Amplituhedron May Shape the Future of Physics

This multidimensional shape can simplify certain quantum equations — and possibly also revolutionize physics.

Physicists have long struggled to understand exactly what happens after subatomic particles collide. For decades, the best tool involved basic sketches (called Feynman diagrams) of each possible result. For all but the simplest scenarios, this method fills pages with drawings and equations. 

A new computational insight in 2004 dramatically reduced the amount of paper required to describe a collision, and these new formulas combined multitudes of Feynman diagrams into a single mess of math. Last year, Princeton physicist Nima Arkani-Hamed was analyzing the formulas in search of a better way to simplify these quantum calculations. Using only pen and paper, he discovered a new kind of geometric shape called an amplituhedron — one that hints at a new way of seeing the universe.

Arkani-Hamed noticed the formula could be rearranged and still yield the same answer. Like paleontologists brushing away dirt to reveal a fossil, he and his colleagues found the pieces of a shape within the math — pieces that together form a multidimensional amplituhedron. The shape’s dimensions — length, width, height and other parameters (hence “multidimensional”) — represent information about the colliding particles, and the equation describing its volume also describes the particles that emerge from the collision. 

This result, the volume, is a single term that fits on a space the size of a napkin.

Unlike the older methods for exploring particle collisions, the amplituhedron is not rooted in a world where a particle starts in one place and time before moving to the next location and moment. That is, the shape does not exist in space-time — it does not rely on a conception of the universe that theoretical physicists suspect might be incorrect. (When they try to knit together large-scale and small-scale forces, such as gravity and those that hold atoms together, the assumption of space-time leads to mathematical inconsistencies, a clue that something’s amiss with current assumptions about the universe.) 

“We’ve known for decades that space-time is doomed,” says Arkani-Hamed. “We know it is not there in the next version of physics.” Though the collisions described by the amplituhedron still occur in space-time, the object itself is outside it, providing a possible way to imagine a world not woven of this fabric.

The new shape is intriguing, says physicist Lance Dixon, a pioneer in the field of particle collisions, but he cautions that so far it can only describe particle collisions within a simplified version of quantum theory — the results don’t yet translate to the real world. Arkani-Hamed acknowledges it is a “baby example”; he calls it “step zero” in the journey to create a new kind of physics — a project on par with the discovery of the probabilistic particle collisions themselves. 

For now, the amplituhedron offers a hint of what this strange new world could look like.

For years, health professionals have been urging better nutrition and more exercise for children. Are we finally listening?

TOP 100 STORIES OF 2013

#9	Childhood Obesity Reversed

For years, health professionals have been urging better nutrition and more exercise for children. Are we finally listening?

By Jeff Wheelwright|Tuesday, January 07, 2014

RELATED TAGS: OBESITY, FAMILY HEALTH

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Public health officials call it an epidemic. The American Medical Association calls it a disease. During the past 30 years, obesity rates in the U.S. have more than doubled among adults (to 35 percent) and tripled among children and adolescents (to 17 percent). The problem seemed unstoppable — until this year. 

For the first time in decades, reported the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), obesity rates declined among low-income preschool children, a particularly vulnerable demographic group. No magic diet was involved: This public health success seems to be the result of promoting healthier foods and physical activity. 

Between 2008 and 2011, the CDC measured the weights and heights of about 12 million children between the ages of 2 and 4 in 40 states, two territories and the District of Columbia. The preschoolers were on the rolls of federal nutrition programs, including the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), which provides dietary counseling and food vouchers to low-income mothers. 

In 18 states, obesity rates declined slightly. Three states showed increases; the remaining 19 had no change from the prior survey. 

This small change could have big benefits down the road. Young children’s weight predicts their future health, says epidemiologist Ashleigh May, the lead author of the CDC report: “If they’re obese at this age, they’re five times as likely to become obese as adults.” Overweight children can develop high blood pressure and high blood sugar, which raises their risk of cardiovascular disease and diabetes when they grow up.

Four years ago, WIC revised its list of approved groceries to emphasize fruits and vegetables — one possible cause for the turnaround. More women are now breast-feeding, and breast-fed babies are more likely to be at a healthy weight. 

The CDC also credits public awareness programs like “Let’s Move,” championed by first lady Michelle Obama, that promote healthy eating and exercise in day care centers and among child care providers. “We were expecting spotty progress, but this [decline] was widespread,” Let’s Move Executive Director Sam Kass says.

A White House task force calls for childhood obesity rates to fall to 5 percent by 2030. Is it a reasonable goal? 

“All the public health campaigns in this country required concerted efforts over many years,” says pediatrician David Ludwig, director of the New Balance Foundation Obesity Prevention Center at Boston Children’s Hospital. He cites drives to reduce traffic fatalities and curb tobacco use. “We have every reason to hope for an eventual
victory.”

Extracting Family Trees From Ancient Genomes

New techniques and very old bones overcome the limits of genome sequencing for prehistoric horses, ancient cave bears, and even our own early ancestors.

For millennia, the stories of long-extinct species — including our own progenitors — have been buried with their skeletal remains. But in 2013, ultramodern DNA extraction and sequencing techniques enabled researchers to access ancient genetic codes and translate their evolutionary tales: Researchers in Denmark reconstructed a record-breaking 700,000-year-old horse genome, and geneticists in Germany began parsing the DNA of 400,000-year-old hominids.

Geologists saw the first glint of the horse’s history in 2003 when they plucked its toe bone from permafrost in a remote Yukon gold mine. The uninterrupted freeze of the permafrost preserved DNA in the horse bone, but since DNA decays into smaller and less intelligible fragments over time, the specimen seemed too ancient to analyze. “When that fossil was found, no one would have believed that we could get DNA out of it,” says Yukon government paleontologist Grant Zazula.

Armed with a decade of improvements in next-generation sequencing techniques, Denmark-based evolutionary geneticist Ludovic Orlando could finally piece together what was left of the bone’s DNA. Using what’s called true single molecule sequencing, Orlando lit up the A’s, C’s, T’s and G’s, one by one, to assemble the horse’s genome — six times older than any nuclear DNA specimen ever sequenced.

The results, published in July, radically revise the timeline for equine evolution, revealing that the common ancestor of contemporary horses, zebras and donkeys originated at least 4 million years ago, twice as far back
as previously thought.

Hunting for Human History

Deciphering human DNA of the same vintage seems like it should be next on the docket. Here’s the catch: No comparably ancient human skeleton has been found preserved in permafrost. Weathered hominid bones — and their decaying DNA — are generally discovered in temperate caves, like the one in Spain’s Atapuerca Mountains, whose collection of these remains is among the world’s largest and oldest. “This is a dream site for studying the ancestors of Neanderthals and perhaps modern humans,” says evolutionary geneticist Svante Pääbo.

But getting a DNA sample from a bone means drilling a hole in it, and archaeologists were not about to let geneticists go to work on the deteriorating human skeletons without some guarantee of a genome. So Pääbo’s team procured a similarly degraded non-human specimen from the same rocky dwelling for their proof of concept, published in August: the genome of a 400,000-year-old cave bear.

The Germany-based team developed two advances to get and use more of the bear’s genetic information from its bones. First, they salvaged DNA fragments degraded down to as few as 30 base pairs (by comparison, fragments from the frozen horse bone averaged 78 base pairs). Second, they separated the complementary strands of DNA in these fragments before sequencing so they could still use one half of the double helix even if the other half were damaged.

Now Pääbo’s team is applying these techniques to Atapuerca’s ancient hominids to pinpoint changes in the human genome and determine when they occurred. “If we can see things directly — things that were alive 400,000 years ago,” says Jesse Dabney, a doctoral student involved with the project, “we can get a clearer picture of our own evolution.”

Two Elusive Prime Number Problems Solved

After centuries of flummoxing number crunchers, two mathematical puzzles about prime numbers were cracked this year.

Prime numbers — those divisible only by 1 and the number itself, like 5, 11 or 37 — are like the atoms of mathematics: All numbers are formed by multiplying these building blocks together. 

But what happens when you add a number to a prime number? When will the sum be prime? Or, conversely, when is a number a sum of primes? Mathematicians have been working to answer these fundamental questions for centuries, and on the same day in May, two mathematicians finally found tantalizing partial answers to both of them.

To imagine the answer to the first question, start by adding the number 2 to a prime. When the sum is also prime, the pair is called a “twin prime,” like 5 and 7. As numbers get bigger, primes become more rare; you might then expect the spacing between them to grow consistently larger, too, so that very large twin primes would never occur.

Yet the famous but unproven “twin prime conjecture” states there are an infinite number of primes that differ by 2 — no matter how high you count, you will never run out of twin primes. A related, more general conjecture suggests there are also infinitely many pairs of primes that differ by 4, or 6, or any even number at all. 

But conjecture is all it was until May 13, when a nearly unknown mathematician, Yitang Zhang of the University of New Hampshire, made a serious dent in the twin primes conjecture. During a talk at Harvard, he presented a proof of the related, general conjecture that as prime numbers increase toward infinity, the spaces between them — counterintuitively — do not always do the same: No matter how big prime numbers get, you’ll always find pairs of them that differ by, at the very most, 70 million. 

Admittedly, 70 million is a lot bigger than 2, so the twin primes conjecture remains unsolved. But Zhang established for the first time a necessary (and supremely difficult) first step — that the spread between successive primes does not increase toward infinity.

On the same day Zhang emerged from obscurity to reveal his stunning proof, Harald Helfgott of the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris cracked another famously elusive problem involving prime numbers — a variation on the Goldbach conjecture, which claims that every even number greater than 2 is the sum of two primes. (For example: 16 = 5 + 11.) 

Instead, Helfgott posted a proof of the “odd Goldbach conjecture,” which states that every odd number above 5 is the sum of three primes. (19 = 3 + 5 + 11.) It’s a big step in the right direction because the full Goldbach conjecture implies the odd version: Just take your odd number (say, 19), subtract the prime number 3 (now you have 16), and apply the Goldbach conjecture to the resulting even number. (16 = 5 + 11.)

While Helfgott’s proof does not solve the full conjecture, which is considered much harder, it shines a light on the intricate dance prime numbers engage in. Now the full conjecture, along with Zhang’s almost-but-not-quite-proven twin primes conjecture, remain a tantalizing plum for future mathematicians

Voyager 1 Goes Interstellar

More than three decades after it left our planet, Voyager 1 entered a realm where no Earthborn spacecraft has gone before.

It took more than 35 years and a journey over 15 billion miles, but: “Voyager 1 is the first human-made object to make it into interstellar space — we’re actually out there,” says Don Gurnett, lead author of a September Science paper announcingthe feat. 

The probe first gained fame in the 1970s and ’80s with visits to the solar system’s outer planets; it’s been racing toward this next milestone ever since. In recent years, various scientists had prematurely trumpeted Voyager 1’s crossing into interstellar space, the area dominated by gas ejected from other stars. This time, however, NASA’s scientists are sure, thanks to three key pieces of evidence — two of which were published earlier in 2013. 

First, astronomers announced that Voyager 1 had recorded a steep drop in the “solar wind,” a stream of charged particles emanating from the sun. At the same time, the spacecraft also detected a corresponding uptick in galactic cosmic rays, ultrafast particles that come from outside the solar system. 

This waning of the solar wind amid growing gusts from interstellar space suggested Voyager 1 had crossed the edge of the heliosphere, the bubble of charged particles blown by our sun that surrounds the solar system. At the bubble’s edge, the expansion of the sun’s hot, ionized gas, or plasma, is halted by the pressure of cooler, denser plasma in the space between the stars.

But that wasn’t enough to prove that Voyager 1 had sailed through the heliosphere; knowing for sure required determining the density of plasma bathing the spacecraft. Alas, Voyager 1’s plasma sensor failed back in 1980, near Saturn. Fortunately, it still has a working plasma wave instrument, which measures the frequency of plasma vibrations (as opposed to the density). All the instrument needed was something to set the surrounding sea of plasma in motion.

A lucky explosion on the sun fit the bill: When this blast of charged, magnetic particles reached Voyager 1 in April, the instrument detected these vibrations and revealed the plasma to be more than 40 times denser than previously measured in the heliosphere. Combined with previous data, this was consistent with an escape into interstellar space at the same time as the measured drop in the solar wind.

“It all really fits,” says Gurnett. “That’s why we’re so confident this is the answer.”

Voyager 1 has enough power in its nuclear generator to send dispatches until the mid-2020s. Beyond that, its momentum will carry this most distant and devoted scout silently toward the stars, a testament to humanity’s will to explore.

Scientists Make Progress in Growing Organs From Stem Cells

Liver buds and brain organoids are among this year's life-saving advances in growing spare human parts.

Liver Buds to the Rescue

Some 16,000 ailing Americans are waiting to receive a liver transplant. But due to a shortage of viable livers, it’s likely that fewer than 7,000 transplants will be performed in 2013. In Japan, where the shortage is worse, the number of people in need of new livers is 10 times as great as the number of deceased donors who could provide one. 

That gap motivated stem cell biologist Takanori Takebe and his colleagues at the Department of Regenerative Medicine at Yokohama City University in Japan to find an alternate solution. This year they succeeded in generating mini-livers, or liver buds, from stem cells that were taken from human skin and reprogrammed to an embryonic state. (Embryonic stem cells are notable because they can morph into virtually any cell type in the body.) 

When mixed with two other types of cells, the fabricated primitive liver cells organized themselves into three-dimensional structures, complete with blood vessels. In effect, Takebe’s team re-created the process by which a human embryo begins to form a functioning liver. 

Transplanted into a mouse, the human liver buds, about 5 millimeters long, exhibited many functions of the mature organ, such as metabolizing sugars and drugs. When the scientists disabled the mouse’s own liver, the human buds kept the animal alive for two months. A person with liver failure would require an infusion of “tens of thousands” of liver buds, Takebe says. 

Until the buds can be generated from the skin of each individual patient, recipients will have to rely on immune-suppressing drugs to avoid rejection, just as they would with the transplant of an entire organ. Replacement liver buds might be available to human patients in a decade or less. — Jeff Wheelwright

Growing Brain Organoids

Scientists can’t yet grow spare parts of the human brain to fix neurological injuries or defects, but they have recently used stem cells to create brain organoids, formations of cells that mimic some of the brain’s regions. A team led by neuroscientist Jürgen Knoblich of Austria’s Institute of Molecular Biotechnology developed the organoids to help them simulate disease. 

Two types of stem cells were used to produce the mini-brains: embryonic cells and adult cells that had been reprogrammed to a starter state. The cells were put into a special culture and then suspended in a gel and stimulated by nutrients, all geared to turn them into neurons like those found in the cortex. 

The neurons literally “self-organized,” according to Knoblich, and after several weeks formed three-dimensional structures about one-tenth of an inch in diameter.

“If you zoom out and look at the whole, it’s not a brain,” Knoblich says. “But our cultures contain individual brain regions that have a functional relationship with one another.” Besides the dorsal cortex, researchers were able to grow, among other regions, parts of the ventral forebrain, which makes neurons that connect to the cortex, and the choroid plexus, which generates spinal fluid. 

In their most impressive experiment, the scientists derived organoids from the skin cells of a person affected by microcephaly. This genetic disorder causes a drastic reduction in brain size and stature. The microcephalic organoids were smaller than the organoids grown from healthy people, apparently because the patient’s stem cells had divided too early and became depleted. 

“What our organoids are good for is to model the development of the brain and to study anything that causes a defect in development,” Knoblich says. For example, by taking neural stem cells from a patient with schizophrenia, researchers might turn back the clock and track the onset of the condition in an organoid. Knowing how schizophrenia starts might help prevent it. — Jeff Wheelwright

Human Stem Cells Made From Eggs

It was 1996 when biologists first fused a mammalian skin cell with an egg cell, cloning Dolly the sheep. That was the start of the race to make a human embryo the same way. The method, called somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), replaces the DNA in an egg cell’s nucleus with the genetic material from the nucleus of a skin cell, then tricks the egg cell to start dividing as if it had been fertilized with sperm. 

The result: an embryo that is an almost perfect genetic copy of the skin cell donor. In humans, the goal of SCNT is “nonreproductive cloning” — making embryos, then removing stem cells from the embryo and cultivating them to grow into tissues that could cure diseases, replace organs and heal injuries.

But getting eggs to act like embryos turned out to be far more difficult in humans than in sheep. It wasn’t until 2013 that Shoukhrat Mitalipov of the Oregon Health and Science University finally made SCNT work in humans, through careful tweaking and fine-tuning based on experiments with more than 1,000 rhesus monkey eggs. His final protocol requires a few dozen steps. 

“It’s a very complex procedure,” he says. Among Mitalipov’s secrets: stimulating reprogramming activity by priming the eggs with caffeine and by precisely dosing them with chemicals that coil and uncoil DNA’s twisted strands, and applying a gentle electric jolt to get the egg to begin dividing. (An embryo created this way will not develop into a fetus.) 

There are now other methods to make stem cells, but those made via SCNT have unique value because they are genetic copies of the living person who donated the skin cells (other methods either use foreign cells or involve genetic reprogramming). Thus, replacement tissues made from them shouldn’t trigger the immune system rejection that dooms many transplants. 

Making purpose-built tissues may be far in the future, because figuring out the exact recipes to turn cells into functioning bone, heart or spinal cord will take time. But Mitalipov’s triumph has big near-term benefits in giving researchers a new tool to understand all the details of how stem cells grow, divide and differentiate, says Larry Goldstein, director of the University of California San Diego Stem Cell Program: “It’s great science.” — Kat McGowan

Carbon Dioxide Hits 400 ppm — Does It Matter?

In May, the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere crossed this long-hyped threshold, setting off a storm of media coverage. But how significant is the milestone?

On May 9, instruments atop Hawaii’s Mauna Loa volcano pegged the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) — the gas that contributes most to global warming — at slightly above 400 parts per million (ppm). 

Pieter Tans, senior scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and his colleague Ralph Keeling, director of the CO2 program at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, had been watching the concentration climb ever closer to 400 ppm — a level not seen in millennia. 

They realized that reaching such a big, round number was “an opportunity to remind the world that CO2 is rising fast, and that the rate of rise in the last decade has been the fastest recorded,” Tans says. They also knew that “the press was looking over our shoulders, and of course they were going to announce it.”

So Tans and Keeling decided to get the word out first, by issuing a pair of press releases on May 10. Journalists jumped on it, calling 400 ppm a “grim” and “long-feared” milestone.

But was it?

National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration

Global warming became big news for the first time during the hot summer of 1988 when now-retired NASA climate scientist James Hansen testified before Congress that the trend was not part of natural climate variation, but rather the result of emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses from human activities. By that point we had already passed 350 ppm. 

So in spring 2013, the approach of 400 ppm seemed like a significant, new threshold — the first one we’ve reached since climate change started making headlines regularly. But it is both an artificial and fuzzy symbol. Nothing fundamental actually changed in Earth’s climate system when we hit it. 

“It’s not that different from 390 or 410,” Tans points out. And even as the instruments in Hawaii indicated that we had reached the milestone, the global average concentration of CO2 was a few points lower. That’s because Hawaii is in the Northern Hemisphere, where most CO2 from fossil fuel burning comes from. 

To make things even fuzzier, the CO2 concentration in Hawaii quickly dipped below 400 ppm as plants greened during the Northern Hemisphere’s growing season, soaking up CO2 through photosynthesis. 

Over the long term, CO2 will continue to increase, bringing growing risks from sea level rise and disruptions to weather patterns. But it will take a couple of years — until about 2016, Tans estimates — for annual global-average CO2 levels to surpass 400 ppm.

For James White, a paleoclimatologist at the University of Colorado, 400 ppm is “a mile marker you pass on the interstate while flying by at 60 mph.” And he expresses few doubts about the road ahead. “We’re blowing the doors off 400.” He would not be surprised if we get to 800. “That will be the next big milestone, and that’s a fundamentally different world.” 

Over centuries, that amount of atmospheric CO2 could cause enough warming to melt all ice on land and bring the sea level up by 80 meters — enough to submerge Bangladesh and almost all of Florida.

Apple Presses Deeper With New iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus and More

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SAN FRANCISCO:  Apple is bolstering its money-pumping iPhone line while looking to dive deep into businesses with iPads and dominate living rooms with Apple TV hardware tuned to app-loving lifestyles.

Tricked-out new iPhone 6 models, along with overhauled Apple TV hardware and iPad Pro tablets with enlarged screens, were major announcements at the technology titan's media event Wednesday in San Francisco.

"Apple did the typical good job at the event," Gartner analyst Brian Blau told AFP.

"Overall, I don't think it is going to push the needle for Apple in a good or a bad direction. These are great devices and cool features."

Apple shares ended the official trading day down slightly less than two percent at $110.15, and danced around that price in after-market trades.

"If you are an investor, you are probably not that excited about today because you didn't hear numbers and these features won't impact sales this quarter," Blau said.

3D touch

Apple introduced two updated iPhones to build on the success of large-screen handsets introduced last year that have dominated the high-end smartphone market.

The iPhone 6S and 6S Plus have the same overall dimensions as the previous versions, but with new technologies under the hood.

One of the key new features is called "3D touch," which responds to pressure exerted on the screen to allow users to look inside messages and applications.

"Apple has performed the ultimate conjuring trick: Change everything about the iPhone, but make it look almost identical to the old model," IHS Technology said in a posted analysis.

By responding to sensing pressure, the phones enable users to dip in and out of content without losing their place.

"It will further refine our use of touch as a main user interface," Blau said.

The 6S has the 4.7-inch (about 12-centimeter) display of its predecessor and the 6S Plus -- which updates one of the more popular handsets in the "phablet category" -- has the same 5.5-inch screen.

But the devices have more powerful processors that allow for improved graphics, harder glass and a new aluminum body. Pricing will be kept at the same levels as the earlier versions.

For those buying without carrier subsidies, Apple will sell the devices on a 24-month installment plan at $27 per month for the $650 iPhone 6S and $31 for the 6S Plus, making the price nearly $750.

Apple will take pre-orders starting Saturday and deliver the phones September 25 in the US, Britain, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, Puerto Rico and Singapore.

iPad Pro

The new iPad Pro has the power and capabilities to replace a laptop computer, Apple said. It had aspects reminiscent of Microsoft Surface Pro tablets, such as covers that double as keyboards.

Apple chief executive Tim Cook called the device "the biggest news in iPad since the iPad."

The new tablet with a 12.9-inch display also includes a detachable keyboard and stylus, sold separately.

According to Apple senior vice president Phil Schiller, the device features "desktop-class performance" and operates faster than 80 percent of portable PCs that shipped in the last 12 months.

The new iPad will be available in November starting at $799.

The iPad Pro stylus, called Apple Pencil, was designed for high-precision illustration and 3D design applications. Apple Pencil will be sold for $99 more and the keyboard for $169.

Avi Greengart at the research firm Current Analysis tweeted that the new tablets "are aimed directly at enterprises. That's a long sales cycle, but could finally stop (the tablet market's) sales slide."

Upgraded TV box

Upgraded Apple TV includes voice search, touchscreen remote control and an app store in a challenge to Google, Amazon and Roku.

Apple TV was overhauled as people increasingly stream films and television shows on-demand online and turn to mobile applications for entertainment.

"We believe the future of television is apps," Cook said.

Apple released a software kit for outside developers, and showed off early versions of Apple TV applications already being crafted by show streaming services Netflix and Hulu, as well as HBO.

Apple TV has the potential to take the kinds of "casual game" apps popular on mobile devices and put them on television screens, according to analysts.

Ask for something funny

Siri virtual assistant software newly built into Apple TV will allow for natural language searches for shows -- for example, by asking for something funny or a certain actor by name.

The new Apple TV will launch in late October at a starting price of $149.

Apple TV has lagged rivals with similar devices.

According to the research firm Parks Associates, Roku leads the US market with a 37 percent market share, to 19 percent for Google Chromecast and 17 percent for Apple TV. Amazon's Fire TV devices have 14 percent.

"For Apple TV to succeed it will have to give people what they already want on a TV: TV shows," said Forrester analyst James McQuivey.

Apple also said the operating system for its Apple Watch, watchOS 2, would be made available as a free update September 16.

The company offered no sales figures but Cook said customers "love using Apple Watch," and that user satisfaction "is an incredible 97 percent."

The latest iteration of the Watch, created with French fashion house Hermes, features a hand-stitched leather band and starts at $1,100.

Lost City Could Rewrite History

The city is believed to predate the Harappan civilization

The remains of what has been described as a huge lost city may force historians and archaeologists to radically reconsider their view of ancient human history.
Marine scientists say archaeological remains discovered 36 metres (120 feet) underwater in the Gulf of Cambay off the western coast of India could be over 9,000 years old.The vast city - which is five miles long and two miles wide - is believed to predate the oldest known remains in the subcontinent by more than 5,000 years.

The site was discovered by chance last year by oceanographers from India's National Institute of Ocean Technology conducting a survey of pollution.Using side-scan sonar - which sends a beam of sound waves down to the bottom of the ocean they identified huge geometrical structures at a depth of 120ft.
Debris recovered from the site - including construction material, pottery, sections of walls, beads, sculpture and human bones and teeth has been carbon dated and found to be nearly 9,500 years old.

Lost civilization

The city is believed to be even older than the ancient Harappan civilization, which dates back around 4,000 years.Marine archaeologists have used a technique known as sub-bottom profiling to show that the buildings remains stand on enormous foundations.

"The whole model of the origins of civilization will have to be remade from scratch" Graham Hancock
Author and film-maker Graham Hancock - who has written extensively on the uncovering of ancient civilizations - told BBC News Online that the evidence was compelling:

"The [oceanographers] found that they were dealing with two large blocks of apparently man made structures.

"Cities on this scale are not known in the archaeological record until roughly 4,500 years ago when the first big cities begin to appear in Mesopotamia. "Nothing else on the scale of the underwater cities of Cambay is known. The first cities of the historical period are as far away from these cities as we are today from the pyramids of Egypt," he said.

Chronological problem

This, Mr Hancock told BBC News Online, could have massive repercussions for our view of the ancient world.

Harappan remains have been found in India and Pakistan

"There's a huge chronological problem in this discovery. It means that the whole model of the origins of civilization with which archaeologists have been working will have to be remade from scratch," he said.
However, archaeologist Justin Morris from the British Museum said more work would need to be undertaken before the site could be categorically said to belong to a 9,000 year old civilization.
"Culturally speaking, in that part of the world there were no civilizations prior to about 2,500 BCE. What's happening before then mainly consisted of small, village settlements," he told BBC News Online.
Dr Morris added that artifacts from the site would need to be very carefully analyzed, and pointed out that the C14 carbon dating process is not without its error margins.

It is believed that the area was submerged as ice caps melted at the end of the last ice age 9-10,000 years ago
Although the first signs of a significant find came eight months ago, exploring the area has been extremely difficult because the remains lie in highly treacherous waters, with strong currents and rip tides.
The Indian Minister for Human Resources and ocean development said a group had been formed to oversee further studies in the area.

"We have to find out what happened then ... where and how this civilization vanished," he said.

Did You Know?

              Interesting facts about India.

History

India is the world's largest, oldest, continuous civilization
Although modern images of India often show poverty and lack of development, India was the richest country on earth until the time of British invasion in the early 17th Century. Christopher Columbus was attracted by India's wealth.
India never invaded any country in her last 10000 years of history.
India is the world's largest democracy.
The four religions born in India, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism, are followed by 25% of the world's population
Chess (Shataranja or AshtaPada) was invented in India.
Varanasi, also known as Benares, was called "the ancient city" when Lord Buddha visited it in 500 B.C.E, and is the oldest, continuously inhabited city in the world today.
The art of Navigation was born in the river Sindh 6000 years ago. The very word Navigation is derived from the Sanskrit word NAVGATIH. The word navy is also derived from Sanskrit 'Nou'.

Medicine

Sushruta is the father of surgery. 2600 years ago he and health scientists of his time conducted complicated surgeries like cesareans, cataract, artificial limbs, fractures, urinary stones and even plastic surgery and brain surgery. Usage of anesthesia was well known in ancient India. Over 125 surgical equipment were used. Deep knowledge of anatomy, physiology, etiology, embryology, digestion, metabolism, genetics and immunity is also found in many texts.
Ayurveda is the earliest school of medicine known to humans. Charaka, the father of medicine consolidated Ayurveda 2500 years ago. Today Ayurveda is fast regaining its rightful place in our civilization.

Math

The value of "pi" was first calculated by Budhayana, and he explained the concept of what is known as the Pythagorean Theorem. He discovered this in the 6th century long before the European mathematician.
India invented the Number System. Zero was invented by Aryabhatta.
Bhaskaracharya calculated the time taken by the earth to orbit the sun hundreds of years before the astronomer Smart. Time taken by earth to orbit the sun: (5th century) 365.258756484 days.

Academic

The World's first university was established in Takshashila in 700 BCE. More than 10,500 students from all over the world studied more than 60 subjects. The University of Nalanda built in the 4th century BCE was one of the greatest achievements of ancient India in the field of education.
Grammar constitutes one of India's greatest contributions to Western philology. Panini, the Sanskrit grammarian, who lived between 750 and 500 BCE, was the first to compose formal grammar through his Astadhyai.

Vastu Shastra - Sacred Architecture of India

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    Adherence to Vastu Shastra, the ancient and medieval canons on city planning and architecture, has suddenly assumed tremendous significance, particularly among the well-educated and affluent in urban India. It may be difficult to predict if this is just a fad or if it will be a way of building dwellings, offices, and factories etc. for many years to come.

Interestingly, practically none of the practitioners of Vastu Shastra has an academic background. So there is a lot of genuine practice as well as hearsay going around. In this brief introduction, the intention is to give a broad overall picture of the Vastu Shastra with some examples.

Vastu Shastras are canons dealing with the subject of vastu which means the environment. Put differently, one may regard them as codification of good practices of design of buildings and cities, which will provide settings for the conduct of human life in harmony with physical as well as metaphysical forces. These Vastu Shastra canons provide guidelines for design of buildings and planning of cities such that they will bring health, wealth and peace to the inhabitants.

Mythological beliefs are certainty at the root of the origins of these canonical texts and their discourse. The first of these relates to Vastupurusha, which appears to be the first step in ordering a part of the vast cosmic space, the brahmanda, for human habitation. According to myth, long ago there existed an unnamed, unknown and formless being which blocked the sky and the earth. The Gods forced it down on earth and pressed it face down. To ensure that it did not escape again, Lord Brahma, the supreme creator, along with other gods weighted it down and called it vastupurusha.

Lord Brahma, of course, occupied the central portion and in a hierarchic distribution along concentric rings assigned different quarters to different major and minor gods. Thus emerged a geometric configuration, which is called mandala. From one basic square, the canons have listed up to 1024 divisions of a square and given each one a name. The most popular among those have 64 and 81 divisions known as Manduka Mandala and Param Sayika Mandala, respectively, which are widely used for temple and dwelling plans.

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             The mandala is also given an orientation with Surya, the sun-god, occupying the central point of periphery to east; Varuna, the Lord of winds, to the west; Kubera, the Lord of Wealth, to the north; and Yama, the Lord of Death, to the south. The rest of the squares are occupied by the other minor gods. With the positions thus assigned and the beneficial or otherwise attributes of gods established through other myths, it is possible to assign the activities of living, working and support facilities over the mandala and therefore the layout of a city or a building.

The mandala is, of course, the most popular aspect of the vastushastras as it is constantly referred to for the location of the various activities in a building. The proper texts themselves, however, deal with a wide range of topics relating to built-environment. These include site selection, soil testing, building materials and techniques, design of temples separately by number of floors, palaces, dwellings, gates, image of the deity, their vehicles and seats even including the making of image of a linga for Shiva temples. All these are treated in different chapters of the canonical texts.

As an example, one may mention the matter of site selection, which is dealt with in both scientific and religious terms. The method of digging a pit and refilling it with excavated earth is given scientific treatment. If a lot of earth is left out, then the soil is compact with good load-bearing capacity.

A similar test checks the seepage of water in the soil. It if is quick, the soil is obviously not good. The religious prescription suggest that if the soil is white with ghee-like smell, it is good for Brahmins, if red with blood-like smell it is good for Kashtriyas, yellow with smell like sesamum oil, it is good for Vaishyas and black with the smell of rotten fish, it is good for Shudras. While the first two suggestions would still find the approval of a modern engineer, the third more likely betrays the caste-ridden nature of some of the Shastra's recommendations.

The Shastras also deal at length with town planning and form of towns suitable for different purposes such as administrative towns, hill towns, coastal towns or religious towns built at a sacred place. Among the most famous examples of a town planned according to these standards is the example of Old Jaipur which is based on a Prastar type town described in several texts. Built in 1727 AD, the final form and structure of the town shows a skillful manipulation, according to the Shastra's prescriptions, of the square mandala right from the whole to the smallest of the plots, the location of activities, and distribution of the caste groups. 

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Jaipur City Palace

Based on the studies carried out by scholars it is suggested that these texts were written down largely between the 7th century AD to 13th century AD following the Gupta period. They are found in all the major languages of medieval India. Of course, the earliest references are also found in the Vedas, which deal with carpentry among other subjects.

Vastusastras can be said to be companion texts to Shilpasastras and Chitrasastras dealing with sculpture, icons and painting respectively. Strangely, among all these texts, those devoted exclusively to one of the areas. i.e. vastu, chitra or shilpa are rare. This is because in the Indian artistic traditions, each was an important and integral part of the creative endeavor largely because all of these, including performing arts such as the dance and music, were based at the temple.

Among the vasthusastra texts are Mansar, Maymata, Vishwakarma and Samrangana Sutradhara which is credited to Raja Bhoja. The others are believed to have been authored by ancient saints and sages. These include Lord Vishwakarma who is architect to the gods in the Nagara or northern traditions, and Maya who is architect to the gods in the Dravida or Southern tradition. In the northern tradition Maya is regarded as architect to the danavas or demons. To give some idea about the size of the text, Masar comprises 5400 verses organized in a total of 70 chapters. 

However, the nature, content and format of the texts as discussed above is in total contrast to the books that have recently been published and gone through, in some cases, half a dozen reprints in a span of one year. They share very little in common. As to what are the origins of the practitioners' texts recently published, I can only suggest that these would he more ritualistic practices broadly interpreted by the various puranic texts such as Agni Purana, Matsya Purana and their Agmic versions in the Dravidian traditions. The parallel I can draw upon is of Brigusamhita used by the palmists, which by itself has no serious pretensions to astronomy. The practitioners themselves are silent and unresponsive when questioned about these aspects.

One of the more recent texts goes so far as to suggest the location of two weighing scales in different parts of the plot in a factory. One was for weighing raw materials which would in that location weigh less than actual, and the other one of weighing finished goods which would register more weight than actual. Very neat, one may say, and very tempting for the factory owner.

As to the beneficial aspects of following these suggestions, the available experience is equally divided. There seems to be an equal number of success stories as well as failures. Here, I believe, the analogy of the typical palmist is best. Perhaps there are genuine jyotish shastris as well as frauds. Is it that human beings want to be able to put blame on some unknown forces for failures? Or that they would want to appease the unknown to ensure a success? These are more a matter of faith rather than belief.

Fortunately, Indians are not alone in this in recent times. Across Asia there is a resurgence of these beliefs and practices. Feng-shui, the Chinese version of Vastusastras, is practiced all over the Far East and South-east Asia. There, too, the situation is one of either you believe and practice or you don't believe and don't practice. Does this mean that one cannot explain this on a rational basis?

These texts (i.e. the genuine ancient and medieval canons) dealt with the classical manner of arts and architecture. This meant that irrespective of who was doing what and where, a certain quality, content and perfection would always be achieved just by following the texts. To paraphrase Einstein's observation for a similar work, "it makes good easy and bad difficult". This means that a temple made on the banks of Ganga would be as perfect as one made on shipra though patronised and designed by different persons.

Even those uninitiated can learn and practice the entire range of connected activities right from the selection of a site to the execution of all the elemental details. Then there is some reason to believe that some of the suggestions may indeed reflect more real concerns such as climatic suitability of locating the human activities in a building. An entrance front north ensures that it will always be in cool shade in India, besides allowing the wealth to flow in as it is the direction of Lord Kubera. The next alternative of entrance from east certainly brightens up the morning environment with the first rays of sun to start a great new day on a cheerful note.

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Then there is a metaphysical aspect to it all. This one concerns the fears of the unknown on one hand, and attempts to intellectually grasp the nature of the world on the other hand. And between these two is the human desire to do things right, in conformity and in harmony with the unknown world and its forces. This is where particularly the mandala diagrams become very useful. These, in abstract terms, manifest or represent the cosmological conception of the world, albeit the world as conceived or interpreted by the ancient and the medieval scholars.

It is therefore natural that buildings and cities which represent a significant alteration of the terrestrial world be based on the mandala to make them harmonize with the unknown world. In other words, it, is undertaking a human act in tune with the nature as well as the unknown in the belief that these will not clash but work harmoniously to bring peace and prosperity to the builder and the inhabitants.

Architecture is a human act. It requires carving out a segment of that omnipotent, universal space of the brahmanda, the cosmic space, for the use of the human beings. It is not often that architecture truly rises to the challenges of capturing the divine character of the brahmanda in its folds. When it does happen the architectural experience exalts generations of people to come. Is this not true of Mahabalipuram, Khajuraho, Kailashnath? Or the city of Jaipur, its havelis as well those of Samod and Shekhavati region? Let us remember that these are all based on the Vasthusastras.

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Kumbha Mela - The world's most massive act of faith

          They came by the millions! Some arrived on overcrowded trains carrying five times their normal capacity. Some came by bus, by car, some by ox drawn carts, and others rode on horses, camels, and even elephants. The rich and famous chartered private planes and helicopters, while the less affluent came on foot carrying their bed rolls and camping equipment in heavy bundles on their heads. Wave after wave, they formed a veritable river of humanity that flowed onto the banks of the Ganges at Allahabad to celebrate the greatest spiritual festival ever held in the history of the world, the Kumbha Mela.

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Kumbha Mela has gained international fame as "the world's most massive act of faith." Pilgrims come to this holy event with such tremendous faith and in such overwhelming numbers that it boggles the mind. Faith is the most important thing for the pilgrims at Kumbha Mela, they have an "unflinching trust in something sublime".
To understand the significance of the Kumbha Mela and the important role that it plays in the spirituality of India, it is helpful to know something about the background of the sacred Ganges River. The devout believe that simply by bathing in the Ganges one is freed from their past sins (karma), and thus one becomes eligible for liberation from the cycle of birth and death. Of course it is said that a pure lifestyle is also required after taking bath, otherwise one will again be burdened by karmic reactions .The pilgrims come from all walks of life, traveling long distances and tolerating many physical discomforts, such as sleeping in the open air in near freezing weather. They undergo these difficulties just to receive the benefit of taking a bath in the sacred river at Kumbha Mela.

This spectacle of faith has for many centuries attracted the curiosity of foreign travelers. Hiuen Tsiang of China, who lived during the seventh century, was the first to mention Kumbha Mela in his diary. He gave an eyewitness report that during the Hindu month of Magha (January-February) half a million people had gathered on the banks of the Ganges at Allahabad to observe a celebration for 75 days. The pilgrims, writes Hiuen Tsiang, assembled along with their king, his ministers, scholars, philosophers, and sages. He also reports that the king had distributed enormous quantities of gold, silver, and jewels in charity for the purpose of acquiring good merit and thus assuring his place in heaven.

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In the eight century, Shankara, a prominent Indian saint, popularized the Kumbha Mela among the common people, and soon the attendance began to grow to enormous proportions. Shankara placed special importance to the opportunity of associating with saintly persons while at Kumbha Mela. Both hearing from sadhus (holy men) and sacred bathing are still the two main focus at Kumbha Mela.
By 1977, the number of pilgrims attending Kumbha Mela had to risen to 15 million! By 1989, the attendance was in the range of 29 million-nearly double that of the previous record. Photographer David Osborn and I contributed to this year's record participation by spending seven austere weeks living in a tent on the banks of the Ganges, observing the Kumbha Mela with wonder and admiration.

The ancient origin of the Kumbha Mela is described in the time honored Vedic literatures of India as having evolved from bygone days of the universe when the demigods and the demons produced the nectar of immortality. The sages of old have related this story thus: once upon a time, the demigods and demons assembled together on the shore of the milk ocean which lies in a certain region of the cosmos. The demigods and demons desired to churn the ocean to produce the nectar of immortality, and agreed to share it afterwards. The Mandara Mountain was used as a churning rod, and Vasuki, the king of serpents, became the rope for churning. With the demigods at Vasuki's tail and the demons at his head, they churned the ocean for a 1,000 years. A pot of nectar was eventually produced, and both the demigods and demons became anxious. The demigods, being fearful of what would happen if the demons drank their share of the nectar of immortality, stole away the pot and hid it in four places on the Earth: Prayag (Allahabad) Hardwar, Ujjain, and Nasik. At each of the hiding places a drop of immortal nectar spilled from the pot and landed on the earth. These four places are believed to have acquired mystical power, and festivals are regularly held at each, Allahabad being the largest and most important.

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Besides the Ganges, there are also two other sacred rivers located at Allahabad, the Yamuna and the Saraswati . The Yamuna, like the Ganges has its earthly origin in the Himalayas. The Saraswati, however, is a mystical river which has no physical form. Its is believed that the Saraswati exists only on the ethereal or spiritual plane and is not visible to the human eye. This holy river is mentioned many times in India's sacred texts such as the Mahabharata and is said to be present at Allahabad where it joins the Yamuna and the Ganges.

This confluence of India's three most sacred rivers at Allahabad is called the sangam. The combined sanctity of the three holy rivers, coupled with the spiritual powers obtained from the pot of nectar of immortality, has earned Allahabad the rank of tirtharaja, the king of holy places.
The main highlight for most pilgrims during a Kumbha Mela is the observance of a sacred bath at the sangam. It is said that a bath in either of the sacred rivers has purifying effects, but where the three rivers meet, the bather's purification is increased one hundred times. Furthermore, it is said that when one takes a bath at the sangam during the Kumbha Mela, the influence is one thousand times increased.

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According to astrological calculations, the Kumbha Mela is held every twelve years and begins on Makar Sankranti, the day when the sun and moon enter Capricorn and Jupiter enters Aries. The astrological configuration on Makar Sankranti is called " Kumbha snana-yoga" and is considered to be especially auspicious, as it is said that the passage from Earth to the higher planets is open at that time, thus allowing the soul to easily attain the celestial world. For such reasons it is understandable why the Kumbha Mela has become so popular among all classes of transcendentalists in India

This year Makar Sankranti fell on January 14th and the Kumbha Mela began with all the pomp and glory for which it is famous. The temperature dropped to 35 degrees Fahrenheit on the evening of the 13th, but bathers were not to be discouraged. Just past midnight, thousands began to enter the confluence of the three rivers, immersing themselves in the icy cold water. Loud chanting of "Bolo Ganga Mai ki jai (all glory to Mother Ganga)" filled the clear night air as the pilgrims washed away their bad karma. They came away from the bathing area wrapped in blankets and shivering from the cold. But as quickly as they came out of the water, thousands more came in their wake. With continual chants of " Bolo Ganga Mai ki jai" they entered the waters.

At dawn the sky reddened and the sun rose to reveal a crowd of five million enthusiasts slowly advancing towards the sangam. From the center of that mass of humanity came a marvelous procession announcing the official beginning of the Kumbha Mela. Bands played, people danced in jubilation, and colorful flags and banners flew above the crowd.

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At the head of the procession were the nagas, India's famed naked holy men. These holy men engage themselves in renunciation of the world in search of equilibrium. They hope to escape the world's concomitant reactions and suffering by their austere practices such as complete celibacy and non-accumulation of material possessions. Thus they are known as liberationists. With matted locks of hair, their bodies covered in ashes, and their tridents ( the symbol of a follower of Shiva) raised high, they descended upon the bathing area. Entering the water in a tumult, blowing conchshells and singing " Shiva ki jai, Ganga ki jai," they splashed the sacred waters upon each other and played just like children. Indeed, they are said to be the very children of the Ganges.

Next came the Vaisnava vairagis, the wandering mendicants who dedicate everything to Visnu, the Sustainer. These saints live a life of service and complete dedication.Then came the innumerable other sects of ascetics dressed in saffron colored cloth and carrying their staffs of renunciation. All the centuries gone by of India's spiritual evolution were simultaneously there together in the procession. Each in turn bathed in the sangam.

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Several hours passed before the procession had finished. Then began the mass bathing of the pilgrims. From the high banks of the river one could see the dark blue water of the Yamuna mixing with the silver gray water of the Ganges. Bathers, immersed up to the waist, scooped up water with folded palms and offered it to heaven in a timeless gesture. Boatmen rowed their boats full of pilgrims to a small sandbar in the middle of the sangam which soon disappeared under a cloud of bathers.

There was none to young or old for this occasion. A young mother sprinkled a few drops of the rivers' water over the head of her newborn baby, asking God to bless her child with a good life and prosperity. In another place an elderly couple eased themselves into the cold water. Some bathers made offerings of flowers, sweets, and colored dyes to the sacred waters, while others offered Vedic hymns. The chanting of OM - the supreme combination of letters - and Sanskrit mantras issued from the lips of every pilgrim.
As night fell, thousands of campfires could be seen burning along the riverbanks. In the central festival area, gaily decorated pandals (large tents) accommodated the thousands who listened to some of India's most exalted gurus lecturing on spiritual and philosophical topics.

In some pandals there were Indian drama and classical dance groups whose exotic costumes and performances attracted large audiences. In other pandals there were elaborate displays and dioramas illustrating the stories from India's ancient epics like the Ramayana and Mahabharata. There was so much to see and do that there was never a dull moment.

Some pilgrims prefer to come to the Kumbha Mela on the days of the big sacred baths like Makar Sankranti and then return home, while others prefer to set up camp and stay for the duration. This year at Kumbha Mela there was six scheduled days for important baths. Those who remained for the full 41 days of the festival and observe all the important baths are called kalpvasis.

This year the Indian government spent more than 8 million dollars on preliminary organization for the Kumbha Mela. According to national newspaper reports, arrangements provided 5,000 gallons of purified drinking water every minute;8,000 buses which shuttle pilgrims in and out of the festival area that spread over 3,00- acres; 16,000 outlets and 6,000 poles which provided electrical facilities; 6,000 sweepers and sanitation employees who worked around the clock to maintain health standards; 9 pontoon bridges which spanned the Ganges at intervals; 20,000 policemen, firemen, and the Indian National Guard who kept a constant vigil at checkpoints and with closed circuit TV guarded against traffic congestion and other possible outbreaks or disturbances; and 100 doctors and nurses on call at all times at medical assistance stations.

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An entire city sprang up along the banks of the river during the Kumbha Mela complete with markets, hospitals, and even a tourist camp to accommodate visitors from foreign countries. The tourist camp informed me that they had sheltered over 1,000 visitors from abroad during the festivities, most being from Europe and South America. Some of these visitors from abroad had never been to India before. Others seemed as well acquainted with what was happening as did the Indians. Kumbha Mela top
In the market areas all the required necessities and luxuries of Kumbha Mela were for sale. In one place fruits and fresh vegetables were available. In another place wool blankets, which sold briskly, were piled in big stacks for easy selection. Along the main thoroughfares gypsies spread their wares which included different shapes and sizes of brass pots and bowls, beads for meditation, exotic perfumes, incense like kastori(musk) and chandan (sandalwood), and even tiger's claws set in gold.

It was also interesting to note that all the food arrangements throughout the festival were vegetarian. There was not a trace f meant, fish or eggs to be found in any camp or in any public eating place. We learned that meat is strictly taboo amongst all types of transcendentalists in India.

For the novelty seekers there was also a wide selection of oddities in the market. For a rupee or two one could employ a snake charmer who, when playing on his pungi (snake charmer's flute) would make the cobras dance, swaying to and fro. It is a long standing belief that the cobra is charmed by the sound of the pungi. Having observed several of these performances , however, it was our conclusion that the snake charmer charms his audience rather than the snake.

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many palm readers and mystic soothsayers set up shop along the Ganges offering passers-by a look into the future. Astrology and palmistry are traditional sciences in India, but one could not help but think that some of these "mystics" were simply out to turn a fast rupee from a gullible public. No doubt that among the sincere and authentic spiritualists at Kumbha Mela there were also the cheaters and hence the cheated. Buyer beware.

The camel, a hardy beast of burden, used in India for centuries to transport cargo long distances and through difficult terrain, was the unsung hero of Kumbha Mela. Carrying heavy loads of firewood, tents, and foodstuffs on their raised backs these awkward creatures formed the very lifeline to the Kumbha Mela residents. In the soft sand, cars, trucks, and even horse carts often got stuck. But the camel was rugged and the goods always got through.

For everyone at Kumbha Mela, early mornings were the most austere time of day because it was always colder than at any other time. However, chilly sunrise is considered the most auspicious time of the day for spiritual practices.Every day at dawn , thousands arose early to bathe in the Ganges and return to their camps to change mantras and meditate.

At the northern end of the festival grounds, cast against the stil blue sky, stood a lone grass hut built upon sturdy stilts. This was the ashrama of Devara Baba who, according to his followers, is more than 200 years old. Devara Baba is a lifelong vegetarian and celibate yogi. His admirers believe that his exceptional longevity is due to the fact that he only drinks and bathes in the Ganges, whose waters are considered very sacred.When we asked Devara Baba about his exact age, he replied, " I have lost count of the years. It has been a very long time."

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Every morning and evening tens of thousands of pilgrims walked the two mile stretch along the Ganges to the ashrama of Devara Baba with the hope that they might get a glimpse of this ancient sage. Much to their delight Devara Baba was always willing and even happy to accommodate them. Sitting on the veranda of his simple raised hut, the old sage relaxed in the warm rays of sunlight and blessed his visitors. Sometimes smiling or raising his hand in a gesture of grace Devara Baba radiated the aura of peacefulness. Some pilgrims brought offerings of fruits and flowers, while others came only with their prayers for blessings. It was our prayer to the sage that he allow us to take a few photographs, and in his usual gracious manner he consented.

As prominent as Devara Baba was, we sensed that there were many great souls who went undetected in our midst. We photographed until we ran out of film and were left only with a feeling of helplessness. Kumbha Mela was indeed a magnificent and awesome encounter.It was impossible to capture the festival. Indeed, it was the festival that captured us. Words, film, print, and paper can not do justice to the event — it is one that has to be experienced personally.