"WSJ theorizes that the visit may have something to do with the US’s intelligence that Russia is preparing for some large-scale new campaign:

The U.S. has collected intelligence showing Russia’s early preparations for a possible military mobilization in Ukraine and plans for testing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s resolve, The Wall Street Journal has reported.

Analysts said Ratcliffe could meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin to deliver a warning. “It could be to say, ‘We know what you are thinking about doing, and you better not,’” said Beth Sanner, a former U.S. deputy director of national intelligence for mission integration. “It could also be about the Iran ceasefire and putting someone else in the discussion,” she said, adding Ratcliffe might also touch upon the Kremlin’s support for Iran following a new U.S. sanctions campaign against the regime.

"Other online aggregators have reported it could have something to do with Russia’s alleged “drone incursions” into NATO territory, though the CIA director’s personal visit related to this seems a tad far-fetched:

CIA Director Ratcliffe’s visit to the Kremlin was an ultimatum addressing recent drone incursions into NATO territory, aimed at deterring Russia from escalating attacks on Kyiv following Ukrainian strikes on commercial supply chain warehouses, a senior US official has told Faytuks Network.

"Russian RVoenkor channel reports that Ukrainian sources believe the meeting is in response to some “significant secret operation” that Russia is preparing:

In Moscow, discussions took place with the Director of the CIA regarding a significant secret operation.

▪️According to Kyiv media, the Ukrainian side is aware of certain aspects and issues that were discussed today in Moscow.
▪️This concerns a significant operation, the preparation of which has been underway in secrecy for a certain period. Its results could have a significant impact on future developments.

"What could such an operation be?
Well, for one there continue to be strong rumors of a major Russian operation to be potentially launched into the Chernigov region of northern Ukraine, bordering Kiev:"

https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/cia-directors-mystery-moscow-trip?r=lp6h7

"Things are afoot, as evidenced by CIA Director John Ratcliffe’s sudden surprise visit to Moscow via C-17 military cargo plane.

"The commentariat is aswirl with rumor as to what his trip could signify. But let us first contextualize with a reminder that this is the first visit to Russia by a CIA director since the fateful November 2021 arrival of CIA Director William Burns, which was marked by the US’s last attempt to thwart Russia from launching its invasion just over two months later."

https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/cia-directors-mystery-moscow-trip?r=lp6h7

🐝 What If Queen Bees Aren’t Made by Royal Jelly Alone?

For decades, the textbook story sounded simple: feed an ordinary honeybee larva royal jelly, and it becomes a queen.

A new study in Nature suggests the real story is far more sophisticated.

Researchers found that future queens are not just fed differently — they are raised inside specially engineered “royal cribs”: peanut-shaped queen cells built from unusual wax, kept warmer and more humid, and maintained by dedicated young worker bees.

These queen cells are not passive containers. Their wax is physically and chemically distinct from ordinary worker-cell wax: softer, less dense, more flexible, and better at holding heat and moisture. In other words, the nursery itself helps shape development.

The key experiment was simple but powerful. Scientists raised queen-destined larvae with the same royal jelly, but changed the wax environment. Larvae exposed to ordinary worker-cell wax were more likely to die and developed into smaller, weaker queens.

So royal jelly matters — but it is not the whole mechanism.

🔹 Queen development depends on diet + architecture + microclimate
🔹 Queen-cell wax is chemically and physically different from ordinary comb wax
🔹 Young “queen cell builders” appear specially adapted to construct and maintain these royal nurseries
🔹 Extra warmth may help queens mature faster: about 16 days vs about 21 days for workers
🔹 Similar patterns were found in western and eastern honeybees, suggesting deep evolutionary roots

Important caveat: this study focused on honeybees, not all social insects. And scientists still need to identify exactly which physical or chemical features of the wax are doing the biological work.

Still, the implication is fascinating: development is not shaped by genes and nutrition alone. Built environments — even tiny wax chambers — can influence what an organism becomes.

If a wax cradle can help decide the fate of a future queen, what other biological outcomes are being shaped by structures we barely notice?

📄 Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-026-10534-3

#Science #Biology #Bees #Nature #Entomology

🇺🇸 🇨🇦 🇨🇳 Vance: We know that Canada allows itself to be used as a backdoor for Chinese goods . They treat Chinese goods. What we've said to Canada is stop it. At the very end, they came in with a bunch of unreasonable last-minute demands.

📎 Acyn

Prayers for Pigeon Forge.
What a pigeon she was.

The War on US Farmers

The utter idiocy of participating in Israel’s war on Iran is being driven home hard in the negative effects on America’s ability to feed itself: US grain farmers have been plunged into their worst financial crisis in four decades as the war with Iran drives up diesel and fertilizer costs, the Financial Times reported on […]

https://voxday.net/2026/08/26/the-war-on-us-farmers/

🪐 A Wobbling “Peanut” Asteroid May Still Carry Traces of Ancient Water

NASA’s Lucy mission has revealed one of the strangest small worlds ever seen up close: asteroid Donaldjohanson — a young, peanut-shaped rock in the main asteroid belt that tumbles through space and still preserves chemical hints of liquid water from its distant past.

