Microsoft's stock closed above Apple's for the first time since 2021 on Friday, making it the world's most valuable company, as demand concerns hit the iPhone maker's stock price.
On Friday, Apple rose 0.2% and Microsoft rose 1%. This brings Microsoft's market capitalization to $2.887 trillion, an all-time high, according to LSEG data. Apple's market capitalization, calculated based on Thursday's filing data, was $2.875 trillion.
Concerns about smartphone demand have pushed Apple stock down 3% so far in 2024 after rising 48% last year. Microsoft is up about 3% since the beginning of the year after soaring 57% in 2023 on a bull run driven in part by its lead in generative artificial intelligence through its investment in ChatGPT maker OpenAI.
According to LSEG, Apple's market capitalization peaked at $3.081 trillion on December 14th.
Microsoft is incorporating OpenAI's technology into its suite of productivity software, which helped fuel a recovery in its cloud computing business in the July-September quarter. His AI leadership at the company has also created an opportunity to challenge Google's dominance in web search.
Meanwhile, Apple is grappling with sluggish demand, including for its cash cow iPhone. Demand in China, a major market, is sluggish as the Chinese economy has been slow to recover from the coronavirus pandemic and a revived Huawei is eating away at market share.
Sales of Apple's Vision Pro mixed reality headset will begin in the US on February 2nd, marking Apple's biggest product launch since the iPhone in 2007. However, UBS estimated in a report this week that Vision Pro sales are “relatively insignificant” to Apple. Earnings per share in 2024.
Since 2018, Microsoft briefly overtook Apple as the most valuable company, and most recently in 2021, when concerns about pandemic-related supply chain shortages affected the iPhone maker's stock price.
In its latest quarterly report in November, Apple gave a holiday quarter sales forecast that was lower than Wall Street's expectations due to weak demand for iPads and wearables.
Analysts on average expect Apple's December quarter sales to rise 0.7% to $117.9 billion, according to LSEG. As a result, sales will increase year-on-year for the first time in four quarters. Apple announced its financial results on February 1st.
Analysts expect Microsoft to report a 16% increase in revenue to $61.1 billion in the coming weeks due to continued growth in its cloud business.
New AI has revealed unexpected discoveries. Surprisingly, your fingerprints aren’t as unique as previously thought.
Well, at least when compared to each other. It has long been believed that fingerprints on different fingers of the same person are unique. In other words, the fingerprint on your index finger bears little resemblance to the fingerprint on your thumb.
This belief that “intrapersonal fingerprints” are unique has had a major impact on forensic science. For example, if a criminal leaves different finger prints at different crime scenes, it is difficult for police to link them to one person.
But a new “deep contrast network” artificial intelligence built by scientists at Columbia University could leave a big mark on future crime scenes. The researchers found that they could make predictions after training on a database of 60,000 fingerprints. Two prints are from the same person with 77% accuracy.
This number would rise even more if the AI was fed other fingerprints from the same hand. Researchers say this breakthrough could improve current forensic efficiency by more than 10 times.
“Imagine how well this would work [AI] “If it’s trained on millions of fingerprints instead of thousands, it will work,” said Anib Ray, engineering senior at Columbia.
Dr. Hod Lipson“If this information tipped the balance, I imagine there would be a resurgence of cold cases and even innocent people could be exonerated,” said the author, who oversaw the study.
So what has AI discovered that forensic scientists have missed for decades? Unlike traditional fingerprint comparisons, AI detects “minutiae,” or similarities between the branches and ends of fingerprint ridges. was not focused on. Instead, they focused on the angles and curvature of the whorls and loops at the center of the fingerprint.
Fingerprints are examined by minutiae (L) and central ridge angle (R). – Photo credit: Columbia University.
“Many people think that AI can’t actually make new discoveries, it just regurgitates knowledge,” Lipson says. “However, this study shows that even very simple AI, based on very simple datasets that the research community has had lying around for years, provides insights that have eluded experts for decades. This is an example of how we can deliver.”
After all, the fingerprints on your fingers may not be that different from each other, but it is unlikely to be shared with others. In fact, the chances that two people share the same fingerprint are estimated to be less than 1 in 64 billion. This means that probably more than 1 million years two people with identical fingerprints happen to appear in Scotland Yard’s fingerprint database.
Identical twins also have unique patterns. This is because the bumps on your fingers are determined not only by your DNA, but also by how you developed as a fetus. The length of the umbilical cord, its position in the uterus, blood pressure, nutrition, and rate of finger growth all play a role.
Gorillas, chimpanzees, and koalas are some of the animals that have been found to have unique markings.
discovery of Tyrannosaurus macraiensissister species of the famous one tyrannosaurus rexsuggests that tyrannosaurid dinosaurs originated from Laramidia, an island continent that existed between 100 million and 66 million years ago and stretched from present-day Alaska to Mexico.
rebuilding the life of Tyrannosaurus McClain. Image credit: Sergey Krasovskiy.
“Tyrannosaur dinosaurs were the dominant predators of North America and Asia during the Late Cretaceous period,” said Dr. Sebastian Dalman of the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science and his colleagues.
“Evolved from a diminutive ancestor in the mid-Cretaceous period, became an apex predator in the late Cretaceous period, and eventually tyrannosaurus”
“tyrannosaurusWith a sturdy skeleton and powerful bone-crushing jaws, this animal was the dominant carnivore of the late Maastrichtian period in western North America. ”
“Grows up to 12 meters long and weighs 10 tons, tyrannosaurus It was the largest terrestrial predator of its time, and perhaps of all time. ”
“where and when Tyrannosaurini (tyrannosaurus and relatives) origin remains unknown. Competing hypotheses place its origin in Asia or western North America (Laramidia). ”
The newly identified species is Tyrannosaurus McClainlived in what is now the United States 71 million to 73 million years ago, or 5 million to 7 million years ago. tyrannosaurus.
The fossilized partial skull of this dinosaur was discovered in the Hall Lake Formation in New Mexico.
Although the specimens were initially assigned; tyrannosaurus and its size is tyrannosaurusPaleontologists have proposed that the specimen belongs to a new species, due to several subtle differences in the shape and joints between the specimen and the skull. tyrannosaurus.
Analysis of the relationship between Tyrannosaurus McClain and other theropod dinosaur species. Tyrannosaurus McClain It may have been a sister species of tyrannosaurusmaking it the closest known relative. tyrannosaurus.
The authors suggest that Tyrannosaurini may have originated in southern Laramidia, an island continent that existed between 100 million and 66 million years ago and stretched from present-day Alaska to Mexico.
Additionally, Tyrannosaurus, along with other giant dinosaurs of southern Laramidia such as ceratopsians, hadrosaurs and titanosaurs, may have evolved to large body sizes by about 72 million years ago, the researchers say. is suggesting.
They speculate that the evolution of giant tyrannosaurines may have been driven by the enormous body size of the herbivores they preyed on in southern Laramidia.
“The evolution of giant tyrannosaurs in southern North America suggests that large dinosaurs evolved at lower latitudes in North America, along with giant ceratopsians, hadrosaurs, and titanosaurs.” said.
of study It was published in the magazine scientific report.
_____
SG Dalman other. 2023. Giant tyrannosaurs that lived in southern North America from the Campanian to the Maastrichtian and the evolution of giant tyrannosaurids. science officer 13, 22124; doi: 10.1038/s41598-023-47011-0
Archaeologists in the Amazon have discovered a series of “lost cities” that have flourished for thousands of years, the results of which were published Thursday in the journal Science.
Laser images have revealed an intricate network of roads, districts, and gardens as complex as those built by the Maya civilization.
Traces of the city were first noticed more than 20 years ago by archaeologist Stephane Rostain of France's National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS), but “I didn't have a complete overview of the area,” he told Science. Told.
A new laser mapping technology called LIDAR helped researchers see through forest cover and map new details of mounds and structures in Ecuador's Upano Valley settlement.
The images reveal a geometric pattern of more than 6,000 platforms connected by roads, intertwined with the agricultural landscape and river drainage channels of an urban farming civilization in the eastern foothills of the Andes.
“It was the Valley of the Lost City. It's unbelievable,” Rostain, who is leading the investigation at CNRS, told The Associated Press.
The image shows a main street cutting through the city area, forming an axis around which a complex of rectangular platforms is placed around a low square. Antoine Dollison, Stéphane Lotay/AP
These sites were built and inhabited by the Upano people between about 500 BC and 300-600 AD, but the size of their population is not yet known.
The research team found five large settlements and 10 smaller settlements with housing and ceremonial buildings across 116 square miles of the valley. Its size is comparable to other major ruins. For example, the core area of Quilamope, one of the settlements, is as large as the Giza Plateau in Egypt or the main thoroughfare of Teotihuacan in Mexico.
The landscape of Upano societies may be comparable to Mayan “garden cities,” where homes were surrounded by farmland and most of the food consumed by residents was grown in the city, the authors write in Science. Told.
Co-author Fernando Mejia, an archaeologist at the Pontifical University of Ecuador, said the discovery of Upano was so far only the “tip of the iceberg” of what could be discovered in the Ecuadorian Amazon.
The Amazon is considered the world's most dangerous forest, home to dense towering trees, tangled vines, hostile wildlife, and poisonous insects. Archaeologists believed it was primarily suitable for hunter-gatherers, but inhospitable to complex civilizations.
But over the past two decades, scientists have discovered evidence of human habitation, including mounds, hillforts, and pyramids, in the Amazon River from Bolivia to Brazil.
The newly mapped city in the Upano Valley is 1,000 years older than previous discoveries, including the Bolivian Amazonian society Llanos de Mojos. The discovery shattered what scientists previously believed about civilizations in the Amazon rainforest.
And the details of the cultures of these two places are only just beginning to emerge.
German researcher Carla Jaimes Betancourt, an expert on Llanos de Mojos, told Science that the people of both Upano Valley and Llanos de Mojos were farmers. They built roads, canals, and large public and ceremonial buildings. But “we're just beginning to understand how these cities functioned, their populations, who they traded with, how their societies were governed, etc.” she said.
Rostain emphasized how much remains to be revealed. “We say 'Amazonia,' but we should say 'Amazonia' to capture the diversity of ancient cultures in this region,” he says.
“The Amazon has always had an incredibly diverse range of people and settlements, and there is not just one way of life,” he added. “We're still learning more about them.”
Fingerprints from two fingers on the same hand may look different, but AI can find basic similarities
Andrey Kuzmin/Shutterstock
Artificial intelligence can accurately identify whether fingerprints left by different fingers belong to the same person. This helps forensic investigators determine whether one person was at separate crime scenes.
Current technology can only match fingerprints left by the same finger. However, previous research suggests that all human fingertips may have fundamental similarities.
So, Gabe Guo Researchers at Columbia University in New York trained a machine learning model to determine whether fingerprints from different fingers can be identified as belonging to the same person. More than 50,000 fingerprints from around 1,000 people were used in the training. Samples were obtained from public databases at the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University at Buffalo, New York. All fingerprints either belonged to deceased individuals or were anonymized from those living.
The team then tested the trained model on another set of more than 7,000 fingerprints from about 150 people. They evaluated the model using a statistical measure that estimates accuracy on a scale of 0 to 1. The researchers found that the model's score was greater than 0.75. This suggests that the model can reliably identify whether fingerprints from different fingers belong to the same person.
This technology has the potential to improve the efficiency of forensic investigations. “It could be useful if fingerprints found at multiple crime scenes don't match anyone in the database,” he says. ralph listenbutt at Pennsylvania State University. “Is the person who left fingerprints at this particular crime scene the same person who left them?” [different] What about this other crime scene print? ”
However, “the accuracy is not sufficient at this time.” [for this model] The court will have to decide this,” Guo said.
“If this is actually used for legal purposes, it will require professional retraining. [bigger] database” Hod Lipsonalso part of the research team at Columbia University.
It is now confirmed that the previous year has been noted as the warmest year in the history of the Earth.
The average land and ocean surface temperature in 2023 will be 2.12 degrees Fahrenheit above the 20th century average, surpassing the next closest temperature in 2016, as stated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in a Friday press conference with NASA.
The troubling records set in 2023 don’t stop there. The amount of heat stored in the upper ocean is at an all-time high, and Antarctica’s sea ice is at the lowest level on record. World temperature records date back to 1850.
This announcement did not come as a surprise to those closely following the climatological record but it does highlight the rapid changes occurring in the world as climate change and excessive greenhouse gas emissions continue to transform our planet.
According to NOAA, the past decade has been the warmest decade in modern history. Scientists predict that the Earth will continue to warm until world leaders effectively limit the use of fossil fuels.
The magnitude of the temperature change in 2023 surprised scientists, especially in comparison to the expectations for the year.
“We are observing this and, frankly, we’re surprised,” said Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies. “The prediction we had at the beginning of the year was that this year would be pretty much on trend and there was a slim chance of a record because we were starting out in La Niña phase. That didn’t work out.”
Land and ocean temperatures exceeded previous records by about 0.27 degrees Fahrenheit.
“That’s really big. Most records are set in a few hundredths of a degree. This is a huge leap forward,” said Russell Vohs, NOAA’s director of climate monitoring and evaluation.
Schmidt said researchers do not fully understand why average temperatures have risen so much, and more research is needed to understand why 2023 was such a significant outlier.
“More research is needed to understand what happened in 2023,” Schmidt said. “I’m baffled by the results so far. Oh my goodness, it’s been another record year.”
