Category Archives: Mars

VANCOUVER, Wash., July 20, 2021 /PRNewswire/ --Mars Veterinary Health North America, part of family-owned company Mars, Incorporated, today announced a $500 million multi-year commitment to create career advancement opportunities, increase workforce diversity, and offer differentiated pay and benefits by 2025. As the nation's largest provider of veterinary care, Mars Veterinary Health is committed to advancing the profession for the health and wellbeing of people, pets, and the planet.

Mars Veterinary Health is a family of more than 2,000 premier veterinary healthcare and diagnostic providers nationwide, including Banfield Pet Hospital, BluePearl Specialty and Emergency Hospitals, VCA Animal Hospitals and Antech Diagnostics in the United States.An employer of more than 55,000 Associates in the U.S. alone, Mars Veterinary Health North America is setting the industry standard for competitive and differentiated rewards and development designed to support Associate health & wellbeing, advance career growth, and promote workforce diversity.

"At Mars Veterinary Health, we recognize that to make A BETTER WORLD FOR PETS, we need to make a better world for the people who care for them," said Doug Drew, President of Mars Veterinary Health North America. "Recognizing the evolving needs of the veterinary profession and after considering feedback from more than 10,000 Associates, we are investing in programs that further enhance their health and wellbeing. While there is more work to do, we're optimistic about the meaningful impact these changes will have in our Associates' lives and look forward to collaborating with the veterinary profession for the health and wellbeing of people, pets, and the planet."

Key aspects of the investment and commitments by 2025 include:

"As a veterinarian who is deeply invested in advancing the profession and addressing key challenges such as diversity, mental health and wellbeing, and veterinary professional shortages it is facing we hope these commitments give Associates the support and peace of mind they need to advance their careers and provide high-quality care to pets," said Dr. Jennifer Welser, Chief Medical Officer, Mars Veterinary Health. "But more than that, we hope our actions communicate to veterinary professionals, and especially our Associates, that their voices are heard and valued as we continue to invest in programs and initiatives that are intended to directly impact their lives for the better."

These investments are part of a multi-year roadmap that aim to create thriving careers, workforce diversity, and sustainable change within the veterinary profession.

About Mars Veterinary HealthMars Veterinary Health is a global division within Mars Petcare more than 65,000 Associates strong dedicated to delivering high-quality pet healthcare to further its collective Purpose: A BETTER WORLD FOR PETS. Mars Veterinary Health's network operates more than 2,500 veterinary clinics around the world, putting pets, people, and the planet first. The Mars Veterinary Health network includes Associates at AniCura, Antech, Asia Veterinary Diagnostics, Banfield, BluePearl, Linnaeus, Mount Pleasant, VCA, VES, and VSH who demonstrate compassion and expertise by providing care to more than 25 million pets each year. Learn more at marsveterinary.com. Press seeking additional information are invited to contact [emailprotected].

SOURCE Mars Veterinary Health

https://www.marsveterinary.com

Originally posted here:

Mars Veterinary Health North America announces $500 million multi-year investment to promote thriving careers, workforce diversity, and sustainable...

Billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos aren't the only first-time astronauts who are thrilled to be going to space.

Millennial mom, TikTok star and citizen astronaut Kellie Gerardi is headed to space with Branson's Virgin Galactic, and she's "just beyond excited for astronaut training."

Gerardi got one step closer to fulfilling a "life-long dream" of heading to space when Virgin Galactic announced in June that the 32-year-old Palantir Technologies project manager and amateur bioastronautics researcher will be on an as yet un-named upcoming search mission aboard one of the private space company's spacecraft.

But perhaps the most exciting part of the trip is that Gerardi is not a professional scientist, and she hopes her trip of a lifetime will help pave the way for a wider range of amateur space enthusiasts, with diverse backgrounds, to reach space.

Gerard, who lives in Florida with her husband, Steven Baumruk, and their 3-year-old daughter, Delta, works on a customer support team at Peter Thiel's software company. She's also a popular science influencer who regularly posts space- and STEM-focused content on social media, including to her nearly half a million followers on TikTok.

Gerardi says she never really considered being an astronaut herself until she started participating in public science campaigns over the past decade.

In 2012, Gerardi started working as a media specialist with the Commercial Spaceflight Federation, an industry association that lobbies on behalf of commercial spaceflight companies. From 2014 to 2020, Gerardi worked on business development for aerospace company Masten Space Systems.

During that time, Gerardi joined the Explorer's Club, which "promotes the scientific exploration of land, sea, air, and space," according to its website, in 2012. She decided to join after she met club president Richard Garriott, a millionaire video game developer who had previously paid $30 million to go to space for 12 days in 2008. Gerardi called that her "aha moment" in which she realized that the commercial spaceflight industry was opening the door for a wider range of people to go to space.

In 2014, Gerardi also got to spend two months as a crewmember at the Mars Desert Research Station, a prototype laboratory in Utah that simulates conditions on Mars, after she was accepted to the Mars One mission, a venture that had planned to send the first people to Mars by 2025 but was eventually shut down. (The mission had been criticized by scientists for not being feasible, and the venture filed for bankruptcy in 2019.)

