There are quite a number of advantages to knowing more than just one language. If you’re interested in becoming multilingual, you can take as much time as you like to learn as many as 56 languages with a lifetime subscription to Qlango Language Learning. It’s currently on sale for only $34.97, which is 70% off the usual $119 subscription price.

Qlango makes learning new languages fun by turning it into a game. The games offer hints so you won’t ever get stuck. You can train at whatever pace is best for you because Qlango allows you to choose a convenient schedule.

Another great feature of Qlango is that the platform lets you customize how you learn. You can choose sentence formation, matching, or multiple choice. You also won’t get confused by dealing with advanced vocabulary before you feel ready; you can remain at a level until you’re confident enough to move on.

Qlango allows you to practice until you get all the questions right. It’s easy to improve your pronunciation and word recognition when you can hear a word as many times as you like by clicking on it. The program employs only practical, real-life conversations so you can learn about 6,700 handy foreign words.

The platform has a unique spaced repetition technique, allowing you to review new words continuously. This method has been scientifically proven to be more effective at helping you remember foreign words. Qlango’s six difficulty levels make it easier to train at your own pace and follow the program’s smart recommendations.

It’s unsurprising that Qlango has been downloaded more than a million times and has a fantastic 4.8 out of 5 stars on Apple’s App Store. The program is accessible on desktop and mobile devices. Both new and existing users can take advantage of this promotion.

Get a lifetime subscription to all languages on Qlango Language Learning for only $34.97.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

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Around 66 million years ago, a six-mile-wide asteroid hit Earth, triggering the extinction of three-quarters of all living species. The age of dinosaurs, which had lasted 165 million years, ended with a fiery crash and suddenly sooty skies. 

Farther back in our planet’s history, volcanic eruptions, rapid climate change, and plummeting oxygen levels have caused at least four additional mass extinctions, with smaller pulses of biodiversity loss also showing up in the fossil record. In each of the five largest events, which spanned anywhere from thousands to tens of millions of years, at least 75 percent of Earth’s species died out. These are the most commonly agreed upon major mass extinctions in paleontology.

You’ve also likely heard about a sixth one. Many ecologists and biologists say we’re on the precipice (or already in the midst) of another era of mass extinction. This sixth mass extinction, also referred to as the Holocene or Anthropocene extinction, is described as ongoing and caused by human activities. Hunting, overfishing, habitat destruction, human encroachment, and invasive species introductions are the major drivers of the losses incurred thus far. Human-caused climate change is also set to become another factor, as decades of rising temperatures, shifting precipitation patterns, and increasingly extreme weather catch up to already stressed ecosystems. 

It’s indisputable that humans shape life on Earth in major ways, and that animals and plants are dying out at an alarming rate. But is it true that our impact is on par with that of an asteroid? Not all scientists agree. 

There is no question that Earth is losing species fast. “Biodiversity crisis is a pretty accurate term” to describe the present moment, says John Wiens, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Arizona. “Extinction crisis” is another, he adds, “based on the large number of species that are threatened with extinction.” 

Five other experts that Popular Science corresponded with for this article all agree on this ‘crisis’ terminology. In comparison with background levels of extinction, all of our sources said that current extinction rates are much higher. 

Extinction isn’t always a sign of disaster. It’s also a natural outcome of evolution. As species diverge, compete, and struggle to survive, not all of them make it long-term. Conditions on Earth shift over geologic time, and those forces inevitably lead to some dead ends on the tree of life. 

[ Related: Earth’s 5 catastrophic mass extinctions, explained. ]

However, throughout most of our planet’s history, the rate of new species emerging has exceeded the rate of species dying out, says Gerardo Ceballos, an ecologist and conservation biologist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Thus, biodiversity normally exists in a positive balance. 

Currently, we’re losing species far faster than new ones emerge. Present extinction rates are up to 100 times faster than background levels, according to one 2015 study co-authored by Ceballos. In that analysis, Ceballos and his colleagues estimated the natural vertebrate extinction rate sits at around two species lost per 10,000 species each century. Then, they compared that statistic with the number of confirmed and likely extinctions recorded on the International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List. They determined that, even using conservative numbers, the extinction rate for every vertebrate group was between eight and 100 times the background rate. The species losses incurred in the past 100 years would have taken thousands of years to occur naturally, per the assessment. 

Other counts find the current rate of extinction is even higher. One often cited 2014 study concluded Earth is losing species 1,000 times faster than natural background rates. That analysis also reported the level of loss is poised to accelerate to 10,000 times the background rate in the near future. 

These numbers vary widely in large part because the estimates of background extinction rates are difficult to pin down. The fossil record is incomplete, so scientists generally rely on mathematical models and reconstructions of the past to determine what was once alive and when it died out. Small shifts in starting assumptions can lead to major changes in the final calculations. The time period you’re calculating average extinction rate over and types of organisms you’re assessing also impact the result. This same ambiguity in estimating extinction rate persists in the present. 

Though Wiens describes our moment as a biodiversity crisis, he doesn’t believe it meets the bar for a sixth mass extinction. “No one has provided a quantitative analysis that has really shown that,” he says. 

If the top five major mass extinctions in the paleontological record each killed off at least 75 percent of species at the time, then the sixth one should theoretically cross the same threshold. Yet so far, the IUCN has confirmed fewer than 1,000 extinctions from the past 500 years–just about 0.1 percent of all known species, according to an analysis co-authored by Wiens in April.

We have not catalogued every living species, and the IUCN is far from having assessed all known species. The IUCN database is also biased, skewing towards large, charismatic vertebrates and wealthy regions like North America. The criteria for extinction are strict, requiring extensive surveys, and yet sometimes species reappear after being declared gone forever. Still, the IUCN dataset is among the best windows we have into the state of life on Earth, and it suggests there’s a way to go before three quarters of species are gone.

[ Related: Earth’s ‘Great Dying’ killed 80-90% of life. How some amphibians survived. ]

However, it’s worth noting that other assessments estimate a much higher proportion of species have already disappeared. One 2022 paper, which extrapolated extinction rates from data on mollusks, found that upwards of 10 percent of all species may have gone extinct in the past 500 years. 

