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Divers in Mexico have discovered Megalodon teeth in a flooded inland cave and the findings have confirmed scientific beliefs. Megalodons were absolutely gigantic prehistoric sharks that reached sizes of up to 50 feet long. They dominated the oceans before going extinct around 3.6 million years ago. Scientists are interested in studying fossils of the huge sea creature, with the animal's teeth proving the most abundant type of fossil to be found today. Teeth fossils were found in Mexico by speleologist (cave specialist) and photographer Kay Nicte Vilchis Zapata and fellow speleologist Erick Sosa Rodriguez while diving in a newly discovered sinkhole in Cholul in 2019. The cenote is 400 meters long and 28 meters deep and located inside were fifteen teeth fossils from various shark species. They also discovered human remains and a vertebrae fossil that potentially belongs to an ancient species. A total of 13 of the 15 teeth fossils belonged to three different species of shark – one being the megalodon (Carcharocles megalodon), while the other two species were the mackerel shark (Isurus oxyrinchus) and the sawshark (Pristiophoridae). Zapata told local media at the time: “We were looking at the wall and suddenly I saw a little something, I went closer and I saw that it was a tooth, that was the first and apparently it belonged to a sawshark.” Experts believe the geological timescale of the megalodon teeth lies anywhere between 2.5 million to 5 million years old. Speleologist Sosa Rodriguez said: “It is just proof of what scientists have already studied and written about; what kind of wildlife lived here millions of years ago when this was part of the sea.” Scientists have suggested that the megalodon’s warm body temperature may have been the reason for its extinction. There is some thought that the megalodon was able to maintain a body temperature around 7 degrees centigrade warmer than the water around it, but ultimately this may have been its downfall. Randy Flores, a UCLA doctoral student and fellow of the Centre for Diverse Leadership in Science, explained: “Maintaining an energy level that would allow for megalodon’s elevated body temperature would require a voracious appetite that may not have been sustainable in a time of changing marine ecosystem balances when it may have even had to compete against newcomers such as the great white shark.” Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Green Day appear to be preparing to make a comeback.

More than 300 people seek compensation for being sexually abused by the late Johnny Kitagawa.

As many of us face the drudgery of a Monday morning commute and a day holed up at work, it’s almost painful to think of beautiful, far-off lands and breathtaking views. And yet, this is what Google is inviting us to do with today’s interactive Doodle. Head to the search engine’s homepage and you’ll find a slideshow in the style of an illustrated scrapbook, teaching readers all about the Appalachian Trail. The iconic trail is the longest hiking-only footpath in the world, spanning more than 14 US states and 2,190 miles, as it meanders across dense forests, rushing rivers, and soaring mountains. And if you're wondering why the tech company has decided to pay tribute to the famous landmark today, it's because on 2 October 1968, America’s National Trails System Act established the Appalachian Trail as one of the country’s first National Scenic Trails. Hiking the full length of the path can take between five and seven months to complete and requires careful planning. And yet, as Google’s slideshow points out, around 3,000 people attempt this staggering feat each year, with a total of three million people visiting the trail annually. The route has served walking enthusiasts for nearly 100 years, having been completed in 1937. It was first proposed by conservationist Benton MacKaye in 1921, with his original plan calling for a stretch of several self-sustaining agricultural camps along the way, Google notes in its blurb for the Doodle. Then 10 years later, a hiker named Earl Shaffer became the first person to make it from one end to the other. Since then, more than 14,000 people have joined him in completing the trek. Perhaps inevitably for such a legendary trail, it has engendered a number of unique traditions. These include being given a “trail name” by fellow hikers and eating two litres of ice cream at the route’s mid-point. However, the trail’s oldest and most important tradition is to leave it just as you found it so that everyone can enjoy the same natural beauty. Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

