A nonprofit founded by two Israeli professors has raised enough money to purchase and protect two plots of land. This is My Earth (TiME), created in 2015 by Professor Uri Shanas of the University of Haifa-Oranim and Professor Alon Tal from Tel Aviv University, secured funds for the fifth year in a row to buy parcels of land where rare animals and plants struggle to survive. Clarke’s weaver is an endangered species. (Photo by Colin Jackson)Because the organization completed its fundraising campaign to purchase 500 acres in the Serra Bonita mountain range of Brazil’s Atlantic forest before the end of…
Author: zenger.news
BINYAMINA, Israel — People with chronic diseases are advised to stay home during the Covid-19 pandemic because they are at risk for complications should they become infected. However, that makes it difficult to get essential medical monitoring for their existing conditions. And while Israel has emerged as a leader in telemedicine, it’s easier to check heart rate and blood pressure remotely than to evaluate from a distance what is happening in the brain. But that is changing, thanks to an FDA-approved solution from Israeli startup Montfort. Using sensors already built into smartphones, Montfort’s EncephaLog app conducts digital neurological tests for conditions…
Two Israeli universities have launched homebuilt “social” nanosatellites with the goal of making outer-space research affordable and accessible to all educational institutions. “The technology we are testing was done already by NASA but cost millions. We are trying to do the same with a fraction of the budget — around $1,000, not including shipment and launch costs,” says master’s student Rony Ronen. Ronenleads the microcontroller and radio communication subsystems group for Ariel University’s first nanosatellite (CubeSat), SATLLA-1. Ariel University’s SATLLA-1 nanosatellite. (NASA)Built from scratch by a multidisciplinary team of students in the research lab of Prof. Boaz Ben-Moshe, SATLLA-1 launched…
Texel, the Netherlands – Divers have discovered cannons and military equipment from a sunken British Royal Navy warship – the HMS Apollo – that sank in 1799 during the French Revolutionary Wars. The divers found numerous other treasures, some of which still bear insignia of the British government near the uninhabited island of Razende Bol, off the coast of Texel in the Netherlands. Sonar scan of the HMS Apollo. (RCE-Periplus/Newsflash).“In the coming years, I expect many more objects will come out of the ship,” said Michiel Bartels, an archaeologist, in a statement. “Various cannons and other military equipment were rediscovered from…
Bursa, Turkey — Parents of a little boy with a rare congenital disease causing his hand and foot to grow at twice the rate of the rest of his body have appealed for help to fund his treatment. Mum Nurgul Tiryaki, 21, and dad Sinan Tiryaki, 27, say they are desperate to help their 18-month-old son Mahmut Efe Tiryaki but are hampered by the lack of money. The family, which lives in the northwestern Turkish city of Bursa, have been told that little Efe has Klippel-Trenaunay Syndrome (KTS). It is a rare congenital medical condition in which capillary malfunction characterized…
Landes, France — Storm Bella has caused havoc in the Landes region of southwest France with roads being cut off due to severe flooding and hundreds of homes still without power. Aerial footage released by the Landes Fire Department showed the excessive damage caused in the area. The firefighters had conducted 436 interventions in 110 municipalities and 39 evacuations till Tuesday. According to Meteo France stations, Landes received a month and a half of rain in just three days. The commune Dax recorded 158 millimeters of rain while the capital town of Mont-de-Marsan had received 107 millimeters till Jan 6.…
MUMBAI, India — Radio producer Shirshendu Banerjee woke up to a notification on WhatsApp one day in the second week of January, informing him about changes to the messaging app’s privacy policy, and that there would be deeper integration between WhatsApp and its parent company, Facebook. Banerjee accepted WhatsApp’s new terms. On the same day, he noticed a conversation regarding concerns about the new policy on a WhatsApp group of Indian podcast enthusiasts. “A lot of us are feeling sensitive about these changes as we have no idea how our data is being used,” he told Zenger News. “On the podcasting…
ISLAMABAD — A new directive from the Taliban emir asks the group’s Islamic fundamentalist fighters to marry only once, even though Islam allows Muslim men to be married to multiple women at any one time. A letter dated Jan. 9 bearing the seal of the office of Taliban emir Mullah Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada issues the new guidelines, asking the fighters in Afghanistan not to marry more than once without a valid reason. “It is allowed in Islam to marry more than once,” the letter states. “And it is also mentioned in the holy book Quran.” But the letter says that with…
KOLKATA, India — Not long ago, Mrs. Bector was an unknown name on Dalal Street, the financial district in Mumbai. But, among food connoisseurs, she was famous as the ice cream lady. A resounding entry into the bourses has made the ice cream lady a known name in the financial circuits as well. Traders in the grey market are willing to pay a 70 percent premium to buy a share of the company started by Rajni Bector in her backyard decades ago. A homemaker, Bector started baking as a hobby in the northern state of Punjab in the early 1970s. She operated from…
Madrid, Spain — A physically challenged air passenger was arrested on Sunday for carrying cocaine after he landed at a Spanish airport. The 55-year-old Spanish man, who was not identified, was arrested after his plane arrived at the Madrid Barajas International Airport from the Dominican Republic. The contraband was hidden in his wheelchair. The suspect had a criminal background for fraud, illegal immigration and fake documentation, said a police spokesperson. National police officers were checking a plane from the Dominican Republic when they got suspicious about the passenger. The suspect was being taken in a wheelchair to an area, where…