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The New York Times notes that white-collar workers have faced higher unemployment than other groups in the U.S. over the past few years — along with slower wager growth. Some economists wonder if this trend might be irreversible... and partly attributable to AI: After sitting below 4% for more than two years, the overall unemployment rate has topped that threshold since May... "We're seeing a meaningful transition in the way work is done in the white-collar world," said Carl Tannenbaum, the chief economist of Northern Trust. "I tell people a wave is coming...." Thousands of video game workers lost jobs last year and the year before... Unemployment in finance and related industries, while still low, increased by about a quarter from 2022 to 2024, as rising interest rates slowed demand for mortgages and companies sought to become leaner.... Overall, the latest data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York show that the unemployment rate for college grads has risen 30% since bottoming out in September 2022 (to 2.6% from 2%), versus about 18% for all workers (to 4% from 3.4%). An analysis by Julia Pollak, chief economist of ZipRecruiter, shows that unemployment has been most elevated among those with bachelor's degrees or some college but no degree, while unemployment has been steady or falling at the very top and bottom of the education ladder — for those with advanced degrees or without a high school diploma. Hiring rates have slowed more for jobs requiring a college degree than for other jobs, according to ADP Research, which studies the labor market.... And artificial intelligence could reduce that need further by increasing the automation of white-collar jobs. A recent academic paper found that software developers who used an AI coding assistant improved a key measure of productivity by more than 25% and that the productivity gains appeared to be largest among the least experienced developers. The result suggested that adopting AI could reduce the wage premium enjoyed by more experienced coders, since it would erode their productivity advantages over novices... [A]t least in the near term, many tech executives and their investors appear to see AI as a way to trim their staffing. A software engineer at a large tech company who declined to be named for fear of harming his job prospects said that his team was about half the size it was last year and that he and his co-workers were expected to do roughly the same amount of work by relying on an AI assistant. Overall, the unemployment rate in tech and related industries jumped by more than half from 2022 to 2024, to 4.4% from 2.9%. "Some economists say these trends may be short term in nature and little cause for concern on their own," the article points out (with one economist noting the unemployment rate is still low compared to historical averages). Harvard labor economist Lawrence Katz even suggested the slower wage growth could reflect the discount that these workers accepted in return for being able to work from home. Thanks to Slashdot reader databasecowgirl for sharing the article.

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"After a long run, Google is sunsetting two of its signature Nest products," reports PC World: Google has just announced that it's discontinuing the 10-year-old Nest Protect and the 7-year-old Nest x Yale lock. Both of those products will continue to work, and — for now — they remain on sale at the Google Store, complete with discounts until supplies run out. But while Google itself is exiting the smoke alarm and smart lock business, it isn't leaving Google Home users in the lurch. Instead, it's teeing up third-party replacements for the Nest Protect and Nest X Yale lock, with both new products coming from familiar brands... Capable of being unlocked via app, entry code, or a traditional key, the Yale Smart Lock with Matter is set to arrive this summer, according to Yale. While both the existing Nest Protect and Nest x Yale lock will continue to operate and receive security patches, those who purchased the second-generation Nest Protect near its 2015 launch date should probably replace the product anyway. That's because the CO sensors in carbon monoxide detectors like the Nest Protect have a roughly 10-year life expectancy. Nest Protect and the Nest X Yale lock were two of the oldest products in Google's smart home lineup, and both were showing their age.