And, those like Ceballos who argue a major mass extinction has already begun, point to calculations that indicate we could reach that grim, 75 percent mile marker in just a few centuries. If all IUCN threatened species went extinct in the next 100 years, and that rate of species loss continued, Earth would surpass 75 percent loss of species across most vertebrate animal groups in under 550 years, according to a landmark 2011 review paper. This study published in Nature, remains among the most thorough quantitative assessments of extinction trends. 

Yet to write every threatened species off as doomed to imminent extinction would be a mistake, says Stuart Pimm, a conservation biologist at Duke University and president of the conservation non-profit, Saving Nature. 

“We have no idea what the future is,” he says. And, in the meantime, “there’s a lot of things we can do.” Pimm points to conservation success stories like the rebound of certain baleen whale populations and the stabilization of savanna elephant numbers over the past 25 years. He worries that claims about the sixth extinction might leave the public resigned to what might otherwise be a preventable catastrophe.

“It’s not inevitable,” Pimm says.

From the paleontological perspective, mass extinctions are something that can only be definitively confirmed in the past tense. They are defined based on the proportion of species that existed before, but not after a cataclysmic event like a major asteroid strike. If there’s not yet an after, it’s impossible to say for sure what number of lineages died out. There are no crystal balls in science. And in that uncertainty, there’s room for hope that we could stop species from sliding off the cliff. 

But nearly half of all animals are losing population worldwide, according to a 2023 estimate, based on trend data for more than 71,000 species. Barring exceptional levels of investment and intervention, lots of species are already doomed to extinction, says Sarah Otto, an evolutionary biologist at the University of British Columbia. “Many of the extinctions we think that humans are causing haven’t actually happened yet. These are the ‘living dead’ species whose population sizes are small, whose habitats are fragmented,” she explains. “There’s a lot of extinction debt.” 

[ Related: An ‘ancestral bottleneck’ took out nearly 99 percent of the human population 800,000 years ago. ]

A 2020 report from the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) found that an average of 25 percent of species across animal and plant groups are threatened with extinction within decades, and that the human impacts to blame are intensifying. Without preventative action, as species disappear, “there will be a further acceleration in the global rate of species extinction,” the report authors write. 

Species depend on one another for survival, Otto notes. For example, in our acidifying and warming oceans, coral reefs are teetering on the brink. If they go, then the fate of the many species dependent on the infrastructure they provide is unclear. Major losses of marine life could then have knock-on effects on land. 

Notably, the IPBES report doesn’t directly consider the influence of climate change on future extinction rate. If it did, “those projected numbers could really go up,” says Otto.

Even under Wiens’ comparatively rosy outlook, he still expects 12 to 40 percent species losses over the next century. And if species don’t disappear across their entire ranges, local losses and population declines can still have major repercussions for ecosystem function and human society. 

The 75 percent threshold is an arbitrary line, Otto notes. Lots can go wrong before we officially place sixth in the world’s worst contest. Human impacts on biodiversity “will be seen in the fossil record,” she says. “Whether or not it’s going to be up there in the top six is really a matter of what we do next.” 

This story is part of Popular Science’s Ask Us Anything series, where we answer your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the ordinary to the off-the-wall. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.

The post Are we in a sixth mass extinction? appeared first on Popular Science.

Face tattoos, typically reserved for rappers and rockers, could one day be used to make sure everyday office workers aren’t overexerting themselves. 

This week, researchers from the University of Texas unveiled a new, removable, sticker-like electronic face wearable that uses electroencephalography (EEG) and electrooculography (EOG) to constantly monitor changes in the wearer’s mental strain as they complete tasks. In theory, the e-tattoo could ensure air traffic controllers or other workers in similarly high-stress environments stay in the “Goldilocks zone” of mental exertion: not so much that it causes errors, but not so little that it leads to boredom and distraction. And unlike regular face tats, these can come off at the end of the day.

“We’ve long monitored workers’ physical health, tracking injuries and muscle strain,” University of Texas Austin professor and study lead author Luis Sentis said in a statement. “Now we have the ability to monitor mental strain, which hasn’t been tracked.”

The new wearable was revealed this week in the journal Device.

Researchers use the term “mental workload” to refer to the overall amount of cognitive effort a person exerts to complete tasks. Though specifics can vary depending on the type of work, past studies have shown that for high-stress activities, people perform best when they are neither overloaded nor underloaded. Measuring that balance can be tricky. The current standard for assessing mental load is a survey called the NASA Task Load Index, which asks workers to rate their perceived level of exertion after completing specific tasks. The problem with this approach is that it’s inherently subjective and doesn’t capture real-time physiological responses.

For years, researchers have tried to overcome the subjectivity of self-reported mental workloads by using EEG and EOG to measure changes in a person’s brain activity. But those systems, typically in the form of helmets or electrodes attached to the scalp, also aren’t ideal for everyday use because of their bulky size that makes it unrealistic for workers to wear throughout the day.

Enter electronic tattoos. The researchers designed paper-thin, sticker-like sensors that attach to a user’s forehead and wirelessly measure brain waves while they work. Each sensor contains wavy lipids and coils that allow it to stretch and bend, helping it adhere to the skin while still maintaining a strong signal. A small, lightweight battery pack keeps the system powered. Each tattoo is also custom-fitted to account for slight variations in individual faces. The stickers themselves are disposable and inexpensive to produce.

Images of the wearable provided by researchers  show a bearded man with the sticker slapped across his forehead. At first glance, the top section of the tattoo resembles a row of black flowers or mandalas spread out across his head, connected by wavy black lines. These lines extend down the subject’s face from each temple. Another flower-like cluster of sensors appears at the top of his right cheekbone. Below each eye, a separate set of sensors sits about two inches beneath the lower eyelid. If the lighting were slightly different, the man would look like he was pulled directly out of concept art for the video game Cyberpunk 2077.

Those markings aren’t just for aesthetics. Together, the sensors placed around the face are capable of measuring changes in theta and delta brain waves—both of which are associated with increased cognitive demand. By contrast, decreases in alpha and beta brain waves signal mental fatigue. The researchers had six test subjects wear the e-tattoos while completing a series of increasingly complex tasks. They then compared those results to responses on the NASA Task Load Index and found that the objective measurements from the tattoos were comparable. Taking it a step further, they trained a computer model to estimate a subject’s potential mental workload based on brain signals collected by the device at the start of the task. The e-tattoos, the researchers note, were able to “predict mental strain.”

This isn’t the first time researchers have used electronic tattoos to measure brain activity. Last year, the same team created a liquid electronic tattoo ink that could be sprayed onto a person’s scalp. Like the newer “face tattoo,” this liquid ink allowed EEG sensors to monitor brainwaves. Back in 2018, researchers from the University of Minnesota developed a 3D-printable tattoo ink made from silver flakes, designed to help heal wounds and be peeled off and discarded when no longer needed. Other researchers have also developed lightweight, sweat-resistant tattoos that can be placed on the chest to continuously monitor heart rate. In theory, future versions of these wearables could be used to detect early signs—or “red flags”—of heart disease.

All of this is still in the early stages, but the researchers behind the electronic face tattoo envision a not-too-distant future where workers in high-stress professions could wear one of these sensors during their shifts and discard it at the end of the day. The device would collect brainwave data during the workday and transmit it wirelessly to a human or machine overseer, who could intervene if the worker’s mental load falls outside the optimal range.

There are still some kinks to work out before that vision becomes reality though. The current design only functions well on hairless skin, which could limit its usability. It’s also unclear how others might respond to sitting shoulder-to-shoulder with a coworker covered in face sensors

The post Electronic face tattoo knows when you’re getting bored  appeared first on Popular Science.

GEOBusiness 2025 dal 4 al 5 giugno a Londra sarà un momento per avere una visione aggiornata grazie anche al programma di seminari ricchi di contenuti pratici e orientati al futuro, progettati per professionisti di tutti i settori per sfruttare la potenza della geolocalizzazione.

In due giorni, sono organizzate oltre 200 sessioni gratuite – inclusi seminari tenuti da esperti, workshop interattivi e demo live – che coprono tutto il settore della geomatica, dai dati geospaziali alla cartografia digitale, al GIS, telerilevamento, IA, sostenibilità e altro ancora.

Ogni sessione offre approfondimenti sul mondo reale e soluzioni pratiche, fornendo a professionisti geospaziali, topografi e decisori del settore spunti concreti per sfruttare la potenza dell'intelligenza territoriale e guidare l'innovazione.

Alcuni interventi vedono i seguenti temi:
- Gestione del patrimonio naturale nel settore energetico – La piattaforma per il patrimonio naturale di SSEN Distribution
Relatori: Calum Crockart (Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks), Harry Catharell-Hargreaves e Kirsteen Allan (Jacobs)
Contenuto: Scopri come SSEN e Jacobs utilizzano strumenti geospaziali per mappare la biodiversità e i servizi ecosistemici di base. Questa sessione illustra le capacità della Natural Asset Platform nel monitorare i cambiamenti di habitat e biodiversità nel tempo e spiega i modelli analitici che la alimentano.

- Dallo scan al gemello digitale – Gestione immobiliare con i digital twins
Relatore: Alec Thomas – Carter Jonas
Contenuto: I gemelli digitali stanno rivoluzionando la gestione immobiliare. Questa sessione spiega come un servizio "scan-to-twin" fornisca ai proprietari strumenti per un migliore processo decisionale, una manutenzione predittiva e il tracciamento degli asset, il tutto basato su dati accurati e accessibili.

- Come il geospaziale sta realizzando le missioni del governo
Relatrice: Sarah Hodgetts – Government Digital Service (Servizio Digitale Governativo)
Contenuto: Questa sessione delinea come il "piano per un governo digitale moderno" del governo migliorerà la vita dei cittadini. Esplora il ruolo essenziale dei dati geospaziali nel raggiungimento di questa visione e come la nostra industria può supportarla.

– Rivoluzionare la formazione topografica attraverso l'apprendimento online
Relatore: Rami Tamimi – The Survey School
Contenuto: Questa sessione affronta una delle maggiori sfide della professione: formare la prossima generazione. Esplora come l'apprendimento online possa supportare l'istruzione nel campo del surveying e gli errori da evitare.

- Migliorare i servizi di emergenza con i dati geospaziali del settore pubblico
Relatori: Egbe Manners e Wes Clift – Ordnance Survey
Contenuto: Dalla risposta agli incidenti alla consapevolezza situazionale, i dati geospaziali del settore pubblico sono vitali per i servizi di emergenza. Questa sessione condivide lezioni apprese da progetti reali come l'Emergency Services Gazetteer (Anagrafe per i Servizi di Emergenza) e il Vernacular Names Tool (Strumento Nomi Vernacolari), esplorando come i dati di posizione stiano salvando vite.

Uno dei punti principali dell'evento sarà quello di fornire spunti pratici ("takeaway" azionabili) per sfruttare il potere dell'intelligenza territoriale (location intelligence) e guidare l'innovazione.

GEOmedia, sarà presente all'evento.

https://www.geobusinessshow.com

Leica Geosystems, parte del gruppo Hexagon, ha lanciato il Pegasus TRK300, una soluzione versatile per applicazioni di mobile mapping sempre più cruciali nel nostro mondo digitale.

Questa tecnologia sta diventando indispensabile per sviluppare smart city, potenziare le infrastrutture e creare gemelli digitali che rivoluzionano la pianificazione urbana e l'efficienza operativa.

