Britain’s Secret Underground City

All images via Full Room

Imagine being caught in the middle of a nuclear war. You’re terrified of the fall out and all you want to do is spend time with your family. You know you may never see them again, so time is precious. Then imagine that your work inform you that you can’t go home (just when you thought you had the perfect excuse not to have to work for a very long time), you can’t see your family one last time, because unbeknownst to you, you’ll be serving queen and country for just a little while longer. Only this time you don’t get to see the light of day, well not much light gets through the walls of a nuclear bunker.

Atomic Handbook

This December, on BBC Radio 4, a programme was aired that detailed the visit to an old nuclear fall out bunker, hidden in the most unlikely place, the Wiltshire countryside. Normally associated with chocolate box houses and English rose gardens, rather than the last bastion of the British Government, the sleepy shire is the now not-so-secret location of a huge underground city complex.

Underground Streets

Code named Burlington, the immense city was set to be the seat of the emergency Government during the war; should nukes be involved. Created to house the Prime Minister of the time, Harold McMillan, the entire Cabinet Office, civil servants and any support staff, the hidden city could accommodate up to 4,000 personnel, but, unfortunately, not their families. Apparently, the site was so secret that many of the workers had no idea they were allocated a desk.

Seats Still Wrapped and Waiting

Built in the 1950s in a former stone quarry, Burlington covers 240 acres and has a network of around 60 miles of roads, which were laid out New York-style, making travelling around below much easier to master than the winding above. It even has its own railway station and pub; although one pub for 4,000 Brits doesn’t seem quite right.

Prepared Hospital Beds

The bunker was equipped with enough supplies so the inhabitants could survive up to three months in total isolation. Three generators powered the whole city and the air was kept to a comfortable 20 degrees. There were hospitals, canteens, a water treatment plant and an underground lake. Burlington also boasted Britain’s second largest telephone exchange and its very own BBC studio, so the PM could address the nation, should he need to.

Radio Studio for Prime Minister’s Address to the Nation

This extraordinary city was kept in working order for 30 years, just in case, but in 1991, at the end of the Cold War, the MOD took over management of it until it was decommissioned last year. Since then all memorabilia has been removed and today the only guard protecting the entrance to this remarkable piece of British history is a solitary garden gnome.

Original here

People who exercise on work days are happier, suffer less stress and are more productive

By Daily Mail Reporter

People's mood significantly improves after exercising

People who exercise on work days are more productive, happier and suffer less stress than on non-gym days, scientists revealed today.

University of Bristol researchers found that employees who enjoyed a workout before going to work - or exercised during lunchbreaks - were better equipped to handle whatever the day threw at them.

It also found that people's general mood improved on days of exercise but they became less calm on non-exercise days.

The research, published in the International Journal of Workplace Health Management, is the first of it's kind to prove that exercise during work hours has mental, as well as physical benefits.

Jo Coulson, Research Associate in the University's Department of Exercise, Nutrition and Health Sciences, said: 'Our statistical results were very important.

'On exercise days, people's mood significantly improved after exercising. Mood stayed about the same on days they didn't, with the exception of people's sense of calm which deteriorated.

'Critically, workers performed significantly better on exercise days and across all three areas we measured, known as mental-interpersonal, output and time demands.'

The study group was made up of 200 university staff and employees working for a pensions company and an IT firm.

Each employee completed a questionnaire about their mood, workload and performance on days when they exercised.

The data was compared to answers from days participants opted not to exercise.

The workers, who were already in the habit of exercising, chose their own mode, frequency and intensity of workout to better reflect a real-life situation.

Most used a gym and did classes while some did weight training and team sports.

The key findings were:

Seventy two per cent reported improvements in time management on exercise days compared to non-exercise days.

Seventy nince per cent said mental and interpersonal performance was better on days they exercised.

Seventy four per cent said they managed their workload better.

The questionnaire scores were 27 per cent higher on exercise days in categories such as dealing calmly with stress and 41 per cent higher for feeling motivated to work.

Those who exercised were also 21 per cent higher for concentration on work, 25 per cent for working without unscheduled breaks and 22 per cent higher for finishing work on time.

Feedback from focus groups found that people who built exercise into their workday were re-energised, calmer and more able to solve problems.

Ms Coulson added: 'It's generally well-known now that there are many physical and mental health benefits that can be gained from regular exercise.

'If people try to fit an active break into their working day, they might also experience the added bonus of their whole day feeling much more productive.

'And that always feels good in our busy lives.

'The study also begs the question whether employers can afford not to be encouraging active breaks.

'The suggestion is that employers who are ahead of the game in offering proper on-site facilities actually get less from their employees on days that they don't exercise.'

Original here

Women 'may face greater HIV risk'

HIV virus (red) slips between loosely connected skin cells to reach its immune cell targets such as the Langerhans cells (orange), macrophages (purple), dendritic cells (green) and CD4 positive T cells (blue)

Women having unsafe sex may be at more risk of HIV than thought after tests revealed the virus could breach even healthy vaginal tissue.

It had been believed that only damaged skin inside the vagina could provide a route to infection.

However, US-based researchers say HIV can get past this intact barrier within hours.

UK HIV charities said it reinforced the need for women to avoid unprotected sex unless their partner's health is known.

The lining of the vagina - the squamous epithelium - had been believed by many to be capable of keeping HIV at bay.

While transmission of the virus from men to women through unprotected sex is commonplace in many parts of the world, it was thought that HIV was most likely travelling through cuts or sores in the vaginal tract, or penetrating a much thinner layer of skin further up the reproductive tract.

The scientists from Northwestern University in Chicago found that, far from this being the truth, HIV could move quickly between the skin cells themselves.

This is an important and unexpected result - we have a new understanding of how HIV can invade the female vaginal tract Professor Thomas Hope Northwestern University

The weak point, they said, occurs when skin cells are about to be shed, as the cells are no longer as tightly bound together.

Using HIV "tagged" with a marker which gives off light, they observed that, within four hours, the virus had reached a fraction of a millimetre below the surface.

At this depth, according to the researchers, it could encounter the immune cells it needed to invade to establish itself in the body.

Professor Thomas Hope, leading the research, said: "This is an important and unexpected result - we have a new understanding of how HIV can invade the female vaginal tract."

"We urgently need new prevention strategies or therapeutics to block the entry of HIV through a woman's genital skin."

Condom call

He said that while condoms were highly effective in blocking the virus, people often rejected them for cultural and other reasons.

Lisa Power, from the Terrence Higgins Trust said: "This is sadly not surprising, though it is an important finding.

"We have long known that it is easier for a man to transmit HIV sexually to a woman than for a woman to transmit it to a man and this helps us understand why.

"This will help in developing better prevention mechanisms - but until then, it's more clear than ever that a condom is a vital part of safer sex."

The charity AVERT echoed this advice, adding: "While there is evidence given by scientists that unprotected heterosexual sex is not as risky as other routes of HIV transmission, AVERT would still advocate the need for the use of condoms in all sexual encounters unless the HIV status of those involved was known.

"This study serves to strengthen that argument and will hopefully give weight to the need for safer heterosexual sex to be advocated further by governments and practitioners worldwide."

Original here