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<ul><li>The UNESCO-listed biosphere reserve hosts over 50 mammal species, 254 bird species, 30 reptile species and 50 butterfly species, among a plethora of others.</li><li>The <keyword id="10677348" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="satpura-biosphere-reserve">Satpura Biosphere Reserve</keyword> composes three wildlife regions - the Bori range, Satpura and the <keyword id="488513" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Pachmarhi">Pachmarhi</keyword> range.</li><li>The Son and Denwa rivers weave through this 1427 sq kilometre expanse frequented by a large variety of exotic birds.</li></ul> When Shyamla Nayyar, an executive search professional, was told she would be travelling to Pachmarhi in Madhya Pradesh for a family vacation, she was less than thrilled. However, after visiting the place she says, “it turned out to be one of the best trips we had in our lives.” Often referred to as the queen of the <keyword id="5934375" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="satpura-range">Satpura Range</keyword> in central India, the hill station of Pachmarhi lodged at the height of 1100 m is a part of Satpura Biosphere Reserve. The Satpura Biosphere Reserve composes three wildlife regions - the Bori range, Satpura and the Pachmarhi range. <div type="image" title="Satpura Biosphere Reserve" msid="80598818" hostid="261"></div> The <a href="http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/environment/ecological-sciences/biosphere-reserves/asia-and-the-pacific/india/pachmarhi">UNESCO-listed Biosphere Reserve</a> hosts over 150 species of flora that is used for medicinal purposes and over 50 mammal species, 254 bird species, 30 reptile species and 50 butterfly species, among a plethora of other species found here. The verdant teak and sal forest is also home to rare and endangered animals like the gaur, bears, tigers, leopards, giant squirrels and crested serpent eagle. Linking two biodiversity hotspots — Eastern Himalaya and the Western Ghats — the Pachmarhi Biosphere Reserve is frequently recognised as a ‘Genetic Express Highway’. The Reserve is also home to two major tribes - the Gond tribes and Korkus tribe whereas the most primitive tribe, <a href="http://www.epco.in/epco_biosphere_pachmarhi.php">Bhariya</a>, reside in the Patalkot region, which is a completely isolated valley in the Chhindwara district of Madhya Pradesh. According to Hindu mythology, it is believed that the five Pandava brothers from Mahabharata built five caves that are located here - thus the place was named Panch (five) Marhi (caves). These caves were first discovered by Captain J. Forsyth in 1862 and feature rock paintings up to 2,500 years old. <div type="image" title="Satpura Biosphere Reserve" msid="80598840" hostid="261"></div> In and around Satpura National Park: Without a doubt, one of the biggest highlights of visiting Pachmarhi is exploring the treasures in this UNESCO-listed Biosphere Reserve. The Son and Denwa rivers weave through this 1427 sq kilometre expanse frequented by a large variety of exotic birds including the Crested Serpent Eagle, Spotted Owlet and the Common Kingfisher. "I fondly remember our drives around the hill station which boasts of great wildlife and a vast forest cover. The mixed terrain of Panchmarhi is what makes this region truly unique." - Shubh Mukherji, a final year student at the School of Communication, Manipal University, tells us. <div type="image" title="Satpura Biosphere Reserve" msid="80599027" hostid="261"></div> You can explore the jungle either by jeep safari, elephant safari, boat, walking (Satpura is one of the few Indian jungles that visitors can experience on foot) and canoe ride. Locals suggest a visit to the Denwa backwaters, a 2-hour road journey from Pachmarhi, for wildlife and bird sightings. There is also an excellent boat safari into the jungle. <div type="image" title="Satpura Biosphere Reserve" msid="80598914" hostid="261"></div> Local guides often recommend 'special' places they have come across while living there and one such find was the vulture point. A short trek from the WelcomHeritage Golf View hotel is a spot from where vultures, that are sadly at the verge of extinction, can be viewed with a binocular. "It turned out to be one of the best experiences of the trip, at least for me," Shyamla tells us. The region is also home to some spectacular waterfalls and the famous Irene Pool that was discovered by Irene Bose, wife of Justice Vivian Bose. The best part is that the place is relatively quiet and not teeming with tourists. Shubh gleefully tells us that "While December is usually peak season for most destinations, we were surprised to see a relatively small number of tourists at the time." Getting there: “We took a train from Nizamuddin Railway Station in Delhi to Itarsi, which was an overnight journey. We reached Itarsi early morning and a pickup was arranged by our hotel. It was a one-and-a-half-hour journey and the roads were pretty decent," says Shyamla. If, however, you don't fancy a train journey, you can always fly down to Bhopal, which is where the closest airport is, and drive down from there.

