Month: April 2026

the 170 million plan to revive Lemóniz

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Seagulls and wild vegetation have been the only tenants of the immense iron and concrete skeleton built in the Biscayan cove of Basordas for decades. As detailed in a report the BBCit is a gloomy image composed of eight million cubic meters of cement and a thousand tons of iron; a giant that cannot be demolished that, more than forty years after its abandonment, finally has a destiny. But the monster designed for atomic fission will not produce megawatts, but fish. The historical turn. The Basque Government and the Atitlan business group will transform the old nuclear power plant in a macro fish farm. The Lehendakari himself, Imanol Pradales, presented the project, defining the ruins as “an uncomfortable and very complex inheritance” and “the scar of dark times”, as collected RTVE. Now, this industrial ghost is called to give birth, in the words of the Basque president, the first soles made in Euskadi. The magnitude of the project. The project has been named ‘Aquacría Basordas’. As detailed Deiawill require a public-private investment of 170 million euros over the next decade. The future aquaculture park will occupy an area of ​​46,600 square meters, will generate around 200 highly qualified direct jobs and, at full capacity, will reach a production capacity of 3,000 tons of fish per year. Forecasts indicate that the main works will start in 2027 and that the first soles will reach the market around 2030 or 2031. But why choose such an atypical environment? Already existing infrastructure and direct access to deep sea water have been key to identifying the failed plant as an “optimal” location for industrial aquaculture. However, Pradales warned that this will be “much more than a simple fish farm,” just as pointed out The Mail. The facility will have the scientific muscle of the Azti technology center, integrating artificial intelligence and advanced water recirculation systems (RAS) that will allow up to 97% of water resources to be reused. The business octopus. To understand the real dimension of the project, you have to look at both the offices of today and the trenches of yesterday. The one who will put the fish in Lemóniz is Sea Eight, the aquaculture subsidiary of the Valencian investment group Atitlan. How to uncover The Jumpthe president of Atitlan is Roberto Centeno, son-in-law of the owner of Mercadona, Juan Roig. In fact, Sea Eight is already a prominent supplier of sole for the supermarket chain. The advance of this business giant has been made, according to media reports such as The Economistignoring the local councils of Mungialdea and Uribe Kosta, which demanded a participatory process to decide the future of this very symbolic enclave. The million dollar question: isn’t it dangerous? The first reaction when combining the concepts “nuclear” and “power” is usually one of alarm, but we must be clear: there is no risk of radiation. As remembers the BBCLemóniz never received uranium or came into operation. However, the environmental controversy is served by other fronts. The NGO Greenpeace has demanded immediate withdrawal of the project. They argue that industrial aquaculture aggravates the pressure on the Cantabrian coast due to pollution by organic matter, use of antibiotics and eutrophication of the sea. In addition, they point out a biological paradox: the sole is a carnivorous species, which requires fishing for other wild fish to make its feed, pushing the oceans “towards collapse.” On the other hand, The Jump raises a worrying warning from FACUA Euskadi, which warned that the waters in the area have heavy metals “above the recommended thresholds”, coming from the sediment of the Urbieta reservoir and an old nearby landfill. Added to this is another complaint of Greenpeace: When the Basque Government assumed ownership of the land in 2018, it exempted Iberdrola (formerly Iberduero) from its legal obligation to return the cove to its original state, “saving” the electricity company about 17 million euros. The neighbors also have something to say. The concrete skeleton remains a thorny issue. As pointed out by BBC Through the testimony of locals like Valentín Elórtegui, the plant is “a taboo, something that no one wants to look at.” At street level, the scars of the families that were expropriated coexist with the irreverence of the young surfers who today catch waves in front of the atomic ghost at a point they call, precisely, “La Central.” And the weight of that taboo is measured in blood. Lemóniz’s abandonment was not an accident, but the result of an unprecedented social shock. As he relates RTVEthe works begun in the midst of Franco’s regime (1972) collided with incipient environmentalism and massive protests. ETA took advantage of the conflict and unleashed a campaign of terror, murdering five workers, including chief engineers José María Ryan and Ángel Pascual. The brutal tension in the streets—which also claimed the life of activist Gladys del Estal at the hands of the Civil Guard—forced the workers to flee, paralyzing the works until the government of Felipe González issued the definitive nuclear moratorium in 1984. The true mutation of Basordas. Pop culture has taught us to view the waters near atomic plants with suspicion. It is inevitable to remember Winksthe iconic three-eyed orange fish that Mr. Burns couldn’t eat in The Simpsons and that he tried to sell to the citizens of Springfield as an evolutionary miracle of his nuclear plant. However, in the rough waters of the Cantabrian Sea there will be no radiation or three-eyed fish; The Lemóniz sole will have the usual two. The true mutation in Basordas Creek is not genetic, but macroeconomic and historical. It is the transformation of a failed atomic megaproject promoted by a dictatorship, paralyzed by the blood of terrorism and environmental fury, which now ends up being resurrected as a lucrative and aseptic link in the immense supply chain of the supermarkets of our century. Image | Dummy Xataka | The most fascinating map you will see today: the entire electrical infrastructure of the planet, in an interactive infographic

