Mobile Tech & Gadgets Archives - Page 819 of 1642

The most unexpected treatment against cancer is LED light, and it is giving good results

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

Currently there are many research groups that have a very clear objective: find a cancer treatment that is effective, specific and above all safe. Something that can be really complex because of everything that cancer hides behind it, but science continues to give us good news. The last one comes from the University of Texas and the University of Porto which have developed a technique based on tin oxide nanoflakes (SnOx) and LEDs that allows cancer cells to be destroyed with precision. The current problem. The therapy par excellence today in the fight against cancer, without a doubt It’s chemotherapy and radiotherapy. The first of these has numerous problems that have been tried to be corrected, such as low specificity, that is, it attacks both cancer cells like the healthy ones. And this ultimately produces many side effects that can cause you to not continue with the treatment. This makes the goal of science to seek specificity and for the treatment to attack only cancer cells. This is something that is being tried to achieve with immunotherapy and techniques like CAR-T which ultimately is part of personalized medicine for each patient and which offers a very specific selection of the type of cell to destroy. But science has not stopped here. The discovery. One of the techniques that appears to be promising is photothermal therapy (PTT). The concept in this case is quite simple to understand: inject nanomaterials into a tumor and then heat them using light. This logically causes a localized increase in temperature, which selectively destroys the cancer cells that have been marked before. The problem until now was materials and light. Many photothermal therapies require high-powered lasers, which are expensive and can damage surrounding tissue. Now, a team of researchers from the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Porto have found the key to changing the rules of the game. A secret ingredient. The team has developed a new photothermal agent called nanoflakes that are made of tin oxide. After all, they are tiny sheets with a thickness of less than 20 nanometers and what is really ingenious is how they were manufactured. The really ingenious thing is how they made them. They started from a cheap and abundant material such as tin disulfide, which ironically is useless for photothermal therapy. In this way, through a ‘green’ and scalable process called electrochemical exfoliation with oxidation, which only uses aqueous media, they managed to transform the inactive tin disulfide into tin oxide that was already ready to fight cancer. And the light came. Once this material was available, all that was left was to expose it to the LED irradiation low-cost that emit infrared light at 810 nm. In this case we are talking about radiation that is very safe and does not damage healthy skin as can occur with radiotherapy, and it is also extremely cheap and accessible to everyone (even developing countries). Results. To test the effectiveness, researchers have tested cells in culture. The first thing they saw was that this treatment had no effect on healthy cells, that is, it did not destroy them. But the best comes when applying it to cancer cells results in a great reduction in the different colonies. Specifically, in skin cancer there was a 92% reduction in the viability of tumor cells, while in colorectal cancer this percentage dropped to 50%, but still maintained good results. And all thanks to an increase in temperature from 37 °C to 50 °C in 30 minutes that killed cancer cells. The future. This study not only presents a more efficient material, but validates its use with safer and more economical light sources. The researchers themselves point to the potential of LED systems for applications such as skin cancer treatment, which could theoretically be self-administered at home. This would be a great advantage for patients and would reduce the burden on health systems, although there is still a lot of research ahead to see if this therapy can be viable in a range that will surely not be less than 10 years. Images | National Cancer Institute Logan Voss In Xataka | Colon cancers are increasing alarmingly among young people. We have a suspect: sedentary lifestyle

India has bombed clouds to improve its terrible air quality. They have wasted 400,000 dollars