Lucy flew past Donaldjohanson on April 20, 2025, at about 30,000 mph, coming within just 650 miles of the asteroid. The encounter was meant partly as a rehearsal before Lucy reaches Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids in 2027. Instead, it became a science story of its own.

Donaldjohanson does not rotate like a simple spinning rock. Data from Lucy show that it tumbles end-over-end once every 10.5 Earth days, while also wobbling around its long axis every 26.5 days — more like an unstable top than a normal asteroid.

Its shape is just as unusual. Donaldjohanson is a contact binary: two lobes joined by a narrow neck, giving it a cosmic peanut-like form. Scientists think it formed about 155 million years ago, when fragments from a violent collision gently came back together under their own gravity.

Since then, sunlight has been slowly reshaping it. Through the YORP effect — a tiny torque caused when sun-warmed surfaces radiate heat back into space — Donaldjohanson’s spin appears to have slowed by at least a factor of 10 over the last 20–60 million years. As the rotation changed, loose material likely slid down its slopes, softening craters and reshaping the surface.

But the most intriguing clue came from Lucy’s infrared data: iron-rich clay minerals on the surface. These minerals form in the presence of liquid water, meaning Donaldjohanson’s parent body once experienced aqueous alteration. But unlike Bennu and Ryugu, which contain magnesium-rich clays suggesting longer exposure to water, Donaldjohanson’s chemistry points to a much shorter episode.

🔹 Donaldjohanson is a bilobed “contact binary” asteroid
🔹 It tumbles on two axes, with rotation periods of 10.5 and 26.5 days
🔹 Its current body likely formed around 155 million years ago
🔹 Sunlight gradually slowed its spin through the YORP effect
🔹 Iron-rich clays suggest liquid water was present — but only briefly
🔹 The flyby was also a successful rehearsal for Lucy’s Trojan asteroid encounters, beginning with Eurybates in August 2027

Important caveat: this was a fast flyby, not an orbital mission or a sample return. Lucy measured the surface remotely; the asteroid’s interior remains unknown.

Still, Donaldjohanson matters because it gives scientists a rare comparison point. Bennu and Ryugu are near-Earth asteroids with long migration histories. Donaldjohanson is a much younger main-belt object that stayed closer to its birthplace. Its strange shape, unstable spin, and brief water history offer a fresh clue to how small bodies evolved — and how water-rich material may have moved through the early Solar System.

📄 Sources: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aec0503

#NASA #LucyMission #Asteroid #PlanetaryScience #SolarSystem

Some good news, apparently courtesy of Steven Miller: https://x.com/desitechsuppoat/status/2092065100484198569

NEW: 🇮🇷🇺🇸 Iran plans to reverse-engineer US stealth JASSM Cruise Missile - Tabnak reports

A largely Intact JASSM Cruise Missile that failed to explode was discovered and seized by the Iranian army during the war

@Megatron_ron

Three Secret Service Officials — Including Communications Chief — Escorted Out and Stripped of Security Clearances Amid Reported Criminal Leak Probe — FBI and CIA Reportedly Involved

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2026/08/three-secret-service-officials-including-communications-chief-escorted/

🇷🇺 🇺🇦 Putin is about to escalate

Russia continues a major military buildup in the Bryansk region of western Russia, fueling speculations that the Russian Armed Forces could potentially reopen the Chernigov front in northern Ukraine.

Belarus has ordered an unplanned nationwide military readiness check.

The public should not assume that something extraordinary is about to happen- Alexander Volfovich, Secretary of Belarus’ Security Council.

@Megatron_ron

A pro-Ukrainian account just posted a picture of Tim Curry from Command and Conquer Red Alert and claimed that he was a Russian general that was KIA

"X, the social media mouthpiece of free speech absolutist Elon Musk, has reportedly sent legal takedown notices to Nitter and related service XCancel over alleged data scraping and rules violations."
https://www.theregister.com/legal/2026/08/26/nitter-no-more-x-sends-in-the-lawyers-to-shut-down-open-source-project/5292548#:~:text=X%2C%20the%20social%20media%20mouthpiece%20of%20free%20speech%20absolutist%20Elon%20Musk%2C%20has%20reportedly%20sent%20legal%20takedown%20notices%20to%20Nitter%20and%20related%20service%20XCancel%20over%20alleged%20data%20scraping%20and%20rules%20violations.

In 2008, molecular analysis of collagen from a 68-million-year-old T. rex confirmed its closest living relative includes Gallus gallus domesticusthe(the domestic chicken). We took this living dinosaur relative and genetically manipulated them to grow faster and bigger just so we could eat them.

Did you know? 🎓

My Huntsville Hamfest Forum...

"Did Oliver Heaviside remove part of Maxwell's theory? Do scalar waves exist? Are there electromagnetic waves that travel without transverse electric and magnetic fields? This talk examines the origins of these claims, from Maxwell's original equations and Heaviside's vector reformulation to modern electromagnetics. This talk explores where longitudinal fields appear in real radio systems, how they differ from the "scalar waves" of popular literature, and why understanding them can improve our intuition about antennas, propagation, and energy flow."

https://aetherczar.substack.com/p/video-did-heaviside-delete-maxwell