The key was not in the stars, but in his birth

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If there is something more difficult than putting doors in the field, it is possibly finding the edge of our galaxy. Or any other, really. They are not perfectly well-defined spacesbut rather a kind of cloud with fuzzy edges. Even so, science has been trying to find the limits of our own galaxy for many years: the milky way. Until now it had been impossible, but an international team of scientists, led by the University of Malta, has discovered that we were defining the borders in the wrong way. Almost 40,000 light years. According to this new researchthe closest thing to an edge of the galaxy would be the place where stars stop forming. This, based on their calculations, is located approximately at a point between 36,800 and 39,600 light years from the center. That would be the radius. There are stars further away. Until now, the error was in considering that the edges of the Milky Way are those that house the most distant stars. This concept of edge is constantly being redefined. The better the tools for detecting stars, the farther away they are. However, these scientists observed that there are stars that move after their formation. Especially when a supernova explosion occurs nearby. Therefore, they could not help us define something like a border. In fact, there are stars up to 10,000 light years away. further of what these researchers have defined as a possible limit. In this case, the radius is measured in kiloparsecs, which are equivalent to 3,262 light years each. This is how stars are born in a galaxy. The first stars are born in the centers of galaxies, where there is a greater density of gas and dust. Then, as gravity allows small pockets of condensed gas to form, they can form further and further away as well. Therefore, the oldest stars are those in the center and the most distant ones are the newest. That’s not counting those that disperse and move to other points in the galaxy. Precisely the ones that had made it so difficult to find those supposed galactic borders. In search of stable orbits. The authors of the recently published study focused on analyzing stable orbits. Those whose stars have barely migrated beyond their point of origin. Thus, they have found the limit of stellar birth. Telescopes can look further. The materials are there, but something is missing. Beyond these borders there is still gas and dust. However, it has not condensed enough to guarantee star birth. Possibly, it is due to the absence of sufficiently intense gravitational processes. In any case, despite having found something resembling a diffuse edge for the first time, it is important to insist that doors cannot be placed on the Milky Way, like the field. And much less borders. Image | Freepik | University of Malta In Xataka | James Webb has found a galaxy from when the universe was 330 million years old. Hides a whole enigma

The current that warms Europe will weaken by 51% before the end of the century. And Spain, according to experts, is already beginning to notice