In 2017, she joined the International Institute of Astronautical Sciences (IIAS) to study bioastronautics in her free time and be a part of an IIAS program that trains private citizens for spaceflight and space research. Gerardi completed an IIAS program called "Project PoSSUM," which offers courses (starting at $4,000 for a five-day in-person course, plus three weeks worth of webinars) that include lessons on topics such as bioastronautics and atmospheric studies, as well as training for space conditions in high altitude flights (where trainees experience weightlessness and even practice moving around in a spacesuit).

IIAS is now funding Gerardi's spaceflight and her training. The institute's overarching mission is in promoting the democratization of space by training private citizens to go to space and conduct research there. Through IIAS, Gerardi has already been on multiple parabolic, or gravity-free, research flights, which simulate weightless space conditions for mere seconds at a time by flying at high altitudes. She will conduct experiments on behalf of IIAS on the Virgin Galactic space flight, like donning the Astroskin Bio-monitor system, a "smart undergarment" that monitors astronauts' vital signs.

Gerardi revealed her big space flight news on TikTok with a series of short videos, including one with Delta that notes fewer than 100 women have been in space, which has been viewed over 1.6 million times.

After Virgin Galactic and IIAS announced her flight in June, Gerardi spoke to CNBC Make It about her longtime dream of going to space and why her ultimate goal is to pave the way for more private citizens, like herself especially women to reach the stars.

CNBC Make It: As a woman and mom, how cool has it been to share this exciting news with your daughter, Delta?

Kellie Gerardi: The most rewarding part is definitely telling our 3 year old daughter, Delta.

I get emotional when I think about what it means for her to watch her mommy become an astronaut, because it's meaningful. And, in her little mind, she thinks flying to space is just another thing that moms do.

And that's just so cool.

How did the Virgin Galactic opportunity come about?

I've been working with IIAS on microgravity [the state of weightlessness in space] research, astronautics research.... And I've also been really heavily involved in outreach and engagement for the organization, especially towards young women.

Enabling access to space for this research community has been a long-time goal of IIAS. So, it really is an exciting honor to be entrusted with the opportunity to just show how all researchers can use the environment of space and these human-tended research fights on platforms like Virgin Galactic as a laboratory to benefit all of humanity.

When did you officially find out you were going to space and what was that like?

It formalized just a few weeks before the announcement. And, you know, it's euphoria, right?

And, I definitely don't want to downplay my excitement; I was and remain overwhelmed with excitement. But, I do feel like sometimes people expect me to say something like, 'I never could have dreamed of this.'

But, that would not be really true. The reality is, I have dreamed of this exact opportunity every single day in detail for a decade, or so. It's like this has always been living in the back of my head, rent-free.

The flight will be around 75 minutes, in total, and you'll have just a few minutes of weightlessness to conduct your experiments before returning to Earth's atmosphere. How do you plan to use that time?

I'm going to be choreographing every single second [of the flight] while I'm here on Earth. I'm going to make sure that every single second is accounted for to maximize the science returns, but also to account for the reality of this being the most exciting moment of my life.

I want to plan for the reality that I'm going to be overwhelmed in the best way. So, I really want to bookmark 30 seconds to a minute, specifically, to just look out the window and digest the fact that I'm in space and the profundity of that moment.

What sort of training or preparation do you need to complete before you can go on this spaceflight?

"I like to joke that I'm upping my dose of 'Vitamin G' [aka g-force].

So, I'll choreograph all of my movements in the cabin and I'll practice that choreography on a series of aerobatic, or High-G flights [where she'll be subjected to high levels of gravitational force] and parabolic [zero-gravity] flights in a test flight suit that is an exact replica of what I'll be wearing in space.

Back in 2014, you were training to potentially go to Mars, and you were a crewmember at the Mars Desert Research Station. Is going to Mars still a goal for you?

I think I'm location agnostic when it comes to space.

Going to Mars is one of those like, 'Oh, gosh, I just wanted to be involved in the societal conversation.' And I really wanted to, like, remove the giggle factor, of the fact that we can send humans to live and work on Mars. That is something within our engineering capability as a society right now.

For me, if I had the opportunity ever to go, yeah, in a heartbeat. But if I had to answer the interview question of where I see myself in five years, it's not necessarily on Mars.

How important do you think it is that you share your journey, and your love of science and space, with your many social media followers? And, did it bother you at all when some headlines about your spaceflight referred to you only as a "TikTok star"?

I think some people would expect that I would feel, I don't know, undermined by that or that it was reductionist somehow. But I feel the opposite.

I'm actually super humbled to have the attention shined on the fact that I have been able to harness some of these social media platforms to really help evangelize space exploration...That's exactly what I set out to do on social media.

I set out to influence the way that people think about space exploration and the type of people that they associate with space exploration.

Gerardi's June interview with CNBC Make It has been edited for length and clarity.

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How SpaceX, social media and the 'worm' helped NASA become cool again

Meet the billionaire high school dropout commanding SpaceX's all-civilian mission

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How millennial mom and TikTok influencer Kellie Gerardi became a 'citizen astronaut' who's going to space with Virgin Galactic - CNBC

The UAE is marking one year since it launched the Arab worlds first mission to Mars.