La vera rivoluzione del TRK300 sta nella sua accessibilità: permette a operatori con qualsiasi esperienza di catturare nuvole di punti ad altissima precisione con una configurazione intuitiva. Christian Schäfer, Business Director del Mobile Mapping di Leica Geosystems, spiega: "Grazie al design leggero e user-friendly, una sola persona può trasportarlo e installarlo su un veicolo in pochi minuti, aprendo possibilità inedite – dal monitoraggio delle buche stradali all'ottimizzazione del traffico urbano – per aziende che vogliono potenziare le loro capacità di mappatura."

Sul fronte prestazioni il sistema multi-beam con doppia testina scansiona l'ambiente a 360° catturando dati ad altissima risoluzione fino a 300 metri di distanza. Questa portata eccezionale garantisce una copertura completa di ampi corridoi e aree aperte, riducendo drasticamente le passate multiple e i tempi di rilevamento. Il risultato sono nuvole di punti ad altissima densità, perfette per la mappatura del territorio e la modellazione 3D delle città.

Robusto e affidabile, il TRK300 opera senza problemi anche in condizioni estreme – dalla pioggia battente agli ambienti polverosi – e con un'autonomia di ben sette ore permette giornate intere di lavoro senza interruzioni. Completa la famiglia Pegasus TRK colmando il divario tra portabilità estrema e capacità di acquisizione dati professionali.

L'integrazione con gli altri strumenti Leica è totale: lavora in sinergia con Pegasus FIELD per il monitoraggio in tempo reale durante l'acquisizione, e con Pegasus OFFICE per la post-elaborazione avanzata e la creazione dei deliverable finali. Questo flusso di lavoro coeso evita le complicate conversioni tra formati e supporta applicazioni diversificate, dalla mappatura delle reti infrastrutturali al rilievo dinamico delle strade fino alla creazione di modelli urbani tridimensionali.

Il sistema è già disponibile nei principali mercati.
https://leica-geosystems.com/products/mobile-mapping-systems/hardware/leica-pegasus-trk300

A66Max FOIF è dotato, come il “fratello” A90, di una scheda gnss da 1048 canali in grado di ricevere dati GPS, GLONASS, GALILEO, BEIDOU, SBAS, QZSS, L-BAND che conferisce ad A90 velocità di FIX e stabilità di misura.

L’unità IMU di ultimissima generazione non è soggetta ad influenze da parte di oggetti metallici o campi elettromagnetici. In A66Max sono presenti, novità di questo modello, il distanziometro laser e la camera fotografica interni.

Questi due elementi, integrati in un gnss di ultimissima generazione, dotato di tutte le ultimissime tecnologie nel settore del gnss definiscono, uniti al nuovissimo software da campagna modello SurvStar. un prodotto ai vertici del settore che non teme nessun paragone.

A66Max. come A90, è costruito interamente in magnesio per attenuare il fenomeno del multypath. Il nuovo controller mod. P9V è dotato di gps e di camera fotografica interna. A66Max, al pari di A90, è dotato di radio UHF ricetrasmittente e di UMTS. Questo consente add A66Max di essere utilizzato come: ROVER in connessione alle reti CORS tramite modem UMTS integrato e certificato.

BASE-ROVER con collegamento locale via RADIO UHF integrata BASE-ROVER con collegamento connessione telefonica UMTS integrato.

STATICO con scheda SD da 32Gb integrato. A66Max è compatibile e collegabile a FOIF A90 ed a moltissimi altri gnss.

VIDALASER è FOIF dal 2003 e garantisce l’assistenza tecnica, i ricambi ed il servizio riparazione strumenti ufficiale per l’Italia di tutti i prodotti FOIF.

Geom. Oreste Vidal

vidaLaser - Vic. N. Tommaseo 3 IT-20045 Lainate MI

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Email info@vidalaser.com

Skype VIDALASER

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Il primo advisory board di EUSATfinder, AB#1, si terrà a Ile Rousse, in Corsica, il prossimo 1° luglio 2025. Il board sarà incentrato sui bisogni e sulle esperienze degli operatori di primo intervento durante operazioni reali in situazioni di emergenza e nella gestione delle crisi, con l’obiettivo di consolidare i punti chiave da includere nella reportistica di EUSATfinder e facilitare ulteriori opportunità di networking e collaborazione.

In questo contesto, le risorse spaziali, come i satelliti e i velivoli a pilotaggio remoto (droni), possono svolgere un ruolo cruciale nella risposta alle emergenze e nella gestione dei disastri. In sintesi, le risorse spaziali sono diventate uno strumento indispensabile nella gestione delle emergenze e possono contribuire in modo significativo a salvare vite umane e a ridurre i danni durante tali situazioni. Più nello specifico, le telecomunicazioni satellitari sicure rappresentano un elemento chiave nella risposta alle emergenze e nella gestione delle crisi, fornendo collegamenti di comunicazione affidabili e sicuri nei momenti di crisi. Di conseguenza, l’obiettivo generale del progetto EUSATfinder è quello di dimostrare l’efficacia dell’uso sinergico di tre principali programmi spaziali europei, ovvero GOVSATCOM, Copernicus e Galileo, in situazioni critiche.

Agenda preliminare:

Inscription form: https://forms.gle/FuyuggE8c1Ck5zWf9

Address: 1 Av. David Dary, 20220 L'Île-Rousse, Francia (click on link for google maps position)

Time: 1 July 2025, 09:00-18:00

Location:Fondata nel 1758 da Pasquale Paoli, L'Île-Rousse è una delle poche città della Corsica ad essere stata costruita ex novo, con una forte visione politica ed economica. Soprannominata la "Città Paolina", fu creata per liberare la Balagna dal dominio genovese e offrire un porto franco ai Corsi. La sua posizione strategica, delimitata da isolotti di porfido rosso, la rese rapidamente un prospero centro commerciale, in concorrenza con il vicino porto di Calvi, rimasto fedele ai Genovesi. L'Île-Rousse si apre sul mare con una spiaggia nel centro cittadino, che contribuisce al suo fascino unico. La città si è sviluppata attorno a Place Pascal Paoli, vero cuore pulsante in cui si intrecciano cultura, religione e commercio.

Fonte: (EUSATfinder Project)

Feeling nostalgic for simpler times? Some things from the ’90s still hold up, like the Microsoft Office staples we all know and love. These days, there are even new apps alongside old faves like Word and Excel, and right now, you can get seven of them for just $24.97 (reg. $229) through June 1 with a Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license.

You may be tackling work from a laptop and not a chunky desktop computer, but you can still take advantage of Microsoft classics thanks to this Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license.

This edition includes seven apps: Word, Excel, Outlook, PowerPoint, OneNote, Access, and Publisher. Each one is geared to help you tackle personal and professional tasks. And this lifetime license means you pay once for permanent access, no monthly subscriptions required.

Concerned that this is an older version? There’s no need to worry; it has been redesigned with better cloud connectivity and improved features like new analysis capabilities in Excel, new presentation tools in PowerPoint, and updated email and contact management features in Outlook.

Note: Your PC must be running Windows 10 or 11 to be compatible with this software.

Outfit your PC with this Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows license for just $24.97 through June 1.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

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Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019 for Windows

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The post Old-school apps with modern perks—get Microsoft Office for your PC for just $25 appeared first on Popular Science.

Cats’ reputation for being aloof and truly not caring about their owners doesn’t really tell the whole story. They can form attachments and are likely able to tell when their owner is speaking to them. New research also indicates that they can recognize their owner’s scent. According to a small study published May 28 in the journal PLOS One, cats spend a longer time sniffing a stranger’s odor than their owners. This suggests that they can identify which humans are familiar to them just by smell. 

Felines use their sense of smell for a variety of purposes. It can help them identify other cats and communicate with each other–and the pungent odor of their spray absolutely lets you know whose territory it is. Whether or not they can use scent to tell humans apart had previously not been studied.

The team from Tokyo University of Agriculture in Japan investigated whether domestic cats can just use smell to distinguish between familiar and unfamiliar humans. They presented 30 domestic cats with plastic tubes containing swabs. These swabs had been rubbed under the armpit, behind the ear, and between the toes of either their owner or a human that they had never met. 

The cats spent significantly longer time sniffing unknown odors than the scents of their owner or an empty tube. They were also initially more likely to sniff the unknown odors with their right nostril. Later, they switched to their left nostril as they became more familiar with the smell.

Next, the participating cat owners were asked to complete an online questionnaire to assess both their cat’s personality and the feline’s relationship with their owner. Male cats with more neurotic personalities tended to sniff each tube repetitively. By comparison, the males with more agreeable personalities sniffed the tubes more calmly. However, personality did not affect the behavior of female cats in this experiment.

[ Related: Are cats really afraid of cucumbers? We asked the experts. ]

While these results suggest that domestic cats can discriminate between familiar and unfamiliar humans based on their odor, it remains unclear whether they can identify specific humans just with smell. According to the authors, the finding that cats preferred to investigate new smells with their right nostril suggests that they might favor different hemispheres of their brain for different tasks. This has previously been demonstrated in dogs, fish, and birds.

“We suggest that cats use their olfaction for the recognition of humans. Also, we record characteristic rubbing (marking) behavior occurring after sniffing, indicating that sniffing may be an exploratory behavior preceding the rubbing of odor (marking) in cats,” the authors wrote in a statement. “This relationship warrants further investigation along with the theory of whether cats are able to recognize a specific person from olfactory cues.”

The post Your cat probably knows your smell appeared first on Popular Science.

In 2022, transportation was responsible for an estimated 28 percent of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. The majority of those emissions came from everyday gas-powered cars. And while electric vehicles have been heralded as a greener alternative, decades of advocacy and hundreds of billions of dollars in investment have yielded meager results. 

Today, electric cars make up just around 8 percent of all vehicles on U.S. roads. (Roughly 90 person of vehicles globally still run on fossil fuels.) Most EVs remain prohibitively expensive for the majority of Americans, and they require enormous amounts of critical minerals—resources that, when extracted at scale, pose their own environmental dilemmas. Most Americans also still just aren’t interested in ditching their gas guzzlers to save the planet. 

But what if they didn’t have to? 

That’s the alluring—if wildly ambitious—vision being presented by New York–based fuels startup Aircela. Earlier this month, the company announced it had created the world’s first functional machine capable of generating real, usable car gasoline “directly from the air.” Aircela’s new device, roughly the size of a commercial refrigerator, combines direct air capture (DAC) with on-site fuel synthesis to create gasoline using just air, water, and renewable energy. No fossil fuels, they say, are required. 

The product their device produces can be poured directly into the tank of any standard gas-powered car. Aircela demonstrated the process, making gasoline directly from air, in front of a live audience in New York. Though most would describe this proof of concept as a “prototype,” company co-founder and CEO Eric Dahlgren takes some umbrage with that label.

“We didn’t build a prototype. We built a working machine,” Dahlgren said in a statement. “We want people to walk away knowing this isn’t too good to be true—it actually works.”

Aircela’s device essentially functions as a compact, portable direct carbon capture facility (DAC) unit. Carbon capture generally refers to the practice of removing carbon dioxide from sources like smokestacks or fossil fuel power plants. Direct air capture, the approach used by Aircela, pulls CO₂ directly from the atmosphere. Europe currently has more than a dozen DAC facilities in operation, and the U.S. federal government is also investing in the technology. Some facilities, such as those run by Climeworks, use large fan-like machines to filter carbon dioxide from the air. Others, like those developed by Carbon Engineering, use chemical mists that bind with CO₂ to extract it. Some researchers are even exploring methods to capture carbon dioxide from the oceans. In most of these cases, the aim is to capture and store the harmful greenhouse gas. Aircela wants to recycle it into cars. 

Aircela claims its device captures carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere and then converts it into gasoline. The resulting fuel doesn’t contain sulfur, ethanol, or heavy metals. Photos of the machine shared by the company show a device composed of three large blue hexagonal units—two side by side on the bottom and one stacked on top. These separate sections handle the stages of air capture and fuel synthesis. On the back of the machine is a standard-looking gasoline nozzle, similar to what you’d find at a gas station. In theory, someone could install one of these units outside their home and use it to refuel their vehicle before heading out for the day. More importantly, it suggests drivers could potentially reduce their environmental impact without needing to change their daily habits.

