiosis. Bdelloids can also survive the dry state for long periods: the longest well-documented dormancy is nine years. After they have dried, they may be revived by adding water. In this, and several other ways, they are a unique group of animals.
Cell number
Rotifers are hatched with a standard number of cell nuclei, exactly the same number for every rotifer in a species. This is called eutely. No cell division whatsoever takes place during adult life. Not only that, but the number of nuclei in each tissue is constant. Furthermore, most of the nuclei do not have cell walls: rotifer tissue is largely or wholly a syncytium.
Resisting radiation
The absence of cell division is probably one reason they are extraordinarily resistant to ionising radiation. Also, repairing DNA is one of the things they are known to do after desiccation.
Parthenogenesis
In one of the classes, the freshwater Bdelloid rotifers, no males have ever been seen. It is the largest group of wholly parthenogenetic species in the Animalia.
Grain
Grain is the seeds of some special kinds of grass. The main types of commercial grain crops are cereals. People grow different kinds of grain as food. The different kinds of grain are perhaps one of the most important foods in the world.
Rotifer
Parthenogenesis
The females in this group produce eggs by parthenogenesis (virgin birth). In some species these eggs develop into small juveniles before they are released from their parent. The offspring are clones of their mother.
Grain
Some kinds of grain are:
Jeep
Jeep is a brand of American automobiles that is a division of FCA US LLC (formerly Chrysler Group, LLC), a wholly owned subsidiary of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles. The former Chrysler Corporation acquired the Jeep brand, along with the remaining assets of its owner American Motors, in 1987. Jeep's current product range consists solely of sport utility vehicles and off-road vehicles, but has also included pickup trucks in the past.
Grain
87% of all grain grown by farmers around the world is maize. Grains contain carbohydrates that people can eat. In poorer countries, grains are a large part of the food supply. In richer countries, they are still important as food, but not as important as in poorer countries. Growing grain uses a lot of water. About 1,000 tons of water is needed to grow one ton of grain.
Jeep
The original Jeep was the prototype Bantam BRC. Willys MB Jeeps went into production in 1941 specifically for the military. Arguably that makes them the oldest four-wheel drive mass-production vehicles now known as SUVs. The Jeep became the primary light 4-wheel-drive vehicle of the United States Army and the Allies during World War II. It remained so in the postwar period. The term became common worldwide in the wake of the war. Doug Stewart notes:
Grain
Many different foods are made from different types of grain. The part of the grain that people can eat is called the grist, and the part they can not eat is called chaff. The grist is often ground into a powder called flour. Flour can be made into breads, cakes, or noodles.
Rotifer
Parthenogenesis
Cytological and molecular genetic studies show that bdelloids evolved from a common ancestor which lost sexual recombination (meiosis and fertilisation) about 100 million years ago. Research has also been done on the implications of parthenogenesis for speciation.
Grain
Tortillas are made from a special flour of dried maize (corn) called masa.
Rotifer
Genetics
Bdelloid rotifer genomes contain two or more non-identical copies of each gene. This suggests their asexual reproduction is of long standing. For example, there are four copies of gene hsp82. Each is different and on a different chromosome. This cannot be explaned by normal gene duplication, which produces two or more near-identical genes next to each other. By contrast, in a monogont rotifer, most genes were single-copy.
Jeep
The first civilian models were produced in 1945. It inspired a number of other light utility vehicles, such as the Land Rover. Many Jeep variants serving similar military and civilian roles have since been designed in other nations. In 2007 Jeep began manufacturing crossover SUVs with its Compass and Patriot models. This led to the 2013 Jeep Cherokee midsize crossover.
Rotifer
The Acanthocephala
The Acanthocephala, a group of parasitic worms previously considered to be a separate phylum, have been shown to be modified rotifers. The exact relationship to the normal, freeliving, members of the phylum is not resolved.
Majek Fashek
Majekodunmi Fasheke, popularly known as Majek Fashek (pronounced as Ma-je-ko-dun-mi Ifa-kii-she-eke) (March 1963 – June 2, 2020) was a Nigerian singer-songwriter and guitarist. He was best known in his home country for the 1988 album Prisoner of Conscience, which included the multiple award-winning single "Send Down the Rain". He worked with Tracy Chapman, Jimmy Cliff, Michael Jackson, Snoop Dogg, and Beyoncé.
Musical Career
In the early eighties, Fashek, who at the time went by the stage name Rajesh Kanal, joined the group Jastix with McRoy Gregg, and Drummer Black ‘Rice. They were best known as the in-house band on the show Music Panorama on NTA Benin and toured with fellow reggae group The Mandators. Jastix were also session musicians for upcoming reggae singer Edi Rasta, who would later be known as Evi-Edna Ogholi.