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

The sky of New Delhi is a painting. While half the world is focused on reduce your emissions and improve air quality (something that ultra-polluted giants like China are successfully implementing), the other half continues with inefficient decarbonization policies. India is one of themand the arrival of winter does not help. To combat its poor air quality, the country has “sown its clouds” about New Delhi. And there are voices that suggest that they have spent a fortune and it has not been worth anything. Crisis. The situation of the large cities of India, with the focus on a capital that has more than 28 million inhabitants in its metropolitan area and a density of almost 6,000 inhabitants per km², is really complicated. Vehicle emissions account for 40% of emissions in the city, but there are other sources such as construction dust, inorganic aerosols or industrial activities themselves that contribute a lot. ‘dirt’ in the city air. The quality is not good at any time of the year, but in the post-monsoon season, between October and November, the situation becomes critical. It is when a large amount of rice stubble and other waste is burned, which, together with the rest of the sources of particles since the arrival of cold air traps the pollutants near the ground, causes the amount of particles to skyrocket. And it’s not a joke: esteem that between 2009 and 2019 there were nearly four million deaths in India linked to poor air quality. Figures. To measure this “dirt” in the air, we turn to PM2.5. It is a measure of the amount of fine particles that are suspended in the air, specifically those that have a diameter equal to or less than 2.5 micrometers. They are so small that they can penetrate deep into the lungs, reaching the blood system and posing a serious health risk. That said, PM2.5 levels in Delhi are between 140 and 170 µg/m³, almost 12 times higher than the safe levels set by the WHO, of 15 µg/m³. Petter Ljungman, a researcher at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, analyzed the role of these particles and determined that “each increase of 10 micrograms per cubic meter in the concentration of PM2.5 leads to an 8.6% increase in mortality.” Bombing the clouds. In the face of a crisis like this, two things can be done: become aware and rethink the country’s strategy or resort to desperate measures. As we read in Reutersit seems that the Government has opted for the latter. On October 28, the Delhi government in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur carried out the first tests of cloud seeding. This is India’s first attempt at this technique and it is not about “creating clouds”, but rather making the existing ones release water. Using a series of catalysts launched from aircraft, water droplets contained in a cloud can be made to coalesce into larger, heavier droplets. In this way, and due to their own weight, they fall to the ground in the form of rain. It is not something new because, although it may seem like something out of science fiction, we have been “sowing” clouds for half a century. Negative… results. The problem is that each time we have had more and more evidence that it is something that is of little use. If clouds are good candidates, yes, showers are generated, but the big problem is that it is a very expensive practice for the results obtained and that is the reason why more and more countries have abandoned his projects related to this “creation” of rain. In the case of the Indian experiment, the cost was about $400,000 to put into operation the planes that dispersed sodium chloride and silver iodide over several districts north of the capital. Each of the flights cost about $70,000 and the person who said that it was not of much use was not an external entity or someone critical of the Government: it was the director of IIT Kanpur himself. Manindra Agarwal admitted that the results were “not as desired” because the humidity levels in the clouds were extremely low. It was a crucial error because it is estimated that the minimum for condensing these cloud droplets is 50% and the chosen ones had levels between 15 and 20%. Despite this, Agarwal commented that a reduction of between 6% and 18% was observed in certain particle measurement parameters, but they were at very localized and short-lived moments. deaf ears. And of course, faced with the investment of such a fortune without results, it did not take long for the voices to say “I told you so” to rain down. Climate activists said it, but also two other official bodies: the Indian Meteorological Department and the Air Quality Management Commission. The two organizations indicated That the technique requires specific clouds that are absent during Delhi’s cold, dry winter. Recommendations. In the end, what this action demonstrates is that, in desperate situations, desperate measures only work as a source of funds. The solutions must be considered more in the medium and short term and this is something in which China has served as an example. In the case of India, what is being proposed is control over stubble burning during this autumn season, better waste management and stricter industrial regulations. On the other hand, the country has taken giant steps in recent years in terms of transport electrification is concerned, but progress must also be made in improving urban forestry that “traps” pollution and in the use of large-scale renewable energy. Until they do that, the almost 30 million inhabitants of New Delhi will breathe air equivalent what they would inhale if they smoked seven cigarettes a day. Images | Naomi E Tesla, Submitmpsd In Xataka | The Atacama salt flat is the key on which the electric car industry pivots. And it’s starting to dry

