05 Sci-Tech
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- Trump plans to ease access to psychedelics like psilocybin, ibogaine The Washington Post
- Trump Loosens Restrictions on Psychedelic Drugs The New York Times
- Trump signs order to speed up review of psychedelic drugs for mental health treatment NBC News
- Trump announces reforms to accelerate access to psychedelic drug treatments The Guardian
- President Trump orders faster review of psychedelic drugs for mental health treatment 10tv.com
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Using JWST data, an international team has, for the first time, successfully mapped the climates of two rocky exoplanets with masses similar to Earth’s. These two planets, TRAPPIST-1b and TRAPPIST-1c, belong to the iconic TRAPPIST-1 planetary system, discovered ten years ago.
The TRAPPIST-1 system, located about 40 light-years away, contains seven rocky planets orbiting a small, cool red dwarf star known as TRAPPIST-1
The two planets are likely devoid of atmospheres, as the temperature difference between day and night exceeds 500°C. TRAPPIST‑1b has a very hot dayside (about 490 K) but no detectable glow from its nightside, suggesting it’s a dark, airless world. TRAPPIST‑1c is cooler (about 369 K) with a similarly cold nightside, which could mean it either has a thin, oxygen‑rich atmosphere or a shiny, airless surface.
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Diego Arguedas Ortiz, BBC
From before their babies are born, men undergo serious hormonal changes that can powerfully influence their behaviour – with consequences for their child’s…
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Quantum computers might eventually be able to handle some AI applications that currently require huge amounts of conventional computing power. Such a development would be a major boost to machine learning and similar artificial intelligence algorithms.
Quantum computers hold the promise of eventually being able to complete certain calculations that are impossible for conventional computers. For years, researchers have been debating whether these advantages over conventional computers extend to tasks that involve lots of data, and the algorithms that learn from them – in other words, the machine learning that underlies many AI programs.
Now, Hsin-Yuan Huang at the quantum computing firm Oratomic and his colleagues argue that the answer ought to be “yes”. Their mathematical work aims to lay the foundations for a future where quantum computers offer a broad boost to AI.
“Machine learning is really utilised everywhere in science and technology and also everyday life. In a world where we can build this [quantum computing] architecture, I feel like it can be applied whenever there’s massive datasets available,” he says.
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“The half-life of humanity is currently around 35 years,” said Nobel laureate in physics David Gross as he concluded an evening lecture at the German Physical Society’s conference in Erlangen in March. Put another way, the physicist believes that in a little more than three decades, there is a 50 percent chance that our species will be extinct.
The alarming statement followed Gross’s estimation that the risk of a nuclear war was increasing from 1 percent per year to about 2 percent annually. After the lecture, the audience was visibly pensive. The current world situation and the award-winning speaker’s warnings hung over attendees like a dark cloud.
“I’m still hoping game theory will come to the rescue,” another physicist later told me at the conference. The rules of logic—provided everyone follows them—would prohibit a nuclear first strike, this reasoning goes.
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For years, the way large language models handle inference has been stuck inside a box — literally. The high-bandwidth RDMA networks that make modern LLM serving work have confined both prefill and decode to the same datacenter, sometimes even the same rack. A team of researchers at Moonshot AI and Tsinghua University is making the case that this constraint is about to break down — and that the right architecture can already exploit that shift.
The research team introduces Prefill-as-a-Service (PrfaaS), a cross-datacenter serving architecture that selectively offloads long-context prefill to standalone, compute-dense prefill clusters and transfers the resulting KVCache over commodity Ethernet to local PD clusters for decode. The result, in a case study using an internal 1T-parameter hybrid model, is 54% higher serving throughput than a homogeneous PD baseline and 32% higher than a naive heterogeneous setup — while consuming only a fraction of available cross-datacenter bandwidth. The research team note that when compared at equal hardware cost, the throughput gain is approximately 15%, reflecting that the full 54% advantage comes partly from pairing higher-compute H200 GPUs for prefill with H20 GPUs for decode.
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Human societies have not just adapted to the natural world. They have steadily learned how to transform it. Drawing on research from archaeology, ecology, anthropology, and evolutionary theory, Erle Ellis, professor of geography and environmental systems at the University of Maryland Baltimore County, explains how cultural practices have evolved to give humans extraordinary influence over the ecosystems that sustain them.
