After one last swing past Titan, the Cassini spacecraft is now plunging to its doom. At 3:04 p.m. EDT (12:04 p.m. PDT) on September 11, the spacecraft used a gravitational nudge from Saturn’s largest moon to set itself on a collision course with the giant planet’s atmosphere on September 15.
Cassini’s last close flyby of Titan on April 21 curved the spacecraft’s orbit to send it on a series of dives between Saturn and its rings. That approach took the probe to about 979 kilometers above the moon’s surface. This final flyby, which the mission team calls the “kiss goodbye,” is a more distant 119,049 kilometers — but that’s enough to slow the spacecraft down and send it into Saturn’s atmosphere, where it will ultimately melt and disintegrate.
“There is no coming out of it,” Cassini project manager Earl Maize said in a press conference on August 29. “That final kiss goodbye, I don’t want to get too romantic about it, but that really is our last flyby.”
Titan is home to lakes and rivers made of liquid hydrocarbons, which may be hospitable to life unlike that on Earth. Mission engineers decided to send Cassini to burn up in Saturn’s atmosphere in part to protect any potential life-forms from contamination if Cassini accidentally crashed into Titan.
Cassini has been orbiting Saturn since 2004 and has revolutionized our understanding of Saturn’s atmosphere, rings, moons, and of the outer solar system in general.
Thousands of years ago, hunter-gatherers native to Europe and incoming farmers from what’s now Turkey got up close and personal for a surprisingly long time, researchers say. This mixing reshaped the continent’s genetic profile differently from one region to another.
Ancient DNA from foragers and farmers in eastern, central and western Europe indicates that they increasingly mated with each other from around 8,000 to nearly 4,000 years ago, a team led by geneticist Mark Lipson of Harvard Medical School in Boston reports online November 8 in Nature. That time range covers much of Europe’s Neolithic period, which was characterized by the spread of farming, animal domestication and polished stone tools. The new findings lend support to the idea that Europe and western Asia witnessed substantial human population growth and migrations during the Neolithic, says archaeologist Peter Bellwood of Australian National University in Canberra. So much mating occurred over such a long time that “geneticists can no longer assume that living people across Europe are a precise reflection of European genetic history,” he says. Previous studies of ancient DNA indicated that farmers in Anatolia (modern Turkey) migrated into Europe roughly 8,000 years ago. Researchers generally assumed that newcomers and native hunter-gatherers interbred at first, perhaps as a single wave of farmers moved through Europe to the Atlantic coast, Lipson says. From this perspective, foragers either joined farming cultures or abandoned their home territories and scattered elsewhere. But it now appears that, after a major migration of farmers into Europe, many groups of farmers and hunter-gatherers living in particular regions mingled to varying extents for many centuries, the researchers say. “Even though there weren’t any major new migrations into Europe after the arrival of farmers, there were ongoing ancestry changes throughout the Neolithic due to interactions between farmers and hunter-gatherers,” Lipson says. Central and northern Europeans next experienced large DNA changes at the start of the Bronze Age around 5,000 years ago, with the arrival of nomadic herders from western Asia (SN: 7/11/15, p. 11).
Lipson’s team analyzed DNA extracted from the skeletons of 154 farmers from Hungary, Germany and Spain, dating to around 8,000 to 4,200 years ago. The farmers’ DNA was compared with DNA from three Neolithic hunter-gatherers found in Hungary, Luxembourg and Spain; a fourth hunter-gatherer from Italy dating to about 14,000 years ago; and 25 Anatolian farmers from as early as 8,500 years ago.
Farmers in each European region displayed increasing amounts of hunter-gatherer ancestry over time, with highs of about 10 percent in Hungary and 20 percent in Germany by around 5,000 years ago, and about 30 percent in Spain by 4,200 years ago. Three farmers from a 6,000-year-old site in Germany fell outside the general trend for that part of Neolithic Europe, displaying 40 to 50 percent hunter-gatherer ancestry.
