The Origin and History of Halloween:

Halloween is a secular holiday combining vestiges of traditional harvest festival celebrations with customs more peculiar to the occasion such as costume wearing, trick-or-treating, pranksterism and decorative imagery based on the changing of the seasons, death, and the supernatural.

Halloween takes place on October 31.

Though it was regarded up until the last few decades of the 20th century as primarily a children's holiday, in more recent years activities such as costume parties, themed decorations, and even trick-or-treating have grown increasingly popular with adults as well, making Halloween a celebration for all ages.

WHAT DOES THE NAME "HALLOWEEN" MEAN?

The name Halloween (originally spelled Hallowe'en) is a contraction of All Hallows Even, meaning the day before All Hallows Day (better known today as All Saints Day), a Catholic holiday commemorating Christian saints and martyrs observed since the early Middle Ages on November 1.

HOW AND WHEN DID THE HOLIDAY ORIGINATE?

According to the best available evidence, Halloween originated as a Catholic vigil observed on the eve of All Saints Day, November 1, in the early Middle Ages.

It has become commonplace to trace its roots even further back in time to a pagan festival of ancient Ireland known as Samhain (pronounced sow'-en or sow'-een), about which little is actually known. The prehistoric observance is said to have marked the end of summer and the onset of winter and was celebrated with feasting, bonfires, sacrificial offerings, and homage to the dead.

Despite thematic similarities, there's scant evidence of any real historical continuity linking Samhain to the medieval observance of Halloween, however.

Some modern historians, notably Ronald Hutton (The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain, 1996) and Steve Roud (The English Year, 2008, and A Dictionary of English Folklore, 2005), flatly reject the popular notion that the Church designated November 1st All Saints Day to "Christianize" the pagan Celtic holiday.

Citing a lack of historical documentation, Roud goes so far as to dismiss the Samhain theory of origin altogether.

"Certainly the festival of Samhain, meaning Summer's End, was by far the most important of the four quarter days in the medieval Irish calendar, and there was a sense that this was the time of year when the physical and supernatural worlds were closest and magical things could happen," Roud notes, "but however strong the evidence in Ireland, in Wales it was May 1 and New Year which took precedence, in Scotland there is hardly any mention of it until much later and in Anglo-Saxon England even less."

It seems reasonable to conclude that the connection between Halloween and Samhain has, at the very least, been overstated in most modern accounts of the holiday's origin.

EARLIEST HALLOWEEN CUSTOMS

The earliest documented customs attributable to Halloween proper grew out of the tandem observances of All Saints Day (November 1), a day of prayer for saints and martyrs of the Church, and All Souls Day (November 2), a day of prayer for the souls of all the dead. Among the practices associated with Halloween during the Medieval period was the lighting of bonfires, evidently to symbolize the plight of souls lost in purgatory, and souling, which consisted of going door-to-door offering prayers for the dead in exchange for "soul cakes" and other treats.

Mumming, a custom originally associated with Christmas consisting of parading in costume, chanting rhymes, and play-acting, was a somewhat later addition to Halloween.

Again, however, despite the obvious similarities between old and new, it may be an exaggeration to say these medieval customs "survived" to the present day, or even that they "evolved" into modern Halloween practices such as trick-or-treating. By the time Irish immigrants brought the holiday to North America in the mid-1800s, mumming and souling were all but forgotten in Ireland itself, where the known Halloween customs of the time consisted of praying, communal feasting, and playing divination games such as bobbing for apples.

The secular, commercialized holiday we know in America today would be barely recognizable to Halloween celebrants of even just a century ago.

Sources

_{Adams, W. H. Davenport. Curiosities of Superstition and Sketches of Some Unrevealed Religions. London: J. Masters & Co., 1882.}

Aveni, Anthony. The Book of the Year: A Brief History of Our Seasonal Holidays. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.

Hutton, Ronald. The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996.

Opie, Iona and Tatem, Moira. A Dictionary of Superstitions. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990.

