THE REAL REASON THE NEPAL GLACIER COLLAPSED

New York Post

 

Mount Everest glaciers are under threat and melting — thanks to climbers relieving themselves

By Ben Cost

Published Sep. 4, 2026, 10:05 a.m. ET

 

Urine trouble, Mount Everest.

 

After standing the test of time for 50 million years, the world’s tallest mountain is under threat from an unlikely source: our pee.

 

Urine deposited on glaciers is enough to melt over 150 tons of ice and snow on Mount Everest every year, according to an a-thaw-calyptic study in the Regional Environmental Change scientific journal, as reported by the Independent.

 

“Urine, with a temperature of around 37°C (human body temperature), causes the ice to melt,” wrote the study authors, who were sent by Nepal’s Survey Department to determine the impact of humans on Everest.

 

The international team of scientists studied the Khumbu Glacier, the home of the Everest base camp on the mountain’s Nepalese side. Hundreds of people congregate there each year before attempting to summit the 29,035-foot wonder.

 

These throngs have turned this majestic pinnacle into a “Burning Man”-esque tent city producing disruptive noise, Himalayan trash mounds, and of course, mountains of human waste.

 

While climbers have been required to pack out their poop in bags since 2024, climbers still relieve themselves directly onto the ice.

 

The researchers focused on the spring season in 2023, when roughly 2,000 people descended upon base camp, situated some 17,958 feet above sea level, the Daily Mail reported.

 

According to their calculations, the pee generated by the enthusiastic climbers totaled roughly 3.181 liters (0.8 gallons) per person. That means on a 50-day journey, the overall leakage hits 338,299 liters — more than 89,000 gallons.

 

The researchers estimated that the heat from heeding nature’s call could melt around 154 tons of ice in a single season.

 

When coupled with the thousands of gallons of gas used for heating and cooking, that figure jumped to 2,492 tons — enough to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

 

“The increasing number of climbers, trekkers and support staff, particularly at the campsite area, has intensified environmental impacts on the Khumbu Glacier,” the researchers wrote.

 

There’s one caveat to this trickle-down theory: The calculation assumes that all the heat from human pee transfers to the ice, which might not be true.

 

“This estimate is likely to represent an upper bound, as it does not account for heat losses through percolation into debris, runoff, incomplete heat transfer, or other dissipative processes that are difficult to quantify under field conditions,” the team wrote.

 

Nonetheless, the scientists are calling for Everest Base Camp to a dryer spot with less melting potential.

 

“Relocating the base camp to an ice–free site could help to mitigate human–induced glacier melt while fostering more sustainable mountaineering practices,” they wrote. “If implemented, relocation could reduce the stress on the Khumbu Icefall, enhance expedition safety, and contribute to a more resilient mountain ecosystem.”

 

Unfortunately, Everest is under threat from more than mountaineers making water.

 

The face is reportedly littered with more than 50 tons of trash, earning it the moniker “the world’s highest garbage dump,” according to National Geographic.

 

Last year, Nepal even shelved a scheme to have Everest adventurers bring their own trash down for cash after it failed to show tangible results, the BBC reported.

 

Part of the problem is that climbers would only haul back refuse from lower camps and not from the higher slopes, where the trash was most plentiful.

 

Therefore, the idea got binned.

CROCODILES AND ALLIGATORS SHOULD CAUSE US TO QUESTION EVOLUTION

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m6U1Dh9B7y8 

NASA'S SOON-TO-BE LAUNCHED NEW TELESCOPE EXPECTED TO UNVEIL DISTANT WORLDS, MILLIONS OF STARS AND BILLIONS OF GALAXIES

PEOPLE

 

NASA’s Soon-to-Launch Telescope Is Expected to Unveil Distant Worlds, ‘Millions’ of Stars’ and ‘Billions of Galaxies’

By Eleanor Jacobs  Published on June 21, 2026 06:00AM EDT

 

Scientists and engineers at NASA will soon bid farewell to a telescope 20 years in the making as the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is scheduled to launch from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Aug. 30.

 

The groundbreaking space telescope — which was adopted as a project by NASA in 2010, per the European Space Agency — is a wide-field infrared tool that “will investigate long-standing astronomical mysteries, such as the force behind the universe's expansion, and search for distant planets beyond our solar system,” according to NASA.

 

NASA completed construction on the telescope in December.

 

Previously known as the Wide Field InfraRed Survey Telescope (WFIRST), the observatory was renamed in honor of Dr. Nancy Grace Roman in 2020, commemorating NASA's first chief of astronomy for her contributions to the administration throughout the 1960s and 1970s and on the Hubble Space Telescope project.

 

The Roman telescope currently resides in NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., where it continues to be tested by scientists.

 

“In the mission's first five years, it's expected to unveil more than 100,000 distant worlds, hundreds of millions of stars, and billions of galaxies,” senior project scientist Julia McEnery told NBC News, which noted that more than $4.3 billion has been invested in the project.