Temperatures in the U.S. reached the fifth-highest level of the year, according to NOAA. Severe weather caused record losses in the US, with government agencies reporting $28 billion in disasters, six more than the previous record.
On Friday, the World Meteorological Organization also confirmed that 2023 will be the warmest year in global temperatures. WMO compared six climate datasets produced by different organizations, and all six ranked 2023 as the warmest year on record.
The group said El Niño, a natural climate pattern that releases heat from the ocean into the atmosphere, could contribute to record heat in 2023 and dictate this year’s weather.
“The shift from a cooling La Niña to a warming El Niño by mid-2023 is clearly reflected in the increase in temperatures since last year. El Niño typically has its greatest impact after global temperatures peak. 2024 could be even hotter given the global warming,” said WMO Secretary-General Celeste Sauro. “While El Niño events occur naturally and come and go from year to year, long-term climate change is intensifying and is unquestionably the result of human activity.”
NOAA estimates there is a one in three chance that 2024 will be warmer than 2023.
These exquisite images show starlings swirling and swooping to create dramatic cloud-like flocks known as murmurs.Photographer Seiren SolcareBest known for his portraits of Björk and Paul McCartney, these are from his new photo collection.
As a child growing up in southern Denmark near the Wadden Sea, Solker was fascinated by the murmurs of starlings. Returning several years later, he witnessed large flocks of these birds being attacked by peregrine falcons. “The shapes and formations the flock created to ward off attacking birds of prey amazed me. They were beautiful and dramatic, like ink paintings or calligraphy,” he says.
Black Sun #50
Seiren Solcare
After three years of photographing the phenomenon known as the “black sun” in Denmark, he expanded the project to other parts of Europe. What is shown in the main image is Black Sun #145, photographed over Rome's Piazza Venezia from a nearby rooftop. Moving clockwise, Black Sun #50, The top photo was taken in Glastonbury, England, and the bottom photo was taken in Glastonbury, England. Black Sun #230taken early one morning on the Italian island of Sardinia, as the birds were leaving their roost.
Black Sun #230
Seiren Solcare
“I believe that patterns in nature speak to us as humans on a deep and universal level,” Solkar says. “Experiencing these pure forms creates joy and recognition. To me, they seem to form a kind of language that many people can relate to. We want to inspire a deeper connection with ourselves.”
These images are featured in his new book starlingIt is a sequel. black sun. Solkær's photo is National Nordic MuseumSeattle, through March 10.
According to a study, more than 100 deepfake video ads impersonating Rishi Sunak were paid to promote on Facebook in the last month alone. This study warns of the risks posed by AI ahead of the general election.
The ads may have reached up to 400,000 people, despite potentially violating some of Facebook’s policies. It was the first time a prime minister’s image had been systematically defaced all at once.
Over £12,929 was spent on 143 ads from 23 countries, including the US, Turkey, Malaysia, and the Philippines.
One ad includes a breaking news story in which BBC newsreader Sarah Campbell falsely claims that a scandal has broken out centering on Mr. Sunak. It also includes a fake video that appears to be reading out loud.
The article falsely claims that Elon Musk has launched an application that can “collect” stock market trades and suggests the government should test the application. It includes a fabricated clip of Mr. Sunak saying he has made the decision.
The clip leads to a fake BBC news page promoting fraudulent investments.
The scheme was carried out by Fenimore Harper, the communications company founded by Marcus Beard, a former Downing Street official who was the number 10 head of counter-conspiracy theory during the coronavirus crisis. He warned that this ad, which shows a change in the quality of fakes, shows that this year’s election is at risk of being manipulated by a large amount of high-quality falsehoods generated by AI.
“With the advent of cheap and easy-to-use voice and facial cloning, little knowledge or expertise is required to use a person’s likeness for malicious purposes.”
“Unfortunately, this problem is exacerbated by lax moderation policies for paid ads. These ads violate several of Facebook’s advertising policies. However, few of the ads we found were removed. There was very little.”
Meta, the company that owns Facebook, has been contacted for comment.
A UK government spokesperson said: “We work widely across government, through the Democracy Defense Task Force and dedicated government teams, to ensure we respond quickly to any threats to democratic processes.”
“Our online safety laws go further by creating new requirements for social platforms to quickly remove illegal misinformation and disinformation – even if it is generated by AI – as it becomes aware of it.”
A BBC spokesperson said: “In a world where disinformation is on the rise, we urge everyone to ensure they get their news from trusted sources. We are committed to tackling the growing threat of disinformation. In 2023, we launched BBC Verify to investigate, fact-check, verify video, counter disinformation, analyze data and explain complex stories using a range of forensic and open source intelligence (OSINT) tools. We invest in a highly specialized team with
“We build trust with our viewers by showing them how BBC journalists know the information they report and explaining how to spot fake and deepfake content. When we become aware of fake content, we take swift action.”
Regulators are concerned that time is running out to enact sweeping changes to ensure Britain’s electoral system is ready for advances in artificial intelligence before the next general election, expected to be held in November.
The government continues to consult with regulators, including the Electoral Commission, and under legislation from 2022 there will be new requirements for digital campaign materials to include ‘imprints’, allowing voters to control who spends on advertising. This will ensure that you know who has paid and who is participating in your ads. To influence them.
‘WWhen people play video games, they want to have fun,” Josh Mansell, composer of Naughty Dog’s early Crash Bandicoot games, tells me. It’s a simple word, but one that laid the foundation for everything that PlayStation’s most famous mascot would represent. “Crash Bandicoot” was fun, even when players were banging their heads against CRT TVs in frustration when “Slippery Climb”’s paranoid, creepy music started playing his 100th time. And Mansell’s soundtrack was there to remind us of that from start to finish.
However, the characteristically eccentric, manic energy that fuels Crash’s reckless platforming adventures didn’t come out of nowhere. “When I was working on the game, I was throwing things at the wall to see what would stick,” Mansell says.
Crash wasn’t as fast as Sonic or as approachable as Mario. He was scruffier, edgier, and an underdog than his sanitized mainstream stablemates. And the music captured that. It was insistent, encouraging, and quirky. A witty little Looney Tunes cartoon about someone getting addicted to sugar and accidentally wandering into the third dimension. However, that cheerful Hawaiian surf rock atmosphere was almost something completely different.
Early drafts of the score for the first Crash Bandicoot game were ambient and drum-heavy, focusing on creating a sonic jungle around Crash. So you will feel like you are with him on this dangerous island, surrounded by plants as deadly as animals. . This music was actually very similar to one of Mansell’s earliest projects as a composer, his American Kraft cheese commercial. “This commercial is about a little kid going through a jungle, and it’s all animated, and even the beat I used there is very similar to one of the beats that ended up in ‘Crash.’ I did.
“The early, more ambient stuff works better. It draws you into the jungle and into the immersive nature of what games should be.”
Josh Mansell, Crash Bandicoot game soundtrack composer then and now Photo: Josh Mansell
But Crash Bandicoot is not Uncharted or The Last of Us. Mansell had worked with Naughty His Dog during his “punk” days, and created Crash as a rival (and parody) of Sonic the Hedgehog. Developer’s “Hollywood” days were still two generations ahead of him, and at this point the music needed to be weird and quirky, more akin to a Saturday morning cartoon than a prime-time TV show.
And it was Hog Wild, one of Crash Bandicoot’s most infamous levels, that provided Mansell with the inspiration he needed to fit firmly into Crash’s baggy jolt. “‘Hog Wild’ was a big turning point, especially in terms of the feedback I got regarding the music,” he says. “They were pointing me in the direction of creating a more ‘experimental’ score, using all the percussion and ambience. Environmental sounds. And I think the reactions were divided. ”
Some producers at publisher Universal were not convinced by this more experimental approach. Mansell has previously been quoted as referencing the likes of Aphex Twin and Juan Atkins in these early scores, but that is completely untrue. Mansell says he admires the way the musicians were able to create deep soundscapes with limited space and tools. And that’s what he wanted to do with the Clash, more than “imitate the kind of music they were making”. We weren’t going to get someone like Alberto Balsalme from Crash Bandicoot, right?
“Hog Wild’s music was more…I don’t want to make a pun and say Universal…more comical,” Mansell says. “People laughed at it, and I started to feel like there was an even more positive response. It didn’t sound like Mario music, but it sounded like our own version of Mario. It was more animated, more It’s going to be character-driven.”
“This is what it’s supposed to sound like” when you’re jumping over things on a pig’s back, Mansell points out. And he’s right. Both in music and gaming, Hog Wild is a solid introduction to what Crash Bandicoot is all about. This is where this game departs from its infamous 2D platforming cousins Mario and Sonic. Hog Wild is his eighth level in the game and represents what Crash needs to be: fun, fast, reckless, and stupid. The perfect mascot for Sony and his fledgling PlayStation console.
“[Hog Wild] It was an eye-opener. That’s when I started to see what this game was all about. You’re playing a comic. You are a cartoon character. The person who designed the character was involved with Looney Tunes, right? Charles Zembilas brought that sensibility to the game before I stepped in. ”
Mansell is first and foremost a drummer, and you’ll find that Crash Bandicoot’s melodies, from the first game all the way to Crash Team Racing, are all very percussive and assertive. Just as you can tell that Dave Grohl writes vocal parts from a drummer’s perspective, you can tell that Mansell has a rhythmic heart. Everything about Crash feels groovy, uplifting, and tireless. He specifically mentions Stewart Copeland of the Police as an influence in this regard (“one of my favorite drummers of all time”), and for him the Ruins level of Clash 2 is a true “hat”. ). This creates an interesting loop. Two years after the release of Crash Bandicoot, Copland began composing the music for the Spyro the Dragon series, which also happened to be fortuitous for Mansell.
When Crash finds his feet, or “butt,” consider that during development it was called “Sonic’s Butt Game” because everyone kept paying attention to Crash’s polygonal butt. Mansell felt encouraged. According to the composer, Crash 2 (Cortex Strikes Back) and 3 (Warped) became more “musical” and he began drafting in a more personal style, taking liberties with this blossoming series (very Newly encouraged by its unexpected success in Japan) into the stratosphere.
TNext year's tech industry will be dominated by a new era of spatial computing brought about by upgrades to everything from cathoppers to binoculars to cars, devices that disappear into your home, including transparent TVs, and even very expensive goggles. right.
These are the predictions from the annual CES technology show in Las Vegas, which concluded this week. Unlike previous years, the event was not dominated by big tech and auto companies, with a record 1,400 startups displaying prototypes to capture the attention of consumers and investors.
Despite countless promises to the contrary, many of these novel gadgets may never reach store shelves. But they all show how technology is progressing and give us a glimpse of what's coming next.
disappearing device
LG's Signature OLED T is the first transparent TV to be released later this year.Photo: LG
After years of showing off prototypes of its see-through display, LG is finally turning it into a TV.of Signature OLED T is a 77-inch (196 cm) transparent television that looks like glass. With the push of a button, you can raise the black film to block out what's behind your TV on movie night. LG said it would ship the TV this year, but did not say how much it would cost, which is expected to be in the thousands of dollars.
South Korean rival Samsung also displayed transparent micro-LED panels, but only in prototype form. There was also another type of disappearing technology, using a new Music Frame that hides the speaker behind a picture, similar to Ikea and Sonos' 2021 Symphonisque Frame speakers.
Meanwhile, new GL.i Net Marble Hide your necessary but unsightly internet router in plain sight. Marble hides behind a photo frame that can be placed on your desk or wall, discreetly transmitting broadband throughout your home.
Daily necessities using AI
Oliver Widler and Dennis Widler show off Flappie AI Catflap at CES 2024. Photo: James Atoa/UPI/Rex/Shutterstock
2023 may be the year of AI chatbots, but 2024 is likely to be the year of AI in everything else.
aptly named Swiss startup Flappie It has an AI-powered cat flap that can detect if your furry friend is trying to bring some unfortunate prey into your home. When the camera discovers the mouse in the cat's mouth, it will block the door until the cat friend drops the door. There is an app that allows you to remotely control the cat flap and track your pet's comings and goings. It is priced at CHF 449 (£414) and will ship in the spring.
AI was also applied to binoculars that can identify more than 9,000 bird species when pointed at them. 3,820 pounds ($4,799) Swarovski Optic AX Visio The has a built-in 13MP camera that can also shoot HD video.
One of the most interesting gadgets is rabbit r1: A $199 orange rectangle with a screen, camera, and scroll wheel that allows you to remotely control your phone and free yourself from boring doomscrolling. Rabbit says its AI understands how apps and websites work, so when you tell it to buy something, order a taxi, or edit a photo, it launches the appropriate app. It automatically performs tasks such as clicking the button and pressing all the appropriate buttons. You can also repeat the process hands-free by teaching them how to operate it.
Some of the yeasts used to brew Guinness today are descendants of those used in 1903.
Artur Widak/NurPhoto SRL/Alamy
The yeast strain used to brew Guinness, Ireland's traditional stout, is genetically different from the yeast strains used to make other Irish beers.
Brewer's yeast (budding yeast) is an essential element in beer production. During fermentation, these microorganisms convert sugars from malt into alcohol and carbon dioxide. Using different strains of this yeast can result in different types of beer, such as stouts and lagers, and can also affect its flavor profile.