On July 20, 2020, the Hope probe was carried to space aboard the H-IIA rocket from Tanegashima Space Centre in Japan.

After a solo journey of 493 million kilometres in seven months, the spacecraft successfully entered the orbit of Mars on February 9.

Since then, fascinating images of the planet and scientific readings of the Martian atmosphere have been made public.

Weve had quite a lot of wiggle room in addition to our planned parameters, and our confidence in our spacecraft has gone from strength to strength, said Omran Sharaf, project director of the mission at the Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre.

We were able to cut the number of trajectory correction manoeuvres, perform additional observations during our flight to Mars and now have added a whole area of scientific study to the mission that I can only describe as a bonus. It has been a very busy year indeed for Hope.

The spacecraft will spend two years capturing data that scientists can use to better understand the atmospheric conditions on Mars and how the Red Planet dried out.

The National highlights some milestones since the launch of the UAEs mission to Mars.

On February 14, the first image of Mars taken by Hope was released.

It marked the spacecrafts arrival at the Red Planet.

The first image of Mars taken by the UAE's Hope probe. Courtesy Emirates Mars Mission

Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, shared the image on social media, describing its transmission as "a defining moment in our history".

He said that the image "marks the UAE joining advanced nations involved in space exploration. We hope this mission will lead to new discoveries about Mars which will benefit humanity."

The photo showed the solar systems largest volcano, Olympus Mons, at sunrise.

Hopes Emirates exploration imager a high-resolution camera took the image 24,700 kilometres above the Martian surface.

The mission began capturing scientific data before its science phase began.

Hope is using an infrared spectrometer, exploration imager and ultraviolet spectrometer to record data from the planets atmosphere.

On May 24, all three instruments observed the planet to provide a snapshot of the Arabia Terra region.

The infrared spectrometer mapped the temperature of the atmosphere and how it warmed up over the course of the morning.

The Hope probe's ultraviolet spectrometer captured the distribution of atomic oxygen in the atmosphere of Mars. Courtesy Emirates Mars Mission

The exploration imager captured many photos. One in ultraviolet showed bright dust on the planet's surface, and an image captured in red band highlighted the thin water-ice clouds.

The ultraviolet spectrometer captured scientific readings that showed distribution of oxygen atoms in the planets upper atmosphere.

Only Nasas Viking and Mariner missions in the 1970s, and more recently the Sofia and Maven missions, have captured presence of atomic oxygen in Martian atmosphere before.

By studying distribution of oxygen, scientists can learn more about atmospheric erosion and how other gases escape the planet.

On June 30, rare images of the discrete aurora on Mars night side atmosphere taken by the Hope probe were released.

The data would help scientists understand the interaction of the atmosphere with solar particles.

Mars aurorae are an area of intense interest to the global scientific community, and their study has tremendous potential to challenge, expand and deepen our understanding of Mars atmosphere and its interaction with the planet and with solar energies, said Hessa Al Matroushi, the missions science lead.

We were hopeful that Emus [ultraviolet spectrometer] could make a contribution in this area but we now know with absolute certainty that contribution is going to be ground-breaking.

On the Hope probe's way to Mars, an additional scientific objective was assigned to the mission.

The ultraviolet spectrometer was activated to cross-calibrate with the Phebus spectrometer aboard the European Space Agencys BepiColombo spacecraft, which was on its way to Mercury.

Hope captured data on interplanetary dust, which is believed to have played an important role in the formation of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago.

The findings will be combined with data collected by BepiColombo.

All data observed so far will be released to the public in October.

Researchers will be able to use the data to study the atmospheric dynamics of Mars and understand why gases are escaping from its atmosphere, making it impossible for the planet to host life.

The spacecraft will continue observing the planet's upper and lower atmosphere until 2023.

Mr Sharaf previously told The National that this mission has paved the way for more deep space exploration missions by the UAE.

This platform is definitely the foundation for UAEs future outer space exploration missions that will be developed, he said.

The main core of the spacecraft, system architecture, design and knowledge are some things that can definitely be re-used. Hopefully, there will be some innovation added to it but, basically, this is the foundation.

An artist's impression of the UAE's lunar rover called Rashid. (Mbrsc)

Updated: July 20th 2021, 5:54 PM

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

3rdODI, Sunday, April 14

4thODI, Tuesday, April 16

UAE squad:Mohammed Naveed (captain), Rohan Mustafa, Ashfaq Ahmed, Shaiman Anwar, Mohammed Usman, CP Rizwan, Chirag Suri, Mohammed Boota, Ghulam Shabber, Sultan Ahmed, Imran Haider, Amir Hayat, Zahoor Khan, Qadeer Ahmed

Zimbabwe v UAE, ODI series

All matches at the Harare Sports Club:

1stODI, Wednesday, April 10

2ndODI, Friday, April 12

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A year of Hope: How UAE's Mars mission has crossed science's frontiers - The National

LAS VEGAS - : Exterior photo of the New York New York Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada. ... [+] (Photo by Doubble Troubble/Getty Images)

Last weekend, Friday July 9thand Saturday 10th 2021 marked the full tilt resumption of ticketed entertainment in Las Vegas.High demand events were everywhere, but tickets were gone.I was in town for the World Ticket Conference, where ticket markets, suppliers, and vendors were all stunned to see the degree to which demand had reappeared after a Covid-19 shutdown which had lasted nearly sixteen months.