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Cloud providers like the security of running things in virtual machines "at scale" — even though VMs "are not known for having fast cold starts or a small footprint..." noted Microsoft's Open Source blog last November. So Microsoft's Azure Core Upstream team built an open source Rust library called Hyperlight "to execute functions as fast as possible while isolating those functions within a VM." But that was just the beginning... Then, we showed how to run Rust functions really, really fast, followed by using C to [securely] run Javascript. In February 2025, the Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF) voted to onboard Hyperlight into their Sandbox program [for early-stage projects]. [This week] we're announcing the release of Hyperlight Wasm: a Hyperlight virtual machine "micro-guest" that can run wasm component workloads written in many programming languages... Traditional virtual machines do a lot of work to be able to run programs. Not only do they have to load an entire operating system, they also boot up the virtual devices that the operating system depends on. Hyperlight is fast because it doesn't do that work; all it exposes to its VM guests is a linear slice of memory and a CPU. No virtual devices. No operating system. But this speed comes at the cost of compatibility. Chances are that your current production application expects a Linux operating system running on the x86-64 architecture (hardware), not a bare linear slice of memory... [B]uilding Hyperlight with a WebAssembly runtime — wasmtime — enables any programming language to execute in a protected Hyperlight micro-VM without any prior knowledge of Hyperlight at all. As far as program authors are concerned, they're just compiling for the wasm32-wasip2 target... Executing workloads in the Hyperlight Wasm guest isn't just possible for compiled languages like C, Go, and Rust, but also for interpreted languages like Python, JavaScript, and C#. The trick here, much like with containers, is to also include a language runtime as part of the image... Programming languages, runtimes, application platforms, and cloud providers are all starting to offer rich experiences for WebAssembly out of the box. If we do things right, you will never need to think about whether your application is running inside of a Hyperlight Micro-VM in Azure. You may never know your workload is executing in a Hyperlight Micro VM. And that's a good thing. While a traditional virtual-device-based VM takes about 125 milliseconds to load, "When the Hyperlight VMM creates a new VM, all it needs do to is create a new slice of memory and load the VM guest, which in turn loads the wasm workload. This takes about 1-2 milliseconds today, and work is happening to bring that number to be less than 1 millisecond in the future." And there's also double security due to Wasmtime's software-defined runtime sandbox within Hyperlight's larger VM...

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"Researchers have discovered nearly 1.5 million pictures from specialist dating apps — many of which are explicit — being stored online without password protection," reports the BBC, "leaving them vulnerable to hackers and extortionists." And the images weren't limited to those from profiles, the BBC learned from the ethical hacker who discovered the issue. "They included pictures which had been sent privately in messages, and even some which had been removed by moderators..." Anyone with the link was able to view the private photos from five platforms developed by M.A.D Mobile [including two kink/BDSM sites and two LGBT apps]... These services are used by an estimated 800,000 to 900,000 people. M.A.D Mobile was first warned about the security flaw on 20th January but didn't take action until the BBC emailed on Friday. They have since fixed it but not said how it happened or why they failed to protect the sensitive images. Ethical hacker Aras Nazarovas from Cybernews first alerted the firm about the security hole after finding the location of the online storage used by the apps by analysing the code that powers the services... None of the text content of private messages was found to be stored in this way and the images are not labelled with user names or real names, which would make crafting targeted attacks at users more complex. In an email M.A.D Mobile said it was grateful to the researcher for uncovering the vulnerability in the apps to prevent a data breach from occurring. But there's no guarantee that Mr Nazarovas was the only hacker to have found the image stash. "Mr Nazarovas and his team decided to raise the alarm on Thursday while the issue was still live as they were concerned the company was not doing anything to fix it..."

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Samsung teased its "AI Vision Inside" refrigerators at January's CES tradeshow. (Its internal sensors can now detect 37 different fresh ingredients and 50 processed foods, generating lists for your cellphone or a screen on your refrigerator's door.) But the refrigerators are part of a larger "AI Home" lineup of screen-enabled appliances with advanced AI features, and Engadget got to see them all together this weekend at Samsung's Bespoke AI conference in Seoul, Korea: The centerpiece of the Bespoke line remains Samsung's 4-door French-Door refrigerator, which is now available with two different-sized screens. There's a model with a smaller 9-inch screen that starts at $3,999 or one with a massive 32-inch panel called the Family Hub+ for $4,699. The former is ostensibly designed for people who want something a bit more discreet but still want access to Samsung's smart features, which includes widgets for your calendar, music, weather, various cooking apps and more. Meanwhile, the larger model is for families who aren't afraid of having a small TV in their face every time they open their fridge. You can even play videos from TikTok on it, if that's what you're into.... For cooking, Samsung's matte glass induction cooktops are mostly the same, but its Bespoke 30-inch single ($3,759) and double ($4,649) wall ovens have...you guessed it, more AI. In addition to a 7-inch display, there are also cameras and sensors inside the oven that can recognize up to 80 different recipes to provide optimal cooking times. But if you prefer to go off-script and create something original, Samsung says the oven will give you the option to save the recipe and temperature settings after cooking the same dish five times. And for a more fun application of its tech, the oven's cameras can record videos and create time-lapses of your baked goods for sharing on social media. When it's time to clean up, Samsung's $1,399 Bespoke Auto Open Door Dishwasher has a few tricks of its own. In this case, the washer uses AI (yet again) and sensors to more accurately detect food residue and optimize cleaning cycles... There's also an "AI Jet Ultra Cordless Stick" vacuum cleaner, which "uses AI to better detect what surface its on to more effectively hoover up dirt and debris." Interestingly, in January Samsung's refrigerators also got a mention in iFixit's "Worst of CES" video.

