Mobile Tech & Gadgets

Before the Incas, a civilization created an impregnable empire in the heights of Peru. His secret: feces

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The coastal desert of southern Peru is one of the most arid environments on the planet, but this was not an impediment for a civilization that was able to prosper here with more than 100,000 people and before the arrival of the Inca empire. Their secret here was seabird guano, and science has now just demonstrated to what extent bird dung was the real economic and demographic driver. of the Chincha Kingdom. The feeding problem. During the Late Intermediate Period, approximately 1000 to 1400 AD, the Chincha Valley became a pre-Inca superpower. But to sustain its growth and maintain some 30,000 workers, it was logically necessary to produce food on a large scale, and more specifically corn, which was the basis of their diet. The problem is that the Peruvian coast is not exactly the most fertile place in the world, so the population faced a serious food problem. But here the solution was to look at the sea and the islands full of guano birds, and more specifically towards their feces and their ability to fertilize. Something that made them begin to prosper and become very strong in the region. The confirmation. To confirm this theory, a scientific team analyzed stable isotopes of carbon, nitrogen and sulfur in 35 ancient corn cobs and 11 seabirds found in tombs in the Chincha Valley. Here it was possible to see how clearly plants that absorb nutrients from fertilizers derived from marine animals show a very specific chemical signature with high levels of nitrogen 15. The results. Here the conservative limit to determine the use of guano in the experiments was located at a value of +20%, but in Chincha corn the average values ​​were +19.4%, reaching peaks of up to +27.4%. Thanks to radiocarbon dating, scientists have been able to place the beginning of this large-scale agricultural practice around the year 1250 AD.a date that coincides millimeters with the rise and expansion of the Chincha Kingdom. What we knew. Modern chemistry only confirms what archeology and history already hinted to us, since the iconography of the time is full of references to this agronomic practice. In textiles, friezes and ceramics of the Chincha culture, corn appears constantly represented alongside guano-producing birds, such as the guanay cormorant, the Peruvian booby and the pelican. Even Spanish colonial chroniclers, such as Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, recorded this practice when describing how the indigenous people applied the guano to corn through irrigation systems and they documented the strict taboo laws later imposed by the Incas to protect these birds that for them were the focus of fertilization of their fields. This is why killing a guano bird or disturbing its nests was a crime punishable by death. A great revolution. The mastery of guano technology not only filled the stomachs of the Chincha, but made them a key player in Andean geopolitics. In this way, when the Inca empire began its expansion, they did not conquer the Chincha because of their great strength, and instead they formed a strategic alliance. The Chincha here had control of the precious fertilizer and dominated the maritime trade routes, exchanging the guano for luxury goods such as prized shells. Spondylus. This agricultural base allowed the Chincha Kingdom to negotiate its integration into the Inca empire from a position of power and privilege. Images | Ames Wainscoat In Xataka | Prehistory was also ‘woke’: a woman from 7,000 years ago suggests that gender was not an immovable barrier

This town in Spain went unnoticed until 1953. Then it decided to carry out the largest tourism experiment in the world