 

During its construction, the telescope has been evaluated under NASA's Independent Verification and Validation (IV&V) Program. Projects developed with NASA's IV&V Program are subject to “rigorous and repeatable engineering methodologies” meant to evaluate the project's strength, longevity and potential risks, according to the organization's website.

 

The telescope will be shipped on NASA's Pegasus Barge from Maryland to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where it will undergo an inspection at the center's Payload Hazardous Servicing Facility as well as powered testing and launch rehearsals.

 

NASA shared that the mission will aim to complete several Core Community Surveys (CCS) during its first five years of orbit. These processes will aim to provide valuable information and imagery to scientists, who may then decipher truths surrounding dark matter, dark energy and the expansion of the universe.

 

The telescope will be prompted to capture observations every 15 minutes for over a year to explore the dense, central portion of the Milky Way known as the Galactic Bulge. NASA aims to track changes in the brightness of stars in order to identify rogue planets, isolated black holes and other bodies.

 

An additional survey, estimated to take about 17 months, will serve to document “hundreds of millions” of galaxies to place in conversation with spectroscopy, or the study of how matter interacts with light. The resulting data and images will be used to construct a 3D map of the universe.

 

Another survey will prompt the telescope to observe one specific region every five days over the course of two years to learn more about objects within the cosmos that change over time, such as exploding stars.

 

The mission may also aim to hunt for primordial black holes so comparatively small that they have previously evaded detection by NASA's observatories.

 

Dominic Benford, a program scientist based at NASA's headquarters in Washington, D.C., shared with NBC News that the first images from the telescope could potentially be released by the end of 2026.

 

Beginning with the launch of Orbiting Astronomical Observatory 1 (OAO-1) in 1966, NASA has since launched a series of increasingly large and complex telescopes and observatories into orbit. Currently, the administration has at least 17 active observatories, according to the administration's website.

 

The administration's other telescopic projects include SPHEREx, which launched in 2025 with the goal of conducting a widespread infrared spectral survey of the sky, and the James Webb Space Telescope, which launched in 2021 and now orbits the sun with a distance of one million miles from Earth.

 

The Hubble Space Telescope has spent 36 years in orbit since its 1990 launch. It is credited with being the first system to capture images of collision between large astronomical objects and providing strong proof on the road to confirming that supermassive black holes exist.

 

NASA estimates that the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will ultimately possess a field of view that is at least 100 times larger than that of the Hubble Space Telescope.

 

NBC News also reports that it should be equipped to work at a speed 1,000 times faster than that of the Hubble.

FROZEN MOUSE BRAINS REVIVED FROM CRYOSLEEP

New York Post

 

Frozen mouse brains revived from ‘cryosleep’ in a scientific first

By Marissa Matozzo

Published March 16, 2026, 4:27 p.m. ET

 

Put “Alien” on standby — because science may be inching a tiny step closer to real-life cryosleep.

 

In a breakthrough that sounds ripped straight from a Ridley Scott flick, researchers in Germany have managed to freeze brain tissue to ultra-cold temperatures and bring it back with key signs of life still flickering — including electrical activity linked to learning and memory.

 

The feat, detailed in a new study published in the journal “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,” suggests that one day scientists may be able to place brain tissue — or even entire organs — into a deep freeze and revive them later without wrecking the delicate circuitry that makes them tick, originally reported on by Nature.com.

 

That’s long been the sticking point.

 

When biological tissue freezes the old-fashioned way, water inside cells crystallizes into jagged ice shards that shred membranes and sever the microscopic connections between neurons.

 

In the brain, those connections are everything — the infrastructure behind thought, memory and consciousness.

 

To dodge that icy death spiral, neurologists at the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg turned to a technique known as vitrification — a rapid-cooling method that transforms liquid into a glass-like state before ice crystals can form.

 

Instead of freezing into rigid ice, the tissue becomes something closer to molecular glass. Chemical activity essentially pauses in place.

 

For their test run, the researchers flash-froze thin slices of mouse brain tissue containing the hippocampus — the region crucial for learning and memory — plunging them into liquid nitrogen at a bone-chilling −196°C.

 

The samples then sat suspended in this glassy deep freeze, anywhere from 10 minutes to a week.

 

The real moment of truth came during the thaw.

 

Scientists carefully reheated the tissue at lightning speed while flushing out the chemical “antifreeze” solution used during freezing — a delicate balancing act designed to prevent the cells from swelling, cracking or bursting.

 

When the revived brain slices were put under the microscope, the team saw something remarkable: the microscopic structures linking neurons — synapses — appeared intact.

 

The cells’ tiny energy generators, mitochondria, were still humming along.

 

And when researchers nudged the neurons with tiny electrical pulses, they fired back.