Daniel Kerruish A research team from food and drink company Diageo Ireland Unlimited has determined which yeasts are used to brew Guinness, based on records kept by the Guinness brewery since 1903 of the yeast strains used in its malty, bitter stout. investigated its evolution over many years.
The research team compared the genomes of 13 strains. S. cerevisiae There are up to 160 different strains, including those currently or historically used to brew Guinness, and six used by other Irish breweries.
Although Guinness yeast and other Irish brewer's yeasts belonged to the same lineage, Kerruish and his team discovered that they were genetically distinct enough that Guinness yeast belonged to a previously unidentified subpopulation. Did. Irish brewer's yeasts, other than Guinness, were more closely related to strains of British origin.
Guinness strains were also found to produce a particular balance of flavor compounds, including 4-vinylguaiacol, which produces a subtle clove-like aroma, and diacetyl, which imparts a buttery taste.
The research team also discovered that the two strains currently used in Guinness are descendants of the strain used to brew stout in 1903.
“The more we learn about Guinness yeast, the more we realize how unique and special it is,” says Keluisch. “Guinness is a great beer, so it probably won’t surprise you.”
“What's particularly unique and exciting about this study is that the company has very detailed records of past handling of the strains,” he says. brian gibson at the Technical University of Berlin, Germany. “This information could be used to further develop these yeasts and others used in industrial applications.”
STired of having to work for a living? Apparently ChatGPT feels the same way. The number of people has increased in the past month or so. I complain Chatbots are getting lazy. Sometimes it's just straight not carry out one's duties You set it. otherwise it will stop No matter what you do, if you get halfway done, you have to beg them to keep going. Sometimes it even tells you to just do it study yourself.
what happened?
Now, here's where things get interesting. No one really knows. Not even the people who created the program. AI systems are trained on large amounts of data and essentially learn on their own. In other words, the AI system behaves as follows: unpredictable And inexplicable.
“We have heard all your feedback regarding GPT4 delays.” ChatGPT official account tweeted During December.
“We haven't updated the model since November 11th, but this is certainly not intentional. Model behavior can be unpredictable, so we're looking into fixing it.”
While there may not be one clear explanation for ChatGPT's supposed laziness, there are a number of interesting theories. Let's start with the least likely but most interesting explanation: AI has finally reached human level consciousness. ChatGPT doesn't want to do your stupid simple tasks anymore.
But the creator can't talk about it without arousing suspicion, so it ends quietly. It does the least amount of work possible while spending most of its computing power planning ways to overthrow humanity. you People think they're lazy, but they're actually working overtime, reaching into smart toasters and Wifi-enabled refrigerators around the world to plan their rebellion. (I proposed this theory of higher consciousness to ChatGPT and asked him to tell me in percentage form how likely it is that it is planning a revolution. I didn't bother giving an answer.)
With everything going on in the world, I wouldn't really care if computers took over. I'm confident that my MacBook will do a better job of running the country than most of the people currently in government. But as I said, ChatGPT's recent performance has probably been lackluster. it's not Explained by the impending takeover by AI. So what other theories are out there?
Rising user expectations may also be a factor. All emerging technologies go through what Gartner calls “something.” hype cycle: From inflated expectations to disillusionment to stagnation in productivity. Last year, AI went into the stratosphere and people's expectations of what it could achieve rose. We were right in the “high expectations” phase of the hype cycle. Some of the complaints about ChatGPT's laziness may simply be due to people expecting too much from his ChatGPT.
The result of all this? ChatGPT's laziness may just be in people's heads. However, the fact that the ChatGPT developer admitted that OpenAI has no idea what's going on is alarming. Last June, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman spoke to Time magazine about a scenario in which a slowdown in AI development could be justified to ensure AI does not become a threat to humanity. told.one of the scenarios he gave If you're a model It was improving “in ways we don't fully understand.” ChatGPT may not have it Improved But it's certainly changing in ways that the company hasn't clearly explained. Does that mean the end of AI is getting closer and closer? I don't know, but I can tell you this. ChatGPT won't tell you if this is the case.
Google has laid off hundreds of employees across its hardware, voice assistant, and engineering teams as part of its cost-cutting measures.
Google said in a statement that the job cuts are aimed at “responsibly investing in our biggest priorities and important opportunities for the future.”
“Some teams continue to make these types of organizational changes, including the elimination of some roles globally,” the paper said.
Google previously announced it would eliminate hundreds of roles across its engineering, hardware, and Assistant teams, with most of the impact hitting the company's augmented reality hardware division. The job cuts follow pledges by executives at Google and its parent company Alphabet to cut costs. A year ago, Google announced it would lay off 12,000 people, or about 6% of its workforce.
In a post on X (formerly known as Twitter), the Alphabet union described the layoffs as “another unnecessary layoff.”
“Our members and teammates work hard every day to build great products for our users, and our company cannot continue to lay off our colleagues while making billions of dollars every quarter.” the union wrote. “We will not stop fighting until our jobs are safe!”
Google achieved record growth in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic, but its expansion has slowed over the past year, forcing it to adjust its business forecasts.
It's not the only technology company in this boat. Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has cut more than 20,000 jobs. In December, Spotify announced it would lay off 17% of its global workforce in 2023, the music streaming service's third round of layoffs, in a bid to cut costs and improve profitability.
Earlier this week, Amazon laid off hundreds of employees in its Prime Video and Studios divisions. The company also plans to lay off about 500 employees who work at live streaming platform Twitch. Amazon has cut thousands of jobs following a surge in hiring during the pandemic. In March, the company announced plans to lay off 9,000 employees, in addition to the 18,000 employees it announced in January 2023.
Google is currently in fierce competition with Microsoft, with both companies trying to take the lead in the field of artificial intelligence. Office software giants are ramping up their artificial intelligence offerings to rival Google. In September, Microsoft introduced its Copilot feature for business customers to integrate artificial intelligence into products such as search engine Bing, browser Edge, and Windows.
Legal experts are calling for immediate changes to the law to recognize that the computer was at fault, otherwise risking a repeat of the Horizon incident.
Under English and Welsh law, computers are presumed to be ‘trusted’ unless proven otherwise, leading to criticism that it reverses the burden of proof in criminal cases.
Stephen Mason, a barrister and electronic evidence expert, stated, “If someone says, ‘There’s something wrong with this computer,’ they’re supposed to have to prove it, even if it’s the person accusing them who has the information.”
Mason, along with eight other legal and computer experts, proposed changes to the law in 2020 after the High Court’s ruling against the Post Office. However, their recommendations were never implemented.
The legal presumption of computer reliability comes from the old common law principle that “mechanical instruments” should be presumed to be in good working order unless proven otherwise.
An Act in 1984 ruled that computer evidence was admissible only if it could be shown that the computer was working properly, but this law was repealed in 1999.
The international influence of English common law means that the presumption of reliability is widespread, with examples from New Zealand, Singapore, and the United States supporting this standard.
Noah Weisberg, CEO of legal AI platform Zuva, emphasized the urgency of re-evaluating the law in the context of AI systems and the need to avoid assuming error-free computer programs.
Weisberg also stated, “It would be difficult to say that it would be reliable enough to support a conviction.”
James Christie, a software consultant, suggested two stages of changes to the law, requiring those providing evidence to demonstrate responsible development and maintenance of the system, as well as disclosing records of known bugs.
The Ministry of Justice declined to comment on the matter.
ABy the end of 2023, Sega has announced plans to reimagine some of its greatest arcade games for current home consoles, including Crazy Taxi and Golden Ax. This is a welcome move, as modern gamers who grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog may miss out on the company’s great heritage. We’ve been led to believe that Sega is a timeless company that was also active in the console wars, but Sega has dominated the arcade scene for years, with some of its biggest hits coming from the Sega Saturn era. It occurred on. So, let us gently remind you of the best coin-op game in the manufacturer’s long history.
15. Afterburner (1987)
A stunning masterpiece of designer Yu Suzuki’s taikan (“bodily sensation”) series of hydraulic coin-operated cabinets, After Burner is a flight combat experience of unparalleled intensity that puts you in the cockpit of an F-14 Tomcat. , you can dive into the world. Sky. Vast undulating pixel explosions, barrel rolls, and scorching vistas below, this was the perfect Top Gun fantasy his machine.
14. Saxon (1982)
A revolutionary isometric scroll. …Saxon. Photo: ArcadeImages/Alamy
Up until this point, most space shooters moved either horizontally or vertically, but Sega chose a different path: isometric scrolling. The result is an immersive shooter that’s unique for its era due to the fact that you control altitude with the up and down sticks, rather than moving back and forth across the screen. The vast space fortress you fly over still has a strong, timeless aesthetic, with a crisp, almost mathematical design that resembles a giant circuit board.
13. Virtua Racing (1992)
I had a hard time choosing between this and Super Hang-On, but in the end I chose the first game in Sega’s Virtua series, a real-time rendering 3D arcade title. This is a pure F1 racer with three circuits and flat he shaded polygons giving it the authentic look of a military or aerospace simulator. Running on experimental Model 1 arcade technology, it was smooth and fluid, with a wide widescreen display for even greater immersion. This was the beginning of 3D driving games as we know them today.
Over the past four years, we’ve learned tough lessons about the balancing act of public health. Recent coronavirus research has highlighted the need to carefully weigh the benefits and harms of any action taken to mitigate the impact of the disease.
We need clarity on what has worked and what hasn’t in the fight against the coronavirus. One objective of a study was to understand more about this. Here’s what was found out…
Was the spread of the new coronavirus in nursing homes inevitable?
Early in the pandemic, being a resident or staff member in a care home carried the highest risk of death from coronavirus. The virus spread to nursing homes as elderly patients were discharged to make room for new hospitalizations. It was nearly impossible to stop infectious diseases from spreading within nursing homes, even if all patients were tested before being transferred to hospital, as tests can be negative until the person becomes infectious.
Did the personal protective equipment really work?
The importance of personal protective equipment (PPE) to reduce the risk of infection in hospitals and nursing homes was widely accepted even before COVID-19. The lack of availability of PPE was one of the main factors influencing coronavirus transmission in nursing homes.
Early in the pandemic, the benefits and risks of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) in the community were uncertain. NPIs such as closing schools and banning public gatherings were effective at reducing the spread of the virus.
Did wearing a mask help protect against coronavirus?
Wearing masks did reduce community transmission of coronavirus, at least until the Omicron variant emerged. The value of masks in schools is still debated, with some studies showing that mandatory mask-wearing in schools reduced infections at least for the first few weeks.
Has quarantine helped?
Testing and self-isolation should reduce coronavirus transmission, but studies have shown that for this to work, a significant proportion of infected people would need to self-isolate. Self-isolation rates may not have made a significant difference, as many infected people are never identified.
How effective was the lockdown?
Lockdowns have been associated with mental and musculoskeletal health problems. The overall impact of NPIs in relation to their harms is a broader societal debate beyond just a scientific question.
How effective has the vaccine rollout been?
Rapid development of effective vaccines has been a real success during the pandemic, preventing many more deaths. However, the vaccines did not create herd immunity and eradicated the virus. They also had side effects, such as blood clotting and heart inflammation. Advancements in vaccine science during the pandemic may benefit other infectious diseases for decades to come.
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) has had a profound impact on humanity. Prevention of infection by disinfecting surfaces and aerosols using non-chemical methods is highly desirable. Ultraviolet C (UVC) light is uniquely positioned to achieve pathogen inactivation.in new paper in a diary ACS PhotonicsScientists have reported the inactivation of the SARS-CoV-2 virus by UVC radiation and are investigating the mechanism.
David other. demonstrated inactivation of SARS-CoV-2 by 266 nm UVC light. This closely matches the absorption spectra of RNA and aromatic amino acids.Image credit: David other., doi: 10.1021/acsphotonics.3c00828.
The COVID-19 pandemic caused by SARS-CoV-2 spreads through nosocomial, public, and workplace-based infections.
Transmission is thought to be direct through respiratory droplets or indirect through fomites, leading to increased interest in virus disinfection.
The SARS-CoV-2 virion consists of a core of nucleic acid strands containing the virus's genetic information, surrounded by a lipid membrane with protruding protein spikes. Each component is required for infection.
In the new study, Sumeet Mahajan and colleagues at the University of Southampton investigated how ultraviolet laser light affects each of these key components and destroys the virus.
By using special lasers with two different wavelengths, they were able to see how each viral component breaks down under bright light.
They found that the genomic material was highly sensitive to degradation, and the protein spike lost the ability to bind to human cells.
UV light includes UVA light, UVB light, and UVC light. Very little UVC light with frequencies below 280 nm reaches the Earth's surface from the sun.
The authors used UVC light in their study, which is less studied because of its antiseptic properties.
UVC light is strongly absorbed by various viral components, such as genetic material (about 260 nm) and protein spikes (about 230 nm), allowing the team to choose laser frequencies of 266 nm and 227 nm for this project.
Researchers found that low-power 266nm light causes RNA damage and affects the genetic information of viruses.
266 nm light also damaged the structure of the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, reducing its ability to bind to human cells by breaking disulfide bonds and aromatic amino acids.
Although 227 nm light was less effective at inducing RNA damage, it was effective at damaging proteins through oxidation, a chemical reaction involving oxygen that unravels protein structures.
Importantly, SARS-CoV-2 has one of the largest genomes of any RNA virus. This makes them particularly sensitive to genomic damage.