the look that became a voice and guide

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

In 2019 we published a 37 minute documentary about Dulce, a girl with motor paralysis who learned to communicate using only his eyes and a system of eye-tracking by Irisbond. When she started with him, she was six years old. The learning process had just begun. The eighteen months of recording culminated with a moment that summed up the entire effort: in front of her classmates, using her communicator, Dulce announced “my mother has a baby.” Pure manifestation of desires, willingness to share. Perhaps the first time he not only named the world but shaped it. Six years later, we have spoken again with Raúl, his father. Today Dulce is thirteen years old, her brother Max is already ten, and Dante, that baby who was beginning to appear in Raquel, is already five years old. The communicator is still your voice, but what has changed is what you say with it and what you use it for. From spectator to teacher When we met her, Dulce was learning to use the device with the patience of first Celia and then Mariano, her educators. He burst virtual balloons on the screen, related pictograms with concepts, constructed basic phrases. The process was methodical and exhausting: each session required prior calibration, sustained concentration, and the diffuse promise that that, one day, would give him communicative independencesomething very remote then. Dulce introducing herself at one of her talks. Image provided. Now Dulce is on the other side. Not only does she now master the system, but she has become a trainer for other communicator users through Gema Canales Foundation. “She is as a teacher, teaching other children to use communicators because she is very good at it and has a lot of patience,” explains Raúl. “He’s taught three or four kids how to use the system already.” It is not a specific activity. According to her father, it is something she would like to continue in the future, when she is an adult. The communicator is no longer just his or her tool of expression, but also what he or she trains others in.. The transformation is complete: from student struggling to articulate simple ideas to mentor capable of transmitting technique and patience to others. Teenage conversations The most notable thing is not the technological leaps—which there have been, although moderate—but the communicative leaps. In 2018, Dulce was pronouncing single words, constructing short sentences and expressing basic desires. Six years later he has more complex conversations. “She has normal conversations of a 13-year-old teenager,” says Raúl. Image provided. The most notable change came with mobile phones. Dulce already has her own, not as the main communication device – for that she continues to use the Irisbond system connected to a tablet – but as a gateway to digital socialization typical of their age. The mobile allows you to access WhatsApp and have conversations with friends, a teenage rite of passage. Although he accesses through WhatsApp Web for fluidity and convenience, he also likes to use his cell phone with the mobility that his left hand allows. This communicative autonomy has also changed its social dynamics. Raúl remembers moments when Dulce, in new environments with strangers, starts conversations using her communicator. The other kids quickly naturalize the system: “Oh, okay, I talk and she answers me like this.” There is no discomfort, just a slight adaptation to the pace of the conversation, which is slower than natural speech but fluid to maintain complete dialogues. The voice that doesn’t want to change Technologically, the system has not evolved a lot in these six years. The most important improvements occurred in the years before the documentary, when the eye-tracking It went from crude to functional. Since then, progress has been incremental. The response speed has improved slightly, the software is somewhat more predictive, but nothing transformative. The most interesting thing is that Dulce has resisted changing the voice of the communicator. The system has been updated with more voices, even from children, not just adults, as some parents had been demanding. Image provided. When the tool added the first children’s voices, Raúl went “with all his enthusiasm” to configure it on Dulce’s tablet, but he found something unexpected: her refusal. She preferred to keep the one she has been using for years, with an adult ring. “She’s already gotten used to that being her sound. It’s like your voice changes overnight, you feel strange, you don’t recognize yourself in it.” His father speculates something obvious but easy to forget: when you’ve spent most of your life hearing yourself speak in one way, changing your voice is not an improvement, it’s losing your sound identity. The limit is still physical Dulce finished primary education with excellent grades, with the only curricular adaptation in Physical Education. Now he is in 1st year of ESO and limitations are beginning to appear, not due to cognitive ability but due to motor demand. Mathematics, which in Primary was numbers, now introduces algebra. “There it could get more complicated for her,” admits Raúl. The solution involves an assistant who transcribes what Dulce indicates with her communicator, a necessary support not because she does not understand the subject but because writing equations with her eyes is infinitely slower than by hand. It is a technical limitation, not an intellectual one, but it sets the pace of your academic progress. The impact of the documentary The 2019 report did not change Dulce’s life or that of her family. There was no media transformation or avalanche of attention. But Raúl remembers a very specific effect: when they had meetings with the Madrid Department of Education or made requests for academic support resources, someone would mention “ah, yes, you are Dulce’s family, the one from the documentary.” “I already had a face, eyes, expressiveness, a story,” he explains. “It wasn’t just a name in a dossier.” In the bureaucratic negotiation for resources and support, this minimal humanization of the file worked in their favor. It wasn’t … Read more

Five technology offers to take advantage of MediaMarkt’s Black Weeks, today, November 9

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

Nothing left for Black Friday! In a few weeks, what is one of the biggest sales campaigns of the year will begin, so many stores have already launched discounts that serve as a small preview. MediaMarkt, for example, has its Black Weeksso in this article we are going to review what they are five of their best deals that will be available over the weekend. Google Pixel 10 by 799 euros with coupon, one of the best proposals of the year with a much more reasonable price. Sony WH-1000XM4L by 189 eurostop quality-price headphones that are now cheaper. LaCie Mobile Drive V2 by 145.99 eurosa 5TB hard drive that has a portable design. iPhone 16e by 599 eurosApple’s mobile phone returns with one of the best discounts it has received to date. Dyson V8 Advanced by 259 eurosa good Dyson vacuum cleaner that has dropped in price by 35%. Google Pixel 10 There are not a few offers that the Google Pixel 10 since its launch, and now a new one has arrived at the MediaMarkt store: introducing the coupon TradeInPixel10100Nov Before processing the purchase, you can buy by 799 euros. And be careful, because it is a mobile phone that has an excellent multimedia section, very good cameras, exquisite software and 256 GB of internal storage. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Sony WH-1000XM4L If what you are looking for are good headphones, be careful because the Sony WH-1000XM4L have fallen in MediaMarkt up to 189 eurosa precious thing considering that, despite the fact that there are a couple of more current generations, They offer a very good sound experience. They have excellent active noise cancellation, are very comfortable and their battery offers a range of up to 30 hours. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links LaCie Mobile Drive V2 Although SSD units have taken a more prominent role than HDD hard drives, the latter tend to have much more competitive prices. He LaCie Mobile Drive V2 is a good example of this, since at MediaMarkt it is on sale for 145.99 euros. Has 5TB internal storage, has a USB-C connection, allows you to make backup copies and has a resistant and portable design. LaCie Mobile Drive V2 (5TB) The price could vary. We earn commission from these links iPhone 16e He iPhone 16e It was launched on sale and since then we have been able to find it on sale many times. Now, MediaMarkt has it for 599 eurosone of the best prices it has had so far. It is a powerful mobile thanks to the A18 chipoffers good autonomy and is ideal for those who want a very compact format (6.1 inches). The price could vary. We earn commission from these links Dyson V8 Advanced On the other hand, if what you are looking for is a good vacuum cleaner, be careful because this Dyson V8 Advanced has fallen to 259 euros. It is a cordless vacuum cleaner that offers a power of up to 130 AW, its theoretical autonomy is up to 40 minutes and it comes with several accessories. In addition, it has several modes of use and has a hygienic emptying system for dirt. The price could vary. We earn commission from these links 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 | MediaMarkt and Compradicción (header), Google, Sony, LaCie, Apple, Dyson In Xataka | The best mobile phones (2025), we have tested them and here are their analyzes In Xataka | Best wireless headphones. Which one to buy and 21 models from 15 euros to 470 euros