Normally, this is a pretty well connected group who knows how to get into an event.However, demand was so high that folks who run mega-million ticket dollar companies were scrambling to find any ticket for Chappelle, Garth, Bruno or even Cirque du Soleil.The town was full, and everyone wanted to be in one of the rooms where the party was going off.

Bruno Mars (Photo by Christopher Polk/Getty Images for NARAS)

Bruno Mars returned to the Park MGM theater with his full production show: lasers, fireworks, confetti, and a surprisingly tight production which emphasized the quality of his band, the ways in which they joined Bruno in alternately hyping the crowd, participating in the dancing or building the layers of sound behind Bruno who brought all of his many skills back to a public audience.This was a pop music concert with all the whistles and bells, and it was exactly what the audience had missed while sequestered at home during the pandemic.Bruno Mars was in top form, with multiple solo dancing sequences which were spotlight highlights of his show in addition to his journey through the deep playlist of hits he has created over the years.

Comedian Dave Chappelle (Photo by Sean Rayford/Getty Images)

Dave Chappelle and Joe Rogan played the MGM Grand Arena on both Thursday and Friday night.Here, more than 12,000 people showed up for a comedy show where tickets seemed to start at $250.00 and move quickly up from there.Both Bruno and Chappelle/Rogan used Yonder pouches to lock away fans telephones.Ive seen that before at smaller shows, but 12,000 people is a lot of folks to try to get into or out of an arena and the added time to lock and unlock pouches adds uncertainty to the timeline.However, it was refreshing to see people inside the venues interacting, rather spiraling every deeper into whichever siren calls flowed there way from deep inside some rabbit hole on the internet.It was also a credit to talent as an event which was insanely expensive had a production value that can be summed as this:a bare stage in the center of the floor with a stool and a microphone, some video screens so people on all sides of the stage could see and a DJ.Id be willing the bet the cost of the Las Vegas Metropolitan police shutting down all access points to the MGM Grand Arena with police cars and two trucks was at least as much as the entire production set used by Chappelle and Rogan.

It was Saturday night, the 10thof July which had me most curious.That night, Bruno played to his usual full house at the Park Theater.There were at least 6,300 in the room.Just across the access road at the T-Mobile arena was the UFC 264 McGregor-Poirier fight with Donald Trump among the 19,000 or so in attendance.Across the street the MGM Grand Arena held a viewing party for those who were unable to attend the UFC fight in person. And, diagonally across the 15 freeway Garth Brooks was playing to 67,000 at Allegiant stadium, new home to the Raiders football team.

As an experienced attendee at live events, this seemed like a disaster in the making.Even the freeway signs for the two days flashed plan your route because so many people were going to be moving about in such a small area, in addition to everything else which was taking place in a sold out Las Vegas.But, Las Vegas has one job, and thats keeping the people who frequent the strip area happy.Garth started at 7pm, Bruno started at 9 pm, and UFC was called for as early as 3:15pm with the early preliminary fights, then the preliminary fights set for 6:15pm prior to the main event which was to take place at 8pm.

I was then staying South of the main Strip area, with dinner reservations at a favorite sushi restaurant northwest of the Strip.I planned to take an eastern route avoiding the central section of the 15 freeway which ran alongside the core section of Strip casinos.As I left, I turned on Waze to see how it directed me to go.Unbelievably, at 7pm Waze directed me to travel the 15 freeway directly through the heart of the triangle of events, and it was right.Traffic flowed at normal speeds even as we saw lines of cars to the west of the freeway navigating the police presence to enter the Garth concert and traffic to the east of the freeway heading toward UFC and Bruno.

Those who planned traffic management did their job well.By staggering start times for the various major events, the city was able to absorb the movement of people in ways I rarely see.Typically, it only takes one major stadium event to lock up traffic in all directions.Las Vegas has to move people quickly, because time lost in the casinos is money lost.

The diversity of entertainment in the city has always been astonishing.This weekend it was amplified by the ways in which the various entertainers celebrated the return of full scale events.Justin Beiber played a show on Friday night at the Wynn hotels Encore theater.On Saturday he did a 10 song surprise drop-in at the Wynns new Delilah supper club.The night before Dave Chappelle did a drop-by comedy set at Delilah along with his performance to a full house at the MGM Grand Arena.

Hotels were sold out and the city was full.The city was teeming with visitors ready for fun.They didnt mind the hour long taxi lines.They didnt complain about the prices.You were hard pressed to get a dinner reservation anywhere.The laws of statistical probability continued to operate at all the gaming tables.Yet, everyone seemed to be elated to be out and ready for adventure. The world had reopened and everybody wanted to avoid that Dave Attell momentary realization of you shoulda been there.Barring a resurgence of Covid, this year is going to be spectacularly fun.

View post:

Live Events Are Back In Las Vegas. Bruno Mars, Garth Brooks, Dave Chappelle, Justin Beiber And UFC 264 All Sell Out On The Same July Weekend. - Forbes

Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who has dialed down talk of freedom in recent weeks, urged the public to exercise "prudence and respect for other people and the risks that the disease continues to present."