Rogers, Nicholas. Halloween: From Pagan Ritual to Party Night. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Roud, Steve. The English Year. London: Penguin Books, 2008.

Roud, Steve and Simpson, Jacqueline. A Dictionary of English Folklore. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

Skal, David J. Death Makes a Holiday: A Cultural History of Halloween. New York: Bloomsbury, 2002.

The Facts and Theories Behind Dinosaur Gigantism:

One of the things that make dinosaurs so appealing to kids and adults is their sheer size: plant eaters like Diplodocus and Brachiosaurus weighed in the neighborhood of 25 to 50 tons, and a well-toned Tyrannosaurus Rex or Spinosaurus tipped the scales as much as 10 tons. From the fossil evidence, it's clear that--species by species, individual by individual--dinosaurs were more massive than any other group of animals that ever lived (with the logical exception of certain genera of prehistoric sharks, prehistoric whales and marine reptiles like ichthyosaurs and pliosaurs, the extreme bulk of which were supported by the natural buoyancy of water).

However, what's fun for dinosaur enthusiasts is often what causes paleontologists and evolutionary biologists to tear their hair out. The unusual size of dinosaurs demands an explanation, and one that's compatible with other dinosaur theories--for example, it's impossible to discuss dinosaur gigantism without paying close attention to the whole cold-blooded/warm-blooded metabolism debate.

So what's the current state of thinking about plus-sized dinosaurs? Here are a few more-or-less interrelated theories.

THEORY #1: DINOSAUR SIZE WAS FUELED BY VEGETATION

During the Mesozoic Era--which stretched from the beginning of the Triassic period, 250 million years ago, to the extinction of the dinosaurs at the end of the Cretaceous period, 65 million years ago--atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide were much higher than they are today. If you've been following the global warming debate, you'll know that increased carbon dioxide is directly correlated with increased temperature--meaning the global climate was much warmer millions of years ago than it is today.

This combination of high levels of carbon dioxide (which plants recycle as food via the process of photosynthesis) and high temperatures (a daytime average of 90 or 100 degrees Fahrenheit, even near the poles) meant that the prehistoric world was matted with all kinds of vegetation--plants, trees, mosses, etc.

Like kids at an all-day dessert buffet, sauropods may have evolved to giant sizes simply because there was a surplus of nourishment at hand. This would also explain why certain tyrannosaurs and large theropods were so big; a 50-pound carnivore wouldn't have stood much of a chance against a 50-ton plant eater.

THEORY #2: HUGENESS IN DINOSAURS WAS A FORM OF SELF-DEFENSE

If Theory #1 strikes you as a bit simplistic, your instincts are correct: the mere availability of huge amounts of vegetation doesn't necessarily entail the evolution of giant animals that can chew and swallow it down to the last shoot. (After all, the earth was shoulder-deep in microorganisms for two billion years before the appearance of multicellular life, and we don't have any evidence of one-ton bacteria.) Evolution tends to work along multiple paths, and the fact is that the drawbacks of dinosaur gigantism (such as the slow speed of individuals and the need for limited population size) could easily have outweighed its benefits in terms of food-gathering.

That said, some paleontologists do believe that gigantism conferred an evolutionary advantage on the dinosaurs that possessed it: for example, a jumbo-sized hadrosaur like Shantungosaurus would have been virtually immune to predation when fully grown, even if the tyrannosaurs of its ecosystem hunted in packs to try to take down full-grown adults.

(This theory also lends some indirect credence to the idea that Tyrannosaurus Rex scavenged its food--say, by happening across the carcass of an Ankylosaurus that died of disease or old age--rather than actively hunting it down.) But once again, we have to be careful: of course, giant dinosaurs benefited from their size because otherwise, they wouldn't have been gigantic in the first place, a classic example of an evolutionary tautology.