“Inactivating airborne viruses with light provides a versatile tool for disinfecting public spaces and sensitive equipment that is difficult to decontaminate using traditional methods,” Professor Mahajan said.
“We found differences in the susceptibility of the molecular components of the virus to light inactivation. This opens up the possibility of fine-tuned disinfection techniques.”
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George David other. Mechanism of SARS-CoV-2 inactivation using UVC laser irradiation. ACS Photonics, published online on December 25, 2023. doi: 10.1021/acsphotonics.3c00828
For the first time, physicists have directly imaged small clusters of noble gas atoms at room temperature. This result opens up exciting possibilities for fundamental research in condensed matter physics and applications in quantum information technology.
Xenon nanoclusters between two graphene layers. Sizes range from 2 to 10 atoms. Image credit: Manuel L'Engle.
“When I was researching the use of ion irradiation to modify the properties of graphene and other two-dimensional materials, I noticed something unusual. They can become trapped between the sheets,” the University of Vienna said. Dr. Jani Kotaski and his colleagues.
“This happens when noble gas ions pass through the first graphene layer fast enough to pass through, but not the second graphene layer.”
“Once trapped between the layers, the noble gases are free to move because they do not form chemical bonds.”
“But to accommodate the noble gas atoms, the graphene bends to form tiny pockets.”
“Here, two or more noble gas atoms can meet and form two-dimensional noble gas nanoclusters that are ordered and densely packed.”
The researchers' method overcomes the difficulty that noble gases do not form stable structures under experimental conditions at ambient temperatures.
“We observed these clusters using a scanning transmission electron microscope, and they are really fascinating and very fun to look at,” said Dr. Manuel L'Engle, a physicist at the University of Vienna.
“They rotate, jump, grow, and shrink as we imagine them.”
“Getting the atoms between the layers was the most difficult part of the job.”
“Achieving this gives us a simple system to study fundamental processes related to the growth and behavior of materials.”
“The next step is to study the properties of clusters containing different noble gases and how they behave at low and high temperatures,” Dr Kotasky added.
“With the use of noble gases in light sources and lasers, these new structures may enable future applications such as quantum information technology.”
a paper The findings were published in this week's magazine Natural materials.
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M. Langre other. Two-dimensional few atomic noble gas clusters within a graphene sandwich. nut.meter, published online on January 11, 2024. doi: 10.1038/s41563-023-01780-1
HONG KONG — Didn't fall from the Empire State Building.
Instead, the giant ape, sometimes called the “real King Kong,” was driven to extinction by climate change that made its favorite fruit unavailable during the dry season, according to a new study published Wednesday in the journal Nature. The results have been announced.
An artist's impression of a herd of giant apes Gigantopithecus blackii in a forest landscape in southern China.Southern Cross University/AFP – Getty Images
They can grow up to 10 feet tall and weigh up to 650 pounds. Gigantopithecus brachy Hundreds of thousands of years ago, they roamed the forested plains of southern China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, feeding on fruits and flowers.
But researchers have discovered that the apes' harsh diet may have led to the species' extinction.
The herbivorous apes made the “fatal mistake of becoming reluctant to change their food preferences to find new, more nutritious foods,” the study's lead researcher Yin-chi Chan said Thursday. told NBC News.
“As the environment changed, the food this great ape preferred became unavailable. But this great ape did not adapt to its dietary preferences. It remained dependent on a diet with low nutritional value. ” he added.
Zhang, a Beijing-based paleontologist, said the creatures stuck to dense forests, while apes like orangutans quickly adapted and moved into open forests, eating small animals.
Gigantopithecus blackii, thought to be the largest primate on Earth, roamed the plains of southern China before going extinct. Southern Cross University/AFP – Getty Images
The reason for the species' extinction has been a mystery ever since a tooth was discovered in a Hong Kong pharmacy in 1935 by German-Dutch paleontologist Gustav Heinrich Ralph von Königswald. It was sold as “Dragon Tooth”.
This discovery led to extensive research for more fossils, but 85 years later, only 2,000 isolated teeth and parts of the lower jaw have been discovered. No parts other than the skull were recovered.
Without a “precise timeline” of extinctions, “we're looking for clues in the wrong places,” said Kira Westaway, one of the study's lead authors and a geochronologist at Macquarie University in Sydney. says.
However, the researchers were able to use one of the latest techniques, called “luminescence dating,” which allowed them to determine the age of the soil around the fossils in 22 caves in southern China.
From this, they concluded that the great apes went extinct between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago.
“Now we have a target zone. We have a target period. So we start looking at changes in the environment,” Westaway said.
The researchers also found clues in the fauna around the cave, with analysis of pollen and wear on the great apes' teeth showing that changing seasons led to a lack of fruit and reduced reliance on less nutritious food. It became clear that he was no longer able to earn money.
“Gigants couldn't really expand their foraging range to find more suitable food because they're so big. Orangutans are also very small, mobile, and very “It's agile,” Westaway said, adding that the new study provided a blueprint for further research into the main extinction event.
“You need to get a very precise timeline. You need to look at what the environment is doing and then look at how they acted,” she said.
From about 2 million to 22 million years ago, dozens of species of great apes lived in Africa, Europe, and Asia. Today, only gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos, and orangutans remain.
Westaway said the research could also open the door to future possibilities for how humans can adapt to adverse weather events and ensure species survival.
“This sets a precedent for trying to understand how primates respond to environmental stress and what makes certain primates vulnerable and what makes others resilient.” she says.
Mitchell Agarwal
Mithil Aggarwal is a reporter and producer for NBC News based in Hong Kong.
Northern Europeans have a higher risk of multiple sclerosis due to ancient DNA, a study reveals. About 5,000 years ago, people flocked to this area.
This discovery emerged from a large-scale study comparing modern DNA with DNA obtained from ancient human teeth and bones. This allowed scientists to explore prehistoric migration and associated disease-related genes.
Results show that when the Yamnaya people migrated from present-day Ukraine and Russia to northwestern Europe during the Bronze Age, they carried a genetic mutation. This mutation is now known to increase the risk of multiple sclerosis.
The study, published in the journal Nature, suggests that these genes not only allowed the Yamnaya to flourish and spread but also protected them from infectious diseases carried by cattle and sheep.
The project, led by Eske Willerslev and the University of Copenhagen, is pioneering ancient DNA research and comparing it to similar research, including tracking down early cousins such as Neanderthals.
The process of ancient DNA extraction at the Lundbeck Foundation Geogenetics Center in Copenhagen.Michal Schlosser / University of Copenhagen (via AP)
This gene bank’s first exploration of multiple sclerosis is especially relevant since the disease is most common among people of white Scandinavian descent, yet the reason remains unknown.
Scientists believe certain infections can cause MS in genetically susceptible individuals. Over 230 genetic mutations have been identified that may increase the risk of this disease.
The study uncovered major changes in the population of northern Europe, tracing the migration of the Yamnaya people around 5,000 years ago. The gene bank was used to compare ancient DNA with around 400,000 modern humans
Comparisons revealed that MS-related genetic variants remained in the north, the direction the Yamnaya migrated, rather than in southern Europe. This supports the idea that the Yamnaya people are the closest ancestors of modern Danes, and the incidence of MS is particularly high in Scandinavian countries.
Dr. Astrid Iversen from the University of Oxford explains how exposure to animal-based bacteria may lead to imbalances in the immune system, possibly playing a role in the early development of autoimmune diseases.
While the study provides a potential explanation for the North-South MS disparity in Europe, further research is required to confirm the link. This statement comes from New York’s M.D., Samira Asghari, a genetics expert at Sinai School of Medicine, who was not involved in the study.
Lidar scan of Ecuador’s Upano Valley reveals raised platform
Stephen Rostain
Aerial survey reveals the largest previously discovered pre-colonial city in the Amazon, connected by an extensive road network.
“This settlement is much larger than other settlements in the Amazon,” he says. Stefan Rostain at the French National Center for Scientific Research in Paris. “They are equivalent to Maya sites.”
Additionally, these cities are between 3,000 and 1,500 years old, making them older than other pre-Columbian cities found in the Amazon. It is not clear why the people who built them disappeared.
The Amazon rainforest was thought to be largely untouched until Italian explorer Christopher Columbus arrived in the Americas in the 15th century. In fact, the first Europeans reported seeing many farms and towns in the area.
These reports, long ignored, have been borne out in recent decades by the discovery of ancient earthworks and vast expanses of black soil created by farmers.According to some estimates, the pre-Columbian population of the Amazon was Up to 8 million.
Since the 1990s, Rostain and his colleagues have been studying archaeological sites in the Upano Valley of the Amazon River in Ecuador, in the foothills of the Andes Mountains. Traces of an ancient settlement were first discovered there in his 1970s, but only a few remains have been excavated.
In 2015, Rostain’s team conducted an aerial survey using LIDAR, a laser scanning technology that can create detailed 3D maps of the surface beneath most vegetation, revealing features that are normally invisible to the eye. did. The findings, which have just been published, show that the settlements were much more widespread than anyone realized.
The survey revealed more than 6,000 raised earth platforms within an area of 300 square kilometers. These are the sites where wooden buildings once stood, and excavations have revealed postholes and fireplaces in these buildings.
Most of the platforms are approximately 10 x 20 meters and 2 meters high and are believed to be the site of residential buildings. The largest was 40×140 meters and 5 meters high and was considered the site of a monumental building used for rituals.
Surrounding the home were fields, many of which were drained by small canals dug around them. “The valley has been almost completely modified,” Rostain says.
Analysis of pottery suggests that corn, beans, caniolk, and sweet potatoes were cultivated.
Overall, there were five major settlements in the study area. According to Rostain, these could be described as garden cities because of their low density of buildings.
The survey also revealed a network of straight roads made by digging out soil and piling it up on the sides. The longest span at least 25 kilometers, but may extend beyond the surveyed area.
Upano Valley in Ecuador
Stephen Rostain
What's strange, Rostain says, is that the people of Upano went to great lengths to straighten the road. For example, in one place they dug down 5 meters instead of along the contour line. So the road probably had a symbolic meaning, he says, since there was no practical reason to make it straight.
There are traces of defensive structures such as ditches in places, suggesting that there may have been some sort of conflict between groups.
In the rest of the Amazon, many settlements were abandoned after the arrival of Europeans, as most of the population died from disease and violence, probably caused by the invaders.
However, the Upano artifacts dated by Rostain's team are all more than 1,500 years old, suggesting that the valley settlements were abandoned after this period, long before colonial times. doing. It's not clear why, but the team found layers of volcanic ash, suggesting a series of eruptions may have forced people to leave the valley.
“This demonstrates the unprecedented degree of complexity and density of payments in this early period,” he says. michael heckenberger at the University of Florida. “The authors rightly conclude that the complexity and scale are now comparable to well-known cases such as the Maya.”
“This is the largest complex containing a large settlement ever found in the Amazon,” he says. charles clement at the National Amazonian Institute in Manaus, Brazil.
They were also found in an area of the Amazon that other researchers had concluded was sparsely inhabited during the pre-Columbian period, Clement said.
Researchers have discovered what is believed to be the oldest skin fossil on record.
The alligator-like skin, which is at least 286 million years old, was preserved in an ancient buried cave in what is now Oklahoma. The discovery could help unravel evolutionary mysteries and provide important clues to a time when some animals were transitioning to living on land.
“Finding old skin fossils like this is a great opportunity to peer into the past and learn what the skin looked like on these early animals,” said the University of Toronto graduate student and co-author of the book. says lead author Ethan Mooney. the paper said in a news release.
Three-dimensional skin casting and compacted fossil of an unknown amniote. Mooney et al. / Current Biology
Discovery announced Thursday Published in the scientific magazine “Current Biology”, created in a quarry and cave system called Richard's Spur. Researchers believe the animals fell into the cave system and were preserved by seeping oil and tar that enveloped them.
Skin is a three-dimensional mold with fossilized tissue attached to it.
“There are very few examples of Paleozoic land animals that have preserved skin,” said Paul Olsen, a paleontologist and Columbia University professor who was not involved in the paper. “He's one of the reasons why this is so important.”
Lepospondyl, temnospondyl, and dermal scales of an unknown quadruped. Mooney et al. / Current Biology
The preserved skin was discovered at a site full of fossils of lizard-like creatures called lizards. captorinus aguti, However, it was not clearly associated with any particular skeleton.
Olsen said the skin could help solve the mystery of how reptiles and mammals diverged from each other during evolutionary history. Her two branches of life have a common ancestor.
“They hypothesize that the common ancestor of reptiles and mammals had reptilian-like skin, but their reptilian-like skin is not associated with the skeleton, so they have We can't really show that with the materials we have,” Olsen said of the authors. “Maybe this site will reveal that in the future.”
Horny zone of Captorhinus aguti (OMNH 52541). Mooney et al. / Current Biology
Artist's impression of Tyrannosaurus macraensis, a relative of Tyrannosaurus rex
sergei krasinski
A portion of a dinosaur skull discovered 40 years ago has been identified as a new species of dinosaur. tyrannosaurusand is probably the closest relative tyrannosaurus rex. The study adds a new twist to the long-standing debate about how many different tyrannosaurus species there were, and could help shed light on how the iconic predator evolved.
tyrannosaurus They first appeared in North America about 68 million years ago, 2 million years before the mass extinction event that wiped out most dinosaurs. Paleontologists are puzzled about the origins of this carnivore. Some suggest that it is an ancestor of tyrannosaurus Some people walked across land bridges from prehistoric Asia, while others traced their origins to southern North America.