China has just completed the world’s tallest dam. And what stands out the least is that it is as tall as a skyscraper

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

China has a beastly capacity to create pharaonic structures. Impossible roadshighways with infernal ‘knots’, very complex tunnels and one ridiculous amount of bridges so functional and essential to connect areas like ostentatious. But among all his civil engineering works, the ones that are most striking to me are the dams. And, after the largest in the world, now They have one that is as tall as a skyscraper. It is the Zhenjiang pumping stationand is key to adding even more renewable energy to your accountant. Figures. The name is “Zhenjiang/Jurong Pumping Station” and, located in Jiangsu province, it has become the latest milestone in Chinese energy engineering. The project began in 2017 and, as is customary in almost all of these infrastructures in the Asian giant, both its dimensions and construction times are surprising. In these eight years, they have built the highest pumping dam in the world, 182 meters high, equivalent to a 60-story building. Apart from the height, its volcano shape is striking, with a reservoir at the top capable of storing up to 17.07 million cubic meters of water. Context? What 6,800 Olympic-sized swimming pools have (okay, it’s equally difficult to imagine the number). Bowels. It’s not just imposing on the outside. Its engine room is 800 meters deep and has dimensions of 250 meters long, 60 meters high and another 25 meters wide. In this room are the six mixed turbines and, in total, the project has established a dozen records in the sector. Its role in renewables. It is estimated that the investment has been about 9.6 billion yuan, about 1.3 billion euros, and all to feed more than 360,000 homes. Each of the turbines generates 225 MW for a total of 1.3 GW of installed power. Thanks to both the dimensions of the turbines and the difference in level and force of the water, it is estimated that it will consume 1,800 million kWh annually during pumping and will generate 1,350 million kWh during discharge. It is a consumption/generation difference of 25% and, although it is not a figure that attracts attention, it is a milestone, since current pumping (or reversible) installations require hydraulic jumps of about 400 meters to operate under the same conditions. The turbines at the Zhenjiang plant do so with a head of less than 200 meters. That is, it is optimized for low gradient conditions, but maintaining a high volumetric flow. In summary, It’s like a giant battery, but with water. During low demand hours, the plant moves water to the upper reservoir and, during peak consumption, releases it, passing it through the turbines at high speed and generating electricity in the process. According to estimates, it will save 140,000 tons of coal per year, which represents 349,000 tons of CO₂. One more in the Yangtze. Despite everything the plant represents in terms of civil engineering and its role in renewablesthe greatest achievement of this plant is that it has been shown that it is possible to build massive storage systems if artificial elevations are created. In flat areas with unfavorable orography, Zhenjiang demonstrates that pumping structures can be created to help achieve decarbonization objectives without depending so much on wind and solar power. Wang Chenhui, director of the Development Department of State Grid Zhenjiang Power Supply Company -responsible for the dam-, assures that “at full operation it will provide approximately 2.7 million kilowatts of bidirectional power regulation capacity, relieving pressure on the electrical grid during peak load periods.” It will be more help for Jiangsu province than this summer consumed 6% more electricity than in 2024, reaching 156 million kilowatts. And also in the Yangtze are the mammoth dam of the Three Gorges and the next largest dam in the world. The one in Zhenjiang is not so huge nor does it generate as much electricity, but it is the highest in the world and, as we said, a demonstration that, if the terrain is not good, you can always build a huge pool at 190 meters high. Image | Ministry of Water Resources of the People’s Republic of China In Xataka | China has built the highest bridge in the world and has done what it must: turn it into a show

We have found 76 megatraps in the Andes. It’s amazing we hadn’t done it before.