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"I've been dreaming of this moment for 20 years," says Aptera co-CEO Steve Fambro. Aptera's solar-powered electric car just drove 300 miles on a single charge. "We're one step closer to a future where every journey is powered by the sun," Aptera says in their announcement. "This go around, Aptera took to the highway for the first time ever..." writes the EV blog Electrek. "At one point, Aptera's video noted that its solar EV was pulling over 545 watts of solar input, even though it was overcast." "Less time searching for chargers," Aptera says in their announcement, adding that their "production-intent" car proved "that a solar EV isn't just a concept for the future, but a real-world solution ready for the present" — while turning Route 66 into "a test bed for a vehicle built to thrive independently..." "The panoramic windshield gives you this incredible view of the landscape," Steve said [in a video accompanying the announcement], describing the drive. "It's like a big picture window into the future." The final stretch took the team back into California, where they reflected on the journey, the data, and the excited reactions from drivers who caught a glimpse of the vehicle on the road. "Almost everyone we passed had their phones out filming us," Steve laughed. "It's clear that Aptera's design stops traffic — without needing to stop for a charge." "I was struck by how normal this trip seemed, except for all the gawking from fellow travelers," writes long-time Slashdot reader AirHog. "Best of luck to Aptera to reach their funding and production goals this year for this remarkable vehicle." They drove on highways to Lake Havasu, and then to California's Imperial Valley — starting in Flagstaff, Arizona on symbolic Route 66. It was 100 years ago that Route 66 was proposed to link Chicago and Los Angeles, which Fambro credits to a visionary who believed in "something bigger than the road itself — believing in what it could unlock for the world." "And they did it. Route 66 became one of the most iconic highways in America, proving that what once seemed improbable could become inevitable. "I think about that alot with Aptera. We're building something people say can't be done. History shows us the boldest ideas, the ones that challenge that status quo are the ones that truly change the world. They take their futuristic, tear-dropped shaped "Jetsons" car to a drive-through wildlife refuge named Bearizona. They stop at a general store for some beef jerky. "We're just having a fun time seeing all the sights." "I've been dreaming of this moment for 20 years," says Aptera co-CEO Steve Fambro. "Driving in the most efficient vehicle on the road. Watching the sights go by. I got emotional just taking it all in." "This company. This idea. It's real. It's visceral. And I'm just so proud of each and every person who helped make this dream a reality. "We have the chance to make a real change in how the world moves. The road hasn't been easy. It's been painful, difficult. And it's brought me to my breaking point sometimes. But being in this moment right now? I can say it's all been worth it... "I feel we're at the forefront of something truly revolutionary. We're not fighting an uphill battle any more. We're standing at the edge of something incredible. Ready to break through. "To all of you who supported us, my commitment is this. We're not stopping. We're moving forward with more energy and more passion than ever. The road ahead is an open highway. And the future is ours to shape." To celebrate Aptera is holding a giveaway for a camping kit, a $100 gift card to their online store, and a free Aptera pre-order to a winner chosen at random from those who subscribe/watch/comment on their new video...

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Some scientists believe life on earth originated in organic matter in earth's bodies of water more than 3.5 billion years ago," reports CNN. "But where did that organic material come from...?" Maybe electrical energy sparked the beginnings of life on earth — just like in Frankenstein: Researchers decades ago proposed that lightning caused chemical reactions in ancient Earth's oceans and spontaneously produced the organic molecules. Now, new research published March 14 in the journal Science Advances suggests that fizzes of barely visible "microlightning," generated between charged droplets of water mist, could have been potent enough to cook up amino acids from inorganic material. Amino acids — organic molecules that combine to form proteins — are life's most basic building blocks and would have been the first step toward the evolution of life... For animo acids to form, they need nitrogen atoms that can bond with carbon. Freeing up atoms from nitrogen gas requires severing powerful molecular bonds and takes an enormous amount of energy, according to astrobiologist and geobiologist Dr. Amy J. Williams [an associate professor in the department of geosciences at the University of Florida who was not involved in the research]. "Lightning, or in this case, microlightning, has the energy to break molecular bonds and therefore facilitate the generation of new molecules that are critical to the origin of life on Earth," Williams told CNN in an email... For the new study, scientists revisited the 1953 experiments but directed their attention toward electrical activity on a smaller scale, said senior study author Dr. Richard Zare, the Marguerite Blake Wilbur Professor of Natural Science and professor of chemistry at Stanford University in California. Zare and his colleagues looked at electricity exchange between charged water droplets measuring between 1 micron and 20 microns in diameter. (The width of a human hair is 100 microns....) The researchers mixed ammonia, carbon dioxide, methane and nitrogen in a glass bulb, then sprayed the gases with water mist, using a high-speed camera to capture faint flashes of microlightning in the vapor. When they examined the bulb's contents, they found organic molecules with carbon-nitrogen bonds. These included the amino acid glycine and uracil, a nucleotide base in RNA... "What we have done, for the first time, is we have seen that little droplets, when they're formed from water, actually emit light and get this spark," Zare said. "That's new. And that spark causes all types of chemical transformations...." Even on a volatile Earth billions of years ago, lightning may have been too infrequent to produce amino acids in quantities sufficient for life — a fact that has cast doubt on such theories in the past, Zare said. Water spray, however, would have been more common than lightning. A more likely scenario is that mist-generated microlightning constantly zapped amino acids into existence from pools and puddles, where the molecules could accumulate and form more complex molecules, eventually leading to the evolution of life. "We propose," Zare told CNN, "that this is a new mechanism for the prebiotic synthesis of molecules that constitute the building blocks of life."

