accelerator

we must lift the accelerator of AI

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Anthropic and OpenAI are competing in two parallel careers. On the one hand, the race to have the best model that continues to push cutting-edge AI. On the other hand, going public to become a public company. The winner of the first is debatable, but in the second competition it is Anthropic that has the advantage. This Monday he confirmed that had registered his application for the expected IPO, which could become the largest operation of this type in history which, as my colleague Javier Pastor commented, remember Netscape going public and marking the beginning of the dotcom fever. And, precisely in this scenario, the company has launched an interesting notice: a global pause must be made in the development of frontier AI. And it makes all the sense in the world at the same time that it is something that cannot happen taking into account the situation between the two powers that are in the current technological war. Taking your foot off the accelerator vs the technology race Anthropic has been using something curious for some time: the fear tactic. It is something that their main rival has thrown in their face (to automatically do exactly the same thing), but the truth is that Dario Amodei’s men from time to time drop some ‘bombshell’ about how We humans run the risk of losing control about this technology, with Amodei ensuring that there are possibilities that “things will go very, very bad.” In one publication Recently, the company behind Claude noted that they would be happy to take their foot off the gas on cutting-edge AI development only, and this is important, if they were confident that others would do the same. Again, they compare it with the development of war, as if it were an explosion in the number of nuclear weaponsnoting that they believe it would be a positive pause when comparing the rise of increasingly capable AIs with a “gun control problem.” When they talk about cutting-edge AI they refer to various models, but they focus on those that develop themselves. In a document shared this Thursday, two heavyweights from the company’s research team they affirmed that AI technology is approaching the point where systems can self-develop. That is to say: AI writing itself to improve. But, if they are so close (or so they say, since they have been talking about the same thing for months), why stop? Well, not for the technology sector, but for everything else. From Anthropic consider that a slowdown would allow other actors – countries and regulators, for example – to catch up with the technology. They comment that “it would be good for the world to have the option to temporarily slow down or pause the development of frontier AI to allow social structures and research to keep up.” The problem is coordination between countries because he does not trust at all that countries tell each other the truth. “AI training runs are much easier to hide than missile silos” As we read in The Telegraphthe company noted that “a significant slowdown or pause would require multiple labs with sufficient resources at or near the border AI agreeing to stop under the same conditions,” but the problem is that “it would also require each to be able to check what the others are doing and make sure they have actually stopped.” This has obviously brought criticism, such as that Anthropic is overestimating its capabilities (that’s why AI writes itself) or exaggerating the AI’s abilities so that it regulations are introduced that ‘harm’ their competitors. In any case, this stoppage is not going to occur in a context in which the United States and China cannot allow themselves to take their foot off the accelerator when they find themselves in a contest in which China is clear that wants to be the first technological power in the short term and the United States, evidently, does not want to allow it. In Xataka | Xiaomi is testing the mother of AIs for its cars, mobile phones and home. And there is no trace of Google or OpenAI

Europe and Japan step on the accelerator of nuclear fusion and place the ball in the court of a strategic country: Spain