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In the middle of the 20th century the skyscrapers They were still a rarity outside of cities like New York or Chicago. In Europe they predominated the horizontal citieswith low-rise buildings and compact historic centers. However, in the middle of the 1950s, experimentation began with an urban idea that seemed almost futuristic for the time: concentrating thousands of homes and hotels in high towers to free up land, bring people closer to the sea and create cities capable of accommodating crowds without expanding uncontrollably throughout the territory. The town facing the sea. At that time Benidorm it was just a fishing village of the Alicante coast. Its economy revolved around the sea and, in particular, the tuna trap, while many families survived by combining fishing, agriculture and work in the merchant navy. That small town barely had more than a few thousand inhabitants and had the typical appearance of a mediterranean town: low houses, narrow streets and a life marked by the rhythm of the tides. However, the fishing crisis, the economic isolation of post-war Spain and the need to find new sources of income pushed the town to seek a different future. It was then that an almost unthinkable transformation began to take place: a humble enclave destined to become one of the most unique urban and tourist experiments in history. The vision that changed the destiny of the city. The great turning point came in the 1950s when Mayor Pedro Zaragoza perceived the potential tourist of that corner of the Costa Blanca. At a time when the Franco regime was trying to attract foreign currency and timidly open the country to the outside world, Benidorm opted for sun and beach tourism as an economic engine. The decision involved breaking with many conventions of the time, from allowing the use of bikini on the beaches (a scandal for conservative Spain) to designing an urban model specifically designed to accommodate thousands of foreign visitors. The municipality developed in 1956 one of the first general urban planning plans in the country, a tool more typical of large cities than a small coastal town. With that plan the metamorphosis began: the place that had lived off fishing for centuries began to be imagined as an international tourist city. Benidorm before the “plan” Grow towards the sky. The key to the urban model was an unusual decision on the Mediterranean coast: grow vertically. The 1963 planning practically eliminated height limits and allowed increasingly slender towers to be built on relatively small plots. The logic was simple and powerful. If the buildings rose towards the sky, the ground could be kept free for green areas, swimming pools, avenues and services. This approach turned Benidorm into a true laboratory of modern urban planning, indirectly inspired by the theories of architects. like Le Corbusier about vertical cities surrounded by open spaces. He first great symbol of that change came with buildings like the Frontalmar or the Coblanca 1 in the sixties, towers (or moles) that they broke completely the traditional scale of the town. Those constructions inaugurated a model that in a few decades would transform the city’s landscape. The hordes are coming. The airport opening of Alicante in 1967 and the expansion of European tour operators triggered the arrival of visitors. British tourism, especially, found Benidorm a cheap, sunny and accessible destination all year round. To accommodate this avalanche of tourists, dozens of increasingly taller hotels and apartment blocks were built. In a few decades, Benidorm’s skyline went from low houses to a forest of towers facing the sea. Today the city has more than a hundred of skyscrapers or, in other words, it is the second in the world with the highest density of tall buildings per inhabitant, only behind New York. Structures such as the Gran Hotel Bali, the Time or the future TM Tower (which will exceed 230 meters) symbolize that vertical race that turned the city into what many call the “Manhattan of the Mediterranean.” Criticized and admired. There is no doubt, the Benidorm model has been the subject of debate for decades. For some it is the perfect example of mass tourism and aggressive urbanization of the coastline. For others it is, paradoxically, one of the coastal developments more efficient of Europe. The concentration of high-rise buildings allows hundreds of thousands of visitors to be accommodated while occupying a relatively small area and reduces land consumption compared to extensive urbanization models with dispersed chalets and resorts. In addition, the city functions as a practically continuous destination throughout the year, with very high hotel occupancy levels even in winter. This spatial efficiency has led some architects and urban planners to consider Benidorm as an urban experiment so unique that, far from being a mistake, anticipated solutions that are discussed today in the debate on sustainability and urban density. From a town to a world tourist icon. The result of this entire process is a transformation that is difficult to imagine if you look at the starting point. In just a few decades Benidorm went from being a small fishing center to a city capable of receiving millions of visitors a year. Its stable population is around tens of thousands of inhabitants, but during the summer can multiply until approaching half a million people. He skyline of skyscrapersvisible from kilometers out to sea, has become an iconic image of Spanish tourism. What began as a risky bet in the 1950s ended up creating a urban and economic phenomenon unique: a place where an ancient Mediterranean town decided to reinvent itself looking up to the sky and ended up building his own Manhattan facing the sea. Perhaps that is why its story continues to provoke the same uncomfortable question: whether that was a brilliant urban planning intuition… or the experiment that forever changed the way of inhabiting the Mediterranean. Image | Javier Martin Espartosa, Double reed In Xataka | If the question is whether a skyscraper can be erased without demolishing it, … Read more

Data centers have run out of “plugs” in central Europe, so they are migrating north and south

