Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2013 i National Geographic Magazine

Wide World let me tell you about a photo that hangs in my house. it was taken by W. Eugene smith, and its title is “the Walk to paradise garden.” it shows his two young children, hand in hand, on a dirt path in the woods, emerging from shadows into the light of a clearing. it reminds me of myself as a young boy exploring the wilderness of my backyard in southwestern oregon. my backyard had this: my favorite black walnut tree, deer tracks, a hornet’s nest, squirrels. i would wander its seven acres, hoping to see a cougar (i never did). or go down to griffin creek, hoping to discover an arrowhead (i often did). Years later, i understood that what my backyard contained, most of all, was the…

United States Like a spaceship gearing up to lift off, a carnival ride throws off orbs of light in this panoramic time exposure. The whirling captures the revelry of a summer’s eve at the Minnesota State Fair. PHOTO: DAVID BOWMAN Benin At a vodun celebration in Ouidah, sequined masquerades known as Egungun embody the spirits of ancestors with ties to Nigeria’s Yoruba culture. Some masked spirits bless the living; others entertain with intricate dances. PHOTO: DAN KITWOOD, GETTY IMAGES Atlantic Ocean Swelling to more than 30 feet across, a school of blue jack mackerel achieves a harmony that belies its purpose: safety from predators. The fish broke apart and re-formed off the azores as dolphins, birds, and sharks pecked away at the pack. PHOTO: CHRISTOPHER SWANN, BIOSPHOTO Order prints of…

SCATOLOGY | To conservation biologists like Samuel Wasser, an animal’s droppings are hardly waste. Each pellet or patty packs a history of its host’s diet, territory, and sexual state. Most mammals can sniff out this info; human trackers—with less keen noses—have had to rely on other methods. Enter Wasser. His University of Washington lab has pioneered more advanced means of studying scat, including hormone profiles and DNA extraction. That means less need for dart guns. “Once we had DNA,” he says, “we could ID an animal without seeing it. Essentially, we could connect the dots.” For the past decade Wasser has been connecting elephant “dots” across Africa. He collects the animals’ dung, genotypes the samples, and adds the information to a growing genetic reference map. By matching DNA from seized…

what compelled cartographers to include leviathans, sirens, and sea dragons on maps of yore? “the motivation varied to some extent depending on the period,” says researcher Chet van Duzer, author of the upcoming Sea Monsters on Medieval and Renaissance Maps. early medieval period mapmakers, van Duzer says, actually believed in the dangers they depicted. their illustrations were warnings. in the 16th century cartographic creatures were made increasingly whimsical in order to lure map buyers—the more marvelous the monster, the better. By the 17th century sea monsters were singing their swan song. increasing confidence on the high seas led cartographers to make maps teeming with triumphant ships, with far fewer sirens in sight. —Sean Rameswaram Sea monsters splash (clockwise from top left) on the 1460 Madrid manuscript of Ptolemy’s Geographia, Mercator’s…

Extreme Kayaker TRIP JENNINGS has paddled white water to explore rivers around the world and in 2008 made a first descent of the notoriously turbulent lower Congo River. The 30-yearold Oregonian now travels by foot, motorbike, and plane as well, heading to remote spots in the name of conservation: collecting elephant scat in the Democratic Republic of the Congo for a DNA map of elephant populations, used to trace the source of ivory sold by poachers; documenting a threatened Alaska salmon migration last summer. You filmed the salmon run from a plane flown by explorer Mike Fay. Mike’s a talented but crazy pilot. We’re flying 10 feet off the river with 200-foot trees on either side, which is terrifying. The whole time I was staring at an iPad showing me…

Mawson rushed on foot back along the tracks. Suddenly he came to the edge of a gaping hole in the surface, 11 feet wide. On the far side, two separate sledge tracks led up to the hole; on the near side, only one led away. It was December 14, 1912. Thirty years old, already a seasoned explorer, Douglas Mawson was the leader of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition (AAE), a 31-man team pursuing the most ambitious exploration yet of the southern continent. Let Scott and Amundsen race for the South Pole. Mawson was determined to discover everything he could about a 2,000-mile-long swath of Antarctica that was terra incognita, and to wring from it the best scientific results—in terms of geology, meteorology, magnetism, biology, atmospheric science, and glaciology—ever obtained on a…

