Our Ten 90s Bands That Sounded Like 70s Bands presents a list of groups that released their first album in the 1990s. These groups found quick success, usually starting with their first album release, even though their origins may have gone back a decade or two. Many of these groups continued on into the 2000s and beyond, while some broke up way too soon. Nonetheless, what they all have in common is that their sound was heavily influenced by 70s rock music. For us, this is a good thing, and we love all the artists on this list. This is The post Ten 90s Bands Thats Sounded Like 70s Bands appeared first on ClassicRockHistory.com.

Our partner Rob Brezsny, who has a new book out, Astrology Is Real: Revelations from My Life as an Oracle, provides his weekly wisdom to enlighten our thinking and motivate our mood. Rob’s Free Will Astrology, is a syndicated weekly column appearing in over a hundred publications. He is also the author of Pronoia Is the Antidote […] The post Your Weekly Horoscope – ‘Free Will Astrology’ From Rob Brezsny appeared first on Good News Network.

They Deserved It

If you’ve ever thought twice about wearing a dark shirt or jacket in case it ends up covered in a light dusting of flakes, you will know the annoyance that dandruff can cause. Lots of us will have to deal with this at some stage in our lives – and while it’s not dangerous, it can make you very self-conscious. But where does it come from, and what can you do about it?What is dandruff?Dandruff is a harmless – if irritating – condition that usually affects the skin of the scalp, causing it to be itchy and flaky. The flakes of skin can appear either white, yellow, or grey and tend to be more visible in darker hair, or if they fall down onto your clothes. It’s a very common condition that normally starts to crop up after puberty, but there’s a similar condition called cradle cap that affects babies. Dandruff can arise from a number of different underlying conditions, but it’s important to note that you cannot catch it from other people.What causes dandruff?Seborrheic dermatitisAccording to the American Academy of Dermatology, dandruff itself may be considered a mild form of a condition called seborrheic dermatitis (SD), thought to affect around 3 percent of people, although estimates do vary. In people with SD, the itchy, flaky patches can extend beyond the scalp to other areas of skin, such as behind the ears and around the nose. The condition also causes inflammation, and in more severe cases yellowish scales of dead skin can appear extensively on the scalp and attach to the hair shaft.The condition is particularly common in infants, adolescents, and older adults, and in males. People who are HIV positive are at increased risk compared with the general population.It’s thought that a major contributor to SD is an overgrowth of yeast in the genus Malassezia, particularly the species M. globosa and M. restricta. They are what’s termed a commensal fungus, meaning they live naturally on our skin, and it’s not completely clear why they cause issues for some people.The National Eczema Association explains one theory, that excess sebum production may provide a hospitable environment for Malassezia, causing it to over-colonize the scalp in some individuals. There’s some research to suggest that free fatty acids left behind by the fungus may damage the skin barrier of the scalp, causing irritation that can lead to dandruff.In 2019, some researchers put forward a perspective on the role of Malassezia in SD, suggesting that other potential causal factors should also be considered. They cited some evidence from animal studies that there could be a genetic component as well as a role for the skin microbiome, and argued that more research is needed to fully understand the causes. A 2024 preprint, which is yet to be validated by peer review, explored the idea that the microbiome could be playing a role in dandruff. The authors found that propionic acid, produced by the skin bacterium Cutibacterium acnes can limit the growth of Malassezia and help prevent dandruff, suggesting that altering the microbial balance in favor of this species could be a possible route to treatment. However, only 57 participants were involved in their clinical study.Other conditionsSD is not the only possible cause for a flaky, itchy scalp and finding snow on your shoulders in the middle of summer. Another fungal infection, tinea capitis or scalp ringworm, causes a rash that can include some skin flaking, and even lead to hair loss. Psoriasis can also occur on the scalp, causing plaques of scaly skin and dandruff-like flaking. It’s also possible to experience flaking after an allergic reaction to hair products, known as contact dermatitis. What are the latest treatments for dandruff?The specific treatment you need may depend on the underlying cause of your dandruff. Here, we’re going to focus on regular dandruff and SD – but if you are concerned that treatments aren’t working or think your dandruff may be caused by another problem, it’s best to seek advice from a doctor.ShampooFor mild dandruff, it’s usually possible to get it under control using an antidandruff shampoo. Medicated shampoos typically contain an antifungal ingredient that targets dandruff-causing fungi, and you may find you need to try a few before you hit on one that works.One common ingredient is pyrithione zinc, which has broad antifungal as well as antibacterial properties. One of its advantages is that it can remain on the skin even when the product carrying it has been rinsed off, continuing to work over a longer period of time. A recent study looked at various shampoo formulations for SD with a focus on pyrithione zinc. It found that while levels of the ingredient delivered to the surface of the skin were sufficient to inhibit the growth of Malassezia, the effects of different formulations at the level of the hair follicle were more variable, suggesting that some may not have as long-lasting an effect. The authors made some recommendations for how future formulas may combat this to maximize their effectiveness.Alternative antifungals include ketoconazole, miconazole, and selenium sulfide. Availability of these products can vary in different locations, so your best resource for finding out what might be accessible to you is your local pharmacy.Some other antidandruff shampoos that can be effective contain coal tar, which is thought to work through its antimicrobial effects as well as by helping the dead skin cells to loosen and shed more easily. Coal tar can cause temporary discoloration of lighter hair, and may also make the skin of the scalp more sensitive to sunlight, so you should wear sunscreen and/or a hat while using these products.You may find you need to alternate between different products if one stops working after a time. Once the dandruff is under control, it’s often possible to return to a regular shampoo and only use a medicated one occasionally for maintenance.Treating more severe casesFor more severe SD, a doctor may prescribe a lotion or scalp treatment containing salicylic acid. This acts as an exfoliant, helping slough off the top layer of skin cells to limit the formation of plaques and scales. You may also be able to get creams or shampoos containing higher concentrations of antifungal ingredients via a prescription from your doctor. In the most severe cases, such as in people who are immunocompromised and who may have widespread SD, an antifungal medication taken as a pill may be required.Where there is more severe inflammation of the scalp, it may be necessary to use a topical corticosteroid for a short period of time, but again this would only be prescribed by a doctor. Alternative remediesThere are a number of alternative and home remedies that people turn to for the relief of dandruff, with varying degrees of scientific backing.One that pops up a lot is tea tree oil, and there was a study back in 2002 that concluded a shampoo containing 5 percent tea tree was effective at improving dandruff based on results from 126 people. Tea tree oil is a generally safe ingredient when used correctly diluted or in a formula like a shampoo, and it’s been used medicinally in its native Australia for centuries. It has antimicrobial properties, which may explain why it appears to work for some people with dandruff. A 2023 study examined a synthetic compound based on an extract from the tea tree plant, finding in in vitro studies – so not in live animals or humans yet – that it may have antibacterial and antifungal properties that could mean it would be of use in SD remedies. Similarly, lemongrass oil is thought to have some potential antifungal effects. A recent review discussed this in addition to other purported health benefits of the extract, citing some evidence that it may disrupt fungal cell membranes and could be beneficial if included in antidandruff hair tonic formulations, but it’s difficult to draw firm conclusions at this stage without larger-scale research.People may also turn to dietary supplements such as omega-3s, seeking to improve skin health generally. In general, supplements may be a good option if, for example, you need to follow a restricted diet and are at risk of deficiencies, but they can’t replace the health benefits of a balanced diet and regular exercise.Dandruff is certainly irritating, and can have a marked impact on quality of life, causing embarrassment and discomfort. Luckily, most people will be able to find a treatment that works for them – you might just have to be prepared for a little trial and error first. All “explainer” articles are confirmed by fact checkers to be correct at time of publishing. Text, images, and links may be edited, removed, or added to at a later date to keep information current. The content of this article is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of qualified health providers with questions you may have regarding medical conditions.  

