What Causes A Tsunami?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to find out what causes a Tsunami.

Tsunami are massage waves that are created by sudden movement of the ocean, mostly because of such things as landslides and earthquakes on the sea floor, land being dumped into the ocean, and volcanic eruptions or meteorite impacts.

Earthquakes

Most tsunami are created by earthquakes on the sea floor, when rocks move past one another suddenly, causing the water to move. The resulting waves are pushed away from the earthquake event.

Landslides

Underwater landslides and terrestrial land that falls into the ocean can cause a tsunami.

Volcanic eruptions

Less common are tsunami as a direct cause of an volcanic eruption. These happen in different ways.

1. The collapse of coastal, island and underwater volcanoes.

2. Pyroclastic flows, these are hot blocks, pumice, ash and gas, running down volcanic slopes straight into the ocean and subsequently pushing the water outwards.

3. A caldera volcano that collapses after an eruption, which causing overlying water to suddenly drop.

What are tsunamis?

The phrase tsunami, is the Japanese word tsu, which means harbour, and nami, meaning wave. A tsunami are massive waves caused by underwater disturbances, usually in connection with earthquakes which happen beneath or near an ocean. Volcanic eruptions, landslides, and rock falls will also create tsunamis, as will an asteroid hitting the ocean. They begin from vertical movement on the sea floor, with the resulting displacement of a water mass.

In deep oceans, waves have been documented to travel at around 800 km/h, and are only a few centimetres high. In the ocean, waves are created by the wind, and can be noted by their amplitude, this is the height of the wave, and wavelength, this is the distance from crest to crest. 

Myth Or Fact Cockroaches Will Survive A Nuclear Blast?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to see if it is true and cockroaches will be the only living thing left standing after a nuclear blast?

Myth - Cockroaches can survive a nuclear fallout?

Most of us have heard the saying, the only things to survive a nuclear war would be cockroaches. However, this is not strictly true. It has even be said cockroaches could survive ground zero radiation after a nuclear explosion, though needless to say, not the actual explosion they were next to it, all assuming of course they weren’t inside a lead lined fridge, then of course they could survive.

In any case, the latest research shows that, even though cockroaches are capable of withstanding ionizing radiation bursts around 10 times more than humans, they are in fact light weights within this arena. In fact, it would only takes around 1,000 rads to interfere with their ability to reproduce, which of course lead to the end of cockroaches, should they be exposed to this level. For reference, this is around the same level of radiation at 15 miles away Hiroshima straight after the bomb exploded, this bomb was a 15 kiloton weapon, which is nothing compared to the megaton bombs which are found in nuclear stockpiles today.

Further more, at levels of only 6400 rads, approximately 95% of pubescent cockroaches will die and at 10,000 rads, and most adult ones will not survive also. While this impressive by human standards, as we are only able to withstand 400 to 1000 rads before dying, it’s very unimpressive by insect standards, as most will survive higher rates than cockroaches, so says the United Nations Scientific Committee, who, when they aren’t taking forever to say their name, apparently get immense enjoy from zapping living things with ionizing radiation. 

What Does Too Much Alcohol Do To A Body?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to find out what the effects are of alcoholism. Drinking too much – on a single occasion or over time – can take a serious toll on your health.  Here’s how alcohol can affect your body:

Brain
Alcohol plays tricks with your brain’s communication pathways, and will affect the way the a person behaves. These disruptions will affect moods and behaviour, and will make it more difficult to think clearly and movement is uncoordinated.

Heart
Drinking over a long period of time, or too much on one occasion will severely damage a persons heart, creating issues such as.

Cardiomyopathy, which is the stretching and drooping of the heart muscle

Arrhythmias, which is an irregular heart beat

Stroke

Elevated blood pressure 

Research has shown that drinking in moderation will protect healthy adults from having coronary heart disease.

Liver
Heavy drinking will eventually take its toll on a persons liver, and will cause various problems and inflammations such as.

Steatosis, or better known as fatty liver

Alcoholic hepatitis

Fibrosis

Cirrhosis

Pancreas

Alcohol will cause a persons pancreas to start to produce toxic substances, which will eventually lead to pancreatitis, this is a dangerous inflammation and swelling of blood vessels found within the pancreas, thus preventing digestion properly.

Cancer
Drinking too much will increase a persons chances of developing cancer, such as cancers of the mouth, throat, liver, breast, esophagus, and breasts.

Immunity System
Drinking will weaken a persons immune system, thus making your body an easier target for disease. Severe drinkers are more open to diseases such as pneumonia and tuberculosis. Drinking too much on one occasion reduces your body’s ability to stave off infections, even 24 hours after being drunk.

What is Coulrophobia?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to find out about peoples irrational fear of clowns.

Coulrophobia, or the fear of clowns, is quite common. An Internet search showed 16,000 hits. There are websites which are dedicated to this subject, where coulrophobes get to share their views. Clowns are common, especially Halloween events, like Universal Orlando's Halloween Horror Nights, that feature killer clowns as their icon for many years. So clearly, this fear is very real.

However, little scientific research has been done on this subject, so it is hard to say exactly how many people actually suffer from this fear. But, no January 2008 a report done by the BBC News stated that a clown phobia could be more ingrained than was previously thought.