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Europe and Japan walk hand in hand towards nuclear fusion commercial. They have been working together for several years in the JT-60SA experimental reactorthe largest magnetic confinement fusion energy machine that currently exists. However, this is not the only project in which they collaborate. They are also fine-tuning the LIPAc linear particle accelerator (Linear IFMIF Prototype Accelerator or IFMIF Prototype Linear Accelerator). This machine resides in Rokkasho (Japan). After having undergone a very ambitious update, it is ready to begin the final phase that will conclude with its commissioning in 2027. Its purpose is to test the limits of particle beam physics to pave the way for future fusion reactors. Europe and Japan began developing this 36-meter-long particle accelerator in 2007 with the aim of validating the design of an IFMIF-type machine (International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility) capable of acting as a neutron source. To achieve this, this device had to recreate the intense irradiation conditions that occur inside a fusion reactor. One of Europe’s most important contributions is a huge steel cryostat with magnetic shielding and a thermal shield that houses a powerful superconducting radio frequency system. This component serves to accelerate protons and deuterium nuclei until they reach a maximum energy of 9 MeV (megaelectronvolts), which will place them close to the high-energy neutrons that future commercial fusion reactors will produce. LIPAc is the precursor of IFMIF-DONES, which is already being built in Spain The knowledge that scientists hope to gain from LIPAc will be used in the development of IFMIF-DONES (International Fusion Materials Irradiation Facility DEMO-Oriented NEutron Source), that is already being built in Escúzar, a town in the province of Granada. The heart of this facility is a linear particle accelerator that will cost approximately 450 million euros, although the Government of Andalusia will provide half of this money. However, this is the cost of the accelerator; The entire IFMIF-DONES project will cost around 700 million euros. Spain will contribute half of this capital. IFMIF-DONES is one of the three fundamental pillars of the nuclear fusion edifice in whose construction the European Union is involved. The other two are ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) and DEMO. The experimental nuclear fusion reactor that is currently being built in the French town of Cadarache aims to demonstrate that fusion at the scale that man can handle worksand also that it is profitable from an energy point of view. However, ITER does not aim to produce electricity. That will be the task of DEMO (DEMOnstration Power Plant), a facility that will take the technological advances that have been proven to work correctly at ITER and take them one step further to establish itself as the true precursor of commercial nuclear fusion reactors. However, without IFMIF-DONES there will be no DEMO, so right now Granada is the center of attention. The IFMIF-DONES linear accelerator will produce high-energy neutrons with the intensity and irradiation volume necessary to test candidate materials To fully understand the role of the IFMIF-DONES project, it is necessary to briefly review the fundamentals of nuclear fusion. One of the greatest challenges faced by technicians involved in the development of nuclear fusion reactors using magnetic confinement, such as ITER, is to recreate the conditions necessary for them to operate inside the vacuum chamber of these sophisticated machines. deuterium and tritium nuclei fuse. However, this is by no means all. When this reaction takes place, the fusion of a deuterium nucleus and another tritium nucleus triggers the production of a helium nucleus and a neutron that is ejected with an energy of about 14 MeV. The problem is that the neutron lacks a net electrical charge, so it cannot be confined inside the magnetic field which, however, does manage to retain the deuterium and tritium nuclei, which have a positive electrical charge. This is the reason why when it originates as a result of the nuclear fusion reaction, this neutron is ejected towards the walls of the vacuum chamber with enormous energy. This particle is very important because in practice it will be closely linked to the production of electrical energy in nuclear fusion reactors, but, at the same time, it represents a very aggressive form of radiation that can significantly degrade the materials used in the reactor. The components that will be most affected by the direct impact of high-energy neutrons and the most intense heat flow are the internal wall of the vacuum chamber and the blanket. The components that will be most affected by the direct impact of high-energy neutrons and the most intense heat flow are the inner wall of the vacuum chamber and the blanketwhich is a mantle that covers it and whose purpose is to regenerate the tritium that must be used as fuel in the nuclear fusion reaction. This is why it is crucial to develop new materials that are able to withstand the neutron flux and therefore ensure that the reactor will have a long operational life. This is, neither more nor less, the purpose of IFMIF-DONES. And to carry it out it is necessary to set up facilities designed to allow the technicians involved in the project evaluate the properties of candidate materials to intervene not only in DEMO, but also in future commercial nuclear fusion reactors. The mission of this project invites us to intuit what the heart of IFMIF-DONES is: a source capable of producing high-energy neutrons with the intensity and volume of irradiation necessary to test the candidate materials. And this neutron source will be nothing more than a linear particle accelerator that will help IFMIF-DONES scientists to test, validate and qualify the materials that in the medium term should reach future electric energy production plants through fusion. Image | Fusion for Energy More information | Fusion for Energy In Xataka | ITER has faced one of the great challenges of nuclear fusion: preventing plasma at 150 million ºC from destroying the reactor

China wants to lead all technological conversations and is clear that this involves 6G. He has stepped on the accelerator

