Remove Electronic signature Presentation Myself

Thank you for A2A.Yes and No both . UPSC PRELIMS is beyond 1000 coaching institutes who do not understand the demand and nature of exam and lakhs of aspirants who blindly depend on them.But UPSC PRELIMS is most predictable and safe exam if you understand it . I myself has proved by clearing all 6 prelims back to back with huge margins( 145- GS1).Let me explain YOU (Ladies and Gentlemen)This is the breakup of subjects this yearHere only 20 were pure current affairs. Other 12 were contemporary topics and were 1 year old so can’t be categorized as current affairs directly. Thus the bulk of questions came from Static and FundamentalsSantosh Sir Prediction before exam :Now read what I had predicted before exam.I had categorically suggested that this year they will focus on Fundamentals and static. Reading and following websites and mugging up stupid compilations will be a waste of time.I had asked to read newspapers , the Hindu .Most of questions are picked from The Hindu like the species one ,etcMy subject distribution was also close.Which section in the prelims 2019 is expected to give more questions according to the trend?I request you go through all my posts and see how relevant they were for PRELIMS 2019.I had strictly warned not to read bulky govt scheme compilation , it was suicidal . I had suggested only few . And I was bang on - only one scheme came which i had suggested Atal innocation mission.1. In India,'extended producer responsibility' was introduced as an important feature in which of the following?(a) The Bio-medical Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 1998(b) The Recycled plastic (Manufacturing and Usage) Rules, 1999(c) The e-Waste (Management and Handling) Rules, 2011(d) The Food Safety and Standard Regulations, 2011My Topic List 3.5 Important topics from environment “ Extended Producer Responsibility”2.Under Ramsar Convention, it is mandatory on the part of the Government of India to protect and conserve all the wetlands in the territory of India.3. The Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2010 were framed by the Government of India based on the recommendations of Ramsar Convention.3. The Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2010 also encompass the drainage area or catchment regions of the wetlands as determined by the authority.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 and 2 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My Topic List Important topics from environment : Ramsar Wetland3.As per law, the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Management and Planning Authority exists at both National and State levels.2. People's participation is mandatory in the compensatory afforestation programmes carried out under the Compensatory Afforestation Fund Act, 2016.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2CAMPA Compensatory afforestationMy Topic List Important topics from environment: CAMPA4. In the context of which one of the following are the terms 'pyrolysis and plasma gasification' mentioned?(a) Extraction of rare earth elements(b) Natural gas extraction technologies(c) Hydrogen fuel-based automobiles(d) Waste-to-energy technologiesMy Topic List : Waste to energy5. In India, the use of carbofuran, methyl parathion, phorate and triazophos is viewed with apprehension. These chemicals are used as(a) pesticides in agriculture(b) preservatives in processed foods(c) fruit-ripening agents(d) moisturising agents in cosmeticsMy Topic List 3.5 Important topics from environment:: Stockhom-Persistant Organic Pollutatnt5. Why is there a great concern about the 'microbeads' that are released into environment?(a) They are considered harmful to marine ecosystems.(b) They are considered to cause skin cancer in children.(c) They are small enough to be absorbed by crop plants in irrigated fields.(d) They are often found to be used as food adulterants.My Topic List 3.5 Important topics from environment: Dead Zones in Ocean6. Consider the following statements about Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs) in India:1. PVTGs reside in 18 States and one Union Territory.2. A stagnant or declining population is one of the criteria for determining PVTG status.3. There are 95 PVTGs officially notified in the country so far.4. Irular and Konda Reddi tribes are included in the list of PVTGs.Which of the statements given above are correct?(a) 1, 2 and 3(b) 2, 3 and 4(c) 1, 2 and 4(d) 1, 3 and 4My Topic List Important Environment Topics :PVTGs in A&N( Tribes)7. Which of the following are the reasons for the occurrence of multi-drug resistance in microbial pathogens in India?1. Genetic predisposition of some people2. Taking incorrect doses of antibiotics to cure diseases3. Using antibiotics in livestock farming4. Multiple chronic diseases in some peopleSelect the correct answer using the code given below.(a) 1 and 2(b) 2 and 3 only(e) 1, 3 and 4(d) 2, 3 and 4My Topic List Important Anti Microbial Resistance and Policy8. With reference to Mian Tansen, which one of the following statements is not correct?(a) Tansen was the title given to him by Emperor Akbar.(b) Tansen composed Dhrupads on Hindu gods and goddesses.(c) Tansen composed songs on his patrons.(d) Tansen invented many Ragas.9. Consider the following statements:1. Saint Nimbarka was a contem-porary of Akbar.2. Saint Kabir was greatly influenced by Shaikh Ahmad Sirhindi.Which of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2My Topic lis :Kabir and Akbar10. Consider the following statements:1. Most of India's external debt is owed by governmental entities.2. All of India's external debt is denominated in US dollars.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2Debt11. Which one of the following is not the most likely measure the Government/RBI takes to stop the slide of Indian rupee?(a) Curbing imports of non-essential goods-and promoting exports(b) Encouraging Indian borrowers to issue rupee denominated Masala Bonds(c) Easing conditions relating to external commercial borrowing(d) Following an expansionary monetary policyRBI steps to check currency devaluation12. In the context of India, which of the following factors is/are contributor/ contributors to reducing the risk of a currency crisis?1. The foreign currency earnings of India's IT sector2. Increasing the government expenditure3. Remittances from Indians abroadSelect the correct answer using the code given below.(a) 1 only(b) 1 and 3 only(c) 2 only(d) 1, 2 and 3Answer: bCurrency Crisis13. Which of the following is issued by registered foreign portfolio investors to overseas investors who want to be part of the Indian stock market without registering themselves directly?(a) Certificate of Deposit(b) Commercial Paper(c) Promissory Note(d) Participatory NoteP notes14.1. No High Court shall have the jurisdiction to declare any central law to be constitutionally invalid.2. An amendment to the Constitution of India cannot be called into question by the Supreme Court of India.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2My Topic List : Amendments15. Building 'Kalyaana Mandapas' was a notable feature in the temple construction in the kingdom of(a) Chalukya(b) Chandela(c) Rashtrakuta(d) VijayanagaraVijayanagar empire (Themes part II) (chap 6)16. Atal Innovation Mission is set up under the(a) Department of Science and Technology(b) Ministry of Employment(c) NITI Aayog(d) Ministry of Skill Development and EntrepreneurshipMt Topic List : AIM17.1.The 44th Amendment to the Constitution of India introduced an Article placing the election of the Prime Minister beyond judicial review.2. The Supreme Court of India struck down the 99th Amendment to the Constitution of India as being violative of the independence of judiciary.44th AmendmentWhich of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2Amendments and HC18. Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) exchange rates are calculated by comparing the prices of the same basket of goods and services in different countries.2. In terms of PPP dollars, India is the sixth largest economy in the world.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2GDP -PPP19. With reference to the Constitution of India, prohibitions or limitations or provisions contained in ordinary laws cannot act as prohibitions or limitations on the constitutional powers under Article 142. It could mean which one of the following?(a) The decisions taken by the Election Commission of India while discharging its duties cannot be challenged in any court of law.(b) The Supreme Court of India is not constrained in the exercise of its powers by laws made by the Parliament.(c) In the event of grave financial crisis in the country, the President of India can declare Financial Emergency without the counsel from the Cabinet.(d) State Legislatures cannot make laws on certain matters without the concurrence of Union Legislature.Advisory Jurisdiction20.1. As per recent amendment to the Indian Forest Act, 1927, forest dwellers have the right to fell the bamboos grown on forest areas.2. As per the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006, bamboo is a minor forest produce.3. The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 allows ownership of minor forest produce to forest dwellers.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 and 2 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3FRA 200621. In the context of polity, which one of the following would you accept as the most appropriate definition of liberty?(a) Protection against the tyranny of political rulers(b) Absence of restraint(c) Opportunity to do whatever one likes(d) Opportunity to develop oneself fullyLiberty22. Consider the following statements:1. The 44th Amendment to the Constitution of India introduced an Article placing the election of the Prime Minister beyond judicial review.2. The Supreme Court of India struck down the 99th Amendment to the Constitution of India as being violative of the independence of judiciary.Which of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 244th amendment23. The- motion to impeach a Judge of the Supreme Court of India cannot be rejected by the Speaker of the Lok Sabha as per the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968.2. The Constitution of India defines and gives details of what Constitutes 'incapacity and proved misbehaviour' of the Judges of the Supreme Court of India.3. The details of the process of impeachment of the Judges of the Supreme Court of India are given in the Judges (Inquiry) Act, 1968.4. If the motion for the impeachment of a Judge is taken up for voting, the law requires the motion to be backed by each House of the Parliament and supported by a majority of total membership of that House and by not less than two-thirds of total members of that House present and voting.Which of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 and 2(b) 3 only(c) 3 and 4 only(d) 1, 3 and 4Judges removal24. Asiatic Lion Conservation Project ( endangered, canine distemper virus, Gir, Pania sanctuary)25. What is common to the places known as Aliyar, Isapur and Kangsabati?(a) Recently discovered uranium deposits(b) Tropical rain forests(c) Underground cave systems(d) Water reservoirsAnswer: DIndian Major Dams- New dams26. Under which Schedule of the Constitution of India can the transfer of tribal land to private parties for mining be declared null and void?(a) Third Schedule(b) Fifth Schedule(c) Ninth Schedule(d) Twelfth Schedule27. The Ninth Schedule was introduced in the Constitution of India during the prime ministership of(a) Jawaharlal Nehru(b) Lal Bahadur Shastri(c) Indira Gandhi(d) Morarji DesaiSchedules28. In the context of which of the following do some scientists suggest the use of cirrus cloud thinning technique and the injection of sulphate aerosol into stratosphere?(a) Creating the artificial rains in some regions(b) Reducing the frequency and intensity of tropical cyclones(c) Reducing the adverse effects of solar wind on the Earth(d) Reducing the global warmingClimate engineering –carbon capture, Bio char, stratospheric aerosol injection29. Consider the following:1. Deification of the Buddha2. Treading the path of Bodhisattvas3. Image worship and ritualsWhich of the above is/are the feature/ features of Mahayana Buddhism?(a) 1 only(b) 1 and 2 only(c) 2 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My Topic list :Buddhism features30.The Environment Protection Act, 1986 empowers the Government of India to1. state the requirement of public participation in the process of environmental protection, and the procedure and manner in which it is sought2. lay down The standards for emission or discharge of environmental pollutants from various sourcesWhich of the statements given above is/ are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2My topic List :EPA31.1. The Parliament (Prevention of Disqualification) Act, 1959 exempts several posts from disqualification on the grounds of 'Office of Profit'.2. The above-mentioned Act was amended five times.3. The term 'Office of Profit' is well-defined in the Constitution of India.Which of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 and 2 only(b) 3 only(c) 2 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My Topic List Polity : Office of profitoffice of Profit32.1.According to the Indian Patents Act, a biological process to create a seed can be patented in India.2. In India, there is no Intellectual Property Appellate Board.3. Plant varieties are not eligible to be patented in India.Which of the statements given above is/are correct?(a) 1 and 3 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My Topic List :Indian Patent and Farmer right33.In the context of wearable technology, which of the following tasks is/are accomplished by wearable devices?1. Location identification of a person2. Sleep monitoring of a person3. Assisting the hearing impaired personSelect the correct answer using the code given below.(a) 1 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My topic List :Cyber Physical System34.Recently, scientists observed the merger of giant 'blackholes' billions of light-years away from the Earth. What is the significance of this observation?(a) 'Higgs boson particles' were detected.(b) 'Gravitational waves' were detected.(e) Possibility of inter-galactic space travel through 'wormhole' was confirmed.(d) It enabled the scientists to understand 'singularity'.My topic List :Gravitational waves35.Consider the following pairs:Movement/OrganizationLeader1. All India Anti-Untouchability LeagueMahatma Gandhi2. All India Kisan SabhaSwami Sahajanand Saraswati3. Self-Respect MovementE. V. Ramaswami NaickerWhich of the pairs given above is/are correctly matched?