According to the museum ‘it is a finding that asks many questions and has confounded some of the accepted theories about the history of early Christianity in Ireland.’ Its significance may be huge, as the papyrus could be evidence of the first ‘tangible connection between early Irish Christianity and the Middle Eastern Coptic Church’, the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria.

The manuscript known as the Faddan More Psalter was unearthed four years ago, on July 20th 2006, from a peat bog at Faddan More near the town of Birr in County Tipperary. The fragmented illuminated vellum manuscript is encased in an Egyptian style leather binding and dates to the eighth century. According to Raghnall O Floinn, head of collections at the Museum, it represents one of the top ten archaeological discoveries in Ireland. It was the first manuscript to be found in a water-logged state in a bog and its discovery posed unprecedented difficulties for the Conservation Department of the Museum.

About fifteen percent of the pages of the psalms, which are written in Latin, are believed to have survived. It is thought that the manuscript was produced in an Irish monastery and later placed in the Egyptian style cover. O Floinn explained that ‘the cover could have had several lives before it ended up basically as a folder for the manuscript in the bog. It could have travelled from a library somewhere in Egypt to the Holy Land or to Constantinople or Rome and then to Ireland.’

Irish scientists have analysed and restored the manuscript for the past four years. It was only as the restoration was completed this summer that the fragments of papyrus were discovered in the binding. However, many questions remain unanswered. The psalm’s leather binding appears to have come from Egypt; but did the papyrus come with the cover or was it added later?

O Floinn hopes that ‘the imperfections in the hide may allow us to confirm the leather is Egyptian. We are trying to track down if there somebody who can tell us if this is possible. That is the next step.’

The Fadden More Psalter is due to go on display in the National Museum of Ireland in June 2011. For further information, read the press release on the website of the National Museum of Ireland.

AHN, Paris, France, 3 November 2010

While sorting through hundreds of galaxy images as part of the Galaxy Zoo citizen science project two years ago, Dutch schoolteacher and volunteer astronomer Hanny van Arkel stumbled upon a strange-looking object that baffled professional astronomers.

Two years later, a team led by Yale University researchers has discovered that the unique object represents a snapshot in time that reveals surprising clues about the life cycle of black holes.

In a new study, the team has confirmed that the unusual object, known as Hanny's Voorwerp (Hanny's "object" in Dutch), is a large cloud of glowing gas illuminated by the light from a quasar-an extremely energetic galaxy with a supermassive black hole at its center.

The twist, described online in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, is that the quasar lighting up the gas has since burned out almost entirely, even though the light it emitted in the past continues to travel through space, illuminating the gas cloud and producing a sort of "light echo" of the dead quasar.

"This system really is like the Rosetta Stone of quasars," said Yale astronomer Kevin Schawinski, a co-founder of Galaxy Zoo and lead author of the study. "The amazing thing is that if it wasn't for the Voorwerp being illuminated nearby, the galaxy never would have piqued anyone's interest."

The team calculated that the light from the dead quasar, which is the nearest known galaxy to have hosted a quasar, took up to 70,000 years to travel through space and illuminate the Voorwerp-meaning the quasar must have shut down sometime within the past 70,000 years.

Until now, it was assumed that supermassive black holes took millions of years to die down after reaching their peak energy output.

However, the Voorwerp suggests that the supermassive black holes that fuel quasars shut down much more quickly than previously thought.

"This has huge implications for our understanding of how galaxies and black holes co-evolve," Schawinski said.

"The time scale on which quasars shut down their prodigious energy output is almost entirely unknown," said Meg Urry, director of the Yale Center for Astronomy and Astrophysics and a co-author of the paper.

"That's why the Voorwerp is such an intriguing-and potentially critical-case study for understanding the end of black hole growth in quasars."

Although the galaxy no longer shines brightly in X-ray light as a quasar, it is still radiating at radio wavelengths. Whether this radio jet played a role in shutting down the central black hole is just one of several possibilities Schawinski and the team will investigate next.

"We've solved the mystery of the Voorwerp," he said. "But this discovery has raised a whole bunch of new questions."

