Turtles’ age determined by atomic-bomb fallout in their shells

Hawksbill turtle. Photo source: ©© Henry Jager

Excerpts;

During the years spanning the mid-1950s to 1970, the US government conducted some serious atomic bomb testing above the waters of the Pacific Ocean. As a result, the corals accumulated a lot of nuclear fallout into their structures. But the coral wasn’t the only sea creature to take radioactive material onboard, hawksbill sea turtles incorporated the material into their shells as well…

Read Full Article, CNET

Biological clock discovered in sea turtles shells, Duke University

Bikini Atoll nuclear test: 60 years later and islands still unliveable, Guardian UK (03-01-2014)

Revisiting Bikini Atoll, NASA (03-10-2014)
Sixty years ago, the United States detonated a thermonuclear bomb on Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, that altered the landscape, hundreds of lives, and the trajectory of a nuclear arms race…

French Nuclear Tests Showered Vast Area of Polynesia With Radioactivity, Guardian UK (07-03-2013)
French nuclear tests in the South Pacific in the 1960s and 1970s were far more toxic than has been previously acknowledged and hit a vast swath of Polynesia with radioactive fallout, according to newly declassified ministry of defence documents…