We have a couple of techniques that allow us to infer the presence of an exoplanet based on its effects on the light coming from its host star. But there's an alternative approach that sometimes works: image them directly. It's much more limited, since the planet has to be pretty big and orbiting far away enough from its star to avoid having light coming from the planet swamped by the far more intense starlight.

 

Still, it has been done. Massive exoplanets have been captured relatively shortly after their formation, when the heat generated by the collapse of material into the planet causes them to glow in the infrared. But the Webb telescope is far more sensitive than any infrared observatory we've ever built, and it has managed to image a relatively nearby exoplanet that's roughly as old as the ones in our Solar System.

Looking directly at a planet

What do you need to directly image a planet that's orbiting a star light-years away? The first thing is a bit of hardware called a coronagraph attached to your telescope. This is responsible for blocking the light from the star the planet is orbiting; without it, that light will swamp any other sources in the exosolar system. Even with a good coronagraph, you need the planets to be orbiting at a significant distance from the star so that they're cleanly separated from the signal being blocked by the coronagraph.

 

Then, you need the planet to emit a fair bit of light. While the right surface composition might allow the planet to be highly reflective, that's not going to be a great option considering the distances we'd need the planet to be orbiting to be visible at all. Instead, the planets we've spotted so far have been young and still heated by the processes that brought material together to form a planet in the first place. Being really big doesn't hurt matters, either.

 

Put that all together, and what you expect to be able to spot is a very young, very distant planet that's massive enough to fall into the super-Jupiter category.

 

But the launch of the Webb Space Telescope has given us new capabilities in the infrared range, and a large international team of researchers pointed it at a star called Epsilon Indi A. It's a bit less than a dozen light-years away (which is extremely close in astronomical terms), and the star is both similar in size and age to the Sun, making it an interesting target for observations. Perhaps most significantly, previous data had suggested a large exoplanet would be found, based on indications that the star was apparently shifting as the exoplanet tugged on it during its orbit.

 

And there was, in fact, an indication of a planet there. It just didn't look much like the expected planet. "It’s about twice as massive, a little farther from its star, and has a different orbit than we expected," said Elisabeth Matthews, one of the researchers involved.

 

At the moment, there's no explanation for the discrepancy. The odds of it being an unrelated background object are extremely small. And a reanalysis of data on the motion of Epsilon Indi A suggests that this is likely to be the only large planet in the system—there could be additional planets, but they'd be much smaller. So, the researchers named the planet Epsilon Indi Ab, even though that was the same name given to the planet that doesn't seem to match this one's properties.

Big, cold, and a bit enigmatic

The revised Epsilon Indi Ab is a large planet, estimated at roughly six times the mass of Jupiter. It's also orbiting at roughly the same distance as Neptune. It's generally bright across the mid-infrared, consistent with a planet that's roughly 275 Kelvin—not too far off from room temperature. That's also close to what we would estimate for its temperature simply based on the age of the planet. That makes it the coolest exoplanet ever directly imaged.

 

While the signal from the planet was quite bright at a number of wavelengths, the planet couldn't even be detected in one area of the spectrum (3.5 to 5 micrometers, for the curious). That's considered an indication that the planet has high levels of elements heavier than helium, and a high ratio of carbon to oxygen. The gap in the spectrum may influence estimates of the planet's age, so further observations will probably need to be conducted to clarify why there are no emissions at these wavelengths.

 

The researchers also suggest that imaging more of these cool exoplanets should be a priority, given that we should be cautious about extrapolating anything from a single example. So, in that sense, this first exoplanet imaging provides an important confirmation that, with Webb and its coronagraph, we've now got the tools we need to do so, and they work very well.

 

Nature, 2024. DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07837-8  (About DOIs).

 

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On Monday the global average surface air temperature reached 17.15C, breaking the record of 17.09C set on Sunday.

It beats the record set in July 2023, and it could break again this week.

Parts of the world are experiencing powerful heatwaves including the Mediterranean, Russia and Canada.

Climate change is driving up global temperatures as greenhouse gas emissions released when humans burn fossil fuels warm the Earth's atmosphere.

"While fluctuations are to be expected, as the climate continues to warm, we are likely to keep seeing records being broken, and each new record is taking us further into uncharted territory," says Prof Rebecca Emerton, a climate scientist at the Copernicus Climate Change Service.

The naturally-occurring climate phenomenon El Niño also added heat to the climate in the first six months of this year but its effects have now waned.

Extreme heat is a serious health hazard, with thousands of deaths attributed to high temperatures every year.

In 2000-2019, almost half a million heat-related deaths around the world occurred each year, according to the World Health Organization.

China has issued heat alerts this week, with central and northwestern areas of the country recording temperatures higher than 40C.

Russia has been battling wildfires in Siberia, and Spain and Greece also endured days of high temperatures.

In the US, more than 40 million people on Tuesday faced dangerous temperatures, and wildfires have broken out in western areas of the country.

The global average temperature usually peaks in July or August during summer in the northern hemisphere.

The northern hemisphere has large land masses - like the US or Russia - that warm up faster than the oceans that dominate the southern hemisphere.

The recent sudden rise in temperatures is also down to significantly-above-average temperatures over large parts of Antarctica, according to Prof Emerton.

Large swings in temperature are not unusual in Antarctica at this time of year - they also contributed to record temperatures in 2023.

Sea ice in the region is almost as low as this time last year, which also leads to above-average sea temperatures in the Southern Ocean.

“The hottest day record has been broken once again because the world continues to burn huge amounts of oil, gas, and coal," says Friederike Otto, Senior Lecturer in Climate Science at Grantham Institute at Imperial College London.

“Every broken record is a warning that our climate is heating to dangerous levels. These warnings are becoming much more frequent; however, we have all the tools, technology and knowledge to stop things from getting worse – replace fossil fuels with renewable energy and get emissions down to net zero as quickly as possible," she added.

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Drinking may immediately increase the risk for a heart attack, and over time, alcohol contributes to heart disease in women and men, increasing the risk of a heart attack. Heavy drinking is especially dangerous: One study found that binge drinkers are 72% more likely to have a heart attack than people who don’t binge drink.

Alcohol can raise blood pressure and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, and heavy drinkers might even develop alcoholic cardiomyopathy, a condition that causes the heart to enlarge. Fortunately, cutting back on alcohol consumption can significantly reduce your risk of heart attack even if you've been a heavy drinker in the past.

Continue reading to learn more about alcohol use and heart health.

Can Heavy Drinking Cause a Heart Attack?

Heavy drinking is associated with an increased risk of heart disease. There’s a lot of research that shows heavy drinking is bad for heart health, but the answer to whether drinking directly causes a heart attack is complicated.

One study looked at 4,000 people who had had heart attacks and asked them about their drinking habits, both over time and immediately before the heart attack. The study found that people who binge drank were 72% more likely to have a heart attack than those who didn’t. Interestingly, the study found that people who didn’t usually drink every day but who binged were more likely to experience a heart attack than those who drank every day.

In this case, researchers concluded that for some people, binge drinking increased the immediate risk of a heart attack.

A Word From Verywell

When it comes to heart health and alcohol, in general, less is more. Alcohol can contribute to different types of heart disease. If you do choose to drink alcohol, keep to no more than moderate intake.

— JEFFREY S. LANDER, MD, MEDICAL EXPERT BOARD

How Alcohol Affects the Heart and Other Organs

There’s a lot more research showing that over time, alcohol can impact heart health, including by raising the risk of heart attack.

In 2024, the American College of Cardiology reported that drinking drastically increases risk of heart disease. Studying more than 400,000 people, the researchers found:

• Women who were moderate (i.e, 3–7 drinks per week) drinkers were 29% more likely to develop heart disease than women who were light drinkers.

• Women who were heavy drinkers (eight or more drinks per week) were 45% more likely to develop heart disease than women who were moderate drinkers.

• Men who were heavy drinkers (15 or more drinks per week) were 22% more likely to develop heart disease compared to men who were moderate drinkers.

Even moderate drinking is associated with:

•     30% higher chance of high blood pressure, a risk factor for heart attacks.

•     40% higher chance of coronary heart disease.

The risks “increase exponentially” with heavy drinking, researchers found.

Short-Term Effects of Heavy Drinking

Drinking alcohol can have the following effects:

•     Increases heart rate, which can increase the risk for irregular heartbeat

•     Increases blood pressure (both immediately and over the long term)

•     Causes irregular heartbeats, which increase the risk for heart attack

•     Increases“bad” cholesterol levels (LDL cholesterol)

Red Wine and Heart Health

Some research has linked light to moderate red wine consumption to better cardiovascular health. Because the risks of drinking outweigh the benefits, it's not advised to start drinking for potential health reasons.

Recovering From an Alcohol-Related Heart Attack

If you’ve experienced a heart attack, you should talk with your healthcare provider. Any amount of drinking can make heart disease worse.7 People who have had a heart attack are at increased risk for another one, so implementing healthy lifestyle changes, including reducing your alcohol intake, is important.

Quitting drinking can be really difficult, even if you only consider yourself a casual drinker. If you’re having a hard time stopping, learn more about alcohol use disorder and whether treatment is right for you. You can also talk with your healthcare provider about medications that can help you stop drinking.

Can Someone With Heart Disease Drink Alcohol?

Alcohol can make heart disease worse. However, you might not need to stop drinking entirely if you have heart disease. Talk with your healthcare provider about what amount and type of alcohol—if any—is safe for you.

Remember that alcohol could interact negatively with medications.9 Talk with your healthcare provider about all medicines you’re taking and whether they’re safe.

Risk Factors for Heart Disease

Heart disease can impact anyone: In fact, it’s the leading cause of U.S. deaths. Black American have an especially high risk of heart disease.1

People are at a higher risk for heart disease if they:10

•     Have diabetes

•     Are overweight or have obesity

•     Drink moderately or heavily

•     Smoke

•     Don’t exercise

•     Have high blood pressure

•     Have high cholesterol

Can Limiting Alcohol Help Lower the Risk for a Heart Attack?

Reducing your alcohol intake can lower your risk for heart attack, even if you’ve been a heavy drinker in the past. A 2024 study of more than 20,000 heavy drinkers found those who reduced their alcohol intake cut their risk of cardiovascular disease by 23%.

These people didn’t stop drinking entirely but reduced the amount they drank. "Heavy drinking" in the study was defined as more than four drinks per day or 14 per week for males and three drinks per day or seven per week for females.

If you’re a heavy drinker, you should talk with your healthcare provider before stopping entirely, since stopping suddenly without medical supervision can be dangerous.

When to Contact a Healthcare Provider

Any time you are worried about your heart health or your drinking habits, you should talk with your healthcare provider. Heavy drinking is linked to many ill effects, but there are treatments available that can help you reduce your intake or stop drinking. If you’re already experiencing heart disease or high blood pressure, work closely with your healthcare provider to decide what amount of alcohol, if any, is healthy for you.

Summary

Alcohol can increase your risk for heart attack, both immediately and over time. One study found that some people who binged alcohol increased their risk for a heart attack within an hour. In addition, research is very clear that over time alcohol can increase blood pressure and raise “bad” cholesterol, both of which can increase your risk for a heart attack.

If you’re drinking too much and worried about the impact on your health, talk with your healthcare provider about treatments that could help you reduce your alcohol intake. Even cutting down on alcohol can drastically lower your risk of a heart attack.

