Month: December 2025

ZTE already has a phone with an AI agent that does things for you, and it’s sold out

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Many technology enthusiasts have spent years imagining a future in which words are enough for the mobile phone to do the rest. Why open an application and navigate between menus if we can ask it out loud and that’s it? “Mark all messages as read”, “Order a car from my location”, “Open the discounts app and tell me what promotions I can use today”. In that ideal future, an agent should take care of everything without us touching the screen. Recent reality, however, has gone another way. Despite the visible rise of AI, interaction with mobile phones remains anchored in known dynamics. The most advanced version of Siri—the one Apple promised with agentic capabilities within Apple Intelligence— still not arrivingand the user experience has not changed substantially. In this context, ZTE has decided to take a step that until now no manufacturer had materialized: integrate a deep AI agent at the system level. The result is the Nubia M153. The mobile that turns agentic AI into its core. Far from being limited to accessory functions, the Nubia M153 is committed to real AI integration. According to Global Timesincorporates a preview version of Doubao Mobile Assistant, developed by ByteDance and ZTE. Although the assistant continues to be polished, it already demonstrates a striking ability to interact with applications and execute tasks that until now required user intervention. The demonstrations have gone viral. In X, un user shows how it is enough to ask him to hire someone to wait in line for him – a common activity in China – for the agent to execute the process. In another testa photo of a hotel is enough to reserve a room with the best available rate. The system identifies the establishment, opens the appropriate app and proceeds with the reservation. On Weibo, the scene is similar: “Order me three lattes and a Mixue ice cream,” says a young woman. The assistant gets going, asking for details when it needs them (size, sugar) and adding new tasks, such as finding the cheapest pizza service, buying movie tickets or converting photos into AI-generated images. An experiment that has exceeded expectations. The Nubia M153 is not a mass consumption mobile. It is only sold in China and in very limited quantities. According to SinaZTE launched about 30,000 units aimed mainly at users with a technical profile interested in testing new agentic capabilities, at a price of 3,499 yuan (about 425 euros at the exchange rate). Despite this reduced production, the device ran out a few hours after going on sale on December 1. Under the hood. IT Home details that The phone has a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 with the Ultra label, 16 GB of RAM, 512 GB of storage and a 6.78-inch LTPO screen with a resolution of 1264 x 2800 pixels. Its camera system relies on three 50 MP sensors – main, wide angle and telephoto – and the design maintains a simple aesthetic, with a white back cover, black module and rounded edges. Are we ready for the agentic era? The launch also showed the first brakes. Shortly after the units reached users’ hands, several accounts of WeChat They started showing warnings of suspicious activity. The same thing happened on Alipay and Pinduoduo. Everything indicates that the assistant’s autonomous behavior activated automation protection mechanisms, designed to block usage patterns that do not fit with normal human activity. It is, in practice, the first pulse between new generation agents and the traditional platforms that dominate the Chinese digital ecosystem. Images | ZTE In Xataka | Almost all phones with optical zoom have the same problem. This Chinese brand believes it has solved it in a curious way

2026 has not yet started but it has already managed to produce the first bad news: the light goes up

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There is one month left until 2026 begins and the January slope already has a clear protagonist: light. The electricity bill will start the year with the largest simultaneous review of regulated costs since 2020. The proposals of the Government and the energy regulator point to an increase that will affect all homes, regardless of what they consume. Without anesthesia. The National Markets and Competition Commission (CNMC) has put into public hearing its toll proposal for 2026 – the part of the bill that finances the electrical networks – and proposes a global increase of close to 4%. This update has two pillars: Transportation, which are the large electric highways, will increase by 12.1%. Distribution, which are the networks that reach homes and businesses, will increase by 2.5%. With these changes, the total money allocated to maintaining and expanding electrical networks will reach 6,608 million in 2026. In addition, to this increase we must add that of the chargesset by the Government. According to Five Daysthe Ministry for the Ecological Transition proposes increasing them by 10.5% to cover, above all, the cost of regulated renewable energies (Recore), which will grow by 37%. The fixed part is in charge again. The electricity bill is divided into two large blocks: The cost of energy, which depends on what each user consumes. Regulated costs (tolls and charges), which are always paid. This new year, the regulated part once again gains prominence. According to the specialized portal Tarifaluzhorathe combination of tolls and charges will increase between 2.8% and 4.8% for households. It may seem like a moderate increase, but it affects the amount paid even if consumption drops. Furthermore, the CNMC report estimates that domestic customers with PVPC 2.0 TD rate will see a final increase of approximately 0.6% on their bill, thanks in part to the slight expected growth in demand and the greater number of consumers among whom to spread the costs. A small print that worries the sector. As Cinco Días detailsthe Government has prepared its proposal for charges under the hypothesis that consumption will grow by 4.5% in 2026. This figure is not minor: the greater the demand, the more the regulated costs are diluted among users and the lower the impact per receipt. However, the problem is that the CNMC – which sets tolls – does not share that optimism. The regulator foresees an increase of only 2.3%. And here a delicate scenario opens up: if demand does not grow as much as the Government expects, the system will not collect what was expected. The tolls and charges are calculated on the basis that there will be more kilowatts consumed in 2026. If they are not ultimately consumed, there will be a lack of money to cover the regulated costs, which are already on the rise due to the Recore renewables, the expansion of networks and the adjustments from previous years. If we get ashy. The return of the tariff deficit is at stake. In other words, putting ourselves in the worst possible scenario, if revenues prove insufficient, Spain could return to a known scenario: tariff deficit. In other words, when the bill does not cover the costs of the electrical system, a hole is created that is financed as debt and drags on for years. It took Spain more than a decade to absorb the deficit accumulated between 2000 and 2013—more than 28 billion euros—and the sector fears a partial repeat of that cycle. A gap of just two percentage points between the demand forecast by the Government and the realistic estimate of the CNMC can make the difference between a balanced system or a stressed one. And all in a year in which tolls and charges will rise at the same time for the first time since 2020. And why will everything go up at once? Because in 2026 several impact factors coincide: More investment in networks to integrate renewables and electrification. Higher cost of Recore renewables, which must be compensated according to their contracts. The cumulative impact of the electricity blackout of 360 million, that the marketers still carry. Pending adjustments from previous exercises. 2026: a year that starts uphill. The electricity bill will be the first notice of a year marked by the structural increase in the cost of the electrical system and the need to accelerate investments that sustain the energy transition. More robust networks, more renewables and a more complex system imply higher operating costs. And, once again, it will be consumers who notice in January. Image | freepik Xataka | Spain needs to modernize its electrical grid, so the remuneration rate has increased. The effect will be noticeable in the next five years

A bad spell devastated my kitchen. The most useful personal finance tool has saved me

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They say that misfortunes never come alone and, when it comes to appliances, that is a more than likely reality. In the last year, all the appliances in my kitchen have been falling apart one by one. First the washing machine, then the dryer, the coffee maker, a couple of months ago the refrigerator, and now the microwave is starting to beep randomly. He’s asking for the time. Being an adult was this. For an average economycope with replacement of all those appliances In a single year it represents a significant setback. However, we have been able to face this important unforeseen event thanks to a key tool in personal finances: the emergency fund. Concern in Spain about unforeseen events The concern about not being able to face an unexpected expense is very present in Spanish households. a study from the neobank Nickel points out that 64% of the people surveyed are concerned that their savings are not enough to cover an unforeseen event, five percentage points more than what was stated in the same study from the previous year. The same report shows that 28% claim to have planned their savings well, while 8% claim to have not no savings available. Furthermore, the impact is not the same for everyone: 5% of men say they do not have savings, compared to 12% of women, and only 35% of those over 65 consider that they have a cushion large enough to deal with an unforeseen event. Why an emergency fund matters The case of my appliances being damaged is a good example of what it is and the importance of having an emergency fund. Financial institutions define the emergency fund as an amount of money saved only for unforeseen events, different from savings for goals such as trips or renovations. It is used to cover, for example, a car breakdown, a boiler that breaks down or a sudden healthcare expense, without upsetting the entire month’s budget. Having this mattress provides two clear advantages: on the one hand, it reduces stress because it allows face unexpected expenses without making hasty decisions, and on the other hand, it protects you from falling into debt that later becomes difficult. How much money do you need? Ok, it is useful and necessary to create “a little corner” for unforeseen events, but how much money would we be talking about? Factors such as inflation, rising prices from the shopping cart or wage stagnation makes saving a utopia. According to a report Elaborated by Triodos Bank, 19.4% of those surveyed say they are never or almost never able to save, while 36.9% can only do so some months. Only 43.7% claim to be able to save regularly. Therefore, it is understandable that the idea of ​​saving, when you have a month left at the end of your salaryit becomes difficult for you. Don’t panic. Some banking entities match in which the fund should cover between three and six months of monthly fixed expenses, adjusting the figure to the financial situation of each person or family. If you have variable income or self-employment, some experts recommend expand that margin by covering six to twelve months of fixed expenses. The result will be your goal saving for emergency fund. To establish a specific savings figure, you must calculate how much you spend each month on housing, supplies, food, transportation and other basic expenses, and multiply that amount by six or twelve months, depending on each situation. There is even calculators that help you to establish that figure. Tricks to build the emergency fund without stress Once the savings goal has been established, it is time to start the plan to make it possible. It is not necessary to spend a large amount of money monthly for this fund, although it is advisable to establish an affordable monthly fee. They can be 10, 20 or 50 euros. It depends on your economy. The important thing is to start contributing. When it comes to money, the flesh is weak and the temptation to skip the monthly contribution will be very strong, so it is best to establish a savings strategy. Automate monthly savings On the one hand, physically separate that emergency fund from the rest of your savings. For example, in a new account. By separating it from your savings or checking account, it will be much easier for you to know how much money you have saved in it and adjust your savings plan. On the other hand, on a psychological level, seeing how that amount grows will serve as motivation to achieve the goal. In order to avoid temptations, it is best to automate the monthly transfer of the amount you have established as a quota for your emergency fund. That way, as soon as your salary is credited to your account, that fee will be reserved for emergencies without you having to do anything. If you are not obliged to manage that money every month, you will not be tempted not to reserve it. It’s not what you save, it’s what you don’t spend When the savings capacity is limited, it makes a lot of sense to review the so-called “ant expenses“: coffees away from home, impulsive purchases on apps, subscriptions to services you never use or frequent low-cost cravings. Redirect those small expenses Frequent trips to your emergency fund can make a difference over time, transforming money that slips away almost without realizing it into a cushion that protects against fines, repairs or unexpected bills. Another key to making the emergency fund grow without realizing it is to redirect all or a good part of any unexpected incomesuch as tax refunds, extra payments, bonuses, smaller prizes or cash gifts to your fund instead of your checking account. After all, it is a income you didn’t count onso nothing better than dedicating it to an equally unexpected emergency. When to use the emergency fund? It seems like a truism question, but when you have a certain … Read more

“The Silk Road AI”

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The CEO of NVIDIA has a mission: to get the US to allow him to sell his chips in China. Over the past few weeks, Huang has been taking advantage of every time a microphone is placed in front of him to warn about the dangers of this blockade. Their argument is that if China does not have access to NVIDIA chips, then they will make their own and create a new Silk Road with AI, thus expanding their influence around the world. The situation. NVIDIA is a key player in the development of AI due to the superiority of its chips, which in turn places it at the center of the trade and technological war with China. Broadly speaking, this is the sequence of events: The AI ​​route. The CEO of NVIDIA has been in Washington and has taken advantage of his visit to criticize the United States’ decision to continue blocking the sale of its most powerful chips. Huang has assured that by blocking NVIDIA, the US “has essentially given up the second largest AI market”, as stated in Nikkei Asia. According to its logic, the decision has left room for China to develop its own technology and make it reach the world, expanding its influence beyond its borders. The Silk Road Economic Belt. Huang has referred to this concept, which refers to the global infrastructure development strategy promoted by the Chinese government in 2013. In other words, a new silk roadbut with technology as a product. Thanks to this initiative Huawei managed to expand its 5G around the world and Huang fears that they will now do the same with AI. “They will undoubtedly spread Chinese technology as quickly as possible, because they understand that the sooner they arrive, the sooner they will build their ecosystem,” he assured. Huawei. It is the company that has the most possibilities of creating alternatives to NVIDIA technology. Jensen Huang has said of them that “they are one of the most formidable technology companies the world has ever seen. We compete with them (…) They are agile. They move at incredible speed.” Huawei is already trying achieve powerful technologies for AI, although they have not yet reached NVIDIA, but it seems that Huang sees that moment very close. Nuclear power. Energy has become the choke point for AI. Data centers consume a lot of energy and there China has a clear advantage; They have a more powerful infrastructure and also The government is subsidizing energy. Recently the CEO of NVIDIA already drew attention to this situation and assured that “China is going to win the AI ​​race” due to these subsidies. Now he has brought up the energy issue again, saying that the United States should “use every form of energy” it can and that the government “should try to accelerate the development of nuclear energy.” Interests. That there is a technological race for the dominance of AI is undeniable, but that catastrophic speech by Jensen Huang is better understood if we take into account that he is the CEO of a company, and what interests him is selling more products. China is not only the US’s competitor, it is also one of the largest markets in the world. Image | Wikipedia, Gary Lerude on Flickr In Xataka | Investing in data centers for AI is insane, and it’s going to get worse. much worse

ChatGPT has the same chance of hitting the Lottery Jackpot as a witch reading the guts of a crow

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There are those who always play the same number. Others travel half of Spain looking for the combination they have dreamed of or simply a special date. This dance of fetishes related to the Extraordinary Christmas Lottery Draw is now added a new name: ChatGPT. And the question is not only whether artificial intelligence is capable of guessing the winning number, something that is obviously not possible. It goes much further than that: there is a lot of superstition in this, but also of believing at face value what the AI ​​tells us. Even when we know that there is nothing behind it to support its results. ChatGPT and the lottery. Christmas is coming and with it interest in the Lottery increases. And with it, an unexpected protagonist also emerges again: ChatGPT. The OpenAI ‘chatbot’ has become another Christmas classic thanks to the fact that, one more yearwe Spaniards ask you again what the winning number will be. The objective is clear: that ChatGPT deciphers the tenth that the Fat Man will win in the 2025 Christmas Lottery. Although only chance rules here. It doesn’t get wet. The Christmas Draw is carried out using a system of two drums, with a manual mechanism, in which all the balls are identical, both in weight and size, so that they have exactly the same chance of winning. The prize is drawn from the first pot and the number to which it is associated is drawn from the second pot. The procedure for drawing the balls is completely random and, therefore, so is the winning number. The chance of getting it right is 0.001%. If you have ever tried to ask ChatGPT what the Gordo will be on December 22, its answer is what it should be: If you insist, he also repeats the same thing: “I cannot tell you with certainty what the winning number of the Spanish Christmas Lottery will be. And in fact no one can. The draw is designed to be totally random; each number from 00000 to 99999 has the same probability of being awarded.” He is not trying to sell us the bike and makes it very clear why: “although there are those who try to use theories, superstitions or even artificial intelligence to predict numbers, these methods have no real foundation: in the end, each number still has exactly 1 in 100,000 probabilities.” Finish singing. But, if we try to scratch a little more, it ends up showing a random number. If you give it a ‘prompt’ asking for a number based on a mathematical sample or taking into account the history of winning combinations, ChatGPT tells us that “I can give you a simulated number as a result of a fictitious statistical sample, but you must be clear that it does not increase your probabilities nor does it represent a real prediction.” And then, what was expected, his bet. In this case, 32,704. Of course, by trying to ask the same question in several different conversations, each time it offers a different answer. The ending doesn’t even have to match. It’s a totally random answer again. The new search engines. Chatbots like ChatGPT or Gemini they are displacing search engines traditional when it comes to search for specific information on a topic or even a much longer explanation. Even Google itself he is taking it to the kitchen to change the way we interact with the internet. If before we asked Google what could be causing a headache or what could happen to us if we took an expired medication, now the quickest, simplest and most accessible way is to have a conversation with the AI ​​as a “know-it-all” to have the solution to all our questions and concerns. Even with those that have no answer, like Gordo’s winning number. A digital superstition. The infinite possibilities of AI are leading us to use it in quite peculiar ways. From have a romantic relationship with her until resorting to it to replace psychological therapy or even interact less with other humans. In the case of the lottery, just as there are gestures associated with good luck, such as passing the tenth over the belly of a pregnant woman or the figurine of a Virgin, asking ChatGPT to choose a number for us is a new digital superstition. Another space to which we have also opened the door to artificial intelligence, “just in case” is right. Cover image | Generated with Gemini In Xataka | We have become filled with digital superstitions. They are a horror for our productivity In Xataka | ChatGPT and the Christmas Lottery: what you can do with artificial intelligence and how to ask it for a prediction

stop importing Russian gas

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Brussels has announced a ban on importing Russian gas at the end of 2027. This is what They confirmed at a press conference the president of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen, and the Commissioner for Energy, Dan Jørgensen. But, beyond the statements, there is an elephant in the room: the European Union has just promised something that it does not know if it will be able to fulfill. A “permanent” veto. According to the official statement of the European Commissionthe Parliament and Council have reached a political agreement to permanently stop imports of Russian gas – not only by gas pipeline, but also liquefied natural gas – and with a very specific timetable: LNG in short-term contracts: prohibited from April 25, 2026. Gas through pipeline in the short term: prohibited from June 17, 2026. LNG in long-term contracts: January 1, 2027. Long-term gas via pipeline: September 30, 2027 (or November 1 with extension if the storage level is not reached). Furthermore, the EU plans to stop importing Russian oil in 2027, something that confirms the Financial Times and that would complete the partial embargo in force since 2022. Even so, Hungary and Slovakia will continue to receive crude oil from the Druzhba pipelinerecently bombed— while their legal exceptions remain in effect. The political message is clear. The reality, less so. On paper, it is the final slam on Russian gas. Von der Leyen celebrated that the veto will allow “deplete Putin’s war chest”, while Jørgensen proclaimed that “blackmail and manipulation are over.” The political message is clear: Europe wants to show that it no longer depends on Moscow to get through the winter. However, consensus is fragile within the EU. The gas veto is official, but not unanimous. The Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade of Hungary published on his social networks which is already preparing an appeal to the Court of Justice of the EU to overturn the ban, while Slovakia asks to extend deadlines and protect its exceptions. The political agreement exists, but the operational unity is fragile: without real coordination between partners, an energy veto can become a simple declarative gesture. The actual reading is less triumphant. According to DWthe Moscow government accused the EU of precipitating “its own economic decline” by forcing the bloc to turn to more expensive alternatives and a global LNG market where already competes with Asia for each shipment. Brussels, aware of oil precedenthas shielded the veto with a much more severe legal framework. As explained by the Financial Timescompanies that try to circumvent the ban will face fines of up to 3.5% of their global turnover, fixed penalties that can reach 40 million euros and a mandatory system of certificates of origin to prevent Russian gas sneaks in disguise in the form of opaque mixtures, triangulations or indirect re-exports. The truth is even more uncomfortable. Europe still need gas to stabilize its electrical grid and cover demand peaks when the wind does not blow or the sun disappears. According to a report by McKinsey & CompanyEurope would need 75% more flexibility before 2030 to function without that fossil support, while global gas consumption will grow by 26% until 2050, just when it should fall by 75% to comply with the Paris Agreement. Added to this is the structural stress of the European gas system. The main Dutch regasification plants—Gate and Eemshaven— operate at 90–100% capacityjust when Europe faces winter with reserves at 83%, the lowest level since 2022. Spain, despite its large regasification capacity, can barely send 7,000–8,500 million m³ per year to France: the bottleneck is in the interconnections. And a cold wave is enough to destabilize prices, as Bloomberg warns. An accelerated roadmap. Brussels insists that this time there is a plan. Each Member State must be submitted before March 2026 a national diversification plan that details how it will replace the 35 billion m³ of Russian gas that was still entering the EU last year: new suppliers, new infrastructure and new LNG routes. On paper it makes sense. In practice, it means rebuilding in two years an energy system that took four decades to build. Meanwhile, Europe is held together by an unexpected lifeline: the United States. According to Bloombergthe continent has endured in recent months thanks to a boom in American LNG, with exports at record levels. This winter Europe “will probably be fine,” but real abundance will not arrive until the second half of 2026. Any unforeseen event—extreme cold, a rebound in Chinese demand, a technical failure—could strain the system again. And meanwhile, China plays another game. Europe looks at its deposits. China dig deeper. The Asian giant increased its domestic gas production by 5.8% in the first half of 2025, has had 20 years of almost uninterrupted growth, reduced its LNG imports by 22% and is moving forward with the Power of Siberia 2 gas pipeline, capable of absorbing 50 billion Russian m³ per year. The consequence is inevitable: if Europe stops buying, Russia you have someone to sell to. The precedent that worries Brussels. Here is the main fear: oil sanctions showed that when Europe closes a door, the market opens a window. As we have told in XatakaAfter the partial embargo, a phantom fleet of oil tankers emerged, European traders moved operations to Dubai, crude oil was mixed to hide its origin, and shell companies appeared in the Emirates that operated outside of European jurisdiction. The result was evident: Russian oil never stopped flowing, it simply changed flag, route and documentation. And that precedent is precisely what they now fear in Brussels: that gas will follow the same logic of opacity, triangulations and parallel markets. Europe promises to turn off Russian gas. On paper, it is a historic decision. By 2027, Europe says there will be no trace of Russian gas left in its energy system. In practice, the road is full of cracks: saturated infrastructure, porous sanctions, hesitant allies, a potentially cold winter and an energy transition that advances … Read more

Mars has just entered the exclusive club of planets with rays. This is discouraging news for NASA.

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NASA’s Perseverance rover has captured a lightning strike on Mars for the first time. Although it may seem strange, it is only the fourth planet in which we have confirmed the presence of this type of electrical activity, after Earth, Jupiter and Saturn. Confirmed. Despite its thin atmosphere, scientists have suspected for decades that the red planet, with its constant whirlwinds and dust storms, must have some type of electrical activity. Now, thanks to the Perseverance rover, we finally have definitive proof. The discovery, published in the journal Natureconfirms that the Martian atmosphere crackles with electricity, although not exactly like the Earthly storms we know. They haven’t seen it, they’ve heard it. As much as we would have liked the Perseverance rover to photograph a blinding flash across the Martian sky, the first evidence of electrical activity on Mars is not visual, but auditory. NASA’s rover’s SuperCam instrument, equipped with a microphone originally designed to listen to the rover’s laser hitting rocks, has captured something unexpected: the sound of electrical discharges. Among dust devils. According to the data analyzed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratorythe rover recorded 55 electrical discharge events over two Martian years. Most associated with dust storms, and 16 of them when the rover was directly crossed by sand devils. “We got some good recordings where you can clearly hear the click,” Ralph Lorenz, Perseverance mission scientist, explains in a statement. But in a specific recording from sol 215 (the 215th Martian day of the mission), you hear not only the electrical crack, but also the swirling wind hitting the rover and grains of sand impacting the microphone. The triboelectric effect. How do these rays form on a planet without rain clouds? Because of the triboelectric effect, exactly the same physical principle that happens when we walk with socks on a carpet and then you touch a doorknob and, ouch, a spark jumps. On Mars, dust devils act like giant generators of static electricity: Hot air rises and begins to rotate, forming a vortex. When rotating, it raises dust and sand. The dust grains rub against each other, transferring electrons and generating charge. It’s not very encouraging. Although on Earth it also occurs in deserts, on Mars this effect is much more likely to result in electrical shocks. The Martian atmosphere is extremely thin, so the amount of charge needed to break air resistance and generate a spark is much smaller. This discovery is not just a meteorological curiosity; has profound implications for the planet’s chemistry and the search for life. Confirmation of these electrical discharges suggests that the Martian atmosphere may become charged enough to activate powerful chemical reactions. These sparks could be creating highly oxidizing compounds, such as perchlorates, which are very aggressive and can destroy the organic molecules (the building blocks of life) that the rover is trying to find. Image | NASA/JPL-Caltech/University of Arizona In Xataka | Who or what excavated the ravines on Mars? The answer is even stranger than we always thought

AEMET has just talked about the December long weekend and it is bittersweet news because the “good weather” in December always has a trick

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Yes ‘negative NOA‘, yes ‘storm train‘, but what AEMET says is that, during the bridge (after some persistent rain in the north), what we are going to have is a predominance of sun and higher than normal temperatures. How is it possible? What dark atmospheric dynamics are conspiring to give us good weather on the Constitution Bridge? The rhombus phenomenon. That’s what he called it meteorologist Luismi Pérez on Cadena Ser and the truth is that the explanation is so visual that it can help us understand what is happening. “Rhombus” is a colloquial way of defining an isobaric configuration that diverts the cold to North America and gives stability, little rain and high temperatures to our country. And what does it take for that to happen? Four masses of air are needed to achieve this: a robust anticyclone in Newfoundland and Greenland another anticyclone in the Mediterranean area a storm in the Azores and another in the Scandinavian peninsula In the image above it is still difficult to see, but arranged on the isobar map “they form an approximate figure of a rhombus.” Why it is important. Meteorologically speaking, the rhombus describes a type of atmospheric block very characteristic: a reconfiguration of the polar jet and the trajectory of the storms that takes us away from the coldest scenarios. Yeah the face is the train of stormsthis is the cross: short periods of stability and good temperatures. What we can expect in the coming days. As Pérez explainedthis rhombus “makes” the very cold air accumulated in Greenland slide towards the west; that is, towards North America, instead of falling on Europe. In addition, Spain (being under the influence of the Azores storm and the Mediterranean anticyclone) is assured of westerly and southwesterly winds, which are more temperate and pleasant. What we can expect in the long term. Because in the background there is something more serious: changes in the atmospheric circulation of the Atlantic Ocean. That is to say, the increase in the number of episodes of stability, clear skies and absence of fronts in autumn and winter. Something that can be perceived as “good weather”, but that aggravates the structural drought and complicates water, agricultural and energy planning. Luckily, it looks like it won’t last long. Just enough to let us enjoy the bridge Image | ECMWF In Xataka | The most beautiful, exciting and hopeful thing about November has come out of England and it is a weather forecast

Google’s TPUs are the first big sign that NVIDIA’s empire is faltering

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It was 2013 and Jeff Dean, one of the directors of Google, he realized something along with your team: if each Android user used their new voice search option for three minutes a day, the company would have to double the number of data centers to cope with the computational load. At the time, Google was using standard CPUs and GPUs for this task, but they panicked and realized they needed to create their own chips for those tasks. This is how it was born Google’s first Tensor Processing Unit (TPU)an ASIC specifically designed to run the neural networks that powered its voice services. That grew and grew and in 2015, before the world knew it, those first TPUs accelerated Google Maps, Google Photos and Google Translate. A decade later, Google has created TPUs so powerful that they have almost unintentionally become a surprising and unexpected threat to the almighty NVIDIA. There it is nothing. Blessed panic. Google TPUs keep their promise Until now when an AI company wanted to train its models, turned to advanced NVIDIA chips. That has changed in recent times, and in fact we have seen two recent signs that certainly pose a turning point. Missing from that timeline is the last and most striking member of this family, Ironwood, presented in April 2025. Source: Google. The first is the release of Claude Opus 4.5, an exceptional modelespecially in programming tasks. Those responsible for Anthropic already they explained that this new model does not depend only on NVIDIA, but combines the power of three different proposals: that of NVIDIA, but also Amazon’s Trainium and Google’s TPUs. But it is also that Google has given the bell because your brand new AI model Gemini 3 He has been exclusively trained using the new Ironwood TPUs that were presented in April and have become a real sensation. As we said, Google started that project in 2013 and launched its first TPU in 2015, but that internal need became a blessing, because what Google I couldn’t know is that these TPUs would end up arriving at the right time: the launch of ChatGPT turned them into a fantastic opportunity to strengthen your AI infrastructure, but also to be used for training and inference of your AI models. From there we end up reaching the current Ironwood TPUs, which in their seventh generation are exceptional both in inference as in training (as its use has demonstrated for Gemini 3). Google has managed to squeeze even more out of its chips and has doubled the peak FLOPS per watt compared to its previous generation. Source: Google. The efficiency and power of these chips gives a very notable jump compared to their predecessors, and for example they achieve double FLOPS performance per watt which was achieved with Trillium chips. If we compare them with the TPU v5p of 2023, the chips manage to reach 4,614 TFLOPS, 10 times more than the 459 TFLOPS of those models from two years ago. It’s an extraordinary leap in performance (and efficiency). The key to 2025: Google now lets others use its TPUs But in the evolution of TPUs there is another differentiating element in 2025. This has been the year in which Google has stopped “being selfish” with its TPUs. Before only she could use them, but in recent months she has reached agreements with OpenAI —which also seeks make your own chips— and especially with Anthropic. The performance of Ironwood is already comparable to that of the GB200 and even the GB300 from NVIDIA. Source: SemiAnalysis. That second alliance is especially monumental as part of that outsourcing strategy. Google is not only renting capacity in its cloud, but facilitating the physical sale of hardware. The agreement covers one million TPUs: 400,000 units of its TPUv7 Ironwood sold directly through Broadcom, and 600,000 rented through Google Cloud (GCP). In a deep report in SemiAnalysis It is revealed how from a technical perspective, the TPUv7 Ironwood is a formidable competitor. The performance gap with NVIDIA is closing, and Google’s TPU is practically the same as NVIDIA’s Blackwell chip in FLOPS and memory bandwidth. However, the real advantage lies in the cost. The Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) of an Ironwood server is estimated to be 44% lower for Google than for an NVIDIA GB200 server, allowing the search giant to offer very competitive prices to clients like Anthropic. To help even more in that race, they point out in SemiAnalysis, Google has another ace up its sleeve. This is Google’s Inter-Chip Interconnect (ICI), a network architecture that allows up to 9,216 Ironwood chips to be connected using a 3D torus topology. Google also uses optical circuit switches that allow optical data to be routed without electrical conversion, reducing both latency and power consumption. This allows you to reconfigure the topology of that network on the fly to avoid (or mitigate) failures and optimize different types of parallelism. NVIDIA’s “moat” with CUDA is narrowing We have often repeated that although semiconductor manufacturers already have flashy chips —tell AMD– In fact the true strength from NVIDIA is in CUDAthe software platform that has become the de facto standard for AI developers and researchers. Google also wants to change things here. During the last few years the company tried to focus on Python libraries such as JAX either XLAbut in recent times has started prioritizing native PyTorch support —a great competitor of TensorFlow— in its TPUs. That’s crucial to making it easier for engineers and developers to start migrating to their TPUs instead of NVIDIA GPUs. Before it was possible to use PyTorch on TPUs, but it was cumbersome, as if one had to speak a language using a dictionary in real time, while for NVIDIA GPUs that was the “native” language. With XLA Google used an intermediate library as a translator to be able to use PyTorch, but that was a nightmare for developers. Native support allows Google TPUs to behave just like NVIDIA GPUs in the … Read more

We already have the missing ingredient to explain the origin of life

by

What the mission OSIRIS-REx brought back to Earth in his capsule after being perched on the asteroid Bennu It could be very enriching, but the truth is that it has exceeded all our expectations. And in the past we have already been surprised to find water or carbon in space, but now NASA has confirmed than what has been seen on this asteroid: Bennu contains sugars essential for life as we know it. But not only that, among the grains of dust and rock, researchers have come across something they did not expect: a mysterious substance that they have already dubbed ‘space gum’. The discovery. After a long time analyzing the materials extracted by this probe, the results have finally been released to a published study in Nature Geoscience led by Yoshihiro Furukawa from Tohoku University (Japan) and which undoubtedly marks a milestone in astrobiology. From a sample of just 603 milligrams of Bennu dust, the team was able to detect a variety of sugars that are biologically significant, such as glucose. This marks something historic since it is the first time that this sugar that we know so well has been identified in a pristine extraterrestrial sample. But this has not only been the important thing, but also samples of ribose which is an essential component of RNA, which is responsible for transporting genetic information in human organisms and which undoubtedly It became popular during the COVID pandemic. Its importance. Until now we had seen signs of these samples in meteorites, but there was always the shadow of land pollution upon impact. Now this doubt disappears since the samples arrived sealed. What is undoubtedly important is that the joint presence of these sugars suggests that they were synthesized by abiotic processes (without life) inside the asteroid, probably through chemical reactions in the presence of water at the dawn of the solar system. Something that would be essential to be able to generate life. Space gum. If sugars are the “hard” science news, what has captured most of our attention is what Danny Glavin, a mission co-investigator at the Goddard Space Flight Center, describes as “space gum.” The analyzes revealed a unique polymeric material, a kind of complex, sticky substance that doesn’t fit the standard minerals we’re used to. That is why its composition is now under study and its presence indicates that Bennu is not only a pile of rubble, but a chemical laboratory that is capable of create organic macromolecules that we have living beings inside us. In addition to this “gum” and sugars, the samples contained star dust that is older than our own Sun, survivors of ancient supernovae that were trapped in the asteroid’s matrix. A ‘complete kit’. With this announcement, the Bennu puzzle seems to be complete since amino acids have been found that are essential for proteins, bases to form DNA, carboxylic acids and now sugars to give energy and structure to RNA. This strongly supports the hypothesis that carbon-rich asteroids, like Bennu, acted as “cosmic delivery boys” during the late intense bombardment, seeding the early Earth with all the ingredients necessary for the life we ​​are now enjoying to emerge. It is literally an asteroid that carries all the ingredients for life as we know it. A look at the past. The stability of compounds like glucose and xylose in these samples, along with the surprising presence of ribose (which is typically very unstable), tells us that Bennu’s parent body had very specific water activity and chemical conditions shortly after the solar system formed. As confirms NASA itselfwe are facing the strongest evidence that the building blocks of biology are not a miracle exclusive to Earth, but rather common products of the chemistry of the universe. Images | NASA Hubble Space Telescope In Xataka | We have left Moss out for nine months in space at the mercy of vacuum and radiation. He’s back alive and breaking records

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