Magnetic Bacterium Extends Lifespan by 43% in Surprising Anti-Aging Study

By W. Zhao & Y. Liu, Hefei Inst. of Physical Sci., Chinese Academy of Sci., Aug. 30, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/magnetic-bacterium-extends-lifespan-by-43-in-surprising-anti-aging-study/

A magnetic bacterium produced a striking longevity effect in worms. Researchers traced the benefit to reduced iron accumulation and lipid damage linked to ferroptosis.

 Credit: Shutterstock



A magnetotactic bacterium extended lifespan in worms by 43.39% and appeared to do so by suppressing ferroptosis.

A bacterium best known for producing microscopic magnetic structures may have an unexpected effect on aging. In experiments with Caenorhabditis elegans, the magnetotactic bacterium Magnetospirillum magneticum AMB-1 extended average lifespan by 43.39% while helping preserve neurological function and intestinal integrity in older worms.

Researchers led by Prof. An Xu at the Hefei Institutes of Physical Science of the Chinese Academy of Sciences traced the effect to suppression of ferroptosis, an iron-dependent form of cell death driven by damaging lipid oxidation. The findings, published in Free Radical Biology and Medicine, point to an unusual connection between a microbe’s magnetic machinery and biological processes involved in aging.

Magnetotactic bacteria produce intracellular structures called magnetosomes, which contain magnetic minerals and help the microbes orient themselves along magnetic fields.

Their unusual properties and biocompatibility have already attracted interest for drug delivery, imaging, and cancer-related applications, but their potential influence on aging has received little attention. The new study suggests that these magnetic microbes could offer another way to investigate, and potentially influence, the cellular damage that accumulates with age.

A magnetic bacterium extended worm lifespan

Using C. elegans as an aging model, the researchers tested how the MTB strain AMB-1 affected lifespan and age-related functions. Worms treated with AMB-1 lived an average of 43.39% longer, while aged animals also showed improved neurological function and better preservation of intestinal integrity.

AMB-1 significantly extended the healthy lifespan of C. elegans by inhibiting ferroptosis. 

Credit: Yun Liu

Ferroptosis inhibition explained the longevity effect

The ability of AMB-1 to produce magnetosomes proved important to the lifespan effect. Wild-type AMB-1 produced stronger benefits than reversibly non-magnetotactic RNM-AMB-1, while the non-magnetotactic strain NM-AMB-1 did not extend lifespan.

The researchers then identified changes connected to ferroptosis. AMB-1 lowered iron accumulation and lipid peroxidation in the worms, suppressing aging-related ferroptosis. Genetic experiments further implicated ferroptosis-related pathways involving ftn-1, bli-3, and ads-1 in the lifespan effects associated with AMB-1.

According to the researchers, the results establish a new microbial strategy for intervening in aging and provide foundational evidence for extending the potential applications of magnetotactic bacteria into geriatric medicine.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Researchers Warn AI Could Be Changing Us in an Unexpected Way

31 Aug. 2026, By D. Nield

https://www.sciencealert.com/interacting-with-ai-might-make-you-act-more-robot-like-researchers-warn

(Yuichiro Chino/Moment/Getty Images)

We know that AI is transforming modern life in myriad ways – influencing everything from scientific research to student education.

But it's less clear how we're all affected as consumers, with the growing use of these advanced tools in customer service settings, such as retail and healthcare.

A new theoretical paper published in AI & Society argues that spending a lot of time interacting with customer-support AIs could lead us to adopt patterns these robotic agents can more easily process, including mimicking how they communicate.

Ironically, the study authors suggest that as these AI bots are getting more human-like and more difficult to distinguish from real people – at least in a typing-out-messages way – we might be reflecting back other characteristics of the machines we're chatting with, and becoming less like ourselves.

The researchers use the term "robotoid humanness" to describe a proposed way that repeatedly interacting with AI could change our sense of self. 

(Ozturkcan et al., AI Soc., 2026)



The international team of researchers behind the study theorizes that we make ourselves more 'AI-compatible' through repeated interactions with the technology, limiting our quirks, idiosyncrasies, and unpredictability.

"Social robots for customer service settings are designed to mimic gestures, speech, and emotional cues to elicit cognitive and emotional responses from customers," says Inci Toral-Manson, a marketing researcher at the University of Birmingham in the UK.

"Our research explores how dealing with these anthropomorphized robots can create a bidirectional influence, where robots become more like people, and people become more like robots, which we call 'robotoid humanness'."

The study is entirely theoretical, so there were no tests done on people over time to measure the effects of interactions with AI. However, the team's framework draws on previous studies into human and robot interactions.

At the core of the argument here is that AI has reached a stage where it can do a passable job of providing customer support and holding a natural conversation. Not only that, it can personalize itself to individual users (by remembering what's been said, for example).

That blurs the line between bot and person, and can make the exchange feel more social, or the AIs seem more 'alive' than ever.

Millions of us are interacting with apps like ChatGPT every day.

 (Solen Feyissa/Unsplash)



"The consumer acts, the robot responds, and with repeated exposure, in time the consumer internalizes the exchange," says Selcen Ozturkcan, a management engineer at Linnaeus University in Sweden.

"Machine learning and AI can amplify this process, adjusting robot behavior based on user input, enabling more personalized and human-like mimicry from the robot."

The researchers go on to posit that our sense of 'self', and the profile we construct of ourselves as individuals, is influenced by this.

Whereas the feedback from real people that we get to inform our sense of self is often unexpected and uncontrolled from our perspective, with AI robots it's affirming, based on statistics, and algorithm-driven. Their hypothesis is that over time, we may begin to reflect some of the patterns the algorithm rewards.

"For people, the innate instinct to mirror can lead to people returning the robot's communicative behaviors, making them more robot-like," says Ozturkcan.

To put it another way, the AI is designed to respond best to a version of ourselves that has the (human) edges smoothed off. The study proposes that, with repeated encounters, we may implicitly drift toward that identity to get the best responses and advance the conversations.

Clearly, all of this needs to be tested experimentally, but these researchers aren't the first to suggest that AI interactions risk changing our thinking and how we express ourselves as flesh-and-blood people.

The human brain remains distinct from AI in a multitude of ways, and the team behind the study is concerned that AI-mediated services could narrow the range of very human ways people understand and present themselves.