The many marvels of Satpura Biosphere Reserve in Madhya Pradesh

<div class="KonaFilter image-container"><div class="image on-image"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/156025775X/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=156025775X&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=FJBKE4PAO6WEAZLH">Spring Chicken</a>Before and after photos of Roy Lee Walford.</div></div>Part hipster, part artist, part Svengali, and part scientist, Roy Lee Walford had long been fascinated by aging, even as a teenager. He was an actor, a writer, and an adventurer who followed the latest research in caloric restriction and life extension.In the early 1990s, Walford got the chance to be part of something that would radically change his career, and his life.In one of his periodic restless phases, he signed on as chief medical officer for Biosphere 2, the famous (or infamous) earthbound "space station" that was being built in the desert north of Tucson."I find it useful to punctuate time with dangerous and eccentric activities," he explained to the Los Angeles Times.Funded by the venturesome oil heir Ed Bass, who considered himself an environmentalist, Biosphere 2 was a glass-enclosed, 3.15-acre terrarium that was designed to replicate the major ecosystems of earth.Walford and seven other "Terranauts" would spend two years inside the hermetically sealed chamber, living off the food they produced in their extensive organic gardens and indoor fish farm.They would receive nothing from outside, not even air or water, which would be recycled by the indoor ecosystem. When the crew entered the Biosphere on September 26, 1991, Walford cut a striking figure in his Star Trek-style uniform, which perfectly matched his Spock-like ears and shiny dome. Things soon took an unexpected turn, however, when the explorers discovered that they could not produce enough food to feed themselves.Spotting an opportunity to turn lemons into diet lemonade, Walford decided that this was the perfect chance to study caloric restriction in people: Henceforth, the eight crew members would be placed on a sharply reduced ration of less than eighteen hundred calories per person per day, at first. As team physician, Walford would monitor its effects on them.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1455527440/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=1455527440&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=6KN7NMFEOQ2HCD4J">Amazon</a>This story comes from "Spring Chicken: Stay Young Forever (or Die Trying) by Bill Gifford.</div></div></div>Normally, humans are hardwired to cheat on any kind of diet, which is another reason it is so difficult to study caloric restriction. But now the Biosphere had presented Walford with eight captive lab rats, for two years. Their so-called healthy starvation diet was heavy on fruits (they grew bananas, papayas, and kumquats), and a long list of vegetables, nuts, and legumes, plus a handful of eggs, dairy from their goats, and a very small amount of tilapia and chicken.Only 10 percent of their calories came from fat, and they ate meat only on Sundays. All this was supposed to fuel them through eighty-hour weeks of serious manual labor, including tending the crops, maintaining heavy equipment, pruning back vines that climbed the glass-steel walls, and even donning scuba gear to clean the fish tanks.Not surprisingly, the Terranauts lost weight like sumo wrestlers in a steam room, shedding pounds until their average BMI dropped below twenty for men and women alike (or in scientific terms, "really skinny"). One man lost 58 pounds, going from a portly 208 to a sleek 150.They lost weight so fast that Walford grew concerned that their fat cells were releasing toxins, like pesticides and pollutants, back into their bodies. They were indeed, he found, but the strict diet and heavy physical workload also caused more immediate problems, like that they were starving.According to crew member Jane Poynter, who wrote a memoir revealingly titled <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/156025775X/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=156025775X&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=FJBKE4PAO6WEAZLH">The Human Experiment: Two Years and Twenty Minutes Inside Biosphere 2</a>, it became accepted practice to lick one's plate clean after every meal, so as not to miss a single precious calorie.The supply of bananas, the tastiest item on the menu, had to be kept under lock and key. Saddest of all, the Terranauts would occasionally peer through binoculars at tourists eating at the on-site hot-dog stand, like monks watching porn."Roy was having a whale of a time, however," Poynter deadpanned, "because this was his life's work."When the eight Terranauts emerged from the Biosphere, in September 1993, pomp and ceremony competed with sheer relief that the long, intensely scrutinized project was finally over.Though it had begun in an atmosphere of gee-whiz optimism- this is how we'll live on Mars! - the project had endured withering skepticism and a spate of negative press, including a Village Voice takedown that explored the project's roots in a strange organization called Synergia, which the paper characterized as a cult.Two years of confinement had divided the crew into bitter, warring factions; the tension and drama inside the Bubble actually helped inspire the reality TV series Big Brother. The meager diet had not helped morale, either. Opening the "seal" was meant to be a joyful day for all concerned. At least now they'd be able to visit the hot-dog stand.For Walford, though, the end of the Biosphere marked the beginning of a dark new chapter of his life. He had been fit and vibrant when he entered the capsule, looking far younger than his sixty-seven years. Two years inside had ravaged his body. Perhaps it was the lack of food, perhaps something else, but in photos taken in the Biosphere, Walford is thin to the point of emaciation, his eyes haggard and sunken.He'd lost 25 pounds from an already-lean 145, and he looks much older than the post- Biosphere version of himself, on the right.But the real damage was invisible. In the six months after leaving the Biosphere, Walford fell into a deep depression, drinking his way through a bottle of vodka every four days. He had injured his back while working in the compound, and he could barely walk, at first.Something seemed to have changed in his brain, as well: Just three years after leaving the Biosphere, he began experiencing episodes of "freezing," where he would simply stop walking, and fall down. Soon he required a walker.Despite his illness, though, Walford's mind remained sharp, and he stuck to his diet, insisting that it had slowed its progression, rather than hastened it. As late as 2001, he touted the benefits of caloric restriction to Alan Alda, who then hosted a TV show for Scientific American, insisting that caloric restriction would "let me live longer than I would otherwise."He said he hoped to live to be 110 years old, just like Suzanne Somers.But physically, he was a wreck. A video taken of Walford that same year is truly shocking: Barely a decade after entering Biosphere, as a vigorous real-life version of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, he had been reduced to a stooped, jittering old man, hunched over and barely able to walk on his own.He had already been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease, from which he eventually died in 2004. Although immortality had eluded him, Walford had packed more living into his seventy-nine years on earth than most of us could fit into three lifetimes.From the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1455527440/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=1455527440&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=2LD4PB5BVHX2QTTQ">SPRING CHICKEN</a> by Bill Gifford. Copyright © 2016 by Bill Gifford. Reprinted by permission of Grand Central Publishing, New York, NY. All rights reserved. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasas-experiments-on-human-blood-in-space-2016-4">How NASA's groundbreaking work on human blood can predict your reaction to certain drugs</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="ZleWo0MzE6drFXTHxbvb68fMi00EXpGk" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

The haunting true story of a man who spent 2 years in a self-contained 'Biosphere' and nearly fell apart