(a) 1 only(b) 1 and 2 only(c) 2 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My topic List :Self-respect movement37. Consider the following pairs:SeaBordering country1. Adriatic SeaAlbania2. Black SeaCroatia3. Gaspian SeaKazakhstan4. Mediterranean SeaMorocco5. Red SeaSyriaWhich of the pair given above are correctly matched?(a) 1, 2 and 4 only(b) 1, 3 and 4 only(c) 2 and 5 only(d) 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5My Topic List :black Sea and Mediterranean Sea-38. With reference to the Legislative Assembly of a State in India, consider the following statements :1. The Governor makes a customary address to Members of the House at the commencement of the first session of the year .2. When a State Legislature does not have a rule on a particular matter, it follows the Lok Sabha rule on that matter.Which of the statements given above is/ are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 239. With reference to Indian National Movement, consider the following pairs:PersonPosition held1. Sir Tej Bahadur SapruPresident, All India Liberal Federation2. K. C. NeogyMember, The Constituent Assembly3. P. C. JoshiGeneral Secretary, Communist Party of IndiaMy Topic List :Constituent assemblySantosh Sir Elimination Techniques:Can you share your intelligent guessing tricks?40 . With reference to Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), consider the following statements1. AIIB has more than 80 member nations.2. India is the largest shareholder in AIIB.3. AIIB does not have any members from outside Asia.Which of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c). 1 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3Answer: aHere statement 2 and statement 3 can be eliminated because they are extreme. You can read what I had advised in my intelligent guessing tricks.41. What was the purpose of Inter-Creditor Agreement signed by Indian banks and financial institutions recently?(a) To lessen the Government of India's perennial burden of fiscal deficit nd current account deficit(b) To support the infrastructure projects of Central and State Governments(c) To act as independent regulator in case of applications for loans of Rs. 50 crore or more(d) To aim at faster resolution of stressed assets of Rs. 50 crore or more which are-under consortium lendingAnswer: dHere option c and d can only be the answer as they are common.42. The Chairmen of public sector banks are selected by the(a) Banks Board Bureau(b) Reserve Bank of India(c) Union Ministry of Finance(d) Management of concerned bankAnswer: cTopic List : Banking bsics43. Consider the following statements:1. Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) is the first regulatory body set up by the Government of India.2. One of the tasks of PNGRB is to, ensure competitive markets for gas.3. Appeals against the decisions of PNGRB go before the Appellate Tribunals for Electricity.Which of the statements given above are correct?(a) 1 and 2 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 1 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3Answer: bHere also extreme statement like First in option 1 can be eliminated. Thus we get the answer.44. With reference to communication technologies, what is/are the difference / differences between LTE (Long-Term Evolution) and VoLTE (Voice over Long-Term Evolution)?1. LTE 'is commonly marketed as 3G and VoLTE is commonly marketed as advanced 3G.2. LTE is data-only technology and VoLTE is voice-only technology.Select the correct answer using the code given below.(a) 1 only(b) 2 only(c) Both 1 and 2(d) Neither 1 nor 2Answer: dTopic List : 5G 4 G.45. Which one of the following is not a sub-index of the World Bank's 'Ease of Doing Business Index'?(a) Maintenance of law and order(b) Paying taxes(c) Registering property(d) Dealing with construction permitsAnswer: aHere option a is unrelated to the question , thus can be eliminated easily. Other 3 deals with doing business.Some indirect Topics46.The Chairmen of public sector banks are selected by the(a) Banks Board Bureau(b) Reserve Bank of India(c) Union Ministry of Finance(d) Management of concerned bankBanking basics:47.Which of the following is not included in the assets of a commercial bank in India?(a) Advances(b) Deposits(e) Investments(d). Money at call and short noticeMy Topic list :Banking48. With reference to the cultivation of Kharif crops in India in the last five years, consider the following statements:1. Area under rice cultivation is the highest.2. Area under the cultivation of jowar is more than that of oilseeds.3. Area of cotton cultivation is more than that of sugarcane.4. Area under sugarcane cultivation has steadily decreased.Which of the statements given above are correct?(a) 1 and 3 only(b) 2, 3 and 4 only(c) 2 and 4 only(d) 1, 2, 3 and 449. Consider the following statements:A digital signature is1. an electronic record that identifies the signNowing authority issuing it2. used to serve as a proof of identity of an individual to access information or server on Internet.3. an electronic method of signing an electronic document and ensuring that the original content is unchangedWhich of the statements given above is / are correct?(a) 1 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3Answer: dMy Topics list - Digital India51. Which of the following statements are correct about the deposits of 'methane hydrate?1. Global warming might trigger the release of methane gas from these deposits.2. Large deposits of 'methane hydrate' are found in Arctic Tundra and under the seafloor.3. Methane in atmosphere oxidizes to carbon dioxide after a decade or two.Select the correct answer using the code given below.(a) 1 and 2 only(b) 2 and 3 only(c) 1 and 3 only(d) 1, 2 and 3My topic List : Climate change and oceans and Deep Ocean Mining.There are many more which I didn’t include because they were indirect.My point here is if you understand the nature and demand of exam , its easy. I have done it not once but six times . You can also do it.But you have to cut the clutter. If you read and follow unnecessary online stuff daily which UPSC will never ask , you are bound to lose as your precious time will get wasted.For free mains guidance :( AsksantoshSir- telegram)How can I join the PGP program for 2020?We are starting mains guidance in a week . I will continue guiding you in this journey . But always remember

It is not lack of interest. The polar regions are of great interest, for instance the Martian dry ice geysers in Richardson crater, one of the most interesting dynamic processes on Mars and the polar regions also have astrobiological interest too. There are potential habitats there that might even have fresh liquid water within 20 cms of the surface of the ice - of all things to find on Mars with its near vacuum atmosphere.As far as I know the only suggested habitats that might have fresh water on Mars are in polar regions, a layer of fresh water only a few cms thick, 10 to 20 cms below the surface in transparent ice. Thin though that layer may be by Earth standards, it is of extraordinary interest on Mars where any fresh water on the surface would evaporate almost immediately. It is a process that happens beneath clear ice in Antarctica and models show it should happen in the Martian ice sheets too, so long as there is similarly clear ice there.The main potential habitats, which I’ll look at in detail in this answer, are:Flow like features in Richardson Crater that form after the Martian dry ice geysers have erupted (not the same as the ones in the northern hemisphere or the ones in Russell’s crater - there are three different similar looking features that form in different conditions - only the ones in Richardson Crater are of special interest for astrobiology)Liquid water forming around sun warmed grains in snow or icePerchlorate salts lying on layers of ice forms liquid water droplets in tens of minutesLiquid water can exist permanently below 600 meters of ice (100 meters of rock) kept warm by the heat of Mars itself, if it once forms, e.g. after an impactIce fumaroles can mask the heat signature of venting of hot moist gas and make good habitatsAnywhere there is clear ice in polar regions, then fresh liquid water can form at a depth of around 6.5 cms by the solid state greenhouse effect.So it’s exciting for astrobiology, also for geology too, but they are also habitats the Earth microbes could contaminate and by the Outer Space Treaty we have an obligation to prevent “harmful contamination” in the words of the treaty. It also just makes sense. If you are searching for native life on Mars, and most people agree that is one of our top science objectives there, the last thing you want to do is to just find life you brought there yourself.So, before we developed this modern understanding of the potential vulnerability of the polar regions to Earth microbes, NASA made two attempts, the Mars Polar Lander which crashed, and Phoenix which succeeded. However it was as a result of unexpected observations by Phoenix that scientists were lead to the realization that actually there could be habitats there for modern native Mars life - and so since then any landers sent there have to be sterilized to a high standard.We could not send Curiosity there, or a second copy of Phoenix either, because it is now not thought to be sterilized sufficiently. Hopefully it has not contaminated the region of Mars around it with Earth life, but I think the Phoenix landing site might be a great site to visit to get ground truth on how effective our planetary protection measures have been on Mars - but with an appropriately sterilized lander of course.WHY IT IS HARD TO STERILIZE TO THE LEVELS OF THE VIKING MISSIONS IN THE 1970SThe current “gold standard” for Mars is set by the Viking landers.Viking Lander being prepared for dry heat sterilization – this remains the "Gold standard" of present-day planetary protection.After preliminary cleaning similarly to the levels used for Curiosity, they were then heat-treated for 30 hours at 125 °CFive hours at 125 °C would be enough to reduce the population of microbes by ten, so this was enough for a millionfold reduction - that’s including enclosed parts of the spacecraft. It would still have a maximum of 30 spores and so several thousand dormant microbes as the spore count used undercounts the number present by a factor of a hundred or so. But in addition the numbers are reduced by the journey out there, the harsh conditions on Mars, and then a microbe would have to be pre-adapted to the conditions there to have a chance of surviving once there.They didn’t achieve certainty but to a high chance no microbe from Viking was able to replicate and spread on Mars.According to modern planetary protection rules then you could send a spacecraft sterilized like this to the Phoenix landing site.But the problem is that modern equipment is much more miniaturized than for Viking, and made up of thin layers only a few atoms thick and delicate materials including epoxy attachments. Even when space hardened, it tends to be more sensitive and so would not stand being baked in an oven for days like Viking. The components would come unglued and instruments also would go out of alignment.WE HAVE ALSO MADE GREAT PROGRESS IN HIGH TEMPERATURE INSTRUMENTS SINCE VIKINGIt’s not all bad news however, for heat sterilization. Since Viking, while commercial equipment for most purposes have got more sensitive to high temperatures, we have also had many advances in high temperature technology too. The commercial equipment is not built to withstand high temperatures not because it can’t be, but because it doesn’t need to be.High temperature electronics and instruments are used where they are needed and are more capable than in the 1970s. We have them for oil wells as they drill deeper to regions where the temperatures go above 200 C. For planes where they can reduce weight by putting sensors closer to the engines, and for electric cars for similar reasons.NASA has also been working for some time to develop a rover able to withstand Venus surface conditions and drive around and study the surface. With high temperatures, high pressures and sulfuric acid too. Very sterilizing for Earth life.In 2007 they developed a silicon chip capable of 17,000 hours of continuous operation at 500 °C.For their Venus rover, we need cameras to operate at high temperatures, we need mechanisms, we need instruments such as a Raman spectroscopy, we need communications and so on. In their 2010 study they thought all of those were possible for the future. Though they couldn’t build it yet, they saw a way to it as a future roadmap.If the aim is to signNow a high temperature for sterilization, the job may be easier to some extent, as the instruments don’t have to actually function at those high temperatures. They have to withstand being heated to high temperatures for a considerable period of time - but will then operate at normal temperatures.So, if you choose the right components for your lander / rover, we actually have the capability to go beyond what they could in the 1970s and I do think that if we went all out with a major program, as for the Venus rover - that we could design a 100% sterile lander in the near future. It would probably need to use RTGs for the power source - and perhaps also as the heat source for sterilization during the journey to Mars, as these have no problem working at high temperatures. Heat your lander at 500 C for six months on the voyage out to Mars and there would be no life left on it at all. Nothing viable. You can also use techniques like CO2 snow which could be done on the surface of Mars to remove even the dead organics from the outside of the lander.There is one plan already for a sterile probe to descend into the Europan ocean by Brian Wilcox.I think myself that designing a 100% sterile rover / lander should be a top priority. It would be expensive to start with, but well worth it.Once we have built the first one and developed the understanding we would have a basic design there that could be used to explore regions such as the subsurface oceans of Europa and Enceladus and the senstiive sites on Mars even if they have cms thick liquid water or more, and yet not have any concerns about introducing Earth life.The long term pay off would be huge.It would obviously take a lot of ingenuity for the astrobiologists, to redesign instruments to be able to be heat sterilized. They did however succeed for Viking, at the temperatures used there. With the Viking sterilization, tenfold reduction every 5 hours, at a dry heat of 125 °C, in theory you wouldn’t need to continue for that long to have pretty much 100% certainty that there is no life left at all.If anyone knows of any work on this apart from Brian Wilcox’s proposed mission, do say!CURRENT PLANETARY PROTECTION RULESAnyway the current rules are not as strict as that. But they do require a lander to be sterilized to Viking levels or higher if they target regions where there is ice within 5 meters of the surface. The reasoning is that a crash could end up melting the ice.So first here is a map of special regions as updated in 2016, but they also decided that even outside of those regions you need to do case by case studies before landing there.There Are Regions On Mars That It's Forbidden To ExplorePOTENTIAL FOR LIQUID WATER HABITATS IN THE POLAR REGIONS - CALCIUM PERCHLORATE SALTS IN LAYERS ON TOP OF ICEDespite what other answers say here, polar regions do have the potential for liquid water. Even fresh, not salty, water.First the Phoenix lander actually spotted droplets forming on its legs.Unfortunately, it wasn't equipped to analyse them but the leading theory is that these were droplets of salty water. They were observed to grow, merge, and then disappear, presumably as a result of falling off the legs.Nilton Renno, who was on the team for Phoenix and also runs the REM “weather station on Mars” for Curiosity was one of several who investigated various ways for thse droplets to form.He found that liquid water can form very quickly on salt / ice interfaces when the salt is on top of the ice. By “salt” there he means calcium perchlorate salts similar to the salts they found in the Phoenix site.Within a few tens of minutes this salt on top of ice formed droplets of liquid brines in Mars simulation experiments. This is striking as it could open large areas of Mars up as potential sites for microhabitats that life could exploit. The professor says"If we have ice, and then the salt on top of the ice, in a few tens of minutes liquid water forms. Our measurements clearly indicate that. And it's really a proof that liquid water forms at the conditions of the Phoenix landing site when this salt is in contact with the ice.  "Based on the results of our experiment, we expect this soft ice that can liquefy perhaps a few days per year, perhaps a few hours a day, almost anywhere on Mars. So going from mid latitudes all the way to the polar regions." This is a small amount of liquid water. But for a bacteria, that would be a huge swimming pool - a little droplet of water is a huge amount of water for a bacteria. So, a small amount of water is enough for you to be able to create conditions for Mars to be habitable today'. And we believe this is possible in the shallow subsurface, and even the surface of the Mars polar region for a few hours per day during the spring."(transcript from 1:48 onwards)That's Nilton Renno, who lead the team of researchers. See also Martian salts must touch ice to make liquid water, study shows . He is a mainstream researcher in the field - a distinguished professor of atmospheric, oceanic and space sciences at Michigan University. For instance, amongst many honours, he received the 2013 NASA Group Achievement Award as member of the Curiosity Rover " for exceptional achievement defining the REMS scientific goals and requirements, developing the instrument suite and investigation, and operating REMS successfully on Mars" and has written many papers on topics such as possible habitats on the present day Mars surface.MOHLMANN’S FRESH WATER FORMING AROUND DUST GRAINS IN SNOW OR ICEThis is another suggested habitat for life in the Mars higher latitudes based on processes that happen in the Antarctic ice. Dust grains in the ice often produce tiny melt ponds around them in the heat of the summer sunshine. The dust grains absorb the heat (preferentially over the ice), and so heat up and melt the surrounding ice. Then this heat gets trapped because of the insulating effect of the solid state greenhouse effect, because ice traps heat radiation, so forming tiny melt ponds of a few millimeters thickness or more. This could happen on Mars too, so is another possible habitat with fresh water.It's just a few millimeters of fresh water, but that could be signNow on Mars. Another example of this process, then meteorites in Antarctica are often found associated with gypsum and other evaporates - minerals that can only form in the presence of liquid water and must have formed after they fell in Antarctica. Sometimes the researchers find capillary water, or thin films of water, and sometimes they even find evidence of a rather large meltwater pond which formed around the meteorite, or find the meteorites in depressions filled with refrozen ice.A similar process could be at work in the Martian icecaps too. This process could melt the ice for a few hours per day in the warmest days of summer, and melt a few mms of ice around each grain. Indeed, if I can venture a speculation of my own, perhaps just as in Antarctica, there could be larger melt ponds around meteorites embedded in the ice too - as Mars must have many meteorites embedded in the polar ice sheets.This could explain another puzzle. Particles of gypsum (the same material that is used to make plaster of paris) have been detected, first in the Olympia Undae dune fields that circle the northern polar ice cap of Mars, See this paper for details. Later on, they were detected in all areas where hydrated minerals have been detected, including sedimentary veneers over the North polar cap, dune fields within the polar ice cap, and the entire Circumpolar Dune Field. There's strong evidence that the gypsum originates from the interior of the ice cap. See this paper for details. Gypsum is a soft mineral that must have been formed close to where it has been discovered (or it would get eroded away by the winds) and as an evaporite mineral, it needs liquid water to form. Opportunity later found veins of gypsum in the equatorial regions, in 2011, a clear sign of flowing water on ancient Mars. But these polar deposits are more of a mystery because they are found in the dust dunes on Mars, so must be produced locally, but where?.Losiak, et al, modeled tiny micron scale dust grains of basalt (2-2 microns in diameter) exposed to full sunlight on the surface of the ice on the warmest days in summer, on the Northern polar ice cap. They found that these tiny dust grains were large enough to provide for five hours of melting which could melt six millimeters of ice below the grain. They say that with pressures close to the triple point, on windless days, you should get a signNow amount of melting. They speculate that this might possibly explain the deposits of gypsum in the polar regions. Could it have formed in a similar way to the gypsum that sometimes forms around Antarctic meteorites?Möhlmann did a similar calculation. This time he was looking at the possibility of liquid water forming inside snow on Mars. The snow would be exposed to the vacuum, but as the ice melted it would plug all the pores in the snow and eventually form a solid crust of ice on the snow, and so protect it from further evaporation. It would trap the heat as well and so encourage melting. This could happen anywhere between a few centimeters depth down to ten meters below the surface.THIN FILMS OF UNDERCOOLED WATER WRAPPED AROUND INDIVIDUAL MICROBESThis is an interesting suggestion by Möhlmann in an article in Cryobiology magazine, that life may be able to make use of thin film monolayers of the " ULI water" (Undercooled Liquid Interfacial water) wrapped around a microbe, even in tiny nanometer scale layers of liquid water only two monolayers thick."In view of Mars it should be mentioned, that there is water ice in the permanent polar caps. At mid- and low-latitudes, ice can form, at least temporarily, via adsorption and freezing in the soil. There, the adsorbed and frozen water overtakes the role of ice, as described above. So, ULI-water can be expected to, at least temporarily, exist also in martian mid- and low-latitudinal subsurface soil. A similar environment can be expected to exist in isolation heated parts of icy bodies in the asteroidal belt, and analogously in the internally heated icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn. It is thus a current and challenging question if ULI-water can act as supporting life in environments with temperatures clearly below 0 °C by delivering that water, which is necessary for metabolic processes, and by permitting transport processes of nutrients and waste. It is the aim of this paper to demonstrate the potential importance of ULI water in view of the possible biological relevance of nanometric undercooled liquid interfacial water."He cites research suggesting life can remain active in the presence of just two monolayers of water wrapped around a microbe.If there is just a small thermal gradient in the ice, of one degree centigrade per meter, then enough liquid water will form to fill a micrometer sized microbe once a month. Enough will form to fill it once a day if there is a locally steeper gradient of one degree centigrade per 10 cm. This can lead to a constant transport of fresh water to bring fresh nutrients to the microbe, and to remove wastes. The main question is whether this is a sufficient flow of water to sustain life. For more details of this intriguing idea, see his article.SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE FLOW-LIKE FEATURES - MAY INVOLVE FRESH WATER CMS THICK!There are two main types of these flow-like features. For a technical overview of them, see the Dune Dark Spots section in Nilton Renno's survey paper. These ones in the southern hemisphere which form in Richardson crater are particularly promising because all the current models involve liquid water in some form and what's more, in the models, these features start off as fresh water trapped under ice.The more interesting ones, for habitability, are in the south. The southern ice cap consists mainly of dry ice. It is colder, and higher up (at a higher altitude). It stretches as far as forty degrees from the pole in winter (so spanning over 4,700 km), but it reduces to just 300 km across in summer, Richardson's crater is 17.4 degrees from the south pole (that's over 1,000 km).So though the features resemble each other in appearance, the conditions in which they form are very different and not directly comparable. The southern hemisphere features from at much higher surface temperatures than the northern hemisphere features, and they appear late in spring, after the rapid disappearance of a vast and thick layer of dry ice that covered the entire southern polar region, and beyond. In the summer then surface temperatures at Richardson crater can actually get above the melting point of ice at times in daytime, as measured by the Thermal Emission Spectrometer on Mars Global Surveyor. (See figure 3 of this paper)..This map shows where the crater is. It is close to the south pole - this is an elevation map showing the location of Richardson crater in Google Mars, and I’ve trimmed it down to the southern hemisphere. You can see Olympus Mons as the obvious large mountain just right of middle, and Hellas Basin as the big depression middle left. Richardson crater is about half way between them and much further south.Here is a close up - see all those ripples of sand dunes on the crater floor?Link to this location on Google MarsWell it’s not the ripples themselves that are of special interest, Mars is covered in many sand dune fields like that planet wide. What interests us are some tiny dark spots that form on them which you can see if you look really closely from orbit.And, would you ever guess? Although it's one of the colder places on Mars, there's a possible habitat for life there in late spring? It is due to the "solid state greenhouse effect" which causes fresh water at 0°C to form below clear ice in Antarctica at a depth of up to a meter, even when surface conditions are bitterly cold.The Warm Seasonal Flows often hit the news (probable salty brines on sun facing slopes). But for some reason, the flow-like features in Richardson crater are only ever mentioned in papers by researchers who specialize in the study of possible habitats for life on Mars.I first learnt about them in the survey of potential habitats on Mars by Nilton Renno, who is an expert in surface conditions on Mars (amongst other things, he now runs the Curiosity weather station on Mars). You can read his survey paper here, Water and Brines on Mars: Current Evidence and Implications for MSL. The models I want to summarize here are described in his section 3.1.2 Dune Dark Spots and Flow-like Features under the sub heading "South Polar Region". But it's in techy language so let's unpack it and explain what it means. I will also go back to the papers he cited, and some later papers on the topic.In the case of Richardson's crater, both models involve liquid water in some form, and also potentially habitable liquid water. One of the two main models involves relatively thick layers of fresh water below optically clear water ice, up to tens of centimeters thick, and so is very promising for microhabitats. The other model involves microscopically thin layers of fresh water that join together to make a larger stream and pick up salts on the way out. That's very promising too. So let's now look at these two ideas in detail.First, early in the year, you get dry ice geysers - which we can’t image directly, but see the dark patches that form as a result and are pretty sure this is what happens:Geysers which erupt through thick sheets of dry ice on Mars. Clear dry ice acts as a solid version of the greenhouse effect, to warm layers at the bottom of the sheet. It is also insulating so helps keep the layers warm overnight. Dry ice of course at those pressures can't form a liquid, so it turns to a gas and then explosively erupts as a geyser. At least that's the generally accepted model to explain why dark spots suddenly form on the surface of sheets of dry ice near the poles in early spring on Mars.So that would be cool enough, to be able to observe them, video them and study them close up. I hope the rover would be equipped with the capability to take real time video. These geysers are widely known and many scientists would tell you how great it would be to look at them up close, and see them actually erupt.But most exciting is what happens later in the year, when it is getting too warm for the thick layers of dry ice needed for geysers. These layers of dry ice vanish rather quickly in spring. You would think that the dark spots that you get in the aftermath of the geysers would just sit there on the surface and gradually fade away ready to repeat the cycle next year. But no. Something very strange happens. Dark fingers