For now, this could prompt us to notice when a helpful tool starts shaping the terms of the conversation.

"Robots and AI are now commonplace in customer service," says Jean-Paul de Cros Peronard, a business development scientist at Aarhus University in Denmark.

"So it is important that we understand how people interact with them for businesses to use the technology at their disposal to best effect, whilst remaining ethical."

The Birth of modern Man

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Your Body Has a 'Second Heart', And It's Crucial You Keep It Pumping

30 Aug. 2026, By E. Öz

https://www.sciencealert.com/your-body-has-a-second-heart-and-its-crucial-you-keep-it-pumping

Veins and arteries in the leg. 

(szjphoto/Moment/Getty Images)

Every step, ankle flex, or rise onto your toes activates a remarkable pump below your knees.

Your calf muscles squeeze the veins in your lower legs, helping propel blood upward toward your heart. This mechanism is so important to circulation that the calves are sometimes described as the body's "second heart".

The name is metaphorical. Your calves cannot replace the organ beating in your chest. But they assist with one of the circulatory system's most difficult tasks: returning blood from the legs against gravity.

The heart pumps oxygen-rich blood around the body through arteries. After reaching the legs, that blood must travel back through veins, where the pressure is much lower. Unlike the heart, veins cannot produce a powerful pumping force.

That's where the calf muscle pump comes in.

When you walk, run, or lift your heels, the muscles in the back of your lower legs contract. These contractions compress nearby veins and push the blood inside them upward.

Activating this pump is simple. 

(Sorrasak Jar Tinyo/Getty Images)



Small, one-way valves in the veins stop the blood from falling back toward the feet between contractions. Each movement helps it travel another step closer to the heart.

When the pump works properly, it helps prevent blood from pooling in the legs. When it does not, people may experience swollen ankles, aching legs, or heaviness. Poor pump function can also contribute to long-term vein problems.

Evidence suggests that an impaired calf pump may reveal something about a person's wider health.

In a 2020 study, researchers examined the medical records of 2,728 adults who underwent vascular testing at the Mayo Clinic's vascular lab in Minnesota.

People with impaired calf pump function were more likely to die during the following years. After 10 years, the mortality rate was about 6 percent among those with normal pump function, compared with roughly 18 percent among those with impaired function.

That doesn't mean weak calf muscles directly caused those deaths. An impaired pump could be a sign of physical inactivity, muscle loss, joint problems, diseases affecting the nerves or muscles, or generally poorer health.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK6TThRMdE

A larger study from the same Mayo Clinic, published in 2024, supported the connection.

This time, researchers examined nearly 6,000 patients. They found that the less blood the calf pump expelled during movement, the higher the risk of death. Those with the poorest pump function had more than twice the mortality risk of people whose calves moved blood effectively.

This study was also observational. It does not prove that exercising the calves will extend someone's life, and scientists don't yet fully understand the association.

Activating this pump is simple.

Walking is the easiest method. Each step contracts the calf muscles and helps move blood upward. Running, climbing stairs, and repeatedly rising onto your toes activate the same mechanism.

People who work at a desk should avoid remaining in one position for hours. The American Heart Association recommends standing up and walking around at least once an hour.

When getting up is not possible, moving the ankles up and down or lifting the heels while keeping the toes on the floor can engage the calf muscles.

Standing still for long periods is not necessarily better. Without movement, the muscles do not squeeze the veins effectively. Taking a few steps, marching in place, or raising and lowering the heels can keep the pump active.

Regular exercise can also help preserve calf strength with age. The World Health Organization recommends at least 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity, such as brisk walking, each week, along with muscle-strengthening activity on two or more days.

Persistent swelling or sudden pain, redness, or warmth in one leg shouldn't simply be blamed on sitting still. These can be symptoms of a blood clot and require medical assessment.

Calf movement may offer benefits beyond circulation, too.

In a small 2022 study, researchers tested a seated movement that activates the soleus, a deep calf muscle capable of working for long periods without tiring.

Activating the soleus muscle with "soleus push-up" exercises (heel raises) may have benefits beyond blood flow. (Hamilton et al., iScience, 2022)

During the "soleus push-up", a person keeps the front of each foot on the floor while repeatedly lifting and lowering the heels.

Researchers found that sustained contractions increased the muscle's energy use and helped the body process glucose and fats after eating.

A subsequent pilot study involving just 10 people with prediabetes found that performing the movement throughout a two-hour glucose tolerance test reduced the rise in blood sugar by roughly one-third compared with sitting still.

But participants performed the movement for extended periods, not just a few repetitions, and both studies were small.

A handful of heel raises under a desk cannot replace walking, whole-body exercise, or necessary medical treatment. Nevertheless, the findings provide one more reason not to remain motionless for hours.

Your calves may not literally contain another heart. But every time they contract, they give the real one a valuable helping hand.

The Life of earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

These Patients Couldn't Beat Lyme Disease, So Scientists Tried Giving Them Psilocybin

30 Aug. 2026, ByC. Cassella

https://www.sciencealert.com/these-patients-couldnt-beat-lyme-disease-so-scientists-tried-giving-them-psilocybin

(Jacob Wackerhausen/iStock/Getty Images Plus)

Of all the diseases spread through the bite of an insect or arachnid in the United States, Lyme disease is the most common.

Each year, nearly half a million people are diagnosed with and treated for the condition, which is caused by bacteria transmitted by an infected tick.

But not everyone gets better after antibiotics.

A substantial number continue to suffer from fatigue, brain fog, and body aches for months or even years after treatment.

Perhaps there's another drug that could help.

A small pilot study of 20 people has now shown that two doses of psilocybin, administered under clinical supervision, were associated with significant improvements in post-treatment Lyme disease (PTLD).

The experiments were led by Albert Garcia-Romeu at the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research, and the results are published in Scientific Reports.

Two weeks after the second and final dose of psilocybin, participants reported a 52 percent reduction in their overall symptom burden compared with baseline.

Six months after the final dose, symptoms remained roughly 40 to 50 percent below baseline.

At every follow-up appointment, depressive symptoms remained 50 to 60 percent lower, sleep disturbance scores remained 40 to 50 percent lower, and fatigue severity remained 25 to 30 percent lower than baseline.

Total pain scores dropped approximately 40 to 50 percent over the course of the clinical trial.