November 9, 2025 by usatoday24

Beyond being an imposing mountain range, the Andes were one of the great hotbeds of civilization. In their complex networks of passageways they developed highly organized societieswith cultures such as the Caral, Chavin, Tiwanaku or Moche that preceded the powerful inca empire. The most impressive thing is that we continue to discover the secrets of these civilizations and we have just found 76 stone structures that not only represent advanced technology. They also confirm that there were authentic technical laboratories in the passageways of the Andes. In short. In a article published in the magazine Antiquity Researcher Adrián Oyaneder, an archaeologist at the University of Exeter, details how, by analyzing high-resolution satellite images belonging to a remote area of the Camarones River basin, he found a series of structures that were repeated. Using images of both Sentinel-2 as of Google Earththe archaeologist combed more than 4,600 km² and found 76 ‘chacus‘. “My reaction when I saw the first chacu was to check it twice or even three times. I thought it was something unique, but as I went along I realized that they were everywhere in a quantity never before recorded in the Andes,” comment. It seems important, but… what corks are those ‘chacus’? The ‘chacus’. It is a term that comes from traditional Inca practices and, basically, they are very specific constructions. Its characteristics are: Funnel shape consisting of two long dry stone walls that converge to form a corridor that gradually narrows. Dimensions of about 150 meters long and one and a half meters high. Locations that seem strategic, since they are built on steep slopes between 2,800 and 4,200 meters above sea level. Not even if they were coffee plantations… So that? That’s the second question. They were traps. Traps for vicuñasspecifically. It is a relative of the alpacas and what the hunters did was urge the herds to move to the chacus, which with its funnel shape trapped the animals. But those traps could not be left by the hand of God, and Oyaneder continued searching until he found what he was looking for: traces of life. In the vicinity of the chacus, the archaeologist identified almost 800 small-scale settlements that consisted of several shelters built of stone and circular in shape. He estimates that they would be temporary camps, since human groups moved strategically through the highlands following the rhythm of the seasons. During the humid months in which the pass flourished, the settlers would go to the higher areas, but when these dried out, they descended, hunting vicuñas and, probably, some early form of agriculture. The estimate from Oyaneder is that some of these traps are about 6,000 years old. Implications. Finding 76 of these megatraps in one fell swoop is fascinating, but more important than the discovery is seeing how it fits into the story we knew until now. The Andes are a hostile environment and having discovered these structures implies that primitive Andean cultures had great resilience to adapt to the difficulties of the mountains. It also suggests that large-scale hunting coexisted with the development of pastoralism and agriculture in the region. Convergent evolution. It is now being analyzed whether the chacus represent the hunting systems at this scale oldest in the Andes, but something interesting is that there are parallels with structures that are thousands of kilometers away. An example, the ‘desert kites’ of Western Sahara: large ‘V’-shaped stone structures that were used to hunt gazelles or antelopes in a way very similar to that of Andean civilizations. It is curious that two civilizations without contact developed such similar megatraps, but it is not that strange and it is a phenomenon called “convergent evolution.” In any case, the discovery of these 76 structures in the Andes once again puts on the table that the 3D techniques and high-resolution satellite images make investigating remote, huge or difficult-to-access areas easier. Images | Antiquity In Xataka | The Incas did not need writing to forge an empire. And we are closer to solving the key object in your organization

On this island in Japan there is a traffic light that only turns green once a year, and not precisely to control traffic

