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☆ After testing more than 25 electric cars, these 5 were the most fun to drive
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-27 | by ( Tim Levin | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The electric Hummer, Porsche Taycan, Rivian R1T, and Pininfarina Battista are each a blast for different reasons. Kia EV6 GTThe 2023 Kia EV6 GT. Tim Levin/InsiderWarn your passengers to brace themselves before pinning it in Kia's new EV6 GT. The 2023 Kia EV6 GT. Porsche TaycanThe 2022 Porsche Taycan Cross Turismo Turbo S. Tim Levin/InsiderPorsches are renowned for their superior driving dynamics.

☆ Solving the mystery of the most powerful objects in the universe
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —Astronomers first discovered quasars, considered to be the brightest and most powerful objects in the universe, 60 years ago — but they didn’t understand their origin. Now, scientists think they have unlocked the mystery behind what ignites these celestial objects. Astronomers observed 48 different galaxies that contain quasars and compared them to more than 100 galaxies without them. When two galaxies merge, massive amounts of gas are pushed toward the supermassive black holes located at their centers. “Quasars play a key role in our understanding of the history of the Universe, and possibly also the future of the Milky Way.”

☆ New image reveals violent events near a supermassive black hole
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Will Dunham | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

[1/2] This image shows the jet and shadow of the black hole at the center of the M87 galaxy together for the first time. The supermassive black hole pictured resides at the center of a relatively nearby galaxy called Messier 87, or M87, about 54 million light-years from Earth. This black hole, with a mass 6.5 billion times that of our sun, was the subject of the first image of such an object ever obtained, released in 2019, with another black hole pictured last year. Seeing the entire scene in the vicinity of a supermassive black hole can be insightful. The EHT project has yielded the images of the two supermassive black holes.

☆ I've studied the sun for 23 years. Here's what happened during the last solar maximum and what to expect from this one.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Crystal Raypole | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Solar maximum is a peak in the sun's activity that happens around the middle of each solar cycle. Mathew OwensThe solar maximum represents a peak in solar activity when the sun's magnetic field reaches its strongest and most disordered and dynamic point. NASA/Solar Dynamics ObservatorySolar cycles typically last 11 years, and the solar maximum happens roughly in the middle of each cycle. The sun's magnetic field reaches peak strength during solar maximum, generating an increase in events like solar flares and coronal mass ejections. These bursts are around four times as likely to occur during a solar maximum than a solar minimum.

☆ Tucker Carlson is gone but Fox News' politics remain the same
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Zachary B. Wolf | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

CNN —Fox News had plenty of reasons to get rid of Tucker Carlson. CNN’s Allison Morrow notes that Fox will need a Carlson upgrade of some kind because upstart conservative networks want into the same space. ET hour on Fox, and if it is any indication, there won’t be much new in the politics that are pushed on Fox’s viewers. On-screen, the words were “Biden’s Legacy: Crime in the Cities.”Related: Here’s a CNN Fact Check on the crime in Manhattan, which far below record levels. Biden legacy 2After declaring crime to be Biden’s legacy, Kilmeade transitioned.

☆ Fox News’ sudden firing of Tucker Carlson may have come down to one simple calculation
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( Oliver Darcy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

In the hours following Carlson’s abrupt dismissal from the right-wing channel, a number of explanations have emerged — all with plausibility. One veteran television news executive told me that they believed the decision came down to a straightforward calculation by the Murdochs: Risk versus reward. It is pretty much enshrined as a law of physics in the universe of right-wing media that whoever the Murdochs put in prime time will rate. All that said, Carlson will test the hypothesis that Fox News as a brand trumps any single personality. Carlson is a force unlike any other in right-wing media and politics.