Fireside Spirit Deep in the Amazon a Waorani woman prepares fish soup by her hammock, underneath a house on stilts in the village of Gabaro, Ecuador. Photographer Karla Gachet turns her lens at the only source of light in the darkness. The woman’s husband, a shaman, is nearby but can’t be seen—his fire has died out. As Gachet watches, the husband moans, mutters, makes animal noises. Villagers, who believe he’s possessed by the spirit of the jaguar, gather to ask questions. Only the wife can answer; she’s the go-between for the spirit and the curious neighbors. —Luna Shyr BEHIND THE LENS How did you feel in this woman’s presence? KG: I couldn’t communicate with her, but her eyes were big and intense. When she talked, they grew wide open. They…

Extreme Weather Very, very early Wednesday morning, August 29, 2012, while sitting in the dark (I had no power), I anxiously awaited Hurricane Isaac, making its way through our area. I tried a little reading with my flashlight to keep my mind off the rising water and picked up my new National Geographic. The rain wouldn’t stop, and the tide was rising in the bayou. I saved your article to read when the power came on. I appreciate recognizing El Niño and La Niña, melting ice, and greenhouse gases. Anyone who does not believe the Earth is warming or rejects that notion has not been in a weather disaster. CAROLYN ROUSSEAU Slidell, Louisiana Writer Peter Miller attributes the river crest forecast of 42 feet to the U.S. Army Corps of…

EDITORS’ CHOICE Trisha Ratledge Carlsbad, California Seeing her 14-year-old daughter laughing and twirling in Tokyo’s Mori Tower was the most poignant moment for Ratledge during a family trip. “It represented Emma literally dancing from one important stage in her life—middle school—to the next, high school,” says the journalist mother. READERS’ CHOICE Shelley Smart Goolwa, Australia This chunk of Antarctic ice, rising some 60 feet, greeted Smart and her mother when they toured the continent aboard a Russian icebreaker. The marine biologist and environmentalist says: “Antarctica is where you go when you want to discover what Earth used to be like.”…

This quiz is the first of seven to run in 2013 to celebrate national Geographic’s 125th anniversary. the next will appear in march. THE LURE OF LONG DISTANCES Great journeys have a powerful hold on the human imagination. we love the idea, if only from an armchair, of cutting loose from the comforts of everyday life and venturing into uncharted worlds—with no certain destination and no guarantee of safe return. this quiz celebrates that bold impulse. 1 A DARING VOYAGE IN OPEN CANOES across thousands of Miles of ocean brought the original settlers to easter island. This tiny pacific “navel of the world” is closest to the longitude of Which city? A. Honolulu, Hawaii B. Juneau, Alaska C. Santiago, Chile D. Moab, Utah 2 Mars has been an object of…

Ever since our species left Africa some 60,000 years ago, the urge to push beyond what’s known— to discover new lands and opportunities—has shaped human culture. And that impulse is still strong. As we celebrate the National Geographic Society’s 125th anniversary, we’re kicking of a year of stories about the new age of exploration. In this issue we consider the origins of our restless spirit; we examine new realms of life at the microscopic scale; we reach deep into the universe, searching for worlds like our own; we urgently document nature’s diversity, even as it vanishes before our eyes. Exploration is alive. Turn the page and begin the journey. A fast-moving party of more than a dozen adults and adolescents left footprints in volcanic ash in the Pleistocene, providing ancient…

A 22nd-century dream: An unmanned probe powered by nuclear fusion explores a new solar system, after traveling several decades from Earth at 100 million miles an hour. Thousands of colonists might live on this interstellar Mayflower for a journey lasting generations. The ship has its own ecosystem and artificial gravity from its rotating cylindrical hull. A sister ship looms in the giant window. On the edge of a parking lot at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, stands a relic from a time when our future as a spacefaring species looked all but inevitable, as clear and grand as a rocket ascending over Cape Canaveral. “This is not a model,” NASA physicist Les Johnson says as we gaze at the 35-foot-tall assemblage of pipes, nozzles, and shielding. “This…

STREPTOCOCCUS A colorized electron microscope image captures delicate chains of streptococcus in a laboratory sample. Though some strep infections can be deadly, many strains are harmless—among the thousands of benign beings that make their home in our bodies. Breathe in. Feel the air pass through your nostrils and move into your nose. Your diaphragm contracts, pulling the air deep into your chest. Oxygen floods into tiny cavities in your lungs and travels into your capillaries, ready to fuel every cell in your body. You’re alive. So is that breath you just took. When we inhale, our nostrils capture millions of invisible particles: dust, pollen, sea spray, volcanic ash, plant spores. These specks in turn host a teeming community of bacteria and viruses. A few types may trigger allergies or asthma.…