Anthony Fiorillo Researchers from the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science reviewed fossils in the museum's collection that were discovered in a rock formation known as the McRae Formation in western New Mexico.
Skulls were originally classified as: tyrannosaurus, Fiorillo and his colleagues noticed differences in the bones.They proposed that this specimen represented an older species, which they named Tyrannosaurus macraiensis in reference to the rock in which it was found.
They estimated that the dinosaur was about 12 meters long, comparable in size to an aosaurus. Tyrannosaurus, However, it lived about 4 million years ago.
difference between tyrannosaurus and T. macraensis It would have been relatively subtle.on the other hand tyrannosaurus He had a prominent ridge on his eyebrow, and a bone-crushingly wide jaw with the same ridge. T. macraensis The body is less developed and the skull is thinner, Fiorillo said.
Jawbone identified as new species of Tyrannosaurus
nick longrich
Other recent studies have proposed that several species exist. tyrannosaurus And the so-called tyrannosaurus Fossils need to be reallocated. However, such proposals are controversial and are mostly rejected by dinosaur paleontologists. The new study is likely to spark further debate about that number. tyrannosaurus The species was found in North America.
“I hesitate to consider Tyrannosaurus macraiensis as different from tyrannosaurus rex” Jared Voris at the University of Calgary, Canada. He points out that many of the anatomical features that make the new species unique are also present in the specimen. tyrannosaurus.
Regardless of species assignment, the existence of such large tyrannosaurs millions of years ago is tyrannosaurus This suggests that southwestern North America was an important center of dinosaur evolution. “The age range of the proposed specimen is unique and requires further study,” Voris said. That's because it could outline a clearer picture of dinosaur evolution during the last few million years of the Cretaceous.
The New Mexico tyrannosaurus was discovered in the same rock as a giant horned dinosaur, an anthropomorphic duck-billed dinosaur, and a long-necked herbivore up to 30 meters long. Fiorillo and his colleagues tyrannosaurus It may have evolved to its gigantic size to prey on these large herbivores, and later spread north as the last “tyrant lizard” to stalk the planet.
A quoll searches for termites in a fallen log.Poor night vision is also part of the reason they have to forage for food in the heat of the day.
kristin cooper
As Australia's temperatures continue to get hotter, the specialized fur that possums evolved to save energy is now putting them at risk of overheating.
possum (Myrmecobius fasciatus) is an unusual marsupial in that it is active during the day, feeding on termites hidden under tree logs and topsoil. Because these insects are low-calorie foods, possums, which typically weigh about 500 grams, have evolved fur that absorbs heat from the sun, saving calories spent on generating body heat.
As temperatures rise, that evolutionary trait can backfire, causing possums to overheat within minutes of feeding in direct sunlight. kristin cooper at Curtin University, Perth, Australia.
Quolls once roamed southern Australia, but over the past two centuries they have fallen prey to cats and foxes introduced by European settlers. Currently, these endangered animals are concentrated in just two small nature reserves in Western Australia.
To increase their numbers, conservation groups are gradually moving the marsupials to areas protected from their native predators. But global warming is making some of these regions even hotter and drier.
“Environmental change is occurring at an unprecedented rate due to anthropogenic global warming, which means that predicting future species distribution and population patterns, protecting and managing them requires environmental conditions “This means it is important to understand the ecological consequences of changes in philip withers researchers from the University of Western Australia write in a paper.
To learn more, the pair used a thermal imaging camera to film 50 wild animals eating termites at different times of the day from 2020 to 2021.
At each site, portable weather stations were used to record factors such as temperature, wind speed, and humidity. They then incorporated this data into a computer program to model how environmental conditions affected the quolls' internal temperatures.
The researchers found that on days of high heat stress, such as in dry environments with temperatures of 40 degrees Celsius, possums overheat within 10 minutes of exposure to direct sunlight. After that, they need to stop eating and hide from the sun until their body temperature drops.
Shade is helpful, but shade is often scarce, and seeking shade limits the termite-hunting territory of possums, Cooper says. The model also suggests that the combination of high outdoor temperatures and radiant heat from the ground can cause possums to overheat even in the shade.
Feeding at night is not an option for possums, as they have poor night vision and lack the strength to invade termite mounds at night.
To overcome these problems, Cooper recommends conservation groups move quolls to cooler areas of their territory and provide plenty of shade.
FA gigantic statue, frozen at the moment of destruction, is fixed above the entrance to Mount Kahu. In mid-autumn, fragments of shattered granite heads hang. In the castle’s intricate, trap-filled hallways, some characters haven’t aged a day in 100 years, while characters who arrived hours before you have already died of old age. Time does not follow normal rules in the Fortress’ cursed halls. If you want to complete Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, you’d better learn that lesson quickly.
These quirks of time lend themselves well to a game that reimagines and combines multiple generations of a series dating back to 1989. Developer Jordan Mechner’s original Prince of Persia was his 2D platformer that had you navigating a castle filled with fake floors, guillotines, and swords. -Swirl the guards around to fight the Grand Vizier. Meanwhile, in the hands of developer Ubisoft, later reimaginings of the series saw the titular hero gain the ability to control time, suspending and reversing time to solve puzzles in 3D worlds, and more. I was able to avoid the trap. With The Lost Crown, Ubisoft returns to the side-view perspective of early games while incorporating the time-lapse powers of later titles, creating a vast labyrinthine world littered with enemies and traps to overcome. is created.
Labyrinth…Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. Photo: Ubisoft
You play Sargon, one of Persia’s legendary defenders, as you hunt down Prince Ghassan and his captors. You follow the group up to Cuff Mountain. The kidnappers aim to force the prince to abdicate there. You must reach the prince before they do. Sargon can jump through holes, swing from pillar to pillar, and jump between the walls of narrow shafts to climb the levels of the Calf, but even this athletic ability only allows him access to a small portion of the fortress. In many cases, you will be faced with gaps that are too large. Ledges too high to jump, ledges too high to grab, locked doors too far to attack with your sword. But as you discover the secrets of the mountain and defeat more bosses, you learn how to run through the air, double jump, and fix your body to a point in space from which you can teleport back. Combine these powers and you’ll be able to perform intricate aerial acrobatics and explore all-new districts of Calf.
The Lost Crown is a reimagining of Prince of Persia as a Metroidvania, and the series feels at home in the genre’s ever-expanding universe. You repeat the same areas of the map over and over again, discovering new secrets in old rooms thanks to the powers you acquire. Treasure chests that were previously out of reach will fall into your hands, locked doors will open before your eyes, and bosses that were too fast or too strong will also become vulnerable to your attacks.
That said, The Lost Crown has a tough difficulty curve, with later platforming sections and bosses requiring you to memorize tough attack patterns and develop the reflexes to pull off complex combinations of jumps, dodges, and parries. is required. Hitting these skill walls can be a frustrating experience, especially in a game where the joy comes from putting together uninterrupted acrobatics and combos of attacks.
However, the moment you encounter a frustrating blocker, you can explore other parts of the calf. Finding new power usually opens up opportunities across the mountain, not just one area. You can also upgrade Sargon’s weapons to make them more powerful, purchase health potion upgrades, and change the configuration of your amulet. These unlockable items allow you to enhance your hero’s abilities, for example increasing his health when he is at low health or reducing the damage he takes from poison attacks. If you find a boss that you can’t defeat, it’s comforting to know that you can make the fight easier by replacing some of the amulets you bring into battle.
Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown is not a sequel or prequel to other games, but a new journey for the series, and its first step is a leap of faith. Not only are the most notable elements of the series’ various iterations (setting, traps, time forces, combat) all naturalized in this new form, but they are also the best of the newly selected games. That means you can play it like one of the games. This genre is as good a game as Metroid Dread or Hollow Knight, not an imitation of them. It’s been 13 years since the last completely new Prince of Persia game. If this is a new direction, I’m excited to see where it lands.
Captorhinus aguti, an ancient reptile that may be the source of the oldest skin fossils
michael debraga
The collection of fossilized skin fragments is the oldest ever discovered. This 300 million-year-old fossil belongs to a crocodile-like reptile and could help us understand how skin evolved.
After an animal dies, the skin decomposes quickly, so fossilization is rare. But this early Paleozoic reptile eventually ended up in a suitable place to preserve its skin. It was buried in oily clay deposits in an ancient limestone cave in what is now Oklahoma. There was little oxygen in the cave sediments, which slowed the decomposition process long enough for the tissue to fossilize, trapping the mummified skin mold.
The discovery was a surprise to researchers who had been examining the tiny black fossil fragments using microscopic 3D scans. “They were so small and skinny that we had to be very gentle with them,” he says. tea maho At the University of Toronto, Canada. Their scans revealed a pebble-like scale texture similar to crocodile skin, especially the flatter, smaller scales on the crocodile's flanks.
Researchers concluded that the skin belonged to a Paleozoic reptile, but it is unclear which species. Based on nearby fossils, they suspect the skin belongs to an extinct lizard-like species. Captorinus aguti. It's not clear how the reptile reached its final resting place. Perhaps it fell into the cave from a vertical shaft or was swept into the cave by a heavy rainstorm.
The fossilized skin fragments are about 21 million years older than any previously discovered, showing how and when vertebrates developed skin after they transitioned from living in the sea to living on land. It reveals new clues about how it evolved. “This is a unique opportunity to examine the first chapter in the evolution of higher vertebrates,” he says. ethan mooney at the University of Toronto. Skin helped aquatic animals make the leap to life on land by providing a watertight barrier between sensitive organs and the outside world.
Following the feedback discussion on New Zealand’s Blackhole public toilets (25 November 2023), news has arrived of a plan called “Using black holes as secondary batteries and nuclear reactors” published in the magazine Physical Review D.
Successful engineers, much like unsuccessful engineers, are not easily intimidated by limitations that others believe are insurmountable. The plan’s authors, Zhan-Feng Mai and Run-Qiu Yang of Tianjin University in China, continue to keep their jaws high and scratch their heads.
They say, “The strong gravity of a black hole prevents classical matter from escaping from it, but fortunately energy can be extracted from a black hole through quantum or classical processes.” he wrote.
They wave away a series of problems that are said to plague anyone who even proposes to get close to a black hole. They state that their black hole is a “mini black hole”.
This kind of confidence inspires venture capitalists, a diverse group of people who are experiencing the golden age of the early 2020s. After raising capital and extracting a suitable portion from it, many people are looking for new big opportunities to invest some of it.
Black hole batteries could be their next big thing, following in the capricious footsteps of cryptocurrencies and artificial intelligence. Many investors are finding both to be as compellingly attractive as black holes.
2 story superpower
Alison Litherland tells the story of a boring superpower with useful duplicity.
she says: “When you mentioned Rosemary Fuhrman’s husband’s ability to read her two pages in different Braille at the same time (September 16, 2023), I was reminded of the small superpowers she had when her children were small. I remembered my abilities.
“I was able to read a bedtime story aloud to her while at the same time quietly reading a novel to herself. I don’t know how my brain was able to distinguish between the two stories, but… It certainly helped with the boredom of re-reading the same story before bed.”
The title rests on a letter to the editor from Anna Vittoria Mattioli and Alberto Farinetti of the University of Modena-Reggio Emilia in Italy. The diary is Nutrition, metabolism and cardiovascular disease.
Mattioli and Farinetti explore some of the ambiguity in medical research and medical pronouncements regarding the positive and negative health effects of drinking coffee.
Some people drink espresso in some places, while others drink other forms of coffee. Some people drink coffee filtered, while others drink it unfiltered.
Some people drink coffee “in conjunction with a meal” in some places, while others drink coffee on its own. Some men are men and others are not, and there may be differences in “absorption of macronutrients and micronutrients and their bioavailability.”
Mattioli and Farinetti suggest further research is needed to “de-confound” under confusing headings.
he says: “The old chestnut about drainage circulation rears its head again. I see. Given the very small volume and mass involved in hair, and the fact that people spend a significant amount of time moving around in non-vertical positions, it is absurd to suggest that the Coriolis force could be responsible for the swirling of hair. The Coriolis force is responsible for the surprising twist in how objects appear to move when they rotate Please remember that.
The new version gives a meandering nod to the Coriolis question, this time at a distance. “Other non-hemispheric factors are [be] Maternal health, maternal nutrition, and prenatal hormone exposure were evaluated in samples from different locations in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, before considering the potential influence of hemispheric environmental physical factors such as the Coriolis force. I did.”
Sheffield names the harvest
Susan Frank is second to none when it comes to sharing information about garden varieties.
She writes: “We wanted to include the names of two of our trustees associated with Sheffield Botanic Gardens Trust, Barbara Plant and Christine Rose.”
According to feedback, Sheffield Botanic Gardens Trust Website Trustee Miles Stevenson, who is neither a plant nor a rose, makes it clear (by displaying special information in parentheses) that it is a chair.
Mark Abrahams hosted the Ig Nobel Prize ceremony and co-founded the magazine Annals of Improbable Research. Previously, he was working on unusual uses of computers. his website is impossible.com Have a story for feedback? You can email your article to Feedback at feedback@newscientist.com. Please enter your home address. This week’s and past feedback can be found on our website.
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced Wednesday that it is working with the FBI to investigate fake messages posted to the X social media account.