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But it's not as simple as that, the researchers say. They call for prescribers and pharmacists to talk with older adults about their personal situation and figure out whether any kind of "deprescribing" is right for them.

The study, published in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, uses data from U-M's National Poll on Healthy Aging, and builds on a poll report issued in April 2023.

It shows that about 30% of older adults who take medication to address cardiovascular disease or diabetes are most interested in deprescribing these medications. This might be because many of those drugs address symptomless risk factors such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and high blood sugar.

Left uncontrolled, these risk factors can set the stage for future emergencies and crises. So medications to manage these conditions are important preventive tools.

However, older adults may not immediately feel the benefit of these medications, which may cause them to wonder if they continue to be needed.

In contrast, the study shows that older adults whose prescriptions address conditions that cause symptoms right now—including arthritis pain, mental health conditions and breathing issues—were less interested in stopping those medications.

The new study underscores the importance of comprehensive medication reviews, says Sarah Vordenberg, Pharm.D., M.P.H., the study's lead author and a clinical associate professor in the U-M College of Pharmacy.

These appointments look at all the medicines and supplements a person is taking, and look for opportunities to safely reduce dosages, costs and the number of times each day a person must take medication.

Medicare pays for such appointments for enrollees who meet eligibility requirements. But the number of older adults taking advantage of this option, even among those who qualify, is evidenced by data from a 2020 report by the National Poll on Healthy Aging.

Condition-specific preferences

The new study goes beyond the 2023 deprescribing poll report by peering more deeply into the conditions the poll respondents said they had.

• 84% of people taking at least one prescription medication said they had some form of cardiovascular condition, which included high blood pressure, and 35% of this group were open to stopping at least one of their cardiovascular medications.

• 29% of respondents taking at least one medication said they had diabetes, and 30% of this group were open to stopping one of their diabetes medications.

• Nearly 50% of the respondents taking prescription medication said they have arthritis, but only 17% of this group were open to stopping a medication for that condition.

• 22% of those taking prescription medication said they had a brain-related condition affecting their mental health or cognition, and 19% of them were open to stopping a medication they take for it.

• 11% of prescription drug users said they had a lung disease such as asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Of these, 11% said they would be open to stopping a drug they take for it.

"With guidelines changing for the use of cardiovascular risk-reducing medications as we learn more about who gets the most benefit, it's important that patients and providers talk openly and regularly about what's best for their individual circumstances," says Jeffrey Kullgren, M.D., M.P.H., M.S., an associate professor of internal medicine at Michigan Medicine and physician and researcher at the VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System.

"The same goes for diabetes-related medication, especially with the rise of direct-to-consumer services including for GLP-1 inhibitor medications," he added. "And with any prescription medication or supplement for any condition, it's critical for your health care providers to know everything you're taking, no matter how you're getting it."

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The global technology outage sparked by CrowdStrike’s faulty update will cost US Fortune 500 companies $5.4bn, insurers estimated, as the cybersecurity firm vowed to make changes to prevent it from happening again.

The projected financial losses exclude Microsoft, the tech giant whose systems suffered widespread failures in the crash.

Companies in banking and healthcare are expected to be hit the hardest, according to the insurer Parametrix, as well as major airlines. The total insured losses for the non-Microsoft Fortune 500 companies could be between $540m and $1.08bn.

A variety of industries are still struggling to rectify the damage from CrowdStrike’s outage, which grounded thousands of flights, caused turmoil at hospitals and crashed payment systems in what experts have described as the largest IT failure in history. The outage exposed how modern tech systems are built on precarious ground, with faulty code in a single update able to bring down operations around the world.

CrowdStrike – a Texas-based, multibillion-dollar company that has lost about 22% of its stock market value since the outage – has repeatedly apologized for causing the international tech crisis. The company issued a report on Wednesday detailing what went wrong in the update.

The primary cause of the failure stemmed from an update that CrowdStrike pushed to its flagship Falcon platform, which functions as a cloud-based service intended to protect businesses from cyber-attacks and disruptions. The update contained a bug which caused 8.5m Windows machines to crash en masse.

CrowdStrike stated in its postmortem that it plans to increase software testing before issuing updates in the future, and only roll out those updates gradually to prevent the widespread, simultaneous failures that took place last week. The company also plans to issue a more in-depth report on the causes of the outage in the coming weeks.

CrowdStrike is one of the world’s most prominent cybersecurity firms, and was valued at around $83bn before the outage. It services about 538 of the Fortune 1000 companies, according to its website, and operates around the world. That ubiquity made the consequences of its botched update particularly severe, showcasing how many companies are reliant on the same products to keep operations running.

Several companies have had an especially hard time recovering from the outage. Delta Air Lines is still in turmoil days later as it cancels and reschedules hundreds of flights, leaving frustrated passengers without the ability to get home and parents scrambling to reach their stranded children. The US Department of Transportation opened an investigation into Delta on Tuesday over its handling of the issue.

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Archaeologists seeking to learn more about how Neanderthals prepared and cooked their food conducted a series of hands-on experiments with small fowl using flint flakes for butchering. They found that the flint flakes were surprisingly effective for butchering the birds, according to their new paper published in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology. They also concluded that roasting the birds damages the bones to such an extent that it's unlikely they would be preserved in the archaeological record.

 

According to the authors, Neanderthals were able to thrive for over 200,000 years across a broad range of geographical regions so naturally archaeologists are interested in how they sustained themselves. There has been research into their killing and hunting of large game. Neanderthals were expert hunters known to kill bears and other carnivores. A pair of lion fibula from the Middle Paleolithic found in eastern Iberia with cut marks indicates the lion was butchered, while other lion bones found in Southwestern France from the same period had cut marks indicative of skinning.

 

And as we reported just last year, researchers found evidence of what might be the earliest example of lion hunting yet known, based on on a close forensic analysis of a cave lion skeleton showing evidence of injury by a wooden spear some 48,000 years ago.

 

The team tested their hypothesis by reconstructing the ballistics of a wooden-tipped spear's impact on the rib, matching the direction, impact angle, and depth of penetration. Judging by those aspects, it looks like the spear went through the left side of the cave lion's abdomen and passed through vital organs before hitting the right side of the rib. That same study also found cave lion claw bones showing evidence of having been skinned around 190,000 years ago.

 

 

However, smaller game like birds has received much less attention. Yet "birds offer a complementary dietary resource that may have played an essential role in Neanderthal adaptation and survival," co-author Mariana Nabais of the Institut Catala de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolucio Social in Spain and her colleagues wrote. So, they designed a pilot study simulating early human cooking and butchering methods to provide a baseline, compiling a database of telltale marks that could help archeologists better analyze artifacts by comparing marks on those to the database.

Birdies roasting on an open fire

Nabais et al. collected frozen bird specimens that had died under natural conditions from a wildlife reserve in Portugal, selecting species that would taxonomically represent those Neanderthals likely would have hunted in the Iberian Peninsula: carrion crow, wood pigeon, and the Eurasian collared dove. All five specimens were de-feathered.

 

Two were butchered uncooked, using a replica flint flake (made by students) when necessary; the techniques used were drawn from archeological evidence and ethnographic data. The scientists then cleaned and dried the bones, examining them under a microscope to look for signature cut marks, breaks, and burns. They also analyzed the flint flake for telltale wear and tear and found small scarring on the edge in a half-moon shape.

 

• 

• 

“Using a flint flake for butchering required significant precision and effort, which we had not fully valued before this experiment,” said Nabais. “The flakes were sharper than we initially thought, requiring careful handling to make precise cuts without injuring our own fingers. These hands-on experiments emphasized the practical challenges involved in Neanderthal food processing and cooking, providing a tangible connection to their daily life and survival strategies.”

 

The other three birds were roasted whole (unbutchered) on hot coals at 500° C : first on their bellies for four minutes, then turned over and roasted for another three minutes. The team was careful to maintain a consistent temperature and monitor the cooking duration so that they didn't overcook the meat. “Maybe because we de-feathered the birds before cooking, the roasting process was much quicker than we anticipated," said Nabais. "In fact, we spent more time preparing the coals than on the actual cooking, which took less than ten minutes.”

 

The team also analyzed the bones of the cooked birds. In the former case, Those bones were much more brittle—some shattered—and almost all had black or brown burns, as well as black stains inside the inner cavities of some of the bones. "As burnt bird bones are prone to breakage and loss, roasting activities may therefore go undetected in archaeological sites," the authors wrote. "Such observations suggest that cooking methods significantly affect the preservation of skeletal remains in archaeological contexts, potentially influencing the archaeological visibility of certain cooking practices."

 

Nabasi et al. emphasized that this is just a pilot study with a very small sample size and limited species; the kinds of birds consumed by Neanderthals may have been more diverse. And despite their careful control of the experimental conditions, it is simply not possible to replicate Neanderthal methods, real-world conditions, and broader cultural contexts exactly. They called for further research, expanding the experiments to more bird species and different cooking methods.

 

Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology, 2024. DOI: 10.3389/fearc.2024.1411853  (About DOIs).

 

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But economic losses from catastrophes in the first half of 2024 weren’t that bad, considering what the world has experienced in recent history, according to a new report from Aon.

The insurance brokerage giant’s impact forecasting team estimated first-half losses from global natural disasters at $117 billion, which is lower than the 21st century H1 average of $137 billion and “significantly lower” than the $226 billion in losses over the same period in 2023.

First-half insured losses stood at approximately $58 billion, which is above the century average of $39 billion but lower than the $60 million-plus in insured losses seen in the first half of the last three years.

Better yet, the insurance protection gap—which is the difference between uninsured and insured losses—has fallen to 50%, “one of the lowest on record for 1H” and largely due to insurance payments covering severe storms in the US. According to the report, US natural disasters made up nearly 80% of global insured losses, at almost $46 billion.

“It is great to see a lowering of the global protection gap, which is a result of the high levels of insurance coverage for the SCS [severe convective storm] events observed in the first half of 2024,” Michal Lörinc, head of catastrophe insight at Aon, said in a news release. “However, the re/insurance industry needs to continue its efforts to increase levels of insurance in emerging markets, through provision of not just capital and capacity, but also advanced data and analytics, which help to qualify and quantify the risk, and ultimately shape better decisions.”

For the remainder of 2024, Aon experts expect that a busy hurricane season and more severe storms in the US and Europe will continue to drive up economic and insured losses.

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Sunday witnessed the highest average temperature on Earth, breaching a previous record set a year ago, according to provisional data from the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service.

Global average temperatures have already hit or exceeded a key climate threshold for 12 months, highlighting the challenge in limiting global warming to below 1.5C above the pre-industrial era. Climate change is increasing the frequency and intensity of heat waves, bringing extreme weather events from flooding to wildfires.

Global warming is bringing hotter conditions to southern Europe, with temperatures exceeding 40C for the past two weeks in Greece. That’s turbo-charging the threat from wildfires.

Firefighters are tackling two blazes near Markopoulo, southeast of Athens, along with wildfires threatening villages in central and northern Greece. Cooler weather will bring some relief this week, although temperatures are still expected to top 39C in some parts of the mainland on Tuesday.

By contrast, a violent thunderstorm has brought flooding to the central city of Larissa, with hail damaging nearby apple and pear orchards.

Spain is also under extreme fire risk this week as temperatures soar in the south of the country. Seville and Cordoba will approach 43C on Wednesday, according to Spanish forecaster AEMET. Parts of the south of France and Italy are also at risk from wildfires.

