"Zombie" Ants Bite at High Noon, Then Die 

By Ker Than 

On National Geographic 

This was a very creepy article. This article is about how a fungus parasite can take control over an ants brain. This fungus only lives in the forests of Thailand. For these "zombified" ants to survive they need to be in conditions of 95 percent humidity and temperatures between 20 and 30 degrees celsius. I will explain the "zombification" process of these ants. 

The spore of the fungus goes on to the head of an ant. Then it slowly grows. In this stage it is technically half fungi half ant. After nine days the ant becomes fully "zombified" and the fungus takes over the nervous system. For the next few days the ant will seem to have very random and insignificant behavior. After a few days the fungus tells the ant to clamp down on a leaf. The fungus cells in the ant cause fibers to detach. This causes the ants jaws to be virtually unlockable. After this stage the fungus then kills the ant using poison. According to the research, they tend to commonly kill the ant at high noon. Why this time, is still unclear. The spores of the fungus spread down off the head and on the leaf, for other ants to "find"....

I chose this article because it was very similar to my other current event about a cyclops shark. I know this article is valid because it is on national geographic which is a widely used website to find out about current events. Also this article is on livescience.com. I found this article interesting because I thought it was creepy how fungi could take control of an animals brain. While I was reading this article I was wondering if this fungi could take control of other animal brains. I was also wondering if it could take control of us! Something that I wish to hear more information about is why they tend to kill at high noon. I think this is a well written because it goes into depth about how and why this mysterious fungus takes control of Thai ants.   

Current Events 11/22/11

Giant, Dinosaur-Age Islands Found in Deep Sea? 

by Richard Lovett 

on National Geographic 

I read a mind-blowing article about how some scientist have found a dinosaur-age island. This "island" is actually two microcontinents. These two microcontinents are 1,000 miles off the coast of Perth, Australia and is about the size of West Virginia.   Scientists think that these micro-continents actually were part of India and Australia when they were connected to Gondwana. Gondwana was a super continent during the time of the dinosaurs. Something interesting that scientists and researchers found on these microcontinents was that it was not covered in basalt rock. Basalt rock is what is usually found on the seabed, instead they found granite, gneiss, and sandstone. All three of these are found on land, not in water. In the chunks of these materials they pulled up, they found several fossils in them. They found a few fossil fragments of bivalves. Bivalves are mollusks, this was important to researchers because they know bivalves live in shallow water not deep water, or land. These findings are some of the little evidence of Gondwana's existence. Gondwana's breaking apart is still a big mystery.  

I chose this article because in Humanities we have been talking about prehistoric times and I thought it would be a cool mix of science and humanities. I know this article is valid because it is on National Geographic which is a trusted website. It was also on digg.com, which I have read good articles on before. I found it very interesting how big land masses or microcontinents can be completely submerged over time. It is also kind of frightening because  our modern day continents might experience this. I am also intrigued by the fact that the we know so little about stuff like Godwana despite our fancy and complex technology that we have. Personally I think it is fascinating how fossils can tell us about something so long ago. Fossils can help us also make inferences. For example, they said that they found bivalves. This tells them that maybe these microcontinents had shallow waters.

Current Events 11/15/11

"Lost" Fortresses of Sahara Revealed by Satellites 

By James Owen 

On National Geographic News 

This very intriguing article is about how we have been able to take more satellite pictures of a super advanced ancient African tribe called the Garamantes. They were around the time 1 A.D. to about 500 A.D and lived in the Sahara Desert in Libya. This tribe had walled farms, towns, and villages. They also had a very intricate irrigation system that would be able to make desert areas, like the Sahara Desert, have green oases in the desert. Since it was hard to grow crops in the Sahara Desert they used these irrigation systems to be able to grow more and wider range of crops and plants. They had a very good writing system and metallurgy. They were also very advanced in architecture and engineering and were able to build bigger walls and buildings. Even though we think we know a lot about them we actually don't. We have no idea how they suddenly disappeared. Scientists think that they ran out of water supply and all of them died. 

I chose this article because from the title it looked very interesting since it was about a very mysterious civilization. I know this article is valid because it is from a very trusted website. Also it was on other websites like the "Heritage Daily" and other news corporation websites.  It is fascinating how ancient civilizations can be very advanced in technology for certain reasons. I thought it was intriguing how they used the irrigation systems to grow grass in desert areas to use for crops. They built underground canals so the water would not evaporate since they were in a desert. It must have been difficult to build this because it took an estimated 77,000 man-years to build this. This proves how smart civilizations can come up with very odd ways to do stuff that is hard to do, like plant crops in a desert. It was difficult to discover these sites because the researchers ran out of money, the sites were in the middle of the Sahara Desert and the war in Libya stopped the researchers for a while.

Current Events 11/7/11

Cyclops Shark Joins Ranks of Cryptic Creatures 

By Stephanie Pappas

On Scientific American 

In this very unique article I found out a lot of interesting and wild facts. This article is about how a fisherman on the coast of California found a shark in it's mother's womb. But this was no ordinary baby. Instead of having two eyes it had one big eye in the middle of it's head.This find was proven authentic because shark researchers examined the shark and was able to prove its authenticity. Other scientific finds like this have been found like a girl that had no nose and one eye in the middle and also a cat that had a similar condition. In the article the author also talked about other acclaimed finds like a kraken's lair and yeti hair and tracks. Over time a lot of finds have been proven a hoax, but some finds that have been proven may be behind the old myths and tales.

I chose this article because the title popped out and made me very interested, you usually do not here about cycloptic sharks. Scientific American is atrusted website. I also know this article is valid because the same story was also on National Geographic. I think this article proves that many myths and legends about creatures could be actually based on a real abnormal creature. This proves that even though these myths and legends are exaggerated, they might actually have a scientific side to them. A good example of this is the rare giant squid. These very rare squids might of attacked a ship and caused people to tell the story of a giant man-eating squid. I learned quite a lot from this article. I found this article very interesting and different. I thought it was kind of creepy that animals could actually have one eye and other deformed body parts. I learned that all of these myth and legends from all over different places and time, could possibly be true. 

Current Events 11/1/11

WHY ANTS NEVER LOSE THEIR WAY 

By Meera Dolasia 

On DOGO News 

In this interesting article it talked about how recent research shows fascinating facts about ants. A Brazilian Scientist named Jandira Oliveira, has done some more research about ants with a group of other scientists. They found out that ants have a small magnet in their antenna. They think the magnet is basically like a built in GPS system. The "GPS" works by tracking magnetic minerals in the soil and also using the magnetic field in the north pole. In the article the author also talked about how some species of ants in deserts navigate their way around by looking at the position of the sun. 

I chose this article because it is very similar to what we are talking about in class. This article talks about how ants use this GPS technique to find food and navigate, and we are talking about survival instincts in class. This article is reliable and valid because they talk about it on National Geographic. Also DOGO News is a trusted website. I learned a few new things about ants from this article. I learned about the magnet technique and I also learned that desert ants use the sun to navigate, which I found very intriguing.