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Suborbital space tourism finally arrives | FCC prepares to run public C-band auction | The big four in the U.S. launch industry — United Launch Alliance, SpaceX, Blue Origin and Northrop Grumman — hope to be one of two providers that will receive five-year contracts later this year to launch national security payloads starting in 2022. | China’s launch rate stays high | The International Space Station is the largest ever crewed object in space.

 
Damning Analysis Finds That Sports Betting Platforms...
Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech Digital betting platforms have exploded into the American zeitgeist over the past few years. These digital sportsbooks are often framed as whimsical apps designed for amusing little small-time bets, but the reality is that they’ve plunged tens of millions of people into gambling debt. According to a bombshell analysis by Bloomberg, the least active two-thirds of sportsbook gamblers account for just 2.7...

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Tech CEOs Bow Down to Their Democratic...
Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech For years now, Palantir CEO Alex Karp has been cozying up to the Trump administration, from aiding Immigration and Customs Enforcement through AI-powered surveillance tech and musing about legalizing war crimes to making unsavory comments about women and bragging that he frequently chats with “real Nazis.” Karp has been accused of going “full MAGA,” defending president Donald Trump by trying to argue...

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Inspired by networks found in nature, engineers...
Order has long been the rule in the design of synthetic “metamaterials,” which have internal structures that give the whole material exceptional properties not found in nature. When scientists engineer a metamaterial, they design from a single building block, or “unit cell,” that is then copied and pasted many times over. The result is a precise, periodic microstructure that results in improved material performance.  Now, a team from MIT and Northeastern University has found that engineering a little disorder...

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China’s Nvidia Honeypot Isn’t Surprising. Jensen Huang...
There’s a specific mantra drilled into government workers, military officers, and intelligence personnel during counterintelligence briefings: “If she’s a 10 and you’re a 5, she’s a spy!” Or, as the US Army’s Counterintelligence Command posted on Valentine’s Day: “It doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out ‘10 + 5 = honeytrap.’” The very beautiful woman who is suddenly interested in your very ordinary existence probably has ulterior motives, is the message. Jensen Huang surely doesn’t live a typical life—he’s...

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Astronomers Puzzled After Watching Entire Planet Wink...
Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech An international team of astronomers were puzzled when an entire gas giant appeared to vanish from the sky. The disappearing exoplanet, dubbed TOI-2535 b, is located roughly 1,000 light-years from Earth. Since it orbits its host star at an extremely close distance, completing a full rotation in just over eight days, its surface is extremely hot, making it a “hot Jupiter.” NASA’s...

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Democrats Considering Crackdown That Would Require Government...
Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech The incoming Democratic majority in Congress appears to be eager to reel in an AI industry that’s been allowed free rein under Donald Trump’s second administration. On top of a slew of regulations meant to address data center electricity use and AI product liability, Democrats are reportedly eying additional preventative regulations aimed at curbing the tech industry’s excesses before they cause harm....

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Duolingo, Strava, and Ticketmaster Are All Caught...
The European Commission announced a sweeping set of updates to consumer law on Wednesday to protect European Union citizens from “harmful digital practices”—whether while online shopping, browsing social media, or doing their Duolingo lesson. Within the package, the Commission unveiled its Digital Fairness Act to address harmful practices online. Proposed rules include banning dark patterns—practices that manipulate consumers into making decisions they would not otherwise make, such as falsely claiming a product is running low. They will also curb...

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The Only Thing Driving Truth Social’s Revenue...
Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech Donald Trump’s social media platform Truth Social is cratering right along with his personal reputation, but it does have one thing going for it: customers dumb enough to pay top dollar for slightly faster access to the president’s posts — or “truths,” in the site’s oxymoronic nomenclature. On Monday, Trump Media and Technology Group, which owns the service, reported that its revenue...

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Energy drinks linked to 11 times more...
Energy drinks and stimulant supplements are raising new concerns about heart health after researchers discovered a striking pattern in reports of serious cardiovascular emergencies. Products containing caffeine and other stimulants appeared far more frequently in reports of cardiac arrest, heart attacks, and other heart problems than products without these ingredients. The findings were particularly concerning among younger adults. People ages 18 to 34 accounted for a substantial share of the reported heart problems involving caffeinated products, according to independent,...

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Obesity linked to up to 27% lower...
A surprising new study has found that people who are overweight or obese when diagnosed with dementia tend to live longer than those who have a normal body weight. The findings challenge expectations about the relationship between weight and health, suggesting that carrying extra weight may be associated with an unexpected survival advantage after dementia develops. Researchers from Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health and NYU School of Global Public Health found that body weight at the time...

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Scientists find deadly virus DNA hidden in...
Some of Europe’s most famous medieval manuscripts, including the York Gospels, have revealed an extraordinary secret hidden in their pages. Scientists have discovered ancient viral DNA preserved in the animal skins used to make parchment, opening a new window into the 3,500-year history of sheeppox virus (SPPV). The discovery was made by an international research team led by University College Dublin (UCD). By analyzing parchment from centuries-old documents, the researchers uncovered the first genetic evidence that this destructive disease...

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A 13-Year-Old Asked AI About Suicide on...
A 13-year-old girl spent three months using her school-issued laptop to discuss depression, research suicide, and plan her funeral before self-harm-monitoring software finally prompted school officials to alert her parents, who intervened and stopped her, according to a lawsuit filed this month by her parents. The lawsuit alleges that Google and parent company Alphabet were negligent in their rollout of a Gemini model, claiming that the AI chatbot “coached” the North Carolina teenager to consider taking her own life....

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Scientists uncover a 192-year-old mystery hidden in...
A badly distorted British silver coin dating to 1834 may hold evidence of an unusual accident during the minting process nearly 200 years ago. New scientific analysis suggests that the remarkable damage to the coin was more likely caused by a manufacturing problem than by ordinary wear, corrosion, or a later impact. The findings, reported by IA STUDIO in the journal npj Heritage Science, center on a silver sixpence issued during the reign of King William IV. The coin...

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LinkedIn Is Testing a Feature That Lets...
Big news for LinkedIn stalkers: If you keep visiting the page of a potential hire—or ex-romantic partner—you might not be lurking as stealthily as you once were. LinkedIn is testing a “frequent viewer” feature that allows certain users with LinkedIn Premium to know if someone has looked at their profile multiple times. Krista Mollion, the founder of creative agency Unignorable Brands, first noticed the added detail last month. “I called it the ‘stalker alert,’” Mollion tells WIRED. Every few...

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Where are all the males? Ancient human...
Deep inside South Africa’s Rising Star Cave system, scientists have uncovered a surprising clue about an extinct human relative that lived hundreds of thousands of years ago. For the first time, researchers have recovered and studied ancient proteins from Homo naledi fossils, revealing evidence that the cave may have contained an exclusively female burial site. The discovery, published in the journal Cell, raises an extraordinary possibility. The cave could represent the earliest known burial location reserved for one sex...

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