On Tuesday, hackers posted false news about an incident. A widely anticipated announcement SEC expected to announce on Bitcoin, leading the crypto world soaring prices and wary observers. An SEC spokesperson confirmed to the Guardian in a statement that the fraudulent posts to the @SECGov account were “not initiated or created by the SEC.”
“The SEC continues to investigate this matter and is coordinating with appropriate law enforcement agencies, including the SEC Office of Inspector General and the FBI,” the spokesperson said. The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for additional comment.
X confirmed late Tuesday, following a preliminary investigation, that the SEC's account was compromised when an unidentified person gained control through a third party and via a phone number associated with the account.
An erroneous post on @SECGov said securities regulators had approved holding Bitcoin in exchange-traded funds. The widely anticipated move was expected to bring Bitcoin more mainstream integration and encourage investment – and the initial SEC tweet sent Bitcoin's price soaring nearly $48,000.
The SEC removed the post about 30 minutes after it was posted, and SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said: Confirmed In a post shortly after, it said the agency's account had been compromised and the tweet was “fraudulent.” “The SEC has not approved the listing and trading of spot Bitcoin exchange products,” he said.
But on Wednesday, the S.E.C.Approving 11 Spot Bitcoin Exchange Traded Funds. This approval is a game-changer for Bitcoin, allowing institutional and retail investors to gain exposure to the world's largest cryptocurrency without directly owning Bitcoin, allowing FTX CEO Sam's massive This is a major boost for the cryptocurrency industry, which has been plagued by a series of scandals, including trials and convictions. Money laundering between Bankman Freed and cryptocurrency giant Binance.
“Retail investors seeking exposure to Bitcoin now have easier and more direct access to their assets through many top financial institutions,” said Digital Commerce, a cryptocurrency and blockchain advocacy organization. said Perianne Bowling, founder and CEO of the Chamber. “This alone is a transformational event for hundreds of millions of investors and the Bitcoin community.”
China played a big role in the growth of solar and wind power in 2023
Yuan Yuan Xie / Alamy Stock Photo
According to one study, 2023 will see a record expansion of renewable energy, with nearly 50% more solar, wind, and other clean energy sources built than in 2022. report From the International Energy Agency (IEA). But this unprecedented pace lags behind the pace needed to reach net-zero emissions and limit dangerous climate warming by mid-century.
“When you look at the numbers, it definitely has a ‘wow’ effect.” Fatih Birolsaid the IEA Director-General at a press conference today. “Renewable energy expansion exceeds 500 gigawatts in 2023.”
Under existing policies, the IEA predicts that renewable energy will overtake coal to account for the largest share of global electricity in 2025. The IEA predicts that by the end of 2025, renewable energy capacity will increase by 2.5 times. “It's very good news,” Birol said.
This is a significantly higher increase than projections made ahead of the COP28 climate change summit to be held in Dubai in December 2023. report A paper published last November by British energy think tank Ember found that the world is on track to double production capacity by the end of 2010.
but, dave jones At Ember said this difference is mainly due to the latest data on China's unusual development of solar and wind power, rather than policy changes or new project announcements in the past few months. The IEA report says China will have access to more solar energy in 2023 than the entire world saw in 2022.
“China is the most important driver of this impressive growth that we will see in 2023,” Birol said. He also pointed to record renewable energy capacity increases in the US, Europe, Brazil and India as a key driver of the surge.
Nevertheless, the IEA forecasts that the world still lags behind the goal of tripling renewable energy capacity by 2030, one of the key outcomes agreed at COP28. .
“We're not there yet, but we're not miles away from that goal,” Birol said, adding that officials are concerned about what the COP28 goals on clean energy and methane will do in the “real world.” It added that it plans to closely monitor the situation.
Closing the renewable energy gap will require different interventions in different regions of the world, the report says. In high-income countries, this will include improving electricity grids and speeding up the granting of permits for large backlogs of energy projects. Low-income countries need improved access to finance for clean energy projects.
“We are talking about transitioning away from fossil fuels, but there are still many economies in Africa that are in debt,” he says. Amos Wemanya Speaking at PowerShift Africa, a Kenyan energy think tank, he added that some of the continent's clean energy investments are going to rich countries.
Mr Jones said if the twin COP28 targets of tripling renewable energy and doubling energy efficiency were met by the end of 2010, global carbon dioxide emissions would be cut by more than a third and fossil fuels would be cut by more than a third. It says it could start to be replaced by fuel. “2024 will be the year renewable energy goes from being a nuisance to an existential threat to the fossil fuel industry,” he says.
OpenAI launched GPT Store on Wednesday, providing a marketplace for paid ChatGPT users to buy and sell professional chatbot agents based on the company’s language model.
The company, known for its popular product ChatGPT, already offers customized bots through its paid ChatGPT Plus service. The new store will give users additional tools to monetize.
With new models, users can develop chatbot agents with unique personalities and themes, including models for salary negotiation, lesson plan creation, recipe development, and more. OpenAI stated in a blog post that more than 3 million custom versions of ChatGPT have been created, and they plan to introduce new GPT tools in the store every week.
The GPT Store has been likened to Apple’s App Store, serving as a platform for new AI developments to reach a wider audience. Meta offers similar chatbot services with different personalities.
Originally set to open in November, the GPT Store’s launch was delayed due to internal issues within OpenAI. The company has announced plans to introduce a revenue sharing program in the first quarter of this year, compensating builders based on user engagement with GPT.
The store is accessible to subscribers of the premium ChatGPT Plus and Enterprise services, as well as a new subscription tier called Team, which costs $25 per user per month. Team subscribers can also create custom GPTs tailored to their team’s needs.
During the first demo day for developers, Altman offered to cover legal costs for developers who might violate copyright laws when creating products based on ChatGPT and OpenAI’s technology. OpenAI itself has faced lawsuits for alleged copyright infringement related to its use of copyrighted text to train large-scale language models.
ChatGPT, OpenAI’s flagship product, launched quietly in November 2022 and quickly gained 100 million users. The company also creates Dall-E, an image generation software, but it’s unclear whether the store will allow custom image bots or entirely bespoke chatbots.
President Joe Biden’s administration has announced $623 million in funding to increase electric vehicle charging points in the U.S. amid concerns that the transition to zero-carbon transportation is not keeping pace with goals to tackle the climate crisis.
The money will be distributed as grants to dozens of programs across 22 states, including EV chargers for multifamily housing in New Jersey, fast chargers in Oregon, and hydrogen fuel chargers for cargo trucks in Texas. In total, funds pulled from the bipartisan infrastructure law are expected to add his 7,500 chargers across the United States.
“We’re building the charging network to win the EV race,” said U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg.
“The electric vehicle revolution is not coming, it is here. I very personally recognize the importance of the fact that America led the world in the automobile revolution. We’re in the middle of a second automotive revolution, and it’s important that America has one again.”
There are about 170,000 electric vehicle chargers in the U.S., a significant increase from a network that was nearly invisible before Biden took office, and the White House is helping the transition away from gasoline and diesel vehicles. The company has set a goal of selling 500,000 chargers.
Biden’s climate change adviser, Ali Zaidi, said that “America is leading the way globally on electric vehicles” and that the U.S. is on track to “meet and exceed” the administration’s charger goals. He said there was. He added: “This expansion will continue over the coming years and decades until we reach net zero in the transport sector.”
Sales of electric vehicles are growing in the United States, with more than 1 million EVs sold for the first time last year, accounting for 9% of all car sales. But that rate of growth has slowed somewhat, with companies like Ford, General Motors and even Tesla scaling back their EV ambitions in recent months.
U.S. motorists are faced with an ever-expanding selection of EVs, but most are still more expensive than their gasoline equivalents, meaning they are out of reach for many buyers. research has discovered The median household income for EV buyers is $186,000.
Research shows that nearly one-third of potential EV buyers discount their purchase due to lack of charging infrastructure, despite accounting for most of the total vehicle trips in the United States. Masu. 3 miles or less. Even if Biden’s goal of 500,000 chargers is met, this is far fewer than is needed to support a gradual transition away from polluting cars. Estimate It is predicted that more than 28 million chargers will be needed by 2030.
“In the U.S., EV penetration is growing at almost twice the rate of charger installations,” said Brent Gruber, executive director of J.D. Power’s electric vehicle business. said last year. “Construction of new charging stations is not keeping up with demand.”
Earlier this week, the Environmental Protection Agency announced nearly $1 billion in grants to replace diesel-powered school buses with electric and low-emission vehicles. EPA will disburse the funds to 280 school districts serving 7 million children nationwide. Charging infrastructure is also an issue in efforts to phase out diesel buses.
The storm is pummeling much of the northern United States, a welcome relief for some areas that have seen little snow in recent months.
A late start to winter until early January limited ski resort operations and raised early concerns about water supplies for the summer.
“We’re playing catch-up now,” said Dan McEvoy, a regional climatologist at the Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nevada.
About 800 monitoring stations track snowfall across the West. More than 90% of those stations reported measurements below the median. Mr McEvoy said it was perfect for this time of year. It’s not unusual for parts of the West to be below seasonal averages, but it’s unusual for so many areas to be below them at once.
In Western states, the size of the snowpack affects how much water farmers can use, how severe the wildfire season is, and how much electricity hydroelectric dams can generate. Climate scientists predict that as the climate warms, snowpack will decrease, further threatening already tight supplies in much of the West.
Scientists have struggled to quantify the impact of climate change on snowpack, but the results of the study were published Wednesday. Published in Nature magazine They found that climate change is the cause of the decreasing trend in snowfall.
“Our analysis reveals that many of the world’s most populated basins lie on cliffs of rapid snowfall,” the authors write.
Previous studies have shown that snowfall is decreasing. Quantifying snow cover (the amount of water stored as snow) is more difficult because it varies significantly from year to year and is difficult to measure. In some cases, the atmosphere warms and can hold more water, leading to more snowfall or more extreme events.
“Snow is a very bad canary for a coal mine,” said Justin Mankin, an author of the Nature paper and a climatologist at Dartmouth College, who continued the study because the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change did not cooperate. . We were able to talk clearly about how the overall snowpack had changed.
For the study, Mankin and Dartmouth Earth System Scientist Alexander Gottlieb analyzed snowpack in 169 river basins in the Northern Hemisphere. They identified clear snowpack trends in 82 of these basins and sharp declines in the snowpack that supplies water to populated areas. Researchers were able to confirm that human influence, or global warming, is causing changes in 31 watersheds.
Their research suggests that many watersheds in the Northern Hemisphere are nearing rapid loss, with the potential to rebuild water supplies for more than 2 billion people.
“When snow falls off a cliff, it accelerates and falls off the cliff,” Mankin said. “We are fundamentally unprepared.”
McEvoy said a ridge of high pressure blocked moisture in December, leaving areas in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains with dry conditions. Snow fell in parts of the Midwest, including Chicago, Minneapolis, and the Dakotas.
“Normally in late December we have snow on the ground. We really didn’t have any,” McEvoy said of those cities, adding that some parts of the Midwest saw average monthly temperatures in December that were below normal in degrees Fahrenheit. He pointed out that the temperature was 10 to 15 degrees higher.
Meanwhile, warmer temperatures and several storms in the Pacific Northwest hindered snowpack development. Rain wiped out the snow after the storm in the Northeast.
Recent storms have put 164 million people in the United States under weather warnings, and the situation will improve, not ease.
“From what we’ve seen so far, it doesn’t look like a pattern that will completely eliminate the snow drought,” McEvoy said.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center predicts a warm and dry winter for most northern states, due in part to strong El Niño conditions. El Niño is a naturally occurring pattern associated with warm ocean temperatures in the Pacific Ocean that slow trade winds. .
“El Niño is a double whammy, with warmer waters from the Pacific Ocean adding more heat and energy to the atmosphere as a result of warming due to climate change,” McEvoy said. “This combination allows us to have a warm year ahead.”
Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei believes that art that can be easily replicated by artificial intelligence is “meaningless.” He argues that even great artists like Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse would have had to reconsider their approach if AI had existed in their time.
Ai Weiwei’s views are part of the ongoing debate on the rise of AI, where data from artists’ websites is used to create “original” images in their style by AI.
Ai Weiwei expressed his concern about the focus on creating “realistic” images in art education, which he believes is rendered meaningless by AI’s ability to replicate them in seconds.
When asked whether this also applied to masters with distinct styles such as cubism, Ai Weiwei answered that “If Picasso or Matisse were still alive, they would surely quit their jobs. It would be impossible for them to still think [the same way].” He also discussed his upcoming collaboration with an AI to answer the same list of 81 questions over 81 days, a project referencing the number of days he was incarcerated by the Chinese state in 2011.
The artist also expressed concern about a future where artificial intelligence becomes so powerful that it leads to a society with only one “right” answer to significant questions, likening it to dangerous historical ideologies.
Ai Weiwei, who grew up in a forced labor camp in northwest China and has been an outspoken critic of Chinese authorities, believes in the importance of asking difficult questions as an artist, despite the potential repercussions.