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Though it's stock price is still up 200% from its IPO in March of 2024 — last week Reddit's stock had dropped nearly 50% since February 7th. And then this week, it dropped another 10%, reports Bloomberg, citing both the phenomenon of "volatile technology stocks under pressure" — but also specifically "the gloomy sentiment around Reddit..." The social media platform has struggled to recover since an earnings report in February showed that it is failing to keep up with larger digital advertising peers such as Meta Platforms Inc. and Alphabet Inc.'s Google, which have higher user figures. Reddit's outlook seemed precarious because its U.S. traffic took a hit from a change in Google's search algorithm. In recent weeks, the short interest in Reddit — a proxy for the volume of bets against the company — has ticked up, and forecasts for the company's share price have fallen. One analyst opened coverage of Reddit this month with a recommendation that investors sell the shares, in part due to the company's heavy reliance on Google. Reddit shares fell more than 5% in intraday trading Friday. "It's been super overvalued," Bob Lang, founder and chief options analyst at Explosive Options said of Reddit. "Their growth rate is very strong, but they still are not making any money." Reddit had a GAAP earnings per share loss of $3.33 in 2024, but reported two consecutive quarters of positive GAAP EPS in the second half of the year... At its February peak, Reddit's stock had risen over 500% from the $34 initial public offering price last March. Some of the enthusiasm was due to a series of deals in which Reddit was paid to allow its content to be used for training artificial intelligence models. More recently, though, there have been questions about the long-term growth prospects for the artificial intelligence industry. "On Wall Street, the average price target from analysts has fallen to about $195 from $207 a month ago," the article points out. "That still offers a roughly $85 upside from where shares closed following Thursday's 8% slump..." Meanwhile Reuters reported that more than 33,000 U.S. Reddit users experienced disruptions on Thursday according to Downdetector.com. "A Reddit spokesperson said the outage was due to a bug in a recent update, which has now been fixed."

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Automotive historian Dan Albert loves the "adorable tiny truck" he's driving. It's one of the small Japan-made "kei" pickups and minivans that "make up about a third of car sales in Japan." Americans can legally import older models for less than $10,000, and getting 40 miles per gallon they're "Cheap to buy and run... rugged, practical, no-frills machines — exactly what the American-built pickup truck used to be." But unfortunately, kei buyers face "bureaucratic roadblocks that states like Massachusetts have erected to keep kei cars and trucks out of the hands of U.S. drivers." Several state departments of motor vehicles (DMVs) have balked at registering the imported machines, saying that they're too unsafe for American streets. Owners have responded with a righteous mix of good humor, lobbying and lawsuits... Kei trucks do not meet the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards, or FMVSS — the highly specific rules US-market new cars must meet. But since 1988, the Imported Vehicle Safety Compliance Act has exempted vehicles that are at least 25 years old from these crash safety standards, allowing drivers to bring over vintage European and Asian market models... Getting insurance coverage was the next barrier, as the company that had long been underwriting the Albert family's fleet also rejected me, forcing me to seek out a specialty "collector car" insurer. (I did eventually get regular coverage....) Maine, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Virginia, and Michigan also tightened their rules on registering small Japanese imports in recent years. The culprit, according to the auto enthusiast press, was the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, the trade organization that serves as the lobbying and policy arm of DMVs across North America. Much of AAMVA's work involves integrating the databases of the 69 US and Canadian motor vehicle jurisdictions who are its members, so that a car stolen in one state can't be titled in another... The kei truck's regulatory troubles can be traced to a 2011 AAMVA report, "Best Practices Regarding Registration and Titling of Mini-Trucks," which called for outright bans and encouraged DMVs to lobby state legislatures to outlaw keis entirely. The Insurance Institute of Highway Safety concurred, telling AAMVA that its recommendation did not go far enough: The IIHS said that keis should join the class of conveyances that the U.S. government calls Low Speed Vehicles, which are mechanically limited to 25 miles per hour or less and should be used only for short local trips on low-speed-limit roads because they can't protect occupants in the event of a collision with a regular vehicle... [But] By 2008, Japan's kei trucks did feature crumple zones and driver airbags in compliance with that country's safety standards... Despite its name, the Imported Vehicle Safety Compliance Act that lets older cars into the US from overseas isn't really about safety: Car industry lobbyists secured passage of the law to protect dealer profits. Newer keis — which are banned — are safer and cleaner than the 25-year-old ones that can be imported now. (Battery-powered keis debuted in 2009.) But even mine has an airbag, front crumple zone, seatbelt pretensioners, and anti-lock brakes. The article notes that kie fans have "a distinctly libertarian streak... Some owners I've talked to report forging titles, setting up shell companies in Montana and finding other means of skirting DMV rules." Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader schwit1 for sharing the article.