Genes got passed from farmers to hunter-gatherers as well, although skeletal remains of Neolithic hunter-gatherers are much scarcer than those of their cultivating contemporaries. A hunter-gatherer from the 6,000-year-old German site, identified via chemical markers of diet in the bones, carried around 27 percent ancestry from farmers. A hunter-gatherer discovered at a Hungarian farming site dating to roughly 7,700 years ago possessed about 20 percent ancestry from farmers. Still, previous work has shown neighboring European farmers and hunter-gatherers sometimes kept their distance (SN: 11/16/13, p. 13).
Despite this unexpected evidence of long-term mating among communities with different cultures and styles, the tempo of genetic change and the population sizes of farmers and hunter-gatherers remain poorly understood, says archaeologist Alasdair Whittle of Cardiff University in Wales.
We're now into the second half of the qualifying schedule and it's Canada at the top of the CONCACAF 2022 World Cup qualifying standings.
A 2-1 home win over Mexico allowed the Canadians to overtake the USA atop the eight-team table. Canada is the only remaining unbeaten team in qualifying as it continues to push to qualify for its first World Cup since 1986.
The USA (2nd, 15 points) and Mexico (3rd, 14 points), long the powers of the region, are now chasing. Meanwhile, Panama continued its surge with another dramatic come-from-behind victory to go level with Mexico on 14 points. The top three teams earn automatic berths to the World Cup, while fourth-place earns passage to a play-in series for one of the final spots in Qatar 2022.
The other half of the table is in precarious position. A group of three teams — Costa Rica (5th), Jamaica (6th), El Salvador (7th) — is now between 5-8 points behind Panama for fourth place. Meanwhile, it's looking unlikely that Honduras will be able to recover from its last-place point total.
The first standings tiebreakers are (1) goal difference, (2) goals scored and (3) most points obtained from matches between teams that are tied. The full list of tiebreakers and results for Matchdays 1-7 follow at the bottom of this post.
CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying Standings & Results Team PTS GP W L D GF GA GD
Canada 16 8 4 0 4 13 5 +8
USA 15 8 4 1 3 12 5 +7
Mexico 14 8 4 2 2 11 7 +4
Panama 14 8 4 2 2 11 9 +2
Costa Rica 9 8 2 3 3 6 7 -1
Jamaica 7 8 1 3 4 6 10 -4
El Salvador 6 8 1 4 3 4 10 -6
Honduras 3 8 0 5 3 5 15 -10 Matchday 8 Date Match Tues, Nov. 16, 2021 Jamaica 1 , USA 1 Highlights Tues, Nov. 16, 2021 Costa Rica 2 , Honduras 1 Highlights Tues, Nov. 16, 2021 Panama 2 , El Salvador 1 Highlights Tues, Nov. 16, 2021 Canada 2, Mexico 1 Highlights Matchday 9 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Thurs, Jan. 27, 2022 Honduras vs. Canada TBD TBD Thurs, Jan. 27, 2022 USA vs. El Salvador TBD TBD Thurs, Jan. 27, 2022 Costa Rica vs. Panama TBD TBD Thurs, Jan. 27, 2022 Jamaica vs. Mexico TBD TBD Matchday 10 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Sun, Jan. 30, 2022 Canada vs. USA TBD TBD Sun, Jan. 30, 2022 Honduras vs. El Salvador TBD TBD Sun, Jan. 30, 2022 Mexico vs. Costa Rica TBD TBD Sun, Jan. 30, 2022 Panama vs. Jamaica TBD TBD Matchday 11 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Wed, Feb. 2, 2022 El Salvador vs. Canada TBD TBD Wed, Feb. 2, 2022 USA vs. Honduras TBD TBD Wed, Feb. 2, 2022 Mexico vs. Panama TBD TBD Wed, Feb. 2, 2022 Jamaica vs. Costa Rica TBD TBD Matchday 12 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Thurs, March 