Why as a society, we are afraid of clowns? In a 2004 an article by Trinity University, Joseph Durwin stated there were two accepted schools of thought. One being the fear is due to a bad personal experience with clowns at a young age. The second, is mass media has fabricated so much hype about evil clowns, that even children who are not normally exposed to clowns are brainwashed into disliking and even fearing them. But, neither of these thoughts are really satisfactory.

The History of Clowns

Durwin has provided an impressive history on clowns, stretching as far back as to the jester of ancient times. Back then, clowns were given permission, and even expected, to show the more deviant side of human nature, from defying the sexual norms, to mocking the gods at the time. As time passed, jesters changed into tricksters, who were said to a more sinister figure, that had less than honourable intentions.

The modern day circus clown is a different version of a tramp from the Depression era. Tramp clowns were members of the underbelly of unsavoury classes, that entertained more privileged people with a caricatured look at on daily life. Although tramp clowns were thought to be quite harmless, a seedy underbelly did exist in the clown circuit.

What Is The Connection Between Earthquakes And Gold Veins?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to learn about the connection between earthquakes and gold formations.

Scientists have known for some time that reams of gold were created by mineral deposits emanating from hot fluids which seeped through cracks in Earth’s crust. However, a study in Nature Geoscience1 found this process could happen nearly instantaneously, maybe as fast as a few tenths of a second.

This process happens along fault jogs, which as sideways zigzagged cracks which connect main fault lines in rock, so says author Dion Weatherley, who is a seismologist in the University of Queensland, Australia.

When earthquakes happen, the sides of these fault lines slide along the direction of a fault, thus rubbing against one another. However, the fault jogs just open. Weatherley and geochemist Richard Henley who is his co-author, contemplated what happened to fluids which circulated through these jogs when an earthquake happened.

What their calculations showed was surprising, a fast depressurization which sees normal high-pressure conditions, drop to pressures close to the surface.

Gradually, more fluid spews out of the rocks surrounding the gap, thus restoring the original pressure. However, this doesn’t happen immediately, and in the meantime a single earthquake will produce an instant vein of gold.

Obviously, the bigger the earthquake, the bigger the gold-vein formation. More interestingly, Weatherley and Henley discovered that even smaller earthquakes will create surprisingly large pressure drops on the fault jogs.

So there you have it folks, now we know how veins of gold are created, however, to find those that have several veins, will take many many years to create. 

What Causes Leprosy And Can It Be Cured?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to talk about an ancient disease which surprisingly is still around even today.

Leprosy is a highly infectious disease which causes severe disfiguring sores, in addition to damage to nerves, arms and legs. This disease has been around for decades, often surrounded by negative stigmas and tales of people getting shunned as outcasts. Outbreaks of leprosy have been heard about on every continent. The oldest civilizations in China, Egypt, and India greatly fear leprosy as an incurable, mutilating, and highly contagious disease.

But, contrary to popular belief, leprosy is not actually that contagious. You will only catch it if you come into close and regular contact with nose and mouth droplets by an individual that has untreated leprosy. Children are more likely to get this over adults.

Even today, approximately 180,000 people around the world have leprosy, states the World Health Organization, an mostly within Africa and Asia. Around 200 people are diagnosed within the U.S. yearly, mostly in California, Hawaii.

What is the Cause of Leprosy?

Leprosy is created by a type of bacteria known as Mycobacterium leprae. It is also referred to as Hansen's disease, after the scientist who first discovered it in 1873.

What Are the Symptoms?

Leprosy mainly affects the skin and nerves outside the brain and spinal cord. It can also hit the eyes and tissue on the inside of the nose.

The main symptom is disfiguring sores, lumps, and bumps which will not go away even after many weeks or months. These are pale in color.

When Will There Be A Cure For Aids?

Welcome back my fellow learners, today we are going to find out more regarding the lethal disease aids.

Researchers are still hopeful they're going in the right direction to locating a cure for HIV and AIDS. Two babies that were treated when they were infants for HIV lived for several years without developing any symptoms of the virus. However, one is now positive for HIV again. However, the treatments held back the virus for a short while, and this can lead to changes with treatments for individuals only recently infected.

Where HIV is found

Usually, babies who could be HIV positive receive medication to stop the virus. Only when the two tests show positive are they then changed to drugs which treat HIV. By this time, an infant could be over 2 weeks old.

However, at times doctors use a different approach. An infant from Mississippi was given treatment just 30 hours after it was born, and another baby was treated when it was 4 hours old.

The second baby is still HIV-negative after nearly a year. The Mississippi one tested was HIV free for over 2 years, however, is now HIV positive once again. The baby's mother stopped giving the baby medication when it was 18 months old. Scientists thought that giving strong medications after birth would remove the HIV gene within the baby's body, or stop it from forming.

Having HIV is the same as AIDS

False

HIV is a virus which destroys a body's CD4 immune cells, these help fight against disease. With the proper medications, a person can have HIV for years without it progressing to full blown AIDS.

True

It is not possible to catch or spread HIV simply by hugging someone, sharing a towel, or the same glass. It's extremely rare to contract HIV from a blood transfusion, the U.S. blood supply carefully tests against this. But, you can spread the disease by having sex unprotected, sharing needles, or having a tattoo using unsterilised equipment.