In a reminder of how volatile the situation is, the prime minister was spending "Freedom Day" in quarantine. Johnson and Treasury chief Rishi Sunak are both self-isolating for 10 days after contact with Health Secretary Sajid Javid, who tested positive for COVID-19 on Saturday.

Johnson initially said he would take daily tests instead of self-isolating -- an option not offered to most people -- but U-turned amid widespread public outrage.

The prime minister is among hundreds of thousands of Britons who have been told to quarantine because they have been near someone who tested positive. The situation is causing staff shortages for businesses including restaurants, car manufacturers and public transport.

Globally, the World Health Organization says cases and deaths are climbing after a period of decline, spurred by the delta variant. Like the U.K., Israel and the Netherlands both opened up widely after vaccinating most of their people, but had to reimpose some restrictions after new infection surges. The Dutch prime minister admitted that lifting restrictions too early "was a mistake."

In the U.S., many areas abandoned face coverings when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said fully vaccinated people didn't need to wear them in most settings. Some states and cities are now trying to decide what to do as cases rise again.

British officials have repeatedly expressed confidence that the U.K.'s country's vaccine rollout -- 68.3% of adults, or just over half of the total population, has received two doses -- will keep the threat to public health at bay. But leading international scientists described England's "Freedom Day" as a threat to the whole world, and 1,200 scientists backed a letter to British medical journal The Lancet that criticized the Conservative government's decision.

"I can't think of any realistic good scenario to come out of this strategy, I'm afraid," said Julian Tang, a clinical virologist at the University of Leicester. "I think it's really a degree of how bad it's going to be."

Tang said nightclubs in particular are potent spreading grounds, because they increase close physical contact among a core customer base -- people 18 to 25 -- that has not yet been fully vaccinated.

"That's the perfect mixing vessel for the virus to spread and to even generate new variants," he said.

The government wants nightclubs and other crowded venues to check whether customers have been vaccinated, have a negative test result or have recovered from the disease.

There is no legal requirement for them to do so, however, and most say they won't. Michael Kill, chief executive of the Night Time Industries Association, said many owners see the passes as a huge turn-off for customers and accuse the government of "passing the buck" to businesses.

"Either mandate it or don't mandate it," Kill said. "This is putting an inordinate amount of pressure on us."

Johnson's decision to scrap the legal requirement for face masks in indoor public spaces -- while recommending people keep them on -- has also sowed confusion.

London Mayor Sadiq Khan has said they will remain mandatory on the capital's subways and buses, and some retailers said they would encourage customers to keep their masks on. But many believe implementing such policies will be tricky without the backing of the law.

Psychologist Robert West, who sits on a science panel that advises the government, said telling people to be careful without giving them thorough knowledge of risks was "like putting someone out on the road without having taught them to drive."

The end of restrictions in England is a critical moment in Britain's handling of the pandemic, which has killed more than 128,000 people nationwide, the highest death toll in Europe after Russia. Other parts of the U.K. -- Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland -- are taking slightly more cautious steps out of lockdown and keeping mask requirements for now.

At the Egg nightclub in London, clubber Alex Clark acknowledged feeling "a bit of apprehension and uncertainty."

Fellow clubgoer Kevin Ally felt no such qualms.

"There's zero concern," he said. "The only concern is why we haven't been here for a year and a half. It's been a very long time since we've been out.

"It's good to be back, and we're here to dance."

Original post:

'Freedom Day' Virus Surge Mars UK 'Freedom Day' DTN The Progressive Farmer - DTN The Progressive Farmer

NASA's Curiosity rover might be sitting near a wealth of information that might hint at signs of life on Mars. New Scientist and Space.com note that Caltech researchers have identified six locations for methane "burps" (that is, emissions blips) on the planet, including one just a few dozen miles west southwest from Curiosity. Ideally, the rover could investigate the emissions and determine their true nature.

Curiosity has detected the methane spurts six times since landing on Mars in 2012, but scientists haven't had success locating their sources until now. Europe's Trace Gas Orbiter has also failed to spot methane at atmospheric levels. The Caltech team narrowed down the on-the-ground sources by modelling methane particles as packets and tracing their routes based on historical wind velocity.

The research hasn't yet been peer-reviewed, so we'd take it with a grain of caution. It's also entirely possible that the gas has non-organic origins. Even if that's the case, though, the burps could be tied to geological activity linked to liquid water. Early Mars reportedly held massive amounts of water even if there's no active water at these sources, a close-up study could help illustrate Mars' history.

See the original post:

Curiosity rover might be sitting near microbe 'burps' on Mars - Yahoo Tech

Panelists will discuss the rovers recently started science campaign and groundwork for its next major milestone.

NASA will hold a virtual media briefing at 1 p.m. EDT (10 a.m. PDT) Wednesday, July 21, to discuss early science results from the agencys Perseverance Mars rover and its preparations to collect the first-ever Martian samples for planned return to Earth.

The briefing will originate from NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, where the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover mission is managed. It will air live on NASA Television, the NASA app, and the agencys website and livestream on multiple agency social media platforms, including JPLs YouTube and Facebook channels.

Briefing participants include:

Members of the public also may ask questions on social media during the briefing using #AskNASA.