Further north, Berlin and Paris are set for heat wave conditions at the start of August. The mean temperature in the German capital is forecast to rise as high as 28C on Aug. 6, 8 degrees above the 30-year norm.

Extreme heat has wreaked havoc across many parts of the global economy already this year, disrupting air travel to power grids.

The average temperature for the year through June 2024 was 1.64C higher than the era from 1850 to 1900, according to Copernicus. Last month was the hottest ever June, the 13th consecutive time a month has set a new average temperature record.

The Paris Agreement set in 2015 seeks to limit planetary warming to below 2C above the pre-industrial average, and ideally to 1.5C.

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Having begun in watchmaking, Meyer Burger shifted into the solar industry in 1983. Faced with widening losses, the group earlier this year announced it would shut a panel factory in the German city of Freiberg.

 

Instead, it set its sights on expanding production in the US, where the Inflation Reduction Act has offered subsidies and incentives as the Biden administration has sought to accelerate the growth of a clean energy industry.

 

The IRA has spurred almost $13 billion of investment in solar manufacturing, more than six times the amount committed in the five years before the legislation, according to the Clean Economy Tracker and an FT analysis.

 

“I think smart decisions have been made in the US in regards to having understood this is the new oil,” said Erfurt. “Solar will by far dominate the new energy system.”

 

But Meyer Burger’s ambition has become a casualty of the collapse in prices, with the company delaying plans for a 2GW solar cell facility in Colorado Springs.

 

“We simply cannot expand even further into the United States with market conditions like this,” Ardes Johnson, head of Meyer Burger America, told a US International Trade Commission hearing in May.

 

Others are also retreating. Heliene, a Canadian manufacturer, this year pushed back plans to add new production for both cells and panels. A Bill Gates-backed Cubic PV scrapped a proposal to build a 10GW solar factory in February in the US, citing a “dramatic collapse” in prices.

 

As some companies freeze plans, the Biden administration has responded.

 

In May, it removed a tariff exemption for double-sided panels and lifted levies on Chinese imports of solar cells from 25 percent to 50 percent. Chinese companies now also face penalties if they are found to have dodged tariffs.

 

US imports of Chinese polysilicon for solar panels had already been hit by a 2021 ban on products made or sourced from China’s Xinjiang because of concerns over the use of forced labor.

 

Nevertheless, America’s solar power companies warn that the steps taken by the Biden administration this year will fail to provide enough protection.

 

In April, a coalition of manufacturers including First Solar, QCells and Meyer Burger filed a petition to the US International Trade Commission calling for new tariffs on imports of solar cells. They accuse Chinese solar companies of dumping cells in southeast Asia, the source of the bulk of US imports.

 

A solar panel manufactured in America, including IRA subsidies, using US-made cells costs 18.5 cents a watt, compared with 15.6 cents for a panel sourced in southeast Asia and just over 10 cents for one produced in China, according to estimates from BloombergNEF.

 

The possibility of victory for Donald Trump in the US presidential election has also cast a shadow over the fledgling industry. At a recent rally, Trump vowed to impose an “immediate moratorium” on “Joe Biden mammoth Socialist bills like the so-called Inflation Reduction Act.”

 

With the European and US industries under pressure, a key uncertainty is whether China’s companies will stomach the current level of prices or scale back production to shore up their own finances. In March, China’s Longi, the world’s biggest solar company, cut 5 percent of its 80,000-strong workforce.

 

“Chinese manufacturers are also struggling in the current low pricing environment,” said Marius Bakke, senior analyst at consultancy Rystad Energy.

 

Hryshko at Wood Mackenzie reckons that about 70 Chinese manufacturers have already reined in expansion plans, but cautions that others are pressing ahead.

 

Some “manufacturers are convinced they can make it,” she said, suggesting those in China may “know something we don’t” about plans for state support.

 

As Solarwatt prepares to outsource operations to China it has kept some machinery in Dresden, refusing to abandon hope that production may one day restart at the plant.

 

According to Bachmann, its fate ultimately lies with politicians.

 

“They need to decide if we want to be completely dependent on Asia or if we want to be resilient at least for a certain percentage,” he said. “This decision needs to be taken.”

 

Additional reporting by Alice Hancock in Brussels and Wenjie Ding in Beijing.

 

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Phoebus 2A, the most powerful space nuclear reactor ever made, was fired up at Nevada Test Site on June 26, 1968. The test lasted 750 seconds and confirmed it could carry first humans to Mars. But Phoebus 2A did not take anyone to Mars. It was too large, it cost too much, and it didn’t mesh with Nixon’s idea that we had no business going anywhere further than low-Earth orbit.

 

But it wasn’t NASA that first called for rockets with nuclear engines. It was the military that wanted to use them for intercontinental ballistic missiles. And now, the military wants them again.

Nuclear-powered ICBMs

The work on nuclear thermal rockets (NTRs) started with the Rover program initiated by the US Air Force in the mid-1950s. The concept was simple on paper. Take tanks of liquid hydrogen and use turbopumps to feed this hydrogen through a nuclear reactor core to heat it up to very high temperatures and expel it through the nozzle to generate thrust. Instead of causing the gas to heat and expand by burning it in a combustion chamber, the gas was heated by coming into contact with a nuclear reactor.

 

The key advantage was fuel efficiency. “Specific impulse,” a measurement that’s something like the gas mileage of a rocket, could be calculated from the square root of the exhaust gas temperature divided by the molecular weight of the propellant. This meant the most efficient propellant for rockets was hydrogen because it had the lowest molecular weight.

 

In chemical rockets, hydrogen had to be mixed with an oxidizer, which increased the total molecular weight of the propellant but was necessary for combustion to happen. Nuclear rockets didn’t need combustion and could work with pure hydrogen, which made them at least twice as efficient. The Air Force wanted to efficiently deliver nuclear warheads to targets around the world.

 

The problem was that running stationary reactors on Earth was one thing; making them fly was quite another.

Space reactor challenge

Fuel rods made with uranium 235 oxide distributed in a metal or ceramic matrix comprise the core of a standard fission reactor. Fission happens when a slow-moving neutron is absorbed by a uranium 235 nucleus and splits it into two lighter nuclei, releasing huge amounts of energy and excess, very fast neutrons. These excess neutrons normally don’t trigger further fissions, as they move too fast to get absorbed by other uranium nuclei.

 

Starting a chain reaction that keeps the reactor going depends on slowing them down with a moderator, like water, that “moderates” their speed. This reaction is kept at moderate levels using control rods made of neutron-absorbing materials, usually boron or cadmium, that limit the number of neutrons that can trigger fission. Reactors are dialed up or down by moving the control rods in and out of the core.

 

Translating any of this to a flying reactor is a challenge. The first problem is the fuel. The hotter you make the exhaust gas, the more you increase specific impulse, so NTRs needed the core to operate at temperatures reaching 3,000 K—nearly 1,800 K higher than ground-based reactors. Manufacturing fuel rods that could survive such temperatures proved extremely difficult.

 

Then there was the hydrogen itself, which is extremely corrosive at these temperatures, especially when interacting with those few materials that are stable at 3,000 K. Finally, standard control rods had to go, too, because on the ground, they were gravitationally dropped into the core, and that wouldn’t work in flight.

 

Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory proposed a few promising NTR designs that addressed all these issues in 1955 and 1956, but the program really picked up pace after it was transferred to NASA and Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) in 1958, There, the idea was rebranded as NERVA, Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Applications. NASA and AEC, blessed with nearly unlimited budget, got busy building space reactors—lots of them.

Kiwi tries to fly

The first of those reactors was called Kiwi-A. The test done on July 1, 1959, proved that the concept worked, but there were devils in the details. Vibrations caused by the flow of hydrogen damaged the reactor after just five minutes of operation at a relatively meek 70 megawatts. The temperature reached 2,683 K, which caused hydrogen corrosion in the rods and expelled parts of the core through the nozzle, a problem known as “shedding.”

 

On the upside, rotating drums placed around the core that replaced standard control rods worked well. These were long tubes made with neutron-absorbing material that had one side covered with a coating that reflected the neutrons back into the core. The reactor was throttled up by rotating the drums so they faced the core with the reflective side and throttled down by turning the neutron-absorbing side toward the core.

 

Over 18 years, NASA, AEC, and industry contractors like Aerojet Corporation built and tested a total of 23 reactors. “The last engine in the Rover/NERVA program was the XE Prime. They tested it in a vacuum environment and brought it to TRL 6,” said Dr. Tabitha Dodson, a program manager at DARPA’s Tactical Technology Office. TRL 6 means “tech readiness level 6”—getting to 7 would mean putting a demonstration engine in space.

 

This didn’t mean “problem-free,” though. Shedding and fuel cracking issues persisted in all NERVA engines to various degrees. But what ultimately killed NERVA in 1973 was a shift in NASA’s goals away from deep space and toward low-Earth orbit. And NERVA wasn’t needed for that.

Nuclear Mars Express

It took over 40 years before NASA brought up nuclear propulsion again, first in the short-lived Jupiter Icy Moon Orbiter project and then in the design reference architecture for human exploration of Mars. Powering the latter missions with a compact reactor could cut down Mars transit by more than half, to three to four months versus the six to nine months predicted for chemical rocket engines. Less time in space meant less exposure to radiation for the astronauts and fewer supplies for the trip.

 

So, in 2017, NASA started a small-scale NTR research program. The budget was just a hair above $18 million, but it was something. Two years later, Congress passed an appropriation bill that granted $125 million for developing NTRs. Things were progressing, but they were mostly paper studies, followed by more paper studies, followed by even more paper studies.

 

And then on June 17, 2020, DARPA entered the chat and said, “We want a nuclear rocket.” Not just another paper study—a demonstrator.

Chasing Sputnik 2.0

DARPA’s website says it has always held to a singular mission of making investments in breakthrough technologies for national security. What does a nuclear-powered spaceship have to do with national security? The military’s perspective was hinted at by General James Dickinson, a US Space Command officer, in his testimony before Congress in April 2021.

 

He said that “Beijing is seeking space superiority through space attack systems” and mentioned intelligence gathered on the Shijian-17, a Chinese satellite fitted with a robotic arm that could be used for “grappling other satellites.” That may sound like a ridiculous stretch, but it was enough get a go-ahead for a nuclear spaceship.

 

And the apparent concern regarding hypothetical threats has continued. The purpose of the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO) project, stated in its environmental assessment, was to “provide space-based assets to deter strategic attacks by adversaries.” Dickinson’s worries about China were quoted in there as well.

 

“Let’s say you have a time-critical mission where you need to quickly go from A to B in cislunar space or you need to keep an eye on another country that is doing something near or around the Moon, and you need to move in very fast. With a platform like DRACO, you can do that,” said DARPA’s Dodson.

 

Two years after DARPA stepped in, the preliminary design phase was completed, and Lockheed won a half-billion-dollar contract to build DRACO. But DARPA wasn’t the only one paying. NASA chipped in as well. The two agencies made DRACO a joint project and split the bill 50-50.

Next-gen NERVA

Building DRACO, however, would run us up against a further problem: using it. “There is a series of regulatory and technical challenges,” said Kirk Shireman, the vice president of Lockheed Martin Space who oversees the DRACO project. For starters, firing nuclear engines in the open air somewhere in the Nevada desert was out of the question. Building facilities compliant with all the regulations alone would take years.

 

Then there was the fuel. NERVA reactors worked with highly enriched uranium used to build nuclear weapons. If anything went wrong at launch, roughly 700 kilograms of weapons-grade uranium would suddenly fall from the sky. And you only need around 25 kilograms of it to make a bomb.