During last year’s harsh winter there were gloomy predictions that waterside wildlife would be devastated. However to the surprise of experts there has been a mini-renaissance in the birds and animals that depend on rivers, streams and ponds. It was feared that kingfishers, in particular, would starve to death as water froze over. But a survey of rivers and canals logged more than three times as many this year as last, proving the ‘river royalty’ to be more than a match for the weather.

The kingfisher is not the only species riding out the storm, with numbers of newts, toads and otters also on the rise. British Waterways, which conducts the annual poll, had feared that coldest winter for more than 30 years had taken a devastating toll on wildlife. Unable to break through the ice on ponds and streams to get food, thousands of kingfishers and other water birds were expected to starve to death. Last summer’s floods also washed away many nests. But against the odds there were 596 sightings this year, a 217 per cent rise on 2009.

Numbers of otters started to climb after harmful pesticides were banned in the 1970s and it became an offence to kill the animals intentionally. They are also benefiting from a clean-up of rivers, which has allowed fish to return. The resurgence of the otter is good news for the water vole. Once a common sight, it became the fastest declining native mammal thanks to pollution, loss of habitat and predatory mink.

The number of mink spotted this year dropped by more than a third, probably due to the rise of the otter. Mark Robinson, British Waterways national ecology manager, said: ‘The decrease in the number of mink could be related to the recent increase in number of otters, as our native otters out-compete mink for territory. Water voles often make a tasty meal for mink.’ He added: ‘Following last winter’s harsh weather we were concerned that some species, and in particular kingfishers, could suffer. I’m delighted we’ve had so many records of kingfishers this year. ‘The results really show the resilience of nature and the importance of our canal and river network in providing vital shelter and food for a wide variety of wildlife.’

The more than 2,000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls -- one of the greatest archaeological discoveries of all time -- will soon be available for free, widespread access on the Internet, thanks to combined efforts from Google and the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Already, Google Books offered excerpts of the Dead Sea Scrolls reprinted in English, including "Scrolls From the Dead Sea," an exhibition by the Library of Congress that ran over two decades ago, as well as several other academic versions.

Sebastian Scheiner, AP The Israel Antiquities Authority and Google announced Tuesday that they are joining forces to bring the Dead Sea Scrolls online. The new project, however, will widen access to the historical treasure -- addressing the limited use issue that scholars have long complained of -- and ensure that the original 30,000 fragments are preserved. In addition, the exact copies will be searchable and available in their original languages: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. An English translation will be available at first, with additional translations to follow.

Both the general public and scholars can expect the scrolls to be available online within the coming months. "Anyone in his office or on his couch will be able to click and see any scroll fragment or manuscript that they would like," antiquities official Pnina Shor told The Associated Press.

The Dead Sea Scrolls are considered an immensely important artifact because they contain segments of the Hebrew Bible and have played a critical role in explaining the origins of Judaism and Christianity. Watch this video to learn more: Google is already considered the bookworm of search engines, based on the company's efforts to count all of the world's books as step one in an even more ambitious plan to digitize all the world's books. (Although not everyone is buying it.) Not to be outdone, Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities recently discovered a fifth-dynasty tomb near the Great Pyramids of Giza. Too bad they can't upload that to the Internet (yet).

Daily Mail, 20 September 2010

The ozone layer is no longer disappearing and could be back to full strength by the middle of this century, UN scientists have confirmed.

The phasing out of nearly 100 substances once used in products like refrigerators and aerosols has stopped the ozone layer being depleted further, although it is not yet increasing, according to a new United Nations report released last week. 

And it claimed that international efforts to protect the ozone layer has averted millions of cases of skin cancer worldwide.

The ozone layer over Antarctica in September 1980, left, and how it looked this weekend. The dark blue indicates extremely low levels of ozone. Scientists expect it to return to pre-1980 levels by 2073

The ozone layer outside the polar regions is projected to recover to pre-1980 levels by 2048, although the annual springtime ozone hole over the Antarctic is not expected to recover until 2073.

Ozone in the stratosphere is important because it absorbs some of the Sun’s dangerous ultraviolet radiation.