"Across all outcomes," the authors write, "within-participant standardized effect sizes were large and remained stable when excluding multivariate outliers."

Garcia-Romeu and colleagues note that these results are "sufficiently positive", however, they are just preliminary and need to be followed up with randomized, controlled, and blinded trials.

At this point, scientists cannot establish that psilocybin actually caused improvements in PTLD symptoms.

PTLD is sometimes known as 'Chronic Lyme Disease', but the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention discourage the use of this term, as it implies that the bacterial infection is ongoing, which is not established.

Changes in Lyme symptom burden and quality of life from baseline through six months of follow up. 

(Garcia-Romeu et al., Scientific Reports, 2026)

"We propose further rigorous investigation of psilocybin and other classic psychedelics as potential avenues for novel, effective treatments for this debilitating condition," the authors conclude, "as well as other infection-associated chronic conditions such as Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/ Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS), Post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection (PASC), and fibromyalgia, that may benefit from similar approaches."

So far, research of this kind is scarce and scattered.

In 2025, a pilot trial in the US tested psilocybin-assisted therapy on five people with fibromyalgia. Compared to baseline, participants reported improvements in pain symptoms, mood, social cognition, sleep, and global functioning.

Another recent case study, meanwhile, shared the story of a woman whose long COVID allegedly improved after taking hallucinogens in consultation with a therapist. The details are muddy, but the idea gained widespread attention.

PTLD has many similar symptoms to post-viral illnesses, like long COVID, whose symptoms of infection can linger for unknown reasons.

Accepted treatments are lacking, which is why some patients and researchers are turning to hallucinogens.

Consider, for instance, the 2023 case report of an immunocompetent man who contracted Lyme disease and another tick-borne disease, babesiosis.

Even after several rounds of antibiotics, this patient continued to have partial remissions and relapses, each bout lasting about two years.

Over the decades, he suffered from fatigue, neck pain, myalgias, night sweats, anxiety, panic attacks, depression, cognitive dysfunction, and insomnia.

At 70 years old, the patient suffered another relapse. He tried anxiety and depression medication, but they didn't work.

"After suffering for three months," the patient's case report reads, "he began microdosing psilocybin (desiccated whole mushrooms) 100 mg orally three times a week, increasing the dose to 125 mg after two weeks. Within two days, there was a noticeable improvement in mood. Within two weeks he was feeling consistently well again."

At the time that the case report was published, the patient was still in remission and continuing to microdose psilocybin.

But this is just one case study outside of a clinical setting. The recent pilot trial at Johns Hopkins seeks to move beyond that.

Changes in self-reported measurements before and after two doses of psilocybin.

 (Garcia-Romeu et al., Scientific Reports, 2026)

Today, there is no approved diagnostic test for PTLD, but the authors of the pilot trial say they used stringent criteria to select their participants for psilocybin-assisted therapy.

Volunteers had to have a detailed history demonstrating prior Lyme disease, they had to be presenting with current symptoms, and other conditions that cause similar symptoms had to be ruled out.

After weeks of preparation, the participants received an initial dose of 15 mg of psilocybin, followed by a 25 mg dose two weeks later. Two participants remained on the lower dose throughout.

During each session, volunteers had their vitals carefully supervised, and they reported any new or worsening physical or mental health events observed during or after each dose.

There were no serious adverse health effects reported, although headaches, nausea, and hypertension were common and temporary.

A dozen of the 20 original study participants also agreed to have their sleep tracked using wearable monitors during and after the 8-week trial.

Those findings revealed a long-term reduction in total sleep time following psilocybin administration.

Further work is needed to see if those changes also impacted sleep quality or daytime sleepiness, but among those with PTLD, excessive sleep is often an issue.

At this point, however, nothing can be said conclusively about psilocybin and its effects on PTLD. This trial included no placebo, and patients knew they were taking psilocybin.

Garcia-Romeu and colleagues say that in forthcoming research, biomarkers of health measured before and after the psilocybin treatment, as well as firsthand accounts from trial participants, will be examined.

The study of hallucinogenics for mental health, pain, and inflammatory disorders is just beginning, and it will take time to carry out more rigorous, randomized studies.

"The results of the current trial are preliminary and should be considered with caution," the trial researchers note.

"Yet findings underscore the compelling possibility that psilocybin-assisted treatment may significantly mitigate key symptoms of PTLD across several physical and neuropsychiatric domains, that participant quality of life may improve substantially… and that these benefits can persist well beyond the time course of acute drug effects for some patients."

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Scientists Discover a Cannabis Receptor That Could Stop Breast Cancer Spreading

30 Aug. 2026, By I. Farkas

https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-discover-a-cannabis-receptor-that-could-stop-breast-cancer-spreading

A THC-treated tumor organoid. (Martínez-Illescas et al., Communications Biology, 2026)




Cancer cells are proving trickier than we thought, so scientists are getting even trickier to shift the survival odds in our favor.

Recent medical research has highlighted a significant issue: cancer cells display plasticity.

Some cancer cells can spontaneously revert from a differentiated state to become 'immature' and stem-cell-like again, switching their identity to yield more diverse, aggressive, and proliferative tumors.

As a result, they thwart traditional treatments like chemotherapy and radiation, which aim to stop cellular division and kill cancerous (and other) cells outright.

Unfortunately, these therapies may also create evolutionary pressure that favors more resistant and aggressive cancers that can more effectively spread throughout the body.

So in a new experiment, medical researchers used the cannabis compound, THC, to push cancer cells to 'lock in' and make tumors less ferocious.

A graphical abstract of the experiment.

  (Martínez-Illescas et al., Communications Biology, 2026)

In a study published in Communications Biology, researchers explored the effects of an ultra-low-dose, 4-day cannabinoid treatment on organoids – lab-built 3D mammary tumor models created from breast cancer cells sourced from humans as well as in mouse models.

This test targeted the endocannabinoid system (ECS), which can regulate developmental pathways paralleled in both cancer evolution and embryonic development, the researchers note.

The ECS features two main cannabinoid receptors, CB1R and CB2R, which the researchers modulated with two types of ligands – molecules that either boost or block their activity to induce a biological response.

After the researchers administered a low-dose, 4-day pulse of THC (an agonist), the organoids exhibited reduced cell invasiveness, self-renewal capabilities, and tumor initiation.