 

That's why DRACO will use a new fuel called high-assay-low-enriched uranium (HALEU)—a fissile material made by blending the highly enriched uranium down to below 20 percent enrichment. “You can relax some security requirements by switching to HALEU,” said Joe Miller, the vice president of BWXT Technologies, a company specializing in naval reactors that Lockheed Martin chose to build the reactor for DRACO. And while making a bomb with HALEU is still possible under certain circumstances, it’s way harder than with highly enriched uranium, which was a must-have in all NERVA reactors.

 

Once the fuel was sorted out, BWXT went on to design the reactor itself. “Using HALEU drives the internal geometry of the reactor,” says Miller. To avoid reinventing the wheel, Miller’s team started with rummaging through huge piles of reports from the NERVA program. But compared to NERVA designs, his team used different channels to route the hydrogen through the reactor core and thermal management systems that transfer the heat to hydrogen.

 

Brown bag sessions

“Our chief engineer was a bit of a historian and a librarian, so he was digging all those reports out, scanning them, and integrating them into our design reviews. Lots of black and white photos. Lots of old graphs from testing. We learned from that. This was extremely relevant,” said Miller.

 

One of the key things BWXT found in the NERVA reports was the data on hydrogen-induced cracking of the reactor fuel. “We gave [the reports] to our young materials scientists, and they were able to use them as a springboard for the early design decisions they were making,” Miller said. The result, he said, was a coating that could withstand reactor temperatures without cracking. “We created our own internal formulation of the nuclear fuel I can’t really talk about in public,” he said.

 

Building a space reactor is challenging, but at least it has already been done before. What hasn’t been done is building a spaceship around it.

The first nuclear spaceship

DRACO will be a medium-sized spacecraft, under 15 meters long with a diameter below 5.4 meters—dimensions dictated by the size of the standard payload fairing of the Vulcan Centaur rocket on which it will probably be launched. “We are familiar with liquid hydrogen, spacecraft systems engineering, and integration. We have the right skillset and the right people to build this thing,” said Shireman.

 

DRACO will work like NERVA-type rockets, with hydrogen tanks located at the head of the propulsion compartment, turbomachinery feeding this hydrogen through the core (fitted right behind them), but separated from the core by a radiation shield. The HALEU reactor will be surrounded by control drums and sit in front of an exhaust nozzle. Based on DARPA requirements, DRACO will have at least 700 seconds of specific impulse, which is over 300 seconds better than the RL-10, the best-performing chemical space engine we have.

 

“The main technical challenge here is working with liquid hydrogen stored at 20 K—very, very cold and really slippery molecules that like to slip out of wherever you put them,” Shireman said. For DRACO, Lockheed went for passive hydrogen cooling. The tanks will be thermally isolated to keep the Sun from heating them up. This way, the hydrogen should stay at 20 K for long enough to complete all tests. For longer missions, nuclear spaceships would need to rely on active cooling.

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One thing seems for sure: people are not ready for “digital workers” just yet.

That’s the lesson learned by Sarah Franklin, the CEO of Lattice, a human resources and performance management platform that offers performance coaching, talent reviews, onboarding automation, compensation management and a host of other HR tools to more than 5,000 organizations around the world.

What is a digital employee? According to Franklin, it’s avatars like Devin the engineer, Harvey the lawyer, Einstein the service agent and Piper the sales agent who have “entered the workforce and become our colleagues”. But these are not real workers. They’re bots powered by AI. They’ve been introduced by companies like customer relationship management giant Salesforce and startups like Cognition.ai and Qualified to perform work in lieu of humans.

Salesforce’s Einstein, for example, can help sales and marketing professionals predict revenues, complete tasks and liaise with prospects.

Cognition’s software engineer Devin can plan and execute complex engineering tasks requiring thousands of decisions, while recalling relevant context at every step as it learns over time, and fixes its own mistakes. Qualified’s sales rep Piper “works around the clock to convert inbound website traffic into pipeline” and is “bright, hard-working, and crushes her pipeline targets”. None of these agents – as far as I can tell – require health insurance, paid time off or retirement plans, either.

Seeing an opportunity, Franklin decided to take advantage. On 9 July, the company said that it would begin to support digital employees as part of its platform and treat them like any other employee.

“Today Lattice is making AI history,” Franklin pronounced. “We will be the first to give digital workers official employee records in Lattice. Digital workers will be securely onboarded, trained and assigned goals, performance metrics, appropriate systems access and even a manager. Just as any person would be.”

The pushback was swift – and, in many cases, brutal, particularly on LinkedIn, which is generally not known for its savage engagement like X (formerly known as Twitter).

“This strategy and messaging misses the mark in a big way, and I say that as someone building an AI company,” said Sawyer Middeleer, an executive at a firm that uses AI to help with sales research, on LinkedIn. “Treating AI agents as employees disrespects the humanity of your real employees. Worse, it implies that you view humans simply as ‘resources’ to be optimized and measured against machines. It’s the exact opposite of a work environment designed to elevate the people who contribute to it.”

Scott Burgess, a self-employed marketing executive, was even more direct.

“Terrifying,” he posted. “The more AI is being used all around, the more I am starting to be like this shit is going to ruin everything. Workers are already struggling enough and now they have to compete with ‘AI workers’[.] Can we put it back into its box and send it back?”

The backlash – which even earned the post the dubious honor of being included in the “LinkedIn Lunatics” subreddit, was enough to force Franklin to suspend her company’s plans three days after her announcement.

Of course, these concerns are legit. But was Franklin in the wrong? Aren’t “digital employees” inevitable?

There’s no argument that AI is currently overhyped. We’ve seen the embarrassing fails of AI results generated from Google. We’ve experienced the less-than-stellar performance of Microsoft’s Copilot AI offering. We know that, with all the predictions and prognostications and soothsaying, AI is still very much in its infancy. Even the AI-powered “digital assistants” mentioned above are known to be only capable of performing the most rudimentary tasks so far and – at least from what I hear from my clients and read in some surveys – most executives correctly view AI at its early age to be as untrustworthy as a toddler.

Franklin made the same mistake that Microsoft, Google and other big tech platforms have made: overhyping something that’s still not ready for prime time in order to achieve a marketing edge. You can’t blame her for her vision. It’s just that she, like many others, executed that vision too soon. It’s still early days for AI, and humans are still trying to absorb its implications. There will certainly be “digital employees” and they will be working better than most human employees in the not-too-distant future. We just don’t know when that future will be. Clearly, it’s not right now.

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Dozens of people were injured, some seriously, during a bout of severe turbulence on an Air Europa flight traveling from Spain to Uruguay at the beginning of July. Just a few weeks earlier, at the end of May, one man died (of a suspected heart attack) and tens of others were injured amid “sudden extreme turbulence” during a Singapore Airlines flight en route to Singapore from London. In both instances, the flights made early, emergency landings.

Extreme turbulence is rare. However these two recent incidents have stoked concern and fear among fliers that dangerously rough flights are becoming more common. Scientific studies do indicate that climate change is increasing the occurrence and intensity of airplane turbulence. Atmospheric shifts triggered by global warming are set to cause trouble for the airline industry, making flights longer and costlier–but experts suggest passengers need not be too worried. Basic precautions can help you stay safe.

What is turbulence?

Turbulence is irregular air movement, experienced by plane passengers as bumps and shaking. There are three basic causes of severe in-flight turbulence: terrain, thunderstorms, and air currents, says Shem Malmquist, an aeronautics instructor at the Florida Institute of Technology and a B-777 pilot. Geologic formations like mountain ranges disrupt airflow and can bring on bumps, in a process known as “mountain wave turbulence.” Thunderstorms can churn up the atmosphere and trigger “convective” turbulence in their immediate vicinity and also “near-cloud” turbulence up to tens of miles away, says Isabel Smith, a meteorologist and PhD student at the University of Reading in England. Finally, jet streams–narrow bands of fast wind that circle the globe at high atmospheric elevations–can become swirling and chaotic under the right conditions.

Why is turbulence becoming more common?

Some research indicates that all three drivers of turbulence could be exacerbated by climate change. Global warming isn’t making mountains bigger, but it is leading to upper-atmosphere shifts that may promote more intense air movement above mountains, according to one 2023 study published in the journal Climate and Atmospheric Science. That same study also found evidence that near-cloud turbulence, spurred by storms, is set to worsen with warming as well. Though more work is needed to confirm these findings, Smith tells Popular Science. “There’s only one published paper that’s really looked at it,” she says.  

Previous research has concluded that storms are generally becoming more intense and frequent due to climate change, in part because warmer air holds more moisture. As a result, Smith says she’d expect convective turbulence to become more common and extreme as well.

But the vast majority of studies of turbulence and climate change have focused on the clear-air (i.e. cloudless) turbulence associated with jet streams. And here, science going back more than a decade has repeatedly shown we’re in for a rough ride.

In a study led by Smith and published last year, she concluded that every one degree Celsius of increased warming is set to boost jetstream-related turbulence by 9%-14%, depending on the season, through 2050. Another 2023 paper from the same lab group assessed weather reanalysis data and found that the most severe type of this sort of clear air turbulence has already increased by 55% from 1979 to 2020.

Greenhouse gas emissions make Earth’s lower atmosphere much warmer because they keep heat trapped in the bottom layers. Since less heat is escaping the lower atmosphere, the upper atmosphere is actually becoming colder, as our planet’s surface warms. The result is a rapid divergence between upper and lower atmospheric temperatures.

Jet streams exist because of thermal gradients–sometimes between low-elevation air in the Arctic and equatorial regions, and sometimes between higher and lower elevation air. As polar air gets warmer and higher elevation air gets colder, these shifts are speeding parts of the stream up and slowing others down, inducing chaos in the global air currents, explains Smith. “There are lots of shifts and temperature changes in the atmosphere, which are leading to the jetstream itself changing. When the jet isn’t in a set position, it can produce more favorable conditions for turbulence,” she says. “You have really fast bands of wind, then slower bands of wind on the edge. It results in these swirls and curls that break down into turbulence.”   

What can airlines do about it?

Avoiding summer flights won’t solve the problem. Despite the link to warming, winter is actually generally considered the worst time for trans-Atlantic, northern hemisphere flights. Climate change is expected to intensify turbulence in all seasons.

The good news is that most bouts of turbulence show up in forecasting, which is about 75%-80% accurate, notes Smith. Weather radar reveals turbulence associated with storms. Terrain is unmoving and a predictable influence on atmospheric conditions. And meteorologists monitor the jetstream, revealing information about most clear-air turbulence, says Malmquist. “The scientists are pretty good at mapping where the jetstream is and then also if the jetstream is curling and bending around, which is a good indication of turbulence for [pilots],” he notes.

However, atmospheric conditions can change quickly. With a storm, that’s visible to a pilot. With clear air turbulence, it’s not, says Smith.

“It can hit the aircraft quite suddenly, without any warning.” And, even in cases where clear air turbulence is clearly forecasted, pilots may not always be able to easily avoid it, especially on long-haul, cross-ocean flights.

 “We’re relying on the jet stream to carry us across and not burn the fuel sometimes,” says Malmquist. On long distance flights, “descending out of the jet stream to avoid turbulence is going to be a big problem… when we don’t have that flexibility in routes and altitudes,” he adds.