THEORY #3: DINOSAUR GIGANTISM WAS A BYPRODUCT OF COLD-BLOODEDNESS

This is where things get a bit sticky. Many paleontologists who study giant plant-eating dinosaurs like hadrosaurs and sauropods believe that these behemoths were cold-blooded, for two compelling reasons: first, based on our current physiological models, a warm-blooded Mamenchisaurus would have cooked itself from the inside out, like a baked potato, and promptly expired; and second, no land-dwelling, warm-blooded mammals living today even approach the size of the largest herbivorous dinosaurs (elephants weigh a few tons, max, and the largest terrestrial mammal in the history of life on earth, Indricotherium, only topped out at 15 to 20 tons).

Here's where the advantages of gigantism come in. If a sauropod evolved to large-enough sizes, scientists believe, it would have achieved "homeothermy"--that is, the ability to maintain its interior temperature despite the prevailing environmental conditions. This is because a house-sized, homeothermic Argentinosaurus could warm up slowly (in the sun, during the day) and cool down equally slowly (at night), giving it a fairly constant average body temperature--whereas a smaller reptile would be at the mercy of ambient temperatures on an hour-by-hour basis.

The problem is these speculations about cold-blooded herbivorous dinosaurs run counter to the current vogue for warm-blooded carnivorous dinosaurs. Although it's not impossible that a warm-blooded Tyrannosaurus Rex could have coexisted alongside a cold-blooded Titanosaurus, evolutionary biologists would be much happier if all dinosaurs, which after all evolved from the same common ancestor, possessed uniform metabolisms--even if these were "intermediate" metabolisms, halfway between warm and cold, that doesn't correspond to anything seen in modern animals.

DINOSAUR SIZE: WHAT'S THE VERDICT?

If the above theories leave you as confused as you were before reading this article, you're not alone. The fact is that evolution toyed with the existence of giant-sized terrestrial animals, over a time span of 100 million years, exactly once, during the Mesozoic Era. Before and after the dinosaurs, most terrestrial creatures were reasonably sized, with the odd exceptions (like the above-mentioned Indricotherium) that proved the rule. Most likely, some combination of theories #1, #2 and #3, along with a possible fourth theory that we have yet to formulate, explains the huge size of dinosaurs; in exactly what proportion, and in what order, will have to await future research.

Facts of the day..!!

In 1986, 12 members of a Florida jury got stuck in the courthouse elevator for 20 minutes. The jurors were hearing a case against the Otis elevator company.

People leave pennies on John Wilkes Booth’s grave to give Lincoln the last word.

The recipe for Tootsie Rolls calls for the previous day’s batch to be mixed in with the new batch each day. Theoretically, this means there are a bit of the very first Tootsie Rolls in every new roll made today. They were created in 1907.

The last words of serial killer Peter Kürten were “Tell me… after my head is chopped off, will I still be able to hear, at least for a moment, the sound of my own blood gushing from the stump of my neck? That would be the pleasure to end all pleasures.”

Larry Fine of the Three Stooges burned his arm with acid as a child. His parents gave him violin lessons to strengthen the damaged nerves. He became so proficient on the violin that his parents planned to send him to a European music conservatory but the plan was thwarted by World War I.

There are an estimated 550 wild parrots living in NYC that were accidentally released from a shipment at JFK airport in the late 60s.

A woman crashed her own funeral after her husband hired hitmen to kill her. They let her go, telling her they didn’t believe in killing women. Five days later she appeared at her own funeral, with her husband pleading for forgiveness.

Chris Farley was originally the Voice of Shrek and had recorded 85% of his lines before he passed away.

Green screens are green because it doesn’t match any natural skin tone of the actor so no part of them will be accidentally edited out.

Rob Gronkowski lives off of his endorsement money and hasn’t spent a dime of his NFL Contract.

Quotes of the day..!!

Fascinating Facts About Your Heart:

The heart is a unique organ that has components of both muscle and nervous tissue. As a component of the cardiovascular system, its job is to pump blood to the cells and tissues of the body. Did you know that your heart can continue to beat even if it is not in your body? Discover 10 fascinating facts about your heart.

1. YOUR HEART BEATS AROUND 100,000 TIMES IN A YEAR

In young adults, the heart beats between 70 (at rest) and 200 (heavy exercise) times per minute. In one year, the heart beats around 100,000 times. In 70 years, your heart will beat more than 2.5 billion times.