Every year, the US Social Security Administration releases its list of the most popular baby names from the previous year, providing an interesting insight into the naming trends that have captured parents – and maybe even what the most popular TV show is at the time (know a baby Khaleesi, anyone?). So what came top in 2023?If you’re familiar with previous years’ lists, or have been to a child’s birthday party recently, you’ll be unsurprised to find out that the top names are Olivia and Liam.Olivia has reigned supreme since 2019, and even before then, had been gradually creeping up the list since 2008, spending 5 years in second place before eventually clinching the top spot. Similarly, Liam has ranked the highest for boys’ names for a whopping 7 years – though that’s nothing compared to Michael, which has taken the top spot 44 times in the last 100 years.In fact, the entirety of the top 5 names for both newborn girls and boys didn’t change at all between 2022 and 2023. What’s on the rest of the list?The top 5 girl names in 2023 were:OliviaEmmaCharlotteAmeliaSophiaAnd the top 5 boy names in 2023 were:LiamNoahOliverJamesElijahThough the top 5 remain unchanged, there were some names that massively shot up in popularity. The biggest changes in girls’ names belonged to Kaeli, Alitzel, and Emryn, which improved their rank by 1692, 1512, and 1287 places respectively.For the boys, the big changes were slightly less dramatic, with Izael, Chozen, and Eiden rising up by 860, 666, and 590 places respectively.Beyond the changes between most recent years, there’s a list which shows the most popular baby names over the last 100 years. Though names have changed a fair bit over that time, there are some that were pretty persistent.Mary was in the top spot 32 times between 1924 and 2023, and remained within the top 5 for 44 years until getting kicked out in 1967. Michael stood its ground until relatively recently, staying in the top 5 all the way from 1950 through to 2010.If you’re interested in how your own name has changed in popularity over time, there’s a handy tool to do so. Let us know what you find!