Perseverance landed in Jezero Crater Feb. 18. The rover team recently wrapped up an initial checkout period, which lasted 90 sols, or Martian days, and which included the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter test flight campaign. Perseverance kicked off the science phase of its mission on June 1.

A key objective for Perseverances mission on Mars is astrobiology, including the search for signs of ancient microbial life. The rover will characterize the planets geology and past climate, pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet, and be the first mission to collect and cache Martian rock and regolith.

Subsequent NASA missions, in cooperation with ESA (European Space Agency), would send spacecraft to Mars to collect these sealed samples from the surface and return them to Earth for in-depth analysis.

The Mars 2020 Perseverance mission is part of NASAs Moon to Mars exploration approach, which includes Artemis missions to the Moon that will help prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet.

JPL is managed for NASA by Caltech in Pasadena, California.

To learn more about Perseverance, visit:

https://nasa.gov/perseverance

and

https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/

News Media Contacts

Karen Fox / Alana JohnsonNASA Headquarters, Washington301-286-6284 / 202-358-1501karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / alana.r.johnson@nasa.gov

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NASA to Brief Early Science From Perseverance Mars Rover NASA's Mars Exploration Program - NASA Mars Exploration

The drama on Mars, in recentmonths, has been like nothing on Earth. The afternoon of February 18th, especially, was a cliffhanger. We knew that Perseverance, the new Martian rover, either had or hadnt made a successful landing, the catch being that we had to wait eleven itchy minutes or so for the result to be beamed across the void. Four days later came a video record of the descentthe umbilical slither of a cable and, at one end, the pop of the parachute, resplendent in red and white. Other delights: the shining heat shield that fell away like a dropped dime; the sky crane, resembling a Lego builders dream, from which the rover was lowered; and the russet dust below, roused from its immemorial nap. Top prizegoes to Ingenuity, the feathery helicopter that has since been deployed from Perseverance, climbing the air that almost isnt there. My only quibble is with the choppers name. It should have been called Astaire.

How can a feature film compete with kicks like that? Just as Mars is littered with the sad corpses of landers that crashed or failed to function (spare a thought for Schiaparelli, the Russian-European craft that slammed into the Martian surface with tremendous elegance, in 2016), so movies about the red planet are a junk yard unto themselves. I could swear that I saw Mission to Mars (2000), starring Gary Sinise and Don Cheadle, as well as Last Days on Mars (2013), with Liev Schreiber, but any memory of them has burned to a cinder; the exceptions have been the loner flicks, such as Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964) or The Martian (2015). The latest contender in this perilous genre is Settlers, which is written and directed by Wyatt Rockefeller. Here is a tale of hardy pioneers, in a little house on a prairie far, far away.

It was Elton John, no stranger to the astronomical, who pointed out that Mars aint the kind of place to raise your kidsa wise maxim, of which Settlers delivers ample proof. At the start, we meet Reza (Jonny Lee Miller) and Ilsa (Sofia Boutella), who live on a Martian farmstead with their young daughter, Remmy, and a piglet, who is, by some distance, the most upbeat figure onscreen. How long the family has lived there is unclear; what we do know is that Reza remembers Earth all too well, and that it was high time to get the hell out. He admits to Remmy that he never saw a whale, or an owl. How about an elephant? she says to him. Nope. Did you see anything? sheasks. He replies, Dogs.

The whole conversation is a model of economy. Why blow half your budget on re-creating a terrestrial dystopia,rife with special effects, when a few words can sketch out the eco-disaster and set our imaginations racing? Much of Settlers relies on a blending of high tech and the humdrum. We meet a robot, but hes a dented metal box with legs, and his name is Steve. Likewise, if the characters wear normal clothes, grow their own vegetables, and breathe without spacesuits or helmets, its because they inhabit a bio-dome; Remmy bumps against its transparent wall, like the fleeing hero at the end of The Truman Show (1998). Everything from the arch of the sky to the scree underfoot has a baked look, tinged with ashy pinks and umber, as if the dome were, in fact, one vast tandoori oven. Were very lucky to have this place, Reza says, adding, Someday, its going to be just like Earth. Uh-oh.

Initially, we assume that the familys hardscrabble existence is a solitary one. Then, one fine day, they are greeted by a message, LEAVE, smeared across the kitchen window in what could be mud, or blood. Just what you need on Marstrouble with the neighbors. Violence flares, death is meted out, and, before we know it, the head of the household is replaced. Reza makes way for Jerry (Ismael Cruz Crdova), who is pale-eyed and heavily armed. Whats truly disturbing is the manner in which Ilsa and Remmy, however sullenly, yield to the force of change, as if they knew it was bound to happen. We begin to realize that Martian civilization, if you can call it that, is governed by a basic Darwinian nastiness. Such is the moral of this movie: travel from one world to another, wielding your advanced technology, and youll wind up going backward.