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The insatiable appetite of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is redrawing the map of Europe. Historically, the European data center market has been dominated by a handful of metropolitan areas known in the industry as the “FLAP-D” markets: Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris and Dublin. The main attraction of these cities was their proximity to large demand centers, which allowed extraordinarily fast data transmission. However, current forecasts indicate that this historical dominance is beginning to crumble. Technology developers are packing their bags and the reason is purely physical: there is not enough energy. The collapse of the giants. The driving force behind this technological exodus is the sheer congestion of the electrical grid in the traditional epicenters. Unlike a conventional factory, data centers present a brutal challenge for any infrastructure: they are huge, hyper-localized loads that operate tirelessly and have the ability to skyrocket their consumption faster than almost any other industry. The local impact of these installations is astonishing. According to Greenpeacein 2023 data centers consumed between 33% and 42% of all electricity in cities such as Amsterdam, London and Frankfurt. The most extreme case is that of Dublin, where they accounted for almost 80% of electricity consumption. The situation became so critical that Ireland was forced to impose a moratorium de facto to new data centers in its capital until 2028. The exodus to the North and South. As a direct consequence of this bottleneck, the proportion of installed capacity in FLAP-D markets will fall from the current 62% to just 51% by 2035. according to a report by Ember. This drop marks the beginning of a new era in which developers flee from bottlenecks. The new map would look like this: The big winners: The Nordic countries top the expansion list. They offer some of the least congested networks in Europe, low electricity prices, minimal carbon intensity and cold climates that reduce the need for cooling. Demand is expected to increase 4 or 5 times in this region. The awakening of the South: On the other side of the continent, countries such as Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain also project explosive growth, driven by their potential in renewable energy. The laggards: There are nations that, despite having strong economies and plenty of IT talent, are falling behind. Poland and Czechia are the best example. As detailed by Paweł CzyżakDirector of the Europe Program at the analysis center Embertheir electrical systems are still tied to coal and gas (Poland emits about 600 gCO2/kWh and the Czech Republic about 400 gCO2/kWh). With no clean energy to offer, investors prefer to look to their greener neighbors. Don’t underestimate the south. While the north squeezes the Scandinavian cold, Spain faces this exodus from a privileged position, breaking daily renewable generation records. However, its electrical network suffers a serious administrative “thrombosis”: There is plenty of clean energy, but there is a lack of cables to transport it, leaving 130 GW trapped in a bottleneck. Faced with the avalanche of data centers that threatened to collapse the system, the Government and the CNMC They have applied emergency surgery. The solution involves pioneering “flexible access permits” – which allow these plants to use residual capacity by accepting outages in emergencies – and the non-negotiable requirement that they withstand “voltage gaps” to shield the electrical stability of the entire peninsula. Planning and more planning. None of this happens by chance. In places where the network flows smoothly, there are years of work behind it. The Norwegian operator, Statnett, has been preparing the ground for some time to assume three times the electricity demand from data centers by 2030. In Denmark, Energinet began building high-voltage substations in 2017 in anticipation of precisely this scenario. Beyond the cables, the internal technology dictates the sentence. The key indicator is the PUE (Power Usage Effectiveness), which measures the technical efficiency of each installation. Paweł Czyżak points out in your newsletter that the difference is abysmal: the leading centers consume 24% less electricity and emit four times less CO2 than an average plant. Google has the best student in the class in Fredericia (Denmark): it averages a spectacular PUE of 1.07 and runs on 91% clean energy. The technological paradox. There is, however, a fascinating irony in the background: the same Artificial Intelligence that today saturates the cables could be the salvation of the electrical system. According to calculations by the consulting firm Deloittethe efficiency improvements that this technology will bring will save more than 3,700 TWh globally by 2030. Put into perspective, the deployment of these algorithms will save almost 4 times the energy consumed by all the data centers on the planet combined. Examples from other latitudes support this theory: in Southeast Asia (ASEAN), It is estimated that integrating AI in the management of its electrical systems it will save more than 67 billion dollars and avoid the emission of almost 400 million tons of CO2 between now and 2035. Infrastructure decides the future. At the bottom of this complex puzzle of cables and algorithms, what is at stake is pure and simple economic competitiveness. They are not minor figures. In the Netherlands, the data and cloud sector already attracts 20% of all foreign direct investment. In Germany, estimates calculate that the contribution of these centers to GDP will jump from the current 10.4 billion euros to more than 23 billion in 2029. The warning for legislators and regulators is clear: the technology giants have no patience to wait for new cables to be buried. They will move their billions to where the network already has space. As Czyżak saysthe country that wants to seduce the industry must guarantee clean energy in abundance and plugs ready to use. In the frenetic race to dominate the technological future, having a ready electrical grid is no longer an advantage; It is the only entry ticket. Image | İsmail Enes Ayhan on Unsplash and IRENA Xataka | Iran is directing its attacks where it knows it hurts the West: energy and data centers

The problem with microrobots is that they don’t have a “brain.” The solution has been to use Einstein’s relativity to guide them

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Making robots the size of a piece of human hair is already a reality, but it faces a big problem: they are too small to bring a “brain” on board. And it is logical, since on a microscopic scale there is no space to insert a microchip, batteries or navigation systems, so in a few words we can talk about “dumb robots” that only react to basic stimuli. But here the Einstein’s relativity has given a small solution. The solution. One of the functions of these small robots is precisely in be able to navigate the bloodstream to react to different stimuli. But the big question here is how they can navigate a bloodstream without colliding with each other. Something that was on the mind of a team of researchers from the University of Pennsylvania what have you seen that the key is not in making robots smarter, but in manipulating the “spacetime” through which they move. To understand this thread, you have to think about how gravity works according to the theory of general relativity. Here Einstein taught us that planets do not revolve around the sun because an invisible force pulls them, but because the mass of the Sun curves the fabric of spacetime, as with the Earth, which follows the easiest path through that curved space. To biology. Here the researchers wanted to apply this same mathematical principle to microrobotics, introducing the concept of “artificial spacetimes”. And since microscopic robots move in response to light, the scientists designed light fields projected onto a Petri dish that mimic the curvature of spacetime. In this way, the variations in light they faced acted like “artificial gravity.” In this way, the robot does not need to know where it is or where it is going. It simply turns on and moves forward, since it is the light pattern that “pushes” it to curve its path to avoid obstacles or find the exit from a maze, exactly like a ray of light curves when passing near a massive object in the cosmos. It seems like magic. In the experiment proposed by the researchers, different two-dimensional light labyrinths are projected. In this virtual scenario, they created dark areas that mathematically act as “black holes”, since when the microrobot approaches these areas, the equations that govern your response to light They are formally identical to those of the path of light falling through an extreme gravitational field. In this way, when the microrobot approaches these areas, the equations that govern its response to light are formally identical to those of the path of light falling through an extreme gravitational field. From here, using mapping, scientists managed to get these robots to ‘patrol’ specific areas, avoid obstacles and group together at an exact point. And the most interesting thing is that all this happens without a single processing chip on board the robot, since the “calculation” falls entirely on the geometry of the projected environment. A future doctor. The implications of this advance will now allow microrobots to be freed from the need to have a computer system inside them, which means they can be manufactured cheaply and even made even smaller. From here opens the door to very important medical applicationssince millions of these “reactive robots” can be injected into the human body. The objective here is to use external fields such as magnetic fields that act as a curved spacetime that allows them to move through our circulatory system to release a drug, clean arteries or perform biopsies at the cellular level. Images | Ruben Sukatendel In Xataka | Robots have a problem that no one has solved in decades: they get lost. A Spanish engineer believes she has found the key