Air traffic controllers and pilots “always put safety as a priority,” says Smith. So moving forward, a bigger part of flight planning will be jetstream conditions. Ultimately, it will likely mean re-mapping flight routes, longer flights to avoid turbulent areas, and burning more jetfuel, she says. “We’ll have more convoluted routes, which will also mean that we’re using more fuel and producing more emissions,” adding to the problem of jetstream destabilization in the first place.

How dangerous is turbulence during a flight?

Even with the rising risk of turbulence, airplanes remain the safest ways to travel. Trips by car, motorcycle, train, ferry, and bus are all significantly more likely to hurt or kill you.

Turbulence on a flight is unpleasant, and in rare, unfortunate cases dangerous. However, planes themselves are built to manage all manner of jostling. “The airplane can handle it,” says Malmquist–passengers should not worry that a plane will incur structural damage or fall apart.

Instead, the real threat is what can happen inside an airplane amid extreme turbulence. All that up and down movement can send objects and people bouncing. The best way to keep yourself safe is rather obvious and boring: wear your seatbelt.

 “People need to keep their seatbelts fastened,” says Malmquist. Even if the cabin light is off and passengers are technically free to move about the plane, it’s always best to stay seated with your seatbelt secure for as much of a flight as possible, considering how rapidly turbulence can materialize. “It’s not a reason to avoid flying, but it’s a really good reminder that those seatbelts are important,” Malmquist emphasizes.

“If you need to pee, go quickly and get back and get buckled in,” agrees Smith. “You wouldn’t sit unsecured in a car going 100 miles an hour,” she says–so why risk it in a plane traveling many times faster?

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Unfortunately, the Mark 18 had numerous problems that took most of the war to sort out. One such problem was something called "circular runs," which involved a torpedo returning to the ship that fired it. There were several instances of circular runs involving U.S. submarines during WWII, but one case was unluckier than most because it fired a torpedo that circled back around like a boomerang and wound up sinking the ship. Here is the story of the early submarine, the USS Tang (SS-306), which had a fearsome reputation before meeting its fate on October 25, 1944.

This submarine was a force to be reckoned with in the ocean

The USS Tang was a Balao-class submarine designed to sink ships, and in her short career, that's precisely what she did. The Tang has an impressive war record, having sunk 33 enemy ships from the day it was commissioned on October 15, 1943, to the day it sank just over two years later. This ship alone accounted for the sinking of 116,454 tons of enemy shipping, which is impressive, seeing as she only sailed for two years.

The Tang's success earned Commander Richard O'Kane the Medal of Honor. O'Kane and the Tang were recognized for sinking a Japanese ship every 11 days she operated throughout five patrol missions. On top of that, she rescued numerous airmen from the ocean, so she was a busy submarine. Although they would be her last, the Tang's final two days of operation were part of what made her a legendary ship.

The Tang went up against several vessels on October 24, 1944. She ran into a Japanese convoy and engaged by firing off a slew of torpedoes. Two tankers tried to ram her, but the Tang managed to avoid them, causing them to slam into one another. She also engaged a destroyer, a transport, a freighter, and several escort ships. While she survived that engagement, she wouldn't survive the following one.

The USS Tang was sunk by its own torpedo

The USS Tang's final day above the water came on October 25, 1944, around Turnabout Island in the Taiwan Strait. Upon her approach, the Tang's radar identified several ships that made up an enemy convoy, so she lined herself up to better engage her targets, beginning with a large transport, a smaller transport, and a massive tanker. She fired at them all and drew a great deal of enemy fire.

The Tang sank the tanker and small transport but had to contend with a destroyer that headed straight for her. That destroyer exploded, possibly from one of the Tang's torpedoes, and with her last two shots, the Tang fired at the transport. One torpedo hit the tanker, but the other went wild and began a circular run back toward the Tang.

The Commanding officer saw it coming, and Commander O'Kane tried to steer his vessel away from the incoming torpedo, but he had little time. It only took 20 seconds for the torpedo to return to the Tang, slamming into its torpedo room and sinking the ship. Most hands were lost, though Commander O'Kane and nine crewmen survived. They were picked up by a Japanese destroyer and spent the rest of the war in the Ōfuna prisoner-of-war camp. The truth of the Tang's hand in its sinking wasn't revealed until the survivors returned and the war ended.

The Tang left a lasting legacy

The USS Tang was one of the most legendary submarines of World War II and remains the most successful American submarine to ever operate during wartime. While the ship was lost, you can still experience being on it during its final mission. The National WWII Museum in New Orleans has an exhibit called Final Mission: USS Tang Submarine Experience, which recreates the Tang's fifth and final war patrol on the day it sank. Guests experience the final battle that brought the Tang down while learning about its story and impact.

Interestingly, the Tang sank in a relatively shallow area of the ocean, coming to rest off the coast of China in water that was only around 180 feet deep. However, her wreck remains undiscovered.

Nevertheless, the USS Tang received two Presidential Unit Citations and four battle stars for her service during World War II. She's been featured in various pop culture outlets, including two episodes of "The Silent Service," which details the Tang's second and final patrol. Plus, an image of the Tang's torpedo damage report appeared in "Godzilla Minus One," so she has a lasting legacy despite sinking over 80 years ago.

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Evidence in humans suggests that the smell of a stressed person subconsciously affects the emotions and choices made by others around them. Bristol Veterinary School researchers wanted to find out whether dogs also experience changes in their learning and emotional state in response to human stress or relaxation odors.

The team used a test of 'optimism' or 'pessimism' in animals, which is based on findings that 'optimistic' or 'pessimistic' choices by people indicate positive or negative emotions, respectively.

The researchers recruited 18 dog-owner partnerships to take part in a series of trials with different human smells present. During the trials, dogs were trained that when a food bowl was placed in one location, it contained a treat, but when placed in another location, it was empty.

Once a dog learned the difference between these bowl locations, they were faster to approach the location with a treat than the empty location. Researchers then tested how quickly the dog would approach new, ambiguous bowl locations positioned between the original two.

A quick approach reflected 'optimism' about food being present in these ambiguous locations—a marker of a positive emotional state—while a slow approach indicated 'pessimism' and negative emotion. These trials were repeated while each dog was exposed to either no odor or the odors of sweat and breath samples from humans in either a stressed (arithmetic test) or relaxed (listening to soundscapes) state.

Freddie approaching the bowl placed at one of the ambiguous locations midway between the two trained locations to check if there is a treat inside.

Credit: University of Bristol

Researchers discovered that the stress smell made dogs slower to approach the ambiguous bowl location nearest the trained location of the empty bowl. An effect that was not seen with the relaxed smell. These findings suggest that the stress smell may have increased the dogs' expectations that this new location contained no food, similar to the nearby empty bowl location.

Researchers suggest this 'pessimistic' response reflects a negative emotional state and could possibly be a way for the dog to conserve energy and avoid disappointment.

The team also found that dogs continued to improve their learning about the presence or absence of food in the two trained bowl locations and that they improved faster when the stress smell was present.

Dr. Nicola Rooney, Senior Lecturer in Wildlife and Conservation at Bristol Veterinary School and the paper's lead author explained, "Understanding how human stress affects dogs' well-being is an important consideration for dogs in kennels and when training companion dogs and dogs for working roles such as assistance dogs.

"Dog owners know how attuned their pets are to their emotions, but here we show that even the odor of a stressed, unfamiliar human affects a dog's emotional state, perception of rewards, and ability to learn. Working dog handlers often describe stress traveling down the lead, but we've also shown it can also travel through the air."

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Professor Mohamed I. Elmasry says simple daily habits such as afternoon naps, memory 'workouts' and not reaching for a smartphone can increase the odds of healthy aging.

His new book, iMind: Artificial and Real Intelligence (with foreword by Canadian cell biologist Dr. Aileen Burford-Mason), says the focus has shifted too far away from RI (natural, or real) intelligence in favor of AI (machine, or artificial) intelligence. Elmasry instead calls us to nurture our human mind which, like smartphones, has 'hardware', 'software' and 'apps' but is many times more powerful—and will last much longer with the right care.

Professor Elmasry, an internationally recognized expert in microchip design and AI, was inspired to write the book after the death of his brother-in-law from Alzheimer's and others very close to him, including his mother, from other forms of dementia.

Although he says that smart devices are 'getting smarter all the time', he argues in iMind that none comes close to 'duplicating the capacity, storage, longevity, energy efficiency, or self-healing capabilities of the original human brain-mind'.

He writes that: "The useful life expectancy for current smartphones is around 10 years, while a healthy brain-mind inside a healthy human body can live for 100 years or longer.

"Your brain-mind is the highest-value asset you have, or will ever have. Increase its potential and longevity by caring for it early in life, keeping it and your body healthy so it can continue to develop.

"Humans can intentionally develop and test their memories by playing 'brain games,' or performing daily brain exercises. You can't exercise your smartphone's memory to make it last longer or encourage it to perform at a higher level."

In iMind: Artificial and Real Intelligence Professor Elmasry shares an anecdote about his grandchildren having to use the search engine on their smartphones to name Cuba's capital—they had just spent a week in the country with their parents.

The story illustrates how young people have come to rely on AI smartphone apps instead of using their real intelligence (RI), he says, adding: "A healthy memory goes hand-in-hand with real intelligence. Our memory simply can't reach its full potential without RI."

Published by Routledge, iMind: Artificial and Real Intelligence includes extensive background on the history of microchip design, machine learning and AI and their role in smartphones and other technology.

The book also explains how both AI and human intelligence really work, and how brain function links the mind and memory. It compares the human mind and brain function with that of smartphones, ChatGPT and other AI-based systems.

Drawing on comprehensive existing research, iMind aims to narrow the knowledge gap between real and artificial intelligence, to address the current controversy around AI, and to inspire researchers to find new treatments for Alzheimer's, other neurodegenerative conditions and cancer.

It argues that current or even planned AI cannot match the capabilities of the human brain-mind for speed, accuracy, storage capacity and other functions. Healthy aging, Professor Elmasry notes, is as important as climate change but doesn't attract a fraction of the publicity.

He calls for policymakers to adopt a series of key reforms to promote healthy aging. Among such changes, he suggests that bingo halls could transition from their sedentary entertainment function to become active and stimulating learning centers.

As well as napping to refresh our memories and other brain and body functions, he also outlines a series of practical tips to boost brain power and enhance our RI (Real Intelligence).

These include building up 'associative' memory—the brain's 'dictionary of meaning' where it attaches new information to what it already knows. Try reading a book aloud, using all of your senses instead of going on autopilot and turning daily encounters into fully-lived experiences.

Other techniques include integrating a day for true rest into the week, reviewing your lifestyle as early as your 20s or 30s, adopting a healthy diet, and eliminating or radically moderating alcohol consumption to reduce the risk of dementia.

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Diuretics and RSA inhibitors are often prescribed together to manage hypertension and are known by various brand names.

Ibuprofen, found in popular brands, is readily available at most pharmacies and stores.

In their study, the research team used computer simulations to model how these three drugs interact and affect the kidneys. They found that for some individuals, this combination can lead to acute kidney injury, which may sometimes be permanent.

The researchers emphasize that not everyone taking these drugs will encounter problems. However, the study highlights that the risk exists and people should be cautious.

This finding is especially relevant for those managing high blood pressure, who might not think twice about using ibuprofen for pain relief.

Diuretics help the body expel excess water, and dehydration is a significant risk factor for acute kidney injury. The combination of a diuretic, RSA inhibitor, and ibuprofen creates a “triple whammy” effect on the kidneys.