<div class="KonaFilter image-container"><div class="image on-image"></div></div>Part hipster, part artist, part Svengali, and part scientist, Roy Lee Walford had long been fascinated by aging, even as a teenager. He was an actor, a writer, and an adventurer who followed the latest research in caloric restriction and life extension.In the early 1990s, Walford got the chance to be part of something that would radically change his career, and his life.In one of his periodic restless phases, he signed on as chief medical officer for Biosphere 2, the famous (or infamous) earthbound "space station" that was being built in the desert north of Tucson."I find it useful to punctuate time with dangerous and eccentric activities," he explained to the Los Angeles Times.Funded by the venturesome oil heir Ed Bass, who considered himself an environmentalist, Biosphere 2 was a glass-enclosed, 3.15-acre terrarium that was designed to replicate the major ecosystems of earth.Walford and seven other "Terranauts" would spend two years inside the hermetically sealed chamber, living off the food they produced in their extensive organic gardens and indoor fish farm.They would receive nothing from outside, not even air or water, which would be recycled by the indoor ecosystem. When the crew entered the Biosphere on September 26, 1991, Walford cut a striking figure in his Star Trek-style uniform, which perfectly matched his Spock-like ears and shiny dome. Things soon took an unexpected turn, however, when the explorers discovered that they could not produce enough food to feed themselves.Spotting an opportunity to turn lemons into diet lemonade, Walford decided that this was the perfect chance to study caloric restriction in people: Henceforth, the eight crew members would be placed on a sharply reduced ration of less than eighteen hundred calories per person per day, at first. As team physician, Walford would monitor its effects on them.<div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"></div></div></div>Normally, humans are hardwired to cheat on any kind of diet, which is another reason it is so difficult to study caloric restriction. But now the Biosphere had presented Walford with eight captive lab rats, for two years. Their so-called healthy starvation diet was heavy on fruits (they grew bananas, papayas, and kumquats), and a long list of vegetables, nuts, and legumes, plus a handful of eggs, dairy from their goats, and a very small amount of tilapia and chicken.Only 10 percent of their calories came from fat, and they ate meat only on Sundays. All this was supposed to fuel them through eighty-hour weeks of serious manual labor, including tending the crops, maintaining heavy equipment, pruning back vines that climbed the glass-steel walls, and even donning scuba gear to clean the fish tanks.Not surprisingly, the Terranauts lost weight like sumo wrestlers in a steam room, shedding pounds until their average BMI dropped below twenty for men and women alike (or in scientific terms, "really skinny"). One man lost 58 pounds, going from a portly 208 to a sleek 150.They lost weight so fast that Walford grew concerned that their fat cells were releasing toxins, like pesticides and pollutants, back into their bodies. They were indeed, he found, but the strict diet and heavy physical workload also caused more immediate problems, like that they were starving.According to crew member Jane Poynter, who wrote a memoir revealingly titled <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/156025775X/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=156025775X&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=FJBKE4PAO6WEAZLH">The Human Experiment: Two Years and Twenty Minutes Inside Biosphere 2</a>, it became accepted practice to lick one's plate clean after every meal, so as not to miss a single precious calorie.The supply of bananas, the tastiest item on the menu, had to be kept under lock and key. Saddest of all, the Terranauts would occasionally peer through binoculars at tourists eating at the on-site hot-dog stand, like monks watching porn."Roy was having a whale of a time, however," Poynter deadpanned, "because this was his life's work."When the eight Terranauts emerged from the Biosphere, in September 1993, pomp and ceremony competed with sheer relief that the long, intensely scrutinized project was finally over.Though it had begun in an atmosphere of gee-whiz optimism- this is how we'll live on Mars! - the project had endured withering skepticism and a spate of negative press, including a Village Voice takedown that explored the project's roots in a strange organization called Synergia, which the paper characterized as a cult.Two years of confinement had divided the crew into bitter, warring factions; the tension and drama inside the Bubble actually helped inspire the reality TV series Big Brother. The meager diet had not helped morale, either. Opening the "seal" was meant to be a joyful day for all concerned. At least now they'd be able to visit the hot-dog stand.For Walford, though, the end of the Biosphere marked the beginning of a dark new chapter of his life. He had been fit and vibrant when he entered the capsule, looking far younger than his sixty-seven years. Two years inside had ravaged his body. Perhaps it was the lack of food, perhaps something else, but in photos taken in the Biosphere, Walford is thin to the point of emaciation, his eyes haggard and sunken.He'd lost 25 pounds from an already-lean 145, and he looks much older than the post- Biosphere version of himself, on the right.But the real damage was invisible. In the six months after leaving the Biosphere, Walford fell into a deep depression, drinking his way through a bottle of vodka every four days. He had injured his back while working in the compound, and he could barely walk, at first.Something seemed to have changed in his brain, as well: Just three years after leaving the Biosphere, he began experiencing episodes of "freezing," where he would simply stop walking, and fall down. Soon he required a walker.Despite his illness, though, Walford's mind remained sharp, and he stuck to his diet, insisting that it had slowed its progression, rather than hastened it. As late as 2001, he touted the benefits of caloric restriction to Alan Alda, who then hosted a TV show for Scientific American, insisting that caloric restriction would "let me live longer than I would otherwise."He said he hoped to live to be 110 years old, just like Suzanne Somers.But physically, he was a wreck. A video taken of Walford that same year is truly shocking: Barely a decade after entering Biosphere, as a vigorous real-life version of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, he had been reduced to a stooped, jittering old man, hunched over and barely able to walk on his own.He had already been diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease, from which he eventually died in 2004. Although immortality had eluded him, Walford had packed more living into his seventy-nine years on earth than most of us could fit into three lifetimes.From the book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1455527440/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&amp;camp=1789&amp;creative=390957&amp;creativeASIN=1455527440&amp;linkCode=as2&amp;tag=thebusiinsi-20&amp;linkId=2LD4PB5BVHX2QTTQ">SPRING CHICKEN</a> by Bill Gifford. Copyright © 2015 by Bill Gifford. Reprinted by permission of Grand Central Publishing, New York, NY. All rights reserved. <div class="margin-top"> <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/white-house-nasa-trip-jupiter-europa-2015-2">Why a NASA mission to Jupiter's famous icy moon is now a priority</a></h3> <div> <div> <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="t5YmI3czqtlGgTLoEHDwxpM12bbWl8Cd" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div> </div> </div> </div>

The haunting true story of a man who spent two years in a self-contained 'Biosphere' and nearly fell apart