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“The 5% chance just became 50%.” This quote from Stefan Rahmstorf, the world’s leading expert on the collapse of the AMOC, describes the change it introduces the study just published by the University of BordeauxIt’s this April 15th. But the story goes beyond the number: it is the latest installment of the great climate debate of the decade. A debate that, whoever wins, we are all losing. What exactly is AMOC and why do we care? The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation is the North Atlantic branch of the thermohaline circulation. Since the sun does not heat the sea equally everywhere and freshwater flows reach the ocean at very specific points, this is the basic mechanism by which the oceans balance differences in temperature and salinity. The AMOC is a good example of this regulation. After all, as explained from AEMETit is an “Atlantic basin-scale north-south ocean flow that begins with cold sea water sinking to the bottom off Greenland, subsequently flowing south, and being replaced by warmer water flowing at the surface from the south, transferring heat from the tropics to the east coast of North America and the west coast of Europe.” Therefore, it is a key mechanism and if it stops, as studies began to say a decade ago, the problems for Europe would be enormous. Huge? “Without it, Western Europe and eastern North America would cool significantly, with a host of potential adverse effects,” said Sánchez Laulhé. We talk about a “widespread cooling throughout the North Atlantic and northern hemisphere in general” that would collapse the temperature in Europe would drop several degrees and cause a “strengthening of winter storms, with more and more powerful explosive cyclogenesis” and a “greater proportion of precipitation falling in the form of snow throughout Europe.” However, scientists do not fully agree. In 2021, the IPCC said the AMOC was “unlikely” to collapse. In 2023, the Ditlevsens not only said that it was a probable scenario, but that they set the first date for the collapse. In 2024, 44 signatories They asked to take the problem seriously. But in January 2025 Terhaar, Vogt and Foukal said which, in short, had not weakened since 1063. Now, the University of Bordeaux states that the AMOC will weaken by around 51% by the end of the century with a confidence level of 90%, under the intermediate emissions scenario. What can already be seen. French researchers they are right in which the most recognizable observational signal of the weakening of the AMOC is the “cold spot” of the subpolar Atlantic south of Greenland. In the midst of climate change, “the only point on the planet that has cooled in the last century.” However, we are also not clear what that really means. And there is the key. So will Europe freeze? Probably, but that’s not what’s interesting. Throughout the history of the Atlantic it has been passed many times. The question is whether it will be soon, if it will be our fault, if we can avoid it and what consequences it will have. Be that as it may, Spain will not be the most affected, but it will be. It is being. Stefan Rahmstorf, for example, said last year at the Autonomous University of Madrid that “the slowdown of the AMOC is already having impacts in Spain.” You just have to know how to read the signs. Image | Xataka In Xataka | We have been fearing the fading of the AMOC current for years. We have good news

A “floating gas station” in the middle of the ocean is making a fool of the US

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In the satellite images of certain points in Southeast Asia there are days in which dozens of oil tankers appear completely stopped in the open sea, forming a kind of improvised parking lot in the middle of one of the busiest shipping routes of the world. Some stay there for hours, others for days, with no apparent direction, as if waiting for something that never comes… or that happens when no one is watching. An invisible map in the middle of the ocean. I told the story this week CNN through data by MarineTraffic reviewed by the media. For years, the Iranian oil trade has followed a logic that barely left a trace in official records, with ships disappearing and reappearing in tracking systems and shipments whose origin changes depending on the document consulted. This dynamic, it seems, has allowed us to sustain a constant flow towards China even under sanctions, relying on a network of intermediaries, opaque routes and an aging fleet that operates on the margins of the international system, similar to the “Russian model”. It happens that what seemed like a succession of dispersed maneuvers begins to draw a much more defined pattern: a floating infrastructure that works away from the spotlight. The “floating gas station”. They explained in the exclusive that, in waters near Malaysia, in the area known as Eastern Outer Port Limitsa key point has been consolidated where dozens or even hundreds of ships remain waiting, exchanging oil in ship-to-ship operations that completely transform crude oil traceability. This enclave acts as a authentic service station intermediate where Iranian oil changes hands, identity and destination before continuing its journey towards Asia, becoming a central gear which allows Tehran to maintain stable exports despite international pressure. Its location, close to critical maritime routes and outside effective control, makes it the ideal place for this type of operations. SAR satellite images show vessels within the outer boundary of the Eastern Harbor off the coast of Malaysia on April 18, 2026 How the shortcut to China works. The system follows a precise and repeated logic: one where large oil tankers load crude oil at Iranian facilities, cross the Indian Ocean and reach this area. where they transfer their cargo to other ships, which in turn transport it to Chinese refineries. In this process, oil change label and appears as originating from countries such as Malaysia or Indonesia, hiding its real origin in official data. This mechanism allows China to continue receiving large volumes of crude oil at reduced prices, while Iran ensures constant income that sustains its economy in a context of sanctions. MarineTraffic data shows the multiple trips the MT Tifani made between the Persian Gulf and the EOPL from April 2025 until its capture by US forces in April 2026 “Ghost” fleet that does not stop. Behind the system are hundreds of vessels that change flag, name and owner frequently, making them difficult to track and reducing their exposure to sanctions. Many operate without identification active for long periods, activating and deactivating its location systems as appropriate, which further complicates any control attempt. The magnitude of the activity is growingwith hundreds of annual transfers that, in practice, turn this maritime space into one of the most active (and least transparent) points of global energy trade. The fight with Washington reaches another board. In the background, a story that remembered the wall street journal the weekend. Recent oil tanker seizures like MT Tifani They reflect a change in strategy on the part of the United States, which has decided to extend its pressure beyond the Middle East and act directly on these distant routes. These interventions they seek to interrupt a system that has operated for years with relative impunity, although they also show the difficulty of stopping such a distributed and adaptable network. Each intercepted ship is a signal, although the total volume of traffic suggests that the mechanism remains fully operational. Floating reserves and economic war. Beyond the immediate exchangethis network also works as a strategic reserve on the high seas, one with millions of barrels stored on oil tankers waiting to be delivered when conditions permit. There is no doubt, this capability offers Iran a mattress facing blockages or interruptions, bringing oil closer to their final buyers and reducing its dependence on vulnerable routes like right now in the Strait of Hormuz. In short, the system represents much more than an evasion of sanctions, approaching an entire logistics architecture designed to keep open a critical avenue of income in the midst of conflict. Image | Department of Defense, MarineTraffic, Sentinel 1/European Space Agency In Xataka | Ukraine taught how to use drones. Iran has gone one step further: turning them into a crusher for US radars and bases In Xataka | If the war resumes again, the US runs a risk unprecedented in the history of war: that the only one with missiles will be Iran.