For those on high blood pressure medication in need of a painkiller, the researchers recommend considering acetaminophen as a safer alternative.

This important study was led by Anita Layton and her team.

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The intense scientific effort that long COVID sparked has resulted in more than 24,000 scientific publications, making it the most researched health condition in any four years of recorded human history.

Long COVID is a term that describes the constellation of long-term health effects caused by infection with the SARS-CoV-2 virus. These range from persistent respiratory symptoms, such as shortness of breath, to debilitating fatigue or brain fog that limits people's ability to work, and conditions such as heart failure and diabetes, which are known to last a lifetime.

I am a physician scientist, and I have been deeply immersed in studying long COVID since the early days of the pandemic. I have testified before the U.S. Senate as an expert witness on long COVID, have published extensively on it and was named as one of Time's 100 most influential people in health in 2024 for my research in this area.

Over the first half of 2024, a flurry of reports and scientific papers on long COVID added clarity to this complex condition. These include, in particular, insights into how COVID-19 can still wreak havoc in many organs years after the initial viral infection, as well as emerging evidence on viral persistence and immune dysfunction that last for months or years after initial infection.

How long COVID affects the body

A new study that my colleagues and I published in the New England Journal of Medicine on July 17, 2024, shows that the risk of long COVID declined over the course of the pandemic. In 2020, when the ancestral strain of SARS-CoV-2 was dominant and vaccines were not available, about 10.4% of adults who got COVID-19 developed long COVID.

By early 2022, when the omicron family of variants predominated, that rate declined to 7.7% among unvaccinated adults and 3.5% of vaccinated adults. In other words, unvaccinated people were more than twice as likely to develop long COVID.

While researchers like me do not yet have concrete numbers for the current rate in mid-2024 due to the time it takes for long COVID cases to be reflected in the data, the flow of new patients into long COVID clinics has been on par with 2022.

We found that the decline was the result of two key drivers: availability of vaccines and changes in the characteristics of the virus—which made the virus less prone to cause severe acute infections and may have reduced its ability to persist in the human body long enough to cause chronic disease.

Despite the decline in risk of developing long COVID, even a 3.5% risk is substantial. New and repeat COVID-19 infections translate into millions of new long COVID cases that add to an already staggering number of people suffering from this condition.

Estimates for the first year of the pandemic suggests that at least 65 million people globally have had long COVID. Along with a group of other leading scientists, my team will soon publish updated estimates of the global burden of long COVID and its impact on the global economy through 2023.

In addition, a major new report by the National Academies of Sciences Engineering and Medicine details all the health effects that constitute long COVID. The report was commissioned by the Social Security Administration to understand the implications of long COVID on its disability benefits.

It concludes that long COVID is a complex chronic condition that can result in more than 200 health effects across multiple body systems. These include new onset or worsening:

Many people experience long COVID symptoms for years following initial infection.

• heart disease

• neurologic problems such as cognitive impairment, strokes and dysautonomia. This is a category of disorders that affect the body's autonomic nervous system—nerves that regulate most of the body's vital mechanisms such as blood pressure, heart rate and temperature.

• post-exertional malaise, a state of severe exhaustion that may happen after even minor activity—often leaving the patient unable to function for hours, days or weeks

• gastrointestinal disorders

• kidney disease

• metabolic disorders such as diabetes and hyperlipidemia, or a rise in bad cholesterol

• immune dysfunction

Long COVID can affect people across the lifespan from children to older adults and across race and ethnicity and baseline health status. Importantly, more than 90% of people with long COVID had mild COVID-19 infections.

The National Academies report also concluded that long COVID can result in the inability to return to work or school; poor quality of life; diminished ability to perform activities of daily living; and decreased physical and cognitive function for months or years after the initial infection.

The report points out that many health effects of long COVID, such as post-exertional malaise and chronic fatigue, cognitive impairment and autonomic dysfunction, are not currently captured in the Social Security Administration's Listing of Impairments, yet may significantly affect an individual's ability to participate in work or school.

A long road ahead

What's more, health problems resulting from COVID-19 can last years after the initial infection.

A large study published in early 2024 showed that even people who had a mild SARS-CoV-2 infection still experienced new health problems related to COVID-19 in the third year after the initial infection.

Such findings parallel other research showing that the virus persists in various organ systems for months or years after COVID-19 infection. And research is showing that immune responses to the infection are still evident two to three years after a mild infection.

Together, these studies may explain why a SARS-CoV-2 infection years ago could still cause new health problems long after the initial infection.

Important progress is also being made in understanding the pathways by which long COVID wreaks havoc on the body. Two preliminary studies from the U.S. and the Netherlands show that when researchers transfer auto-antibodies—antibodies generated by a person's immune system that are directed at their own tissues and organs—from people with long COVID into healthy mice, the animals start to experience long COVID-like symptoms such as muscle weakness and poor balance.

These studies suggest that an abnormal immune response thought to be responsible for the generation of these auto-antibodies may underlie long COVID and that removing these auto-antibodies may hold promise as potential treatments.

An ongoing threat

Despite overwhelming evidence of the wide-ranging risks of COVID-19, a great deal of messaging suggests that it is no longer a threat to the public. Although there is no empirical evidence to back this up, this misinformation has permeated the public narrative.

The data, however, tells a different story.

COVID-19 infections continue to outnumber flu cases and lead to more hospitalization and death than the flu. COVID-19 also leads to more serious long-term health problems. Trivializing COVID-19 as an inconsequential cold or equating it with the flu does not align with reality.

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The reason is actually quite simple: CrowdStrike is hardly used there.

Very few organisations will buy software from an American firm that, in the past, has been vocal about the cyber-security threat posed by Beijing.

Additionally, China is not as reliant on Microsoft as the rest of the world. Domestic companies such as Alibaba, Tencent and Huawei are the dominant cloud providers.

So reports of outages in China, when they did come, were mainly at foreign firms or organisations. On Chinese social media sites, for example, some users complained they were not able to check into international chain hotels such as Sheraton, Marriott and Hyatt in Chinese cities.

Over recent years, government organisations, businesses and infrastructure operators have increasingly been replacing foreign IT systems with domestic ones. Some analysts like to call this parallel network the "splinternet".

"It's a testament to China's strategic handling of foreign tech operations," says Josh Kennedy White, a cybersecurity expert based in Singapore.

"Microsoft operates in China through a local partner, 21Vianet, which manages its services independently of its global infrastructure. This setup insulates China’s essential services - like banking and aviation - from global disruptions."

Beijing sees avoiding reliance on foreign systems as a way of shoring up national security.

It is similar to the way some Western countries banned Chinese tech firm Huawei’s technology in 2019 - or the UK's move to ban the use of Chinese-owned TikTok on government devices in 2023.

Since then, the US has launched a concerted effort to ban sales of advanced semiconductor chip tech to China, as well as attempts to stop American companies from investing in Chinese technology. The US government says all of these restrictions are on national security grounds.

Hong Kong airport did see some of its services affected by the outage

An editorial published on Saturday in the state-run Global Times newspaper made a thinly veiled reference to these curbs on Chinese technology.

"Some countries constantly talk about security, generalise the concept of security, but ignore the real security, this is ironic," the editorial said.

The argument here is that the US tries to dictate the terms of who can use global technology and how it is used, yet one of its own companies has caused global chaos through lack of care.

The Global Times also took a jab at the internet giants who "monopolise" the industry: "Relying solely on top companies to lead network security efforts, as some countries advocate, may hinder not just the inclusive sharing of governance outcomes but also introduce new security risks."

The reference to “sharing” is probably an allusion to the debate over intellectual property insofar as China is often accused of copying or stealing western technology. Beijing insists this is not the case and advocates for an open global technology marketplace - while still keeping tight control over its domestic scene.

Not everything was totally unaffected in China, however. A small numbers of workers expressed thanks to an American software giant for ending their working week early.

“Thank you Microsoft for an early vacation” was trending on the social media site Weibo on Friday, with users posting pictures of blue error screens.

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A fierce heatwave is continuing to roll across southern and central Europe, bringing temperatures of up to 44C (111.2F) to parts of Spain, sparking forest fires in Greece and Croatia, and prompting governments to urge people to take special care as the mercury rises.

In Spain, the state meteorological agency, Aemet, said temperatures on Friday could hit 40C across large parts of the country – and even 44C in areas of Andalucía – as the first heatwave of the summer hit. Aemet said the high temperatures, caused by a mass of “very hot, dry and dusty air” from North Africa, were expected to last until Saturday.

“Today is forecast to be the hottest day of this heat episode, with temperatures that could exceed 40C in large areas of the southern half of Spain, in the Ebro valley and in the interior of Mallorca,” said Luis Bañon, a spokesperson for Aemet.

“Today, the skies will remain full of sand from the Sahara, especially in the south-east of the peninsula, in Ceuta, Melilla, the Balearics and the eastern Canaries.”

Tourists walk past a terrace with a water spray in Athens, Greece. Photograph: George Vitsaras/EPA

Spain’s health ministry issued alerts for large parts of the country, calling on people to take all necessary precautions against the high temperatures: “When it comes to the heat: protect yourself; hydrate yourself; refresh yourself, and take care of more vulnerable people.”

Héctor Tejero, the ministry’s head of health and climate change, said people needed to take the heat seriously and change their behaviour accordingly.

“We’re not talking about polar bears and all that stuff, we’re talking about something that affects your health,” he said in an interview with the online newspaper elDiario.es on Friday.

“The heat is killing 3,000 people a year and it’s going to get worse. But while exposure to extreme heat is going to rise, we can also step up our adaptation to it … Although it’s hotter in Spain than it was 20 years ago, fewer people are dying because homes are better adapted, because we have air conditioning, and because people are getting into a culture of dealing with the heat.”

In Greece, the second heatwave of the summer brought hot, dry winds, forest fires and temperatures of up to 43C on Thursday.

Firefighters fought two large blazes on Thursday, one near a village on the outskirts of the northern city of Thessaloniki, and a brush fire on the island of Kea, near Athens. Emergency services ordered the evacuation of two areas on Kea, while local media said the fire near Thessaloniki had damaged several homes.

“We appeal to the public to be particularly careful as over the next few days there is a very high risk of the outbreak of serious wildfires,” a government spokesperson, Pavlos Marinakis, said. “Even one spark can cause a major catastrophe.”

The authorities shut all archaeological sites in Athens for a second consecutive day on Thursday and restricted outdoor work.

People at a drink fountain in front of the Colosseum in Rome. Photograph: Anadolu/Getty Images

Like many countries in Europe, high temperatures have disrupted daily activities repeatedly since June. Hundreds of wildfires, which scientists link to the climate emergency, have broken out following the warmest winter on record.

Faced with what is forecast to be the country’s longest heatwave on record, the government has ordered some businesses not to let their employees perform heavy outdoor duty from midday until 5pm this week as the mercury is expected to reach 42C in parts of the country.

Italy, meanwhile, put 14 cities under the highest level of alert as temperatures were expected to climb past 40C, particularly in central and southern regions. The health ministry said it would further extend the red alert to 17 Italian cities on Friday, as the intense heat was forecast to continue until Sunday.

Dozens of firefighters and three water-bombing planes were tackling a forest fire that broke out late on Thursday near Croatia’s popular coastal resort of Trogir, officials said.

About 70 firefighters prevented the blaze from spreading to houses and a hotel complex, the national firefighting association said.