Despite its barren and unforgiving environment, <keyword id="19905161" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Saudi-Arabia" source="keywords">Saudi Arabia</keyword> has emerged as a blazing beacon of infrastructural development. Remarkably enough, this story of resilience extends far into the past, as the region may also be where the first bits of life on Earth originated. <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="Earliest forms of life" comment="subhead" text="Earliest forms of life">Earliest forms of life</cmsannotation> <keyword id="20004656" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="scientists" source="keywords">Scientists</keyword> have unearthed living <keyword id="21922967" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Stromatolites" source="keywords">stromatolites</keyword> — ancient geological structures made from algae — on <keyword id="21922969" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="Sheybarah-Island" source="keywords">Sheybarah Island</keyword>, nestled on the northeastern shelf of the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia. These ancient <keyword id="21922968" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="life-forms" source="keywords">life forms</keyword>, dating back 3.48 billion years, were previously thought to thrive only in select modern environments like Shark Bay, Australia, and the Exuma Islands in the Bahamas. The reason this is such a crucial discovery is because Stromatolites are the earliest geological indicators of life on Earth. Further, these biotic structures were instrumental in the Great <keyword id="20075793" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="oxygen" source="keywords">Oxygen</keyword>ation Event over two billion years ago, introducing oxygen into the atmosphere and transforming the planet's habitability. The oxygenation event initially wiped out many of their competitors, allowing stromatolites to dominate the biosphere during the Archean eon, when life had just begun to bud. However, as life forms adapted to the oxygen-rich atmosphere, stromatolites began to decline, only reappearing in the geological record after mass extinctions or in extreme environments. "The bacteria are always around, but they don't usually get the chance to make stromatolites," explains study author Volker Vahrenkamp. "They are largely outcompeted by corals." <cmsannotation type="cmsannotation" annotationid="An accidental discovery" comment="subhead" text="An accidental discovery">An accidental discovery</cmsannotation> The Sheybarah Island’s several hundred stromatolites formations were accidentally found when the researchers were studying tepee structures — massive salt crust domes visible from space. Some stromatolites were well-developed and textbook-perfect, while others were more sheet-like with low relief. This diversity intrigued the researchers, hinting that they may be at different stages of development. The island's harsh environment — characterised by extreme temperature swings, alternating wet and dry conditions, and nutrient-poor waters — mirrors the conditions of the Bahamas, suggesting that similar stromatolite fields might exist elsewhere on the Al Wajh carbonate platform. However, the small size of stromatolites, about 15 cm across, makes them challenging to detect without close inspection. Understanding stromatolite growth rates remains a significant scientific challenge because dating these structures is complicated by the presence of two indistinguishable carbonate components: the newly microbe-precipitated material and environmental carbonate sand. To overcome this, Vahrenkamp's team conducts monthly monitoring, documenting any visual changes. Future plans include experimental attempts to cultivate stromatolites in aquarium settings, aiming to unlock the secrets of their growth and development. The rediscovery of stromatolites on Sheybarah Island not only provides a unique glimpse into Earth’s ancient history but also offers potential insights into the search for extraterrestrial life, particularly on Mars. By studying stromatolites, which thrived before Earth had an oxygenated atmosphere, scientists can develop models to recognise potential signs of life on other planets. The findings of this research have been published in <keyword id="6438753" type="General" weightage="20" keywordseo="geology" source="Orion">Geology</keyword> and can be accessed <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1130/G51793.1" data-type="tilCustomLink">here</a>.

The first life forms on Earth might have come from Saudi Arabia, scientists find new proof

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A new species of snake in Peru has been named after Harrison Ford.</li><li>Ford, who has also inspired the name of an ant and a spider, called the discovery "humbling."</li></ul>Harrison Ford has added a new species of snake to his collection of namesakes.The copper-and-black reptile was discovered in Peru's Andes mountains and christened Tachymenoides harrisonfordi, per <a href="https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/harrison-ford-snakes-indiana-jones-new-species-1235566363/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Hollywood Reporter</a>.Although Ford described the discovery as "humbling," he also said he was confused by the name."These scientists keep naming critters after me, but it's always the ones that terrify children," he told THR. "I don't understand. I spend my free time cross-stitching. I sing lullabies to my basil plants, so they won't fear the night."Ford previously inspired the name of an ant, <a href="https://www.antweb.org/description.do?rank=species&amp;genus=Pheidole&amp;name=harrisonfordi&amp;project=worldants" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Pheidole harrisonfordi</a>, which is primarily found in Honduras, and a Californian spider, <a href="https://wsc.nmbe.ch/species/5848/Calponia_harrisonfordi" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Calponia harrisonfordi</a>.The 81-year-old actor has long been an advocate for environmentalism and serves as vice chair of Conservation International. But he's best known for his roles as Han Solo in "Star Wars" and the titular hero in "Indiana Jones," who shares Ford's distaste for slithery creatures."Snakes. Why'd it have to be snakes?" he famously grumbles in "Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark."<div type="image" title="harrison ford indiana jones" height="2035" width="4070" msid="102782030" hostid="261" sizebytes="241334"></div>"In all seriousness, this discovery is humbling," <a href="https://www.conservation.org/blog/had-to-be-snake-new-species-gets-famous-name" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ford said in a statement</a>. "It's a reminder that there's still so much to learn about our wild world — and that humans are one small part of an impossibly vast biosphere. On this planet, all fates are intertwined, and right now, one million species are teetering on the edge of oblivion. We have an existential mandate to mend our broken relationship with nature and protect the places that sustain life."He added: "The snake's got eyes you can drown in, and he spends most of the day sunning himself by a pool of dirty water — we probably would've been friends in the early '60s."The discovery was led by biology professor Edgar Lehr of Illinois Wesleyan University, according to Conservation International.Scientists from Peru and the US teamed up for the trek into Peru's Otishi National Park, where they found just one male snake of the Tachymenoides harrisonfordi variety, sunbathing in the little-explored grasslands.Despite encountering danger on their mission — including a near-encounter with narco-traffickers in the region known as "Peru's cocaine valley" — Lehr told Conservation International that it was all worth it."Discovering new species, including Harrison Ford's snake, is always worth it," he said.

Harrison Ford doesn't get why scientists are naming animals that 'terrify children' after him: 'I spend my free time cross-stitching'