Seating Arrangements “United states air force pilots are finding it much safer and more comfortable to lie down while handling the controls of a plane,” according to notes that accompany this 1949 photograph. “shown here is the prone position pilot bed developed by air Materiel command’s aero-Medical laboratory. the prone seat produces less fatigue on long flights and permits the pilot to withstand greater gravitational pull without danger of blackout.” Lying down didn’t fly. neck support for military pilots, as seen above, continues to be a concern, though. recent studies by the U.S. Army Aeromedical research laboratory have covered neck stress caused by today’s heavier helmets and the effects of head tilt in banking aircraft. Flashback Archive find all the photos at ngm.com.…

Facing a Glacier We were on the scent of snow leopards. But first my team and I had to cross a glacier. On the other side was a 16,000-foot Karakoram pass, and beyond that, we suspected, a snow leopard trail. Before setting out, we had asked the locals if we needed crampons or other climbing gear. They assured us we didn’t, so we took only a rope for this walk across the side of a mountain covered in ice. There were also chunks of ice in a crevasse lake below—the air temperature was hovering around 14°F. The three of us looped the rope around our stomachs to bind ourselves to each other—if one slipped, the others could stop his fall. Our local guide followed, gripping the rope in his hands.…

Antarctic Pod There’s only one current that circles Antarctica. At the bottom of the planet, wind whips the water around and around without any land to get in the way. Because these waters are so dangerous to study, scientists depend largely on data from automated floats and summer research ships. That’s what makes explorer Jean-Louis Etienne’s new research pod important. Scheduled to be deployed in 2015, the vessel will act like a buoy and be steered by the Circumpolar Current—it’ll be towed out, then let go. Critical to Etienne’s design is a stable platform 80 feet above the water, so researchers can study how the ocean and air interact plus accurately measure salinity, temperature, and currents, nighttime and daytime, year-round. The pod might also tell scientists more about the feeding…

Astronomers can see that our universe is expanding at an increasing rate, and dark energy is what they call the mysterious accelerant. to shed light on its nature, researchers with the Baryon oscillation spectroscopic survey (Boss) are mapping the sky over the northern hemisphere with new Mexico’s Sloan telescope, one metal plate at a time. Every manhole-size disk, customized for each of the telescope’s viewing angles, is perforated with a thousand tiny holes corresponding to the locations of previously identified galaxies. With the plate attached to the base of the telescope, the holes help funnel the light of each galaxy into instruments that yield data being used to map the universe’s structure and motion. Boss leader David Schlegel says the full survey, due to be completed in 2014, will hint…

IN THE WINTER OF 1769, the British explorer Captain James Cook, early into his first voyage across the Pacific, received from a Polynesian priest named Tupaia an astonishing gif—a map, the first that any European had ever encountered showing all the major islands of the South Pacific. Some accounts say Tupaia sketched the map on paper; others that he described it in words. What’s certain is that this map instantly gave Cook a far more complete picture of the South Pacific than any other European possessed. It showed every major island group in an area some 3,000 miles across, from the Marquesas west to Fiji. It matched what Cook had already seen, and showed much he hadn’t. Cook had granted Tupaia a berth on the Endeavour in Tahiti. Soon after…

THE NEW AGE OF EXPLORATION Author Scott Wallace and a team of photographers journey into the heart of the Amazon, where big oil is threatening one of the last wild frontiers. THE LEAVES ARE STILL dripping from an overnight downpour when Andrés Link slings on his day pack and heads out into the damp morning chill. It’s just after daybreak, and already the forest is alive with hoots and chatter—the deep-throated roar of a howler monkey, the hollow rat-a-tat-tat of a woodpecker, the squeal of squirrel monkeys chasing each other from branch to branch. A strange, ululating chant starts up in the distance, fades out, then builds again. “Listen!” says Link, grabbing my arm and cocking an ear. “Titi monkeys. Can you hear? Tere are two of them, singing a…

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ON TV The Next Frontiers National geographic has been exploring the world for 125 years. this special celebrates that spirit by taking you into the labs of scientific pioneers, including engineer Albert Yu-Min Lin (left), whose technological advances might help him locate the tomb of Genghis khan. Witness Lin’s work and more—from lightning chasing to DNA tracing— this month on the National geographic channel. TRIP TRAVEL WITH THE PROS there’s a team of experts aboard every voyage of the national geographic explorer. this 148-passenger vessel can reach the far corners of the world and is fully equipped with underwater cameras, kayaks, and Zodiac landing craft. For departures bound for Antarctica, south America, and beyond, see ngexpeditions.com/explorer EXPEDITION A WALK THROUGH TIME this month Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Paul Salopek…