In the fallout from last year’s overturning of Roe v Wade, the legislation that secured abortion rights in the US, a great many young American men simultaneously did a quite radical thing. They took to social media to intimately document themselves getting a vasectomy, to prove it was a simple and painless act. One was vegan bodybuilder and influencer Brian Turner, who was certain from around the age of 22 that he’d never want children. He acted on his stance, aged 30, and made some genuinely great content in the process. “The reaction was positive,” he tells me. “A few people commented in disbelief, calling me crazy names or saying, ‘You’re no longer a man – you chopped your balls off.’ But they don’t bother me. I have a thick skin.” It started a global discussion on vasectomies, chiefly around how men can step up and take the burden of contraception away from their female partners forever. Adam, a 35-year-old father of two from Brighton, had the same desire around the same time: “I had a growing guilt about never really fully taking responsibility for contraception. Apart from condoms, all the solutions are for women, and they all seem to have pretty gnarly side effects. It seemed like the decent thing to do, to try to take on the responsibility.” But what of younger British men, who absolutely, definitely don’t want children, who know they want to be what I call “none and done”? For them, although the hurdles are curiously higher and their reasoning more diverse, the same desire to make an informed decision about their body exists. Britain has never had a big national conversation about the vasectomy, the way America – a place where some states even offered them for free in the wake of the Supreme Court’s historic verdict – clearly has in recent years. “The vasectomy was thought to be illegal here until around the Sixties, and only came on the NHS in the early Seventies,” explains Dr Georgia Grainger, a historian of vasectomy. Before this, the concept of men choosing to sterilise themselves was – in her words – “murky”, owing to many of the key doctors and campaigners evangelising the process also being supporters of eugenics. It was actually the beloved broadcaster Michael Parkinson who, in Grainger’s eyes, did the most to burst bubbles on the subject. “He was open about having a vasectomy back in 1972 when it was still very uncommon. He did an interview about it that was on the front page of the first issue of Cosmopolitan magazine. It definitely brought awareness and also dispelled some myths – that it would affect a man’s masculinity or even cause things like a higher-pitched voice”. While the procedure has undoubtedly become more common, I’m not sure that we as a society know a huge amount more about it than in the Seventies. The good news for men is that the procedure is more successful than ever. Doctors reported in March this year that, after surveying 94,000 patients, only 0.2 per cent of men get what’s known as “chronic scrotal pain”. It is generally seen as being more than 99 per cent effective as a form of birth control. The bad news is that there’s still a lot of misinformation around it – from daft macho ideas that it decreases your testosterone levels or sex drive (it doesn’t) to the more assimilated notion you hear a lot: that, similar to an intrauterine device (IUD) with women, it’s easy to undo (it isn’t sadly, not all reversals work, they get less successful over time plus they’re significantly more expensive too). In reality, a vasectomy is quick, carried out under local anaesthetic and takes around 15 minutes. Today, most are what’s known as “scalpel-free”, meaning the incision is so tiny (only 2-4mm) that it doesn’t require stitches. The two tubes that carry sperm from your testicles are severed (hence the colloquial term “the snip”) and closed. Post-surgery, men are encouraged to rest for a couple of days, to apply ice packs to their scrotum and – if possible – wear a jock strap that’s slightly too small to ease any swelling. And that’s it. “The most common question I get asked is, “Do you still cum?’”, says Gregory, who had a vasectomy in January. “It’s funny how so many people think you’ll never ejaculate again after a vasectomy. The truth is: the difference isn’t noticeable.” In fact, sperm is still produced, but it’s discharged internally and absorbed by the membrane around the epididymis (the coiled tube behind each testicle) in a totally natural process. The body still produces semen, which is ejaculated but it no longer contains sperm – although it’s said that a man needs to ejaculate on his own a good number of times before the presence of sperm totally vanishes. “I did hear rumours about ‘40 w***s’,” confirms Gregory, “but I just stuck with the doctor’s deadlines and the sperm test came back clear four months later.” Yet, while the procedure has some fringe areas of conjecture, one important aspect is dramatically less well known: men – especially young men – won’t automatically be granted a vasectomy if they choose to have one. There’s huge variation in the UK, based on regional NHS procedures and resources, plus, “a lot depends on the individual doctor, unfortunately” according to Grainger. Some areas don’t offer them, meaning having to go private and pay an often prohibitively expensive £600. But even simply having the autonomy to choose is also a grey area. “A lot of younger men, especially if they’re unmarried or don’t have children, really have to push to get a doctor to take them seriously,” says Grainger. “We often think of that kind of pushback as being something women get within their