The long reign of Elizabeth, who became known as the “Virgin Queen” for her reluctance to endanger her authority through marriage, coincided with the flowering of the English Renaissance, associated with such renowned authors as William Shakespeare. By her death in 1603, England had become a major world power in every respect, and Queen Elizabeth I passed into history as one of England’s greatest monarchs.

The amount of time a person sits during the day is associated with a higher risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and death, regardless of regular exercise, according to a recent study. More than one half of an average person’s day is spent being sedentary—sitting, watching television, or working at a computer. Avoiding sedentary time and getting regular exercise are both important for improving your health and survival.

(1) Researchers have built a rice grain-sized microwave laser, powered by single electrons, that demonstrates the fundamental interactions between light and moving electrons. (2) It is a major step toward building quantum-computing systems out of semiconductor materials. (3) Quantum-computing systems could revolutionize the way we do almost everything because they will theoretically allow computers to be significantly quicker and more powerful. (4) This could very well be the future of computing as we know it.

In recent years, police officers have faced increased scrutiny from the public. There have been too many incidents of officers firing their service weapon without just cause in the news. We understand how difficult and stressful these situations can be for our officers, so we have instituted a new policy requiring all officers to wear body cams, which must be kept on at all times during a shift. We assure you that this is not meant to be a way for us to scrutinize every one of your moves, but rather a tool we can use to protect ourselves in cases where we are required to use force.

NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope has discovered a star with three planets only slightly larger than Earth. Its outermost planet orbits in the ‘Goldilocks’ zone—a region where surface temperatures could be moderate enough for liquid water, and perhaps life, to exist. The star ranks among the top 10 nearest stars known to have transiting planets.

A new study suggests that thick crustal plugs and weakened mineral grains may explain a range of relatively speedy moves among tectonic plates around the world, from Hawaii to East Timor. Traditionally, scientists believed that all tectonic plates were pulled by subducting slabs—which resulted from the colder, top boundary layer of the Earth’s rocky surface becoming heavy and sinking slowly into the deeper mantle. Yet that process does not account for sudden plate shifts. Such abrupt movement requires that slabs detach from their plates, but doing this quickly is difficult since the slabs should be too cold and stiff to detach.

According to the study, there are additional factors at work. Thick crust from continents or oceanic plateau is swept into the subduction zone, plugging it up and prompting the slab to break off. The detachment process is then accelerated when mineral grains in the necking slab start to shrink, causing the slab to weaken rapidly. The result is tectonic plates that abruptly shift horizontally, or continents suddenly bobbing up.

At the time Paine wrote “Common Sense,” most colonists considered themselves to be aggrieved Britons. Paine fundamentally changed the tenor of colonists’ argument with the crown when he wrote the following: “Europe, and not England, is the parent country of America. This new world hath been the asylum for the persecuted lovers of civil and religious liberty from every part of Europe. Hither they have fled, not from the tender embraces of the mother, but from the cruelty of the monster; and it is so far true of England, that the same tyranny which drove the first emigrants from home, pursues their descendants still.”

In November 2007—after the sale of nearly 1.4 million iPhones—Time magazine named the sleek, 4.8-ounce device, originally available in a 4GB, $499 model and an 8GB, $599 model, its invention of the year. The iPhone went on sale in parts of Europe in late 2007 and in parts of Asia in 2008. In July 2008, Apple launched its online App Store, enabling people to download software applications that let them use their iPhones for games, social networking, travel planning and an ever growing laundry list of other activities. Apple went on to release updated models of the iPhone, including the 4S, which debuted in October 2011 and featured Siri, a new voice-activated digital assistant.

(1) About a minute after taking off from New York’s La Guardia Airport on January 15, 2009, US Airways Flight 1549 collided with a flock of geese. (2) Crippled by the bird strike, both engines lost power and went quiet, forcing Captain Sullenberger to make an emergency landing. (3) When air traffic controllers instructed the seasoned pilot to head for nearby Teterboro Airport, he calmly informed them that he was “unable” to reach a runway. (4) “We’re gonna be in the Hudson,” he said simply, and then told the 150 terrified passengers and five crew members on board to brace for impact.

(5) Ninety seconds later, Sullenberger glided the Airbus 320 over the chilly surface of the Hudson River, where it splashed down. (6) As flight attendants ushered passengers into life jackets, through emergency exits and onto the waterlogged wings of the bobbing jet, rescue vessels hastened to the scene. (7) One survivor suffered two broken legs and others were treated for minor injuries or hypothermia, but no fatalities occurred. (8) After walking up and down the aisle twice to ensure a complete evacuation, Sullenberger was the last to leave the sinking plane.

Athletes who down beet juice before exercising to increase blood flow and improve performance may be surprised at the results of a recent study. While beetroot juice rich in nitrates did not enhance muscle blood flow or vascular dilation during exercise, researchers found that it did ‘de-stiffen’ blood vessels under resting conditions, potentially easing the workload of the heart.