Month: May 2026

On its way to increasing military production, Spain already has two new candidates: Seat and Ford

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Europe rearms. The war in Ukraine and the constant pressure from the United States Government for European countries to increase their defense spending has driven a rearmament that crosses Europe and has raised blisters among the nations that invest the least in defense. One of them is Spain. But Spain, like many other European countries, is already looking for spaces to increase its weapons production. And he has an idea: car factories. What has happened? Spain is already considering using car factories to promote its military modernization programs. That’s what it says Expansiona medium that points to internal Defense sources as the voices that advance the conversations that the Government would have had with companies such as Ford and Seat. According to this medium, the conversations are part of the implementation of “the budgets and sizing of the new military modernization programs (PEM) that are going to be launched.” The objective is to define the budget to be used and where it could go, with the intention of presenting them around summer and assigning them at the end of the year. Seat and Ford? That Seat and Ford are the first to be mentioned makes a lot of sense. With its conversion towards the electric carMartorell planned to reduce staff and resize its facilities. In 2022 they estimated a surplus of almost 2,000 direct jobs and with a commitment to new technology, the El Prat plant focused on gearboxes is one of the most notable. For its part, Ford seems to be looking for a new future to its Almussafes plant or, at least, part of it. The company has significantly reduced its production and, although it has confirmed the assembly of a new modeleverything indicates that Ford does not fully trust the plant. In fact, the latest rumors suggested that The Chinese company Geely wanted to take over part of the facilities. With a view to Defense. Although there is now open talk of converting part of the plants of these two companies into spaces to produce military material, the truth is that this idea has been floating around Seat for a few weeks. Last March it already emerged that Seat negotiated with Indra to manufacture light military vehicles. The agreement, they assured in Five Dayswould have the approval of the Government, which already stated last year that the reconversion of the automobile industrial sector could involve, at least in part, supporting Defense. It also coincides with the increase in Indra’s investments in the military field. Not only in Spain. Reconditioning automobile facilities to produce war material is not an idea that was born in Spain, far from it. In Germany, there have been negotiations that one of the Volkswagen plants begins to manufacture tanks. Last year there was also talk of Renault’s turnaround, pioneer in tank productionto manufacture drones bound for Ukraine. And not just vehicles. Last March there was already talk of the possibility that Volkswagen will start producing parts for missiles at its Osnabrück plant, according to Financial Times. The intention is that trucks would leave their facilities to transport them but also basic equipment such as shuttles or electrical generators to activate them. A key moment. If governments are looking with eager eyes at European automobile plants, it is because they know that the industry is not going through its best moment. The conversion to electric cars points to massive layoffsespecially because they lack a good part of the mechanical components that are present in any combustion car. Furthermore, its simplification points to shorter assembly times, a greater presence of robots and less human capital. These massive layoffs could be saved, at least in part, with the reconversion of these plants. It must be taken into account that manufacturing in Europe is more expensive than doing so in Asia or countries with preferential trade agreements with Europe such as Morocco either Türkiye. This is moving part of European production to these countries. Especially the smaller ones that are more complicated to make profitable. Spain is of the countries that are suffering the least from the blow because, at the level of salaries and energy costs, we are more competitive than plants from Germany or France. However, both Volkswagen with Seat and Ford, Stellantis either mercedes They have dropped that they are willing to reduce their workforce and production in our country. Photo | Caesar and seat In Xataka | Ford invested 1 billion to produce electric cars in Europe. Now it will invest money in laying off 1,000 employees