reproductive healthcare, but I’ve heard a lot of men share their experiences of having to go to multiple doctors to find one to agree to refer them for a vasectomy, just because they ‘might change their mind’.” This seems like quite a significant flashpoint, given that all the urologists we spoke to confirmed a definite movement of younger people wanting the snip. “Traditionally, the typical age of a man seeking a vasectomy would be 35-40 years old,” states Dr Peter Quinn who performs the procedure for Vasectomy NI. “However we are finding more and more younger men in their twenties are looking for a permanent method of contraception.” Luckily, I didn’t encounter a single man who had any regrets or who had “changed their mind”. What I found instead were more men making an informed choice around their own reproductive health, from a variety of backgrounds, viewpoints and life situations. Some for example, like Simon, are single and dating. He had his tubes snipped aged 28, while in a long-term relationship that subsequently ended. Does he have any regrets? “Absolutely not – I really want to make that clear.” Despite being from a big family with plenty of cousins whom he loves, he’s felt like he’s known he never wanted children himself “from as far back as my teens”. Now aged 30, he’s starting to date again. He doesn’t declare his snipped status on the dating app he uses, but does bring it up quickly, in case there’s any awkward confusion. “Not wanting to have kids is a pretty big part of who I am, I feel like I talk about it all the time anyway without needing to advertise it.” Ray, who is also young, single and snipped feels “it’s a flex” when it comes to being on the dating scene. Aside from being a talking point and a sign of emotional maturity, crucially it “finalises that aspect of ‘maybe he’ll change his mind’. which I have experienced in relationships in the past. I’ve been very clear I don’t want children previously, but nobody fully believes that when you tell them. They might put it to one side and say ‘let’s think about that later’.” Ray also has no regrets. Dr Nick Demediuk has performed more than 50,000 vasectomies in his career. The name of his clinic in Australia says it all: Dr Snip. His perspective over 34 years of performing a life-changing operation is thus pretty unique and his recommendation is unequivocal: “It’s the simplest and easiest form of permanent contraception that responsible men can use to contribute to their relationships and the planet.” For him, one of the key reasons behind the growth in younger men taking up vasectomies has been “issues related to climate change”, with a significant subgroup of “hard-line vegans”. There’s not enough resources for people alive on earth today – it feels almost a bit selfish for us to contribute to that scenario Nat and Charlie* This chimes with Nat and Charlie*, a male/female couple who moved from a big city to the English countryside this year, in part motivated by a desire to give their beloved trio of cats more space. Having been on the fringes of eco-activism since university, their decision – raised initially by Nat and enthusiastically supported by Charlie – to have the procedure when Nat was 29 was very much informed by the climate emergency. “We both feel like we’re loving people and capable of lots of love,” says Charlie “but we both felt inside of ourselves that we never wanted to have children, especially in the world as it is today.” Citing the extreme weather events all over Europe this summer as just one example, they fundamentally worry about the world being safe enough to bring kids into, as well as the feeling that “there are not enough resources for people alive on earth today – it feels almost a bit selfish for us to contribute to that scenario.” They stop short of endorsing the emerging philosophy of anti-natalism, a controversial belief first advanced by South African philosopher David Benatar that sees all human reproduction as immoral, in part due to the climate emergency but also because life is inevitably tinged with suffering and pain. But, in choosing not to have children out of concern for the environment, they find themselves at one end of an extreme and widening political spectrum. The same week I speak to them, Hungary’s leader Viktor Orban was holding the fourth of his biannual Demographic Summits, which – with Italy’s leader Georgia Meloni, religious leaders and right-wing thinkers in tow – aimed to solve what’s seen as a crisis in underpopulation in Europe. Encouraging more babies via defence of traditional family values feels a world away from the outlooks of Nat, Charlie and the many others taking up the vasectomy as a way of definitely not having kids on principle. As if we didn’t have enough 50-50 splits in society today, an increasing number of people believe we need fewer children while an equal number believe we need more. Britain in 2023 therefore seems conflicted between two worlds – the privatised freedom of America where a young, non-parent like Brian Turner is waved through (“I talked to my GP and she said, ‘All good’ and referred me straight away”) and a more prohibitive or simply untrusting mindset that looks at a young man and says, “Hmm, go away and think about it a while.” Perhaps if we want young men in society to play a more positive, active role, maybe they need to be trusted with their own bodily autonomy first? *Names have been changed Read More No music, no ball games, no fun: society is wiping out play ‘I was really struggling to get it up’: Why younger men are turning to Viagra I couldn’t climax, so I let ‘big testosterone’ take me for a ride Woman prepares hamper basket as her husband’s vasectomy gift Why taking a mental health day could be bad… for your mental health What the world’s happiest children tell us about where Britain is going wrong