☆ How Anthropic cofounder Daniela Amodei plans to turn trust and safety into a feature, not a bug
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-24 | by ( Stephanie Palazzolo | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Amodei chatted with Insider about her approach to trust and safety and what the future holds for AI. However, the majority of Anthropic cofounder and president Daniela Amodei's career has been spent trying to prove the opposite: that trust and safety is a feature, not a bug. "It's an organizational structure question, but it's also a mindset question," she told Insider. In 2020, Amodei and six other OpenAI employees, including her brother Dario Amodei, left the company to start rival AI lab Anthropic. Throughout Anthropic's growth, the company has kept an interdisciplinary culture, with employees whose experiences range from physics to computational biology to policywriting, Amodei told Insider.

☆ A powerful solar storm is hitting Earth, sparking stunning northern and southern lights across the planet. Here's how to see them tonight.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-24 | by ( Marianne Guenot | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

A powerful G4 solar storm is hitting the Earth with winds as fast as 600 mph. Auroras seen in LaCrosse, Wisconsin, on March 24, 2023. NWS La CrosseThe spectacle also gave a treat to skygazers globally, with the lights seen across the UK, in the skies over Kyiv, Ukraine, and as far as Victoria, Australia. SANKA VIDANAGAMA/AFP via Getty ImagesThe powerful storm should continue until Monday evening. Storms like this aren't just prettyA view of the sun on April 21 shows the coronal mass ejection that caused the April 24 storm.

☆ Moderna teams up with IBM to put AI, quantum computing to work on mRNA technology used in vaccines
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Annika Kim Constantino | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Moderna and IBM are teaming up to use generative artificial intelligence and quantum computing to advance mRNA technology, the development at the core of the company's blockbuster Covid vaccine, the companies announced Thursday. The companies said they signed an agreement for Moderna to access IBM's quantum computing systems. IBM will also provide experts who can help Moderna scientists explore the use of quantum technologies, the companies added. Unlike traditional computers, which store information as either zeroes or ones, Quantum computing hinges on quantum physics. The companies said Moderna will use IBM's model to understand "the characteristics of potential mRNA medicines" and design a new class of vaccines and therapies.

☆ ‘Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret’: Beloved, Banned and Finally Adapted
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( Melena Ryzik | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Ryder Fortson filmed it when she was 13, so she was going through some of the same things as her character. Casting an adolescent meant “I was in a race against puberty,” Fremon Craig noted. There was some CGI, and a scene in which Margaret tries on a bra actually features a boy standing in.) It was “a vulnerable position to be in,” Ryder Fortson, now 15, said. “I remember walking across in front of the Episcopal Church” and having someone explain penetrative sex, Bates, who is 74, said.

☆ Live Updates: SpaceX Prepares Again to Launch Starship Rocket
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-20 | by ( The New York Times | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +5 min

PinnedSpaceX’s first attempt on Monday to launch Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built, was called off. During a livestream for a different SpaceX launch on Wednesday, the company noted that another Starship postponement was possible. Credit... Patrick T. Fallon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhy didn’t Starship launch on Monday? Splashdown Near Hawaii Launch SpaceX Starbase Boca Chica, TexasStarship is designed to be entirely reusable. About eight minutes after the launch on Thursday, the Super Heavy booster will splash into the Gulf of Mexico.

CNN —China is making “significant progress” building the country’s fifth research facility in Antarctica after a several years-long lull in construction, according to a report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). The site – a research station China has hailed as a means to expand its scientific investigation in the Antarctic – could also be used to enhance the country’s intelligence collection, according to CSIS. In February 2020, a team of US inspectors visited the station, where they were hosted by station leader Wang Zhechao of the Polar Research Institute of China. China has established four scientific research bases in Antarctica since 1984, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Under the 1959 treaty Antarctic Treaty, to which China is party, activities on the continent are restricted to “peaceful purposes.”Military personnel are allowed to conduct scientific research, but may not set up bases, test weapons of carry out maneuvers.

☆ US government tracking more than 650 potential UFO cases, Pentagon says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Jeremy Herb | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —The US government is tracking more than 650 potential cases of so-called “unidentified aerial phenomenon,” commonly known as UFOs, according to the director of the office created last year to focus on the sightings. He played video from two of cases that had been declassified, one that had been resolved and the other unresolved. Kirkpatrick explained that this case was unresolved because there was no other evidence beyond the video. He said that in a small number of cases, he has concerns the episodes could be evidence of potential technological advancements. Those cases, he said, are handed off to the intelligence community to investigate further.