A spokesperson from Aircela told Popular Science that their machine is designed to capture 10 kgs of CO₂ each day. From that, it can produce 1 gallon of gasoline. The machine can store up to 17 gallons of fuel in its tank. For context, a Toyota Tacoma’s fuel tank has a capacity of 21.1 gallons. In other words, at least in its current form, the device wouldn’t be capable of filling up a car’s tank with gas overnight. The spokesperson didn’t comment on the device’s precise cost but noted that “affordability is essential” to the company’s mission. Aircela is designing the device for mass production, which they believe will drive down costs over time.

The company reportedly wants to start manufacturing the machine by the fall with an interest in targeting a mix of residential, commercial, and industrial customers.

Related: [The truth about carbon capture technology]

The most obvious downside to an approach like this compared to a larger, industrial-scale DAC facility, is sheer impact. A single device, on its own, won’t make a meaningful dent in reducing carbon emissions. But Aircela believes its relatively small size actually makes it less costly and faster to deploy at scale. CEO Eric Dahlgren says the compact form factor gives the technology the flexibility to scale down for individual car owners or scale up for larger clients, such as gas stations or even cargo shipping containers.

“We truly believe that our approach is the fastest way to bring carbon neutral fuels to as many people as possible, to as many places as possible, as soon as possible,” Dahlgren said in a statement. 

Of course, that vision also depends entirely on the continued expansion and viability of renewable energy sources. If an Aircela machine uses electricity from a grid powered by natural gas, then not much has really been achieved in terms of carbon reduction. In the U.S., the trend toward renewable energy is strong, though notably less so under the current presidential administration, which has openly embraced the motto“drill baby drill.” Still, Dahlgren says it’s important to approach carbon reduction and environmentalism with a broad perspective and a sense of urgency.

“We cannot wait decades,” Dahlgren added “we need to do something about it right now.”

Update, May 28, 2025, 4:23pm ET: This story has been updated to include comments from an Aircela spokesperson.

Correction, May 29, 2025, 10:09am ET: An earlier version of this story listed the incorrect amount of CO₂ captured per day. It has been updated and we regret the error.

The post Refrigerator-sized machine makes gasoline out of thin air appeared first on Popular Science.

Soothing sore muscles. Improving mood and sleep. Accelerating weight loss. Vagus nerve stimulation. Wellness enthusiasts, athletes, and maybe even your gym buddy are regularly praising ice baths for a wide range of benefits.

And today’s fans of cryotherapy—the use of cold for therapeutic purposes—aren’t on to anything new. Ancient Egyptians and Hippocrates all have touted the healing benefits of cold water. “This has been around for a really long time,” says Dr. Georgine Nanos, a board-certified family physician and owner of Kind Health Group, in an interview with Popular Science. 

But was Hippocrates onto something? Research shows that the effectiveness of ice baths depends on their intended purpose. 

An ice bath or cold plunge typically involves immersing yourself in frigid water—either in a tub filled with ice or a naturally cold body of water. Even a cold shower can offer similar effects. 

Especially for beginners, moderation is key, Nanos says. She recommends starting with water around 55 degrees to 60 degrees Fahrenheit, staying in for just 30 seconds, and then gradually increasing the duration to one to two minutes. Over a few weeks, and depending on how you feel, you can work up to three to five minutes. Benefits tend to plateau beyond five to six minutes, she points out. 

Getting colder is possible, but extra caution is required. Nanos advises that anyone immersing themselves in water colder than 45 degrees should be supervised. Cold plunges, she notes, aren’t for everyone, especially those with heart conditions, high blood pressure, or a history of arrhythmias or heart attacks. 

An ice bath “can worsen an arrhythmia, because when you’re in the cold, it can increase oxidative stress and suppress short-term immune responses, and that can cause gasping and hyperventilation and acute cardiac strain,” Nanos explains. 

From a scientific standpoint, cold water exposure triggers a series of internal changes in our body. It activates the sympathetic nervous system and releases a cascade of hormones called catecholamines, such as norepinephrine and dopamine, according to Nanos. “Those are like our feel-good hormones,” she says, and their release can improve your mood and alertness. 

When you plunge into cold water, your blood vessels also narrow—a process called vasoconstriction—to preserve heat, she says. When you come out, your vessels widen again—vasodilation—to bring your body temperature back to normal. Those changes could improve circulation, Nanos says.

What’s more, cold exposure causes shivering, which is your body trying to generate heat. The theory is that shivering could temporarily raise your metabolism, which some believe could help with losing weight, she says. “That’s the scientific idea, but the evidence for that is not that great,” Nanos explains. 

So, how do those physiological changes actually help us? Healthcare providers and experts have mostly relied on small clinical studies or observational data to support the potential health benefits of cold-water immersion, Nanos says. But systematic reviews of the research are beginning to shed light on the popular therapy, though everybody notes more study of the impacts is required..  

A 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis of cold-water immersion, for example, examined the effects of cold-water immersion across 11 studies involving 3,177 participants. The interventions used either baths or showers with water between 45 degrees to 59 degrees Fahrenheit, lasting anywhere between 30 seconds and two hours. 

The review found no immediate reduction in stress following cold-water immersion, but participants did report relief 12 hours later. In addition, there were improvements in sleep quality and overall quality of life, although no significant changes in mood were observed. 

A separate 2023 meta-analysis of 20 studies homed in on how well ice baths help athletes reduce muscle soreness, fatigue, and damage after intense exercise. Researchers found that an ice plunge can help reduce muscle soreness and fatigue immediately after exercise.

But they also found that time in frigid water could reduce so-called explosive performance—such as the ability to jump high—immediately after getting out of cold water.  

And, cautions Nanos, timing seems to matter when it comes to a post-workout ice bath. A 2024 review of eight studies found that cold-water bathing after resistance training could actually reduce muscle growth—a big downside for those seeking to bulk up.