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ADHD awareness is on the rise – yet it can still sometimes be tricky for parents and carers to know whether their child is affected or not. It’s estimated that 5% of children in the UK have ADHD, according to the charity ADHD UK. And while the condition has previously been stereotypically associated with ‘disruptive’ and ‘naughty’ behaviour, particularly in young boys, it is now understood to be far more complex and nuanced than that. “Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD, is a neurodevelopmental condition that impacts someone’s attention, their levels of hyperactivity and impulsivity,” explains Dr Seb Thompson, consultant clinical psychologist at Cygnet Health Care. “Typically when someone has ADHD, they tend to struggle with their attention, with hyperactivity and with impulsivity – although it is possible to just struggle with symptoms from one of those,” Thompson adds. Of course, no child has ‘perfect’ concentration all the time, and many kids can have impulsive moments or bouts of being a bit hyperactive. So, how do you know if they’re actually showing signs of ADHD? To mark October’s ADHD Awareness Month, we talked to some experts… ADHD does not always look the same There are some common patterns that crop up with ADHD, however it can also affect individuals very differently. So, if another child has similar behavioural traits to yours and has had a diagnosis, that does not necessarily mean your child has ADHD too. At the same time, children could have very different behavioural traits, yet both have ADHD. “Every child with ADHD will probably struggle with a unique set of difficulties,” explains Georgia Chronaki, senior lecturer in developmental neuroscience at University of Central Lancashire. “[For example] One child might struggle with paying attention in class, another may struggle with managing their emotions.” They find being still and quiet really hard It may be a stereotype, but uncontrollable fidgeting could be an indicator of possible ADHD. Thompson explains: “The hyperactivity and impulsivity difficulties associated with ADHD could include being unable to sit still without fidgeting, excessive restlessness, finding the quiet to be uncomfortable, difficulty engaging in tasks quietly, difficulties in turn-taking, impulsively saying or doing things without thinking through consequences, as well as a tendency not to consider the risks of behaviour.”Your child is often forgetful and loses things easilyThompson says if they are “frequently misplacing or losing items, being easily distracted, appearing to be daydreaming, and having difficulties remembering to do tasks and difficulties following through with instructions”, it may be linked with ADHD. You can tell your child is struggling If your child seems to be finding things a struggle, this could be a big indicator. “Imagine really wanting to pay attention to a conversation that is happening but your brain is not letting you,” says Thompson. “Imagine really wanting to focus on your homework, but your brain is not letting you. Imagine really wanting to sit and watch a TV programme, or sit and eat a meal, or sit and relax and your brain is not letting you. “The world can be a very frustrating place for young people with ADHD, particularly if they do not understand why their brain works in the way it does.” They seem down or depressed Thompson adds that kids with ADHD “can often suffer with low self-esteem, depression and anxiety”. He explains: “Young people who get frustrated by their difficulties may stop trying at school, or lose interest in their hobbies because they can’t sustain the attention to take part.” Seeking advice If any of these things are impacting your child’s wellbeing and making things seem hard for them, or if you are concerned they may have ADHD, then it may be worth seeking professional support. Diagnoses are typically given by specialist ADHD assessment teams, and referrals tend to be made via schools or Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS). Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Naomi Campbell on the catwalk at Sarah Burton’s final Alexander McQueen show This is how your make-up needs change as you age Victorian dahlia show recreated at Stonehenge with thousands of flowers

China’s factories look to have stabilized for now, though the recovery has been far from swift and the