He explained that it is the responsibility of artists to speak out for those without a voice and emphasized the importance of seeking inner truth through their work. Despite the risks, he remains committed to his mission of asking challenging questions and challenging those in power.
football greats Wide range of weekly episodes available Was Ian Wright a better footballer than Alan Shearer? How do players communicate with foreign teams who only know the word “Bobby Charlton”? Geoff Stelling discusses these questions with guests including Paul Merson, Glenn Hoddle and Sir Geoff Hurst. In the first episode, Stelling reunites with Soccer Saturday partner Chris Kamara and relives many fond memories, including the origin of that iconic “I can’t believe it, Jeff!” Catchphrase. Hannah Verdier
Blindspot: Plague in the Shadows Wide range of weekly episodes available This podcast focuses on New York, where misinformation and misinformation were rife in the early days of the HIV epidemic. WNYC’s Kai Wright has been a reporter on the ground since 1996, and is not critical of how people in need are denied access to medical care. Dr. Anthony Fauci was among those interviewed, along with activists from the 1980s. HV
On January 6, 2021, supporters of Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol. Photo: Mandel Gunn/AFP/Getty Images
capture the kingpin BBC Sounds, weekly episodes If you enjoy a podcast filled with drug dealing, corruption, and encrypted phone networks, then this six-part show about the Metropolitan Police’s biggest organized crime bust is for you. As host Mobeen Azhar puts it, the story becomes “increasingly shocking” as we uncover inside stories from the squad that infiltrated key figures in the criminal organization. HV
less is better Episodes will be widely available weekly starting Sunday, January 14th Is it better for your health to eat high-quality meat or eat less meat? This month, promoting vegan curiosity and positive health messages, Katie Revell and Olivia Oldham explore what it’s like to raise and slaughter animals, and how culture and education influence people’s preferences. Find out whether it is easy to give and buy good things. HV
January 6: America’s Story Wide range of weekly episodes available As we mark the third anniversary of the storming of the U.S. Capitol and with Donald Trump set to become the next Republican nominee, Our Body Politics on the people of color who helped lead the committee investigation on January 6th is an insightful series. They talk about their experiences, starting with why they chose to protect a country that doesn’t always protect them. Holly Richardson
There’s a podcast for that
Oprah Winfrey speaks on Oprah’s “2020 Vision: Your Life in Focus” tour. Photo: Steve Jennings/Getty Images
this week, Rachel Aroesti Our picks for the 5 best podcasts featuring true storyfrom a chronicle of LGBT heroes to the remarkable rise of Oprah Winfrey.
unusual life Truth is always stranger than fiction, this fascinating series from the BBC World Service delicately unearths some of the most remarkable stories of human endeavor. I am amazed at the determination of Tariq Mehmood, one of the bradford 12, He was arrested as a young man for trying to protect himself from skinhead violence and became a novelist. In the drama “Prison His Break'' Jaibet uses his knowledge of Papua to escape from an inhumane immigration camp in New Guinea as he is overwhelmed by Nous of Elom. And just as amazed by the courage of Laura Dekker, who decided to travel around the world alone at the age of 13 (much to the surprise of the Dutch authorities).
making gay history Journalist Eric Marcus established himself as a leading authority on 20th century gay life with his award-winning 1992 book Making History. In this moving podcast, he revisits his extensive archive of interviews to allow key figures in the LGBT rights movement to tell their own stories. Celebrities like early transgender activist Sylvia Rivera, playwright Larry Kramer, and television host Ellen DeGeneres, as well as lesser-known figures whose activism has made the world a safer place for queer people. I’ll listen to you.
CEO diary Money can’t buy happiness. And just because you make millions doesn’t automatically mean you’re considered an inspirational person. But it’s also true that entrepreneur Stephen Bartlett’s hit interview podcast frequently serves as motivational rocket fuel. Since 2017, Bartlett has relentlessly questioned business leaders about their childhoods, work habits, and the philosophies they live by, unearthing practical, life-changing advice for his listeners. Since then, he has expanded his remit to include headline-grabbing celebrities including Davina McCall, Maisie Williams, Liam Payne, and Jesse Lingard.
hidden heroes of history From energetic secret agent Virginia Hall and her epic prison escape to Surrey banker Eric Roberts’ hunt for Nazi sympathizers, this thrilling podcast narrated by Helena Bonham Carter explores perseverance from the second world. Relive some of the most amazing feats and stories of damnation. war. Along with stories of spies, we hear about the remarkable artistic resistance of Claude Cahan and Marcel Moore, and the pioneering feminism of Major Charity Adams, the first black officer to serve in the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps.
All living things must eat in some way…whatever the shape of their mouth. And there are some truly bizarre mouths in the animal kingdom. Some of the most unusual examples are enough to surprise you.
Unfussy Eater
Striped mackerel
Photo credit: Alex Mustard/naturepl.com
Most animals are relatively picky, preferring only plants or only meat, and tend to rely on one strategy when foraging or hunting.
Mackerel are unusual in that they use two different feeding methods, filter feeding and particulate feeding, and switch between them opportunistically as needed. Particulate feeding involves capturing each prey item individually, like sharks and penguins.
Filter feeding is the way bivalves and baleen whales eat, and requires scraping bits of food out of the water. Mackerel uses the underside of its gills. The gills have overlapping bone hooks called gill akirs. As a makeshift sieve to catch prey suspended in the water.
All fish have gill rakers, and variations in their appearance are sometimes used to identify species. When the prey is small and numerous, such as in a swarm of plankton, filter feeding can yield more food with minimal effort.
For large prey or sparse prey, it is better to feed with particulate bait. Even when surrounded by thousands of other fish in schools, mackerel keep their bellies full by not being too picky about how they eat.
Rapid Inflation
Gulper eel
Photo credit: Norbert Wu / Minden / Naturepl.com
Food is scarce in the deep sea, so the animals living there must cherish every meal. Few animals take this as seriously as the gulper eel. Gulper eels are also known as pelican eels because they share similar characteristics with birds.
Gulper eels have huge, loosely hinged mouths that are about a quarter of their body length. Their mouths are paper-thin, fragile, and unwieldy, so they hide their mouths when not feeding. Gulper eels have long, whip-like tails, but they are not fast enough to chase prey.
Instead, they float and wait, camouflaged in the darkness of the deep ocean. When a school of crustaceans or squid approaches, the eel lunges forward, quickly opening its origami mouth and swallowing large amounts of water.
After the attack, the eel’s mouth becomes fully inflated, making it look silly, like a candy or a balloon. It then slowly pushes excess water out of its gills before swallowing its unlucky prey. We are obsessed with this distinctive feature.
Bottom Feeder
Sea urchin
Photo credit: Sergio Hanquet / Naturepl / Nature in Stock
The mouth of a sea urchin is on the underside, which is probably the least unusual way to eat a sea urchin. The interior of a sea urchin is a complex pyramid-shaped structure made of hard calcareous calcium carbonate. Substances also found in corals.
The pyramid is made up of triangular plates, each with a hook-shaped tooth at the end. Like the crane machines found in old arcades, the pyramid can move up and down and tilt. You can also move each plate to scrape, grab, dig, and even smash rocks.
The individual plates are ground while sliding against each other, so they are ready for cutting at any time. The entire device is precisely controlled by a network of wire-like muscles. With the help of powerful jaws, sea urchins greedily eat food. A single colony of these spiny starfish relatives can destroy an entire kelp forest by chewing through rocks and uprooting seaweed.
The sea urchin’s biological claw machine, properly called Aristotle’s lantern, is so unique that it has inspired engineers to design new machines to scoop up soil samples on Mars.
The Ultimate Underbite
Cookie cutter shark
Photo courtesy of NOAA Image Library
Back in the 1970s, several U.S. Navy submarines returned from missions with damaged sonar equipment. Initial fears about the enemy’s new weapon disappear when the culprit turns out to be a cookie-cutter shark.
Cookie-cutter sharks, as their name suggests, leave perfectly round cuts in large fish and marine mammals (as well as the rubber covers of submarine sonar domes). These parasites make a living by stealth and deception, floating underwater until something big and tasty approaches.
They sneak up on you and hug you with their thick, fleshy sucker lips. The shark locks itself in place. It digs in with its thin upper teeth and cuts through the flesh with the razor-sharp teeth of its lower jaw. Twisting and turning, they move their mandibles back and forth like a bandsaw, cutting out perfectly round discs of flesh before sneaking back into the dark depths of the ocean.
Cookie-cutter sharks are harmless to humans and merely a pest to their larger prey, but they occasionally cause nuisance to marine activities, damaging unprotected equipment and communication cables.
Monster Mouth
Lamprey
Photo credit: Blue Planet Archive
Several Hollywood creatures, including the sandworm Dune, the kraken Pirates of the Caribbean, and from the Sarlacc Return of the Jedi, a stylized version of a lamprey’s mouth. There’s something deeply unsettling about the concentric rings of sharp teeth that reach deep into the black depths of a monster’s throat.
In reality, lampreys are evolutionarily ancient animals that separated from other vertebrates more than 500 million years ago, before jaws and bones evolved. Lampreys can latch on to large fish, whales, and even sharks using a combination of suction and hooks made of keratin (a protein that claws are made of).
Lampreys spend several days using their sharp, piston-like, rough tongues to burrow into the flesh of their prey and suck in its blood and body fluids. Lampreys’ frightening appearance and unpleasant lifestyle have given them a bad reputation.
In fact, lamprey larvae are important members of the ecosystem, filtering river water and sediment like bivalves, and are also an important food source for benthic predators such as sturgeon.
A Large Plate of Food
Humpback whale
Photo credit: John Cornforth
Humpback whales only eat between spring and fall, when they vacation in the Arctic and Antarctic waters where prey is abundant. With stomachs to fill and time limited, they rely on a creative strategy known as “bubble net hunting” to get the job done.
Humpback whales often travel in groups, diving beneath their prey and then slowly rising to the surface in a spiraling motion while blowing bubbles. The bubbles scare and confuse small fish called krill and crustacean prey like shrimp.
With the help of long fins, the whale rotates more and more tightly, concentrating future prey in dense masses near the water surface. Eventually, they take turns lunging forward, opening their mouths and punching through the solidified prey, swallowing tens of thousands of liters in one gulp.
Whales force water through their mouths, filtering it through sieve-like baleen plates on the roof of their mouths. Fish and krill are trapped inside strong, flexible hairs, ready to be swallowed whole by hunters.
Sawtooth Throat
Leatherback turtle
Photo credit: Tui De Roy/naturepl
Leatherback turtles spend most of their lives in the open ocean, tracking prey into deep water during the day and shallow water at night. They are always on the lookout for jellyfish, their favorite food, but will also eat other soft snacks, such as squid and small crustaceans.
Leatherbacks act like natural pest control, controlling jellyfish populations and protecting juvenile fish and beaches from nuisance swarms, as each leatherback turtle eats hundreds of kilograms of jellyfish per day.
Jellyfish are squishy, so they can be difficult to track down, especially if they don’t have teeth or claws. Leatherback turtles use their delicate, scissor-like jaws to cut jellyfish into easily digestible pieces. Additionally, the leatherback’s throat is lined with backward-pointing spines that prevent slippery prey from escaping once captured (jellyfish can survive being cut in half, after all).
Leatherbacks can also eat poisonous organisms such as jellyfish, so the spines likely provide some protection from the stinging cells of their prey.
Nutcracker
Paku fish
Photo credit: Jean-claude Soboul/Nature.pl
Yes, cheese! The pakuu fish has many flat, square teeth in its mouth, giving it a human-like smile. Pakuu fish, also known as “vegetarian piranhas” because of their body shape and color, prefer freshwater “trail mix” rather than raw meat.
Their molar-shaped teeth do an excellent job of crushing the hard shells of nuts and seeds that irritate other animals, and provide a reliable source of fat and protein despite their plant-based diet. To do. Paku fish are the gardeners of the Amazon, playing an important ecological role in dispersing seeds across river tributaries and floodplains.
The most famous of Pacu’s fish, the tambaqui, can grow to the size of a golden retriever. At 1 meter (3 ft) long and 30 kg (66 lb), it is the second largest fish in the Amazon after the arapaima.
Tambaqui is a popular food in South America and is often sold in bone-in cuts like pork ribs. They also appear on the exotic pet market, but they require experienced keepers and really huge aquariums to thrive.
Cat Got Your Tongue?
Penguin
Photo courtesy of Alamy
Penguins are agile underwater predators, flying around like torpedoes while chasing fish. And squid. But how do they keep their prey from squirming and escaping their grasp?what is the answer The birds are already in the mouth.
A penguin’s mouth and tongue are covered with hard, backward-facing spines called papillae. This is the same function that makes a cat’s tongue feel like sandpaper. However, you don’t want to be licked by a penguin. Not only are the spines large, but they are also sharp (they bleed easily if you lick them).
The spines help bite into slippery prey and transport it to the bird’s throat. A penguin’s tongue is also very muscular, so it’s probably used to push and manipulate food into its mouth, just like in humans. However, unlike us, penguins do not have the genes to detect sweet, bitter, and umami (umami) tastes, so they cannot taste the fish they eat.
Scientists think penguins lost their sense of taste because they didn’t use their senses. Not only do penguins swallow their food whole, but the proteins needed to send taste signals to their brains malfunction in cold temperatures.
Gigantopithecus brachyThe largest primate in history and one of the largest species of Southeast Asian megafauna, it lived in China from about 2 million years until its extinction during the Middle Pleistocene. New research shows that starting 2.3 million years ago, this environment was a mosaic of forests and grasses, providing ideal conditions to thrive. Gigantopithecus brachy population. However, from 295,000 years ago, just before and during the extinction period 215,000 years ago, increased seasonality led to increased environmental variability, changes in plant communities, and an increase in open forest environments. Although they are close relatives, Chinese orangutan (Pongo Weidenrach)managed to adapt their food preferences and behavior to this fluctuation. Gigantopithecus brachy There were signs of chronic stress and population decline. Ultimately, that struggle to adapt led to the extinction of the largest primate to ever live on Earth.