The THC-treated organoid on the right exhibits a reduction in migratory cellular projections compared to the control variant on the left. 

(Martínez-Illescas et al., Communications Biology, 2026)



Interestingly, this result seems to be mediated predominantly by CB2R, which is associated with inflammatory responses, rather than CB1R, which is associated with cannabis' psychoactive effects.

The researchers played a bio-molecular 'good cop bad cop' routine. They treated CB1R and CB2R with separate inverse agonists, called SR1 and SR2, respectively, which reduce the receptors' baseline activity.

Despite the switcheroo, the organoids still seemed to be less, well, cancerous. Amazingly, the CB2R inverse agonist SR2 reproduced the cancer-mollifying effects of THC, while the CB1R inverse agonist SR1 did not.

But here's the strange part – organoids made from mice genetically engineered to lack CB2R showed similar changes.

Granular to cystic represents a coordinated, multicellular, system-level change, rather than altered activity in, say, a few cells or cell types.

(Martínez-Illescas et al., Communications Biology, 2026)

Altogether, this may suggest that the baseline activity of CB2R is what's important for the differentiation of cancer cells, and manipulating it may influence cancer cells' plasticity.

Equally important for practical purposes, the researchers found evidence that these tumor-inhibiting effects appear to be stable in vivo.

The effects persisted for up to 100 days when the researchers transplanted the THC-treated organoids into living cancer-prone mice, which developed tumors later and showed slower tumor growth and less aggressive lesions than mice receiving control organoids.

In a separate experiment, THC-treated cells also produced fewer clusters of cancer cells in the lungs four weeks after injection.

Furthermore, organoids that were modulated also showed resilience when the researchers actively tried to increase their tumor-forming activity.

This opens up numerous therapeutic avenues. Controlling the process could influence "differentiated cells [to] occupy space and resources that would otherwise be used for tumor expansion", the researchers explain.

CB2R modulation also seems to increase estrogen receptor activity, making breast cancer cells more responsive to endocrine therapy via the commonly used drug tamoxifen.

In addition to showing the value of investigating complementary kinds of treatments, the research suggests that subtle CB2R modulation holds promise for reprogramming tumor cell behavior, with genome-wide effects that persist long after cannabinoid withdrawal.

"This view is consistent with the concept that tumor cell populations occupy continuous and dynamic state landscapes, where relatively small perturbations can trigger large-scale and self-reinforcing transitions in collective behavior," the researchers conclude.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Your Gut Microbiome May Be Contagious, Scientists Discover

By U. of Vienna, Aug. 29, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/your-gut-microbiome-may-be-contagious-scientists-discover/

Some highly adapted gut bacteria may spread rapidly between people and even across continents. The finding suggests that microbial transmission could be an overlooked force shaping the human microbiome.

 Credit: Shutterstock

In addition to diet and medication, person-to-person transmission can also play an important role in shaping the microbiome.

The human gut contains a vast community of trillions of microorganisms (the microbiome) that helps shape digestion, immune function, and metabolism.

A team led by the University of Vienna used a method called ‘reverse ecology’ to show that many familiar gut bacterial species are actually made up of several evolutionarily separate groups, each adapted to different conditions inside the gut. Some of these bacterial populations are linked with older age, chronic inflammatory bowel diseases, colorectal cancer, and type 2 diabetes. The results, now published in Nature, could eventually help improve biomarker discovery and, over the long term, support more precise treatments.

Most microbiome research groups bacteria by whole species or by broad genetic similarity. These categories are useful, but they may miss the distinct populations that have evolved to live under specific conditions in the human body. Because of that, it can be difficult to tell which bacteria are connected to disease, which are simply present by chance, and which may help protect health. The central question is whether scientists can identify more precise biological units that arose through adaptation and occupy separate ecological niches in the gut.

About the study

The research team analyzed thousands of bacterial isolates from the human gut, along with extensive metagenomic data, meaning the complete genetic information of microbial communities in a sample, from people across different countries, ages, and health groups.

Using a newly developed bioinformatic method within the framework of ‘reverse ecology,’ an approach that infers ecological adaptations from genomic data, the researchers looked for genetic signs of successful adaptation.

More than one species

One important clue came from signs of so-called genome-wide selective sweeps. These events occur when one individual gains a useful mutation and then outcompetes closely related individuals.

The process reduces diversity, but it also produces populations whose members are highly similar in both ancestry and function, making them stand apart clearly in the dataset. The analysis revealed that many known gut bacterial species split into several such lineages. These populations seem to differ in the conditions where they are most successful.

“If you don’t just count species but take evolutionary adaptation into account, you can identify the biologically relevant units in the microbiome much more accurately,” says lead author Xiaoqian Annie Yu, Center for Microbiology and Environmental Systems Science (CeMESS), University of Vienna. “Even within the same bacterial species, some populations occur more frequently than others in certain diseases. When all are considered together, this often remains hidden.”

Global spread within a few decades

The researchers also found evidence that highly competitive bacterial populations can spread quickly across continents, in some cases within only a few decades. Until now, this kind of pattern had mainly been seen in pathogens.

“Our findings show that gut bacteria are also more dynamic than previously thought. Well-adapted strains can spread internationally and occupy new ecological niches,” says study leader Martin F. Polz from the University of Vienna.

The finding suggests that the microbiome is shaped not only by diet, medication, or lifestyle, but also by transmission between people.

New perspectives for medicine and diagnostics

The study creates new opportunities for microbiome research. Rather than connecting entire bacterial species with disease, scientists may eventually be able to focus on the specific populations that matter most. This could improve biomarker searches and, over the long term, help make therapies more precise, for example, by encouraging beneficial bacterial strains or reducing problematic ones.

Next, the team plans to study which genes distinguish the identified populations from one another and what biological functions those genes may control.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Longer Breastfeeding Linked to Fewer ADHD Symptoms in Children

By The U. of Bergen, Aug. 27, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/longer-breastfeeding-linked-to-fewer-adhd-symptoms-in-children/

A study of more than 37,000 families links breastfeeding duration with later differences in ADHD symptoms. 

Credit: Stock

A baby’s first meals may shape attention for years, with longer exclusive breastfeeding linked to fewer ADHD symptoms through age eight.