☆ New propellers with looped blades could help make the oceans quiet again, sparing both marine life and the climate
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +9 min

Sharrow Marine sells them for small boats but would need to scale up to reach the shipping industry. A traditional ship propeller that has blades in a screw-like form. That's what Sebastian realized when he put loop propellers on a drone. Sharrow began selling propellers to recreational boaters in 2020 through a company he founded called Sharrow Marine. Testing led by the company BoatTEST found that the Sharrow Propeller was up to 30% more efficient than a standard blade propeller.

Some are turning to startups who are pivoting to using powerful chips to run quantum-inspired software on regular computers as they bide their time. In the past 18 months, quantum software startups including SandBoxAQ - an Alphabet spinoff - raised about $1 billion, according to data firm PitchBook. Ultimately, the software inspired by quantum physics won't perform well on quantum computers without some changes, said William Hurley, boss of Austin-based quantum software startup Strangeworks. Still, he said companies that start using them will have engineers "learning about quantum and the phenomenon and the process, which will better prepare them to use quantum computers at the point that they do so." Strangeworks, which also operates a cloud with over 60 quantum computers on it, raised $24 million last month from investors including IBM (IBM.N).

[1/5] A demonstrator takes part in a protest against the shut down of the last three German nuclear power plants, in Berlin, Germany, April 15, 2023. An estimated 50,000 protesters in Germany formed a 45-kilometre long (27-mile) human chain after the Fukushima disaster from Stuttgart to the Neckarwestheim Nuclear Power Plant. One of the long-running movement's early successes came in the 1970s when it managed to get plans for a nuclear plant in Wyhl in western Germany overturned. It was a Greens-coalition government that introduced the country's first nuclear phase-out law in 2002. "The nuclear phase-out is a Greens project ... and all parties have practically adopted it," said Rainer Klute, head of pro-nuclear non-profit association Nuklearia.

☆ Paper airplane designed by Boeing engineers breaks world distance record
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Taylor Nicioli | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

The engineers had to pay careful attention to the numerous rules and guidelines set forth by the Guinness World Record Team. I didn’t think we could get useful data from a simulation on a paper airplane. The Guinness paper plane record for duration of flight is currently 29.2 seconds. From origami enthusiasts to aerospace engineersRuble and Jensen began their paper plane engineering careers while in middle school, participating in paper airplane events held at Boeing. For those looking to create their own record-breaking paper plane design, the feat is not impossible, but may take some time (and skill).

☆ Bill Gates recommends these 4 books about climate change, 15 years after reading them—'not much has changed since then'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-11 | by ( Tom Huddleston Jr. | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +4 min

Bill Gates has four science books he recommends to "anyone who wants to understand the weather and how it's affected by climate change" — and you don't need a science background to understand them. Four of them particularly helped him learn more about climate change and its effects on the planet, and are still useful to read today, he wrote. "It's actually one of the first books I recommend to anyone who wants to understand the weather and how it's affected by climate change," Gates wrote in his blog post. It also dives into climate issues like global warming and how weather affects the "global ecosystem," making it easier to identify the effects of climate change in your daily weather report. It also includes subject areas relevant to climate change, like a section on glaciers that are receding due to warmer temperatures, Gates added.

☆ At elite Chinese university, Macron hails 'critical thinking'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-07 | by ( Michel Rose | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

GUANGHZOU, China, April 7 (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron was given a rock star welcome by Chinese students at an elite university in Guangzhou where he took questions and hailed critical thinking in a country with tight media and political control. In opening remarks, Macron repeated the message of firmness against Russia he had conveyed to Chinese President Xi Jinping the day before. 'FREE AND EMANCIPATED INDIVIDUAL'Asked by a nuclear physics student what he thought were the skills needed for a bright future, Macron cited knowledge, critical thinking and self-confidence. "Critical thinking is just as important as access to knowledge. Without critical thinking, an individual "would not know what to do with knowledge and would simply be the victim of propaganda," Macron added.