The report, published jointly by UNEP and the UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is the first comprehensive update in four years on the Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer and the Montreal Protocol phasing out chemicals which accelerate both ozone layer damage and climate change.

'It (the Protocol) has protected the stratospheric ozone layer from much higher levels of depletion by phasing out production and consumption of ozone depleting substances,' said the report.

The report was written and reviewed by 300 scientists and launched on the UN International Day for the Preservation of the Ozone Layer.

Given that many substances that deplete the ozone layer are also potent greenhouse gases, the Montreal Protocol ‘provided substantial co-benefits by reducing climate change,’ it added.

In 2010, reductions of ozone-depleting substances as a result of the Protocol, were five times larger than those targeted by the Kyoto Protocol, the greenhouse emissions reduction treaty.

'Without the Montreal Protocol and its associated Vienna Convention atmospheric levels of ozone-depleting substances could have increased tenfold by 2050,' Mr Steiner said.

‘This in turn could have led to up to 20 million more cases of skin cancer and 130 million more cases of eye cataracts, not to speak of damage to human immune systems, wildlife and agriculture.'

Daily Mail, 15th September 2010

Say 'aaargh'... This is the nail-biting moment a pretty young woman dices with death in the jaws of a killer crocodile.

Smiling sweetly the 27-year-old does the unthinkable as she places her head inside the toothy mouth of the deadly predator.

Using a small piece of wood Thai Tueanjhai Pimsan gently urges the crocodile to open its mouth before putting her head inside for up to 30 SECONDS.

Amazingly because of the trust between her and the reptile - nicknamed Snappy by keepers - Tueanjhai emerges totally unscathed.

The pair perform the incredible act every week at the Sriracha Zoo, near Bangkok, Thailand.

Despite his placid reaction to Tueanjhai, Snappy is still a 100 percent meat eater consuming four whole chickens at feeding time.

Tueanhjai said: "I am never scared when I do this because I have been doing it for many years and never had an accident.

"I suppose it is a crazy thing to do most people might think, but for me it is my job and I like it.

"I have been working here for six years and my husband Wanchai also works here too.

"When I am working with the crocodiles we have a lot of trust and respect for them, and over time you begin to learn how they move and they learn about you too."  

Photographer Tony Hanscomb, 50, an ex-pat who now lives in Thailand, caught the amazing crocodile act on camera.

He said: "I have never seen anything like this before and I was flabbergasted the first time I saw it.

"It really is incredible how Tueanjhai and this fearsome reptile can work together."

Daily Mail, 15th September 2010

Betty Griffin lost touch with her nine brothers and sisters after all of them were adopted by new families when they were orphaned in 1936.

The family had lived together in Stoke Heath, Shropshire, but when their parents Annie-Ellen and Arthur Easterlow died, the couple's children went on to live separate lives.

Many grew up completely unaware they came from such a large family, and although some tried to keep in touch with each other, eventually they all lost contact.

Now Betty Griffin, 81, has been reunited with her brother John Tarber, 77, and sister June Raybould, 75, for the first time in more than seven decades.

John and June had spoken previously on the phone, but this week was the first time John was finally able to meet her and Betty in person.

John only discovered he was adopted at the age of 23 when he received a letter from a solicitor telling him he was entitled to £7 from his late father?s estate.

The resulting confusion meant John eventually found out the truth. It later emerged that the solicitor had waited until the youngest child June?s 21st birthday to alert the family.

But John didn't find out about his large family of six sisters and three brothers until last year.

John, who now lives in the Isle of Man, said: 'The one word I spoke was 'wow'. I think June and I were on the phone for an hour and a half when she first got in touch.

'When we first met I was really quite tense. I didn't know what to expect. Even when I was on the plane flying over I was wondering what exactly I was doing. My son even told me to make sure it wasn't a scam.'

Over the years other family members have staged two reunions as they managed to locate missing relatives.

Now they are just one sibling away from knowing what happened to the whole family.

The last piece in the family jigsaw is their brother Harold Clarke - who would be 76 if he is still alive.