Researchers at the University of Bergen examined data from 37,600 families in the Norwegian Mother, Father, and Child Cohort Study (MoBa). The association appeared in both boys and girls and was strongest when the children were ages three and five, although it remained detectable at age eight.

Breast milk contains long-chain fatty acids, amino acids, antibodies, beneficial bacteria, and other substances involved in brain growth and immune development. Scientists have long investigated whether these components, breastfeeding itself, or related family and health factors could shape a child’s later development.

“It is well established that psychiatric symptoms and disorders can be influenced by both genetic and environmental factors,” says Berit Skretting Solberg, a psychiatrist and researcher at the University of Bergen’s Department of Biomedicine and a senior consultant at Betanien Hospital.

Tracking Breastfeeding and ADHD Symptoms

Six months after giving birth, mothers answered questions about exclusive breastfeeding, partial breastfeeding, and when they introduced other liquids or solid foods. The researchers used those responses to estimate how long each child had received only breast milk.

“We found that the longer a child was exclusively breastfed (up to six months), the lower the level of ADHD symptoms at ages three, five, and eight years,” says Solberg.

Breastfeeding of any kind was associated with lower symptom levels, but the pattern became stronger as its duration and intensity increased. The clearest association occurred among children who were exclusively breastfed for longer, up to the six-month limit examined in the study.

Genetics Complicates the Connection

Breastfeeding and ADHD may be connected in several directions, making the results difficult to interpret. ADHD is strongly influenced by genetics, and traits shared between parents and children can affect both feeding experiences and later behavior.

Mothers with ADHD symptoms tend to breastfeed less and are also more likely to have children who develop ADHD symptoms. Babies who already display early traits associated with ADHD may also be more difficult to breastfeed.

“This may partly explain the relationship between lower breastfeeding and increased ADHD symptoms in children,” says Solberg.

To separate these overlapping influences as much as possible, the team adjusted its analysis for known genetic susceptibility to ADHD and sociodemographic factors. The researchers also compared siblings from the same families who had experienced different breastfeeding patterns, helping to account for some shared genetic and household influences.

A Moderate Association Remained

“Even after these adjustments, there was a clear but moderate protective effect of the duration of exclusive breastfeeding on later ADHD symptoms,” Solberg explains.

MoBa does not perfectly represent Norway’s wider population. Its participants tend to have higher education levels and are more likely to breastfeed, often for longer, than the population overall. Solberg said the association might be larger in communities where breastfeeding is less common, although further research would be needed to test that possibility.

One Possible Influence Among Many

“As with other observational studies, it is difficult to draw firm conclusions about causality,” says Solberg, emphasizing the need for further research.

ADHD is a complex neurodevelopmental condition rather than the result of any single experience or parental decision. Genetics remain the leading influence, while numerous biological and environmental factors may affect how symptoms emerge. Breastfeeding can also be limited or impossible for medical, practical, or personal reasons, and this study does not imply that feeding choices determine whether a child develops ADHD.

“In our society, heredity is likely the strongest risk factor for ADHD. However, since ADHD, like other neurodevelopmental disorders, is influenced by multiple factors, our study suggests that the extent of breastfeeding may also help protect against the development of ADHD symptoms in young children.”

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Blackbirds Somehow Know When a Snake Is Too Dangerous To Attack

By Oregon State U., Aug. 26, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/blackbirds-somehow-know-when-a-snake-is-too-dangerous-to-attack/

Red-winged blackbirds treated two similar-looking snake threats very differently, aggressively striking gopher snakes while rarely making contact with rattlesnakes.

 Credit: Shutterstock

Red-winged blackbirds largely avoided striking rattlesnakes while aggressively attacking gopher snakes, revealing a striking difference in nest defense behavior.

At nests across western Oregon, red-winged blackbirds readily confronted many threats to their young, but rattlesnakes prompted a strikingly different response. Even though the birds likely had little or no experience with vipers, they were remarkably reluctant to physically attack them.

The research, published in Behavioral Ecology, tested how red-winged blackbirds responded to several potential nest predators found in western Oregon, including scrub jays, ground squirrels, and nonvenomous gopher snakes.

Led by Shelby Lawson of Oregon State University, the researchers used realistic but inanimate models of the animals, placing them on platforms a few meters from blackbird nests. Red-winged blackbirds are known for aggressively defending their nests.

The birds were also presented with cowbirds, which are brood parasites – they lay their eggs in someone else’s nest, forcing another species to expend resources raising them – along with song sparrows (as a control species; sparrows don’t prey on blackbird nests) and rattlesnakes.

Clockwise from upper left: Gopher snake, rattlesnake, squirrel, jay, cowbird, sparrow. 

Credit: Shelby Lawson

Rattlesnakes triggered unusual restraint

Although rattlesnakes are native to western Oregon, they were largely eliminated west of the Cascade Range during the 1800s, so blackbirds living there today probably rarely encounter them. Yet across tests at dozens of nests – roughly half featuring eggs and half containing nestlings – the birds struck a rattlesnake only once. Gopher snakes, by comparison, were struck more than 80 times.

“We don’t know whether that’s because they recognized the danger or if there’s something about the viperid features or the rattle that gave the birds pause,” said Lawson, a postdoctoral researcher in David Kikuchi’s integrative biology lab in the OSU College of Science.
Nest defense depends on parental risk

The experiment also provides a new test of parental investment theory, a biological framework for understanding when animals devote more effort or accept greater danger to protect their offspring and when they prioritize their own survival.

Red-winged blackbirds have been studied extensively in this context, Lawson said. Their defensive behavior changes according to how much danger a predator poses to the nest and whether approaching that predator also puts the parent at risk.

“For example, they might physically beat up an egg-eating jay or squirrel near their nest, but in response to something like a hawk that could eat them, they might choose to keep their distance and alarm-call instead,” she said.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwZZ3x4APpQ

Nesting red-winged blackbirds react to an apparent scrub jay. Credit: Russell Campbell

Across the experiment, blackbirds reacted more aggressively to predator models than to controls. They also did not simply become more cautious around all snakes, despite snakes generally posing greater danger to adult birds than most of the other predators included in the tests.

Blackbirds and other passerines—perching birds, as opposed to raptors, waterfowl, hummingbirds, penguins, etc.—typically respond more cautiously to predators capable of killing them, Lawson said. By contrast, they often directly attack animals such as crows and squirrels that primarily threaten their offspring.