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Antimatter engines could be humanity's ticket to interstellar travel. </li><li>When antimatter particles come in contact with regular matter, it produces loads of energy. </li></ul><a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/business-leaders-space-travel-ethical-decisions-experts-2021-7">Interstellar travel</a> is only something humanity has achieved in science fiction — like Star Trek's USS Enterprise, which used antimatter engines to travel across star systems.But antimatter isn't just a sci-fi trope. <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cern-antimatter-factory-creates-most-explosive-material-photos-2023-4">Antimatter really exists.</a>Elon Musk has called antimatter power "<a target="_blank" href="https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1706232706818769397">the ticket for interstellar journeys,</a>" and physicists like Ryan Weed are exploring how to harness it.<a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/most-valuable-substances-by-weight-2014-9">Antimatter is made</a> up of particles almost exactly like regular matter but with opposite electric charge. That means when antimatter contacts regular matter, they both annihilate and can produce enormous amounts of energy."Annihilation of antimatter and matter converts mass directly into energy," Weed, cofounder and CEO of Positron Dynamics, a company working to develop an antimatter propulsion system, told Business Insider.Just <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cern-antimatter-factory-creates-most-explosive-material-photos-2023-4">one gram of antimatter</a> could generate an explosion equivalent to a nuclear bomb. It's that kind of energy, some say, that could boldly take us where no one has gone before at record speed.<h2>Space travel at record speed</h2><div type="image" title="alpha proxima centauri stars eso" height="1299" width="1280" msid="107921386" hostid="261"></div>The benefit of all that energy is that it can be used to either accelerate or decelerate spacecraft at break-neck speeds.For example, let's take a trip to our <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/super-earth-orbits-proxima-centauri-closest-star-to-sun-2020-1">nearest star system, Proxima</a>, about 4.2 light years away.An antimatter engine could theoretically accelerate a spacecraft at 1g (9.8 meters per second squared) getting us to Proxima in just five years, Weed said <a target="_blank" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBebWBjpWIQ">in 2016</a>. That's 8,000 times faster than it would take Voyager 1 — one of the fastest spacecraft in history — to travel about half the distance, according to <a target="_blank" href="https://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/did-you-know/">NASA</a>.Even within our own solar system, an antimatter-powered spacecraft could reach Pluto in 3.5 weeks compared to the 9.5 years it took <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-new-horizons-spacecraft-completes-ultima-thule-mission-2018-12">NASA's New Horizons</a> probe to arrive, Weed said.<h2>Why we don't have antimatter engines</h2><div type="image" title="Instrument used in the capture of antimatter at CERN." height="413" width="623" msid="107921390" hostid="261"></div>The reason we don't have antimatter engines, despite their tremendous capabilities, comes down to cost, not tech.Gerald Jackson, an accelerator physicist who worked on antimatter projects at Fermilab, told <a target="_blank" href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/brucedorminey/2016/02/24/antimatter-space-propulsion-possible-within-a-decade-say-physicists/?sh=ad089d858493">Forbes in 2016</a> that with enough funding, we could have an antimatter spacecraft prototype within a decade.The basic technology is there. Physicists armed with the world's most <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/cern-large-hadron-collider-explained-2015-6">powerful particle accelerators</a> have made antiprotons and antihydrogen atoms.The issue is that this type of antimatter is incredibly expensive to make. It's considered the <a target="_blank" href="https://theconversation.com/space-rocks-and-asteroid-dust-are-pricey-but-these-arent-the-most-expensive-materials-used-in-science-214614">most expensive substance</a> on Earth. Jackson gave us an idea of just how much an antimatter machine would cost to build and maintain.Jackson is the founder, president, and CEO of Hbar Technologies, which is working on a concept for an antimatter <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/first-solar-sail-spacecraft-orbiting-earth-powered-by-sunlight-2019-7">space sail</a> to decelerate spacecraft traveling 1% to 10% the speed of light — a useful design for entering into orbit around a distant star, planet, or moon that you want to study.Jackson said he's designed an asymmetric proton collider that could produce <a target="_blank" href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0094576522001163?via%3Dihub">20 grams of antimatter</a> per year."For a 10-kilogram scientific package traveling at 2% of the speed of light, 35 grams of antimatter is needed to decelerate the spacecraft down and inject it into orbit around Proxima Centauri," Jackson told BI.He said it would take $8 billion to build a solar power plant for the enormous energy needs of antimatter production and cost $670 million per year to operate.The idea is just that, for now. "There is currently no <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/space-tech-sector-is-taking-off-thanks-to-ai-2023-12">serious funding</a> for advanced space propulsion concepts," Jackson said.However, there are other ways to produce antimatter. That's where Weed focused his work.Weed's concept involves positrons, the antimatter version of an electron.<h2>A different kind of antimatter engine</h2><div type="image" title="NASA animation shows magnets separating antimatter particles from regular matter." height="495" width="876" msid="107921392" hostid="261"></div>Positrons "are several thousand times lighter than antiprotons and don't pack quite as much punch when annihilating," Weed said.The advantage, however, is that they occur naturally and don't need a giant accelerator and billions of dollars to make.Weed's antimatter propulsion system is designed to use krypton-79 — a form of the element krypton that naturally emits <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/alpha-magnetic-spectrometer-experiment-dark-matter-2013-4">positrons</a>.The engine system would first gather high-energy <a target="_blank" href="https://nets2020.ornl.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/TRACK-4-Full-submission.pdf#page=51">positrons from krypton-79</a> and then direct them toward a layer of regular matter, producing annihilation energy. That energy would then trigger a powerful fusion reaction to generate thrust for the spacecraft.While positrons may be less expensive to obtain than more powerful forms of antimatter, they are difficult to harness because they are highly energetic and need to be slowed down, or "moderated." So building a prototype to test in space is still beyond reach, cost-wise, Weed said.Such is the case for all antimatter <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-big-falcon-rocket-spaceship-booster-design-elon-musk-2018-9">propulsion designs</a>. Over the decades, scientists have proposed dozens of concepts, none of which have come to fruition.For example, in 1953, Austrian physicist Eugen Sänger proposed a "photon rocket" that would run on positron annihilation energy. And since the '80s, there's been talk of thermal antimatter engines, which would use antimatter to heat liquid, gas, or plasma to provide thrust."It's not sci-fi, but we aren't going to see it flying until there is a significant 'mission-pull,'" Weed said about his engine concept.<h2>Can it work?</h2><div type="image" title="Artists impression of antimatter particles." height="660" width="1024" msid="107921397" hostid="261"></div>To build Weed's concept at the scale of a starship, "the devil's in the engineering details," Paul M. Sutter, an astrophysicist and host of "Ask a Spaceman" podcast, told BI."We're talking about a device that harnesses truly enormous amounts of energy, requiring exquisite balance and control," Sutter said.In general, that enormous energy is another obstacle holding us back from revolutionizing space travel. Because during testing, "if something goes wrong, these are big explosions," Steve Howe, a physicist who worked on antimatter concepts with NASA in the '90s, told BI."So we need an ability to test high energy density systems somewhere that don't threaten the biosphere, but still allow us to develop them," said Howe, who thinks the moon would make a good testing base. "And if something goes wrong, you melted a piece of the moon," and not Earth, he added.Antimatter tends to bring out the imagination in everyone who works on them. "But, we need crazy but plausible ideas to make it further into space, so it's worth looking into," Sutter said.Weed echoes the sentiment, saying "until there is a compelling reason to get to the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-new-horizons-spacecraft-sends-back-kuiper-belt-images-2018-2">Kuiper Belt</a>, the Solar Gravitational Lens, or Alpha Centauri really quickly — or perhaps we are trying to return large <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/asteroid-mining-startup-has-booked-its-first-test-mission-spacex-2022-6">asteroids for mining</a> — progress will continue to be slow in this area."

