Week in Review: Animals from hell edition (May 29 - June 4)

Whether you walked out of Fitzrandolph Gate one week ago, diploma in hand, or you're waiting for your freshman roommate assignment, we at the Ink know you're already desperate for more news from Old Nassau. Since nothing ever happens in Princeton, and especially not in the summer months, we'll skip the more frequent updates and post our weekly summer feature, Week in Review--a short post on anything and everything that has to do with Princeton, once a week.This week, it's all about animals from hell. Mostly because--aside from a tornado warning--nothing much happened in the post-Reunions afterglow.Described as both a "demon of underworld" and "worm from hell," the Halicephalobus mephisto, a new species of nematode named after Faust's Lord of the Underworld, has been discovered by Geosciences professor Tullis Onstott, in South Africa, 2.2 miles below the earth. Previously, it was thought that only single-celled bacteria existed at that depth. Basically, the biosphere just got a lot bigger. The discovery of this worm hints that life deep underground in Mars may be more plausible than we thought. The best part? It grazes on tiny bacteria living in biofilm (described as "big, snot layers of gelatinous goo").From Catholic Online (No idea.):

"The find entirely changes how and where scientists believe multi-cellular life can exist. While nematoda are known to live on the ocean floor and as far at 10 to 20 feet beneath the ocean bed, this discovery puts them about a mile beneath the surface.""We tried to get the title of the paper to be 'Worms from Hell,'" study author Tullis Onstott of Princeton University joked. The highly respected journal Nature passed on the idea.

Closer to home, Princeton had another close call with the dangers of wildlife. Students were sent a Public Safety alert last Friday, after a raccoon with rabies was captured in Princeton Township, near a local school.From the Princeton Packet:

”It wasn’t acting right,” said David Henry, Princeton Health Officer. “It seemed to have neurological symptoms. School officials didn’t think it was acting right and since it was 9 o’clock in the mooring school officials called animal control for an assessment.”

Though I must admit I don't know the "right" way for a raccoon to act, I can say with some authority that raccoons--rabid or not--are a lot scarier than you'd think. Less cuddly, more: