Isopoda is an order of crustaceans that includes woodlice and their
relatives. Most isopods are small greyish or whitish animals with rigid,
segmented exoskeletons. They have two pairs of antennae, seven pairs of
jointed limbs on the thorax, and five pairs of branching appendages on
the abdomen for respiration. Aquatic species live in marine or
freshwater habitats, mostly on the bottom, but some can swim for a short
distance. Terrestrial forms tend to be found in cool, moist places.
Around 4,500 species dwell in salt water, 500 in fresh water and another
5,000 on land. Some isopods eat dead or decaying plant and animal
matter, others are grazers or strain food particles from the water
around them, a few are predators, and some are parasitic, mostly on
fish. Some species are able to roll themselves into a ball to conserve
moisture or as a defence mechanism. The fossil record of isopods dates
back to the Carboniferous period (in the Pennsylvanian epoch), at least
300 million years ago, when they lived in shallow seas.
Read more: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isopoda>
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Today's selected anniversaries:
1774:
The publication of The Sorrows of Young Werther raised the 24
-year-old Johann Wolfgang von Goethe to international fame.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sorrows_of_Young_Werther>
1923:
The British Mandate for Palestine came into effect, officially
creating the protectorates of Palestine under British administration and
Transjordan as a separate emirate under Abdullah I.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Mandate_for_Palestine_(legal_instrument)>
1941:
The Holocaust: German Nazis aided by their collaborators began
the Babi Yar massacre in Kiev, Ukraine, killing over 30,000 Jewish
civilians in two days and thousands more in the months that followed.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babi_Yar>
1963:
The University of East Anglia was founded in Norwich, England,
after talk of establishing such a university in the city began as early
as the 19th century.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_East_Anglia>
2006:
Gol Transportes Aéreos Flight 1907 collided in mid-air with an
Embraer Legacy business jet near Peixoto de Azevedo, Mato Grosso,
Brazil, killing 154 people, and triggering a Brazilian aviation crisis.
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gol_Transportes_A%C3%A9reos_Flight_1907>
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Wiktionary's word of the day:
freedom of speech:
The right of citizens to speak, or otherwise communicate, without fear
of harm or prosecution.
<https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/freedom_of_speech>
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Wikiquote quote of the day:
Act so that in your own judgment and in the judgment of others you
may merit eternity, act so that you may become irreplaceable, act so
that you may not merit death. Or perhaps thus: Act as if you were to die
tomorrow, but to die in order to survive and be eternalized. The end of
morality is to give personal, human finality to the Universe; to
discover the finality that belongs to it — if indeed it has any
finality — and to discover it by acting.
--Miguel de Unamuno
<https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Miguel_de_Unamuno>