Settlers has its problems, most of which are structural. Tense and firm at either end, it sags in the middle like a mattress. Also, the grownups are pretty dull and flat, their mood set to maximum glower; luckily, we have Remmyplayed first by Brooklynn Prince and later, as a teen-ager, by Nell Tiger Freeto steer us through the doldrums and to energize the plot. Prince, in particular, who made such an impact in The Florida Project (2017), is equally resolute and uningratiating here, and the severity of Remmys gaze, as she despairs of the adults and stalks off into the wilderness, carries real weight. The fast fade of her innocence shows what an unusual chunk of science fiction Rockefeller has built; stripped down, provocative, and wary of hope, it should be required viewing for Elon Musk, the founder of SpaceX, who has lofty plans for the colonization of Mars. In his words, You want to wake up in the morning and think the future is going to be great. Thanks to Settlers, we have a sharper vision of that future. I can see it now: the elderly Musk, allpassion spent, pottering around his scrubby Martian yard, feeding his swine, chiding the chickens, and wondering where his billions went.

There was a film about the red planet, in 2000, that bore the enterprising title Red Planet. Its leading man was Val Kilmer, who seemed less thanthrilled to be clad as an astronaut. In one scene, his character collapsed to the Martian ground, fighting for breath as his oxygen tank ran dry. Poor Kilmer. Five years earlier, hed had to squeeze into ribbed black rubber as the star of Batman Foreverno picnic, as he reveals in Val, a new documentary about his life and work. You can barely move, Kilmersays of the costume. You also cant hear anything, and after a while people stop talking to you. Movie after movie, cramping his style: it was enough to send a guy batshit.

These days, the cramping is real and very distressing. Kilmer has endured throat cancer, and although, happily, he is recovering, the treatment took a toll on his voice, which is a strangulated husk of what it used to be. In Val, he can address us only after pressing a button on his windpipe. Gone, too, is the comical beauty of the young Kilmer; how wistful it is to watch him as Iceman, in Top Gun (1986), opposite Tom Cruise, and to reflect on their subsequent paths. In the documentary, directed by Leo Scott and Ting Poo, we see Kilmer signing Top Gun posters at Comic-Con before throwing up in a trash can and being hurried away, in a wheelchair, with a towel over his head. Cruise, by contrast, will be returning later this year, scarcely altered, in the Top Gun sequel. We know that time both sullies and preserves, but does Hollywood have to make the discrepancy quite so cruel?

On the other hand, as Kilmer reassures us, I obviously am sounding much worse than I feel. He remains buoyed by an irrepressible candor, and by the fact that, after picking up a video camera at an early age, he has thousands of hours of footage at his disposalmanna to the films directors. We catch glimpses of a childhood in the San Fernando Valley; Kilmer was one of three brothers, who staged home movies of a rare inventiveness. We see clips of his time at Juilliard; two lines of a Hamlet soliloquy, again and again; and a dressing room in a New York theatre, where a couple of pallid striplings turn out to be Kevin Bacon and Sean Penn. We hear of Kilmers marriage to the British actress Joanne Whalley, and we learn that he was served with divorce papers while filming, or attempting to film, The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996) with Marlon Brando. Discretion, Im glad to report, is not the better part of Val. Watching this documentary is like having Dorian Gray give you a guided tour of his attic.

How, then, to account for the melancholy that veils the whole endeavor? Its not just that Kilmer lost his way but that the way, even at the crest of his fame, was never as sure as it might have been. Whether he was unlucky, ill-advised, or as hard to handle as rumor suggested is a quandary left unsolved by Val, which is so engulfed by his presence that the comments of othersfriends or foesare seldom aired. Whatever the case, the roster of his films is oddly glum. If his finest hour was in Heat (1995), thats because Michael Mann was running the show, and one wishes that Kilmer had enjoyed more frequent tutelage under first-rate directors. I guess he thinks so, too; thats why Val includes a snatch of an audition tape that he presented, in person and in vain, to Stanley Kubrick. One final mystery: aside from an ambiguous cameo in True Romance (1993), Kilmer was never cast as Elvis. And yet, with that fallen cherubs mouth, and that all-knowing grin, was he not born to play the King?

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Settlers and Val, Reviewed - The New Yorker

Maybe hold off on that Martian ice fishing trip. Two new studies splash cold water on the idea that potentially habitable lakes of liquid water exist deep under the Red Planets southern polar ice cap.

The possibility of a lake roughly 20 kilometers across was first raised in 2018, when the European Space Agencys Mars Express spacecraft probed the planets southern polar cap with its Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface and Ionosphere Sounding, or MARSIS, instrument. The orbiter detected bright spots on radar measurements, hinting at a large body of liquid water beneath 1.5 kilometers of solid ice that could be an abode to living organisms (SN: 7/25/18). Subsequent work found hints of additional pools surrounding the main lake basin (SN: 9/28/20).

But the planetary science community has always held some skepticism over the lakes existence, which would require some kind of continuous geothermal heating to maintain subglacial conditions (SN: 2/19/19). Below the ice, temperatures average 68 Celsius, far past the freezing point of water, even if the lakes are a brine containing a healthy amount of salt, which lowers waters freezing point. An underground magma pool would be needed to keep the area liquid an unlikely scenario given Mars lack of present-day volcanism.

If its not liquid water, is there something else that could explain the bright radar reflections were seeing? asks planetary scientist Carver Bierson of Arizona State University in Tempe.