The war in Iran has destroyed another critical supply chain for consumer technology: PCBs

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While the war in Iran is leaving us with a global energy crisis unprecedented, it is also hitting the technology industry squarely in one of its most critical components: printed circuit boards (PCB). These boards are found in basically any device, and in the last month their price has skyrocketed by up to 40%, according to they count from Goldman Sachs. The reason: an attack on a critical plant for the manufacture of PCBs that puts the global supply of these boards in check. Stroke. ANDIn the first days of April, Iranian forces attacked the Jubail petrochemical complex in Saudi Arabia. SABIC (Saudi Basic Industries Corporation) operates in this complex, a company that produces approximately 70% of the world’s supply of high-purity polyphenylene ether (PPE) resin, an essential material for manufacturing the laminates with which PCBs are built. According to they count From Reuters, since the attack, SABIC has been unable to resume production. And that is a problem on a global scale. Raw material at stake. It is not just about the direct attack on Jubail. The conflict has also generated serious disruption in maritime traffic in the Persian Gulf, one of the most critical logistics routes connecting Middle Eastern chemical producers with Asian electronics manufacturers. Added to this is the pressure on copper, which represents around 60% of the total cost of raw materials in PCB manufacturing, according to they count from Victory Giant Technology, one of the largest Chinese suppliers in the sector with clients such as Nvidia. The company warned this month that the conflict could make key materials such as resin and copper even more expensive. According to Reuters, the price of sheet copper has risen up to 30% since the beginning of the year. Qproduction ties. From Daeduck Electronics, a major South Korean PCB manufacturer that supplies Samsung, SK Hynix and AMD, among others, confirmed Reuters that the company has started talks with its customers to pass on the price increases. The company pointed out that the waiting period for materials such as epoxy resin has gone from three weeks to fifteen. A market that was already stressed. PCB prices had already been rising for months due to the skyrocketing demand for AI servers. According to Reutersdemand has accelerated sharply since March, with manufacturers trying to secure supplies before the situation worsens. Goldman Sachs points out that large cloud service providers are willing to take on further increases because they expect demand to outstrip supply for years. On the other hand, research firm Prismark projects that the global PCB sector will grow 12.5% ​​in 2026, reaching $95.8 billion. And PCBs aren’t the only thing affected. The technology supply chain is taking hits from all sides. According to inform The Elec Korea, large Japanese manufacturers of photoresist (a key chemical in chip production) have begun to notify clients such as Samsung and SK Hynix of problems in the supply of gasoline, a raw material that these suppliers obtain more than 40% from the Middle East. Besides, the price of helium (essential gas in the manufacture of semiconductors) has almost doubled after the Iranian attacks on Ras Laffan, in Qatar, which provides about a third of the global supply, according to Fitch Ratings. What does this mean for the consumer. The impact will end up reaching the final price of the products. PCBs are in absolutely everything that has electronics inside, and a 40% increase in their cost is difficult to absorb without the increase being passed on to the user. Manufacturers are already negotiating price transfers with their customers, and these, in turn, will transfer them downstream. The worst thing is the timing, since we are also in the middle of a RAM and storage crisis and the pressure around the markets only increases. Cover image | Random Thinking In Xataka | There is a company that has grown 3,000% in the stock market, even beating the performance of Nvidia: Sandisk