“In our experiment, the gopher snakes and rattlesnakes represented medium-sized adults that would be unlikely to pursue healthy adult blackbirds but definitely able to injure them during close-range nest defense,” Lawson said. “And obviously a rattlesnake’s venom makes it inherently more dangerous to deal with.”

Venom changed strikes, not overall response

Despite that additional danger, the blackbirds otherwise responded to rattlesnakes much as they did to gopher snakes, including swooping toward them. The major difference was that the birds almost never made physical contact with the vipers.

“Neither snake was struck during incubation, but during the nestling stage the focal birds—the ones whose nest it was—routinely struck gopher snakes, and neighboring blackbirds regularly got in the act too,” she said.

“This is the first paper to test responses of breeding birds to both nonvenomous and venomous snakes within a parental investment theory framework, and it shows that we need to be including snakes in these kinds of tests more often,” Lawson added. “We still don’t fully know how birds recognize or make decisions regarding snakes despite them being a major threat to their nests, and this study is a good step toward understanding that.”

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

NASA Finds Earth Microbes Could Hide in the Moon’s Deep Shadows

By J. Holland, U. of Maryland, Aug. 28, 2026

https://scitechdaily.com/nasa-finds-earth-microbes-could-hide-in-the-moons-deep-shadows/

Shadows near the Moon’s south pole may create temporary refuges where microbes carried by astronauts can withstand otherwise lethal conditions.

 Credit: Shutterstock

Microbes carried to space by human explorers could survive in shaded areas near the moon’s south pole, according to researchers from NASA and the University of Maryland.

Even on the moon, where extreme temperatures and intense ultraviolet (UV) radiation make the surface deeply hostile to life, some microbes from Earth may find temporary refuge. New modeling suggests that shaded pockets near the lunar south pole could allow certain bacteria and fungi to survive for as long as a week.

The NASA-led research, published in Science Advances, could matter as human exploration expands across the moon and eventually reaches Mars.

“When we created lunar maps with purple, red and blue representing different surviving microbe species, we were surprised at how colorfully they turned out,” said study co-author Stefano Bertone, an associate research scientist in the University of Maryland’s Department of Astronomy. “So much for ‘nothing can survive on the moon.’”

Human exploration raises contamination risks

The results underscore how differently microbes can respond to extreme lunar conditions and why their persistence matters for future exploration. As people establish a longer-term presence on the moon and eventually travel to Mars, biological material carried from Earth could make it harder to separate naturally occurring ancient chemistry from contamination introduced by astronauts.

Humans constantly shed microbes into their surroundings. A patch of skin about the size of a pinky nail, for example, can contain roughly a million bacteria. An astronaut’s footprint could therefore leave hundreds of millions of living bacteria behind on the lunar surface. Even with stringent sterilization procedures, “there’s potential for a lot of human contamination of the lunar landscape and, inevitably, the science we do there,” Bertone said.

Understanding and planning for that contamination will be important wherever human missions travel.

“We need to understand what was there before us, because when we go to Mars to search for signs of life beyond our planet, we will want to make sure it’s not stuff we brought,” said Prabal Saxena, a planetary scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center who led the new study.

Lunar shadows can shelter microbes

Determining where microbes could persist requires understanding how sunlight reaches the moon’s polar terrain. Because the moon has only a slight axial tilt, the sun remains very low above the horizon near the poles. Even modest rises in the landscape can therefore block sunlight from depressions and low-lying areas, creating cold shadows that can preserve water and reduce exposure to damaging radiation.

Earlier studies concluded that microbial survival was highly unlikely in the places humans have already visited on the moon, primarily near the equator. Those models, however, did not account for how local topography changes environmental conditions. That omission becomes especially important near the lunar poles, where craters, slopes, and other surface features create extensive shadows and where future human exploration is now focused.

“Incorporating the bumps and craters was a key to this study,” Bertone said. “The question was, how well can the moon’s surface topography shield some areas from UV, and is it enough to keep any of our study organisms alive?”

Microbial survivability in the Moon’s polar regions. Top panels show 24-hour UV exposure; bottom panels identify areas where microbes may survive based on UV and maximum summer temperature, with permanently shadowed regions in black. Panels highlight survivability near the north and south poles, including De Gerlache, while white squares mark Artemis III candidate regions and circles indicate 85° latitude. 

Credit: University of Maryland

The researchers simulated microbes commonly associated with spaceflight environments and/or human skin in three areas near the lunar south pole that are candidate landing regions for the upcoming Artemis III mission. They constructed detailed environmental maps using elevation and temperature measurements from instruments aboard NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, then combined those data with models describing how radiation reaches the lunar surface.

Bertone also applied ray tracing, a technique that follows the movement of light and can model effects such as reflection, refraction, soft shadows, and more. He combined it with measurements from the Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter—which provides precise topographical information including surface brightness, slopes, and roughness.

“We can trace the path of light from the sun to the moon considering the sun’s position and every bump and boulder that causes a ray to bounce and pivot before reaching the surface,” he explained. “Even what are called permanently shaded regions get light, and therefore UV, indirectly. It’s all extremely nuanced, and this method lets us account for small details.”

Some microbes could persist for days

The simulations revealed “survivable niches” of varying sizes where microbes might persist for as long as seven days. Aspergillus stood out for its resistance to UV radiation and could potentially survive across 15 to 30% of areas that receive at least some sunlight during lunar winter.

Every microbe examined had potentially survivable locations in all three modeled regions. Aspergillus could persist for at least seven days across 3% of the mapped terrain, while all five microbes could potentially survive in portions of the De Gerlache Rim’s permanently shaded regions even after scattered UV light was taken into account.

Survival, however, does not mean the microbes would be able to grow. Organisms persisting under these conditions would remain in a cryptobiotic state, with growth possible only if suitable conditions later developed. There is currently no evidence that the moon provides key requirements for microbial growth and reproduction, including liquid water, which typically requires an atmosphere and moderate temperatures.

Even so, survival has to occur before growth is possible, making microbial persistence an important consideration for both exploration and scientific research, Bertone said.