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"I am having conversations every day with people whose careers are sort of over," a 53-year-old film and TV director told the New York Times: If you entered media or image-making in the '90s — magazine publishing, newspaper journalism, photography, graphic design, advertising, music, film, TV — there's a good chance that you are now doing something else for work. That's because those industries have shrunk or transformed themselves radically, shutting out those whose skills were once in high demand... When digital technology began seeping into their lives, with its AOL email accounts, Myspace pages and Napster downloads, it didn't seem like a threat. But by the time they entered the primes of their careers, much of their expertise had become all but obsolete. More than a dozen members of Generation X interviewed for this article said they now find themselves shut out, economically and culturally, from their chosen fields. "My peers, friends and I continue to navigate the unforeseen obsolescence of the career paths we chose in our early 20s," Mr. Wilcha said. "The skills you cultivated, the craft you honed — it's just gone. It's startling." Every generation has its burdens. The particular plight of Gen X is to have grown up in one world only to hit middle age in a strange new land. It's as if they were making candlesticks when electricity came in. The market value of their skills plummeted... Typically, workers in their 40s and 50s are entering their peak earning years. But for many Gen-X creatives, compensation has remained flat or decreased, factoring in the rising cost of living. The usual rate for freelance journalists is 50 cents to $1 per word — the same as it was 25 years ago... As opportunities and incomes dwindle, Gen X-ers in creative fields are weighing their options. Move to a lower-cost place and remain committed to the work you love? Look for a bland corporate job that might provide health insurance and a steady paycheck until retirement? The article includes several examples of the trend: One magazine's photo studio director says professional photographers have been replaced by "a 20-year-old kid who will do the job for $500." The article adds that "When photography went digital, photo lab technicians and manual retouchers were suddenly as inessential as medieval scribes." (And "In advertising, brands ditched print and TV campaigns that required large crews for marketing plans that relied on social media posts."") An editor at Spin magazine remembers the day its print edition folded... And besides competition from influencers, there's also AI, "which seems likely to replace many of the remaining Gen X copywriters, photographers and designers. By 2030, ad agencies in the United States will lose 32,000 jobs, or 7.5 percent of the industry's work force, to the technology, according to the research firm Forrester." Meanwhile the cost of living has skyrocketed, the article points out — even while Gen X-ers "are less secure financially than baby boomers and lack sufficient retirement savings, according to recent surveys..."

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Last week an Air France flight to the Caribbean had to turn around and return to Paris, reports the Washington Post, "after a passenger could not locate their cellphone." Because of fears that an unattended cellphone could overheat — and because the passenger and crew couldn't find the phone — the Boeing 777 turned around off the coast of France "and returned to the airport, according to the flight-tracking service FlightAware. It landed back where it started a little more than two hours after taking off, with 375 passengers, 12 cabin crew and two pilots on board..." It was the airline's second Caribbean-bound flight to turn around because of a phone since early February as the aviation industry grapples with the risk of fires sparked by lithium batteries... Air France did not say where on the plane the phone was lost — or where it was ultimately located. "After checks by the maintenance teams, the device was found and the aircraft was able to take off again quickly," the airline said in an unsigned statement. "Air France regrets this situation and reminds that the safety of its customers and crew members is its absolute priority." The plane made it to Guadeloupe, a French overseas territory, about four hours later than scheduled... The articles notes that U.S. air passengers "are required to keep vape pens and spare lithium batteries, such as portable chargers, in the cabin at all times, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The items are not allowed in checked bags..." The agency — which handles about 16.4 million flights per year — "says it is aware of 85 lithium battery air incidents involving smoke, fire or extreme heat last year."