its first reusable spacecraft

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Vehicle reuse is the future of the space race. Not only for the economic savings. Also because emissions derived from the manufacture of new vehicles here on Earth and the amount of garbage there in space are reduced. SpaceX has been working with reusable vehicles for some time and Blue Origin has also done the first tests with a similar rocket. Some other private agencies have reached similar milestones. But no public agency has achieved what the European Space Agency (ESA) wants to do with its reusable Space Rider craft. A heat resistant structure. The two main challenges facing a reusable spacecraft are resistance to the heat of re-entry on Earth and controlled landing after the return trip. ESA has to overcome both handicaps with its Space Rider, which is why it has recently launched a series of thermal resistance tests. As announced in a statementthey have gone perfectly. The ship is prepared to face the heat of reentry. A laboratory that returns home. Spice Rider will basically be an unmanned laboratory that will remain in low orbit performing various kinds of experiments for 1-2 months. Afterwards, it will return to Earth with the samples or results that must be analyzed by scientists. Therefore, it is expected that it can be launched and reused numerous times. Extreme temperatures. To test the heat resistance of reentry, ESA scientists have placed Space Rider’s thermal protection system in a plasma wind tunnel. Once there, jets of gas have been shot at it at a speed 10 times the speed of sound. With this, a temperature of 1,600ºC has been reached, to which all the components have resisted with flying colors. Also with damage. The protection effect is achieved thanks to the use of a special ceramic material. But what would happen if it suffered damage, for example, from the collision of micrometeorites? To answer this question, the experiment has been repeated, simulating all these breaks. The results have been equally positive. The landing. This ship will not land in the ocean. The objective is for it to land on the runway, with the help of a type of adjustable parachute. The ship contains software with which this damping system can be guided and controlled, predicting the landing site much better and adapting it to external conditions such as wind. Important dates. At the moment, the landing system has not been tested. However, it is expected that a first prototype can be tested at the end of this year. It will be done in Sardinia, with the help of a helicopter, which will raise it high enough to land later. There will be no exit from the atmosphere; but, at least, thanks to the experiments that have just been carried out we know that the ship would resist the inhospitable conditions of the return. If all goes well, it is expected to launch the complete ship and begin its first mission at the end of this decade. There are still a few years left, but everything is going smoothly. Or ship in orbit, rather. Image | THAT In Xataka | Europe still has a lot to say in the space race: the launch and loading of the Ariane 64 are the best proof

literally urinating in the same bathroom

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In 1961, Italian artist Piero Manzoni sealed 90 small metal cans claiming they contained his own excrement and sold them as a work of art under the name “Merda d’artista”. Decades later, some of those cans would reach hundreds of thousands of euros at auctions and would become one of the most famous examples of how contemporary art can transform the eschatological into an object of worship. Venice and its strangest attraction. The Venice Biennale It is often sold as the great showcase of world contemporary art: national pavilions, monumental installations, political debates and artists trying to capture the attention of hundreds of thousands of visitors. However, this year the city has ended up finding its great phenomenon in something very more absurd and eschatological. As hundreds of thousands of tourists walk through the canals and exhibitions, the longest lines are not in front of the United States, Russia or Israel pavilions, but in front two portable toilets blue ones installed in the Austrian pavilion. There, visitors are literally invited to urinate to keep a human performance alive. The idea, developed by the artist and choreographer Florentina Holzingerhas turned something as mundane as a chemical bath into one of the most talked about, uncomfortable and viral experiences in all of Venice. A surreal system. The “Seaworld Venice” installationpresented by Austria, functions as a kind closed circuit between tourists, waste and human bodies. The urine collected in the bathrooms goes through a complex filtering system before being pumped into a huge transparent tank where a naked woman remains submerged for hours breathing through a diving mask. A few meters away, another room exhibits deposits of faeces and pipes filling with brown sewage while visitors, artists and the curious observe the process with a mixture of fascination and repulsion. Not only that. The entire pavilion has been partially flooded and completed with deliberately excessive scenes: there are naked women spinning on jet skisperformers climbing rotating metal structures and almost apocalyptic musical shows in the middle of the Venetian lagoon. All this under an (il)logic that mixes ecology, bodily decay and extreme visual provocation. Art and virality. The great irony of this edition of the Biennial is that many of the political and cultural controversies that seemed destined to monopolize the conversation ended up eclipsed by some simple chemical baths. The death of the main curator of the event, the tensions due to the presence of Russia and Israel or the criticism of the American pavilions have taken a backseat to the endless queues to participate in this kind of “urinal orgy” of the Austrian work. Even artists historically associated with scandal, as Maurizio Cattelan (famous for installing a solid gold toilet at the Guggenheim), appeared orbiting around an installation that literally turned tourists’ pee in central part of the artistic experience. If you like, the situation sums up perfectly. an uncomfortable reality of contemporary art today: in an era dominated by social networks, virality and mass tourism, the ability of a work to generate conversation and selfies can end up being as important as its conceptual content, or something like that. Provocation as language. As for the artist, Holzinger has spent years building her career precisely on that border between grotesque spectacle and artistic reflection. His previous works included nuns skatingperformers suspended through hooks embedded in the skin or scenes of simulated incontinence related to aging. In Venice he once again uses bodily fluids, nudity and uncomfortable situations as a mechanism to break taboos and force the public to react. His defenders maintain that under the scandal there is a serious discourse about the human relationship with waste, pollution, the environmental fragility of Venice and the contemporary obsession with purity. own partial flooding The Austrian pavilion aims to function as a reference to the rise in sea level and the vulnerability of a city built on water. To achieve this, the team even had to collaborate with environmental engineers and technical specialists to design a filtration system capable of operating without damaging the historic building from 1934. When to go to the bathroom is the news. The final scene perfectly sums up the surreal tone of this Biennial. While some national pavilions remained practically empty and others were consumed by political protests or diplomatic debates, hundreds of visitors they were still waiting their turn to enter some portable toilets that have accidentally become the great attraction of Venice these days. in a city saturated with tourismlines and experiences designed to be photographed, the Austrian facility ended up functioning almost like a perfect caricature of the Biennale itself: masses of people moving to voluntarily participate in an eschatological performance become a global cultural phenomenon. Venice, a city accustomed for centuries to living off spectacle and foreign fascination, has just discovered that even something as basic as going to the bathroom can be transformed into an artistic experience capable of eclipsing half the art world. Image | Wolfgang In Xataka | In 2024, Venice invented an entrance fee for tourists: it has turned out so well that it has doubled and expanded it In Xataka | Venice spent 5 billion euros on flood barriers. Five years later they are already “unsustainable”