How antimatter engines could fly humans to other stars in just a few years

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Staff at a conservation group captured the birth of 15 Burmese peacock softshell turtle hatchlings.</li><li>The rare species, found only in Myanmar, is one of the world's most endangered freshwater turtles.</li></ul>Fifteen tiny turtles in Myanmar just made waves across the scientific community after their birth was captured on camera by conservation workers in what appears to be the first official record of Burmese peacock softshell turtle hatchlings.The rare species, named for bright orange spots on its shell reminiscent of peacock feathers, are found only in Myanmar and are highly sought after in East Asian food markets. In addition to being <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/species-of-exotic-turtles-have-been-poached-to-near-extinction-2023-4">overharvested as an ingredient</a> for stews and soups in the region, the quality of the turtles' environment has degraded over time, diminishing the resources available for the previously abundant species. <div type="image" title="Burmese peacock softshell turtle hatchlings" height="3024" width="4032" msid="101264399" hostid="261" sizebytes="696706"></div>As a result, Burmese peacock softshell turtles are one of the world's most endangered freshwater turtle species. According to The Zoological Society of London's <a href="https://www.edgeofexistence.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Edge of Existence Programme</a>, they are at significant risk of extinction.Local volunteers, in partnership with the conservation group Fauna &amp; Flora International, have been working since mid-2022 to increase the population of the turtles near Indawgyi, one of the largest inland lakes in Southeast Asia.This year, designated "turtle guardians" discovered five nesting sites for the <a href="https://www.insider.com/endangered-animals-us-2018-5">endangered creatures</a> around Indawgyi, fenced them off to prevent them from being damaged, and set up regular patrols to monitor the nests, according to a statement from Fauna &amp; Flora International.<div type="image" title="Adult Burmese peacock softshell turtle (Nilssonia formosa) being released, Indawgyi." height="1065" width="1600" msid="101264400" hostid="261" sizebytes="80894"></div>According to the conservation group, the <a href="https://www.insider.com/two-headed-baby-turtle-south-carolina-2019-8">video of the turtles hatching</a> is the first known recording of the species born in the wild. After Fauna &amp; Flora staff took measurements and the turtles' weight, they were released back to the wild near Indawgyi.<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/24/climate/tiny-bundles-of-hope-critically-endangered-turtles-hatch-in-myanmar.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The New York Times</a> reported the discovery is "exquisitely thrilling," according to Fredric Janzen, a biology professor at Michigan State University specializing in softshell turtles but not involved in the project.The discovery comes several years after Fauna &amp; Flora worked to establish Indawgyi as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2017 to support the home of more than 160 bird species — some of which are globally threatened — as well as turtles, mammals, reptiles, primates, and fish endemic to the area."Working with local communities will be key to our success in addressing the threats to the critically endangered Burmese peacock softshell turtle. We are already seeing the results of collaborating with communities to manage and protect key nesting sites and habitat," said Zau Lunn, Programme Manager, Freshwater and Marine, Fauna &amp; Flora.Lunn added: "Our work to save this species, which is unique to Myanmar, has only just begun, but the discovery and release of these hatchlings is a great start and a wonderful example of how we can work together to save nature."

First ever video captures the adorable birth of critically endangered Burmese peacock softshell turtle hatchlings

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A shark was found in the Caribbean — thousands of miles away from its usual habitat in the Arctic.</li><li>The Greenland shark, which has a lifespan of 250 – 500 years, surprised researchers in Belize.</li></ul>Biologists were stunned to find a mysterious cold-water shark thousands of miles away from its natural habitat, <a href="https://mashable.com/article/greenland-shark-discovered-caribbean" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according to a recent marine study</a>. A Greenland shark — the longest-living vertebrate on Earth — was discovered in the tropical Caribbean Sea.Researchers were tagging and temporarily catching tiger sharks off the coast of Belize when they encountered the mysterious shark, said a paper recently <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00227-022-04090-3" target="_blank" title="(opens in a new window)" rel="noopener">published</a> in the science journal Marine Biology.After setting a line in Belize's protected Glover's Reef Atoll while monitoring and researching tiger sharks, the biologists returned to find their line had moved several miles away from the coral reef into waters as deep as 2,000 feet.When they retrieved their scientific catch, they were astonished to find the ancient Greenland shark. One of the researchers, Hector Daniel Martinez, remarked, "It looked very, very old," emphasizing its deep-sea habitat.Initially, the scientists suspected it might be a sixgill shark, a dominant deep-sea predator, but upon photographing the rarely-seen animal, they confirmed its identity as "most likely" a Greenland shark."We suddenly saw a very slow-moving, sluggish creature under the surface of the water," Devanshi Kasana, a biologist and Ph.D. candidate at Florida International University's Predator Ecology and Conservation lab, <a href="https://mashable.com/article/greenland-shark-discovered-caribbean" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Mashable reported</a>. "It looked like something that would exist in prehistoric times."Greenland sharks are the longest-living vertebrates on Earth, with an astonishing lifespan of 250 — 500 years, <a href="https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/greenland-shark.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according to the National Ocean Service</a>.The sharks live thousands of feet underwater in pitch darkness and are rarely seen or photographed, and little detail is known of their incredibly long lives. In the depths of the water, they grow, move, and age slowly. Their energy-conserving, slow-paced lifestyle is an essential adaptation to the nutrient-scarce deep sea.Finding a Greenland shark near a coral reef off Belize was unexpected but plausible. These obscure sharks thrive in the Arctic's deep seas and could inhabit other deep ocean regions, including the Caribbean.The nearby reef's slope plunges to depths of up to 9,500 feet, offering a cold and dark environment suited for Greenland sharks.The discovery raises the question of whether this particular Greenland shark migrated to the Caribbean from Arctic waters or if it spent much of its life in the depths of tropical waters of the region.It remains unanswered, but there is a strong likelihood that more of these enigmatic creatures roam the dark depths of the Caribbean, hidden from our sight. "I doubt it's the only one," Demian Chapman, director of Sharks and Rays Conservation Research at Mote Marine Laboratory and Aquarium, told Mashable.<h2>"They have to wait more than 100 years to get laid"</h2>The deep seas remain largely unexplored, and the discovery of this Arctic shark serves as a reminder that the ocean and its biosphere are much unknown.<a href="http://news.fullerton.edu/2020su/Greenland-shark-research.aspx" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A 2020 study</a> determined via genetic analysis that there are two geographically separate populations of Greenland sharks: One group swims near Canada's Baffin Basin, above the Arctic Circle, while the other occupies waters of the North Atlantic Ocean between Nova Scotia and Svalbard, near Norway.Greenland sharks are primarily scavengers, eating everything (dead or alive), including <a href="https://geerg.ca/greenland-shark/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fish, seals, polar bears, and whales</a>.Some can grow to 24 feet long and weigh up to 2,645 pounds (1,200 kilograms), even though they grow only up to 0.4 inches (1 centimeter) annually. <a href="https://science.sciencemag.org/content/353/6300/702.full" target="_blank" rel="noopener">According to a 2016 study</a>, Greenland sharks don't reach sexual maturity until they are at least 134 years old. "They have to wait more than 100 years to get laid — I'm sure they're not happy about that," Julius Nielsen, a coauthor of that study, <a href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2100823-worlds-oldest-vertebrate-is-a-shark-that-may-live-for-500-years/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told New Scientist</a> in 2016.