It is the most powerful ever seen

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Raising your head and looking at the sky looking to recognize constellations and encounter a shower of stars or meteorites is a pleasure, but what the astronomical community has found It is simply extraordinary: a beam of cosmic energy aimed at Earth from half the known universe. It’s not the first time we’ve seen something like this, but this is the brightest and most distant ever seen. The discovery. South Africa’s MeerKAT telescope has discovered the most powerful and distant space laser ever detected. It is a beam of microwaves fired 8 billion years ago that has just arrived at Earth and to locate it, the team needed a cosmic magnifying glass that Einstein predicted more than a century ago. Context. Hydroxyl megamasers (the prefix mega denotes that their luminosity is millions of times higher than that of an ordinary hydroxyl maser) are natural phenomena that occur when two galaxies collide. At that moment the gas clouds are violently compressed, exciting hydroxyl molecules. These release microwaves in an amplified and coherent way (like artificial lasers). Simply put, they are the cosmic equivalent of a laser. Of course, instead of visible light, what they emit are microwaves. For astronomy they serve as a kind of “cosmic beacon” used to study how galaxies were formed in the early universe. to the telescope. This natural laser comes from a pair of colliding galaxies (the HATLAS J142935.3–002836 system) that emit a megamaser so bright that the research team has proposed upgrade it to gigamaser, an order of magnitude higher. The person responsible for the discovery is the MeerKAT radio telescopea network of 64 radio frequency antennas located in South Africa. The signal we receive today was emitted 8 billion years ago, that is, when the Universe was half its current age. Why is it important. Because megamasers are direct tracers of galactic mergers in the young universe. Their study allows us to determine how they were formed and how they evolved. Furthermore, this proposal to classify it as a “gigamaser” opens the door to more objects similar in size to exist yet to be discovered. As details Thato Manamelaastronomer at the University of Pretoria and lead author from the study: “This is just the beginning. We don’t want to find just one system, but hundreds or thousands” Illustration of the distant galaxy 8 billion light years away (in red), magnified by an unrelated foreground disk galaxy, resulting in a red ring. By breaking radio light into different colors, like a prism does, the hydroxyl gigamaser is revealed. IDIA How they did it. The microwave signal was too weak to be detected at that distance, but the scientific team made use of something that Einstein glimpsed: the gravitational lens. In short: a huge mass located somewhere between Earth and galaxies acts as a natural amplifier, bending space-time around it, that is, bending and concentrating microwaves like a magnifying glass. What is produced is an Einstein ring, a luminous halo around the intermediate object. That effect amplified the signal enough that MeerKAT could capture the cosmic ray and analyze it. In Xataka | The quietest place in the solar system is on the far side of the Moon, which is why they have just installed a radio telescope there In Xataka | A new “solar system” has just been discovered. There’s just one problem: it shouldn’t exist. Cover | NASA Hubble Space Telescope