2. YOUR HEART PUMPS ABOUT 1.3 GALLONS OF BLOOD IN ONE MINUTE

When at rest, the heart can pump approximately 1.3 gallons (5 quarts) of blood per minute. Blood circulates through the entire system of blood vessels in only 20 seconds. In a day, the heart pumps around 2,000 gallons of blood through thousands of miles of blood vessels.

3. YOUR HEART STARTS BEATING BETWEEN 3 AND 4 WEEKS AFTER CONCEPTION

The human heart starts to beat a few weeks after fertilization takes place. At 4 weeks, the heart beats between 105 and 120 times per minute.

4. COUPLES' HEARTS BEAT AS ONE

A University of California at Davis study has shown that couples breath at the same rate and have synchronized heartbeats. In the study, couples were connected to heart rate and respiration monitors as they went through several exercises without touching or speaking to each other. The couples' heart and breathing rates tended to be synchronized, indicating that romantically involved couples are linked on a physiological level.

5. YOUR HEART CAN STILL BEAT APART FROM YOUR BODY

Unlike other muscles, heart contractions are not regulated by the brain. Electrical impulses generated by heart nodes cause your heart to beat. As long as it has enough energy and oxygen, your heart will continue to beat even outside of your body.

The human heart may continue to beat for up to a minute after removal from the body. However, the heart of an individual addicted to a drug, such as cocaine, can beat for a much longer period of time outside of the body. Cocaine causes the heart to work harder as it reduces blood flow to the coronary arteries that supply blood to the heart muscle. This drug increases heart rate, heart size, and can cause heart muscle cells to beat erratically.

6. HEART SOUNDS ARE MADE BY HEART VALVES

The heart beats as a result of cardiac conduction, which is the generation of electrical impulses that cause the heart to contract. As the atria and ventricles contract, the closing of the heart valves produces the "lub-dupp" sounds. 

A heart murmur is an abnormal sound caused by turbulent blood flow in the heart. The most common type of heart murmur is caused by problems with the mitral valve located between the left atrium and left ventricle. The abnormal sound is produced by the backflow of blood into the left atrium. Normal functioning valves prevent blood from flowing backward.

7. BLOOD TYPE IS LINKED TO HEART DISEASE

Researchers have found that your blood type could put you at a higher risk of developing heart disease. According to a study published in the journal Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology, those with blood type AB have the highest risk for developing heart disease. Those with blood type B have the next highest risk, followed by type A. Those with blood type O have the lowest risk. The reasons for the link between blood type and heart disease are not fully understood; however, type AB blood has been linked to inflammation and type A to increased levels of a certain type of cholesterol.

8. ABOUT 20% OF CARDIAC OUTPUT GOES TO THE KIDNEYS AND 15% TO THE BRAIN

About 20% of blood flow goes to the kidneys. The kidneys filter toxins from the blood which are excreted in urine. They filter about 200 quarts of blood per day. Consistent blood flow to the brain is necessary for survival. If blood flow is interrupted, brain cells can die within a matter of minutes. The heart itself receives about 5% of cardiac output through the coronary arteries.

9. A LOW CARDIAC INDEX IS LINKED TO BRAIN AGING

The amount of blood pumped by the heart is linked to brain aging. People who have a low cardiac index have a smaller brain volume than those with a high cardiac index. Cardiac index is the measure of the amount of blood that pumps from the heart in relation to a person's body size. As we get older, our brain shrinks in size normally. According to a Boston University study, those with low cardiac indexes have almost two years more brain aging than those with high cardiac indexes.

10. SLOW BLOOD FLOW CAN CAUSE HEART DISEASE

Researchers from the University of Washington have uncovered more clues as to how heart arteries may become blocked over time. By studying blood vessel walls, it was discovered that blood cells move closer together when they are in areas where blood flow is swift. This clinging together of cells reduces the loss of fluid from blood vessels. The researchers noted that in areas where blood flow is slow, there tends to be more leakage from arteries. This leads to artery-blocking cholesterol buildup in those areas.