OpenAI expects an 80% drop in its flagship revenue. The low-cost “ChatGPT Go” is your escape forward

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OpenAI is in trouble. More than beforeeven. In The Information indicate that internal projections for subscribers in 2026 are worrying. The users of ChatGPT Plustheir $20 a month plan, will fall from 44 million in 2025 to just 9 million this year. That represents a drop of 80%, and they want to compensate for it with their affordable subscription. It’s not clear that plan can work. ChatGPT Go as a lifesaver. What OpenAI is going to lose with ChatGPT Plus according to these internal forecasts, they want to counteract with an extraordinary increase in subscriptions to ChatGPT Gothe ad-supported plan that costs between $5 and $8. The company’s objective is for this plan to go from having the current 3 million subscribers to 112 million, an increase of 3,600% in twelve months. A terrible quarter. While The Information showed these forecasts, in The Wall Street Journal they informed OpenAI does not have the accounts in this first quarter of 2026. The company has not achieved the expected income, and has not achieved the user acquisition figure that it had projected. OpenAI CFO Sarah Frier has warned that the company may not be able to pay for its future computing contracts if revenue doesn’t start growing immediately. The accounts do not come out. OpenAI has contracted close to $600 billion in spending on future data centers, an astronomical figure that was built with all the announcements that Sam Altman and the company made in 2025. The company expects to spend $25 billion but plans to enter $30,000, a narrow margin even if everything goes well. But according to WSJ it is not doing so, and Anthropic’s popularity has eroded its position in the market. They wanted to reach 1 billion weekly active users by the end of 2025 and they didn’t achieve it, and the decision to bet on ChatGPT Go seems like a desperate response to their revenue problem… and their IPO. No one has ever grown so much. ChatGPT Go’s growth goal poses a colossal challenge. Achieving 109 million paying subscribers in twelve months is unprecedented. It took Facebook four years to get 100 million free users, and although ChatGPT achieved the same thing in two months and set a prodigious precedent, for this to be repeated for a paid subscription even extending the time frame to 12 months would be unusual. But not even for those. Analyst Ed Zitron point Because even if OpenAI achieved 112 million subscribers at $5/month on average, it would earn $560 million per month. That figure is a far cry from the $880 million per month generated by the 44 million Plus subscribers at $20/month. The difference should be covered with advertisingbut that doesn’t seem to be going as well as they expected either. Until have activated pay per click adssomething that already caused the credibility of SEO to be greatly damaged. We go public, yes or no? According to WSJ, Sarah Friar and Sam Altman disagree about whether it is advisable to go public this year given this change in the situation. Altman wants to speed it up, but Friar doesn’t think the company is ready to meet the data reporting obligations that public companies have. The problems accumulate because the financing round closed in March made OpenAI’s valuation amounted to 852,000 million dollars. If investors had known the situation of OpenAI’s first quarter, perhaps they would not have entered that round, or they would not have done so in such a notable way. The challenge of charging $20 for AI. OpenAI’s forecast is worrying. That a company that managed to popularize generative AI can only get 9 million people around the world to pay $20 a month is disturbing and says a lot about the state of the market. On the one hand, maybe people just don’t see that $20 worth it, which is bad for the entire industry. But perhaps what people don’t see is that those 20 dollars are not worth it if they spend them on ChatGPT and they do on competitors like Claude. That is even more worrying. It is clear that there is a segment of users willing to pay such a price, but today that segment is smaller than the expectation created suggested. The Pro plan will remain a rarity. OpenAI also has the Pro plan for $200 per month, and expects its subscribers there to also double in 2026. However, that will still not be almost anecdotal because less than 1% of the total number of users—the truly intensive ones—will opt for this alternative. It is evident that this will not be the core of OpenAI’s business at the moment, and the company seems to be clear about this. They prefer to leave the middle segment in the background, have a small premium segment and bet on massive volume at a low price with advertising. We’ve seen this before… with Netflix. OpenAI’s strategy reminds us of the one Netflix launched with its advertising plan. Which many criticized when it was announced has become in a overwhelming success. The company has returned us to square one: we want to pay to see adssomething surprising but it works. And OpenAI seems to want to apply the same story. In Xataka | The surprise with the new GPT 5.5 from OpenAI is not that it is good: it is that Claude looks like GPT and GPT looks like Claude