November 8, 2025 by usatoday24

On the small Japanese island of Himakajima there is a traffic light which remains flashing amber or red all year round. Only during one day in May does it change its usual behavior and activate its green light (or blue, as they insist in Japan). This is not a fault. It was designed this way for a reason that goes beyond traffic control. An educational traffic light. The traffic light was installed in 1994 at the Himakajima East Port intersection, but not to regulate traffic. The island barely has 2,000 inhabitants and few vehicles circulate on its roads. The traffic light exists solely to teach children of the place how the urban signals work before they leave the island for larger cities. One less problem. According to explains the Himaka Road Safety Association, which promoted its installation, minors grew up without real experience with traffic lights. Before, they used small models in traffic safety classes, but the children themselves asked “what does a real traffic light look like?” account Kazuo Sugiura, former president of the association, to the local media Asahi. One day a year to learn. Every May, the traffic light is activated for a full day. Third and fifth grade students from the local school go to the crossing accompanied by teachers, parents and authorities. There they practice how to cross correctly: they wait for the color to change, look both ways and cross the zebra crossing with their arm raised, just as they would in any city in Japan. More difficult than expected. The children also discover that calculating the time they have to cross the pass is not as simple as it seems. “It was complicated because it turned red when I was trying to cross,” explained a third-grade student after practicing with her bicycle. The exercise helps them understand the real times of light change and develop security reflexes that they cannot acquire in their daily life on the island. An unexpected tourist curiosity. This little anecdote has gained notoriety beyond Japan. Every year videos and photos circulate on social networks showing the peculiar educational ritual. Some users even consult the local government website to find out the exact date of “green day” and witness the event, although it varies slightly each season. It is already part of the island’s identity. Once the annual training is completed, the traffic light returns to its flashing lights routine. It does not serve any practical function in traffic control, but it has ended up becoming a small symbol of how the community of this island prepares its children for the urban world. The rest of the year, Himakajima remains a quiet place known for its beaches and octopus dishes, with a traffic light that counts down the days until it can turn green again. Cover image | Google Maps In Xataka | Convenience stores were an emblem of Japan. Until the demographic crisis has revealed the dark side of opening 24 hours

A new mathematical proof settles the debate over whether the universe is a simulation

November 8, 2025 by usatoday24

What if everything we see, feel and experience is not real? It is one of the most fascinating ideas in science fiction and modern philosophy, in which it is proposed that everything around us it’s a real simulation of computer of some higher civilizationas if we were literally sims. And such is its magnitude, that science has had to come out to deny this idea. The problem. The ‘simulation hypothesis’ has gone beyond being a simple movie premise to a serious debate in technology circles and physical. The argument is usually statistical: if a civilization can create one simulation of reality, it will probably create many. These simulations could in turn generate their own and in this infinite ‘stack’ of realities, the odds that our universe be original, they are almost non-existent. And although this has been a very restrained topic among philosophers, science has also wanted to fully enter into research to respond to a problem within fundamental physics and pure mathematics. And the answer is quite clear: we are not in a simulation. The study. An international team of physicists, including Dr. Mir Faizal of the University of British Columbia (UBC) and renowned physicist Dr. Lawrence M. Krauss, has mathematically proven that the universe cannot be a computer simulation. His findings, published in it Journal of Holography Applications in Physicsnot only disprove the idea, but reveal something much deeper about the nature of reality: the universe is based on a type of “understanding” that exists beyond the reach of any algorithm. The reality. To understand this test, we must first understand what ‘reality’ is. Modern physics no longer sees the universe as tangible ‘matter’ moving in empty space, but thanks to Einstein space and time merged to now demonstrate that the microscopic world is probabilistic. The most widely accepted theory today focuses on quantum gravity, which suggests that space and time are fundamental. They are “emergent”: they spring from something deeper, something more like pure information. In this way, physicists assume that a “Theory of Everything“(ToE) that unifies gravity and quantum physics would, in essence, be a large axiomatic system: a set of meaningful rules and algorithmic calculations from which the entire universe, including spacetime itself, could be “computed” and generated. Incompleteness Theorems. In 1931, logician Kurt Gödel demonstrated something that blew up the foundations of mathematics: any formal system (such as a computer program or a set of physical laws) that is complex enough to include basic arithmetic will be incomplete or inconsistent. By ‘incomplete’ we mean that there will be true statements within the systems themselves that will never be able to be demonstrated following their own rules. It’s like the famous paradox that says “this statement is true, but it cannot be proven.” Faizal’s team argues that any purely algorithmic ToE would suffer from this limitation. There would always be “Gödelian truths” about the physics of the universe (perhaps about specific microstates of black holes or the nature of the singularity) that such a computational system could not test. Two layers. If the algorithmic universe is “incomplete”, how does our reality seem to work? Researchers propose that reality is not only the algorithm. This is what allows the universe to “know” that these Gödel truths are true, even though the algorithm alone cannot prove them. It is a fundamental layer of reality that transcends simple computing. The final test. With all the pieces on the table, the refutation of the simulation hypothesis becomes clear and elegant. The first of all is that every simulation is logarithmic, that is, a computer executes a problem following very specific rules that leave no room for doubt. In this way, we come face to face with our theories that are not ‘perfect’ in their demonstrations. But they don’t stop there, since scientists have pointed out that an algorithm can only simulate the algorithmic part, meaning that a computer could only, in the best of cases, emulate the computational and incomplete part of our universe. And the most important thing without a doubt is that our universe is more than an algorithm, since as Gödel’s theorems demonstrate, complete physical reality must include a non-algorithmic layer to be consistent and complete. Images | Compare Fiber In Xataka | Exactly 100 years ago we began to understand how the world works. Quantum physics has radically changed our lives