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In 1999 Slashdot reader Jeremie announced "a new project I recently started to create a complete open-source platform for Instant Messaging with transparent communication to other IM systems (ICQ, AIM, etc)." It was the first release of the eXtensible Messaging and Presence Protocol, and by 2008 Slashdot was asking if XMPP was "the next big thing." Facebook even supported it for third-party chat clients until 2015. And here in 2025, the chair of the nonprofit XMPP Standards Foundation is long-time Slashdot reader ralphm, who is now issuing this call to action at XMPP.org: The European Digital Markets Act (DMA) is designed to break down walled gardens and enforce messaging interoperability. As a designated gatekeeper, Meta—controlling WhatsApp and Messenger—must comply. However, its current proposal falls short, risking further entrenchment of its dominance rather than fostering genuine competition. [..] A Call to Action The XMPP Standards Foundation urges Meta to adopt XMPP for messaging interoperability. It is ready to collaborate, continue to evolve the protocol to meet modern needs, and ensure true compliance with the DMA. Let's build an open, competitive messaging ecosystem—one that benefits both users and service providers. It's time for real interoperability. Let's make it happen.

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Long-time Slashdot reader Baron_Yam writes: No more burning fossil fuels, playing with fissile material, damming rivers, erecting wind mills, or making solar panels. All of our energy needs could potentially be supplied by the angular kinetic energy of the Earth — and because of the mass of the planet, doing so would slow its rotation down by a mere 7ms per century. [Which is similar to speed changes caused by natural phenomena such as the Moon's pull and changing dynamics inside the planet's core."] Normally this would be considered impossible as the Earth's large and uniform field does not induce a current in conductors, but researchers believe that a hollow cylinder of manganese, zinc and iron can alter the interaction with our planetary magnetic field and allow the extraction of energy from it. So far, the results are positive but still below the level where they cannot be explained by multiple possible causes of experimental error. Further research is required to confirm the effect. "The effect was identified only in a carefully crafted device and generated just 17 microvolts," reports Scientific American, "a fraction of the voltage released when a single neuron fires — making it hard to verify that some other effect isn't causing the observations." But if another group can verify the results, the experiment's lead says the next logical step is trying to scale up the device to generate a useful amount of energy.

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An anonymous reader shared this report from the Mercury News: After a year of fastidious planning, a microscopic sample of the ultra-rare radioactive element berkelium arrived at a Berkeley Lab. With just 48 hours to experiment before it would become unusable, a group of nearly 20 researchers focused intently on creating a brand-new molecule. Using a chemical glove box, a polycarbonate glass box with protruding gloves that shields substances from oxygen and moisture, scientists combined the berkelium metal with an organic molecule containing only carbon and hydrogen to create a chemical reaction... [Post-doc researcher Dominic] Russo, researcher Stefan Minasian, and 17 other scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory had created berkelocene, a new molecule that usurps theorists' expectations about how carbon bonds with heavy-metal elements. In the future, berkelocene may help humanity safely dispose of nuclear waste, according to a study published in the academic journal Science... The new molecular structure is, in the nomenclature of researchers, a "sandwich." In this formation, a berkelium atom, serving as the filling, lays in between two 8-membered carbon rings — the "bread" — and resembles an atomic foot-long sub. "It has this very symmetric geometry, and it's the first time that that's been observed," Minasian said. The researchers believe more accurate models for how actinide elements like uranium behave will help solve problems related to long-term nuclear waste storage.