being to form and creep down the surface as in this animation. Very quickly too (for Mars). I haven't been able to find a video for this, as the papers just use a sequence of stills, so I combined together some of the images myself into an animation to show the idea:Flow-like features on Dunes in Richardson Crater, Mars. - detail. This flow moves approximately 39 meters in 26 days between the last two frames in the sequenceAll the likely models for these features, to date, involve some form of water. Alternatives that one might try to use to model them might include a second ejection of material by the dry ice geyser, or dust deposition, but researchers think these are unlikely to produce the observed effects.SIMILAR LOOKING FEATURES NOT TO BE CONFUSEDThe Richardson crater flow-like features should not be confused with two rather similar looking features, the dark streaks in Russell crater, 55 degrees from the south pole (compared to 17.4 degrees for Richardson crater).These are braided, divide, recombine and cross each other's tracks. They flow down the slopes channeled by wind formed ridges in the dunes, and most distinctive of all, they are able to rush up over small features of up to two meters high and down the other side.These seem to be dry features associated with defrosting and small dust avalanches as they are episodic, moving rapidly at speeds of 2-4 meters per second like an avalanche. The authors call them "dark flows". For details see this paper.They also should not be confused with the Flow-like features in the Northern polar dunesThe two Martian ice caps are rather different. The northern cap is low lying, mainly ice, with a thin layer of dry ice that disappears in summer. The flow like features in the northern hemisphere form at 12.5 degrees from the pole at surface temperatures of about -90°C, which is low enough for dry ice to be stable on the surface. Their models involve either extremely cold salty brines or dry ice and sand. These features are far too cold to be habitable to Earth life and may not even involve liquid waterThey are easily confused because they are so similar in appearance, and because both are referred to as "flow like features".These are thought to form at much lower temperatures. Some of the models for these also involve liquid water but there are other hypotheses as well, some of them involving dust and ice slipping down the cliff faces.Perhaps one reason the Richardson crater flow-like features get so little attention is that it is easy to confuse them with these other features and assume they have been proved to be dust flows or to form at temperatures to low to be habitable.But they form in different conditions at different temperatures and the explanations used for these other features don’t work for them. Currently the only models for them involve fresh liquid water beneath the ice, either as layers cms thick, or as thin undercooled liquid water layers, then combining with salts to form the flows on the Martian surface.MORE ABOUT THESE FEATURES AND WHY THEY ARE SO INTERESTING FOR HABITABILITYSo, these southern hemisphere flow like features seem very promising. That’s not as surprising as you might think. The same thing happens in Antarctica - if you have clear ice, then you get a layer of pure water half a meter below the ice.The water is trapped by the ice so stays liquid. And what’s more, if they model it assuming clear ice like the ice in Antarctica they find that the ice there gets enough heat from the sun in the day to keep it liquid through the night to the next day so the layer can actually grow from one day to the next (ice is an excellent insulator). Also the Mars atmosphere is so thin that it doesn't matter at all that the air above the ice is very cold in these regions. The atmosphere is a near vacuum and works as a great insulator. Better in some ways than Antarctica.Inuit village, Ecoengineering, near Frobisher Bay on Baffin Island in the mid-19th century - ice and snow are very insulating on Earth or on Mars. Just as you can be snug and warm inside an igloo, a layer of fresh water can stay warm a few tens of cms below the surface, warmed by the sun every day beaming through th clear ice. The near vacuum of the Mars atmosphere helps if anything.Möhlmann's model is pretty clear (abstract here). If Mars has transparent ice like the ice in Antarctica, then it should have layers of liquid fresh water 5 - 10 cm below the surface and a couple of cm in vertical thickness in late spring to summer in this region. His model doesn't involve salt at all, so the water would be fresh water.The only question here is whether clear ice forms on Mars in Mars conditions and whether the ice is sufficiently insulating. We can’t tell that really from models, the only way is to go there and find out for ourselves.Blue wall of an Iceberg on Jökulsárlón, Iceland. On the Earth, Blue ice like this forms as a result of air bubbles squeezed out of glacier ice. This has the right optical and thermal properties to act as a solid state greenhouse, trapping a layer of liquid water that forms 0.1 to 1 meters below the surface. In Möhlmann's model, if ice with similar optical and thermal properties forms on Mars, it could form a layer of liquid water centimeters to decimeters thick, which would form 5 - 10 cm below the surface.In his model, first the ice forms a translucent layer - then as summer approaches, the solid state greenhouse effect raises the temperature of a layer below the surface to 0°C, so melting it.The melting layer is 5 to 10 cm below the surface. In the model, then the ice below the surface is first warmed up in the daytime sunshine, due to a greenhouse effect, the infrared radiation is trapped in the ice in much the same way that carbon dioxide traps heat to keep Earth warm. Then because the ice is so insulating, the heat is retained overnight, and the water remains liquid to the next day. To start with it would be only millimeters thick but over several days, gets to thicknesses of centimeters.He found that subsurface liquid water layers like this can form with surface temperatures as low as -56°C.CREATES POTENTIAL FOR FRESH LIQUID WATER FLOWING ON MARS!This should happen on Mars so long as it has ice with similar properties to Antarctic clear ice.If there is a layer of gravel or stone at just the right depth, the rock absorbs the infrared heat and that can speed up the process. In that case, a liquid layer can form within a single sol, and can evolve over several sols to be as much as several tens of centimeters in thickness. That is a huge amount of liquid water for the Mars surface.The fresh water of course can't flow across the surface of Mars in the near vacuum conditions, as it would either freeze back to ice, or evaporate into the atmosphere. But the idea is that as it spreads out, it then mixes with any salts also brought up by the geyser to produce salty brines which would then remain liquid at the much lower temperatures on the surface and flow beyond the edges to form the extending dark edges of the flow-like features.Later in the year, pressure can build up and cause formation of mini water geysers which may possibly explain the "white collars" that form around the flow-like features towards the end of the season - in their model this is the result of liquid water erupting in mini water geysers and then freezing as white pure water iceThis provides:A way for fresh water to be present on Mars at 0 °C, and to stay liquid under pressure, insulated from the surface conditions.5 to 10 cm below the surface, trapped by the ice above itDepending on conditions, the liquid layer is at least centimeters in thickness, and could be tens of centimeters in thickness.Initially of fresh water, at around 0°C.They mention a couple of caveats for their model, because the surface conditions on Mars at these locations is unknown. First it requires conditions for bare and optically transparent ice fields on Mars translucent to depths of several centimeters, and it's an open question whether this can happen, but there is nothing to rule it out either. Then, the other open question is whether their assumption of low thermal conductivity of the ice, preventing escape of the heat to the surface, is valid on Mars.The process works with blue ice on Earth - but we can't say yet what forms the ice actually takes in these Martian conditions. The authors don't go into any detail about this, but ordinary ice can take different forms even in near vacuum conditions. As an example of this, the ice at the poles of the Moon could be "fluffy ice""We do not know the physical characteristics of this ice—solid, dense ice, or “fairy castle”—snow-like ice would have similar radar properties. [then they give evidence that suggests fluffy ice is a possibility there] " (page 13 of Evidence for water ice on the moon: Results for anomalous polar)That's the main unknown in their model, whether the ice is blue ice like Antarctic ice, or takes some other form. The ice should at least be in the same hexagonal structure crystalline phase as ice is on Earth - Mars is close to the triple point in this ice phase diagramPhase diagram by Cmglee, wikipedia. Ice outside of Earth can be in many different phases. For instance in the outer solar system it is often so cold that it is in the very hard orthorhombic phase, where it behaves more like rock than what we think of as ice. However ice on Mars is likely to be in the Ih phase similar to Earth life. The Mars surface is close to the triple point of solid / liquid / vapour in this diagram.  So, the ice is likely to be of the same type as the blue ice in Antarctica. Not likely to have bubbles of air in it. But it could still take a different forms. The model shows that Mars should have layers of liquid water ten to twenty centimeters below the surface if there are any areas of clear blue ice as in Antarctica.This solid state greenhouse effect process favours sun facing slopes (equator facing). Also, somewhat paradoxically, it favours higher latitudes, close to the poles, over lower latitudes, because it needs conditions where surface ice can form on Mars to thicknesses of tens of centimeters. (The examples at Richardson crater are at latitude -72°, longitude 179.4°, so only 18° from the south pole. There is no in situ data yet for these locations, of course, to test the hypothesis. Though some of the predictions for their model could be confirmed by satellite observations.ALTERNATIVE - THIN LAYERS OVER SURFACES MELTING AT WELL BELOW O CAnother model for these southern hemisphere features involves ULI water (Undercooled Liquid Interfacial water) which forms as a thin layer over surfaces and can melt at well below the usual melting point of ice. In Möhlmann's sandwich model, then the interfacial water layer forms on the surfaces of solar heated grains in the ice, which then flows together down the slope. Calculations of downward flow of water shows that several litres a day of water could be supplied to the seepage flows in this way.The idea then is that this ULI water would be the water source for liquid brines which then flow down the surface, mixing with dust, to form the features. That would still be interesting as you end up having flowing liquid water on Mars, several litres a day what’s more. Here is a paper from 2016 describing the idea.See also Möhlmann's paper The three types of liquid water in the surface of present MarsThose are the only two models so far. So it does seem very likely that there is liquid water here, and even with the interfacial liquid layers, the water starts off as fresh water beneath the ice, or possibly salty (in either model) if there are salt grains in the ice for the water to pick up. Either way the features start out as a flow of fresh water trapped beneath a layer of ice. This is one of the least publicized types of habitat on Mars, seldom mentioned outside the specialist literature. Yet in some ways it's one of the most interesting, if it exists, because of the potential for fresh water at 0 °C.This liquid water is hard to observe because the features are so small, beyond the resolution of CRISM. However, analysis of the larger spots, at around the spring equinox, produced a signal that just possibly could be liquid water, where the ice is in contact with the dark material of the dune spots." In the gray ring area the water ice 631 surrounds darker surface, where liquid interfacial water layer or brine (Möhlmann 2004, 632 2009, 2010) may form. We found no firm evidence for the presence of liquid water in near-IR 633 spectra, although linear unmixing results show that the data are not inconsistent with a 634 possible slight contribution (a few %) of liquid water in the dark core unit." page 26 of this paper.MORE WIDESPREAD LIQUID WATER AT DEPTH OF ABOUT 6.3 CM BELOW OPTICALLY CLEAR ICEMöhlmann has also suggested that his process could be a more widespread phenomenon in the Mars ice caps, not just associated with the geysers, as for Antarctica. Just more noticeable for the flow-like features because of the conditions in which it forms there.Liquid water could form at a depth of around 6.3 cm wherever there is optically clear ice on Mars in snow / ice packs, just as it does in Antarctica. In summer, it could form layers from centimeters to tens of centimeters in thickness.Results of Mohmann's modeling of the solid state greenhouse effect in clear ice on Mars. The plateaus show temperatures that get above the melting point of water regularly every Martian sol, at depths of about 6.3 cms. L here is 11.4 cm. Ice at this level will melt periodically, and especially in summer can stay liquid overnight, leading to subsurface liquid water in layers of from cms to tens of cms in thickness. This should happen on Mars not just in the flow-like Features of Richardson crater, but also, anywhere where there is optically clear ice.In another paper he writes "This liquid water can form in sufficient amounts to be relevant for macroscopic physical (rheology, erosion), for chemical, and eventually also for biological processes. "His models seem clear enough. The air temperature hardly matters, because the Mars air is so thin it's a near vacuum, insulating the ice, like a thermos flask. The only unknown here is whether Mars does have optically clear ice like this, which is common on Earth in cold conditions like this in Antarctica.Before I go on to the last couple of examples of possible habitats in the polar regions, let’s just revisit the Phoenix lander site. I think it would be a great place for a mission that’s both interesting for astrobiology and also for ground truth for planetary protection.LIFE IN ICE TOWERS HIDING VOLCANIC VENTSSo, this is another suggestion, that we could find habitats on Mars inside ice fumaroles. It's a nice idea, and perhaps ice fumaroles do form on Mars from time to time. So far we haven't found any on present day Mars. But it may well be worth keeping a look out for them, as it would be a very interesting habitat if we find one, or one of them starts to form, around a volcanic vent on Mars. If Mars does have any volcanic vents which vent water rich gases through a fumarole, they are likely to form ice towers like this, as happens in Antarctica.Let's look at the idea in some more detail. This photo shows an ice fumarole - an ice tower that forms around a vent of volcanic gases in the extremely cold conditions right near the top of Mount Erebus in Antarctica.