A mysterious Arctic shark that can live for 500 years got lost and ended up swimming in the balmy waters of the Caribbean, scientists say

<ul class="summary-list"><li><keyword id="11895441" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="space" source="Orion">Space</keyword> travel is crucial in driving people to protect planet Earth, according to Jane Poynter. </li><li>Poynter is the founder of a <keyword id="11937988" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="space-tourism" source="Orion">space tourism</keyword> company aiming to send people to space via a balloon.</li></ul>The amount of <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/business-leaders-space-travel-ethical-decisions-experts-2021-7?r=US&amp;IR=T">space travel</a> that takes place outside of governmental organizations is growing. In recent years, business tycoons like <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/watch-spacex-launch-first-civilian-crew-dragon-spaceship-2021-9?r=US&amp;IR=T">Elon Musk</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/bezos-blue-origin-space-fragile-earth-overview-effect-astronauts-emotions-2021-7?r=US&amp;IR=T">Jeff Bezos</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/watch-live-virgin-galactic-fly-richard-branson-to-space-2021-7?r=US&amp;IR=T">Richard Branson</a> have not only opened the skies to professional astronauts but to ordinary citizens too. This has helped make space tourism a new reality for the world. Space travel may have its downsides, such as the harmful effects it has on the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/emissions-from-space-tourism-could-quickly-add-up-2021-7?r=US&amp;IR=T">atmosphere</a>. But it also has long-term environmental benefits, says Jane Poynter, the founder of a space tourism company, <keyword id="11909522" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="space-perspective" source="Orion">Space Perspective</keyword>, and a former technical advisor to <keyword id="11897862" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="elon-musk" source="Orion">Elon Musk</keyword>.Poynter told Insider that what seems to get lost in the discussion is "the incredible secondary effect of having so many people go to space." After speaking with astronauts who have traveled to space, Poynter said: "They will all tell you that seeing Earth in space is a truly profound experience." She added: "They go to space thinking they're going to discover the unknown and what they really discover is the Earth. These astronauts subsequently get more involved in social-environmental causes." Poynter's remarks precisely align with Bezos' sentiments during <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-launches-to-space-blue-origin-first-human-spaceflight-2021-7">his roughly 10-minute spaceflight</a> last year. "Every astronaut, everybody who's been up into space, they say that it changes them," Bezos said during a press conference after the launch. "And they're kind of amazed and awestruck by the Earth and its beauty, but also by its fragility. And I can vouch for that."This, according to David Yaden, a psychiatry and behavioral sciences research fellow at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, is called "the overview effect." For Bezos, flying to space ignited a drive to protect Earth. Particularly, he said, it reinforced his commitment to climate change and the environment. It was a similar experience for Poynter, after she spent two years in <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/biosphere-two-pictures-tour-2018-4?r=US&amp;IR=T">Biosphere 2</a>, an artificial, airtight ecosystem designed to test the viability of maintaining human life in outer space. <div type="image" title="Biosphere 2 housed a crew of eight people for two years." height="750" width="1000" msid="90031076" hostid="261"></div>The experiment took place in 1991 in which eight people shut themselves inside a 3.14-acre bubble-like facility until 1993. "My experience in Biosphere 2 changed my perception of the world forever and it actually changed my behavior," Poynter said. "Before I went into the Biosphere, I wasn't terribly interested in environmental and social causes. Afterwards? Completely," she added. According to Poynter, if you think about hundreds, thousands, and eventually millions of people going to space and having that experience of seeing Earth in this context, it's going to have a "ripple effect through our society."Since her time in Bisophere 2, Poynter said she's been on a journey to find a way to take all civilians on planet Earth to space to have that "quintessential astronaut experience." On this journey, Poynter said she was focused on ways to keep life thriving in what is otherwise a very hostile environment of outer space. It was at that point in time when she was approached by Musk who had similar visions alongside sending people to Mars. Poynter believes it is extremely important to take people to space, "especially now." This is because we, as species, are not motivated enough to protect Earth armed with facts alone, when it comes to the environmental problems we face today. "We know we are living unsustainably on this planet, we know we have issues with our climate, but it's not driving behavior change on the scale that it needs to happen," she said. She added: "I don't expect every single human that we take to space to be completely transformed, but there are going to be a fairly large percentage of people that we take that will be moved to action."

Space travel is critical because it will drive people to protect the Earth, says the founder of a spaceflight company and ex-advisor to Elon Musk

<ul class="summary-list"><li>Matt Lucas spoke about his short-lived tenure hosting "The Great British Baking Show."</li><li>The comedian said on <a href="https://open.spotify.com/show/2ec0P3FkqqB9OH84M2bg1S" target="_blank" rel="noopener">"Deeney Talks"</a> that he "never saw the show beforehand" and was "not a baker." </li></ul><a href="https://www.insider.com/great-british-baking-show-mexican-week-reactions-netflix-2022-10">Matt Lucas</a> has spoken about his short-lived tenure hosting "<a href="https://www.insider.com/winners-great-british-baking-show-bake-off-where-are-they-now" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Great British Baking Show."</a>Appearing on British soccer star Troy Deeney's podcast, <a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/matt-lucas/id1565144261?i=1000600776380" target="_blank" rel="noopener">"Deeney Talks"</a> on Tuesday, Lucas admitted that prior to taking over as cohost from Sandi Toksvig in 2020, he "never saw the show" and was "not a baker." The 48-year-old comedian and actor presented <a href="https://www.insider.com/what-the-bake-off-application-is-really-like" target="_blank" rel="noopener">three seasons</a> of the show alongside Noel Fielding before announcing his departure from the beloved baking competition series in December 2022."They were just looking for a new host and it just came at a time where I had been living in LA for seven years and I just sold my house there and I was thinking about coming back and spending more time with my family and friends," he said. The "Doctor Who" actor said that he was told that the production company behind the show, Love Productions, was particularly interested in him and wanted him to check out the show before saying no."So I watched a couple of episodes and thought, 'This is great but I don't want to host a TV show but thank you, I'm really grateful,'" said Lucas.Even though he was convinced he wasn't going to audition for the show, Lucas said his agent encouraged him to at least take a meeting since the production company and the series' British broadcaster Channel 4 commission a lot of other shows as well.<div type="image" title="&quot;The Great British Baking Show.&quot;" height="2033" width="2711" msid="98215097" hostid="261" sizebytes="615876"></div>"I went along with it, I got the job and then I was like, 'Oh, OK,'" he said. "It just kind of happened, it was exactly when the pandemic was."Lucas said that it was the "perfect pandemic job," seemingly because it came at a time when a lot of production companies in the UK were either <a href="https://www.insider.com/coronavirus-movies-tv-sets-shutdowns-hollywood-2020-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">pausing or completely scrapping projects</a> in light of the strict filming restrictions and the danger of catching COVID-19. During the 2020 and 2021 seasons of the <a href="https://www.insider.com/former-contestants-on-great-british-baking-show-diversity-issues" target="_blank" rel="noopener">baking competition series</a>, the presenters, judges, and contestants famously formed a self-contained biosphere by completely booking out a countryside hotel over the course of the show's filming. "It was great, and I did it, and it was fun," the "Bridesmaids" actor continued. "I had a great time with Noel and I had a great time with Paul and Prue and the bakers were lovely and I learned a bit about baking,""I did 51 episodes and now it's time for someone else to do it," he said.Announcing his exit on <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cl1fTAzIEdj/?hl=en" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Instagram</a>, Lucas said that filming "The Great British Baking Show" had been "a delicious experience and I can't imagine a more fun way of spending my summers."He added: "I wish whoever takes over all the very best and I can't wait to tune into the next series without already knowing who won!"Lucas's replacement for the upcoming series has not yet been announced, although showrunner and executive producer<a href="https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-media-podcast-with-matt-deegan/id883205650" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> Richard McKerrow</a> has shared that the show's new cohost will "look after the bakers during their experience and be curious about what they're baking and to do it with charm, humor, and kindness."

'The Great British Baking Show' host Matt Lucas had never watched the show before joining but it was the 'perfect pandemic job'

<ul class="summary-list"><li>A resort in the Maldives is looking for someone to live and work on the island as a bookseller.</li><li>The role pays $750 a month, but the person would live for free in a villa that costs $36,500 a night, TimeOut reports.</li></ul>A resort in the Maldives is looking for someone who loves reading and social media to run its bookstore.The pop-up bookshop in the Soneva Fushi resort has a job opening for a <a href="https://www.barefootbookseller.com/home">"barefoot bookseller"</a> to live and work for a year starting in October.<a href="https://www.timeout.com/news/dream-job-alert-you-could-live-in-a-luxury-villa-in-the-maldives-for-free-for-an-entire-year-080322">According to TimeOut</a>, the job pays $750 a month, but the bookseller will live in a villa for free that usually costs $36,500 a night.To be considered, <a href="https://www.barefootbookseller.com/apply">the job application says</a> "excellent written &amp; verbal English skills" are required. Interested people should have previous experience with bookselling or publishing, love reading, and know a lot about classical and modern literature. On the other side of the job as the "barefoot bookseller," applicants should know how to follow social media trends and run social pages. The bookseller will be responsible for running the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/barefootbooksellers/">"Barefoot Bookseller" social media</a> pages to share their experience as a bookseller in the Maldives.Day to day, the bookseller will run the bookshop's sales and be responsible for guest experiences like creative writing classes and lectures.The "barefoot bookseller" project <a href="https://www.barefootbookseller.com/home">started in 2018</a>, when Ultimate Library brought the pop-up bookshop to the Soneva Fushi resort. Since then, there have been six booksellers. Soneva Fushi is located on Kunfunadhoo island which <a href="https://www.timeout.com/news/dream-job-alert-you-could-live-in-a-luxury-villa-in-the-maldives-for-free-for-an-entire-year-080322">TimeOut reported</a> has a "no shoes, no news," rule, lending the "barefoot" part of the "barefoot bookseller" title. Kunfunadhoo is located in the Baa Atoll, a biosphere reserve <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/laurenjadehill/2019/07/31/why-you-need-to-visit-the-baa-atoll-now/?sh=68fa5f275ec2">recognized by UNESCO</a>.Job applications are due on August 13, and the company said it's only accepting and responding to applications written in English.

A resort in the Maldives is looking for a 'barefoot bookseller' to work there for a year — and stay for free in a villa that reportedly costs $36,500 a night

You Searched For "biosphere" and got 11 results

The many marvels of Satpura Biosphere Reserve in Madhya Pradesh

Kavita Majumdar

The haunting true story of a man who spent 2 years in a self-contained 'Biosphere' and nearly fell apart

Bill Gifford, "Spring Chicken"

The haunting true story of a man who spent two years in a self-contained 'Biosphere' and nearly fell apart

Bill Gifford, "Spring Chicken"

The first life forms on Earth might have come from Saudi Arabia, scientists find new proof

Ankush Banerjee

Harrison Ford doesn't get why scientists are naming animals that 'terrify children' after him: 'I spend my free time cross-stitching'

Callie Ahlgrim

How antimatter engines could fly humans to other stars in just a few years

Adam Barnes

First ever video captures the adorable birth of critically endangered Burmese peacock softshell turtle hatchlings

Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert

A mysterious Arctic shark that can live for 500 years got lost and ended up swimming in the balmy waters of the Caribbean, scientists say

Rebecca Rommen

Space travel is critical because it will drive people to protect the Earth, says the founder of a spaceflight company and ex-advisor to Elon Musk

Zahra Tayeb

'The Great British Baking Show' host Matt Lucas had never watched the show before joining but it was the 'perfect pandemic job'

Eve Crosbie

A resort in the Maldives is looking for a 'barefoot bookseller' to work there for a year — and stay for free in a villa that reportedly costs $36,500 a night

Britney Nguyen

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