The moon could test microbial limits

The lunar south pole could also provide researchers with a natural laboratory for studying just how far microbial survival can be pushed. Carefully controlled experiments in shaded terrain could reveal how Earth organisms respond to environmental conditions that are difficult to reproduce accurately in laboratories on Earth.

The researchers next plan to develop more detailed illumination models, use higher-resolution topography, and expand microbial experiments. One approach, called shape from shading, can reconstruct 3D planetary terrain, craters and surface slopes from 2D photographs by analyzing light intensity, shadows and surface angles. Together, these efforts could provide a clearer picture of how human-associated microbes persist after reaching the moon.

“In planning human operations to the moon or elsewhere, we need to know everything we can about what’s been left behind,” Bertone said.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Scientists Analyzed Earth's Hidden Seed Vaults And Made a Disturbing Realization

28 Aug. 2026, By P. Dockrill

https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-analyzed-earths-hidden-seed-vaults-and-made-a-disturbing-realization

(Jonathan Kemper/Unsplash)

The iconic 'Doomsday Vault' – aka Norway's Svalbard Global Seed Vault – is perhaps the world's best-known seed bank.

Holding over a million seed samples from plants from almost every country, the monolithic fortress is like a global insurance policy, ensuring the world of tomorrow has vital seed backups to grow food and other essential crops in an uncertain future.

But for all the Doomsday Vault's impressive collection, nature has it comprehensively beat.

The world's biggest seed bank is actually hidden beneath your feet, in what's called the soil seed bank – nature's own vast repository of seeds lying in wait on the ground, in the dirt, or scattered among leaf litter.

Unlike Svalbard's meticulously coordinated donations, deposits in the soil seed bank are a chaotic affair, with seeds falling randomly onto the ground, carried on the wind, or dispersed via floods.

Despite the randomness, it amounts to a staggeringly large reserve of seeds, new research shows.

In a study published in Nature Communications, scientists analyzed a global database of the soil seed bank, containing 3,096 records of soil samples collected from 94 countries across all seven continents.

Something is happening to the world's biggest seed bank, the one beneath your feed.

 (Cora Mueller/Shutterstock)



Millions of seeds and seedlings were counted and identified in those samples, as part of some 1,400 studies.

Those seeds are an immense reservoir we can now put some numbers to.

The team's calculations suggest that globally, there's an average of more than 5,000 seeds hidden in the soil for every square meter of surface, across land, wetland, and aquatic environments worldwide.

"In the broadest sense, if you put your finger to the earth, you are likely to be pointing at a seed," the researchers explain in their paper, led by co-first authors and ecologists Alistair Auffret from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and Emma Ladouceur from the University of Prince Edward Island in Canada.

"The high density of seeds in the soil is a testament to the formation of soil seed banks as an important component of plant population and community dynamics, and a valuable strategy for many plant species to facilitate establishment following disturbance."

Be that as it may, the researchers uncovered a pattern in the data, and it's one that could limit the effectiveness of the soil seed bank's vital role in regenerating vegetation after disturbances such as severe weather, which can wipe out plants on the surface.

The pattern in seed species richness parallels the biodiversity crisis we're seeing in plant life. (sbayram/iStock/Getty Images)



While it's long been known that different habitats support differing levels of plant diversity and density – deserts are sparse, and rainforests are packed – less is known about how this extends to the soil seed bank, especially on a global scale, as most studies of the soil seed bank are limited to specific regions.

Using their global database, assembled by some of the same team and first published in 2024, the researchers found a surprising contrast in seed populations across different regions.

"Across the world's biomes and ecosystems, patterns in species richness in the seed bank often diverged from patterns of seed density," the team reports.

In other words, soils that contained seeds from a wide variety of plant species did not have high numbers of seeds themselves – and areas with high seed density often didn't show a great diversity of species.

One example of this is tropical ecosystems, which show high species richness in the soil seed bank, but low seed density. On the other side of the scale, arable (farmland) ecosystems had low species richness, but a high density of seeds.

More concerningly, the researchers found evidence that human activity could be negatively impacting the soil seed bank, especially with regard to the diversity of seed species present in the environment.

"Strikingly, we also found that the richness of soil seed banks appeared higher in undisturbed compared to degraded habitats, suggesting how across the world's ecosystems, soil seed banks also reflect the ongoing depletion of biodiversity as a result of anthropogenic activities," the researchers write.

"This indicates that the potential for seed banks to contribute to the recovery and restoration of degraded ecosystems might be limited."

If further research confirms this, it's a new perspective on the biodiversity crisis already evident in plant life at the surface – only now mirrored in their seed precursors hidden underground.

"Our findings are concerning," the researchers explain, "matching general trends of reduced biodiversity in the established vegetation over time, and have consequences for the potential of passive restoration to reverse biodiversity losses."

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

The Immune Systems of 110-Year-Olds Are Hiding a Remarkable Secret

By Cell Press, Aug. 27, 2026
https://scitechdaily.com/the-immune-systems-of-110-year-olds-are-hiding-a-remarkable-secret/

The immune systems of people who live past 110 may be doing something unusual. 

Credit: Shutterstock

Rare cancer-killing T cells expand markedly in some exceptionally old adults, suggesting the immune system may continue adapting even at extreme ages.

Among people who live past 100, the immune system may not simply weaken with age. Instead, rare immune cells known as CD4 cytotoxic T lymphocytes (CD4 CTLs), which can kill tumor cells in some cancers, appear to become increasingly prominent. These cells multiply through a process called clonal expansion when the immune system responds to threats, and research published August 19 in the Cell Press journal Cell Reports suggests they may also be involved in healthy aging among supercentenarians.

“Immune aging is not simply a process of decline,” says first author Kosuke Hashimoto, an associate professor at the University of Osaka in Japan. “The selective expansion of certain T cells suggests that, even in extreme old age, the immune system may continue to adapt to age-related challenges.”

CD4 CTLs have emerged as a cellular feature of supercentenarians, people who reach age 110 or beyond. In the new study, researchers found evidence that these uncommon cells continue expanding and adapting in this exceptionally old population.

“CD4 CTLs are an atypical and relatively rare T cell population,” Hashimoto says. “So, their marked increase in supercentenarians may provide important clues as to how the immune system is maintained in extreme old age.”