 

In fact, the brain circuits still showed long-term potentiation — a key biological process that strengthens synaptic connections and underpins learning and memory.

 

The results suggest that parts of the brain’s functional wiring survived the deep freeze.

 

“If brain function is an emergent property of its physical structure, how can we recover it from complete shutdown?” said Alexander German, a neurologist at the University of Erlangen–Nuremberg and the study’s lead author.

 

The team also experimented with preserving an entire mouse brain — a far trickier challenge because of the brain’s protective blood–brain barrier, which blocks large molecules from entering the tissue.

 

By repeatedly cycling cryoprotective chemicals through the brain’s blood vessels, the researchers were able to distribute the protective compounds more evenly and prevent catastrophic swelling or dehydration.

 

Still, the work remains early-stage.

 

The revived brain slices only stayed viable for a few hours — a natural limitation once the tissue is removed from a living organism — and the study did not attempt to revive a whole animal or test whether memories survived the icy pause.

 

“This kind of progress is what gradually turns science fiction into scientific possibility,” Mrityunjay Kothari, a mechanical engineer who studies cryobiology, told Nature.

 

But he cautioned that practical applications remain a long way off, noting that preserving large organs — let alone whole bodies — is still “far beyond the capabilities of the study.”

 

For now, the technology’s most realistic payoff may lie in medicine rather than space travel.

 

If scientists can safely pause brain tissue without destroying it, doctors might someday be able to slow or halt damage during severe injuries, strokes or certain diseases — buying precious time for treatment.

 

It could also open the door to long-term storage of organs for transplant, potentially easing chronic shortages.

PATIENTS LIKELY HEAR THEMSELVES BEING PRONOUNCED DEAD, NEW STUDY SAYS

New York Post

 

Doctor reveals the frightening words patients hear in the moments after their body dies — while the brain hangs on

By Ben Cost

Published Feb. 13, 2026, 11:25 a.m. ET

 

Sometimes it’s the living who haunt the dead.

 

A New York primary care doctor redefined the phrase “life after death” after finding that the brain remains active even after one’s heart stops, as detailed in a morbid study in the journal Resuscitation.

 

This means that the alleged deceased can likely hear the doctors announcing their time of death after they cease resuscitation efforts, the Daily Mail reported.

 

This macabre revelation was brought to light by Dr. Sam Parnia of the NYU Langone Medical Center in New York. He had spoken to patients who were revived after being declared clinically dead —  when their heart stops beating —  finding that they were able to recall events transpiring in their room with astounding accuracy.

 

In the Frankenstein-like study, Parnia shed light on why their postmortem memory is so lucid —  because of “normal and near-normal brain activity found up to an hour into resuscitation,” he previously told The Post.

 

“We were not only able to show the markers of lucid consciousness — we were also able to show that these experiences are unique and universal,” he said. “They’re different from dreams, illusions and delusions.” This didn’t seem to jibe with doctor’s methods of declaring a patient dead when their ticker stopped.

 

To shed light on this surprising disconnect between heart and mind, Parnia and his team examined brain activity and awareness among 53 patients who survived cardiac arrest at 25 hospitals, mostly in the US and UK.

 

A staggering 40% of participants reported having memories or conscious thoughts, per the clip.

 

“In death, they have a perception that they are separate from their body,” Dr. Parnia said, “and then they can move around. But they’re in that [hospital] room and they’re gathering information. They felt that they were fully conscious.”

 

The clinically dead patients also had spikes of gamma, delta, theta, alpha and beta brain waves associated with thinking and awareness, as determined by an electroencephalogram, a device that records brain activity with electrodes. These were present 35 to 60 minutes after the person’s heart stopped.

 

From this, Dr. Parnia concluded that the brain is surprisingly durable.

 

“Although doctors have long thought that the brain suffers permanent damage about 10 minutes after the heart stops supplying it with oxygen, our work found that the brain can show signs of electrical recovery long into ongoing CPR,” he said in a statement.

 

In fact, not only does the brain survive —  it functions at a high level.

 

Like a seemingly defunct computer rebooting, this neurological surge is believed to induce a super-focused state, possibly explaining why people might hear their surroundings in great detail —  including medics’ death declarations —  even though their body is technically dead.

 

This energy burst also allows these resurrectees to access everything in their mind simultaneously, hence the perception that their life is flashing before their eyes.

 

“As the brain shuts down, because of a lack of blood flow in death, the normal braking systems in the brain are removed, known as disinhibition,” Dr. Parnia explained. “This enables people to have access to their entire consciousness. All their thoughts, memories, all their emotional states, everything that they’ve ever done, which they relive through the perspective of morality and ethics.”

 

Along with satisfying morbid curiosity, this pioneering research could perhaps change the way doctors restart the heart or deal with brain injuries caused by cardiac arrest.