If you feel the world is breaking down into chaos, you’re right. You may or may not be correct if that feeling is in regard to politics and the state of society, but on the timescale of the universe there is no doubt, order is breaking down. That is what it always does. But why?Physicists call the amount of disorder in a system entropy. Technically it is defined as the “measurement of the energy in a system or process that is not available to do work”. Others refer to it as the amount of randomness or disorder in a system. Either way, it comes to the same thing. The second law of thermodynamics states that the entropy of an isolated system cannot decrease. Since it also cannot stay the same when any work is being done, this means entropy is constantly rising in a closed system. Since the universe, almost by definition, is a closed system, that means its entropy must be rising.Answering why this is can lead to questions about which features of the universe are inevitable, and which might have been different had things gone a little otherwise. That’s not something that is currently answerable, and maybe it never will be. Nevertheless, it is fair to say that while we can imagine a universe in which certain laws of physics were a little different, and sometimes even find out they’re not as we thought, the tendency to disorder appears inevitable.The physicist Arthur Eddington, perhaps most famous for providing the first confirmation of general relativity, advised his students: “The law that entropy always increases—the Second Law of Thermodynamics—holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature.”“If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell’s equations - then so much the worse for Maxwell’s equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation - well these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation.”The quote is remembered more than a century later because while other pillars of physics from Eddington’s era have tumbled, this one stands firm. What the second law saysA newcomer to physics encountering the second law of thermodynamics won’t always grasp its significance, because it’s often stated in ways that don’t mention entropy at all.A common way of presenting the law is the seemingly obvious statement that heat naturally flows from a hotter region to a colder one. It’s possible to reverse this – air conditioners operate on the basis of cooling an indoor space that is usually colder to start off with than the outside where the heat is dumped. But to do that you need to put in a great deal of energy, as is obvious to anyone receiving their electricity bill after a summer where they ran the air con.The connection of this observation to entropy isn’t obvious, but starts to become clearer when we add the law’s other side; that not all the heat in a system can be converted to useful work in a cyclic process. No engine can be 100 percent efficient in converting heat to other forms of energy, let alone exceeding that. The inefficiency means more waste heat, which is the same thing as more disordered molecules, and more total entropy. An engine can increase the order within a system, but only at the cost of creating more disorder around it.Although talk of heat flowing and the efficiency of engines may seem abstract, the second law is a way of translating a concept familiar in other fields: there is no such thing as a free lunch.In a universe where the second law did not apply, free lunches would be universal. One could get out more energy from an operation than one put in. It might be nice to imagine such a circumstance, but it makes a kind of intuitive sense to most of us that the universe does not owe us a living, at least not an easy one.Not everyone accepts Eddington’s warning. Every year patent offices and physics departments around the world receive messages from people who claim to have invented a perpetual motion machine. Some of these work by harvesting the closest thing we have to a free lunch, the energy emitted by the Sun or another external source. These do not violate the second law because they rely on the fact the Earth is not a closed system; it receives sunlight and cosmic rays from space and radiates back out again. The incoming energy can be used to create more order on Earth: plants and photosynthesizing algae have been doing it for a very long time, and our solar panels are only just catching up. From a broader perspective, however, any local progress made in the battle against disorder is more than overcome by the increased entropy the Sun produces as it fuses molecules to make heat.A true perpetual motion machine, one that does not rely on external energy, violates the second law because if we built enough of them, we could make the universe as a whole more ordered, reversing the rise of entropy. Countless people have tried, including some of the greatest minds in physics. James Clerk Maxwell, he of the equations Eddington referred to, proposed the idea of a miniscule being, later nicknamed Maxwell’s demon, that could create a perpetual motion machine by sorting molecules. It took decades to show why this was impossible, although quantum physics continues to complicate the question. Many lesser minds have claimed to have succeeded where Maxwell failed, but none actually have. The second law stands undefeated.There’s still a lot of uncertainty about the eventual fate of the universe. Some models propose the second law may not rule over us forever. However, at this stage, probably the most likely way for everything to end remains the very depressing one known as the “heat death of the universe”, where all energy is evenly distributed and entropy comes to overwhelm us all.