“If you do it too soon, you’re blunting muscle protein synthesis,” Nanos says. It’s recommended to wait four to six hours after strength training to do a cold plunge—or even only stepping into frigid water on rest or cardio days, she said. 

So, bottom line, if you enjoy an ice bath and experience benefits, go for it. “And if it makes you miserable, stop,” Nanos advises . “Some people just really have a strong aversion to being that cold and their bodies don’t adapt, and they don’t feel good or they panic. If you find that your body can’t regulate, even after starting slowly, it’s just not for you.” 

However, if the cold water calls to you, dive in.

This story is part of Popular Science’s Ask Us Anything series, where we answer your most outlandish, mind-burning questions, from the ordinary to the off-the-wall. Have something you’ve always wanted to know? Ask us.

The post Are ice baths good for you? The benefits and risks of a cold plunge. appeared first on Popular Science.

Prehistoric stone tools are among some of the oldest and important pieces of evidence we have of a time when our species began to evolve a higher level of intelligence. Many of these tools were also made from animal bones–including the bones of some of the biggest animals on the planet. New research finds that humans living up to 20,000 years ago may have been making tools out of whale bones. The discovery not only adds more to the story of early human tool use, but gives a glimpse into ancient whale ecology. The findings are detailed in a study published May 27 in the journal Nature Communications.

“That humans frequented the seashore, and took advantage of its resources, is probably as old as humankind,” Jean-Marc Pétillon, an archaeologist at the Université Toulouse Jean Jaurès in France and study co-author, tells Popular Science. “There is evidence of whale scavenging at the site of Dungo 5 in Angola dating to 1 million years.”

For our Paleolithic ancestors living in coastal areas, the sturdy bones of large whales were potentially an excellent resource for various tools. However, many prehistoric coastal archaeological sites are fragile and are at risk of rising sea levels, making reconstructing the past interactions between marine mammals and humans a challenge for scientists..  

“The tools were dated between 20,000 and 16,000 years before [the] present, a period way before the invention of agriculture, and during which all human groups in the world lived a life of nomadic hunter-gatherers,” says Pétillon. “Climatically, this is the last part of the last glaciation, with a climate much colder than today.”

That colder climate brought a sea level that was roughly almost 400 feet lower than it is today. With this change in sea level, we have no direct evidence of the human occupations on the shore, since the rise in sea level either wiped them out or the settlements lay buried under 300 or so feet of water. 

With this lack of evidence Paleolithic people have historically been viewed as inland hunters. Those living in present day western Europe would have hunted red deer, reindeer, bison, horse, and ibex. While they did hunt inland, there is a growing body of evidence from the last 20 years showing that they also took advantage of the Paleolithic seashore.

“There are studies showing that people also gathered seashells, hunted seabirds, fished marine fish, etc., as a complement to terrestrial diet, and these studies were made possible because Paleolithic people carried remains of marine origin away from the seashore, into inland sites,” explains Pétillon. “Our study adds whales to the lot. It is one more contribution showing that Late Paleolithic humans also regularly frequented the seashore and used its resources.”

[ Related: Ice age humans made needles from animal bones, archeologists discover. ]

In the new study, the team analyzed 83 bone tools that were excavated from sites around Spain’s Bay of Biscay and 90 additional bones uncovered from Santa Catalina Cave in Spain. They used mass spectrometry and radiocarbon dating to identify which species the bones belonged to and estimate the age of  the samples. 

The bones come from at least five species of large whales–sperm, fin, blue, gray, and either right whales or bowheads. The latter two species are indistinguishable using this technique. The oldest whale specimens are dated to roughly 19,000 to 20,000 years ago, representing some of the earliest known evidence of humans using the remains of whales to make tools. Some of the whale bone points themselves were over 15 inches long. 

“Most of the objects made of whale bone are projectile points, part of the hunting equipment. They can be very long and thick, and were probably hafted on spear-style projectiles rather than arrows (and the use of the spearthrower is documented in this period),” says Pétillon. “The main raw material used to manufacture projectile points at that period is antler, because it is less brittle and more pliable than bone, but whale bone was preferred in certain cases probably because of its large dimensions.”

Most of these whale species identified in this study are still found in the Bay of Biscay and northeastern North Atlantic to this day. However, gray whales are now primarily limited to the North Pacific Ocean and Arctic. Additional chemical data from the tools also suggests that the feeding habits of the ancient whales were slightly different than those living today. According to the authors, this is likely due to behavioral or environmental changes. That the whales in the area have stayed relatively the same was particularly intriguing for Pétillon.

“What was more surprising to me—as an archeologist more accustomed to terrestrial faunas—was that these whale species remained the same despite the great environmental difference between the Late Pleistocene and today,” he says. “In the same period, continental faunas are very different: the ungulates hunted include reindeer, saiga antelopes, bison, etc., all disappeared from Western Europe today.”

Importantly, the findings here do not imply that active whaling was occurring. The techniques at the time would not allow humans to hunt sperm, blue, or fin whales and the team believes that these populations took advantage of whale strandings to harvest the bones for tools. 

“The earliest evidence of active whaling is much younger, around 6,000 [years] before present in Korea (site of Bangudae) and maybe around 5,000 before present in Europe (Neolithic sites in the Netherlands),” says Pétillon.

Future studies could look at the systematic way that these ancient Atlantic Europeans systematically used the seashore and how they developed their ocean hunting techniques. 

The post Oldest-known whale bone tools discovered in a Spanish cave appeared first on Popular Science.

You probably have a plan in place for backing up your photos and important files—but what about your emails? If you’d like an easy way to back up, archive, and manage your emails, Mail Backup X can help. And right now, a lifetime subscription to its individual edition is just $39.99 with code SAVE20 through July 20.

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The post Back up and manage your emails easily with Mail Backup X, now $40 for life appeared first on Popular Science.