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Chenoa said that “when you go, I come.” In the technology sector it can be applied to many things, and one of them is the development of 6G by China. In 2018, the commercial deployment of 5G was taking its first steps, but in China there was already talk of the next generation. In the last update of the Five Year Plan they reconfirmed that 2030 was the deadline for network deployment, but now they are going one step further because 6G is not a simple improvement in communications. This is a geopolitical issue and a technology that will be ubiquitous. Completing phases. It was during the Annual Conference of the Zhongguancun Forum in Beijing where experts and representatives of the technology and communications industry presented an ambitious route for the development of the 6G network. Over the last five years, China has been patenting technologies related to the sixth generation and it is estimated that it accounts for approximately 40% of all global 6G patent applications. This is a very important step because, for example Huawei has already achieved something similar with 5G and that implies that everyone who wants to use that technology has to pay certain fees to the Chinese company. It also attracts talent and reinforces the internal industrial ecosystem for what is considered “a comprehensive industrial chain” in the country. It is something that has been bearing fruit, with a first phase in which companies have been collecting information and “materials” and a second phase for 2026 in which they project integrate more than 300 key 6G technologies into a functional prototype. AI from the ground up. Something key about this technology is that it is not simply something that will allow a connection with lower latency and higher speed. That is relevant, of course, since it is estimated that speeds above 100 Gbps will be achieved with a delay much less than a millisecond (in 5G, the figure is about 1Gbps), but in 6G what matters most is that it will be a system that will have artificial intelligence integrated into each layer. This is, perhaps, the most ambitious of everything that has been discussed in the forum. Unlike 5G, which has had to adapt to the capabilities of artificial intelligence and robotics, 6G has been designed with AI from the ground up. This implies that each network unit (stations, terminals and core networks) will have built-in AI computing power. In short: they will be systems that, in addition to allowing 6G connection, will have the capacity to operate AI agents locally. The idea is not to have to depend, for certain tasks, on data centers that are sometimes long distances away. In addition, it is being proposed that the network be ubiquitous – that it be everywhere -, being a system that can operate on land, air, space and sea. It sounds tremendously ambitious, but we are talking about a technology that will coexist with plans to take data centers into space. Mass adoption. As we pointed out a few days ago, China wants to carry out the deployment by 2030, but this ‘launch’ of 6G will not be for the consumer. Once the network is deployed and seeing that it is viable to promote the technologies they want to develop (robotics, physical AI, remote computing or autonomous driving, for example), it will be the consumer’s turn. It is something that will arrive by 2035, but here we should not be too optimistic. It won’t be easy. Although it sounds great to have devices in your pocket and at home that achieve that speed without the need for a cable connection, you have to keep something in mind: although 5G has been with us for more than six years, is still taking its first steps. We have 5G devices, yes, but there are several problems. One is that, many times, 5G is not “real” or does not reach the speeds it could. On the other hand, coverage is essential, and it is something that varies by neighborhood. In a report from a few months ago, the European communications giant Ericsson pointed out that Europe has a problem. While other countries have deployed the millimeter band, most European countries have prioritized the medium and low bands. We have a lot of coverage (there are the covered territory maps), but we have less speed and more latency. And if it is not resolved, the deployment of 6G will be useless. At least Europe has spoken out and He doesn’t want the play to be repeated.. Vital. And this, as we say, is essential because you will already be sensing that 6G is not only more speed: it is the wireless technology on which we want to shape the immediate future. have the superiority It is a geopolitical advantageand China is not the only one in this battle. China may have ZTE and Huawei, but South Korea has SK Telecom and Samsung. They want to have a functional 6G network by 2028, something in which they also Japan and the United States are involved. In any case, it is evident that we are going to start talking a lot about 6G in the short term because all the powers are moving. It will not be easy and the vice president of ZTE himself has commented that there are obstacles such as the supply chains of essential components and the cost of deploying a 6G network, but that as it is a technology that unites communications, AI, the aerospace industry and, above all, the military, it can make countries focus on this development. In Xataka | China was not supposed to be able to produce 7nm chips without ASML machines. It already has two companies capable of doing it

a proton accelerator against cancer

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At the Madrid hospital in Fuenlabrada they are building something that, from the outside, doesn’t look like much: a two-story building with three-meter-thick concrete walls, a roof that had to be opened with a crane, and foundations designed to support dozens of tons of machinery. Inside that bunker is kept one of the most valuable assets that Spanish public health has received in decades. That technological jewel that they protect with concrete is the proton accelerator donated by the Amancio Ortega Foundation: one of the ten latest generation machines that the founder of Inditex agreed to surrender to the public health system in October 2021 in a donation valued at 280 million euros. The objective is to install them in seven autonomous communities and transform the cancer treatment in Spain. A custom concrete bunker. Building this type of technology is not like installing a scanner or an X-ray device. The radiation emitted by a proton accelerator requires the construction of a specific building to act as a containment barrier. In Fuenlabrada that has become concrete walls three meters thick. The construction of the bunker began in July 2024 and the regional government has allocated 13 million euros to finance the construction of the new building. According to a statement of the Community of Madrid, the result is a two-story structure with more than 2,000 square meters of total surface area, partially connected to the already existing oncology area. The ground floor, of about 1,300 square meters, will house the diagnosis, treatment and patient preparation areas. The first floor, of 875 square meters, will be used for maintenance, supplies, medical offices and training. The pieces that entered through the roof. The proton therapy equipment is made up of two main elements, and both are already inside the bunker. The first is the Cyclotron, the device that generates and accelerates protons that are then used as “ammunition” against cancer cells. It measures eight meters tall and weighs almost 50 tons. To place it in place, it was necessary to open the roof of the building and use a heavy crane to install it inside the bunker. The second element is the Gantry, the rotating arm that directs the radiation towards the tumor with millimeter precision. This component exceeds 11 meters in height and reaches 75 tons in weight. Its complete rotation capacity is what allows the tumor to be attacked from any angle and reduce damage to healthy surrounding tissues. In this video The installation process of one of these machines in the New York Proton Center is shown, using a process very similar to that used in the Fuenlabrada hospital. Protons change the rules of the game. Proton therapy is not an improved version of conventional radiotherapy, but rather it works with high-energy proton beams capable of concentrating the impact exactly on the tumor and stopping there, without continuing to irradiate the tissues behind. This makes it an especially useful tool for treat hard-to-reach tumorssuch as brain tumors, on neckspinal cord, lung, ocular, sarcomas, etc., and for pediatric patients, where minimize side effects In the long term it is critical. Until now, in Spain there were only two centers with this technology, both private: the Hospital Quirón de Pozuelo de Alarcón and the Clínica Universidad de Navarra. Thanks to the donation from the Amancio Ortega Foundation10 new proton therapy centers will soon be inaugurated in public hospitals distributed throughout the national territory. A nuclear reactor in the basement. The arrival of the two main pieces does not mean that the equipment is ready to use. Only the main elements have been installed in place. Over the next 12 months, engineers will carry out the complete assembly of both components, their calibration and the commissioning of the accelerator. It is a process that involves continuous testing to check and monitor radiation before any patient is approached. In December 2025, the Nuclear Safety Council (CSN) already issued a favorable authorization, with conditions, for the radioactive facility of the hospital: an essential requirement before the unit can operate. It won’t be the first, but it adds up.. The one in Fuenlabrada will not be the first public health device of these characteristics to offer proton therapy treatments. The Galicia center, in Santiago de Compostela, is the most advanced in its installation and already has the Proteus One accelerator. In this case, two bunkers have been necessary (one for treatment and the other for research) and the first patients are expected to be treated at the end of 2026 or beginning of 2027, with capacity for 250 patients per year per room. The Madrid hospital, for its part, aims that its unit will be operational throughout the first quarter of 2027. In Xataka | Amancio Ortega: the billionaire who lives like a neighbor (except for private jets and superyachts) Image | GTRES, New York Proton Center