Sherburne County, Minnesota
Sherburne County is a county in the U.S. state of Minnesota. As of 2020, 97,183 people lived there. The county seat is Elk River.
Majek Fashek
Musical Career
Majek Fashek attracted international attention, when his self-penned tune, “Send Down The Rain,” appeared to coax a rainstorm that ended one among the worst droughts in Nigeria's history.
Labeled a “prophet”, Fashek went on to become one among Africa’s greatest reggae-influenced performers. His debut solo album, Prisoner Of Conscience, released in 1988, sold quite 200,000 copies in Nigeria alone.
Fashek died in his sleep on 2 June 2020 in New York City from esophageal cancer, aged 57.
Denmark at the Olympics
Denmark at the Olympics is a history which includes 40 games in 22 countries and 1,800+ athletes. Since 1896, Denmark has contributed to the growth of the "Olympic Movement".
History
Teams from Denmark have taken part in the Olympic Games since the very first games in 1896.
The National Olympic Committee for Denmark (National Olympic Committee and Sports Confederation of Denmark or Danmarks Idræts-Forbund Olympisk Komite) was created in 1905; and it was recognized by the International Olympic Committee the same year.
Denmark has sent athletes to every Summer Olympic Games except for the 1904 Games.
Denmark has been a part of the Winter Olympic Games several times since 1948. They have been at every Games since 1988.
Miocene
The Miocene is the last and final epoch of the first Neogene period and the fourth of the Cainozoic. It started about 23 million years ago and ended about 5.33 million years ago. The rock beds that mark the start and end are well known, but the exact dates of the start and end of the period are uncertain. The Miocene was named by Charles Lyell. The name comes from the Greek words μείων (meiōn, “less”) and καινός (kainos, “new”) and means "less recent", because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene.
Denmark at the Olympics
History
Danish athletes have won a total of 171 medals. Sailing is their best medal winning sport.
Miocene
The animals at the end of the Miocene are quite different from those at the start. What happened was climate change. The biota becomes 'modern' because the climate has become more like it is today. That much is certain, but what is not certain is the exact cause of the climate change.
Denmark at the Olympics
History
Denmark has won only one medal at the Winter Games. This was in curling at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano
Miocene
As the Earth cooled, it went from the Oligocene epoch, through the Miocene, and into the Pliocene. The Miocene boundaries are not set at any particular world wide event. They are set at regional boundaries between the warmer Oligocene and the cooler Pliocene epochs.
The plants and animals of the Miocene were not yet modern, and familiar present-day species had not yet evolved. Modern families of mammals and birds existed. Whales, seals, and kelp spread. Modern sharks appeared. Grasslands became more common. Mammalian browsers became less common, and grazer species became more common. About 100 species of ape lived at that time. They lived in Africa, Asia and Europe. Cetaceans were very common in the seas. The gigantic shark Carcharodon megalodon may have preyed on them.
The standard reason why the Earth's climate varies is that there are Milankovich cycles. They cause variations in the Earth's orbit. These changes affect the climate. Changes taking place at present have to consider the influence of humans as well. Over long periods the position of continents and the growth and decay of mountain ranges can also have big effects.
Climate
The climate was warm in the Miocene, especially in the first half. Then the global climate rivalled that of the Oligocene. The diagram shows that throughout the Oligocene and the first half of the Miocene, climate remained very warm.
Lower temperatures
The Miocene warm period began 21 million years ago and continued until about 14.5 million years ago. Then global temperatures took a sharp drop — it is called the Middle Miocene Climate Transition (MMCT) or Middle Miocene disruption.
Eight million years ago, the temperature dropped again, and the Antarctic ice sheet grew. Greenland may have had large glaciers as early as seven or eight million years ago. The climate for the most part remained warm enough to support forests well into the Pliocene.
Impact events
A large impact event occurred during the Miocene. The date is very uncertain. The event formed the Karakul crater (52 km diameter), in Tajikistan which is estimated to have an age of less than 23 mya or less than 5 mya.
Later Miocene
The large mountain ranges: the Himalayas, the Andes and the Cascades continued to go upwards. This was due to movements of continental plates grinding against each other. The movement of India into Asia, and the Americas moving against plates to the west caused all these area to buckle up into large ranges.
How would new mountain ranges lower global temperature? This has several possible causes. A falling CO2 would cause the temperature to drop, so the real question is, what would cause the CO2 to drop? One type of cause is CO2 being sequestered (hidden away) by, for instance, organic remains not being recycled. A quite different type of cause points to changes in the Earth's orbit or changes in the heat given out by the Sun (called "insolation").