We already know what happens to the GPU hourly price when OpenAI or Anthropic launch a new model: it doubles

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This week, an analyst named Tomasz Tunguz published in X two revealing graphs. They show the evolution of what it costs AI startups to access cloud computing, and there is bad news. The cost of renting the NVIDIA B200 GPUs with Blackwell architecture has gone from $2.31 per hour in early March to $4.95 per hour this week. It is an increase of 114% in just six weeks and it has a clear cause: the arrival of new models from Anthropic and OpenAI. What the graphs show clearly. Those charts focus on the price index of Ornna cloud computing trading marketplace. The first of them covers the price of renting the B200 chips from the end of 2025 until today, and there are vertical lines showing each release of the latest models from OpenAI and Anthropic. The correlation is almost perfect: GPT-5 Codex, Claude 4.5, GPT-5.3 Codex, Claude Opus 4.7 and GPT-5.5 coincide with a jump in price indices. Every time these companies announce a new version of their frontier models, demand skyrockets, and so does the cost. If you want the best, pay (much more). The second graph shows the price difference between renting the previous generation of chips, H200 with Hopper architecture, and the new B200. The historical average of that “spread” is $1.06, but now it stands at $2.09, practically double. That means buyers—startups and AI companies—are paying a record premium for the extra memory and superior computing power of Blackwell architecture chips. Accessing the latest of the latest was already expensive. Now it is even more so. This also makes the H200 in a second class option for the most demanding models of 2026. Action and reaction. There is overwhelming logic here. When OpenAI or Anthropic release a new model, there is an explosion in inference. Developers and companies want to test them as soon as possible and integrate these models into their products (or compete with them). To do this, they need computing quickly, and a simultaneous demand is caused that unbalances the available inventory in the market for renting AI chips by the hour. The problem is that the supply of B200 does not grow at the same rate. Some companies have wanted to anticipate, and we have the perfect example in Google. He has bought all the B200s he can, and that has made these GPUs around now the 500,000 dollars on the secondary market according to analyst Jack Minor. The irony of efficiency. The curious thing is that the more efficient these chips are – and the B200s are – the more companies want to rent them at the same time to take advantage of those efficiency advantages that should lead to cost savings. What actually happens is that the scarcity of these advanced chips cancels out any theoretical savings. Long term contracts. Startups and companies that think in the short term are especially harmed in this area, because they face price jumps that are increasingly difficult to assume. Companies that signed computer rental contracts at the price then can now operate at less than half the cost of their competitors. Thinking in the medium or long term seems reasonable, although once again those who win are the hyperscalers and those companies that have managed to get hold of many B200s. And who wins even more is of course NVIDIA, which cannot cope. Few alternatives. In other markets such as energy or metals there is usually room for maneuver, Tunguz points out, but the same is not happening at the moment in the AI ​​segment. In the oil market, for example, if the price rises 114% in six weeks, companies can buy futures, options or fixed-price supply contracts to protect their margins. In cloud computing rental, those options are much more limited. And the result is a much more volatile segment. This will go further. We are probably facing a peak in demand that will be followed by a correction: the new batch of B200 chips that arrive in the second half of 2026 are expected to cause a drop in current prices. However, that $4.95 is now the new floor, not a peak, because demand for AI computing will continue to grow faster than TSMC’s production capacity. In the absence of the supply of AI chips growing significantly – and there are certainly movements that are trying to achieve this, such as those of Google with its TPUsAmazon with its Trainium or Huawei with its Ascend—, the problem will still be there. In Xataka | Europe is taking its technological independence so seriously that it is aiming for the most ambitious goal: NVIDIA

science explains what happens to your body (and your brain) depending on the time you choose