From early uses of fire to cook food and shape landscapes to modern systems like industrial agriculture, global trade, and rapidly growing cities, societies have developed powerful tools and institutions. These social and cultural advances have allowed humans to reshape the planet on a massive scale while improving their ability to survive and thrive.
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The Perseus Cluster is a massive galaxy cluster located in the constellation Perseus. It is one of the largest structures in the observable universe, comprising more than a thousand galaxies—equivalent to roughly a thousand trillion times the mass of the sun. Hot gases within the cluster, known as the intracluster medium (ICM), emit powerful X-rays detectable by telescopes. These gases are produced by billions of supernova explosions, and their chemical composition reveals how typical supernovae have exploded throughout cosmic history.
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Kyle Umipig, Longevity.Technology
What if the reason we haven’t “solved” the mysteries of aging yet is that we’ve been treating it like a single disease? That’s the question underneath new…
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AI tool Claude, developed by Anthropic, suddenly announced the rollout of a new identity verification system requiring users to complete a real-time selfie check while holding a government-issued ID.
The move has drawn global attention, but for Chinese users in particular, it feels like a heavy blow that erects a difficult-to-cross “wall” in AI access.
This verification is not being applied universally to all users at once. Instead, it is being introduced gradually in specific scenarios. When users attempt to access certain advanced features, or as part of routine platform integrity checks and other safety and compliance measures, a verification prompt may appear.
The process itself appears simple and typically takes no more than five minutes. However, users must prepare a government-issued photo ID—such as a passport, driver’s license, or national ID card—and use a camera-enabled device to capture a real-time selfie.
For Chinese users, the impact of this mechanism is both broad and profound. The barrier to entry has been significantly raised: individuals without passports are excluded from using Claude.
Even for those who do have passports, older accounts may become valuable assets, while new users face hurdles due to real-name verification requirements, making normal access increasingly difficult.
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Ahead of a consequential vote on extending the government’s authority to conduct overseas espionage, several House conservatives are expressing their concerns.
On April 20, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which enables the government to spy on foreigners, is set to expire.
Many House Republicans and President Donald Trump have argued in the past that this power is easily abused, resulting in the inadvertent surveillance of American citizens.
Back in 2024, facing a different deadline, Congress agreed to extend Section 702 for two years.
Several members of the House Republican Conference demanded reforms to the authority, some of which were ultimately granted.
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Key Takeaways
- A 16-year-old boy shot two people in downtown Seattle before being killed by a licensed concealed carrier.
- The shooting occurred near the Four Seasons Hotel during a fight that escalated with gunfire.
- Two victims, aged 18 and 17, were hospitalized in serious condition following the incident.
- The armed citizen cooperated with police and was not arrested after the event.
- This incident highlights the importance of lawful concealed carry in responding to active threats.
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
SEATTLE, WA — A 16-year-old boy who shot two people in downtown Seattle Wednesday night was killed by a licensed concealed carrier who intervened at the scene. As reported by MSN, the initial shooting happened around 10 p.m. near the Four Seasons Hotel on Union Street.
Seattle Police Chief Shon Barnes said three people got into a fight when one pulled out a gun and shot two bystanders before fleeing the scene. A private citizen who was licensed to carry a firearm stepped in and shot the suspect.
Seattle Fire Department crews treated an 18-year-old man and a 17-year-old boy, both transported to the hospital in serious condition. The 16-year-old suspect was taken to Harborview Medical Center, where he died from his injuries.
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Nearly every week, the headlines about AI are dominated by the news of the latest model. A few days ago, Meta announced its newest model called Muse Spark – its first under its revamped AI division. According to their internal benchmarking tests, the new model is competitive with leading rivals across several tasks.
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As scientists confirmed that March was the United States’ most abnormally hot month in recorded history, dozens of climate deniers gathered to promote misinformation and tout their newfound influence on federal policy.
At a conference hosted by the prominent science-denying think tank the Heartland Institute last week, a crowd of mostly middle-aged men in suits claimed the world is finally waking up to the idea that the climate crisis does not exist. “I feel wonderful,” James Taylor, president of the Heartland Institute, said in an interview. “The truth is winning out.”
The clearest sign of the crowd’s rising power was the gathering’s keynote speaker: Lee Zeldin, the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), whom President Donald Trump is also reportedly considering for attorney general. “It is a day to celebrate vindication,” Zeldin said on Wednesday morning.