This is the new pCloud promo

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I don’t know about you, but I have storage problems every so often. No matter how much I delete photos, videos or even applications, my phone is already full (and the laptop continues on the same path). Does it happen to you too? I go further, does it happen to your friends too? Well pCloud has a promo that may interest you for International Day of Families: you can share one of its plans with four friends and have cloud storage for life. 2 TB, for example, comes out 449 euros (instead of 1,119 euros). 2TB of lifetime storage The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Shared cloud storage, but with separate spaces pCloud is a good cloud storage option if you are looking a European cloud that is an alternative to others in the USlike Google Drive or iCloud. But why choose lifetime cloud storage? Well, in essence, you have two advantages: It is a single payment (so it is not just another subscription to add to the ones you already have) and you forget about possible increases or changes in prices. Below, we leave you the prices of the three plans that this company has as a summary: 2 TB of cloud storage: 449 euros (instead of 1,119 euros, a 60% discount). 5TB of cloud storage: 599 euros (instead of 1,698 euros, a 65% discount). 10 TB of cloud storage: 1,099 euros (instead of 2,478 euros, a 56% discount). Several things to keep in mind. The first is that this subscription is for up to five people, so you can share it with whoever you want. Furthermore, each of the members you will have your own account and separate spaceso no one will be able to see each other’s files (although you can share them among yourselves without any problem). As a bonus, these three plans include ‘pCloud Encryption’ for free. It is a tool that will allow you encrypt your files before uploading them to the cloud. In fact, not even pCloud itself will have access to them, so they will have a very high level of security. This cloud is very versatile, since you can use it on both Windows and Mac, as well as Android and iOS. You can configure it to make an automatic backup and it even has a cloud photo editor. It also has a multimedia player, so you can watch videos or listen to songs without having to go to a third-party app. A very complete cloud whose family plans are on sale, although, yes, only until May 24. Some of the links in this article are affiliated and may provide a benefit to Xataka. In case of non-availability, offers may vary. Images | pCloud In Xataka | Google Drive alternatives: the best cloud storage services for your files In Xataka | Best VPNs 2026: guide with the 17 best services to protect your online privacy

More advanced chip factories are being built in China and Taiwan than anywhere else. It’s only good for them

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According to SEMI, an international organization that looks after the interests of the electronics and integrated circuit industries, only six of the 64 new factories of semiconductors that are going to come into operation in Asia before 2029 will reside in Southeast Asia. The remaining 58 They will be located in China and Taiwan. These two countries have compelling reasons to strengthen its chip industry and develop its integrated circuit production capacity. It is essential for China to set up new plants equipped with cutting-edge photolithography equipment. And that is precisely what SMIC, Hua Hong Semiconductor and other Chinese chipmakers are doing. Currently this nation is limited by the difficulty of going beyond 7 nm without being able to use the extreme ultraviolet lithography (VVE) of ASML. Even so, Huali Microelectronics, the division of Hua Hong Semiconductor specialized in manufacturing chips for third parties, is preparing to start the production of 7nm integrated circuits at its Shanghai plant. Taiwan also needs to expand its semiconductor industry, although its motives are very different from China’s. The two largest Taiwanese integrated circuit manufacturers, TSMC and UMCthey need to develop more cutting-edge plants in order to satisfy the growing needs of their customers. TSMC’s 2 and 3 nm nodes in particular cannot cope, so it is essential for this company to expand its production capacity in the midst of the boom in data centers for data applications. artificial intelligence (AI). SEMI is concerned about the vulnerabilities of the chip industry Ajit Manocha, the executive director of SEMI, assures that “we want to see more centers emerge in related countries. We want more plants to be established to reduce the risk derived from vulnerabilities.” What worries the spokesperson of this organization is that the geopolitical tensions maintained by the US, China and Taiwan end up threatening the integrated circuit factories that reside in these last two countries. TSMC’s in Taiwan are especially sensitive to a possible conflict with China due to the undoubted strategic importance that they have not only for Taiwan, but also for the US and its allies. Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand are candidates to host new cutting-edge chip plants Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam and Thailand are strong candidates to host new cutting-edge chip manufacturing plants. In fact, Several centers already reside in Malaysia Intel’s advanced packaging and verification software. However, Manocha You are also concerned about other types of vulnerabilities. The most critical of all is the shortage of critical minerals, as well as bromine and helium, two fundamental gases in chip manufacturing processes. What is happening with helium in particular is very worrying. This gas is a byproduct of natural gas processing, and its price skyrocketed in March shortly after the war that the US, Israel and Iran have been fighting since then began because Qatar was forced to stop production of liquefied natural gas. In the current unstable scenario, SEMI argues that Southeast Asian countries should aim to build more semiconductor manufacturing plants over the next decade to help the sector diversify and reduce supply risks. Image | TSMC More information | Reuters In Xataka | The US’s problem in the AI ​​and humanoid race is not China: it is all of Asia and it is greatly disadvantaged

wants to eliminate the limit of eight-hour days a day

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The working day in much of Europe has been established for more than a century with a maximum limit of eight hours a day. This limit represents the maximum number of hours an employee can work per day. However, Germany is about to change that scale to make it more flexible and eliminate the daily work day as a metric in the work organization to establish the weekly schedule. As and as I advanced the german newspaper Weltthe bill will reach the Bundestag in June 2026. The idea is not that the Germans work more hours in total, but rather making the working day more flexible so that those hours can be distributed differently throughout the week. Count hours by weeks, not days. What the government proposes is seemingly simple: that the legal reference ceases to be the eight hours a day and becomes the 48 hours per week established by its legislation. With this change, it would no longer matter how many hours are worked each day, but rather that the total number of hours worked throughout the week does not exceed the legal maximum allowed. In this way, an employee could work more hours one day in exchange for working less on another, or concentrate all the load on the first days of the week and spare the rest. The government presents it as a measure to make the working day more flexible and facilitate family conciliation, especially for employees with children. Furthermore, this change would give carte blanche to companies to reinforce the hours on those days with more demand, and reduce (or close) their activity when the workload decreases. What German law says about it. In its article 3, the Arbeitszeitgesetz (Working Day Law) establishes that no employee can work more than eight hours a day as a general rule, with an exception of up to ten hours on specific days, as long as the average of the last six months does not exceed eight hours a day. The maximum limit for the weekly working day, including overtime, is 48 hours. However, the law also sets other limits that indirectly condition the daily work day. For example, you establish that between two work days, there must be at least 11 hours of rest and, if more than nine hours are worked in a row, the worker has the right to an additional minimum break of 45 minutes. These rules are not negotiable by collective agreement and apply without exception to all sectors. They are, precisely, the ones that the government wants to touch with the reform. why now. The definitive impetus for this reform came with the sentence of the Court of Justice of the EU of 2019 and is supported by the European Working Time Directive (2003/88/EC) imposed by the EU, which imposes the maximum weekly limit at 48 hours, and obliges all European employers to record the daily working hours of their employees. Germany, which until now did not require such registration in general, has to adapt to this obligation. The Minister of Labor, Bärbel Bas (SPD), has included electronic time registration in your project precisely as a safeguard. Without this control, Bas warns, flexibility can become a mechanism of exploitation in sectors with little union representation, such as last-mile delivery and parcel delivery. It is an implicit recognition that the standard, on its own, is not enough to protect those who work in more vulnerable environments. What unions and experts say. According what was published by the German media Handelsblatt, The German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) has been the first union platform to oppose the reform. Its president, Yasmin Fahimi, declared that “We are seeing attempts to question the eight-hour work day or to undermine social security systems. Don’t touch the eight-hour work day.” The unions assure that, without a daily limit, workers without a strong collective agreement are exposed to increasingly longer hours without any legal barrier to prevent it. For unions, real protection is not in the weekly total but in control of what happens each day. That is where the limitation of eight hours a day had its strength. The labor law experts of the Hans Böckler Foundation have calculated how much could be worked in the most extreme scenario allowed by European regulations: 73.5 hours per week. A theoretical figure, but possible if there is no daily limit to stop it. Several studies on occupational health document that long hours sustained over time are associated with a greater risk of errors, accumulated fatigue and decreased productivity, effects that the reform does not contemplate. In Xataka | Germany tried working four days a week: seven out of 10 companies no longer want to work five days a week Image | Unsplash (Maheshkumar Painam, Spencer Davis)

