12 hours ago Gustavo Ocando AlexReporting from Maracaibo, Venezuela for BBC News Mundo Gustavo Ocando Alex Wilder Fernández is a young fisherman in the west of Venezuela who is concerned by the US military presence in the Caribbean Wilder Fernández has caught four good-sized fish in the murky waters of a small bay north of…
Thousands of networks—many of them operated by the US government and Fortune 500 companies—face an “imminent threat” of being breached by a nation-state hacking group following the breach of a major maker of software, the federal government warned on Wednesday. F5, a Seattle-based maker of networking software, disclosed the breach on Wednesday. F5 said a…
Gamma rays show up in surprisingly high concentrations in the centre of the Milky Way The centre of our galaxy is behaving strangely, and it may be because of dark matter. In 2009, observations from the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope revealed a surprisingly high concentration of gamma rays coming from the middle of the Milky…
In 2017, Hulu made television history by becoming the first streaming network to win the Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama Series, thanks to the phenomenon that was The Handmaid’s Tale. While Netflix has largely cornered the streaming market on original movies—and even managed to persuade A-listers like Guillermo del Toro, Alfonso Cuarón, and Martin Scorsese to come aboard—Hulu is starting to…
AIs rely on data centres that use vast amounts of energy Jason Alden/Bloomberg/Getty Being more judicious in which AI models we use for tasks could potentially save 31.9 terawatt-hours of energy this year alone – equivalent to the output of five nuclear reactors. Tiago da Silva Barros at the University of Cote d’Azur in France…
Imagine you’re walking your dog. It interacts with the world around you—sniffing some things, relieving itself on others. You walk down the Embarcadero in San Francisco on a bright sunny day, and you see the Ferry Building in the distance as you look out into the bay. Your dog turns to you, looks you in…
Biofuels are contributing to environmental harm Dave Reede/Alamy It’s obvious, isn’t it. Plants turn sunlight into food – stored energy – so if we turn that food into fuels, we should get sustainable biofuels with zero carbon emissions, right? Wrong, utterly wrong. The growth in biofuels is, in fact, increasing emissions, and also hurting both…
Some schools require students to leave their phones in lockers all day Robin Utrecht/Shutterstock Many people are concerned about the negative consequences of too much screen time, particularly if phone use at school distracts students and affects their learning. But a study suggests banning them from schools makes some students lonelier, at least initially. “If…
Can you undo a spinning top? Shutterstock Imagine spinning a top and then letting it come to rest. Is there a way for you to spin the top again so it ends up in the exact position it started, as if you had never spun it at all? Surprisingly, yes, say mathematicians who have discovered…
Josie Ford Feedback is New Scientist’s popular sideways look at the latest science and technology news. You can submit items you believe may amuse readers to Feedback by emailing feedback@newscientist.com Our expiry date Bad news, everyone: our cards are marked. The human species will go extinct by the year 2339, so we have just a…