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Given above are the National Geographic’s top 10 images for 2006. Talking about them clock wise:

Rare Rainbow!
First is the image of a rainbow that is seen very rarely, this is known as a circumhorizontal arc. It is caused by light passing through wispy, high-altitude cirrus clouds. This was caught on film on June 3 as it was formed over the northern Idaho near the Washington State border.

Cat Chasing Bear!

The next picture is a rare sight where a bear is chased onto the top of a tree by a cat! On June 4 this black bear wandered into a West Milford, New Jersey, back yard, was confronted by a 15-pound (7-kilogram) tabby cat. Hissing at the base of the tree, Jack the clawless cat kept the bear at bay for about 15 minutes, then ran him up another tree after an attempted escape.

Fly Wearing Designer Lenses!

The third one made an entry into a German science-photo competition, this image shows a fly sporting a set of “designer” lenses crafted and set in place with a cutting-edge laser technique. The glasses fit snuggly on the fly’s 0.08-inch-wide (2-millimeter-wide) head.

Snake meals an Electric Blanket!

Next in line is an image of a Surgery performed to save the 12-foot (3.5-meter) snake when it made a meal of a queen-size electric blanket, complete with electrical cord and control box, as seen in this July 19 photo. The blanket’s wiring extended through about 8 feet (2.5 meters) of the the 60-pound (27-kilogram) reptile’s digestive tract.

New Species Found in Indonesia!

The next image is a golden-mantled tree kangaroo which is one of the dozens of species discovered in late 2005 by a team of Indonesian, Australian, and U.S. scientists on the island of New Guinea.

Female Android in S Korea!
This image is that of an andriod with whom you can hold a conversation, make eye contact, and express joy, anger, sorrow, and happiness. The school kids in the picture seem to be making friends with EveR-1,that made her debut this month in South Korea. The robot was built by Baeg Moon-hong, a senior researcher with the Division for Applied Robot Technology at the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology (KITECH) in Ansan, just south of Seoul.

Alien in a Duck’s X Ray!

Next is the picture of a an x-ray of a duck with what looks like an alien hiding in its gut. Workers at the International Bird Rescue Research Center (IBRRC) in Fairfield, California, took the x-ray on May 21 while treating a mallard duck that had been found with a broken wing. But they say this could be formed because of the food garins the duck ate.
Pyramid in Bosnia!

The sixth image is of a pyramid that an Amateur archaeologist Semir Osmanagic recently uncovered with proof that a four-sided hill in the town of Visoko, Bosnia, is an ancient manmade structure. On April 19 Osmanagic said he and his team unearthed large cut stone slabs on a side of the hill that form the outer surface of an ancient pyramid.
Python Swallows a Pregnant Sheep!
The next image is of a 18-foot-long (5.5-meter-long) python. But this hungry snake could have waited for the lamb to be born.This reptile had swallowed an entire pregnant sheep and was too full to slither away and digest its supersize meal. But the stress of being captured made the python regurgitated the dead ewe.
Giant Jellyfishes!
This last image is of a diver attaching a tracking device to a giant Nomura’s jellyfish off the coast of Japan on October 4, 2005. Since last summer, Japanese waters have been filled with these massive sea creatures, which can grow upto 6.5 feet (2 meters) wide and weigh up to 450 pounds (220 kilograms).
For more information on these pictures go to National Geographic.

Palaeontologists have recently found a small dinosaur-era reptile with two heads. This is the first time this extremely rare developmental anomaly has been found in a fossil. This 120-million-year-old specimen, mesures just 2.8 inches (7 centimeters) long, and is considered as a hatchling of a species of Choristoder, an extinct aquatic reptiles that resembles the modern day crocodiles or lizards This fossil has been found in China, and has two perfectly formed heads and necks.

According to experts, two headed reptiles are very rare to find and thus the chances of them getting fossiled is bleak. The developmental factors that cause these animals to occasionally form two heads is called axial bifurcation.This is actually an abnormality that is caused when the embryo gets damaged in the womb.

A lesion could have been formed, making some parts of the animal to develop in duplicate. This phenomenon is quite rare but has been seen in some reptiles like the lizards, snakes, turtles and tortoises. This hatchling that has been found, belongs to a long-necked fish-eating species known either as Sinohydrosaurus or Hyphalosaurus that grew up to 3 feet (1 meter) long.

Many other one-headed specimens that resembled the fossil were found around the hatchling.This unusual nature of the fossil aroused some suspicion among the people. In the case of the two-headed Choristodere, however, the slab having the fossil is untouched and shows no signs of tampering, so experts have confirmed that this specimen is genuine.

Air pollution has had many far reaching effects on the environment, and that needs to be curbed. As we all know the governments, scientists and environmentalists of different countries are researching on a variety of methods that could help in reducing pollution.

There are two ways of controlling pollution. One is at the input level, which empahsizes on preventing the problem well before it occurs, or atleast try to limit the effects of the pollution that is produced. Five major input control methods exist. People have to try to restrict population growth, use less energy, improve energy efficiency, reduce waste, and move to non-polluting renewable forms of energy production, like the the wind and water.