They are the lifeline of the consumer market

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The DRAM memory industry is facing a profound structural transformation. The three largest chip manufacturers of memory on the planet, the South Korean companies SK Hynix and Samsung Electronics, and the American Micron Technology, They have reallocated about 70% of its production lines high bandwidth memories (HBM by its name in English) to satisfy the currently insatiable demand of data centers specialized in artificial intelligence (AI). The consequences of this movement did not take long to appear: standard DDR4 and DDR5 memories and their derivatives, which are the most used in the consumer segment, immediately began to become scarce. And its price skyrocketed. In fact, according to the consulting firm GartnerRAM has gone from representing 16% of the total cost of a laptop in 2026 to 23%. And it is possible that this escalation will continue to develop in the coming months. However, users can cling to the greatest stabilizing agent in the memory market today: the Chinese company CXMT (ChangXin Memory Technologies). CXMT is already the fourth world manufacturer of DRAM memories During 2025 and just two and a half months into 2026, CXMT has scaled its production capacity to reach a share in the global market for between 11 and 13%. These figures position this company as the fourth largest manufacturer of memory chips on the planet. However, the most interesting thing is that this company is acting as an escape valve that is allowing some of the main integrators in the consumer market, such as ASUS, HP or Acer, to get the memories they need for their mid-range laptops at competitive prices. Little by little CXMT is managing to close the technological gap that separated it from Samsung, SK Hynix and Micron All this sounds good, but we must not overlook that, in addition to price, performance matters. According to the Canadian laboratory TechInsightswhich enjoys a solid reputation for your analytical skills of hardware from China, CXMT’s 15nm architecture has reached a comparable maturity to that of its South Korean competitors. In practice this means that its D1z manufacturing process is allowing it to produce effective 8,000 MHz DDR5 chips on a large scale. However, this is not all. just a month ago CXMT announced which had begun large-scale manufacturing of HBM3 memories, which has allowed it to break the iron control that SK Hynix, Samsung Electronics and Micron Technology exercised over the market. At the moment its production of HBM3 chips is intended to satisfy the domestic demand of the Chinese market, but its mere presence indirectly contributes to alleviating the pressure that the demand for AI data centers is putting on the supply chain. On the other hand, this Chinese company has confirmed that it is dedicating 20% of its production capacity to the manufacture of HBM3 memories, which has caused several large integrators to evaluate their chips. According to DigiTimesCXMT, thanks to its factories in Hefei and Beijing, is injecting into the market some 300,000 wafers monthly. Without them the cost of DRAM memory would most likely be even higher, which would definitely put it out of reach of the average user. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that CXMT and other companies manage to stabilize a market segment that has a very profound impact on users’ pockets. Image | Generated by Xataka with Gemini In Xataka | Seagate warns that memories will continue to rise in price while AI is booming: there is something that worries us even more In Xataka | While the US tries to stop it at any price, the Chinese industry exports more chips than ever: it has AI in its favor

the supermarket next to the house

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With Mercadona gaining weight in the sector and the white label has become the unexpected ram of the market, more and more chains of retail They ask themselves the same question: How the hell do they grow in Spain? How to gain business share? The data of the sector suggest that more and more chains arrive at the same answer: leaving behind old formats and betting on the neighborhood ‘supers’. If the customer does not go to the store… it is the store that goes directly to the customer, either landing in their neighborhood or ‘sneaking’ in airports and stations. The question is whether it will work for them. Putting sixth. The data has revealed it theEconomist: If there are no surprises and the plans that the companies in the sector have been outlining are fulfilled, this year hundreds and hundreds of new supermarkets will open in the cities of Spain. Only Carrefour, Dia and Alcampo will add about 350 And to them are added the openings planned by chains such as Eroski, Consum, Unide, Lidl or Aldi, sometimes with direct management and other times through franchises. The most curious thing, however, is not the figure itself, but what it hides: a step back from the old hypermarkets in favor of the ‘super’ ones, smaller and closer to the customer. Going down to detail. The largest deployment will come from Carrefour. In the remainder of the decade, the French group wants to open 750 stores convenience stores in Spain (net openings), especially under the Carrefour Express brand. Most of them (450) will be deployed between the remainder of 2026, 2027 and 2028. At the end of last year Alcampo also announced its intention to undertake a “growth phase” with between 80 and 100 openings per year and the remodeling of 31 stores. Its commitment also involves the ‘hypermarket’ format, although when presenting its roadmap the company only mentioned one, under a franchise regime, in Toledo. The objective is similar to that of Grupo Dia, which has also set the objective of achieving the hundred openings throughout 2026. Are they the only ones? At all. They also have expansion plans for Eroski (which aspires to launch 75 new stores per year over the next three years) and Lidl, aldi and consumptionwhich will add up to dozens of openings. Only Aldi plans to launch 40 new supermarkets throughout 2026, which will allow it to further strengthen a commercial network that at the end of 2025 was around 500 establishments with a commercial area of ​​about 549,000 m2. Added to these new features are already announced by other chains that will probably be announced by other firms over the coming weeks and months. Mercadona, without going any further, has not yet presented its results. Beyond the numbers. The opening figures are interesting, but even more so is the reading they leave: the chains are not opening just any type of store. Its commitment focuses above all on local stores located in urban centers, prioritizing them over larger spaces in the suburbs. In other words, the supermarket is strengthened and the ‘hyper’ loses weight, a format that has more than five decades present in the Spanish market and achieved considerable success both socially and in sales volume. In the doldrums. Right now it is estimated that in Spain there are around 500 hypermarketsa wide network that has been losing strength over the years in favor of the ‘super’ format, which has more than 48,200 establishments. According to data from Worldpanel by Numerator, in 2025 the hyper market share was 11.3%. A triple bad data. Not only does it show a year-on-year drop of 0.8%, but it is also far from the 30% it reached in the 1990s. The figure is also well below the super market share, which is around 67%. The example of Carrefour. Probably the company that best reflects the change in trend is Carrefour. The French signature was a pioneer in the commitment to hypermarkets in Spain (one opened in El Prat de Llobregat in the 70s), but in recent years its commitment has largely pivoted towards another format: that of small stores and even operated by franchisees. “The convenience format gives us an extraordinary opportunity to grow,” recently recognized Alexandre Bompard, CEO of the company. Its commitment is not only to extend its convenience ‘super’ network. It wants to reach more places, gaining presence for example in airports and train stations. As for the hypers, consider giving them a spin, dedicating up to 10% from the drugstore space, pets… products beyond food. What about the ‘hypers’? That we Spaniards seem less and less dice to make our purchases in these commercial spaces, characterized by their large size, wide range and location. At least that is what indicators such as those published by Woldpanel by Numerator suggest, which reflects a gradual loss of share. There is who is speaking now of the “hyper crisis”. That decrease is perhaps one of the reasons which explain that Carrefour have seen burdened his market sharenext to other chains with a similar approach. The French firm boasts of being “absolute leader” in the hypermarket network in Spain. Of the 1,500 establishments that manages, 200 respond to that concept. Images | Eroski Group (Flickr) and Carrefour Via | theEconomist In Xataka | We knew that Mercadona was making gold from its suppliers. Now we know the million-dollar toll that this entails.