The origin of life on Earth is still enigmatic, but we are slowly unravelling the steps involved and the necessary ingredients. Scientists believe life arose in a primordial soup of organic chemicals and biomolecules on the early Earth, eventually leading to actual organisms.It’s long been suspected that some of these ingredients may have been delivered from space. Now a new study, published in Science Advances, shows that a special group of molecules, known as peptides, can form more easily under the conditions of space than those found on Earth. That means they could have been delivered to the early Earth by meteorites or comets – and that life may be able to form elsewhere, too.The functions of life are upheld in our cells (and those of all living beings) by large, complex carbon-based (organic) molecules called proteins. How to make the large variety of proteins we need to stay alive is encoded in our DNA, which is itself a large and complex organic molecule.However, these complex molecules are assembled from a variety of small and simple molecules such as amino acids – the so-called building blocks of life.To explain the origin of life, we need to understand how and where these building blocks form and under what conditions they spontaneously assemble themselves into more complex structures. Finally we need to understand the step that enables them to become a confined, self-replicating system – a living organism.This latest study sheds light on how some of these building blocks might have formed and assembled, and how they ended up on Earth.Steps to lifeDNA is made up of about 20 different amino acids. Like letters of the alphabet, these are arranged in DNA’s double helix structure in different combinations to encrypt our genetic code.Peptides are also an assemblage of amino acids in a chain-like structure. Peptides can be made up of as little as two amino acids, but also range to hundreds of amino acids.The assemblage of amino acids into peptides is an important step because peptides provide functions such as “catalysing”, or enhancing, reactions that are important to maintaining life. They are also candidate molecules that could have been further assembled into early versions of membranes, confining functional molecules in cell-like structures.However, despite their potentially important role in the origin of life, it was not so straightforward for peptides to form spontaneously under the environmental conditions on the early Earth. In fact, the scientists behind the current study had previously shown that the cold conditions of space are actually more favourable to the formation of peptides.The interstellar medium. wikipedia, CC BY-SAIn the very low density of clouds of molecules and dust particles in a part of space called the interstellar medium (see above), single atoms of carbon can stick to the surface of dust grains together with carbon monoxide and ammonia molecules. They then react to form amino acid-like molecules. When such a cloud becomes denser and dust particles also start to stick together, these molecules can assemble into peptides.In their new study, the scientists look at the dense environment of dusty disks, from which a new solar system with a star and planets emerges eventually. Such disks form when clouds suddenly collapse under the force of gravity. In this environment, water molecules are much more prevalent – forming ice on the surface of any growing agglomerates of particles that could inhibit the reactions that form peptides.By emulating the reactions likely to occur in the interstellar medium in the laboratory, the study shows that, although the formation of peptides is slightly diminished, it is not prevented. Instead, as rocks and dust combine to form larger bodies such as asteroids and comets, these bodies heat up and allow for liquids to form. This boosts peptide formation in these liquids, and there’s a natural selection of further reactions resulting in even more complex organic molecules. These processes would have occurred during the formation of our own Solar System.Many of the building blocks of life such as amino acids, lipids and sugars can form in the space environment. Many have been detected in meteorites.Because peptide formation is more efficient in space than on Earth, and because they can accumulate in comets, their impacts on the early Earth might have delivered loads that boosted the steps towards the origin of life on Earth.So what does all this mean for our chances of finding alien life? Well, the building blocks for life are available throughout the universe. How specific the conditions need to be to enable them to self-assemble into living organisms is still an open question. Once we know that, we’ll have a good idea of how widespread, or not, life might be.Christian Schroeder, Senior Lecturer in Environmental Science and Planetary Exploration, University of StirlingThis article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

In a significant move, the Vatican has announced a revision of its protocols for evaluating purported supernatural occurrences. This update, the first of its kind in over four decades, was presented at a press conference earlier today. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, responsible for the oversight of doctrine, has issued these new directives as a countermeasure to the surge of alleged miraculous events circulating on digital platforms. The guidelines set forth a more rigorous investigative process to ensure the authenticity of such claims and to prevent deceptive practices that could tarnish the Church’s image or disrupt its unity. Under the revised guidelines, ecclesiastical authorities, including bishops, are now mandated to obtain consent from the Holy See before making any public declarations regarding supernatural events. This measure underscores the seriousness with which the Church regards such phenomena and its commitment to maintaining doctrinal integrity. The document emphasizes a prudent approach, highlighting the potential for exploitation through fraudulent activities that claim divine origin. The Vatican’s concern is that such deceptions could lead to division, scandal, and a loss of trust in the institution. The updated guidelines signify an adaptation to the modern era, where information—and misinformation—can spread rapidly and widely. The Church’s response aims to balance the need for openness to the possibility of the divine with a judicious evaluation process. As the Church navigates these changes, the effectiveness of the new guidelines in addressing the complexities of faith in the digital age will be closely monitored. The world watches as the Vatican takes a step forward in its quest to uphold the sanctity of its teachings amidst the ever-evolving landscape of communication and belief. The post Vatican introduces stricter measures on supernatural phenomena appeared first on Anomalien.com.

A volatile back-and-forth contest between liberals and populists has marked the nation’s politics over the past decade-plus. Is a more stable future possible?

RedState Weekly Briefing: Florida Men Show How It's Done, Joe Biden Shows How It's Not