Kashmiri separatist leaders condemn terror attack on Amarnath pilgrims

Separatist leaders in Jammu and Kashmir condemned the terror attack on Amarnath pilgrims in Anantnag district tonight, saying the incident “goes against Kashmiri ethos.”

In a joint statement, Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik expressed grief over the killing of seven Amarnath yatris.

“The incident goes against the very grain of Kashmiri ethos. The Amarnath yatra has been going on peacefully for centuries and is part of yearly rhythm and will remain so,” it said.

“Our heart goes out to the families of the bereaved and we express our heartfelt condolences,” they said.

A Sun Up On Tatooine

If you thought Tatooine from Star Wars was a weird planet with two suns, then what about the huge planet that astronomers discovered during the past year about 320 light years away that has three suns?

The Greenland Shark

Greenland sharks are now the longest-living vertebrates known on Earth, scientists say.

Researchers used radiocarbon dating to determine the ages of 28 of the animals, and estimated that one female was about 400 years old.

The team found that the sharks grow at just 1cm a year, and reach sexual maturity at about the age of 150.

The research is published in the journal Science.

Lead author Julius Nielsen, a marine biologist from the University of Copenhagen, said: "We had our expectations that we were dealing with an unusual animal, but I think everyone doing this research was very surprised to learn the sharks were as old as they were."

The former vertebrate record-holder was a bowhead whale estimated to be 211 years old.

But if invertebrates are brought into the longevity competition, a 507-year-old clam called Ming holds the title of most aged animal.

Slow swimmers

Greenland sharks are huge beasts, that can grow up to 5m in length.

They can be found, swimming slowly, throughout the cold, deep waters of the North Atlantic.

With this leisurely pace of life and sluggish growth rate, the sharks were thought to live for a long time. But until now, determining any ages was difficult.

Leprotic Squirrels

There are squirrels living the United Kingdom which are carrying a particular strain of leprosy that can be traced back to our own human ancestors who lived in Medieval Europe.

Tanzania’s Helium

A vast underground reserve of helium gas has been discovered by scientists in the Tanzanian Rift Valley.

The discovery of one of the world's biggest helium gas fields is the first time that the gas has ever been found intentionally. Previous discoveries have always been accidental and revealed small quantities of helium while people were drilling for oil and gas.

Researchers from Oxford and Durham universities estimate that just one part of the helium gas field contains 54 billion cubic feet of the gas, more than six times the global annual consumption of helium. The gas, which is vital for use of MRI scanners, welding equipment and nuclear reactors is commonly extracted from natural gas, where it makes up about seven per cent of the substance.

Helium is the second most common element in the universe and is produced in large amounts by the sun, but it's particularly scarce on Earth. In 2010, Nobel prize-winning physicist Robert Richardson warned that world supplies could run out in 30 years.

Bird Happiness

An Australian Geographic study found that domesticated birds who had been able to mimic human sounds, and then managed to escape, had been able to teach those sounds to other wild birds. I mean, that’s not a direct influence on your own personal happiness but just knowing that happens makes me a little bit happier.

Lengthy gestation Period for Dolphin

A dolphin’s gestation period will vary depending on species. For small species such as the Tucuxi dolphin, the period is around twelve months, while the orca is around seventeen months.