WHY YOU SHOULDN'T BAKE YOUR PASTA DISH IN A STEEL PAN

NBC 5 Dallas-Fort Worth

 

‘Lasagna battery': Why you shouldn't bake your pasta dish in a steel pan

This one mistake could turn your holiday dinner into an accidental galvanic cell.

By Joseph Lamour | TODAY • Published December 24, 2025 • Updated on December 24, 2025 at 11:10 am

 

Homemade lasagna can be an exciting dinner, but one cooking mistake could instead make it electrifying — literally.

 

On Dec. 5, Threads user Tay Tanesha posted about her lasagna mishap: After the aluminum foil melted into it as it baked, it became inedible.

 

“I didn’t know aluminum foil melted in such low heat tf is this 🤔😒🤬,” she wrote.

 

In a trio of photos, we see the aftermath: The first shows the aluminum foil on top of the pan speckled with burn holes; the second shows the foil melted into the lasagna; and the third shows the many holes in the foil held up to the light.

 

“Did you set it to hell,” one user asked.

 

“Lasagna looking like E.T. at the end of the movie,” joked another.

 

But Tanesha is far from the first person to create such a charged dish — or, as one user put it, “L A S A G N A B A T T E R Y.”

 

What is a ‘lasagna battery’?

 

“Me when I create a simple galvanic cell where the aluminum and steel act as electrodes and the food’s moisture/ions act as the electrolyte, causing the foil to corrode and the food to taste metallic 😔,” explained one person who clearly aced CHEM101.

 

“Put enough of these together and you can light an LED!” wrote another Threads user, posting an Instagram Reel of someone making lasagna batteries … on purpose.

 

A few folks wondered about the science involved in Tanisha’s melty metal mishap.

 

“Can you explain this is standard American English for me so I can explain it to my boyfriend who doesn’t believe I taste the metal when food is cooked in these types of pans???” one such user asked.

 

Batteries are devices that store electrical energy in the form of chemical energy, which convert that energy into electricity to conduct it. Your TV remote, mobile phone and mid-sized sedan all have different types of batteries — and others can be made with food like lemons, potatoes or, in this case, tomato sauce and pasta.

 

Lasagna batteries in pop culture

 

According to a comment, lasagna batteries were mentioned in the sitcom “The Big Bang Theory.” A more recent clip in the Netflix show “A Man on the Inside” shows a lasagna battery created during a Thanksgiving dinner.

 

“I think what just happened was you accidentally made a lasagna battery,” Charles (Ted Danson) says in a Season 2 episode. “The steel pan acts as the cathode and the aluminum port, and then all the acid and the salt in the lasagna is the electrolyte. So a current just runs all through it.”

 

Smart, though Danson’s character then suggests scraping off the corrosion to serve, which is probably a bad idea.

 

The science behind lasagna batteries

 

Whether you make a lasagna with three or 50 layers, tomatoes and cheese need a metal pan and aluminum foil to conduct electricity. What happened to these lasagnas has a scientific term: galvanic corrosion, an electrochemical process that occurs when two different metals are in contact with each other in the presence of an electrolyte.

 

Shane C. Street, an associate professor of chemistry at the University of Alabama, explains that a galvanic, or spontaneous, electrochemical cell in the dish “apparently formed” between the iron or steel pan and the aluminum in the foil, all supported by an electrolyte — namely, tomato sauce, which is salty and acidic.

 

“The aluminum oxidizes to aluminum oxide (gives up electrons) and iron oxide in the pan is reduced to metallic iron (takes the electrons),” Street explains to TODAY.com, adding that the overall reaction is exothermic, meaning it gives off heat and could become hot enough to melt aluminum.

 

The melting point of aluminum is 1220 F, by the way.

 

Jin Suntivich, associate professor of materials science and engineering at Cornell University, says the electrochemical reaction causes holes in the foil due to a few factors.

 

“Tomato sauce contains water and dissolved salts that allow charged atoms (so-called ‘ions’) to move,” Suntivich tells TODAY.com. “Aluminum foil is a material that readily gives up electrons, while oxygen in the air can accept them. Together, they form a battery that slowly eats away the foil.”

 

Suntivich says the principle is similar to an aluminum-air battery, which scientists have explored for energy storage like data centers and other large-scale applications.

 

“A more dramatic form of this reaction is called the thermite reaction,” Street adds. “This forms molten iron and gives off a tremendous amount of heat (energy), so much that it can be used in welding!”

 

He notes, though, that a thermite reaction and the exothermic nature of the lasagna may be making for a faster cooking environment. He adds the conditions of these two reactions are “totally different.”

 

“Science in action,” Street says of the accidental power source.

 

Regardless, while chemistry is a delightful subject to learn, maybe cook your next lasagna in a glass or ceramic pan to avoid any surprise lessons.

 

This story first appeared on TODAY.com.