Also, automobile-produced pollution can be decreased with highly beneficial results. This would mean regular check ups of the pollution levels in our vehicles. The output control, the opposite method, helps in fixing the problem that is already caused by air pollution. This usually means cleaning up an area that has been damaged by pollution.Input controls are usually more effective than output controls. Output controls tend to be more expensive, making them infamous among the tax payers and polluting industries. The present air pollution control efforts are mostly not effective. In the first world countries, industries are able to change to methods that can decrease air pollution.

In the United States, for example, air pollution control laws have been successful in stopping air pollution levels from rising. However, in developing countries and the under developed countries, even though pollution is tried to be strictly regulated, much more still needs to be done.

I know Iam not an expert on such issues but I sure did notice that we tend to give a cold shoulder to a lot of them, as we think they dont immediately affect us. But all of us are capable of doing our bit to look forward to more fresh air for us in future.

For those of us who have been wondering, how the ozone hole is doing, NOAA has now formed an index that might be of use in measuring the ozone layer. This is also called as the Ozone Depleting Gas Index and is used in measuring the overall health of the planet’s ozone layer.

This index tracks the recovery of the ozone layer by monitoring the atmospheric levels of the chemicals chlorine and bromine which are the main players in destroying the ozone layer. The ODGI ranges from zero to 100, with zero denoting the recovery of the ozone layer and 100 being the maximum level of ozone-depleting gases as measured in 1994.

There are 2 different ozone holes that can be tracked in the stratosphere. First of them is in the Antarctic ozone hole and the second is the state of ozone layer at mid-latitudes. There is a need for scientists to track each of them separately because of the physics of the stratosphere being very different at both these locations.

The discovery of the ozone hole, like that of global warming, is proof that human activity is changing the planet, and changing it for the worse. There was good news when there was a proposal by the international community to phase out the production of chemicals that can deplete the ozone layer.

But the amount of damage is huge but the recovery is a slow process. The good news is that the hole can be filled if the emission of the chemicals into the atmosphere can be slowed down. Scientists are estimating that the Antarctic ozone hole could recover anytime between 2075 and 2080 but the mid-latitude ozone layer can recover by about 2045 or 2050.

According to a recent report published by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MEA), the planet’s ability to support life and human habitation is now threatened by the accelerated rate of modern development.

This study includes around 1,360 experts from 95 nations revealed that two third of the ecosystem that sustains life have been polluted. They also predict that there is an increased risk of abrupt collapse in nature that could lead to disease outbreak.

The crux of the four-year research effort says that, “human activity is putting strain on the natural functions of the earth such that the ability of the planet’s ecosystem to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted”.

New Delhi in India is perphaps a perfect example of the degradation of air. According to findings, breathing air in such a place is equivalent to smoking 70 packs of cigarettes.In USA, over seven billion pounds of toxic chemicals are released directly into the environment. One of the air pollutants is carbon dioxide.

In a normal biological system, vegetation takes this gas in and produces oxygen for animals and people to breathe. But the situation has changed and there is way too much carbon dioxide in the air to be processed naturally.Carbon dioxide is mainly emitted by the burning of coal, gas and oil.

Other primary sources of it are power plants and cars. Its high concentrations in the air isconsidered toxic and can in turn affect the breathing pattern. In extreme cases it can also cause unconsciousness and even death.

The commonly known CFC’s (Chlorofluorocarbons) generally used as coolants in refrigerators and air conditioners or in fire fighting equipment, can rise into the upper atmosphere and react with the layer of the ozone layer protecting the planet from the sun.

This reaction depletes the ozone layer and allowing more ultra violet–light to reach the earth. This situation can affect a man’s immune system, causes eye defects, skin cancer and damage to crops. One of the vital organ of the body of a human that seems to be affected by pollution is the lung or the respiratory organ.

As I was writing this blog, there are so many questions that were ringing in my head! Now that we see such grave situation where we cannot even breathe some fresh air, what are we going to do? where are these situations going to lead us to? Who is responsible for them? I know this can make us all feel dismal, but I also believe there is hope if all of us stand up for nature and help it rejuvenate itself.

A new species of fish was discovered, which is so tiny that it ranks as the world’s second smallest vertebrate around the polluted water of Borneo. This fish like the other species on our earth is threatened by the habitat destruction. The scientists identified around 52 new species of animals and plants that around the southeast Asian island.

According to a report by the global conservation organization WWF, these species include 30 unique fish species, two tree frogs, 16 ginger species, and three new species of trees. Borneo is a mountainous region of 220,000 square kilometers covered with equatorial rainforest in the center of the island.WWF warns that the habitat where these plants and animals have thrived undiscovered for millions of years is at increasing risk.

This miniature new fish species, Paedocypris micromegethes, is translucent in color and measures around 7.9 mm and represents the two smallest vertebrates known to science. The swamp where these fishes live in are now threatened by logging, urbanization and agriculture.

Conservationists have warned for many years about Borneo losing most of its lowland forest and there is an urgent need to conserve the habitat and species of the world’s third largest island. Huge forests of Borneo are being cleared for rubber, oil palm and pulp production. According to the estimates of WWF , only half of Borneo’s original forest covers remain.

It is a bit of a paradox that where on one side we find huge species diminishing from the face of the earth we find tiny species being discovered! The habitat destruction caused by man puts the survival of so many hundereds of species at risk. The question we need to ask ourselves is : what are we doing to ourselves in the name of development and urbanization?