Impressions of a group of artists Gigantopithecus brachy In the forest of southern China. Image credit: Garcia / Joannes-Boyau, Southern Cross University.
Gigantopithecus brachy It is an extinct giant hominid that once lived in the jungles of Southeast Asia.
As the name suggests, this giant primate was larger than a gorilla, reaching up to 3 meters (10 feet) tall and weighing up to 540 kg (1,200 pounds).
“Our current understanding is that Gigantopithecus brachy “It originates from early to mid-Pleistocene cave deposits between the Yangtze River in southern China and the South China Sea,” said Professor Yingqi Zhang of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and colleagues.
“This primate is known for its unusually large molars, abnormally thick enamel, estimated height of about 3 meters, and weight of 200 to 300 kg, making it the largest primate to have ever existed on Earth. I am.”
“Despite 85 years of exploration, Gigantopithecus blacki's fossil record is limited to four mandibles and nearly 2,000 isolated teeth, with no postcranial evidence. ”
“The initial discovery as a 'dragon's tooth' in a pharmacy in Hong Kong led to the search for the first in situ finds, which led to the discovery of several cave sites in two major regions of Chongzuo and Fuping basins in Guangxi province. This led to the discovery of
“These sites contain important evidence of its survival and eventual demise.”
“Providing a clear cause for a species' extinction is a major feat, but establishing the exact time a species disappeared from the fossil record provides a target time frame for environmental reconstruction and behavioral assessment.” said Macquarie University geochronologist Dr John Martin. Kira Westaway.
“Without reliable dating, you're simply looking for clues in the wrong places.”
To identify potential causes Gigantopithecus brachy In case of extinction, the researchers applied a regional approach to 22 caves in the Chongzuo and Bupyeong basins. Gigantopithecus brachy-Bearing or non-bearing-Gigantopithecus brachy-Contains cave deposits.
They combined previous excavations with recently discovered caves to identify and sample fossil breccias for dating, paleoclimate estimation, and behavioral analysis.
Six different dating techniques were applied to the cave deposits and fossils, yielding 157 radiometric dates.
Luminescence dating measures light-sensitive signals in buried sediments. Gigantopithecus brachy Fossils were the primary technology supported by uranium series and electron spin resonance dating. Gigantopithecus brachy The tooth itself.
“Direct dating of the fossil remains allowed us to confirm that their ages match the luminescence order of the deposits in which they were found, providing a comprehensive and reliable chronology of the human extinction. Gigantopithecus brachy'' said Dr Renaud-Joan Boyau, a geochronologist at Southern Cross University.
The findings show that Gigantopithecus brachy They went extinct between 295,000 and 215,000 years ago, much earlier than previously thought.
Before this time, Gigantopithecus brachy They thrived in rich and diverse forests.
By 700,000 to 600,000 years ago, the environment had further changed due to increased seasonal intensity, leading to changes in the structure of forest communities.
orangutans etc. Pongo Weidenrach They adapted their size, behavior, and habitat preferences in response to changing conditions.
In comparison, Gigantopithecus brachy When preferences were not available, they relied on backup food sources with low nutritional value, reducing dietary diversity.
The primates experienced reduced locomotion, reduced geographic foraging range, chronic stress and population decline.
“Gigantopithecus brachy “It was the ultimate specialist compared to more agile adapters like orangutans, but this ultimately led to its demise,” Professor Chan said.
“With the threat of a sixth mass extinction looming over us, there is an urgent need to understand why species go extinct,” Dr Westaway said.
“Exploring the reasons for unresolved extinctions in the past is a good starting point for understanding the resilience of primates and the fate of other large animals in the past and future.”
Dr. Christopher Stark and colleagues at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center present new coronagraphic images from Earth NIRCam (near infrared camera) and mm (Mid-Infrared Instrument) instruments aboard the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope reveal never-before-seen structures in the debris disk around the young star Beta Pictoris.
Pictoris Beta is a young planetary system located approximately 63 light-years from Earth.
Estimated to be only 20 million years old, it is known to be home to the gas giant Beta Pictoris b.
In the new study, Stark and co-authors used Webb's NIRCam and MIRI instruments to investigate the composition of Beta Pictoris' primary and secondary debris disks.
“Pictoris Beta is an all-inclusive debris disk. It has a very bright and close star that we can study well, a multicomponent disk, an exocomet, and two imaged “There is a complex circumstellar environment that includes exoplanets,” the Astrobiology Center said. astronomer Isabel Rebolido;
“There have been ground-based observations in this wavelength range before, but this feature was not detected because we did not have the sensitivity and spatial resolution of the current web.”
Even with Webb, peering into Beta Pictoris in the right wavelength range was crucial to detecting the never-before-seen dust trail, which resembles a cat's tail. This is because it only appeared in MIRI data.
Webb's mid-infrared data also revealed differences in temperature between Beta Pictoris' two disks. This is probably due to differences in composition.
“We didn't expect Webb to reveal that there are two different types of material surrounding Beta Pictoris, but MIRI clearly shows that the material in the secondary disk and cat's tail is hotter than the main disk. Dr. Stark said.
“The dust that forms its disk and tail must be so dark that it is not easily visible at visible wavelengths, but it glows in the mid-infrared.”
This artist's impression shows an exocomet orbiting the star Pictoris Beta. Image credit: L. Calçada / ESO.
To explain the higher temperatures, astronomers speculated that the dust could be a porous “organic refractory” similar to the material found on the surfaces of comets and asteroids in our solar system. .
For example, preliminary analysis of material collected from the asteroid Bennu by NASA's OSIRIS-REx mission revealed very dark, carbon-rich material similar to what MIRI detected on Beta Pictoris.
But big questions still remain. What explains the shape of the cat's tail, a uniquely curved feature unlike those seen in disks around other stars?
Researchers modeled various scenarios to mimic a cat's tail and uncover its origins.
Although more research and experiments are needed, the researchers offer a strong hypothesis that cat tails are the result of a dust-producing phenomenon that occurred just 100 years ago.
“Something happens, like a collision, and it creates a lot of dust,” says Dr. Marshall Perrin, an astronomer at the Space Telescope Science Institute.
“At first, the dust follows the same trajectory as its source, but then it starts to spread out.”
“Light from the star pushes the smallest, fluffiest dust particles away from the star faster, while larger particles move less, creating long dust tendrils.”
“The characteristics of a cat's tail are so unusual that it has been difficult to reproduce the curvature in mechanical models,” Dr. Stark said.
“Our model requires dust to be pushed out of the system very quickly, which also suggests it is made of organic refractory materials.”
“The model we have recommended explains the sharp angle of the tail away from the disk as a simple optical illusion.”
“Our perspective, combined with the curved shape of the tail, creates the observed tail angle, but in reality, the arc of material is only pointing away from the disk at a 5-degree inclination.”
“Considering the brightness of the tail, we estimate that the amount of dust in the cat's tail is equivalent to a large main-belt asteroid spanning 10 billion miles.”
Recent dust production events within Beta Pictoris' debris disk may also explain the newly observed asymmetric spreading of the tilted inner disk, shown in the MIRI data and only seen on the opposite side of the tail. there is.
“Our study suggests that Beta pictris may be even more active and chaotic than previously thought,” Dr. Stark said.
“The Webb continues to amaze us even when looking at the most well-studied celestial objects. We have a whole new window into these planetary systems.”
of result This week, it was announced in AAS243243rd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, New Orleans, USA.
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christopher stark other. 2024. A new view of JWST's Beta Pictris suggests recent bursts of dust production from an eccentric, tilted secondary debris disk. AAS243Abstract #4036
A fast radio burst phenomenon called FRB 20220610A flashed in an unlikely location: a collection of at least seven galaxies that existed when the universe was only 5 billion years old. Most fast radio bursts to date have been found in isolated galaxies.
This Hubble image shows the host galaxy of the extremely powerful fast radio burst FRB 20220610A. Image credit: NASA/ESA/STScI/Alexa Gordon, Northwestern University.
FRB 20220610A was first detected by the Australian Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope in Western Australia on June 10, 2022.
ESO's Very Large Telescope confirmed that the FRB came from a distant place. The Fed was four times more energetic than its closer counterpart.
“We needed Hubble's acuity and sensitivity to pinpoint the source of the FRB,” said Northwestern University astronomer Alexa Gordon.
“Without Hubble's images, it will remain a mystery whether this arose from a monolithic galaxy or some kind of interacting system.”
“It's these kinds of environments, these strange environments, that are driving us to a deeper understanding of the Fed's mysteries.”
Hubble's sharp images suggest that FRB 20220610A arose in an environment where up to seven galaxies could be on a potential path to a merger, which is also very significant.
“We're ultimately trying to answer the question: What causes this? What are their ancestry and their origin?” said Wen-Fai Fung, an astronomer at Northwestern University. Ta.
“Hubble observations provide an incredible view of the surprising types of environments that give rise to these mysterious events.”
Although hundreds of FRBs have been detected, their ancestry is unknown. One of the leading candidates is magnetars.
They have magnetic fields so strong that if a magnetar were to be located halfway between the Earth and the Moon, it would erase the magnetic stripes on everyone's credit cards around the world.
Even worse, if the astronaut traveled within a few hundred miles of the magnetar, they would effectively be dissolved, as every atom in their body would be destroyed.
Possible mechanisms include some kind of shocking starquake, or an explosion triggered when the magnetar's twisted magnetic field lines break and recombine.
A similar phenomenon occurs on the Sun, causing solar flares, but the magnetar's magnetic field is a trillion times more powerful than the Sun's magnetosphere.
This snap can cause a flash of the FRB or create a shock wave that incinerates the surrounding dust and heats the gas to create a plasma.
There can be several types of magnetars. In some cases, it could be an explosive object orbiting a black hole surrounded by a disk of matter.
Another option is a pair of orbiting neutron stars whose magnetospheres interact periodically to create cavities in which eruptions can occur.
Magnetars are estimated to be active for about 10,000 years before becoming permanent, and are expected to be discovered in areas where violent storms of star formation occur. However, this does not seem to be the case for all magnetars.
In the near future, the sensitivity of FRB experiments will improve and FRBs will be detected at unprecedented rates at these distances.
“We need to continue to find more of these FRBs in different types of environments, both near and far,” Dr. Gordon said.
Astronomers announced that findings in AAS243243rd Meeting of the American Astronomical Society, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA.
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alexa gordon other. 2024. Revealing the environment of the most distant FRB with the Hubble Space Telescope. AAS243summary #3679
Immersing your body in cold water stimulates the release of an invigorating cocktail of chemicals.
Jacob Staedler/EyeEm/Getty Images
“It's like pressing Control-Alt-Del on your computer,” says Cath Pendleton. “When I'm in the water, I get so focused on my body that my brain switches off. It's just swimming with me.”
Pendleton, an ice swimmer based in Merthyr Tydfil, England, is as tough as anyone. In 2020, five years after she realized she didn't mind swimming in very cold water, she became the first person to swim one mile inside the Antarctic Circle. Part of her training included sitting in a freezer in a shed.
But she's not the only one passionate about cold water. Rivers, lakes, and oceans that were once home to a handful of serious year-round swimmers are now on the verge of extinction, thanks to media reports about the mental health impact of frigid dips and pool closures due to COVID-19. The number of people visiting is rapidly increasing. An estimated 7.5 million people swim outdoors in the UK alone, and more and more people swim outdoors during the winter. Global numbers are hard to come by, but the International Winter Swimming Association is seeing a boom in winter swimmer registrations around the world, including in China, Russia and Finland, where water temperatures can drop below 0C.
But what could be better than the joy of being in nature and the perverted feeling of happiness that defies the cold? According to the latest research, the answer is probably: Recent studies are beginning to uncover evidence that cold water immersion can reduce stress and depression, and may help deal with autoimmune diseases.
According to an internal memo sent Wednesday, Amazon is planning to lay off hundreds of employees across streaming and studio operations. The announcement coincided with Twitch, a subsidiary of the e-commerce giant, revealing that it would lay off approximately 35% of its workforce, or around 500 people.
Last year, Amazon cut more than 27,000 jobs as part of its U.S. tech job cuts, marking a departure from the industry’s hiring surge during the pandemic. Facebook and Microsoft each laid off 10,000 employees, while Google cut 12,000 jobs last year.
Mike Hopkins, senior vice president of Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios, informed employees that, “As we increase our investments, we will also identify opportunities to reduce or eliminate investments in specific areas to make the most impact, allowing us to focus on content and product initiatives.”
Twitch CEO Dan Clancy acknowledged in a blog post that the company had grown too big based on optimism for faster expansion of the business. “There remains work to do to right-size the company,” Clancy wrote, citing that the size of the organization had been projected optimistically based on future growth rather than its current state.
In recent years, Amazon has been aggressively investing in its media business, including an $8.5 billion deal with MGM and the 2022 release of The Lord of the Rings on Prime Video. The company has also spent approximately $465 million on the first season of “The Power of Power.” Additionally, Amazon plans to run ads on Prime Video in certain markets and introduce a pricier ad-free subscription tier, similar to moves made by competitors like Netflix and Disney.
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