Big Tech spent $725 billion on AI. Then they ran out of money in their pockets.

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This is non-stop. Big tech companies have already spent an irreverent amount of money in 2025 to not lose footing in the AI ​​race, but this year things are getting better. Together Amazon, Microsoft, Google and Meta have announced a capex of $725 billion, which represents an astonishing 77% growth over last year’s (also astonishing) figure of $410 billion. The numbers they are dizzyingbut they are having a worrying consequence. A lot of money saved. For years, Big Tech has been able to boast extraordinary accounting books in which revenues and profits have practically not stopped growing. They’ve built up exceptional cash flow, but now they’re taking advantage of all that money to fund an AI race that doesn’t seem to end at the moment. Cash flow plummets. The amount of investments is of such magnitude that all of these hyperscalers have encountered a problem: their cash flow—the available liquidity— has collapsedthey indicate in the Financial Times, and now it is at levels that we have not seen since 2014. Before, the average was to have 45,000 million dollars since the pandemic, but now that figure is expected to fall to 4,000 million in the third quarter of 2025. Source: Financial Times. Let’s see who spends more. Amazon leads this unique race for spend more than others. The company led by Andy Jassy foresees an investment of 200,000 million dollars in 2026, which will lead it to burn about 10,000 million of its cash flow this year. Meta will continue that same trend in the second half of the year, while Microsoft could enter negative territory in at least one quarter. Even Google, which remains positive, will post its lowest level of cash flow in a decade. Debt, new fuel for AI. To finance this deployment, both Alphabet and Meta have had to resort to massive debt issues and suspend their share buyback programs for the first time in almost a decade. Alphabet issued $48 billion in bonds recently (in February a partdoes some days other), while Meta sumo 55,000 million debt in just six months. Bet now to win later. This strategy marks a paradigm shift: it is no longer investing only with the income one has in cash, but Big Tech is mortgaging its future. The objective is what we have mentioned time and time again: not to lose step in a race where, as Zuckerberg said, staying behind is not an option. Disguising the beads. These companies fear Wall Street’s reaction to these movements, so they are moving billions of dollars in infrastructure but they are doing so outside of their conventional balance sheets. In the FT they explain how Big Tech are using special investment vehicles that allow them to attract external capital and hide debt. They are also more opaque about who will be impacted if the AI ​​does not meet expectations. The memory crisis is also having an impact: in such a way that Microsoft already has added 25 billion dollars to its investment needs this year just to be able to assume the increase in component prices. The danger of going with the flow. CEOs justify these moves by comparing them to what happened with cloud investment two decades ago, but analysts warn: investing when the competition invests is not always a strategic choice, but rather a forced response to staying out of the race. In Xataka | The chip crisis is leaving no stone unturned: motherboards seemed untouchable, but their time has come

This is how you can get a Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Pro