CD4 killer T cells rise with age

Researchers examined blood samples from 28 adults divided into three age groups: 70–99, 100–109, and 110 and older. Median CD4 CTL levels rose steadily across those groups, from 4% to 9.6% and then 17.6%, respectively.

The pattern suggests that expansion of these cells may begin around age 100, although it was not limited to centenarians and supercentenarians. One participant younger than 100 actually had the highest proportion of CD4 CTLs in the study.

The researchers next analyzed participants’ T cell receptors and found that clonal expansion was helping drive the increase. CD4 CTLs can make copies of themselves when the immune system encounters a threat. Across the study, the largest clone represented an average of 33.3% of all CD4 CTLs, suggesting that some older adults may be responding to persistent immune challenges. In one centenarian, a single clone made up 53.8% of the CD4 CTLs in the blood sample.

Cancer protection remains an open question

To investigate what these dominant cells might be responding to, researchers compared receptor sequences from each participant’s leading CD4 CTL clone with sequences stored in a public database. Nearly three dozen matches came from people with cancer, including lung, breast, and liver cancers.

None of the centenarians or supercentenarians in the study had been diagnosed with those cancers, leading the researchers to propose that the expansion of these cells might represent early immune responses to abnormal targets.

“Some CD4 CTLs may recognize cancer-related targets, although their exact targets remain unknown,” Hashimoto says.

The study examined T cells circulating in blood and cannot establish that having more CD4 CTLs protects against cancer or causes exceptional longevity. Hashimoto says the researchers now plan to investigate how these cells behave within human tissues.

“As we age, abnormal cells, including senescent and cancerous cells, become more common,” Hashimoto says. “Our findings suggest that immune adaptation to these changes may contribute to exceptional longevity.”

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/

Meet The Gaia Hypothesis: The Theory That Earth Regulates Itself Like a Living Thing

28 Aug. 2026, By E. Öz

https://www.sciencealert.com/the-strange-hypothesis-that-suggests-earth-may-be-alive

Earth photographed by the Apollo 17 crew on 7 December 1972. 

(NASA)

Earth has survived asteroid impacts, volcanic catastrophes, ice ages, and dramatic changes in the Sun's brightness. Yet it has remained habitable for billions of years.

Was that merely extraordinary luck? Or could life itself have helped keep the planet suitable for life?

It sounds like something from science fiction. Yet the idea was developed by a respected British scientist and went on to influence how researchers think about the relationship between life and the planet.

Known as the Gaia hypothesis, it proposes that Earth's living organisms, atmosphere, oceans, soil, and rocks form one enormous interconnected system.

Through countless feedback loops, this system may help maintain conditions in which life can continue.

In other words, life may not simply exist on Earth. It may be helping to run it.

To understand what that means, think about your own body.

(helivideo/iStock/Getty Images Plus)



When you become too hot, you sweat. When you become cold, you shiver. Your body continually makes adjustments to keep its internal conditions within a safe range. This process is called homeostasis.

British chemist James Lovelock wondered whether Earth might do something broadly similar. This was the provocative possibility that he explored with American microbiologist Lynn Margulis during the 1970s.

Photosynthetic organisms help replenish atmospheric oxygen. Microorganisms produce and transform gases and compounds involving methane, nitrogen, sulfur, and other elements. Together, biological processes continually reshape the atmosphere and Earth's surface chemistry.

None of these organisms understands what it is doing. There is no planetary control room and no committee of microbes deciding how warm Earth should be.

Their actions change the environment – and those environmental changes then affect the organisms. The result is an immense network of feedback loops linking life, air, water, and rock.

To demonstrate how something resembling planetary regulation could emerge without intelligence, Lovelock and Andrew Watson developed a model of a fictional planet called Daisyworld.

This hypothetical Daisyworld is home to only two kinds of life: black daisies and white daisies.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCxIqgZA7ag

Black daisies absorb sunlight and warm their surroundings. White daisies reflect sunlight and cool them. When the planet becomes cold, black daisies thrive and help warm it. As temperatures rise, white daisies gain the advantage and help cool it down.

The daisies are not trying to save their planet, the researchers propose. They are simply growing under the conditions that suit them. Yet their competition acts like a planetary thermostat, keeping temperatures suitable for life longer than would otherwise be possible.

This thought experiment does not prove that Earth is alive, of course.

But it shows that a planet could appear to regulate itself without consciousness, foresight, or a master plan.

The hypothesis has always had its skeptics. Biologists pointed out that if organisms appear to regulate the planet 'for the benefit of' life as a whole, natural selection offers no obvious mechanism to have produced that – selection acts on individuals within a species, not on planets.

Daisyworld was built partly to answer that criticism, showing that self-regulation can emerge from ordinary competition rather than cooperation or foresight.

And this is where the Gaia hypothesis becomes more than an entertaining thought experiment.

If Earth resembles a self-regulating system, it is tempting to assume that the planet will correct the damage humans cause. But Gaia is not a protective mother who will always restore the world we know.

A system can regulate itself in ways that are disastrous for some of its inhabitants.

Earth has endured mass extinctions before. Life continued, but countless species disappeared. A self-regulating planet is therefore not necessarily one that remains safe for every species – including us.

This leads to the most unsettling question raised by Gaia: are humans triggering a planetary change that could destroy us while creating conditions suitable for whatever life comes next?

Burning fossil fuels and destroying ecosystems are now altering the atmosphere, oceans, and climate on a planetary scale. Some of these changes can activate feedback loops that make the original problem worse.

Melting ice reveals darker land and water that absorb more sunlight, causing additional warming. Thawing permafrost releases greenhouse gases. Dying forests can release the carbon they once stored.

Beyond certain tipping points, parts of the system may continue changing even if humans later reduce the pressure that started the process.

Some researchers have therefore asked whether humanity could become part of a more deliberate form of planetary regulation.

A 2022 study described Earth as having an "immature technosphere." Our technology is powerful enough to change the entire planet, but our collective intelligence is not yet advanced enough to control the consequences.

As ScienceAlert has previously reported, intelligence exists on Earth, but humanity has not yet achieved a mature form of planetary intelligence.

The Gaia hypothesis does not prove that our planet thinks, plans, or cares whether humans survive. Its warning may be more disturbing than that.

Earth will respond to the changes we cause. But its response will not necessarily be designed to save us.

The Life of Earth

https://chuckincardinal.blogspot.com/