+ One of the numerous Ice Fumaroles near the summit of Mount Erebus in Antarctica. If these also occur on Mars, they could provide a habitat for life, and would be extremely hard to spot from orbit due to the low external temperatures. Image credit Mount Erebus Volcano ObservatoryFor more photos of ice fumaroles see "Ice Towers and Caves of Mount Erebus",They were originally discovered by the Antarctic explorer Shackleton during his 1908 Nimrod expedition, when he and a few others set out to climb Mount Erebus.Photograph from Shackleton's Mount Erebus expedition with a fumarole in the backgroundHe described them like this."The ice fumaroles are specially remarkable. About fifty of these were visible to us on the track which we followed to and from the crater, and doubtless there were numbers that we did not see. These unique ice-mounds have resulted from the condensation of vapour around the orifices of the fumaroles. It is only under conditions of very low temperature that such structures could exist. No structures like them are known in any other part of the world."Ice caves form below the fumaroles, and these are especially interesting as a habitat for life.Entrance to Warren Cave on Mount Erebus. Credit Brian Hasebe. Volcanically heated, the temperatures inside their three study sites were 32, 52 and 64 degrees Fahrenheit (2,11 and 18 degrees Celsius), far warmer than the surroundings.These ice caves on Erebus are of especial interest for astrobiology, as analogues for habitats outside of Earth, because they are so biologically isolated. Most surface caves are influenced by human activities, or by organics from the surface brought in by animals (e.g. bats) or ground water. These caves at Erebus. are high altitude, yet accessible for study. There is almost no chance of them being affected by photosynthetic based organics, or of animals in a food chain based on photosynthetic life. Also there is no overlying soil to wash down into them.As described in this paper, these ice towers eventually collapse and then rebuild themselves, but though temporary features, they persist for decades. The air inside has 80% to 100% humidity, and up to 3% CO2, and some CO and H2, but almost no CH4 or H2S. Many of the caves are completely dark, so can't support photosynthesis. Organics can only come from the atmosphere, or from ice algae that grow on the surface in summer, which may eventually find their way into the caves through burial and melting. As a result most micro-organisms there are chemolithoautotrophic i.e. microbes that get all of their energy from chemical reactions with the rocks. They don't depend on any other lifeforms to survive. They survive using CO2 fixation and some may use CO oxidization for their metabolism. The main types of microbe found there are Chloroflexi and Acidobacteria.This makes them very interesting as an analogue for Mars habitats. If Mars is currently geologically active, then in such cold conditions, it may well have ice fumaroles around its vents, and if so they would be only a few degrees higher in temperature than the surrounding landscape and hard to spot from orbit. We haven't found these yet. The closest we have got so far is that the silica deposits in Home Plate which Spirit found, might have been formed by ancient fumaroles on Mars, (not necessarily ice fumaroles) though they could also have been formed by hot springs or geysers.This article Martian Hot Spots in NASA's Astrobiology magazine presents Hoffman's ideas. He explains that ice fumaroles on Mars could be up to 30 meters tall in its lower gravity and 10 to 30 meters in diameter, circular or oval in shape. So, potentially these things could grow to be huge on Mars, as high as a nine story high skyscraper, and potentially some of them could be as wide as they are high.He suggests searching for them on Mars from orbit, and he wondered if some temperature anomalies in Hellas Basin could be ice fumaroles. They wouldn't need to be in polar regions because the fumaroles themselves would bring large quantities of water vapour to the surface to keep replenishing the ice towers as they sublime away in the thing Mars atmosphere. They might be quite easy to spot as white circles or ovals, probably in permanently shadowed regions, and they would be slightly warmer than their surroundings. This shows one of his candidates.Daytime infrared from Odyssey IRAnomalous warmth in infrared at night as well on all nine infrared bands, so not a chemical signature.That candidate is in Hellas Planitia and is from 2003. Despite a search of high resolution visual images they were unable to find anything visual corresponding to them, they were only visible in infrared. But it shows the sort of thing they would be looking for. Lots of small dots around 10-30 meters in diameter each, clustered around a potential fracture. For details see their paper.The idea is that just as on Earth, volcanic action could bring water vapour and other gases from below. The water vapour, as in Antarctica, would freeze out to form these ice towers. If these environments do occur on Mars, they would provide a warm environment, high water vapor saturation, and some UV shielding. The ones we have on Earth don't have signNow amounts of liquid water. However, as they have close to 100% humidity inside, that doesn't matter. They sustain microbial communities of oligotrophs, i.e. micro-organisms that survive in environments that are very poor in nutrients. The same could be true of Mars.Though we haven't found ice fumaroles on Mars yet, we have found recently formed rootless cones, which are the results of explosive contact of lava with water or ice. This shows that ice (or water) and lava were in close proximity as recently as around ten million years ago.This shows rootless cones on Mars (to the left) and in Iceland. They are the locations of small explosions of steam, when lava surges over the surface over water or ice. These rootless cones on Mars formed around ten million years ago which shows that Mars has had ice and lava in close proximity very recently. They range in diameter from 20 meters to 300 meters.So, could there be other ways that volcanic processes on Mars produce habitats by interacting with ice, such as the ice fumaroles? From this 2007 paper:Hoffman and Kyle suggested the ice towers of Mt. Erebus as analogues of biological refuges on Mars. They combined the idea of still existing near surface ice deposits with the assumption that there is still some localized volcanic activity on Mars today.There are several examples from Mars that show a direct interaction between lava and ice in the geological history of Mars. The most obvious cases are the rootless cones seen in the northern lowlands. HRSC images show direct and violent interaction in the relatively recent geological history, for example at the scarps of Olympus Mons. Mars today is in relatively dormant phase, and any interactions which might be occurring today are presumably on a much less dynamic scale. Nevertheless, they may be driving local hydrothermal systems. Studying the geothermal processes in the first few tens to hundreds of meters below the surface of Mars today might thus uncover a wide variety of new habitats where biological activity may survive on this cold and dry planet.For more about this topic see Volcano-Ice Interaction as a Microbial Habitat on Earth and Mars. These ice fumaroles would be of great interest, but of course, being open to the surface, would easily be contaminated by Earth life from surface explorers or brought in to them through dust from the Martian storms.So far we've been looking at habitats deep below the surface of Mars, though perhaps connected to the surface. But what about habitats on the surface itself? They would make planetary protection even more of an issue, so it's important to look at the possibility. First we need to look at the question, is surface life possible there at all. Just a decade ago, most scientists (with the exception of Gilbert Levin) would have answered with a resounding "No". But that's all changed.There might also be habitats for native Mars life below the surface similar to lake Vostok in Antarctica - well within signNow of drilling. Searches so far have turned up a blank but they could still be there if the lakes are small up ot a few kilometers in size. They could be as close to the surface as only 100 meters deep below rock, or 600 meters deep below ice and remain liquid indefinitelyICE COVERED LAKES HABITABLE FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS AFTER LARGE IMPACTS - OR INDEFINITELYWhen comet Siding Spring was discovered in 2013, before they knew its trajectory well, there was a small chance that it could hit Mars. Calculations showed it could create a crater of many kilometers in diameter and perhaps a couple of kilometers deep. If a comet like that hit the martian polar regions or higher latitudes, away from the equator, it would create a temporary lake, which life could survive in.Artist's impression of Mars as seen from comet Siding Spring approaching the planet on 9th October 2014. It missed, by less than half the distance to our Moon. But sometimes comets will hit the Mars ice caps or higher latitudes. If that happens, it will create lakes and hydrothermal systems that last for thousands of years.These lakes can last for a surprisingly long time, insulated by the ice and heated from below by the rock. The models suggest that large craters of 100 - 200 km in diameter in the early solar system would have made lakes that stayed liquid for as long as one to ten million years. This happens even in cold conditions, so it is not limited to early Mars. A present day comet a few kilometers in diameter could form a crater 30 - 50 km in diameter and an underground hydrothermal system that remains liquid for thousands of years. The lake is kept heated by the melted rock from the initial impact in hydrothermal systems fed by water from deep underground.Also, there's another way to keep water liquid. Any ice deep enough below the surface, only 100 meters deep, can actually stay liquid indefinitely if covered by an insulating layer of gravel. There'd be enough heat from below, just from the heat of Mars itself and enough insulation above from the gravel, to keep the water permanently liquid. See section 2.2.3 of Niton Renno's article. This is also one theory for the Martian "dry gullies" that they formed through liquid water suddenly flowing out of a subsurface aquifer like this. This was the most popular theory for them at one point, though there are other explanations for them now.It's much harder to keep water liquid below ice, since rock is much more insulating than ice. It's especially hard for water to form below an ice sheet. If the ice cap was four to six kilometers deep, then you'd expect the base of it to be liquid water, melted from below just through the heat of Mars itself. Though Mars does have ice at both poles, its ice sheets aren't quite as deep as that. But it could still have liquid water at the base of its ice sheets, if there's localized geothermal heating from below.Also, if a lake formed, originally by geothermal melting or a meteorite impact, it's much easier to keep the lake liquid than it was to melt the water in the first place. In one model, then if a lake forms at a depth of over 600 meters below the ice (originally open to the surface) then it can remain liquid indefinitely from the heat flux from below, even without local geothermal heating.We'd be able to detect this water using ground penetrating radar because of the high radar contrast between water and ice or rock. MARSIS, the ground penetrating radar on ESA's Mars Express is our best instrument for the job. After several searches, it hasn't found anything yet. See page 191 of this paper. Their resolution isn't that great, however, around a kilometer.From the searches done to date, we can say with reasonable certainty that Mars doesn't seem to have an equivalent of our Lake Vostok (250 km by 50 km by 0.43 km deep) beneath its ice caps at present. It could however still have small subglacial lakes of up to a kilometer or so in diameter. They were looking for water liquid through geothermal heating, but their search would surely have found impact lakes too.So, Mars doesn't seem to have any large lakes created from impacts just now. Nor does it have any major lakes formed through geothermal activity below glaciers or ice caps, though it could have smaller lakes.So in short there are lots of exciting prospects to explore in the polar regions for astrobiologySo far we haven’t even made a start at looking for life there. Or anywhere on Mars except briefly in the 1970s with the Viking landers which produced ambiguous results and have never been followed up.See also myIs This Why We Haven't Found Life On Mars Yet? Value Of Actually LookingLet's Make Sure Astronauts Won't Extinguish Native Mars Life - To Jupiter's Callisto, Saturn's Titan And Beyond - Op EdModern Mars habitability - WikipediaTouch Mars? (book, around 2,000 pages, in a single web page, give it time to load) - this article is based mainly on sections of this bookRemoved section of this answer about the idea of using the Phoenix lander site to test planetary protection ideas - it was long enough anyway and that made it rather long :)