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We return with another exclusive draw for Xataka Xtra subscribers. If last week we raffled a Plaud Note Prothis week it’s time to leave artificial intelligence aside to talk about the home. Because? Because the draw that concerns us today is that of a Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Proa high-end robot vacuum cleaner valued at 1,200 euros and that we loved when we analyzed it. As we said before, this giveaway is reserved for members of the Xtra Community. If you are already part of it, you can go to the next section without problem. If you haven’t discovered it yet, for only 30 euros a year You can expand your experience at Xataka with exclusive benefits and discounts, access to the Discord server, our experts through El Consulturio and much more. You have all the information here And, now yes, let’s go with the raffle. How to enter the draw for a Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Pro Participating in this giveaway is as simple as being part of Xataka Xtraaccess your member area and check the box that appears in red in the image below. When you have done so, you will not only participate in this draw, but in all those to come. Make sure you check that box to automatically participate in the exclusive Xataka Xtra draws | Image: Xataka If you are already part of the Community and have participated in previous draws by checking the box, don’t worry, you don’t have to do anything. You will automatically participate in the draw that concerns us today. These are the coordinates of this edition: Requirements: be a Xataka Xtra subscriber and resident in Spain (Peninsula, Balearic Islands, Canary Islands, Ceuta and Melilla) Start of the draw: Monday, May 11. End of the draw: Friday, May 22, at 9:00. Winner selection and resolution: Friday, May 22. How will the winner be chosen? From Xataka we will choose a random subscriber and two substitutes. If the winner does not respond within the period stipulated in the legal bases of each draw, the winner will go to the first substitute and, if this does not happen either, to the second. Winning a giveaway does not prevent you from winning in the following ones. You can find the legal bases at this link. Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Pro | Image: Xataka As far as the prize is concerned, it is a Roborock Qrevo Curv 2 Pro. It is, in fact, the same device that we used for the review. On this occasion, This is a used product and opened which we have cleaned, disinfected and verified that it works correctly. The prize includes the robot, its charging and cleaning base and all accessories included in the box. It’s like new. Otherwise, the best way to summarize the device is “like a Land Rover with a mop”. When we analyze it, we come to the conclusion that few vacuum cleaners are more all-round than this one. I didn’t really like its performance vacuuming and scrubbing thanks, in part, to its arms and joints to reach everywhere. It also has a good battery, good navigation… In short, what could be expected from a 1,200 euro robot vacuum cleaner. Good luck to everyone! In Xataka | Subscribe now to Xataka Xtra

2,500 years ago Athens suffered an epidemic that marked the end of its golden age. Science is determined to know what caused it