What Is an Annotation?

An annotation is a note, comment, or concise statement of the key ideas in a text or a portion of a text and is commonly used in reading instruction and in research. In corpus linguistics, an annotation is a coded note or comment that identifies specific linguistic features of a word or sentence.

One of the most common uses of annotations is in essay composition, wherein a student might annotate a larger work her or she is referencing, pulling and compiling a list of quotes to form an argument.

Long-form essays and term papers, as a result, often come with an annotated bibliography, which includes a list of references as well as brief summaries of the sources.

There are many ways to annotate a given text, identifying key components of the material by underlining, writing in the margins, listing cause-effect relationships, and noting confusing ideas with question marks beside the statement in the text.

IDENTIFYING KEY COMPONENTS OF A TEXT

When conducting research, the process of annotation is almost essential to retaining the knowledge necessary to understand a text's' key points and features and can be achieved through a number of means.

Jodi Patrick Holschuh  and Lori Price Aultman describe a student's goal for annotating text in "Comprehension Development," wherein the students "are responsible for pulling out not only the main points of the text but also the other key information (e.g., examples and details) that they will need to rehearse for exams."

Holschuh and Aultman go on to describe the many ways a student may isolate key information from a given text, including writing brief summaries in the student's own words, listing out characteristics and cause-and-effect relations in the text, putting key information in graphics and charts, marking possible test questions, and underlining key words or phrases or putting a question mark next to confusing concepts.

REAP: A WHOLE-LANGUAGE STRATEGY

According to Eanet & Manzo's 1976 "Read-Encode-Annotate-Ponder" strategy for teaching students language and reading comprehension, an annotation is a vital part of a students' ability to understand any given text comprehensively.

The process involves the following four steps: Read to discern the intent of the text or the writer's message; Encode the message into a form of self-expression, or write it out in student's own words; Analyze by writing this concept in a note; and Ponder or reflect on the note, either through introspection or discussing with peers.

Anthony V. Manzo and Ula Casale Manzo describe the notion in "Content Area Reading: A Heuristic Approach" as among the earliest strategies developed to stress the use of writing as a means of improving thinking and reading," wherein these annotations "serve as alternative perspectives from which to consider and evaluate information and ideas."

An A-to-Z History of Mathematics:

Mathematics is the science of numbers. To be precise, the Merriam-Webster dictionary defines mathematics as, the science of numbers and their operations, interrelations, combinations, generalizations, abstractions and of space configurations and their structure, measurement, transformations, and generalizations.

There are several different branches of mathematical science, which include algebra, geometry, and calculus.

Mathematics is not an invention. Discoveries and laws of science are not considered inventions since inventions are material things and processes. However, there is a history of mathematics, a relationship between mathematics and inventions and mathematical instruments themselves are considered inventions.

According to the book Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times, mathematics as an organized science did not exist until the classical Greek period from 600 to 300 BC. There were, however, prior civilizations in which the beginnings or rudiments of mathematics were formed.

For example, when civilization began to trade, a need to count was created. When humans traded goods, they needed a way to count the goods and to calculate the cost of those goods. The very first device for counting numbers was, of course, the human hand and in which fingers represented quantities. And to count beyond ten fingers, mankind used natural markers, rocks or shells.

From that point, tools such as counting boards and the abacus were invented. 

Here's a quick tally of important developments introduced throughout the ages, beginning from A to Z. 

ABACUS

One of the first tools for counting invented, the abacus was invented around 1200 B.C.E. in China and was used in many Ancient civilizations, including Persia and Egypt.

ACCOUNTING

The innovative Italians of the Renaissance (fourteenth through sixteenth century) are widely acknowledged to be the fathers of modern accounting.

ALGEBRA

The first treatise on algebra was written by Diophantus of Alexandria in the 3rd century B.C.E. Algebra comes from the Arabic word al-jabr, an ancient medical term meaning "the reunion of broken parts.'' Al-Khawarizmi is another early algebra scholar and was the first to teach the formal discipline. 