“We felt cheated.” Even gas station owners are freaking out about the sudden, meteoric rise in oil

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The missiles fell and the energy markets soared. When the conflict officially began on February 28 between the US, Israel and Iran and its expansion through the Middle East, the energy markets responded to the new scenario and in more or less two weeks, the barrel of Brent has already risen by 50% according to EIA data. At gas stations, the price of fuel also rose overnight. The rapid rise in fuel. Below these lines you can see how the average price of fuel in Spain has evolved according to the data extracted from the Ministry of Ecological Transition of the States and compiled by the Dieselogasoline website. Thus, if we closed February with a price of €1,493/l for Unleaded 95 and €1,548/l for Diesel A+, March has been a relentless uphill climb for all fossil fuels. Today they mark €1,727/l and €1,935/l respectively. With this panorama and the figure of 2 euros/liter on the horizonthe first days already There were long lines at some service stations. before what was coming. Evolution of fuel prices in Spain in March. Dieselogasolina.com The perfect storm. With the blockade of the Strait of Hormuzthe place through which approximately 20% of the world’s production of crude oil and liquefied natural gas passes, confirmation that China turns off the tap of its exports to meet domestic demand, the slowdown in activity of some deposits and that large merchant companies are paralyzed or surrounding all of Africa to satisfy demand at the cost of a longer and more expensive route, it is clear that the scenario for buying oil looks bleak. In fact, not even the International Energy Agency release 400 million barrels of emergency reserves (the largest mobilization in history) was enough for the market to react. Ultimately, that number equivalent about four days of world consumption or about 20 days of what passes through the Strait of Hormuz. And it could be worse: as the spokesman for the Khatam al-Anbiya headquarters of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps explained: “They will not be able to artificially lower the price of oil. Prepare for oil to reach $200 per barrel,” picks up Al Jazeera. Instability, the reduction in supply and its use as a measure of pressure summarize the black picture. But that gasoline is not that of war. Although the history of conflicts in the Middle East is an unequivocal precedent to glimpse the rise of fuel and everything, because in practice it has an impact on the logistics of the bulk of the activities: if the fruit store brings its delivery five times a week, those deliveries cost more. And if you travel 50 kilometers a day to get to work, it will also cost you more. Economy of the obvious. However, there is a harsh reality: that fuel that you are already paying at war prices was acquired previously. We are paying prices for the future, those for replacement. And not just consumers: also gas stations. As Michel-Édouard Leclerc, president of the E. Leclerc supermarket chain and its gas stations, said, to public broadcaster Franceinfo: “We felt cheated, just like the drivers, by the almost automatic speed with which prices rose.” In his case, he also announced the reduction of 30 cents at the group’s gas stations in France thanks to negotiations with suppliers. Who sets the price of fuel. In the Spanish state, prices have been free since 1998, as the CNMC explainsbut from here there are several actors that influence: The international market, based on the price of Brent oil or refined oil in the reference markets. The refinery or wholesale operator, which adds its operating and logistics margin until distribution. The gas station operator: if it is a flagship station such as Repsol or BP, the price is practically a matter for the parent company. If it is independent or belongs to a large surface (such as Plenoil or Leclerc), it has more room for fixation. Hence they are the cheapest. The State through taxesmore specifically the Special Tax on Hydrocarbons and VAT. In Xataka | The rocket and the pen: the theory that explains why the rise in gasoline is here to stay In Xataka | There is a hidden war to sell us the cheapest possible gasoline. One that Ballenoil and Plenergy already dominate Cover | Leclerc