Africa
Africa (and elsewhere) was much more forested than today, and the herbivorous mammals were mainly browsers (eating leaves) rather than grazers (eating grass). The advantage was with browsers because Africa was generally forested.
In the second half of the Miocene temperatures dropped, and grasslands began to expand. After the mid-Miocene climate change there grew vast grasslands in place of the forests which were there before. The browsers had teeth and behaviours which suited forests, and they largely died out. The modern herbivores are almost entirely grazers which "mow the lawns" of the huge African grasslands. This can be seen by comparing their teeth with the teeth of species from the earlier part of the Miocene. The same is true of the Americas and Asia. The world was drier, and grasslands spread.
All flesh is grass (Hebrew: כָּל־הַבָּשָׂ֣ר חָצִ֔יר kol habbasar chatsir) is a phrase from the Old Testament book of Isaiah, chapter 40, verses 6–8. It applies from the last part of the Miocene to the present day, at any rate so far as land animals are concerned. The steppes of Asia, the mid-West of the USA and the grasslands of Africa all offer the same lesson: that when the temperature and rainfall dropped, most of the forests changed to grassland. Atmospheric carbon dioxide is the other factor which research looks at.
One fundamental cause of the change was the drop in rainfall in Africa and Arabia. This was partly caused by the rise of the Himalayas, which interfered with the flow of air from the wet tropical parts of the East. A major and permanent cooling occurred between 14.8 – 14.5 mya in the Langhian stage. However, as mentioned above, the grasslands expanded all over the Earth, not just in Africa.
There was a major growth in the Antarctic ice sheet. Ice cores tell us what happened: 18O:16O is a proxy for temperature.
In an indirect way, all this affected human evolution. The reduction in forests led to an expanse of grasslands with some trees. Into this more open area the Australopithecines later ventured out.
Mediterranean
Another great event, which undoubtedly affected climate, was the refilling of the Mediterranean basin. The so-called Zanclean flood is thought to have refilled the Mediterranean Sea 5.33 million years ago. This reconnected the Mediterranean Sea to the Atlantic Ocean. It is possible that even before the flood there were partial connections to the Atlantic Ocean.
According to this model, water from the Atlantic Ocean refilled the dried up basin through the modern-day Strait of Gibraltar. The process took up to two years.
The flood may have affected global climate. The much smaller flood triggered when Lake Agassiz drained did result in (or coincide with) a cold period.
Africa and Eurasia
During the early Miocene, the Arabian Peninsula collided with Eurasia. This cut the link between the Mediterranean and Indian Ocean. It let animals move between Africa and Eurasia, (elephants into Eurasia). In the late Miocene, the connection between the Atlantic and Mediterranean shut. This caused the Mediterranean Sea to almost completely evaporate. The Strait of Gibraltar opened and the Mediterranean refilled at the Miocene-Pliocene boundary: the Zanclean flood.
The Americas
North and South America continued to drift westward. As they did so, their western edges gradually built up, and their eastern edges trailed.
There was as yet no land connection between the two continents. However, many groups can cross water to some extent. This is illustrated by the mammalian fauna of Madagascar, which is mostly got from Africa even though the two landmasses separated 120 mya.
Gershon Shafat
Gershon Shafat (גרשון שפט, 6 December 1927 – 16 August 2020) was an Austrian-born Israeli politician. He was a member of the Knesset for Tehiya from 1984 to 1992. He was born in Vienna.
He became a member of the Bnei Akiva youth movement, and later joined the National Religious Party. In 1946 he was amongst the founders of kibbutz Ein Tzurim.
Shafat died on 16 August 2020 in Tel Aviv, aged 92.
Cosimo Fusco
Cosimo Massimo Fusco (born 23 September 1962) is an Italian movie and television actor. He is known for his role as Paolo in Friends. He was born in Matera, Italy on September 23, 1962. He lives in Rome, Italy.
Cabannes, Bouches-du-Rhône
Cabannes is a commune of 4,119 people (1999). It is found in the region Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur in the Bouches-du-Rhône department in the south of France.
Nut (fruit)
A nut is a hard-shelled fruit of some plants. They are an important part of human and animal diets. Many dried seeds and fruits are called 'nuts' in English, but only some are nuts to a botanist.
Nuts are made of the seed and the fruit, where the fruit does not open to release the seed. Most seeds come from fruits, and the seeds are released from the fruit. But nuts (such as hazelnuts, hickories, chestnuts and acorns) have a stony fruit wall which keeps the seed inside.
Dyskobolia Grodzisk Wielkopolski
Dyskobolia Grodzisk Wielkopolski, is a Polish football club based in Grodzisk Wielkopolski, Poland.