ARCHIMEDES

Archimedes was a mathematician and inventor from ancient Greece best known for his discovery of the relationship between the surface and volume of a sphere and its circumscribing cylinder for his formulation of a hydrostatic principle (Archimedes' principle) and for inventing the Archimedes screw (a device for raising water).

DIFFERENTIAL

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716) was a German philosopher, mathematician, and logician who is probably most well known for having invented differential and integral calculus. He did this independently of Sir Isaac Newton.

GRAPH

A graph is a pictorial representation of statistical data or of a functional relationship between variables. William Playfair (1759-1823) is generally viewed as the inventor of most graphical forms used to display data, including line plots, the bar chart, and the pie chart.

MATH SYMBOL

In 1557, the "=" sign was first used by Robert Record. In 1631, came the  ">" sign.

PYTHAGOREANISM

Pythagoreanism is a school of philosophy and a religious brotherhood believed to have been founded by Pythagoras of Samos, who settled in Croton in southern Italy about 525 BC. The group had a profound effect on the development of mathematics.

PROTRACTOR

The simple protractor is an ancient device. As an instrument used to construct and measure plane angles, the simple protractor looks like a semicircular disk marked with degrees, beginning with 0º to 180º.

The first complex protractor was created for plotting the position of a boat on navigational charts. Called a three-arm protractor or station pointer, it was invented in 1801 by Joseph Huddart, a U.S. naval captain. The center arm is fixed, while the outer two are rotatable and capable of being set at any angle relative to the center one.

SLIDE RULERS

Circular and rectangular slide rules, an instrument used for mathematical calculations, were both invented by mathematician William Oughtred.

ZERO

Zero was invented by the Hindu mathematicians Aryabhata and Varamihara in India around or shortly after the year 520 A.D.

Exactly..!!

Exploring Deep Ocean Trenches:

Ocean trenches are long, narrow depressions on the seafloor, hidden deep beneath Earth's oceans. These dark, once-mysterious canyons can plunge as deep as 11,000 meters (36,000 feet) into our planet's crust. That's so deep that if Mount Everest were placed at the bottom of the deepest trench, its rocky peak would be 1.6 kilometers beneath the waves of the Pacific Ocean.

WHAT CAUSES OCEAN TRENCHES?

Some of the most amazing topography exists beneath the waves of Earth's oceans.

There are volcanoes and mountains that tower higher than any of the continental peaks. And the deep ocean trenches dwarf any of the continental canyons. How do those trenches form? The short answer comes from Earth science and the study of tectonic plate motions, which applies to earthquakes as well as volcanic activity. 

Earth scientists have discovered that deep layers of rock ride atop Earth's molten mantle layer, and as they float along, they jostle each other. In many places around the planet, one plate dives under another. The boundary where they meet is where deep ocean trenches exist. For example, the Mariana Trench, which lies beneath the Pacific Ocean near the Mariana island chain and not far from the coast of Japan, is the product of what's called "subduction." Beneath the trench, the Eurasian plate is sliding over a smaller one called the Philippine Plate, which is sinking into the mantle and melting.

That sinking and melting have formed the Mariana Trench.

FINDING TRENCHES

Ocean trenches exist around the world and are routinely the deepest part of the ocean. They include the Philippine Trench, Tonga Trench, the South Sandwich Trench, the Eurasian Basin and Malloy Deep, the Diamantina Trench, the Puerto Rican Trench, and the Mariana.

Most (but not all) are directly related to subduction. Interestingly, the Diamantina Trench formed when Antarctica and Australia pulled apart many millions of years ago. That action cracked Earth's surface and the resulting fracture zone became the Diamantina Trench. Most of the deepest trenches are found in the Pacific Ocean, which is also known as the "Ring of Fire" due to tectonic activity that also spurs the formation of volcanic eruptions deep beneath the water.