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The Washington Post reports that after months of polar darkness, the extent of sea ice blanketing the Arctic this winter "fell to the lowest level on record, researchers announced this week... the smallest maximum extent in the 47-year satellite record, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. "Since then, the ice has already begun to melt again." "Sea ice is acting like the old canary in the coal mine," Dartmouth University geophysicist Don Perovich said. "It's saying loud and clear that warming is occurring...." In the summer, when the sun's radiation shines down on the Arctic for 24 hours a day, the ice acts as a shield, reflecting more than half of the light that hits it back into space.... With so little sea ice in the Arctic this year, more sunlight will be able to reach the open ocean, which absorbs more than 90 percent of the radiation that hits it. This will further warm the region, accelerating ice melt and exposing even more water to the light. This feedback loop helps explain the rapid warming of the Arctic, and it is expected to lead to a complete lack of summer sea ice in the region within decades, [said explained Melinda Webster, a sea ice scientist at the University of Washington]. The consequences would be dire for seals, polar bears and other wildlife, which depend on a stable sea ice platform to birth their young and hunt for food. It would also expose miles of coastline to pounding ocean waves, accelerating the erosion that threatens to tip some communities into the sea. But the effects will also be felt in places far from the poles, Perovich said. Studies suggest that a complete loss of Arctic sea ice would raise global temperatures as much as adding a trillion tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. Changes in the Arctic could also affect the jet stream, the river of winds that flows through the upper atmosphere, contributing to more extreme weather around the globe. "What happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic," Perovich said. Earlier this year sea ice also fell 30% below the amount typical in the Antarctic prior to 2010, the researchers report. The total amount of sea ice on earth has now reached an all-time low, declining by more than a million square miles (2.5 million square kilometers) below the pre-2010 average. "Altogether, Earth is missing an area of sea ice large enough to cover the entire continental United States east of the Mississippi."

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An anonymous reader shared this report from BleepingComputer: Three security bypasses have been discovered in Ubuntu Linux's unprivileged user namespace restrictions, which could be enable a local attacker to exploit vulnerabilities in kernel components. The issues allow local unprivileged users to create user namespaces with full administrative capabilities and impact Ubuntu versions 23.10, where unprivileged user namespaces restrictions are enabled, and 24.04 which has them active by default... Ubuntu added AppArmor-based restrictions in version 23.10 and enabled them by default in 24.04 to limit the risk of namespace misuse. Researchers at cloud security and compliance company Qualys found that these restrictions can be bypassed in three different ways... The researchers note that these bypasses are dangerous when combined with kernel-related vulnerabilities, and they are not enough to obtain complete control of the system... Qualys notified the Ubuntu security team of their findings on January 15 and agreed to a coordinated release. However, the busybox bypass was discovered independently by vulnerability researcher Roddux, who published the details on March 21. Canonical, the organization behind Ubuntu Linux, has acknowledged Qualys' findings and confirmed to BleepingComputer that they are developing improvements to the AppArmor protections. A spokesperson told us that they are not treating these findings as vulnerabilities per se but as limitations of a defense-in-depth mechanism. Hence, protections will be released according to standard release schedules and not as urgent security fixes. Canonical shared hardening steps that administrators should consider in a bulletin published on their official "Ubuntu Discourse" discussion forum.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from MIT Technology Review: The first clinical trial of a therapy bot that uses generative AI suggests it was as effective as human therapy for participants with depression, anxiety, or risk for developing eating disorders. Even so, it doesn't give a go-ahead to the dozens of companies hyping such technologies while operating in a regulatory gray area. A team led by psychiatric researchers and psychologists at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College built the tool, called Therabot, and the results were published on March 27 in the New England Journal of Medicine. Many tech companies are building AI therapy bots to address the mental health care gap, offering more frequent and affordable access than traditional therapy. However, challenges persist: poorly worded bot responses can cause harm, and forming meaningful therapeutic relationships is hard to replicate in software. While many bots rely on general internet data, researchers at Dartmouth developed "Therabot" using custom, evidence-based datasets. Here's what they found: To test the bot, the researchers ran an eight-week clinical trial with 210 participants who had symptoms of depression or generalized anxiety disorder or were at high risk for eating disorders. About half had access to Therabot, and a control group did not. Participants responded to prompts from the AI and initiated conversations, averaging about 10 messages per day. Participants with depression experienced a 51% reduction in symptoms, the best result in the study. Those with anxiety experienced a 31% reduction, and those at risk for eating disorders saw a 19% reduction in concerns about body image and weight. These measurements are based on self-reporting through surveys, a method that's not perfect but remains one of the best tools researchers have. These results ... are about what one finds in randomized control trials of psychotherapy with 16 hours of human-provided treatment, but the Therabot trial accomplished it in about half the time. "I've been working in digital therapeutics for a long time, and I've never seen levels of engagement that are prolonged and sustained at this level," says [Michael Heinz, a research psychiatrist at Dartmouth College and Dartmouth Health and first author of the study].