Portable batteries are part of urban infrastructure in China. I have tried them and I need them to arrive in Europe

November 8, 2025 by usatoday24

After a decade of writing about gadgets and tens of thousands of miles of travel under my belt, a few weeks ago a destination managed to make me nervous. I was traveling, for the first time, to China. A few days before leaving, I realized that I did not have any batteries with the necessary certification and buying them in Spain is complicated. My idea was to get one there, but to my surprise I came across reality: hives of external batteries on every corner. Below I will tell you about my experience renting one and testing its loading speed. Powerbanks as urban infrastructure. A few months ago, my colleague Javier He already commented on his fascination with this ecosystem of external batteries that anyone can rent. It is really not something so new, since it has running since 2017 and its concept is very interesting. In China we need the cell phone for everything (AliPay and Wechat They are two apps that are your bank, your transportation card, your payment card, your way of ordering in restaurants and much more) and it is something that drains the battery. Therefore, the idea arose to locate stations with several external rental batteries at strategic points in the city. The market is dominated by four companies, they are in the main cities and the process is as simple as: Scan the station’s QR code. Take one of the removable batteries. Use them while we eat or move. Return them to any other point on the network (it does not have to be at the station where we took it). Photo: Xataka Photo: Xataka Photo: Xataka Photo: Xataka Photo: Xataka Photo: Xataka renting one. For me, who went with a iPhone 16 in your pocket (whose battery is no wonder), having something like this available was a lifesaver. And, since science doesn’t do itself, during breakfast I rented one available at my hotel with the intention of using it while I ate and returning it just before leaving. The process is indicated just above these lines and, in my case, I used AliPay. Photo: Xataka You have to go with the application previously configured and, in my case, I loaded a Revolut prepaid card. I didn’t have any problems during the week I was in Beijing. I scanned the QR code of the charging station with AliPay itself and… blessed translation system. It works when it wants and it translates some things regularly, but enough to understand it. The price is 0.12 yuan per minute (about 0.014 euros), but since I don’t have a bank account in China, I had to pay a deposit of 99 yuan (about 12 euros). As soon as I paid, the app told me what power bank I had to remove it and the station itself made the corresponding battery LED flash. To load. Charging experience. The first thing I liked is that you don’t need absolutely anything other than the battery. This includes a USB-C, Lightning and even micro-USB cable. They are short cables, but they are appreciated so you don’t have to carry yours in your pocket. It has LEDs that indicate the charge level and there really isn’t much more to say about the design. Regarding their characteristics, it depends, but they usually have 5,000 mAh and the big asterisk is in the power. 5V/2.4A It is about 12 W and that implies that it will charge at a slow speed. But hey, it is designed so that you can carry it for a while or while you eat and spend at least half an hour/an hour with it. Photo: Xataka On my iPhone 16, the charging times were as follows: I started with 26% battery and in 30 minutes I reached 45%. At 60 minutes it had reached 64%. After 90 minutes it was charged up to 82%. As I say, a slow experience, but I see it as feasible to spend an hour eating or walking between stores, and recovering 38% allows you to survive the rest of the day. When you return it, you have a map where you see all the available stations. I simply went to a different one, clicked on the finalize the transaction button, scanned the QR again and inserted it into the indicated slot. The final price was 14 yuan after almost two hours in my possession, about 1.73 euros to my account. And, the next day, I already had the 99 yuan deposit back in my Revolut. Reviews. Discussing the move with our teammates, we agreed that the price is not high for us, that we use the euro and for those 1.7 euros, well… it allowed me to continue the rest of the day. But we also wonder how the Chinese would view those 14 yuan. And it seems not very well. One of the complaints It is precisely that the price has been increasing in some points. If at the beginning it cost one yuan per hour, now it ranges between two and six. The reason is that it depends a lot on the location (more or less tourist areas, hospitals, hotels, bars, etc.). Coupled with the fact that it is a very fair power and cell phones have more and more battery life, it is almost better to buy an external battery if you know that every now and then you have to rent at one of these stations (which, in addition, can be full at times and you have to go around looking for another one to return the battery. The businesses themselves have also been dissatisfied at times, since it is a market monopolized by a few companies that, evidently, control both the rental price and the profits. Future. Despite this, for tourists, it is an extremely attractive option due to its convenience and because, let’s not fool ourselves, the exchange rate to our currency is favorable to us. And for the industry, it represents an important benefit. In 2020, … Read more

