ICYMI: Feel-good stories from around the world
June 11, 2021
Organism comes back to life after 24,000 years
A microscopic organism known as a bdelloid rotifer, which was frozen in time for about two dozen millennia, came back to life after it was extracted from the soil.
It was taken from 3.5 meters (11.5 feet) below the ground under the Russian river Alazeya and was able to reproduce asexually. Previous research believed that such organisms could only survive for ten years when frozen at -20 degrees Celsius (-4 degrees Fahrenheit).
The journal Current Biology said this moment shows that these organisms could potentially reanimate even after staying in "permanently frozen habitats” for hundreds of thousands of years.
Dancing is (not) forbidden in Berlin
Germany's political and nightlife capital, Berlin, will allow outdoor clubbing from June 18, in another sign that the city is slowly coming out of the pandemic.
Party-goers will have to abide by certain rules, including wearing masks and following each club's individual hygiene rules.
Berlin's seven-day incidence rate fell to 16.6 per 100,000 on Friday. The city has already allowed other activities to resume, including re-opening hotels, eating inside restaurants and allowing movie-goers back to the theater.
Turning trash into roads
Spanish contractor Acciona built a stretch of highway near Valencia using paper ash instead of concrete.
The decision to use paper ash, which cannot be recycled, reduced carbon emissions by 65-75%. Project manager Juan Jose Cepria Pamplona told Euronews that one change "could save up to 18,000 tons of cement per year.”
Juan Jose said he plans to extend paper ash's use across Spain and internationally.
Canadian kayakers save moose
Kayakers traveling down the Sheep River, just outside of Calgary, leapt into action to save a baby moose.
Off-duty firefighter Scott Linton and kayaker Benny Clark jumped into the river to save the calf that was fighting to stay alive. Using a rope, the two men pulled the struggling moose to dry land.
"It was really cuddly. It was nice. I would have taken her home…was a nice little moose,” Linton told Global News.