Some of the 3,500-year-old mummies buried in China’s Taklamakan Desert. Taklamakan literally means “go in and you won’t come out.” The area, with its salty, hyper-dry sands, extreme hot in summer and cold in winter, provided the perfect conditions for natural mummification.

The Indus Valley Civilization has yielded evidence of dentistry being practiced as far back as 7000 BC. This earliest form of dentistry involved curing tooth related disorders with bow drills operated, perhaps, by skilled bead craftsmen. 

The reconstruction of this ancient form of dentistry showed that the methods used were reliable and effective. Cavities of 3.5 mm depth with concentric grooves indicate use of a drill tool. The age of the teeth has been estimated at 9000 years. (Source) 

The Pearl of Lao Tzu also known as the Pearl of Allah is the largest known pearl in the world. The pearl was recovered from a giant clam off the Coast of Palawan Island, Philippines on May 7, 1934. The pearl is 9.4 inches in diameter and weighs about 14 lbs (6.4 kilograms). 

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World’s Oldest Trousers Found At Burial Site In China

A team of researchers in China have uncovered what is believed to be the oldest pair of trousers in the world.

The wool trousers, and other items of clothing, were discovered in the Yanghai tombs in the Tarim Basin and are thought to date back approximately 3,000 years, according to radiocarbon dating.

The tombs, in western China, are an ancient burial ground.

According to an article in the journal Quaternary International, fragments of woollen trousers were found in two tombs which date from between the 13th and the 10th century BC.

The men who wore the trousers were estimated to be approximately 40 years old, and the design of the trousers indicates that they were horse riders. (Source)

Money Trees of Britain 

There are places in England where you can find trees with coins hammered and bent into the bark. Nobody knows for sure why people pushed coins into the trees. Some believe it brings good luck. Others believe that the amount of coins pushed in by an individual may result in them producing the same amount of children. (Source) 

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Solar Farm in the Mojave Dessert

When completed in late 2013, the $2.2 billion Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System will power 140,000 California homes.

(More Information)

Mariana Trench

Better known as the deepest point on earth’s surface, this trench lies in Pacific Ocean, at Challenger Deep. Located at a depth of about 10.91 km or 11,033 meter or 36,204 feet below sea level, this trench runs for 2,550 kilometer, somewhere below the expanse of water lying between Australia and Japan.

Robert Buelteman is not your average nature photographer. The California-based artist shocks flowers and plant life with thousands of electric volts, capturing an entrancing image of the energy streaming through them.

Belgian architect group, Gijs Van Vaerenbergh, built a church in Belgium, and it’s pretty plain from certain angles. From others, the structure reveals itself to be something else entirely: a building that’s almost entirely see through. 

The project, named “Reading Between the Lines,” is a composition of 100 layers of stacked steel, that are equidistantly staggered in a way that illusively change in appearance based on where the viewer is standing.

Surgeon Finds Embryonic Twin Inside Woman’s Brain

26-year-old Yamini Karanam started having difficulty comprehending things she read and heard, and when many people were speaking in a room at once, she found it hard to understand what was happening.

Doctors soon discovered a tumor in her brain. But when she underwent surgery, the surgeon found something startling. The tumor was actually the woman’s embryonic twin.

Karanam recently underwent the minimally-invasive brain surgery at the Skullbase Institute in Los Angeles. Her surgeon, Dr. Hrayr Shahinian, says he was surprised when he found Karanam’s embryonic twin. The twin had never developed, but it was still found “with bone, hair and teeth.” (Source)