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Fiery 230ft crater nicknamed the 'Door to Hell' baffles scientists after burning endlessly for 40 YEARS

Originally a level surface, the site was identified by Soviet scientists in 1971 as an area that was believed to house a substantial oil field

Yahoo News UK

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/video/door-hell-burns-over-40-231636083.html

With fiery embers glowing deep underground, it looks like a scene from an apocalyptic sci-fi blockbuster.

But this huge crater is amazingly a real-life phenomenon which has been flaming away for more than four decades.

The 230ft-wide crater, known by locals in Turkmenistan as the 'Door to Hell', has baffled scientists since it first appeared more than 40 years ago.

Originally a level surface, the site was identified by Soviet scientists in 1971 as an area that was believed to house a substantial oil field.

However, the ground beneath the drilling rig soon collapsed, creating a wide crater that was believed to be releasing large quantities of methane gas, a potential danger to the nearby villages in Derweze, Turkmenistan.

Scientists decided that the most efficient way to solve the problem would be to burn off the poisonous gases -- by doing so, it was expected that all of the gas in the crater would be burnt off within days.

More than four decades later, though, the crater is still ablaze with endless flames and boiling mud - and hundreds of tourists flock to visit it every year.

The Karakum Desert, where Derweze is located, has one of the largest gas reserves in the world. Turkmenistan hopes to up its exportation rate around 75 million cubic meters of gas in the next 20 years.

The fiery crater first appeared in Turkmenistan more than 40 years ago. (TORMOD SANDTORV / CATERS)

The astonishing crater is 230ft wide. (MARTHA DE JONG-LANTINK / CATERS)

Will Keeping, a retiree from Buchlyvie, near Stirling, visited the crater last month.

Unaware of the Door to Hell's existence before he visited Turkmenistan, Will, 57, was told on his tour that the crater was one of the hundred most bizarre places to visit before you die.

Intrigued, he decided to ride across the bleak desert environment, not knowing what to expect.

Will said: 'During daylight, I was initially not impressed as it looked like a hole in a vast desert. As we got nearer and the glow from inside the carter became evident, though, I started to notice the size of the crater and wondered how could continually glow like that.

Bubbling: The crater has been nicknamed the 'Door to Hell' by locals in Turkmenistan. (MARTHA DE JONG-LANTINK / …

Inside, the crater is filled with endless flames and boiling mud. (WILLIAM KEEPING / CATERS)

'As I approached on foot, it became clear that this was a large crater and that inside was like a huge open furnace. At first, it appeared that it might have been a natural phenomenon, but the sides of the crater contradicted that. I could see the bent and rusted remains of some sort of metal railings or structure, implying some sort of catastrophe having occurred long before.

'I stood there gazing into the crater, the sheer size and intensity of the fire inside became more and more apparent.

'As the sun began to set, the location slowly transformed from a large, isolated furnace in the middle of the desert into the centre of attention that dominated the surrounding area - the glow became more intense and lit up the area including the sky above. It was impossible not to be drawn to the crater, something that was just dominant over the surrounding area.'

"Amazing find" hailed as scientists unearth 1,400-year-old skeleton of one of Britain's first Christians

"Amazing find" hailed as scientists unearth 1,400-year-old skeleton of one of Britain's first Christians
Scientists have discovered the remains of what is thought to be one of Britain's first ever Christians after unearthing an "excessively rare" 1,400 year old Anglo-Saxon burial site in Cambridgeshire.

Discovery: The skeleton

The amazing grave in Trumpington Meadows contains the skeletal remains of a 16-year-old female Catholic convert lying on an ornamental bed clutching a gold and garnet cross.

It is believed the girl, from the 7th century AD, was a member of nobility, persuaded to join the Christian faith after the Pope dispatched St Augustine to England in 597AD.

St Augustine was a benedictine monk, known as the ‘Apostle to the English’, whose job was to convert Anglo-Saxon pagan kings and their families.

Amazing find: The cross

Dr Sam Lewsey, an expert on the period, said: "This is an excessively rare discovery. It is the most amazing find I have ever encountered.

"Christian conversion began at the top and percolated down. To be buried in this elaborate way, with such a valuable artefact, tells us that this girl was probably nobility or even royalty.

"This cross is the kind of material culture that was in circulation at the highest sphere of society."

UK scientists develop new test for prostate cancer
More accurate and cheaper than existing methods
© Alexander Raths - Fotolia.com Thu 14 Oct, 2010

A team of UK scientists has developed a new method to test for the presence of prostate cancer which is twice as accurate as the existing method.


Current prostate cancer detection

When doctors screen for prostate cancer, they take a blood sample which is tested for the level of the protein prostate specific antigen (PSA), which is the most abundant protein in semen. Men with prostate cancer typically have higher levels of PSA. But other factors can result in high PSA, such as infection or a non-cancerous tumour. In fact two out of three men with raised PSA levels do NOT have prostate cancer.

Crucially, the test can only detect the possible existence of prostate cancer - it cannot be used to predict the possibility of the man developing the disease in the future.

Therefore the current test has poor reliability, and is difficult and expensive to use. This has prevented the introduction of a national screening program for prostate cancer. As prostate cancer is the most common form of cancer in men, causing 10,000 deaths each year, screening for the disease to allow early diagnosis and treatment could save many lives.

About the new test

The team, from the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Research Institute and The Institute of Cancer Research, looked at the second most common protein in semen, microseminoprotein-beta (MSMB). Levels of this protein are in fact reduced in cases of prostate cancer. This reduction is linked to a genetic "marker" which is a good predictor for prostate cancer risk. Importantly, MSMB is secreted into the urine from semen, so a simple urine test can be used to measure its level.

Furthermore MSMB levels do not seem to be affected by an enlarged prostate or by hormone levels - both major drawbacks with the current test.

Lead author Dr Hayley Whitaker said: "We looked in tissue and urine from over 350 men with and without prostate cancer to find out how much MSMB they had. We then looked to see who had the genetic change. It was really exciting to find out that the genetic change and the amount of protein were linked."

Co-author Professor Rosalind Eeles explained: "Our studies have shown that men with a small change in their MSMB gene are at a higher risk of prostate cancer, and so we are very excited that there may be a simple test for this genetic change."

Additional work is now required to develop the test into a viable testing kit. The researchers suggest that the price could be as low as £5 or £6 per test - a third less than the current PSA test.
The research is published in PLoS ONE.

All about prostate cancer

All about prostate cancer - kewego

A potentially killer disease - facts, figures and symptoms

Prostate cancer kills 1 man every hour in the UK - so don't be one of them - know the symptoms, and then report to your doctor!

One in twelve men in the UK will develop prostate cancer - but 60% of men don't know the symptoms of this potentially killer disease.

Symptoms of prostate cancer

One of the problems with prostate cancer is that in its early stages it often does not cause any obvious symptoms. When they do occur they may include any of the following:

• Needing to rush to the loo to wee.
• Passing urine more often, daytime and/or night-time
• Slow at getting the flow or urine started
• Weaker flow of urine
• Starting and stopping whilst passing urine
• Discomfort (pain or burning) whilst peeing
• Feeling of not having emptied the bladder fully
• Dribbling after you've finished peeing
• Blood in urine or semen
• Pain or stiffness in the back, hips or pelvis

Many of these symptoms can be due to just simple enlargement of the prostate, which occurs as men get older. This is not cancer and is called Benign Prostatic Hypertrophy (BPH) - 'benign' meaning non-cancerous, 'prostatic' meaning relating to the prostate, and 'hypertrophy' just means enlargement.

If you're a man over the age of 40 with any of the above symptoms, don't put it down to just getting older - tell your GP!