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In a study published in the July 16 Geophysical Research Letters, Bierson and colleagues describe a couple other substances that could explain the reflections. Radars reflectivity depends on the electrical conductivity of the material the radar signal moves through. Liquid water has a fairly distinctive radar signature, but examining the electrical properties of both clay minerals and frozen brine revealed those materials could mimic this signal.

Adding weight to the non-lake explanation is a study from an independent team, published in the same issue of Geophysical Research Letters. The initial 2018 watery findings were based on MARSIS data focused on a small section of the southern ice cap, but the instrument has now built up three-dimensional maps of the entire south pole, where hundreds to thousands of additional bright spots appear.

We find them literally all over the region, says planetary scientist Aditya Khuller, also of Arizona State University. These signatures arent unique. We see them in places where we expect it to be really cold.

Creating plausible scenarios to maintain liquid water in all of these locations would be a tough exercise. Both Khuller and Bierson think it is far more likely that MARSIS is pointing to some kind of widespread geophysical process that created minerals or frozen brines.

While previous work had already raised doubts about the lake interpretation, these additional data points might represent the pools death knell. Putting these two papers together with the other existing literature, I would say this puts us at 85 percent confidence that this is not a lake, says Edgard Rivera-Valentn, a planetary scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston who was not involved in either study.

The lakes, if they do exist, would likely be extremely cold and contain as much as 50 percent salt conditions in which no known organisms on Earth can survive. Given that, the pools wouldnt make particularly strong astrobiological targets anyway, Rivera-Valentn says. (SN: 5/11/20).

Lab work exploring how substances react to conditions at Mars southern polar ice cap could help further constrain what generates the bright radar spots, Bierson says.

In the meantime, Khuller already has his eye on other areas of potential habitability on the Red Planet, such as warmer midlatitude regions where satellites have seen evidence of ice melting in the sun. I think there are places where liquid water could be on Mars today, he says. But I dont think its at the south pole.

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Lakes of liquid water at Mars southern ice cap may just be mirages - Science News Magazine

If there were ever a "maverick" among the naked eye planets, that title would certainly go to Mars.

Just nine months ago, Mars came to within 38.8 million miles (62.43 million kilometers) of Earth, the closest it had been to us since August 2003, and it will not be that close again until September 2035. Mars appeared three times brighter than Sirius, the brightest star in our sky and even rivaled Jupiter in brilliance. In fact, Mars ranked as the third brightest nighttime object behind the moon and Venus.

But that was then, this is now.

Related: The brightest planets in July's night sky: How to see them (and when)

At this moment in time, Mars is on the other side of the brightness spectrum. On Sunday evening (July 11) look low in the west-northwest sky about 45 minutes after sunset.

You'll be able to use a very conspicuous benchmark in order to make a positive identification, for the first object to attract your attention will certainly be dazzling Venus. After you've found it, look about one degree to its immediate left and you'll see Mars appearing as a yellowish-orange, though by no means outstandingly bright star.

Don't expect the eye-popping object that adorned our skies in the early fall of 2020. Rather, right now Mars is much farther away from us at a distance of 231 million miles (371 million km). So, Mars will appear only about 1.7% as bright as it was nine months ago and a mere 0.5% as bright as Venus.

In fact, by virtue of it currently shining at magnitude +1.8, Mars has dropped in rank to the category of a second-magnitude object; to assure you make a positive sighting I would strongly recommend you use binoculars.

Another object appearing in the general vicinity of the two planets in the fading evening twilight will be the moon. Two days past new phase, it will appear as a hairline arc of light, just 4% illuminated and will be situated about a half-dozen degrees to the right of the two planets. If your clenched fist measures about 10 degrees at arm's length, then the moon and the two planets will be separated by roughly half a fist.

All three objects will remain in the west-northwest sky for about 90 minutes after sunset. Mars in fact is practically midway between two other noteworthy sky objects. At 45 minutes after sunset, the sky might still be too bright to see the moon and Mars readily with the naked eye, so already noted, you'll probably need binoculars. But after another 15 minutes have passed the sky will have darkened sufficiently so that you should readily be able to identify them with your unaided eyes, though they'll all be lower in the sky.

The scene will have changed noticeably the very next evening.

On Monday, July 12, the moon will have widened a bit to 9% illuminated and will have shifted to a spot nearly 7 degrees to the upper left of the two planets. But the positions of the planets have also changed; the distance between them will have been halved with Venus now sitting just about a half degree to the right of Mars.

Venus will continue to grow more prominent albeit rather slowly in the western evening sky through the balance of 2021.

As for Mars, it will continue to be evident as an evening object for another couple of weeks or so, closely passing the bright bluish 1st-magnitude star, Regulus on July 29. But as we move into August, it will become lost in the bright sunset glow and will then go on a hiatus of sorts as it transitions into the morning sky, eventually reappearing in the early morning sky around Thanksgiving to set the stage for its gradual return to prominence during 2022.

Joe Rao serves as an instructor and guest lecturer at New York'sHayden Planetarium. He writes about astronomy forNatural History magazine, theFarmers' Almanacand other publications. Follow uson Twitter@Spacedotcomand onFacebook.

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Venus and the moon pass a fading Mars in the evening sky this weekend - Space.com