The red-throated wryneck (Jynx ruficollis) is a bird in the woodpecker family that is related to the Eurasian wryneck. Its three subspecies are resident in much of sub-Saharan Africa in open habitats with trees. It is a slim bird about 19 cm (7.5 in) in length, with a fine bill, long tail and cryptic grey and brown plumage. The sexes look similar. The diet is almost entirely ants. This wryneck‘s call is a series of shrill notes. When threatened, it will hiss and twist its neck and head in a snake-like manner to deter predators. It nests in pre-existing holes, usually in trees, preferring old barbet or woodpecker nests. The nest cavity is unlined, and the clutch is typically three or four white eggs. Both sexes incubate for 12 to 15 days until the blind, naked chicks hatch. The chicks are fed by both adults for 25 to 26 days until they fledge. There are usually two broods. This bird has a very extensive range, and a large and increasing population. It is evaluated as a species of least concern by the IUCN. (Full article…)

Subduction of the Juan de Fuca Plate under the North American Plate, causing volcanism in the Boring Lava Field

The Boring Lava Field is a Plio-Pleistocene volcanic field with cinder cones, small shield volcanoes, and lava flows in the northern Willamette Valley of the U.S. state of Oregon and adjacent southwest Washington state. The zone became active about 2.7 million years ago, with long periods of eruptive activity interspersed with quiescence. Its last eruptions took place about 57,000 years ago; individual volcanic vents are considered extinct, but the field itself is not. The volcanic field covers an area of about 1,500 square miles (3,900 km²) and has a total volume of 2.4 cubic miles (10 km³). The highest elevation of the field is at Larch Mountain, which reaches a height of 4,055 feet (1,236 m). The Portland metropolitan area, including suburbs, is one of the few places in the continental United States to have extinct volcanoes within a city’s limits. The probability of future eruptions affecting the Portland metropolitan area is very low. (Full article…)

Obverse of the Delaware Tercentenary half dollar

The Delaware Tercentenary half dollar is a commemorative fifty-cent coin designed by Carl L. Schmitz and minted by the United States Bureau of the Mint to mark the 300th anniversary of New Sweden, the first successful European settlement in Delaware. Also known as the Swedish Delaware half dollar, the coin was produced by the Philadelphia Mint in March 1937, though that year appears nowhere on the piece. The obverse (pictured) shows Wilmington‘s Old Swedes Church, one of the oldest Protestant churches in the United States still standing, while the reverse features the ship Kalmar Nyckel, which carried emigrants to New Sweden. Schmitz won a competition to design the coin. The half dollars were sold to the public by the Delaware Swedish Tercentenary Commission for $1.75 each, and more than 20,000 coins were sold of the 25,000 coins minted for sale. The profits were used to help fund the tercentenary celebrations. (Full article…)

23 Wall Street, also known as the J.P. Morgan Building, is an office building in the Financial District of Manhattan in New York City, at the southeast corner of Wall Street and Broad Street. The four-story building, designed by Trowbridge & Livingston in the Neoclassical style, was constructed between 1913 and 1914. When it was damaged during the Wall Street bombing in 1920, J.P. Morgan & Co. refused to make repairs to defy the bombers. The building was the firm’s headquarters until 1989, when the company moved to 60 Wall Street. During the 2000s, there were plans to convert 23 Wall Street into condominiums. The building was sold in 2008 to interests associated with the billionaire industrialist Sam Pa. It has mostly remained empty, although it has been used for events. The building is a New York City designated landmark and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP); it is also a contributing property to the NRHP-listed Wall Street Historic District. (Full article…)

Island from Proteus in spring

Proteus is a 2013 exploration and walking simulator video game designed and created by Ed Key and David Kanaga for Microsoft Windows, OS X, and Linux. Versions for the PlayStation 3 video game console and the Vita handheld console were developed by Curve Studios. Key first conceived Proteus as an open-ended role-playing game, but redesigned it to be “nontraditional and nonviolent”, without prescribed goals. The flora and fauna of the procedurally generated world (pictured) emit unique musical signatures that trigger changes to the background music as the player moves about the world. Before its full release, Proteus won the prize for Best Audio at the 2011 IndieCade awards. In 2012 it was a finalist for the Independent Games Festival‘s Nuovo Award and was featured in an exhibit at New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Following its release, critics praised the game, especially for its audio features, although some criticised its brevity and limited replayability. Journalists debated whether Proteus should be described as a video game. (Full article…)

Irreversible inhibitor binding to an enzyme

An enzyme inhibitor is a molecule that binds to an enzyme‘s active site, or another site on the enzyme, and blocks the enzyme’s catalysis of the reaction. Enzyme inhibitors are generally specific to one enzyme and control that enzyme’s activity. They also control essential enzymes such as proteases or nucleases that, if left unchecked, may damage a cell. Many poisons produced by animals or plants are enzyme inhibitors, and many drug molecules are enzyme inhibitors that inhibit an aberrant human enzyme or an enzyme critical for the survival of a pathogen. Since anti-pathogen inhibitors generally target only one enzyme, such drugs are highly specific and generally produce few side effects in humans. Medicinal enzyme inhibitors often have low dissociation constants, meaning a minute amount of the inhibitor will inhibit the enzyme. The discovery of enzyme inhibitors and their refinement are researched in biochemistry and pharmacology. (Full article…)