Note: The cars that I have mentioned below are my strictly my own personal picks and I have selected them on the basis of the category to which they belong.Photos are only for representational purposes.Prices are approximate and may not represent each model of a particular car.● Category- HyperCarMy pick- Hennessey Venom F5.Hennessey Venom F5 is clearly faster than Bugatti Chiron and Koenigsegg Agera RS. As told my Hennessey, this hypercar is designed from the ground up with only one goal in mind:To be the absolute fastest road car on earth.Only 30 people in the whole world will have the privilege to own one.SOME STATS:Top Speed-301MpH(484Km/H)0–186MpH(300Km/H) in less than 10 seconds0–249MpH(400Km/H) in less than 20 secondsPrice-$1.6 Million(₹101,704,159)● Category-ElectricMy pick-Tesla Model SDefinitely a car from the future, Model S is a revolutionary car even after 5 years when it was introduced by none other than maverick entrepreneur Elon Musk himself. It has sheer combination of sports car, luxury car and a technological marvel.The Model S cemented it's status as a top electric car and has the longest driving range currently on the market.Price: $69,500(₹4,441,744)(for standard 75kWh battery pack)● Category- LuxuryMy Pick- Mercedes-Benz S ClassThe guts of the S Class engineering is as good as it ever was-it's super quite, smooth and refined luxury cruiser, Mercedes Benz today offers various cars ranging from lumbering SUVs to small hatches . However, one thing hasn't changed. The pinnacle Mercedes-Benz is still after all these years-the S Class Sedan.Price- $196,000(₹12,457,523)● Category-Off Road/PickupMy Pick- Chevrolet Colorado ZR2The ZR2 Model turns the Chevrolet Colorado midsize pickup truck from a normal work vehicle into an off road missile. The ZR2 will also have a number of special editions that will appeal to all types of buyers. It is a great truck that can handle anything you throw at it.Price- $40,160(₹2,552,573)● Category- Rare afMy Pick- Lamborghini VenenoDrop dead gorgeous!!! This beast is unapologetically one of the best designs any car can have. Named after a fighting bull from the 1900s, the Veneno has a carbon-fibre light weight design and has consistently focused on optimum aerodynamics and cornering stability.Exactly three Lamborghini Venenos have ever been sold to the car buying community.Price- $3.9 Million(₹247,860,803)Thanks for reading!An upwote would be nice● ●︶

Long story, short: when proof of lacking ethics in major gaming publications was uncovered, a wall of false SJW victimhood was quickly constructed in order to hide behind and deflect any questions focusing on their corruption.Games were never cheap but their prices have gone up substantially recently. A complete game, which used to cost $40 in 2004 (or $53.50, if inflation corrected for 2018), today, by the time all the DLCs’ and Season Passes’ dust settles, will have set you back at least $150-$180. If the game is good, it could still offer you from 40 to over 100 hours of fun. If it is not good, however, this creates a real problem because returning a game is close to impossible. That is why accurate and honest game reviews are so important. And we always knew that something was not right with professional game reviews.It is not by mistake that so many big publisher games receive a far greater Metacritic score from professional reviewers than from actual gamers (while indie games receive the opposite treatment). In 2014 there was finally a smoking gun: professional gaming journalists and reviewers were caught in bed with game developers and their PR people. Both figuratively and literally. So, in order to cover up the stink, the spin-masters of the multi-Billion dollars industry quickly tried to masquerade this into a sexist harassment issue as a way to keep people from paying attention to the facts and, instead, focus on the staged “outrage”.PULLING ON A SMALL THREAD ENDS UP RIPPING THE CURTAIN:It all started with a female game developer having a string of affairs with some game journalists and publishers, which, of course would be no one’s business but their own. Oldest story in the world, anyone not directly involved would pay exactly zero attention. Only her (now former) boyfriend called them out very loudly and very publicly, by posting proof online. This made some people to take notice and realize that this was not just another case of serial infidelity but, in fact, it looked very much like the exchange of sexual favors in order to (allegedly) secure journalistic exposure and favorable reviews.The fuse was lit and the flame was starting eating its path towards the bomb. The Pied Pipers of the gaming Industry quickly realized that the mice were about to wake up on them. And they collectively tried to change their tune.THE PANIC DANCE AROUND THE LOOT PILE:The professional gaming press has cornered a very profitable niche market. And, besides direct advertising, it depends largely on early access and swag: all-paid trips to gaming conventions and press events with overly generous per diem; exclusive developing studio tours; special and collector’s editions of gaming paraphernalia as gifts that can be sold later at great profit; and, of course pre-release access to new games, because the early review gets the worm. If my competitors have access to the latest over-hyped games and I don’t, my readers will switch over in order to read their reviews on the latest triple-A title. And they will stay there. And if these incentives are not enough, good ol’ bribes rarely fail to deliver the desired reviews.Game publishers and developers have been known to secure favorable reviews for their products by reducing or closing the flow of the above. And they sure get their way: ten years ago, the Evil incArnate of the gaming industry (also known as EA) even had at least one gaming journalist fired for giving one of its games less than an enthusiastic review.So the lack of ethics was painfully real, the profits from such practices were very substantial and so any threat to them was decided to be met with an asymmetric response. As a first salvo, the most entrenched gaming press unleashed a coordinated name-calling attack against anyone who would dare question their “integrity”. It is never a good idea to indiscriminately insult your own audience but they did not stop there. Because next they called in a Rodeo Clown.It has been estimated that the money pile Jocker had amassed from Gotham City’s organized crime syndicates comprised of 6.3 Billion dollars. Well, the Gaming Industry brings in twenty times that amount every year, a growing market second only to China in size.FOLLOW THE CLOWN. FORGET THE MAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN:Anita Sarkeesian is a professional feminist who, since 2007, kept raising thousands of dollars in order to produce SJW videos on YouTube, videos whose production value could be easily matched by 15 year olds on an allowance budget. She psignNowes her controversial politics to a very small, fringe minority and that is why most of her videos have both the comments and voting options disabled. Which is her prerogative, of course. In order to keep the funding coming, however, she kept inviting, instigating and fanning controversy as a way to receive free publicity which, then, tries to turn into more funding - and, when no such reaction could be elicited, she has even been accused of creating it herself. So, even though completely irrelevant to the GamerGate scandal, she was connivingly inserted into the mix.Admittedly she was never good at anything she tried her hand at except stirring up anger in anyone unlucky enough to be exposed to her intentionally inflammatory drivel. Yet that “talent” and her gender was exactly what the gaming press spin-doctors needed in order to change the narrative. By first cultivating and harvesting the angry backlash and then focusing solely on the unethical game developer’s and Sarkeesian’s gender, they tried to turn a story about a severe lack of journalistic ethics into a story of “two poor women under attack by the bad male gamers”. It was a ridiculous smoke screen. But they were not going to be alone in blowing it.THE LIBERAL ARTS MAJORS ARE UP TO BAT:It is no secret that the mainstream media suffer a severe pro-SJW bias. Even on issues they do understand, they tend to focus on the leftist regressive aspects of them - let alone on issues, such as gaming journalism, they care and know very little about. So, even if it was besides the point and it ignored 99% of the GamerGate story, from all of Kotaku’s sister sites (Gizmondo, LifeHacker, i09, Jalopnik, Gawker, Jezebel) to Network news and the Colbert Report (not to mention the Grade-A certified SoyBoy Canadian PM), the purple-haired crowd was triggered to come out en mass to reproduce a false narrative, and, in the process, managed to obfuscate the real issue threatening to be exposed: that gaming journalism is as corrupt as the political one.Now, the people generating the fake outrage may have never been gamers but a lot of women actually are. And they strongly objected to their gender been used so shamelessly to hide dishonest business practices behind - and that is how the secondary #NotYourShield movement got started.Ever since 2014 I have deleted my bookmarks of Polygon, Gamasutra, EuroGamer and, of course, Kotaku (and all its GAWKER tentacles) and never gave them a second thought. Not only are they totally unreliable sources of gaming (or any) information, but their problematic ethics will stop at nothing in order for them to keep getting away with it.

I’m not naturally a science person, so bare with me.574 ft (175 meters) underneath Geneva, Switzerland, is a tunnel that has a circumference of ~17 miles (~27 km). This tunnel holds the most innovative and elaborate experimental facility in the world: the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).The below picture [1] shows the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) cavern, which is one of two large particle detectors that are part of the LHC.The CMS is [2]:…built around a huge solenoid magnet. This takes the form of a cylindrical coil of superconducting cable that generates a magnetic field of 4 teslas, about 100 000 times that of the Earth. The magnetic field is confined by a steel 'yoke' that forms the bulk of the detector's weight…It contains subsystems which are designed to measure the energy and momentum of photons, electrons, muons, and other products of the collisions. The innermost layer is a silicon-based tracker…which generates a powerful magnetic field…The interaction point…is the point in the centre of the detector at which proton-proton collisions occur between the two counter-rotating beams of the LHC. At each end of the detector magnets focus the beams into the interaction point…New particles discovered in CMS will be typically unstable and rapidly transform into a cascade of lighter, more stable and better understood particles. Particles traveling through CMS leave behind characteristic patterns, or ‘signatures’, in the different layers, allowing them to be identified. The presence (or not) of any new particles can then be inferred.What is the point of the LHC? [3]…its purpose is simple but ambitious: to crack the code of the physical world; to figure out what the universe is made of; in other words, to get to the very bottom of things.How does the LHC “get to the bottom of things”? [3]…two beams of particles will race in opposite directions around the tunnel, which forms an underground ring 17 miles in circumference. The particles will be guided by more than a thousand cylindrical, supercooled magnets, linked like sausages. At four locations the beams will converge, sending the particles crashing into each other at nearly the speed of light.If all goes right, matter will be transformed by the violent collisions into wads of energy, which will in turn condense back into various intriguing types of particles, some of them never seen before. That’s the essence of experimental particle physics: You smash stuff together and see what other stuff comes out.Here is a gif that shows an animated version of how the LHC works:You may be thinking “what does the LHC have to do with ghosts”? Well, Brian Cox, a physicist said that if ghosts did exist, the LHC would have found them by now. I am not a physicist, but I want to challenge Cox’s view and then show how the LHC’s search for unknown particles actually strengthens the possibility of the paranormal (more specifically, the existence of ghosts) in my opinion.Here is what Cox said regarding the LHC and ghosts [4]:"If we want some sort of pattern that carries information about our living cells to persist, then we must specify precisely what medium carries that pattern, and how it interacts with the matter particles out of which our bodies are made.We must, in other words, invent an extension to the Standard Model of Particle Physics that has escaped detection at the Large Hadron Collider. That's almost inconceivable at the energy scales typical of the particle interactions in our bodies."Neil deGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist, asked Cox if he was saying that ghosts couldn’t exist regarding the above assertion [4]:“If I understand what you just declared, you just asserted that CERN, the European Centre for Nuclear Research, disproved the existence of ghosts."Cox agreed.Cox’s assertion relies on the The Standard Model of Particle Physics, which is [4]:…everything we know about the fundamental building blocks of nature. It says fundamental particles are governed by four forces:gravityelectromagneticweak nuclearstrong nuclearIt is the best description of the fabric of reality we have so far, but it is not perfect.It may seem odd that I bring up the LHC since Cox uses it to dispute the existence of ghosts, but here’s the thing: part of being a scientist is to make discoveries. Scientific discoveries may disprove and/or call for amendments to the current models/theories/laws in science.I think it is a tad presumptuous for Cox, a physicist, to say that ghosts don’t exist because the LHC hasn’t found them. Why? Because the particle physicists who are working with the LHC are challenging current models in science by looking for evidence that would provide explanations to the current disparities within incomplete theories…yet Cox asserts that the second law of thermodynamics doesn’t allow for ghosts to exist [4]:…if ghosts existed, they would be made purely of energy, because they contain no matter – allowing them to pass through walls and do other "spooky" things. The second law of thermodynamics says the overall entropy, or disorder, in a system always increases with time and this means energy is always lost to heat.The only way a ghost could continue to haunt Earth is if they had a constant incoming source of energy – otherwise they would not last very long at all.First, Cox is being selective in what he is acknowledging as a possibility of what ghosts (if they exist) are made of - who says that ghosts are 100% energy? Who says ghosts couldn't exist as some form of matter?Secondly, Cox does not acknowledge that the second law of thermodynamics may be flawed or might need to be amended. Scientific Laws should never be seen as infallible or perfect.To elaborate further, one of the goals of the LHC is to find axions [5]:Axions are hypothetical particles.They are said to potentially be involved in the interactions between particles in the Standard Model and are believed to be the best bet when trying to identify the existence of dark matter.Axions could result in the existence of Dark Matter, which can be understood as [6]:…a hypothetical type of matter distinct from baryonic matter (ordinary matter such as protons and neutrons), neutrinos and dark energy. The existence of dark matter would explain a number of otherwise puzzling astronomical observations.The name refers to the fact that it does not emit or interact with electromagnetic radiation, such as light, and is thus invisible to the entire electromagnetic spectrum.Although dark matter has not been directly observed, its existence and properties are inferred from its gravitational effects…Now, lets look at the comparison that can be made between paranormal phenomenon and physics regarding dark matter [7]:Most scientists, myself included, are pretty skeptical of ghost stories. But…I got to thinking: How are we physicists different from anyone else telling ghost stories?