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moss

Scientists Discover Desert Moss That ‘Could Survive On Mars’

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Scientists in China stated that they have discovered a moss that would be able to withstand conditions on the planet Mars. The moss itself is called Syntrichia caninervis, and was found in regions of Antarctica and the Mojave desert. 

The scientists involved in this feat recently published the information in the journal The Innovation. They wrote that the moss could withstand conditions such as drought, high levels of radiation, and extreme cold temperatures. 

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The team stated that this work is the first to look at how the plant could potentially survive, and potentially be grown, on the planet’s surface. 

​​“The unique insights obtained in our study lay the foundation for outer space colonization using naturally selected plants adapted to extreme stress conditions,” the team wrote.

“Cultivating terrestrial plants is an important part of any long-term space mission because plants efficiently turn carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and carbohydrates – essentially the air and food that humans need to survive. Desert moss is not edible, but it could provide other important services in space,” said Professor Stuart McDaniel, an expert on moss at the University of Florida who was not involved in the study. 

The moss itself could also work to transform rocky surfaces that would allow other plants to grow on Mars. 

They wrote that the desert moss was able to quickly recover from almost complete dehydration, and was able to regenerate in normal growth conditions after spending nearly five years at -112 degrees Fahrenheit, and 30 days at -320.8 degrees Fahrenheit. It also could regenerate after exposure to gamma rays. 

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The team wrote that they created a set-up that has similar pressures, gases, temperatures, and UV radiation levels to Mars.  

“Looking to the future, we expect that this promising moss could be brought to Mars or the moon to further test the possibility of plant colonization and growth in outer space,” the researchers wrote. 

“This paper is exciting because it shows that desert moss survives short exposures to some of the stresses that are likely to be found on a trip to Mars, including very high levels of radiation, very cold temperatures, and very low oxygen levels,” Professor McDaniel said. 

“These experiments represent an important first step, but they do not show that the moss could be a significant source of oxygen under Martian conditions, nor do they show that the desert moss could reproduce and proliferate in the Martian context.”

Dr Agata Zupanska, of the SETI Institute, agreed that the study’s findings are exciting, however, more research is needed before we can get to a place of growing plants on Mars. 

“In my opinion, we are getting close to growing plants in extraterrestrial greenhouses, and moss certainly has a place in those. Implying that moss, or any other pioneering species, is ready to terraform Mars, or any other outer planet, is an exaggeration,” she said. 

“This extremotolerant moss could be a promising pioneer plant for Mars colonization. We have a long way to go, but this lowly desert moss offers hope for making small portions of Mars habitable for humankind in the future,” said Professor Edward Guinan of Villanova University.

truck

US Truck Drivers Call For Federal Action To Improve Working Conditions 

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US truck drivers are currently pushing for federal action to be taken to improve the conditions in which they’re working. Drivers are asking for higher ups to address their deteriorating working conditions, decreasing pay, and rampant fraud. 

Caleb Fernandez is a part of the movement, and has been a long-distance truck driver since 2017. He stated to the media that he will often spend hours loading and/or unloading his truck’s cargo without getting paid for the full time. 

“I think that I’ve got my schedule down and then just one customer can completely mess it up. Even if there’s an appointment, they just don’t show much that they care about wasting my time.”

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“My whole week gets wrecked because of one customer that just didn’t care about the time. It’s a chaotic life,” he said. 

May 1st of this year, 75 members of the Truckers Movement for Justice held a protest outside of the US Department of Transportation offices in Washington DC, demanding action be taken on things like wage theft, lack of overtime pay, and unpaid wait times for delivering cargo or taking on loads. 

The group met with senior officials from the Department in 2021 as a part of President Joe Biden’s trucking action plan, and set initiatives that were meant to increase the supply of truck drivers. The group has claimed that they have yet to see any improvement on the three core demands made during the meeting. 

“We’ve lost our patience. This has been going for years and has only gotten worse with the lack of federal action. We don’t need taskforces and studies,” said Fernandez, who is also the deputy secretary for Truckers Movement for Justice.

When we look at the stats and consider the impact of inflation on salary, truck drivers in the US in 1980 made about $110,000 annually, and today they make, on average, about $48,000. There are currently more than 2 million Americans working as truck drivers today. 

Ray Randall also spoke on the hours he’s worked unpaid, and other working conditions that he was not compensated for in his 20 years working as a truck driver. 