the household employees of the ultra-rich who earn more than Pedro Sánchez

November 8, 2025 by usatoday24

In the month of April we count a trend that was beginning to circulate among that sector of civilization that is capable of having eight or more figures in the bank account. The ultra-rich, after years spending fortunes on home automation of their mansions, had decided to return to analog times by eradicating any trace of technology in homes. But it’s one thing to throw LEDs, and quite another to throw a Picasso. Because they don’t ignore works of art and luxury furniture. In fact, they pay a premium for their care. Even more than a president of the government. The art of cleaning luxury. In the universe of the richest households on the planet, cleaning is no longer a household chore: it is a painstaking science, a highly specialized skill, and a six-figure job. He told it in a extensive Bloomberg report with cases like that of Gina, who with 26 years of experience in domestic service, is today a executive housekeeper in the San Francisco Bay that wins more than $100,000 a year for taking care of mansions where each piece of furniture is a work of art. Her rise from basic cleaning to managing multimillion-dollar residences reflects a global phenomenon: the transformation of luxury cleaning into a skilled profession driven by the sophistication of contemporary design and the shortage of trained staff. In these houseserror is not measured in stains but in thousands of dollars: a miscalculated rub can destroy the original finish of a knob or the shine of a collector’s piece. In this ecosystem, cleaning requires as much technical knowledge as a kind of restorer or even a museum curator. The new frontier of cleaning. All this is understood due to the rise of high-end design, which has raised standards of domestic work at unprecedented levels. In the houses where Gina works, the objects are no longer “furniture”, but investments and fragments of history: tables by Diego Giacometti more expensive than a Ferrarisofas by Jean Royère valued in millions or pieces by François-Xavier Lalanne that reach record numbers at auctions. Cleaning them requires knowing the materials, understanding their chemical reactions and applying precise protocols. Wood, metals, fabrics, glass or rattan become conservation challenges more than hygiene challenges. Common products and tools (such as popular Swiffer) are, according to expertsenemies of conservation: they alter surfaces, remove patinas or introduce chemical residues. The correct thing to do is almost artisanal: moisten your hands, use a cotton cloth and maintain just the right humidity to trap the dust without damaging the material. The border between cleaning and disinfecting, seemingly trivial, is essential: “You cannot disinfect without cleaning first,” repeat the trainers, aware that ignorance can cost more than an annual salary. Shortages and astronomical salaries. The value of these professionals has been triggered. Before the pandemic, a housekeeper with experience maintaining luxury homes earned a few $60,000 annually. Today, that figure easily exceeds the 100,000more benefits and bonuses. In fact, demand has grown at the same pace as extreme wealth and the proliferation of delicate objects. Training companies like that of Charles MacPherson in Toronto they offer five week programs that combine communication with the employer, home security and cleanliness with contemporary design. The lack of qualified personnel has made housekeepers executives in a good scarce and coveted. To give us an idea, they remembered in Bloomberg that some are the subject of “signing” attempts by other millionaires, aware that a good professional can be the difference between preserving or ruining a collection. The competition, Gina explained.is fierce: “There are very few truly professional people in this, and many see it as a minor job.” In reality, luxury has redefined cleaning as a technical discipline where knowledge outweighs strength, and confidence outweighs hierarchy. From home to museum. The cultural change surrounding this new elite of cleaners also reflects a mutation in the relationship of the upper classes with its spaces. Billionaires’ homes have become hybrids between home and gallerywhere maintenance is part of the value of the heritage. Owners not only buy beauty, they buy responsibility: each object requires a conservation regime, and cleaning becomes an extension of curation. Here a mistake can be catastrophic: the case of the housekeeper who, when trying to “reshine” the handles of a door, removed an intentional patina and caused $75,000 damageis already a classic of the sector. In these houses, the hands that clean are not invisible: they are part of the ecosystem that protects the investment and maintains the aesthetics. The paradox is that a historically undervalued profession has become, at the top of the social pyramid, a profession as delicate and exclusive as the objects it touches. Economy of precision. The rise of cleanliness luxury to professional category highlights the contemporary logic of the market: when wealth multiplies and objects become irreplaceable, the care becomes a luxury in itself. In this environment, the shortage of trained personnel raises salaries, but also redefines the prestige of the profession. The professionalization of high-end domestic service marks a new frontier in the care economy: that of maintenance as art. If you like, Gina and her colleagues are no longer cleaners, they are guardians of heritage material of an elite that prefers to pay more than risk a unique piece. Thus, in the meticulous silence of those mansions, where each surface is worth as much as a sports car, the cotton rag has become a symbol of status, precision and trust. Image | Pexels, Pexels In Xataka | Barcelona has surpassed Vienna and Geneva: the rich now prefer to live near the beach, have fiber optics and public healthcare In Xataka | If the question is which is the place in Spain where there are the most millionaires and why, the answer is obvious: in Madrid, of course.

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