A Xiaomi SU7 has humiliated an entire Ferrari SF90 in an acceleration race. And that means absolutely nothing

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If in recent days you have wandered through social networks (and something tells me that is very likely) perhaps you have seen a video in which a Xiaomi SU7 Ultra makes a fool of an entire Ferrari SF90 XX Stradale in an acceleration race. “A Ferrari worth a million euros losing against a phone manufacturer” reads the tweet from accounts like that of @kinglinzhui who regularly posts information or videos proselytizing Chinese technology and culture. The tweet, in fact, has also been replicated by high-ranking figures in the State, as the Chinese ambassador to Colombia. In the video you can actually see how The Chinese car passes over the Ferrari. He Xiaomi SU7 Ultra It is the most advanced electric car from the Chinese manufacturer. It has 1,548 HP of power available and is limited to 350 km/h. He Ferrari SF90 XX Stradale It is also the most radical version of one of the most advanced sports cars that Ferrari has launched in recent years. In this case it is a plug-in hybrid with 1,030 HP of power with a V8 engine that generates up to 797 HP of power and is supported by three other electric motors to give the best of itself. Although there are some details to understand why the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra is faster, both Twitter accounts have focused on the inevitable: the most emblematic Western firm that puts a million-euro car on the market. (actually it is a limited edition of 790 units sold starting at 770,000 euros) is crushed by an electric supercar from a company that has just been born in the automobile market and that opened reserves for just over 100,000 euros at direct exchange. The problem is that it doesn’t mean much. Or, directly, it doesn’t mean anything. Click on the image to go to the original tweet The problem is the aura How important is technique in the debate? Everything and nothing really. And the first thing to keep in mind is that the comparison does not hold up. An electric car with more than 1,500 HP of power will always be faster in a straight line race than a car with a combustion engine. All its difficulty (and it is not a little, mind you) lies in being able to lower the power to the ground in the most effective way and launch the car forward as quickly as possible. In this case, it doesn’t matter if we are comparing a Ferrari with a Xiaomi or any other high-performance electric car. It is also not the first time we have seen comparisons of this type. And it is that carwow has already demonstrated the potential of the electric car facing a Kia EV6 GT against a Ferrari Purosangue. The power and sound of the naturally aspirated V12 against a general electric sports car. The result was the same again, with the Ferrari crushed. In the case of the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra and the Ferrari SF90 XX Stradale things change a little because those from Maranello have in this case an electrified car on their hands. All in all, although it certifies 0 to 100 km/h in just over two seconds, it is not enough to defeat the Chinese electric car. The problem for Xiaomi is that it sweeps the purely technical section but there is something it cannot offer right now compared to one of Ferrari’s most advanced cars in recent years: aura. When you spend more than 770,000 euros on a Ferrari (as if you were spending a million euros) it is not because you want to buy the fastest car. Or, at least, not only for that. First, you have to understand that the Ferrari SF90 XX Stradale is a circuit car, designed to perform at its best when linking curves. Something in which, of course, Also the Xiaomi SU7 Ultra has proven to be among the best. The case of this Ferrari is special because the “Program XX” It is designed to sell to a very specific group of customers a car that is not approved for the street, that can only be driven on a track. In fact, Ferrari takes the car wherever you want and maintains it when you have it stopped. It is a service typical of a pilot. However, this time, Ferrari has made the necessary adjustments to be able to drive it wherever the client wants. That exclusivity, that treatment of the customer is what a Ferrari SF90 XX Stradale customer buys when they get one of these limited units. The customer of this type of car is not concerned that a Xiaomi SU7 Ultra is faster in a straight line. I would dare say that few even care that it is faster on a track. Building a car brand from scratch has this problem. And it is even more complicated when it comes to an electric car. Chinese brands face a major obstacle. In many cases they are technically better than Westerners but they lack history. My colleague Javier Lacort explains it well in the podcast Infinite Loop. It is no coincidence that Xiaomi partners with Leica on its mobile phones. Nor that TCL has done the same with Sony for its televisions. Building a brand from scratch and having specific recognition as a firm that makes premium products worldwide is very complicated. The Volkswagen Group needed shovelfuls of marketing money for more than two decades to ensure that Audi was perceived as a German premium at the level of Mercedes or BMW. And the higher you aim, the more difficult it is to achieve that recognition. But Xiaomi also has another challenge: creating a story around its electric devices. When we tested the Porsche Macan We said that the car was great, a sporty electric SUV for traveling at extraordinary speed. And yet, it lacks soul. Because that same car previously had a V6 engine that generated sensations that were impossible to replicate by an electric car. It … Read more