My neighbor is a pretty cool person, but they were mowing their lawn 7:30 a.m. this morning with an ancient gas-powered mower. It’s too loud. If any of you reading this know my neighbor, can you please send them this post with these great Greenworks battery-powered lawnmower deals? These mowers are just as powerful as gas-powered models, but they’re much quieter and more efficient. The deals won’t last much longer, though, so please hurry and send it. Or tell them to stop mowing their lawn. You can also grab some battery-powered yard tools for yourself at great prices, too.

Greenworks

This two-tool kit is a perfect compliment to a mower. The string trimmer can trim up to two miles of terrain on a single charge. The blower creates a wind up to 180 miles per hour without, which makes it great for quickly cleaning up driveways and sidewalks. The battery works with both devices and is compatible across the 60V Greenworks lineup so you can add more tools down the road.

Greenworks

This 20-inch mower has a wide deck that makes quick work of a typical yard. It has a three-in-one system that can mulch, bag, or drop clippings. Dual battery ports allow for an extra cell to extend run time without stopping in the middle of a mow.

• Greenworks 60V 21″ Brushless Self-Propelled Battery Powered Lawn Mower + (2) 4.0Ah Batteries & Dual Port Charger $499 (was $629)
• Greenworks 60V 21″ Cordless Brushless Lawn Mower with 5.0Ah Battery & Charger $349 (was $500)
• Greenworks 40V 17″ Cordless Walk-Behind Push Lawn Mower with 4.0 Ah Battery and Charger $225 (was $300)
• Greenworks 60V 42″ Cordless Battery CrossoverT Riding Lawn Mower + (6) 8.0Ah Batteries & (3) Dual Port Turbo Chargers $3,797 (was $4,497)
• Greenworks 60V 25″ Self-Propelled Lawn Mower with (2) 4.0 Ah Batteries & Rapid Charger $598 (was $749)
• Greenworks 80V 21″ Push Mower with (1) 4Ah Battery & Charger $368(was $499)
• Greenworks 80V 21″ Self Propelled Mower, 5Ah Battery and Charger $448 (was $599)
• Greenworks 60V 21″ Self Propelled Lawn Mower with (1) 8.0 Ah Battery & Rapid Charger $396 (was $468)
• Greenworks 60V 30″ CrossoverT Riding Lawn Tractor + (2) 8.0 Ah, (2) 4.0 Ah Batteries & 600-Watt Charger $2,996 (was $3,497)
• Greenworks 16″ Corded Electric 10 Amp Walk-Behind Push Lawn Mower $124 (was $159)

• Greenworks 1301402AZ Pro STBA80L210 80V Cordless String Trimmer and Blower Combo (2 Ah Battery and Charger Included) $276 (was $359)
• Greenworks 60V 16″ String Trimmer & 750 cfm 180 mph Blower Combo + 2.5Ah Battery & Charger $264 (was $334)

• Greenworks 40V 16″ Brushless Chainsaw with 4 Ah Battery & Charger $207 (was $259)
• Greenworks Pro 60V 16 in. Brushless Cordless 2kW Chainsaw with 2.5 Ah Battery and Charger $239 (was $299)
• Greenworks 24V 8″ Cordless Pole Saw with 2Ah Battery and Charger $127 (was $149)
• Greenworks 40V 16″ Cordless Brushless Chainsaw with 4.0 Ah Battery and Charger $169 (was $249)
• Greenworks 60V 18″ Cordless Chainsaw with 4.0Ah Battery & Charger $279 (was $399)
• Greenworks 60V 16″ 1.5kW Brushless Chainsaw with 2.5 Ah Battery & 3 Amp Charger + Bonus Chain $148 (was $268)
• Greenworks 24V 10″ Cordless Chainsaw with 2.0 Ah Battery & Charger $98 (was $129)
• Greenworks 48V (2x24V) 16″ Brushless Chainsaw + (2) 4Ah USB Batteries & Dual Port Charger $255 (was $280)

• Greenworks 60V 450 CFM at 125 Mph Cordless Leaf Blower with 2.0Ah Battery & Charger $159 (was $199)
• Greenworks 60V 630 CFM 170 MPH Leaf Blower with 2.5 Ah Battery & 3 Amp Charger $164 (was $199)
• Greenworks 40V 120 Mph at 450 Cfm Axial Blower with 2.5Ah Battery & Charger $106 (was $138)
• Greenworks 60V 630 CFM 170 MPH Leaf Blower with 2.5 Ah Battery & 3 Amp Charger $164 (was $199)
• Greenworks 60V 750 CFM 180 MPH Leaf Blower with 4.0 AH HC Battery and 6 Amp Charger $248 (was $278)
• Greenworks 24V Cordless Axial Blower (90 Mph / 320 Cfm) with 2Ah USB Battery & Charger $58 (was $80)
• Greenworks 60V 630 CFM 170 MPH Leaf Blower with 2.5 Ah Battery & 3 Amp Charger $164 (was $198)
• Greenworks 40V 135 CFM Cordless Leaf Blower/Sweeper, Battery Not Included $30 (was $53)
• Greenworks Pro 80V (170 MPH / 730 CFM) Brushless Cordless Axial Blower, Tool Only $119 (was $145)
• Greenworks 48V Brushless 515​CFM 125MPH Leaf Blower + 2 (24V) 2.0Ah Batteries & 4A Dual Port Charger $95 (was $138)

• Greenworks 24V 12″ Cordless String Trimmer/Edger with 2.0 Ah USB Battery & Charger $88 (was $100)
• Greenworks 60V 16″ Top Mount String Trimmer with (1) 4.0 Ah Battery & 3 Amp Charger $174 (was $278)
• Greenworks 40V 13″ Cordless String Trimmer/Edger (Tool Only) $51 (was $85)
• Greenworks 60V 16” Front Mount String Trimmer + 2.5Ah Battery & 3A Charger $164 (was $198)
• Greenworks 24V 12-inch TORQDRIVE String Trimmer with 2Ah USB Battery and Charger $91 (was $130)

The post Walmart is blowing out Greenworks battery-powered yard tools, including mowers, blowers, chainsaws, and more appeared first on Popular Science.