24, 2022 Costa Rica vs. Canada TBD TBD Thurs, March 24, 2022 Panama vs. Honduras TBD TBD Thurs, March 24, 2022 Jamaica vs. El Salvador TBD TBD Thurs, March 24, 2022 Mexico vs. USA TBD TBD Matchday 13 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Sun, March 27, 2022 Canada vs. Jamaica TBD TBD Sun, March 27, 2022 Honduras vs. Mexico TBD TBD Sun, March 27, 2022 El Salvador vs. Costa Rica TBD TBD Sun, March 27, 2022 USA vs. Panama TBD TBD Matchday 14 Date Match Time (ET) Stream Wed, March 30, 2022 Panama vs. Canada TBD TBD Wed, March 30, 2022 Jamaica vs. Honduras TBD TBD Wed, March 30, 2022 Mexico vs. El Salvador TBD TBD Wed, March 30, 2022 Costa Rica vs. USA TBD TBD CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying results & highlights Matchday 1 Date Match Thurs, Sept. 2, 2021 Canada 1, Honduras 1 Highlights Thurs, Sept. 2, 2021 Panama 0, Costa Rica 0 Highlights Thurs, Sept. 2, 2021 Mexico 2, Jamaica 1 Highlights Thurs, Sept. 2, 2021 El Salvador 0, USA 0 Highlights Matchday 2 Date Match Sun, Sept. 5, 2021 Jamaica 0, Panama 3 Highlights Sun, Sept. 5, 2021 Costa Rica 0, Mexico 1 Highlights Sun, Sept. 5, 2021 El Salvador 0, Honduras 0 Highlights Sun, Sept. 5, 2021 USA 1, Canada 1 Highlights Matchday 3 Date Match Wed, Sept. 8, 2021 Canada 3, El Salvador 0 Highlights Wed, Sept. 8, 2021 Panama 1, Mexico 1 Highlights Wed, Sept. 8, 2021 Costa Rica 1, Jamaica 1 Highlights Wed, Sept. 8, 2021 Honduras 1, USA 4 Highlights Matchday 4 Date Match Thurs, Oct. 7, 2021 USA 2, Jamaica 0 Highlights Thurs, Oct. 7, 2021 Honduras 0, Costa Rica 0 Highlights Thurs, Oct. 7, 2021 Mexico 1, Canada 1 Highlights Thurs, Oct. 7, 2021 El Salvador 1, Panama 0 Highlights Matchday 5 Date Match Sun, Oct. 10, 2021 Panama 1, USA 0 Highlights Sun, Oct. 10, 2021 Jamaica 0, Canada 0 Highlights Sun, Oct. 10, 2021 Costa Rica 2, El Salvador 1 Highlights Sun, Oct. 10, 2021 Mexico 3, Honduras 0 Highlights Matchday 6 Date Match Wed, Oct. 13, 2021 USA 2, Costa Rica 1 Highlights Wed, Oct. 13, 2021 Canada 4, Panama 1 Highlights Wed, Oct. 13, 2021 Honduras 0, Jamaica 2 Highlights Wed, Oct. 13, 2021 El Salvador 0, Mexico 2 Highlights Matchday 7 Date Match Fri, Nov. 12, 2021 Honduras 2 , Panama 3 Highlights Fri, Nov. 12, 2021 USA 2 , Mexico 0 Highlights Fri, Nov. 12, 2021 Canada 1 , Costa Rica 0 Highlights Fri, Nov. 12, 2021 El Salvador 1 , Jamaica 1 Highlights How CONCACAF World Cup Qualifying works Eight nations from the CONCACAF region (North America, Central America and the Caribbean) are competing for three automatic berths to the 2022 Qatar World Cup in the final "octagonal" qualifying round.
The eight countries are facing off in a round-robin format with each team playing the other seven opponents once at home and once on the road. The 14 total matches for each national team began in September 2021 and will wrap up in March 2022.
The top three finishers will earn automatic berths to Qatar, while the fourth-place team will head to an intercontinental playoff with a final ticket to Qatar on the line. Here are the standings tiebreakers for teams even on points:
Goal difference in all group matches Most goals scored in all group matches Most points obtained from group matches between teams concerned Goal difference from group matches between teams concerned Most goals scored in group matches between teams concerned Goals scored away from home (if two teams tied) Discipline points (based on yellow/red cards) Drawing of lots by FIFA The Qatar World Cup will be played from Nov. 21 to Dec. 18, 2022.