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In social circles, the truth is that there are sometimes very interesting debates about common customs, such as whether it is better to shower first thing in the morning or just before getting into bed. Here, while there is a group of people who defend tooth and nail the revitalizing power of water in the morning to “start” the day, others say that there is nothing like hot water at night to conclude sleep. And here science has something to say. It makes us sleep better. If you have trouble falling asleep, the science here suggests that a nighttime shower may be a good idea, and explained in a meta-analysis published in 2019 in the magazine Sleep Medicine which analyzed 17 different studies. Here it was concluded that bathing or showering with hot water between one and two hours before going to bed reduces the time to fall asleep by approximately 36%. Because? Here hot water is our main ally, since it warms the skin and, therefore, increases blood flow to the extremities such as the hands and feet. From here, when you get out of the shower, that heat dissipates quickly, causing a drop in the body’s core temperature. And this is the key, because this thermal drop mimics the natural cooling that our body experiences before sleeping, which sends an unequivocal signal to the brain to release melatonin, which is the sleep hormone, and reduce levels of cortisol, which is related to stress. It depends on the time. From a psychological point of view, morning and night showers fulfill completely opposite functions and it depends precisely on the time at which we take them. In the case of the morning showerthe goal is increase performance with the activation of the sympathetic system by stimulating muscle tone and, above all, preparing us for the stress of the day. In the case of the night shower, as we have said before, an attempt is made to activate the parasympathetic system with a longer and more leisurely duration of the shower with the aim of reducing the accumulated physical and mental tension, fulfilling the function of an authentic ritual of transition and disconnection. According to psychology. Here we enter territory that is not so clear, but which indicates, for example, that people who prefer a shower at night do so because they have a lower tolerance for dirt, which is why they prefer to remove all the sweat of the day before going to bed. But it is also noted that people who prefer solitude tend to prefer nighttime showers, precisely because, after a day full of stimuli, the bathroom becomes a capsule of sensory disconnection. In the end, it is a way to relax from everything that has happened throughout the day. Images | freepik In Xataka | Cooling down is the forgotten step in our exercise routines. And that affects how we shower

Wolves, bears and wild boars are dividing up the map of Spain and the real battle is between the rural world and the cities

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Wolves, bears, vultures, cormorants, wild boars, lynxes… When, a few months ago, Christian Gortázar, professor at the University of Castilla-La Mancha, was asked about Spanish wildlife, his words were tremendously accurate: “the problem is everywhere.” And dozens of species are being redistributed throughout traditional territory while rural and urban society confront each other over something extremely basic: what the hell nature is and what it is for. Why are we talking about this? Complaints from the agricultural sector about wildlife have been with us for years. However, in recent months (and spurred by the African swine fever crisis) the “mismanagement” framework has been gaining weight in public debate. But the truth is that the idea that “there are many animals and no one controls them” is not innocent. It is, in reality, a ‘discursive umbrella’: an idea-force that brings together very heterogeneous demands (the cuts from the future CAP, the fears derived from the Mercosur treatybureaucratic burdens, rising costs, rural identity, etc.). That is the main reason why the political debate does not fit with the scientific one, but not the only one. How to survive the end of the field. Talking about Spain being emptied today is almost obvious: 62% of Spanish municipalities has lost population since the nineties. In Castilla y León and Asturias that figure is around 85%. For the urban population it is only a sociological question, for the rural population it is an existential question. And in that context, the wolf has expanded to the southeast, the bear has doubled its area of ​​influence and the wild boar has sneaked into towns and neighborhoods (causing a complete economic and health earthquake). Regardless of the real effect of conservation measures on the rural world, it is easy for the feeling of general abandonment to curdle into an aversion to this way of seeing the countryside. A legitimate debate. From an ecological point of view, species recovery makes sense (as long as it is done properly). Degraded ecosystems lose the ability to adapt and become much more fragile: recovering species is the simplest and most cost-effective strategy. But we must not forget that these species return to a world completely different from the one they left and that the gaps they left are now occupied by “de facto powers” and realities historically established in the countryside and that still survive. And those powers They maintain that the ‘intervention’ of cities In their world it is counterproductive. The debate, as I say, is legitimate (and even healthy). And then? The real problem is not the discussion about whether the resources allocated to recovery measures would be better invested in other policies. The problem is that in the public debate the data and arguments are missing; and everything has become a partisan quagmire that is very difficult to manage. But the wildlife is still there. And the farmers too. In fact, all the actors who have taken us here are still there. The fundamental question is whether there is a future that can be understood as a solution. Image | Nancy Stapler In Xataka | Wolf hunting throughout Spain depended on a red button that changes its status. And Europe has decided to press it