…Over the last few decades, scientists have built a new picture of the universe where about 95 percent of its stuff comes in a "dark" form…But what exactly do physicists mean when they talk about something being "dark?"Well, basically, they mean the dark stuff acts a lot like a ghost in a horror movie. You can't see the dark matter and dark energy — but you know it's with you because it messes with the things you can see.Dark matter was discovered decades before dark energy by looking at how galaxies rotate. Vera Rubin's famous work…showed pretty much all spiral galaxies were spinning way too fast to be accounted for by the gravitational pull of the their "luminous" matter (the stuff we see in a telescope). Rubin and others reasoned there had to be a giant sphere of invisible stuff surrounding the stars in these galaxies, tugging on them and speeding up their orbits around the galaxy's center.Kind of sounds like those ghostly kitchen drawers doesn't it?…For years now, people have been looking for direct evidence of dark matter. This is the equivalent of seeing a ghost with your own eyes rather than seeing the kitchen drawers it keeps opening.The above comparison can be tied back to the LHC [8]:…there are plenty of theorized particles the Large Hadron Collider hasn't discovered yet, from so-called supersymmetric particles to tiny dark matter particle candidates called axions."The investigation of very low mass low energy dark matter is an ongoing thing," Bob Jacobsen, professor at the University of California, Berkeley who works on the LUX dark matter detector, told Gizmodo. "We still don't know whether axions exist. How do you know ghosts aren't made out of axions?"On the CERN website (which is responsible for housing the LHC), an axions is described as [9]:...a neutral and very light (but not massless) particle, and it does not interact (or does it very weakly) with conventional matter.In some way one can see the axion as a "strange photon".In fact, theory predicts that the axion, if it exists, could transform into a photon (and vice versa) in the presence of electromagnetic fields.Which leads me to the following point [10]:SOUNDS A LOT LIKE GHOSTS TO ME, MISTER COX.Experiments…are actively searching for dark matter particles, and haven't found or ruled them out yet…Of course, I'm not saying that ghosts exist. In fact, I vehemently do not believe in them. I'm just saying that while the LHC can explain a whole lot, it hasn't ruled out the existence of ghosts yet.The search for particles like axions creates some space for other possibilities, i.e. ghosts, which shows that Cox’s assumption of what ghosts could be composed of is a rather limited interpretation. If axions and dark matter are believed to exist, and neither operate in conventional ways (and may lead to amending or disproving current scientific models/laws/etc. upon discovery), then doesn’t the very unconventional nature of these hypothetical concepts bring about a wider threshold that acknowledges the possibility of ghosts?Richard Yannopoulos-Ruquist (who has a PhD in Applied Physics), wrote about the possibility of ghosts existing. [11]He begins by exploring the concept of axions:Dark matter has been detected (indirectly) by astronomers using several different types of star observations. Analysis using Newton’s gravitational theory of the motion of stars, galaxies and galactic clusters, and analysis using Einstein’s theory of the bending of light around these collections of stars, all indicate that the amount of dark matter…is at least 10 times the mass of the visible matter in the universe…Cosmic axions differ from all other candidates in that they were (presumably) created in primordial symmetry breaking processes whereas all the other candidates were created in thermal processes and have thermal velocities. Cosmic axions are then unique in that they essentially are fixed in space. They have no inherent motion or momentum…that makes them especially suitable to be the medium of religious, psychic and paranormal phenomena.…Superconductors and superfluids like Helium at near absolute zero are also BECs. You might say that the axions are at absolute zero as they are motionless…If they are a major constituent of dark matter, there must be more than a 10 trillion axions for every proton and neutron in the universe.If the symmetry breaking process produced axions before matter and anti-matter recombined, then the number of axions is comparable to the number of photons in the universe, a fantastically large number, and we cannot detect them…Dark energy is even more indirectly detected from supernovae observations…Physicists essentially have no clue what constitutes dark energy. One thought is that its source are the virtual particles of vacuum. Another is a rudimentary theory of quintessence…What I do discuss here is a conceptual model of how the cosmic axion field could be a medium of the paranormal…The western literature associated with a hypothetical quantum model of human consciousness is also discussed, since any paranormal medium must be able to support consciousness. And finally I extend this model to the cosmic axion field and discuss possible coupling mechanisms between it and physical particles…However, this is just a matter of convenience as axions, if they exist, are really physical particles that experience the same wave/particle duality as physical particles like electrons and photons.I also use the most common interpretation of quantum mechanical wave/particle duality: that waves are invisible; and that waves collapse into visible particles when detected; so that energy and information can be wavelike or particle like, but not both at the same time…Dr. Yannopoulos-Ruquist expands on the possibility of the paranormal by exploring certain concepts within science and expanding on certain paranormal hypotheses:A recent scientific conference to discuss “rational perspectives on the paranormal”…sorts paranormal phenomena into three categories:non-paranormal phenomena that have physical explanationsmind-based phenomena (such as out-of-body: OBE)near-death experiences (NDE: hypnosis and apparitions)direct interaction (PSI) phenomena (i.e. clairvoyance [local and remote viewing], telepathy, and psyhcokinesis).…The intent of this article is to understand the medium in which apparitions exist, but it is the medium of other aspects of the paranormal, as well.An alternative monistic approach is discussed by Peter Lloyd…claims that everything is mental rather than physical...It suggests that there exists a paradigm inadequacy and lists possible paradigms:the holographic paradigmthe cyberverse or infoverse paradigmthe non-linear or multi-continual time paradigmthe multi-dimensional reality paradigm.It refers to these paradigms as vague metaphors. Actually I do not recognize them to be paradigms at all. In fact I see evidence that each of these alternative ‘mathematical’ approaches to the paranormal may have a place in a final theory.The multi-dimensional approach has been summarized by Simon Harvey-Wilson…related to:string theoryconsciousnessvarious paranormal perspectives (poltergeist activity; the spiritual; the Shamanistic; UFOs, as well as virtual reality-the cyberspace approach).The claim is that all paranormal phenomena comes from other dimensions…this is still more metaphor than model.My hypothetical model includes the possibility of higher compactified dimensions, as possible sources of the axions and their coupling to physical particles; but it is decidedly three dimensional and no extraordinary concepts are invoked except for the particles that are thought to exist in dark matter…In this context, my hypothetical model does not offer an ‘active’ mechanism by which spiritual entities could alter the physical. What is offered is strong evidence of a medium in which they could exist and ‘passive’ coupling mechanisms between the two realms. The Russian theory also does not provide an active coupling mechanism. But the existence of apparitions that are detectable indicates that such an active coupling mechanism must exist.Sonny Ayran…presents a rather comprehensive description of the various manifestations of ghosts…ghosts are:naturalphysicalnormal…Furthermore, that quantum field theory supports the existence of ghosts within its uncertainty principle.This ‘uncertainty principle’ mechanism may allow active coupling between the paranormal and the physical world, but it is an unlikely medium for ghosts. Rather, the axion superfluid provides a straightforward, understandable medium for their existence…He correctly points out that ghosts must absorb physical energy (or my view, at least excite physical particles) requiring active coupling mechanisms to be detectable in the physical realm. He also refers to the existence of ghosts in a subspace which lies between the physical and a higher spiritual realm. That certainly reminded me of the three-fold universal categories of:the physicaldark matterdark energy…my view is that the best evidence in support of a nonphysical realm is found in experimental investigations of mind-based remote viewing…A model to explain remote viewing is presented by former astronaut, Dr. Edgar Mitchell…based on the quantum hologram. Holograms can create 3 dimensional images for 2 dimensional data. This model is also used to explain Delawarr camera data by Mitchell, etal. on CASYS. This camera obtains 3-D images from 2-D pictures of live and inert bodies. No external source of energy is required. In fact, all must be removed, except for the intention of the photographer, which implies the propagation of information in an undetectable medium from the photographer to the object, the inverse of remote viewing. The results are similar to MRI data.This experimental data suggests that all objects radiate detectable quantum fields…The data is explained by a ‘quantum hologram model’ of the object and a ‘phase conjugate adaptive resonance(pcar)’ associated with the photographer…Mitchell claims that “the history of the object is carried in its quantum hologram” which implies that it is a space-time effect…A theory of the above effects has been proposed by Russian researchers…Boris Iskatov derived a mathematical quantum theory of an information-energy field residing in a “global gas of microleptons”…it is likely that the microleptons are actually the axions of dark matter. The equations of this theory can be solved to obtain the quantum hologram…signals in this medium travel at the speed of light; but there are also weak pre- and post-signals that can travel much faster than the speed of light…The experimental work of Russian Anatloy Ohatim…claims to confirm the existence of the microlepton gas experimentally; and suggests that all information produced by the material world is embedded in the microlepton gas. This includes human thoughts, which are said to be propagated by the lightest particles. This information exists in the form of holograms and comes in units called “eidoses”…Particles with less mass have longer lifetimes, in agreement with Penrose’s gravitational wave collapse hypothesis…Potential for a “paranormal medium”:The investigations of remote viewing imply the existence of a supernatural medium in; the Russians claim to have detected it; and Russian theory indicates that it is an axion superfluid.But I believe the most relevant data for such a medium comes from:out-of-body experience (OBE) and near-death experience(NDE)after-death-experience(ADE)- religious phenomena.Unfortunately, there is little or no scientific data on ADE, NDE or OBE (formerly called ‘astral projection’ and more recently referred to as ‘consciousness projection’). OBE is not the same as remote viewing (RV). In RV the subject remains awake and very attentive to some remote object. The images obtained are shadowy and not easily recognized, being reflective of an internal structure. And anyone can be trained to perform RV.Rather, OBE is an altered state of consciousness in which the subject appears to be unconscious (asleep), but the subject himself or herself feels awake, separated from his or her own body, and able to travel elsewhere. In this state, the environment appears distinct and reflective of external surfaces rather than internal structure…One claim is that we all have OBEs in the dream state.Next, Theories of Consciousness are explored:Most summaries of the various quantum theories of consciousness…do not consider biochemical neuroscience theories, but they are not pertinent to the present discussion; nor is psychology considered…In sciences other than psychology, consciousness is at best secondary, and usually non-existent.In fact, there is still discussion regarding how consciousness should be defined. There are both quantum and classical aspects of consciousness, as well as visible and invisible components.There is no present verification of any theory of consciousness. Yet we all know subjectively that it exists. So what is it? The inherent assumption in all the work described on this site is that quantum consciousness is required on the physical plane.For example, Froehlich and later Marshall hypothesized that consciousness resides in the dipoles of membranes that when excited metabolically and electrically act collectively as a macroscopic BEC possessing quantum coherence…Penrose and others have extended the same ideas to microtubules within neurons…suggests that BECs exist in living organisms and that consciousness may be related to quantum wave function reduction (collapse) due to gravitational effects, or may even be related to Goedel’s Incompleteness Theorem. The