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“Words are insufficient when trying to describe this disease. As for his suffering, it seemed almost beyond what is humanly bearable.” Although the news about the hantavirus They make it sound even scarier, that commentIn reality, it is more than 2,000 years old. The chronicler Thucydides wrote it in his ‘History of the Peloponnesian War’ to give an idea of ​​the terrible plague that devastated Athens around 430 BC, an ailment that he himself suffered and took the lives of some 75,000 people. For centuries that epidemic has been remembered as the ‘plague of Athens’although we don’t actually know exactly what caused it. Now a group of Greek researchers have shed some more light on that dark episode. Epidemic detectives. In a hyperconnected world, in which people are capable of traveling thousands of kilometers in a few hours and it comes with blocking a remote strait of the Middle East to put the world economy in check, the specter of pandemics seems more present, but the truth is that humanity takes centuries dealing with him. Before the COVID pandemic, we had, for example, the 1918 flu or the disastrous Black Deathwhich devastated Europe between 1346 and 1353 and (by some estimates) reached 60% case fatality rates in some regions. Long before any of them, in the times of Classical Greece, another equally devastating epidemic was recorded: the plague of Athens. Thanks to authors like Thucydideswho in addition to being a chronicler suffered it himself, today we can learn in detail how that outbreak developed and experienced, which left tens of thousands of dead. The episode was important not only because of its death toll: between 75,000 and 100,000 in the four years that elapsed from 430 to 426 BC One of the deceased was Periclesa historical leader of Athens. In fact, experts usually agree that the plague precipitated the decline of the Athenian Golden Age and its death toll facilitated its final defeat in the war against Sparta. The great unknown. Despite this historical value, the Athenian plague remains shrouded in unknowns. We know when it developed, we know where it developed and there is even evidence suggesting that the initial outbreak occurred in sub-Saharan Africa, spread to Egypt and Libya and then passed to Athens via Piraeus. What is not clear is what exactly caused the plague and why it was so disastrous. And Thucydides was in charge of describing all its symptoms. Now a team from the University of Athens (NKUA) have wanted to clear up this mystery by analyzing the symptoms described by the chronicler and comparing it with that of known ailments. The result they have published it in the magazine AMHA. A pulse on history. If it is difficult to track a viral outbreak in 2026, the task becomes daunting when we are talking about one of the first known epidemics in human history. To face such a challenge, Dr. Dimosthenis Papadimitrakis and his colleagues had an idea: they looked at the symptoms described by Thucydides and other sources, They selected 17 diseases known that more or less fit that symptomatology and created a “metric system” with different scores to determine which of them best fit the epidemic that hit Athens 2,400 years ago. “The most terrible thing, despair”. Whether due to his zeal as a chronicler or because he himself suffered from the disease, Thucydides detailed the symptoms suffered by those who contracted the Athenian plague: migraines, high fever, redness and inflammation of the eyes, bad breath, sneezing, cough and profound gastrointestinal discomfort, such as nausea, vomiting, spasms and painful diarrhea. Over time, rashes, pustules and ulcers appeared on the patient’s skin, especially in the abdomen area. Those who could not stand the disease died after seven or nine days, after experiencing intense burning that led them to take off their clothes or even immerse themselves in cold water. “Gangrene of the extremities and eyes was common among both survivors and victims,” detail experts, who remember that it was not unusual for patients who survived the plague to do so with amnesia. “The most terrible thing was the despair into which people fell when they realized that they had contracted the plague. They immediately adopted an attitude of absolute hopelessness and, by giving in in this way, they lost their capacity for resistance,” Thucydides reflects. “Words are insufficient when trying to give a general image of the illness.” Ruling out candidates. With that starting point, Papadimitrakis and his colleagues developed a list of diseases that the Athenians of 2,400 years ago could have contracted and that coincided to a greater or lesser extent with the symptoms described by Thucydides. They came up with 17 potential ‘candidates’, including cholera, measles, scarlet fever, tuberculosis, Ebola, malaria, smallpox, bubonic plague, ergotism or Lassa fever. Then with that chart on the table, two questions were asked: Which of those diseases caused rashes and gangrene? How many are transmitted between humans? And what historical evidence is there for each of these ailments? Thanks to this analysis they reached a series of conclusions, although the team warns that they are only hypotheses based on probability, not firm and unquestionable truths. “The plague of Athens presents difficulties in identifying the causal agent due to several factors. The main source of information is the accounts of Thucydides, but his lack of medical knowledge and the lapse of up to 20 years between the events and their documentation can lead to erroneous interpretations,” the authors explain. “Furthermore, the inability to isolate or culture the responsible microorganism poses a major obstacle. Even if preserved bodies of plague victims were discovered, the microbes would have decomposed over time.” And what is the conclusion? That of the diseases analyzed, the one with the most votes is typhoid fever. “It appears to meet most of the criteria, so it is considered the most likely agent,” summary the researchers. Furthermore, in a necropolis from the time of the epidemic, remains of the bacteria that trigger this disease … Read more

Three settings for iOS and Android that are more effective to avoid straining your eyes if you have presbyopia than changing the text size

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If you are already a few years old and presbyopia is starting to make an appearance, don’t limit yourself to making the text on your cell phone bigger. Let’s tell you others three most effective adjustments to avoid straining your eyes that you can turn to, and that are available on both Android and iOS. These are three fairly simple adjustments that are not going to be as disruptive in terms of showing less content on the screen as when you increase the font size. However, they are going to be even more effective in helping you read. The key is contrast, bold and white balance. Expands screen contrast In the accessibility options of your mobile you have an option to increase contrast or high contrast text. By doing so, there were no more pale grays or blues that are difficult to read, the mobile will force the apps to show the maximum contrast in your texts to make them easier to read. You can combine this option with reducing transparency on iOS or disabling blur effects on Android, to eliminate some translucent effects that can make content difficult to read. Turn on bold text On iOS, within the text display and size section in the accessibility options you will have the option to activate bold text. With this you will make all the letters of the operating system, from the clock to the notifications, appear in bold. This will make all text easier to read without having to make it larger. In Android 16 you will have an even more advanced option, which is outlined text, within the Screen and text size section in the accessibility options. This will add a small border to each character to make it much easier to read, even when there are complex backgrounds behind it. Adjust the white balance The third setting that I recommend you try is the white balance. In iOS the option is called Reduce white pointand it’s in the display and text size settings in the accessibility section. On Android the equivalent is in the screen tone settings, within the section Screen. With this, what you will do is reduce the intensity of pure whitesnot the brightness in general. By doing so, the screen will be less bright, and it will be more comfortable for your eyes to read, especially when you are using your mobile at night or in poorly lit areas. In Xataka Basics | How to create a podcast from a text to study, research or simply listen to if you don’t feel like reading

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