☆ The hat: Mathematicians invent 'einstein' tile that never repeats
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Jacopo Prisco | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +7 min

Called “The hat” because it vaguely resembles a fedora, the elusive shape is an “einstein” (from the German “ein stein,” or “one stone”). “I’m not really into math, to be honest — I did it at school, but I didn’t excel in it,” Smith said. “The hat,” however, is an aperiodic tile, meaning it can still completely cover a surface without any gaps, but you can never identify any cluster that periodically repeats itself to do so. How ‘The hat’ worksThere’s nothing inherently magical about “The hat,” according to Kaplan. “We’re not trying to protect it in any way,” Kaplan said.

☆ This Y Combinator-backed startup helps reduce climate-warming methane in cow burps. Check out the pitch deck Alga Biosciences used to secure $4 million.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Tasmin Lockwood | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Y Combinator startup Algo Biosciences has developed a way to reduce methane in cow burps. Check out the 11-slide pitch deck the company used to secure $4 million from Collaborative Fund. A Y Combinator-backed startup trying to curb methane spewing cow burps has just landed $4 million in its first institutional funding round. Berkeley-based Alga Biosciences, founded in 2021, has developed a feed additive to reduce methane from cow burps using biochemically modified kelp. Check out the 11 slide pitch deck the company used to raise the funds.

☆ 4 side hustles for early birds and night owls: Some pay as much as $100 per hour
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-05 | by ( Gili Malinsky | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +3 min

Whatever your post-wake-up or just-before-bed activities are, if you're an early bird or night owl, you likely start or end the day with lots of energy. And for those interested in side hustles, this could be the perfect time to make a little extra cash. Here are four gigs for early birds or night owls to consider. Hospitality staffIf you like working with people, plenty of events and restaurants could use your energy late into the night. Hustlers who find work on the aforementioned websites can expect to get minimum wage to about $30 per hour, says Kristof.

☆ After fatal Greek train crash, a campus simmers with rage
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( Karolina Tagaris | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

[1/6] A man stands next to flowers and messages for the victims of a fatal train crash, at the closed train station of Thessaloniki, Greece, March 24, 2023. REUTERS/Alexandros AvramidisTHESSALONIKI, Greece, April 4 (Reuters) - A month after 12 students at Greece's largest university were killed in a train crash, messages of grief across the campus are tinged with rage. "This crime will not be forgotten," a note on a makeshift memorial at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki reads. Fifty-seven people died in the country's deadliest rail disaster on Feb. 28, when a passenger train and a cargo train travelling on the same track collided head-on. "This sadness, this anger, we tried - as students - to turn it into a fight," said Evangelia Grigoriou, a civil engineering student.

☆ Repeating radio signal leads astronomers to an Earth-size exoplanet
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —Astronomers have detected a repeating radio signal from an exoplanet and the star that it orbits, both located 12 light-years away from Earth. The signal suggests that the Earth-size planet may have a magnetic field and perhaps even an atmosphere. The researchers believe the radio signal was created by interactions between the planet’s magnetic field and the star. How strong radio waves occurIn order for the radio waves to be detectable on Earth, they must be very strong, the researchers said. “This research shows not only that this particular rocky exoplanet likely has a magnetic field but provides a promising method to find more.”

☆ The next big thing in Big Tech career path is an AI-based 'bilingual' job skillset
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-02 | by ( Eric Rosenbaum | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +8 min

Microsoft unveiled new versions of its Bing internet-search engine and Edge browser powered by the newest technology from ChatGPT maker OpenAI. But the biggest one of all may be next, he says, through the combination of artificial intelligence and branches of science involved in medicine. But the opportunity won't translate into achievement without a new form of collaboration between the classic big tech talent and the medical field. One of her portfolio companies, Insitro, was founded by Stanford AI researcher Daphne Koller (Koller co-founder edtech company Coursera). "There is lots of exciting big talent opportunities coming from big tech and big cap pharma," she said.

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