A superyacht has just crossed Hormuz before the astonished gaze of the US and Iran. Its flag has confirmed that mines are not for everyone

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In 2019, during one of the highest recent tensions in the Persian Gulf, several marine insurers they raised their premiums so much that some shipowners chose to keep their ships anchored for weeks rather than crossing certain routes considered too dangerous. In parallel, other ships continued sailing with relative normality thanks to apparently minor details such as their registration or the documentation they carried, making it clear that, even in times of greatest uncertainty, not all ships play with the same rules. A strategic step converted into a global funnel. we have been counting. The Strait of Hormuz, through which about a fifth of the world’s oil normally circulates, has become one of the most tense points of the planet after the outbreak of the conflict between the United States, Israel and Iran, with traffic plummeting from more than 130 ships daily to just a few dozen and hundreds of ships trapped waiting for safe conditions. The situation has skyrocketed energy prices and generated a domino effect in global trade, while Tehran demands permits to cross and Washington threatens to intercept certain movements. In this scenario, crossing this bottleneck has become an operation fraught with military, legal and economic risks. Or maybe not so much. A superyacht that defies the blockade. Because in the midst of that collapse, he Northa luxury superyacht valued at just over $500 million and linked to the Russian oligarch Alexei Mordashovachieved what very few have achieved in recent weeks: crossing Hormuz from Dubai to Oman without incident. With more than 140 meters in length, several decks, a swimming pool, heliports and even a convertible hangar, its journey not only contrasts with the general paralysis of maritime traffic, but also makes it a striking anomaly in an environment where even large oil companies prefer not to take risks. Your journey, monitored in real timefollowed routes that other ships have used with some type of coordination in the area, although without official confirmation about permits. Alexey Mordashov The invisible key. Possibly the most revealing element of this episode is not in the luxury of the ship, but in how did he get through without being detained or attacked, in a context where any ship can become a target. Everything indicates that he achieved it with a combination of factors: not heading to Iranian ports (which would place it outside the direct focus of the US blockade), sailing through corridors tolerated by Iran and, above all, operating under a diffuse legal structure where the formal property does not entirely coincide with the real one. In other words, in an environment where each movement is interpreted as a political signal, the flag, the chosen route and the legal ambiguity act as a kind of tacit safe conduct that allows one to move between red lines without completely crossing them. Geopolitics, sanctions and alliances in the background. Of course, the journey of North cannot be understood without the political background that surrounds it, marked by the close relationship between Russia and Iran and by the fact that Vladimir Putin maintains a strategic support to Tehran in full escalation with the West. Mordashov, one of the men richest in Russia and sanctioned for the United States and the European Union since the invasion of Ukraine, you have already seen other seized assetswhich has led many oligarchs to move their assets to safer jurisdictions. In this context, the passage of the yacht through Hormuz also becomes a sign of the extent to which certain networks of power and alliances can influence what, in theory, should be a total blockade. A symptom of how conflicts work. Beyond the anecdote, the episode reflects a dynamic increasingly common in contemporary conflicts: while great powers impose restrictions and threats, they always there are gray spaces where specific actors manage to move thanks to combinations of diplomacy, crossed interests and legal loopholes. The fact that a luxury superyacht can cross one of the most dangerous points on the planet in the middle of a crisis, while hundreds of ships remain immobilized and frightened by mines and drones in the surrounding area, illustrates how power is not only measured in military capacity, but also in ability to browse (literally and figuratively) between rules that are not always applied uniformly. Image | POT, Wolfgang Fricke In Xataka | The US resurrected the “right of prey” to capture a ship from China: the problem is that China has taken note In Xataka | Ukraine taught how to use drones. Iran has gone one step further: turning them into a crusher for US radars and bases

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