supposition of course is that consciousness resides in the BEC…The Achilles Hell of all these hypotheses is that quantum consciousness on the physical plane requires a room temperature BEC…The field of quantum consciousness has not overcome this profound obstacle of requiring a room temperature Bose-Einstein Condensate (BEC). I offer an alternate hypothesis below.The alternate hypothesis looks at possible components of Dark Matter:A model of consciousness may be based on the supposition that an axionic superfluid is the major component of Dark Matter. We assume that consciousness requires, as one of its components, a macroscopic quantum coherent medium, namely a Bose-Einstein Condensate (BEC). We also presume that BECs cannot exist at room temperature in the physical world of electrons and protons. So perhaps Dark Matter contains a BEC as one of its constituents. As stated above, the cosmic axionic field, if it exists, is both a local and cosmic BEC.Astronomical observations of other spiral galaxies indicate that dark matter permeates and extends well beyond the visible galaxy…axions exist for every proton and neutron. So axions are expected to be a major component of dark matter; and the huge number of them indicates that the superfluid is local as well as cosmic. However, there is still a serious problem.Human consciousness is physical. For sure the visible component of human consciousness is physical and not a quantum consciousness. If quantum consciousness exists in the axion superfluid, it must be invisible. So we are faced with the problem of how the invisible axion consciousness couples with the visible physical consciousness.This is an unsolved problem. But it reminds us of the fundamental wave/particle duality of quantum theory: In one interpretation, both waves and particles exist, but at different times, with the invisible waves collapsing or reducing into visible particles, so that particles of different kinds can exchange energy and information…The hypothesis is then that axion waves couple into physical processes when they collapse into axion particles. Penrose has already suggested that as a basis of consciousness in a slightly different context…Penrose and others have also suggested several physical processes that might be BEC capable at room temperature. We now presume that none are, but that some or one of these physical processes might be capable of coupling with axion particles. The Froehlich/Marshall hypothesis, where metabolic or electrical stimulation of membrane dipoles is required for physical consciousness, is preferred here, as it correlates with the human experience of going asleep and waking up.But is there any reason to think that a non-physical world exists, other than it being a possible source of quantum consciousness. Our answer appeals to paranormal data.“Non-physical World”:The best available experimental data verifying the existence of a non-physical world with strong non-local effects that “couples” into the physical world comes from Stanford Research Institute and SAIC research of Remote Viewing sponsored by the CIA and other government agencies. It has been reported that anyone can be trained to perform Remote Viewing, but that expertise is required to recognize objects from their internal structure. Considerable (but much more subjective) data that requires the existence of coupled non-physical world and physical worlds is available from out-of-body experience (OBE), near-death experience(NDE) and after-death experience(ADE), e.g., religion.Another source of such data that perhaps has been neglected is the experience of apparitions. Photographic evidence exists in this case where light is reflected from the apparition or the apparition is a source of light. This means that the apparition can couple energy into the physical, or at least guide energy already available in the physical world into its own being. For our purposes this is good evidence of an active coupling mechanism.Furthermore, from the evidence of Remote Viewing, it would seem the all physical processes couple into the axion medium, which then is like a shadow world of all physical processes that can also sustain quantum consciousness on microscopic, macroscopic and perhaps macrocosmic scales.The key to my understanding of physical consciousness came from the requirement that Frohlich’s dipoles must be excited. That is, physical energy is needed for physical consciousness. Turn off the energy and you become unconsciousness- you fall asleep. Yet physical consciousness is probably not quantum consciousness. In the dream-state you still have some form of consciousness. I assume that the evidence of dreaming implies another state of consciousness, one that does not reside in arrays of dipoles. The axion gas or superfluid of dark matter is an obvious candidate. Moreover, axions satisfy the zero-point temperature requirement for a BEC. So my hypothesis is that your mind- your invisible quantum conscious mind -resides in the axion medium, not in the physical medium…Take your imagination for example. You can will yourself to visualize forms and objects. What I think is happening is that your ‘will’ collapses invisible quantum waves in your brain into axion particles that are visible but rather shadowy for most of us…But occasionally you encounter a problem that you cannot solve. So you forget about it. But later on the solution comes to you in a flash…your brain has been, as we say, unconsciously solving that problem; and the final solution is dumped into your visible (or audible) consciousness by collapse of the axion waves into axion particles that excite physical particles. This is my understanding of quantum consciousness as it relates to physical consciousness.Conclusion:Briefly, if the BEC axion medium exists, it is the likely site of quantum consciousness. The fundamental postulate is that consciousness is of a quantum nature. Since room temperature BECs are not likely, our physical consciousness is not of a quantum nature, but is driven by the axion quantum consciousness.Words and will are used to collapse the invisible axion waves into visible arrays of axion particles that we perhaps see directly in the dream or OBE state; and which in turn can excite energized physical membrane dipoles in the awake state.If so, the frictionless axion BEC permeates the galaxy, according to astronomical data, so that quantum conscious beings must possess considerable permanence and freedom in ADE (after death experience)…The fact that we can sometimes see and even photograph apparitions is very important to our understanding of the medium of the paranormal, for it is evidence of both active and passive coupling between the physical world and the paranormal medium.Here is a less complex hypothesis (that should not be read as a reputable source) regarding Dark Matter and how it could explain the possible existence of ghosts (keep in mind that the exert below is complete conjecture and should not be read as evidence; rather it should be seen as an imaginative proposal that makes presumptuous conclusions that lack evidence) [12]:Dark matter consists largely of a plasma of very high energy non-standard particles (sometimes of a different parity) - or "dark plasma". Non-standard particles are particles that are outside the physicists' Standard Model and include dark matter - matter which is six times more prevalent in the known universe than ordinary matter. Two different substrates, plasma and carbon, gave rise to life. Plasma life forms, in fact, spurred the development of organic carbon-based life on Earth.Meteorites, asteroids and comets, containing both the dark and visible building blocks of life fell into habitable zones and generated the first single-celled and later multi-cellular life-forms which developed both ordinary and dark matter "bioplasma" bodies that were coupled to each other.Hence, when life began on Earth, plasma life forms were forming symbiotic relationships with these primordial carbon-based organisms.Practically all carbon-based life forms today, including homo sapiens, had symbiotic relationships with plasma-based life forms. Hominids are the products of a symbiogenesis between a carbon-based and plasma-based life form. Unlike other animals, however, carbon-based hominids were able to utilize the alternative cognitive-sensory systems of their plasma-based symbiotic partners. Their unique brains allowed them to activate the higher energy bioplasma bodies that co-evolved with the carbon-based body…Relationships developed between the lower energy carbon-based bodies of hominids and the higher energy bioplasma bodies and were sustained for several millions of years up to the present.When certain brain circuits in the biochemical brain are disabled, the locus of consciousness from the carbon-based body of a human is transferred to the plasma-based body. During REM sleep the carbon-based body processes information from the bioplasma body. The plasma-based body is connected with, and an extension of, the biological body. Our brains form neuronal patterns from our experience. In a similar way our bioplasma ‘brain’ also form patterns from our experience…The bioplasma body originates and usually dies together with physical-biochemical body or a short time thereafter. This is not surprising as the age of this bioplasma body approximates the carbon-based body since both bodies originates at about the same time in a particular lifetime.However, in certain cases, for example accidental death, the still healthy and undamaged bioplasma body decouples from the carbon-based body. These bioplasma life forms continue to exist as entities commonly referred to as "ghosts."As bioplasma bodies, ghosts generate electromagnetic fields and radiate electromagnetic waves. Ghosts can glow in the dark, radiate heat, light and other electromagnetic waves that can be measured by scientific instruments like radar or even infra-red cameras when ordinary matter condenses around them. Embedded in these bioplasma bodies are "plasma antennae" which can tune-in and receive electromagnetic waves generated by other bioplasma bodies. The bodies of ghosts can sometimes be molded by expectations which radiate out from our own bioplasma bodies in the form of electromagnetic waves and are received by them through their embedded antennae. The nearer they come to a person the better they are able to tune-in to the thought waves (i.e. electromagnetic waves which are modulated by your thoughts) that person is radiating out from their bioplasma body.By switching-off the relevant (and specific) brain circuits, a person may transfer his or her locus of consciousness to their bioplasma body, which has the necessary sensory apparatus to be able to view these plasma-based life forms known as ghosts. Sightings of ghosts often occur at night - when a person is sleepy. This provides the ideal conditions for a person to…effect a transfer of consciousness to the bioplasma body with the different cognitive-sensory systems.The relevant brain circuits may be switched-off physically through surgery, accidents like brain injuries, transcranial magnetic stimulation and ambient electromagnetic fields which simulates brain lesions; chemically through psychoactive drugs; psychologically through meditation or hypnosis or during sleep.In conclusion, evidence for the existence of ghosts has not materialized. Evidence does not include personal experiences; personal experiences are simply conjecture if they cannot be tied back to scientific evidence.At the same time, the existence of ghosts have not been disproven. Certain hypotheses regarding the existence of axions, dark matter and dark energy, strengthen the possibility of ghosts existing (in my opinion).Axions, dark matter and dark energy - if discovered - would provide evidence of unconventional behaviors between matter and energy. Furthermore, they could also provide insight into possible mediums that ghosts could operate along.Footnotes[1] Kamikaze Weasel Shuts Down the Large Hadron Collider[2] Compact Muon Solenoid - Wikipedia[3] The God Particle[4] If ghosts were real, Brian Cox claims CERN would have found them by now[5] Scientists point the LHC at the Sun in the hunt for dark matter[6] Dark matter - Wikipedia[7] If Dark Matter Can't Be Seen, What About Ghosts?[8] Does The Large Hadron Collider Actually Disprove Ghosts?[9] Physics | iaxo.web.cern.ch[10] Does The Large Hadron Collider Actually Disprove Ghosts?[11] Dark Matter- by Richard Ruquist PhD[12] Ghost/Ghosts as dark matter

I’ll admit that I’m rather smug about my waist/stomach.I don’t really believe in being proud of things that aren’t earned, but my waist is perfect. I’ve always loved my waist. It’s probably the one thing I’ll be most sorry to lose when I get older.My stomach is nice too. I mean, it’s pretty much always flat. My body has this thing though where it gains weight either temporarily or permanently. When I gain weight, everything initially migrates down to my stomach, and my belly starts protruding a little making me look a little bloated. But that is an easily reversible change; all I have to do is eat normal portions for the next week or so and it automatically flattens again and my weight goes back to normal. That is the temporary stage of weight gain.But if I don’t do anything about it and continue eating elevated portions of food (like literally gorging on feast after feast), then after a few weeks or so the extra flab in the stomach area melts away naturally … but it all migrates to other places of my body, particularly my arms and my bum/thigh area. That weight gain is pretty much permanent and I’ll have to actually work to make it go away. But my stomach ends up flat anyway.I must admit I’m a little smug about it because it’s something I’ve got without doing anything, but celebrities fork out thousands and thousands of dollars to get a stomach/waist like mine, and even so their stomachs/waists don’t look half as good.I’m sure mine would look even better with actual exercise and proper eating, but at this point in life I can’t really be arsed to do more than what I actually do — I get enough activity walking, and I refuse to restrict my diet.Hm … as for being proud of something I actually worked to get, then I must say I am quite proud of my skin. It’s not without its flaws (I have eye bags and the occasional pimple) but I take pride in taking care of it, pampering it with new serums and face masks, trying out new cleansing oils and cleansing foams, moisturising it day and night, putting on daily sunscreen and just keeping it looking radiant and bright.I’ve never needed to use foundation because of how much work I put into having a good skin care routine.