A firefighting plane sprays water to extinguish wildfires at Ciovo island, Croatia. Photograph: Miroslav Lelas/AP

The fire near Trogir, on the central Adriatic coast, was under control and additional firefighting forces were arriving in the area, it added. “There is no threat to houses and tourists,” the chief fire commander, Slavko Tucakovic, said.

In the village of Seget Donji, the fire engulfed a large forest area by the sea near a tourist camping site, the state-run HRT television reported.

Croatia, like the rest of the Balkans, has been hit by a prolonged heatwave that started earlier this month, with temperatures exceeding 37C. On Tuesday, Serbia’s state power company reported record consumption due to the use of air conditioning.

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Some locations have seen the heat index, or how it feels when factoring in the humidity, reach 140 to 150 degrees Fahrenheit (60 to 65 Celsius), fueled by an intense heat dome, the warmest water temperatures in the world and the influence of human-caused climate change.

Temperatures at the Persian Gulf International Airport in Asaluyeh, Iran, climbed to 108 (42 C) on Wednesday and 106 (41 C) on Thursday, with both days recording a peak heat index of 149 (65 C). In Dubai, the temperature topped out at 113 (45 C) on Tuesday and the heat index soared to 144 (62 C). Other extreme heat indexes in recent days include 141 (61 C) in Abu Dhabi and 136 (58 C) at Khasab Air Base in Oman.

Last August, this same region experienced even more extreme heat indexes, climbing as high as 158 degrees (70 C).

The maximum air temperatures this week — generally between 105 and 115 (41 and 46 C) — have only been somewhat above normal. But the dew points — which are a measure of humidity — have been excessive, climbing well into the 80s (27 to 32 C). In the United States, any dew point over 70 degrees (21 C) is considered uncomfortably humid.

The Persian Gulf is enduring life-threatening heat indexes above 140 degrees © The Washington Post

 It’s the very high dew points that have propelled heat indexes up to 30 degrees (16 C) above actual air temperatures.

The extreme humidity levels are tied to bathtub-like water temperatures in the Persian Gulf, the warmest in the world. According to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration data, sea surface temperatures are as warm as 95 degrees (35 C).

 Largely because of the high humidity, nighttime minimum temperatures have also remained exceptionally warm, in many cases staying above 85 (29 C). Temperatures in Iranshar, Iran, only dropped to 97 (36 C) on Wednesday night, its hottest July night on record.

A Washington Post analysis found that the wet-bulb globe temperature, which measures the amount of heat stress on the human body, reached 96 (36 C) at the Persian Gulf International Airport and 95 (35 C) in Dubai, exceeding the threshold of 89.6 (32 C) that researchers have said poses a risk to human survival if such heat is prolonged. The wet-bulb globe temperature, which was calculated using data from nearby weather stations, takes into account a combination of temperature, humidity, wind and clouds.

Researchers have identified the Persian Gulf among the regions most likely to regularly exceed life-threatening heat thresholds during the next 30 to 50 years. Dubai was recently ranked as the city having the most dangerous summer heat in the world, with dangerous heat on 89 percent of summer days. Doha, Qatar, came in second.

Weather observations from Persian Gulf International Airport showing the heat index reaching 149 on both Wednesday and Thursday.

© U.S. National Weather Service

There were also numerous heat records in the same region last week, according to weather historian Maximiliano Herrera. The United Arab Emirates saw a scorching high temperature of 123 while Adrar, Algeria, tied its record of 122 (50 C). Cities in both Kuwait and Iraq reached 126 (52 C), and Al Ahsa, Saudi Arabia, notched a record of 124 (51 C). The city of Amarah recorded Iraq’s warmest nighttime low on record at 102 (39 C).

The same heat dome that’s in the Persian Gulf region has spread record heat northward into Eastern Europe, westward into northern Africa, and eastward into India, Pakistan and Indonesia. In Eastern Europe, high temperatures surpassed 104 (40 C), with some locations staying above 85 degrees (29 C) at night.

 It was so hot in Greece on Wednesday that officials closed the Acropolis for five hours, according to the Associated Press.

The intense July heat comes after the temperature reached 125 (52 C) in Saudi Arabia in June, leading to hundreds of deaths from heatstroke during the Hajj pilgrimage. Also in June, nighttime temperatures remained as high as 95 (35 C) in Delhi on June 18.

Dangerous, record-setting heat swept across five continents in June, which was Earth’s hottest June on record according to NOAA. Scientists say the heat waves show how human-caused climate change has made life-threatening temperatures more common.

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The Persian Gulf has been experiencing an extreme and potentially life-threatening heat wave, with temperatures and humidity levels soaring to triple-digits this week.

The heat, fueled by a combination of factors - from the brutal heat dome to the impact of human-caused climate change - is pushing the boundaries of heat tolerance for people living in the Middle East that have seen the heat index reaching 140 or 150 Fahrenheit.

Iran and Dubai are some of the countries that are hit the hardest, with temperatures at the Persian Gulf International Airport in Iran reaching as high as 108 degrees and a heat index of 149 degrees this week.

Dubai is also experiencing a relentless heat wave, with temperatures reaching as high as 113 degrees and the heat index of 144 degrees.

The Persian Gulf International Airport in Iran experienced temperature as high as 108 degrees (Image: Getty)

But this was not even the hottest tempearture, as the Persian Gulf region reached a record high of 158 degrees on the heat index in 2023.

The heat indexes have been propelled by the humidity and have exceeded the actual air temperatures by up to 30 degrees.

A NASA analysis finds the Persian Gulf to be one of the most vulnerable regions most likely to be exposed to life-threatening heat and humidity thresholds by 2050.

Dubai, known for its hot desert climate, was ranked as the most dangerous city in terms of high summer heat in the world, with the heat occurring at approximately 89 percent of summer days, followed by Doha and Qatar.

The extreme heat comes a month after the tempearture soared to at least 125 degrees Fahrenheit in Saudi Arabia, where more than 1,300 Muslims pilgrims died during the annual Hajj, or pilgrimage to Mecca, according to Human Rights Watch.

It also come a month after the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration ranked June of this year as Earth's hottest June on record when the average ground and water temperature reached 1.89 degrees Farehenheit.

It surpassed the previous record set in June 2020, when it reached 1.66 degrees Farehenheit.

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The secret to healthy teeth and gums isn’t much of a secret: Brush twice a day, floss once a day and visit a dentist regularly for cleanings.

“It’s not sexy or surprising, but this is what works if you want to avoid cavities and gum disease,” said Dr. Matthew Messina, a clinical director and assistant professor at Ohio State University College of Dentistry.

But dentists say there’s more we could be doing in the name of oral health. Here are some good and bad habits they suggest starting — or stopping.

Bad habit: Using a toothbrush or toothpaste that contains charcoal

Charcoal-infused brushes and toothpastes can be effective at whitening teeth, but the benefits come at a cost.

“Charcoal is incredibly abrasive,” Dr. Messina said. “It whitens your teeth by sanding away the outer layer of tooth enamel.”

Enamel is the hard, crystalline tissue that covers and protects your teeth. While removing a little enamel can have a temporary whitening effect, over time, that lost enamel will weaken your teeth and can lead to staining, cracks, cavities and other problems.

“The body doesn’t make more tooth enamel, so anything we do that wears it away is a bad idea,” he said.

Good habit: Brushing gently, with a soft brush

Using a hard-bristled toothbrush and brushing forcefully can wear away enamel as well, and can lead to gum recession and tooth lesions.

“People in general tend to brush too hard, and that can hurt your teeth and gums,” said Dr. Natalie Peterson, a clinical associate professor at the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry. “If your brush bristles are spread out or splayed while you brush, you’re pressing too hard.”

Instead, brush lightly with a soft-bristled toothbrush and try holding it like you would a pen, “as it is harder to exert too much pressure holding it that way,” she said.

If you’re finding it difficult to remember to brush gently, Dr. Peterson said switching to an electric toothbrush can be helpful: “Many of them will alert you if you use too much pressure.”

Bad habit: Drinking sports drinks, soda and flavored coffee

We’ve all heard that sugar “rots your teeth.” More precisely, researchers have found that sugary foods and beverages support the kinds of mouth bacteria that cause tooth decay and gum disease.

Acidic foods and drinks are also damaging. “Acid erodes tooth enamel, and so over time can cause quite a lot of destruction,” said Dr. Frank Scannapieco, a professor of oral biology at the University at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine.

Sports drinks, energy drinks and soda all tend to be high in both acid and sugar — a double whammy for teeth. “Even sugar-free sodas have high acid levels,” Dr. Scannapieco said. “If you have one of these drinks a day, that’s not going to be a big problem, but drinking these throughout the day will greatly increase your risk for tooth erosion.”

Flavored coffee drinks are another sneaky but significant source of acids (from the coffee) and sugar (from the sweet additions).

Flossing once a day can help keep teeth and gums healthy. Interdental brushes are also a good option.Credit...Naila Ruechel for The New York Times

“We often have patients where we are trying to figure out where their cavities are coming from, and it often turns out to be from flavored coffees,” Dr. Peterson said. “Those caramel macchiatos or whatever sometimes contain even more sugar than soda.”

Good habit: Swishing with water

Rinsing your mouth with water immediately after eating or drinking can help neutralize acidity, remove residual sugar and clear away the kinds of bacteria that cause cavities and bad breath.

“Especially if you’ve been eating or drinking something sweet or acidic, swishing with water afterward will be beneficial,” Dr. Messina said. “Something that simple can help neutralize any damage.”

Good habit: Postponing post-meal brushing

Brushing enamel that has been temporarily softened by acids and sugars can wear it away, Dr. Messina explained.

“If you can wait 30 minutes after eating or drinking before brushing, that’s better for your teeth,” he said.

During that period, the tooth enamel will “remineralize” as the acid loses its effect, he explained. “But the bacteria stay around unless we remove them by brushing and flossing.”

Bad habit: Using toothpicks

“Habitual tooth picking — whether with a fingernail or wood toothpicks — can lead to injury to the gums between the teeth, gum abscesses, sensitive teeth or abrasion of the teeth,” Dr. Scannapieco said.

If you feel the need to pick, he recommended cleaning between the teeth with interdental brushes. They’re safe and effective — perhaps even more effective than floss, he said. Some of his research has also found that these brushes cause less gum irritation than floss.
Bad habit: Using your teeth as tools

“I see people who have used their teeth to bite off the little plastic price tag holders on clothing, or to tear open packaging,” Dr. Messina said.

Tooth enamel is very strong when compressed, like during biting or chewing, he said, but it is not nearly as strong when it’s bent or flexed.

“Pulling on a plastic tab bends the tooth and the enamel can break or chip,” he said. “I see this damage on front teeth all the time.”

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Welcome to Edition 7.03 of the Rocket Report! One week ago, SpaceX suffered a rare failure of its workhorse Falcon 9 rocket. In fact, it was the first time the latest version of the Falcon 9, known as the Block 5, has ever failed on its prime mission after nearly 300 launches. The world's launch pads have been silent since the grounding of the Falcon 9 fleet after last week's failure. This isn't surprising, but it's noteworthy. After all, the Falcon 9 has flown more this year than all of the world's other rockets combined and is fundamental to much of what the world does in space.