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Despite recent test failures, NASA has added SpaceX's Starship to its Launch Services Program contract, allowing it to compete for future science missions once it achieves a successful orbital flight. Florida Today reports: NASA announced the addition Friday to its current launch provider contract with SpaceX, which covers the Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy. This opens the possibility of Starship flying future NASA science missions -- that is once Starship reaches a successful orbital flight. "NASA has awarded SpaceX of Starbase, Texas, a modification under the NASA Launch Services (NLS) II contract to add Starship to their existing Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launch service offerings," NASA's statement reads. Th announcement is simply an onboarding of Starship as an option, as the contract runs through 2032. However, SpaceX is under pressure to get Starship operational by next year as the company plans not only to send an uncrewed Starship to Mars by late 2026, but the NASA Artemis III moon landing is fast approaching. Should it remain the plan with the current administration, Starship will act as a human lander for NASA's Artemis III crew. "The NLS II contracts are multiple award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity, with an ordering period through June 2030 and an overall period of performance through December 2032. The contracts include an on-ramp provision that provides an opportunity annually for new launch service providers to add their launch service on an NLS II contract and compete for future missions and allows existing contractors to introduce launch services not currently on their NLS II contracts," NASA's statement reads.

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A new study warns that toxic Martian dust contains fine particles and harmful substances like silica and metals that pose serious health risks to astronauts, making missions to Mars more dangerous than previously thought. The Guardian reports: During Apollo missions to the moon, astronauts suffered from exposure to lunar dust. It clung to spacesuits and seeped into the lunar landers, causing coughing, runny eyes and irritated throats. Studies showed that chronic health effects would result from prolonged exposure. Martian dust isn't as sharp and abrasive as lunar dust, but it does have the same tendency to stick to everything, and the fine particles (about 4% the width of a human hair) can penetrate deep into lungs and enter the bloodstream. Toxic substances in the dust include silica, gypsum and various metals. "A mission to Mars does not have the luxury of rapid return to Earth for treatment," the researchers write in the journal GeoHealth. And the 40-minute communication delay will limit the usefulness of remote medical support from Earth. Instead, the researchers stress that limiting exposure to dust is essential, requiring air filters, self-cleaning space suits and electrostatic repulsion devices, for example.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: A concert on Monday night at New York's Radio City Music Hall was a special occasion for Frank Miller: his parents' wedding anniversary. He didn't end up seeing the show -- and before he could even get past security, he was informed that he was in fact banned for life from the venue and all other properties owned by Madison Square Garden (MSG). After scanning his ticket and promptly being pulled aside by security, Miller was told by staff that he was barred from the MSG properties for an incident at the Garden in 2021. But Miller says he hasn't been to the venue in nearly two decades. "They hand me a piece of paper letting me know that I've been added to a ban list," Miller says. "There's a trespass notice if I ever show up on any MSG property ever again," which includes venues like Radio City, the Beacon Theatre, the Sphere, and the Chicago Theatre. He was baffled at first. Then it dawned on him: this was probably about a T-shirt he designed years ago. MSG Entertainment won't say what happened with Miller or how he was picked out of the crowd, but he suspects he was identified via controversial facial recognition systems that the company deploys at its venues. In 2017, 1990s New York Knicks star Charles Oakley was forcibly removed from his seat near Knicks owner and Madison Square Garden CEO James Dolan. The high-profile incident later spiraled into an ongoing legal battle. For Miller, Oakley was an "integral" part of the '90s Knicks, he says. With his background in graphic design, he made a shirt in the style of the old team logo that read, "Ban Dolan" -- a reference to the infamous scuffle. A few years later, in 2021, a friend of Miller's wore a Ban Dolan shirt to a Knicks game and was kicked out and banned from future events. That incident spawned ESPN segments and news articles and validated what many fans saw as a pettiness on Dolan and MSG's part for going after individual fans who criticized team ownership. "Frank Miller Jr. made threats against an MSG executive on social media and produced and sold merchandise that was offensive in nature," Mikyl Cordova, executive vice president of communications and marketing for the company, said in an emailed statement. "His behavior was disrespectful and disruptive and in violation of our code of conduct." Miller responded to the ban, saying: "I just found it comical, until I was told that my mom was crying [in the lobby]. I was like, 'Oh man, I ruined their anniversary with my shit talk on the internet. Memes are powerful, and so is the surveillance state. It's something that we all have to be aware of -- the panopticon. We're [being] surveilled at all times, and it's always framed as a safety thing, when rarely is that the case. It's more of a deterrent and a fear tactic to try to keep people in line."

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