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“Drivers should be paid detention time. We believe all drivers should be paid for all hours worked, because once you come on duty, you’re working. If you come to a shipper and have to wait, I’m working. Also, after 40 hours, companies pay employees overtime but drivers don’t get any overtime and we can put in 70-plus hours a week. We can be on duty 12 hours a day and we’re not getting paid for those 12 hours,” he explained. 

William McKelvie, a truck driver for over 25 years, explained that “in addition to unpaid detention time, broker fraud and a lack of overtime pay, layover rates for overnight hauls have decreased in years, down from $500-$1,000 to $250 or less.”

“Drivers have a right to review freight bills, which provide the transaction information regarding loads to ensure all parties that no one is being ripped off. Many brokers will blackball or push drivers out for requesting to see freight bills, to avoid any pushback or criticism of how the costs are dispersed from shippers to brokers and what portion is paid out to drivers,” said McKelvie. 

“This is something that corporations and others have used their strong arms and intimidation tactics to overrule and overpower the working men and women in the industry,” he said.

“The more of our time that they waste, the more it hurts us financially, economically, and the ability to go and get our proper rest and relax for the next load,” McKelvie said.

“From back in the day we went from working 50 hours a week to 60 hours a week, to now we are at 70 hours a week, and with the extended work, that doesn’t give us any time for any real-life quality,” he said.

Income Inequality

The Cultural Impact of Income Inequality

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Over the past several decades, as tax cuts and other economic policies have benefited wealthy Americans at the expense of lower and middle-class Americans, the gap between the wealthy and the poor has continued to widen. A number of factors account for this; not only have wages remained virtually stagnant since the 1970s despite accelerating economic growth overall, but the cost of living has also increased, as have expenses for education and health care. This radical transformation in the country’s economic landscape has not only had effects on the financial world, but on the broader cultural environment that informs human behavior in society. Nearly every aspect of life is affected, from entertainment to politics to our shared system of fundamental values. 

Perhaps the most striking example of the broader impacts of income inequality is the fact that rich people live longer lives than poor people. For some groups of disadvantaged people, life expectancy is shorter than it was for their parents, pointing to the extreme effects of these people’s inability to earn as much as their parents did. A number of factors account for this difference in life expectancy; one possible explanation is racism in the healthcare industry, as minorities are both likely to receive less in wages and face discrimination in hospitals and doctor’s offices. Another factor is the fact that people are not able to retire as young as they used to be able to; many workers continue their jobs into their 60’s and 70’s, opening them up to stress and work-related health complications in old age. Additionally, as healthcare costs increase, many lower-income individuals may delay or opt out of doctors’ visits over financial concerns, leading to exacerbated illnesses and early death.

The type of work people engage in, too, is shaped by income inequality. While human societies have virtually always been divided by class, with lower classes working in service of the upper classes, the widening income gap between the classes has led to an explosion of service-related jobs, such as manicure and massage therapy. These types of jobs often employ immigrants and workers who did not receive a college degree, and are characterized by low pay and poor working conditions. Nail salons in particular are plagued by poor and illegal working conditions, leading to a statewide investigation by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. 

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This category of work, which many call “wealth work,” also applies to jobs like driving an Uber or delivering food. Though these jobs are beneficial to those without a college education, particularly in the aftermath of the collapse of the American manufacturing industry, they also point to a cultural shift towards more rigid definitions of class, which makes it hard for lower-class individuals to advance in their careers. What’s more, these jobs are often performed with a certain degree of anonymity, as they are performed through an app or in urban business centers far from the worker’s place of residence, in contrast with the more personal interactions between the classes of several decades ago.

The gap in income between the classes correlates with an increase in polarization in American politics; as the Right has moved further to the political right under authoritarian leader Donald Trump, the Democratic Party as a whole has moved to the left in recent years, with once-taboo leftist policy positions like a substantial raise of minimum wage, entirely socialized medicine, the cancellation of student debt, and the idea of a universal basic income becoming topics of open discussion. The wealthy class has also transformed politics through the use of substantial political donations, with Donald Trump having raised well over $100 million for his re-election campaign this year alone. Wealthy donors, including oil executives and Wall Street titans, have successfully lobbied to cut taxes on the super-rich and roll back regulations which are meant to protect customers but impose costs on large companies. On a large scale, the effects of these policy changes have been to further disenfranchise the lower and middle classes in service of the upper class, as evidenced by the rapidly declining quality-of-life of most Americans.