The lowest part of the Mariana Trench is called the Challenger Deep and it makes up the southernmost part of the trench. It has been mapped by submersible craft as well as surface ships using sonar (a method that bounces sound pulses from the sea bottom and measures the length of time it takes for the signal to return). Not all trenches are as deep as the Mariana. As they age, trenches can get filled with sea-bottom sediments (sand, rock, mud, and dead creatures that float down from higher in the ocean). Older sections of the sea floor have deeper trenches, which happens because heavier rock tends to sink over time.

EXPLORING THE DEEPS

Most trenches weren't really known until the late 20th century. Exploring them requires specialized submersible craft, which didn't exist until the second half of the 1900s.

These deep ocean canyons are extremely inhospitable to human life. The pressure of the water at those depths would instantly kill a human, so no one dared venture into the deeps of the Mariana Trench for years. That is, until 1960, when two men descended in a bathyscaphe called the Trieste. It wasn't until 2012 (52 years later) that another human being ventured into the trench. This time, it was filmmaker and underwater explorer James Cameron (of Titanic film fame) who took his Deepsea Challenger craft on the first solo trip to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Most other deep-sea explorer vessels, such as Alvin (operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts), do not dive nearly quite so far, but still can go down around 3,600 meters (around 12,000 feet).

DOES LIFE EXIST IN THE DEEP OCEAN TRENCHES?

Surprisingly, despite the high water pressure and cold temperatures that exist at the bottoms of trenches, life does flourish in those extreme environments.

Tiny one-celled organisms live in the trenches, as well as certain types of fish, crustaceans, jellyfish, tube worms, and sea cucumbers.

FUTURE EXPLORATION OF DEEP SEA TRENCHES

Exploring the deep sea is expensive and difficult, although the scientific and economic rewards can be very substantial. Human exploration (like Cameron's deep dive) is dangerous. Future exploration may well rely (at least partially) on robotic probes, just as planetary scientists reply on them for the exploration of distant planets. There are many reasons to keep studying the ocean depths; they remain the least-probed of Earth's environments. Continued studies will help scientists understand the actions of plate tectonics, and also reveal new life forms making themselves at home in some of the most inhospitable environments on the planet.

Popular Names and Nicknames for Residents of States:

It's easy to see why someone who lives in New York State is called a New Yorker. And why a resident of California is a Californian. But what do people in Massachusetts call themselves? And where do Huskies and Nutmeggers live?

In the first column of the table below, you'll find the official names for residents of the 50 states according to The United States Government Printing Office Style Manual. The right-hand column contains alternative names and nicknames.

Official Names	Nicknames & Alternative Names
Alabamian	Alabaman, Alabamer, 'Bamer
Alaskan
Arizonan	Arizonian
Arkansan	Arkansasian, Arkansawyer
Californian	Californiac
Coloradan	Coloradoan, Highlander
Connecticuter	Nutmegger
Delawarean	Delawearer
Floridian	Floridan
Georgian
Hawaiian	malihini (newcomer)
Idahoan	Idahoer
Illinoisan	Illini, Illinoyer
Indianian	Hoosier, Indianan, Indianer
Iowan	Iowegian, Iowigian
Kansan	Kanser
Kentuckian	Kentucker, Kentuckeyite
Louisianian	Louisianan
Mainer	Down Easter
Marylander	Marylandian
Massachusettsan	Bay Stater
Michiganite	Michiganian, Michigander
Minnesotan
Mississippian	Mississippier, Mississipper
Missourian
Montanan
Nebraskan	Husker
Nevadan	Nevadian
New Hampshirite	Granite Stater
New Jerseyite	New Jerseyan
New Mexican
New Yorker	Empire Stater
North Carolinian
North Dakotan
Ohioan	Buckeye
Oklahoman	Okie
Oregonian	Oregonner
Pennsylvanian
Rhode Islander	Rhodian
South Carolinian
South Dakotan
Tennessean
Texan	Texian
Utahn	Utahan
Vermonter
Virginian
Washingtonian	'Toner
West Virginian
Wisconsinite	Cheesehead
Wyomingite