 

As always, we welcome reader submissions. If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Astra finally goes private, again. A long-simmering deal for Astra's founders to take the company private has been finalized, the company announced Thursday, capping the rocket launch company’s descent from blank-check darling to delisting in three years, Bloomberg reports. The launch company's valuation peaked at $3.9 billion in 2021, the year it went public, and was worth about $12.2 million at the end of March, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Astra's chief executive officer, Chris Kemp, and chief technology officer, Adam London, founded the company in 2016 with the goal of essentially commoditizing launch services for small satellites. But Astra's rockets failed to deliver and fell short of orbit five times in seven tries.

 

Spiraling ... Astra's stock price tanked after the spate of launch failures, drying up its funding spigot as Kemp tried to pivot toward a slightly larger, more reliable rocket. Astra acquired a company named Apollo Fusion in 2021, entering a new business segment to produce electric thrusters for small satellites. But Astra's launch business faltered, and last November Kemp and London submitted an offer to retake ownership of the company. Astra announced the closure of the take-private deal Thursday, with Kemp and London acquiring the company's outstanding shares for 50 cents per share in cash, below the stock's final listing price of 53 cents. "We will now focus all of our attention on a successful launch of Rocket 4, delivering satellite engines to our customers, and building a company of consequence," Kemp said. (submitted by EllPeaTea and Ken the Bin)

 

Firefly chief leaves company. Launch startup Firefly Aerospace parted ways with CEO Bill Weber, Payload reports. The announcement of Weber's departure late Wednesday came two days after Payload reported Firefly was investigating claims of an alleged inappropriate relationship between him and a female employee. “Firefly Aerospace’s Board of Directors announced that Bill Weber is no longer serving as CEO of the company, effective immediately,” the company said in a statement Wednesday night. Peter Schumacher takes over as interim CEO while Firefly searches for a new permanent chief executive. Schumacher was an interim CEO at Firefly before Weber's hiring in 2022.

 

Two days and gone ... Payload published the first report of Weber's alleged improper relationship with a female employee Monday. Two days later, Weber was gone. Payload reported an executive brought his concerns about the alleged relationship to Firefly's board and resigned because he lost confidence in leadership at the company. Citing four current and former employees, Payload reported Firefly's culture became "chaotic" since Weber took the helm in 2022 after its acquisition by AE Industrial Partners. The Texas-based company achieved some success during Weber's tenure, with four orbital launches of its Alpha rocket, although two of the flights ended up in lower-than-planned orbits. (submitted by Ken the Bin)

 

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Themis hop tests delayed to next year. The initial hop tests of the European Themis reusable booster, developed by ArianeGroup and funded by ESA, won't start until next year, European Spaceflight reports. The Swedish Space Corporation, which operates the space center in Sweden where Themis will initially fly, confirmed the schedule change. Once ArianeGroup moves on to higher altitude flights, the testing will be moved to the Guiana Space Center. ESA awarded the first development contract for the Themis booster in 2019, and the first hop tests were then scheduled for 2022. Themis' hops will be similar to SpaceX's Grasshopper rocket, which performed a series of up-and-down atmospheric test flights before SpaceX started recovering and reusing Falcon 9 boosters.

 

Fate of Themis ... The Themis booster is powered by the methane-fueled Prometheus engine, also funded by ESA. A large European reusable rocket is unlikely to fly until the 2030s, but a subsidiary of ArianeGroup named MaiaSpace is developing a smaller partially reusable two-stage rocket slated to debut as soon as next year. The Maia rocket will use a modified Themis booster as its first stage. "As a result, for MaiaSpace, the continued and rapid development of the Themis program is essential to ensure it can hit its projected target of an inaugural flight of Maia in 2025," European Spaceflight reports. (submitted by Ken the Bin)

 

Baby steps for Vaya Space. Launch startup Vaya Space has received its first full-size liquid oxygen tank shell for its two-stage Dauntless rocket, Spaceflight Now reports. Robert Fabian, Vaya's chief operating officer, called the delivery an "amazing moment of the company," which was founded in 2017 by former astronaut Sid Gutierrez. Vaya's Dauntless rocket, which is now scheduled to debut in 2026, will be capable of lofting a metric ton of payload mass into low-Earth orbit, roughly comparable in performance to Firefly's Alpha rocket. For the rest of this year, Vaya will focus on testing the hybrid vortex engines that will power the Dauntless rocket, along with the newly delivered liquid oxygen tank.

 

Saturation ... Vaya is trying to break into a small satellite launch market that seems, from many indications, to be a losing business, at least for new entrants. Rocket Lab is the only company with a long track record of success in the smallsat launch business, and it's transitioning to a larger reusable rocket. Firefly's Alpha rocket appears to be on the cusp of a breakthrough, with several successful launches and a large backlog of launch contracts. But Firefly, too, is eyeing a larger rocket to go after a more lucrative slice of the market. Virgin Orbit went bankrupt, and Astra has washed out of the launch business after a string of rocket failures. Vaya will share a launch pad at Cape Canaveral, Florida, with another small launch startup named Phantom Space. (submitted by Ken the Bin and EllPeaTea)

 

RFA test-fires upper stage. German rocket builder Rocket Factory Augsburg has completed a full-mission hot fire test of its Redshift upper stage, European Spaceflight reports. The stage will now be sent to SaxaVord Spaceport in Scotland ahead of an inaugural flight of the RFA One rocket later this year. The RFA One will have three stages, stand nearly 100 feet (30 meters) tall, and can carry nearly 2,900 pounds (1,300 kilograms) of payload into a polar Sun-synchronous orbit. It has a good chance to be the first of several privately developed small orbital-class European rockets to reach the launch pad.

 

Where things stand ... With the hot-fire test, the rocket's Redshift upper stage is now fully qualified for flight, according to RFA. The upper stage will next be delivered to Scotland for payload integration. The second stage of the RFA One completed qualification testing last year. And the booster stage for the RFA One rocket completed a test-firing at SaxaVord with four of its kerosene-fueled Helix engines in May. The company is now preparing for a full-scale hot-fire test of the first stage with all nine engines. (submitted by Ken the Bin)

Falcon 9's streak of perfection ends. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket suffered an upper-stage engine failure and deployed a batch of Starlink Internet satellites into a perilously low orbit after launch from California on July 11, the first blemish on the workhorse launcher's record in more than 300 missions since 2016, Ars reports. The upper stage of the Falcon 9 failed during a second engine burn that was required to place 20 Starlink Internet satellites into a stable orbit. The rocket deployed the Starlink satellites in a lower-than-planned orbit, and atmospheric drag was expected to pull all the spacecraft back to Earth for destructive reentries. SpaceX said the upper stage developed a liquid oxygen leak that led to the failure.

 

Grounded by the FAA ... Going into the failed mission, the current version of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, known as the Falcon 9 Block 5, was indisputably the most reliable launch vehicle in history. Since debuting in May 2018, the Falcon 9 Block 5, which NASA has certified for astronaut flights, never had a mission failure in all of its 297 launches before the ill-fated Starlink 9-3 mission. The Falcon 9 Block 5 now has a 99.7 percent success rate. This is still an enviable number for any launch company. The Federal Aviation Administration grounded the Falcon 9 rocket while SpaceX investigates the failure. However, SpaceX is making preparations to resume Falcon flights as soon as this weekend, pending FAA approval.

 

Long March 12 on the cusp of launch. China is set to boost its space launch capabilities as preparations for the first launch of the Long March 12 are underway at a new commercial space launch center, Space News reports. Flight hardware for the first Long March 12 rocket has been delivered to the Wenchang launch base on Hainan Island, suggesting the rocket could launch as soon as August. The medium-lift Long March 12 is designed to launch payloads up to 10 to 12 metric tons (approximately 22,000 pounds to 26,500 pounds) into low-Earth orbit. It was developed by Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology, part of China's apparatus of state-owned aerospace companies.

 

A new engine ... The Long March 12 will debut the new YF-100K engine, an uprated version of the YF-100 engine flying on the Long March 5, 6, 7, and 8 rockets. The YF-100K will also power the first stages of China's Long March 10 rocket, a human-rated launcher in development to send Chinese astronauts to the Moon before the end of the decade. (submitted by Ken the Bin)

Super Heavy fires up at Starbase. The next test flight of the company's next-generation Starship vehicle appears to be on track for liftoff next month. On Monday, SpaceX test-fired the 33 Raptor engines on the Starship rocket's Super Heavy booster at the company's Starbase facility in South Texas, Ars reports. The methane-fueled engines fired for about eight seconds, long enough for SpaceX engineers to verify all systems functioned normally. At full power, the 33 engines generated nearly 17 million pounds of thrust, twice the power output of NASA's iconic Saturn V Moon rocket. The test moves SpaceX closer to the fifth full-scale test flight of Starship.

 

To catch or not to catch? … Back in May, SpaceX test-fired the engines on the Starship upper stage for the next test flight. Lessons learned on the fourth Starship flight in June prompted SpaceX to replace the heat shield on the ship. That work is continuing inside a high bay at Starbase. Barring any surprises, it certainly looks like SpaceX is on track to launch Starship again in August. One of the main goals for this next flight may be an attempt to catch the Super Heavy booster back on its launch pad. If SpaceX tries this, it will be a can't-miss event for space enthusiasts.

 

Artemis II's core stage is on the move. The core stage of NASA's second Space Launch System rocket rolled out at its factory in New Orleans on Tuesday. The 212-foot-long (65-meter) core stage left the Michoud Assembly Facility for loading onto NASA's Pegasus barge to begin the roughly one-week journey from New Orleans to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where it will be prepared for launch on the Artemis II mission as soon as next year. The core stage, with its shuttle-era RS-25 main engines already installed, will undergo final touch-ups inside the Vehicle Assembly Building before stacking between two solid rocket boosters.

 

A noteworthy milestone … Built by Boeing, the core stage is the largest element of the SLS rocket. Its arrival at the Florida spaceport will mark a turning point in the Artemis II launch campaign. The rocket will launch four NASA astronauts into space to begin a journey around the far side of the Moon on the Artemis II mission, the first flight of humans to cislunar space since the last Apollo mission in 1972. NASA says the Artemis II mission is scheduled for launch in September 2025.  (submitted by Ken the Bin and EllPeaTea)

 

SpaceX headquarters moving to Texas. Elon Musk said Tuesday that he will move the headquarters of SpaceX and his social media company X from California to Texas in response to a new gender identity law signed by California Governor Gavin Newsom, Ars reports. Musk said SpaceX's headquarters will move from Hawthorne, California, to the company's Starship launch site, named Starbase, near Brownsville, Texas. He said he will also relocate X's headquarters from San Francisco to Austin, and he moved Tesla's headquarters from California to Texas in 2021.

 

Staking SpaceX's future in Texas … After Tesla moved its headquarters to Texas, Musk committed to maintaining an engineering hub for the electric car company in California. One of Tesla's largest factories also remains in California. Relocating SpaceX's headquarters is also likely to be largely symbolic, with engineering support and production for the company's Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft likely remaining in Southern California. However, Musk has already chosen Texas as the home for the programs that will shape SpaceX's long-term future. The giant Starship rocket is built and launched from the Texas Gulf Coast, SpaceX tests engines in Central Texas (and plans to build them there), and the company manufactures Starlink user kits at a new factory outside of Austin.

Next three launches

July 21: Falcon 9 | Starlink 10-4 | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida | 04:59 UTC

July 22: Falcon 9 | Starlink 10-9 | Kennedy Space Center, Florida | 04:44 UTC

July 22: Falcon 9 | Starlink 9-4 | Vandenberg Space Force Base, California | 09:44 UTC

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