In 1888 an English doctor dissected a corpse down to its nerves. And illuminated forensic science along the way

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If you stop by the bookstore of the Faculty of Medicine of the Drexel Universityin Philadelphia, you’re most likely in for a scare. Fright that will be followed by an uncomfortable gesture. Discomfort from which you will jump to surprise. And surprise that will give way to absolute fascination. There, locked in a glass display case located in the Student Activities Center of the faculty, received visitors until at least a couple of years ago, a dissected human body, tall, well bleached and with bulbous eyes with an expression of superlative and perennial surprise. The most curious thing is that the corpse does not preserve the skin. Not even the muscles. Not even the veins. Not even cartilage. Not even the bones. The corpse, baptized “Harriet”, is pure nerve. And it is in the most literal and full sense of the word. “Harriet” is the result of the surgical virguería of the late 19th century, the result of meticulous and pioneering work – it had so much of both that there were those who believed it impossible – prepared more than 130 years ago by the Dr. Rufus B. Weavera former professor of Hahnemann Medical Collegenow known as Drexel College. Maybe in the era of 3D printing Harriet’s vision is less moving than in 1900, when medical students observed her; but the effect revives when you know two things. One, that Harriet are the remains of a real person, a former employee of the center who died at the age of 35; two, that to give it shape Weaver had to arm himself with patience and separate, filament by filament, the entire nervous system. The process took five to six months. and it only failed in the intercostal area. This is your story. With the eye of an anatomist and the pulse of a seamstress By the late 1880s Dr. Weaver was a well-established and respected professional. He was almost 50, had made a name for himself by identifying and removing bodies from fallen soldiers at Gettysburg and had been working for some time as a professor of Anatomy at the Hahnemann Medical College. In mind, however, Weaver had a project that would allow him to gain fame in the United States and abroad: completing a total dissection of the cerebrospinal system. During his travels through Europe he had seen partial works, but none that showed a complete “x-ray”. Help for his task came, it is believed, from where he least expected: from Harriet Cole, a young African American who was dedicated to cleaning the anatomy laboratory. Although he was only 35 years old, Cole’s health was very delicate. He suffered tuberculosis and his forces were greatly undermined. Before he died in 1888, however, he decided to donate his body to science and offer Dr. Weaver the opportunity he was looking for for his ambitious nervous system project. Over the next six months, Professor Weaver, armed with patience, eyesight and a seamstress’s hand, set about extracting the entire cerebrospinal nervous system. It takes a look at the result to understand that the work was anything but simple. Only the base of the skull required two weeks of dedicationalmost half a month during which he cut the bones piece by piece to keep the dura mater intact and that the eyes remained attached to the optic nerves. With the help of a very fine needle he separated the cranial nerves, the spinal cord and its nerves. Then he used bandages, gauze and pads soaked in alcohol and applied white lead-based paint and shellac to preserve them. Extracting and preserving the intricate system of filaments that shaped Harriet Cole’s system was only part of the challenge. To shape the composition that still today, 13 decades later, continues to amaze Drexel medical students, he had to suspend the mass of fibers from a special board with thousands of pins. The result, named “Harriet” in a nod to the donor, was used by Weaver for his anatomy classes at Hahnemann Medical College; but his virguería soon transcended the walls of the laboratory and even the limits of Philadelphia. In 1839, about three years after the professor’s death, the board was presented and achieved distinction in the famous Word’s Columbian Exhibition. Since then, Harriet’s image has been reproduced in books, articles… Even today, more than 130 years later, the Legacy Center in Drexel University welcomes applications of teachers who want to use their images for their classes at universities or secondary schools. Who was Harriet? As time has passed, the focus has also been placed on Cole herself. Years ago precisely the Legacy Center decided to go beyond inherited history since the end of the 19th century and delve into the figure of the former Hahnemann cleaner. Specifically, he asked himself some questions: Did Harriet really exist? And if it was so, who was it? Why did he donate his body? Under what circumstances did you decide it? Did she know what Professor Weaver would use her corpse for? During their investigation they found many clues and circumstantial evidence, but no conclusive data. The Legacy Center located an 1870 census entry referring to an African-American woman named Harriet Cole who worked as a domestic servant and lived in Philadelphia, right in the same district where Hahnemann College was located; also a death certificate with his name signed in March 1888 and which attributes the cause of death to tuberculosis. What’s more, the center dedicated to medical study is designated as the “place of burial.” Does that mean that Harriet is the same person that, stripped of muscles, veins, bones and cartilage, we continue to see pinned at Drexel University? The institution recognizes that it is very difficult to know. The gaps in the center’s records between 1869 and 1900 make it difficult to go further. In any case, slip that it is not crazy think that Harriet Cole was a poor woman who, faced with the prospect of imminent death, decided to bequeath her … Read more

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