It’s geopolitics. And China goes with the accelerator to the table

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When commercial 5G was taking its first steps in 2018, China was already talking of the next generation. The Asian giant saw very early that 6G would be a strategic element and got to work to dominate the conversation before its rivals. Because this is not about playing with less latency at a cloud game or download data faster. It is about having frontier technology before the rival. Strategic 6G. Since the middle of the last century, China has had something known as the ‘Five Year Plan’. It is a roadmap that sets out the objectives to be developed and achieved over a period of five years. Everything goes into it: energy, economy, society, technology and the environment, and it represents an organizational chart to coordinate policies that make the set objectives possible. In the 14th Five-Year Plan, the focus was on developing technologies that would allow China to be self-sufficient in semiconductors and digital technologies such as 6G. Time has passed and we have been able to see enormous progress during this time (especially in semiconductors), and now the new development plan has just been published in which we want to strengthen that sovereignty, but where two key objectives are framed: AI and 6G as a lever for economic growth. Calendar. The new roadmap defines the objective for the period 2026-2030, but the country has been preparing the ground for years. Huawei, already in 2019, He pointed out that they were testing 6G internally and that it was considered that it would not be until the end of the next decade when it would begin to be deployed commercially. The moment is approaching and steps have been taken. In 2020, China deployed what was considered the world’s first 6G satellitein 2022 experimented with sending data packets of one TB per second from a kilometer away, and in 2023 we learned that military uses were also being analyzed. For example, vibration analysis in water to detect even smaller submarines and drones in the open sea from the air. In the middle of last year, the state media CCTV commented that China’s objectives with 6G were being met as planned, highlighting, again and as they do every time they make a communication on the subject, the country’s leadership in this field. And… for what? China wants the world to know that are very actively developing this technology. And the big question is… do we need 6G? And here there is a big mistake: thinking that 6G is a technology for users. Obviously, consumer devices capable of having connections of these speeds will be essential for applications, for example, of artificial intelligence that are not calculated at the local level, but 6G is not so much for mobile phones but for the global network. From the same CCTV statement it is detailed that “6G is more than a communication technology.” This is something to drive more complex devices, smart terminals and new generations of sensors. Speeds above 100 Gbps are targeted with a delay of less than a millisecond (in 5G, the figures are about 1Gbps) and this will benefit the remote manipulation of devices, the number of simultaneous connections and tasks that require total precision, such as “swarms” of robots working in the field and coordinated by artificial intelligence. This sounds like science fiction, but recently Samsung presented its plans to transform its factories by 2030. Robots will be the workforce and the brain will be the AI. In its own updated five-year plan, China emphasizes the development of ’embodied AI’, that “robotics with AI” as one of the pillars of the country’s technological development. Everyone wants to lead. The country detailed that “the future 6G will not only be a mobile communication network, but a new generation of mobile information.” But of course, with all the range of possibilities that something like this opens up, and with how important it can be for an accelerated and massive deployment of robots, Physical AI and even of the remote computing in data centersno country wants to miss the train. Because China has giants like Huawei, but South Korea has SK Telecom and Samsung. Both have already expressed their intention to start conduct short-term technology tests with an ambitious goal: to have a functional 6G network by 2028. Japan is also in that raceEurope (which missed out on 5G) He doesn’t want things to repeat themselves. with 6G and the United States, whose current president already said in 2019 that I wanted 6G for yesterdayis also in garlic. A basic problem. My colleague Laura points out in Xataka Mobile that China wants to win the 6G battle before the battle for 6G begins, but although it is evident that they are in it and they lead patent applications worldwide (as has already happened thanks to Huawei with 5G), as users… we say again that the thing will take a while to start. At least in Europe. In a report last year, Ericsson, which is a communications giant, He pointed out that there is a basic problem: While competitors have deployed the millimeter band, most European countries have prioritized medium and low bands. More coverage, less speed, and although soon it will be time to talk about 6G as a current technology, the 5G has been with us for more than six years, and it is still taking its first steps. And if Europe wants to be a reference in robotics, AI and new technologies, it will have to start deploying towers as they are already doing in other regions. Pexels (edited with Gemini) In Xataka | Qualcomm believes that 6G will be the definitive network for AI and has already set a date: the reality is that 5G is still in its infancy

China has a nuclear reactor 100 times more efficient than traditional ones. The trick is to shoot atoms with an accelerator

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China has had one goal in mind for some years: to have a voice in the nuclear race. In the weaponsyes, but also in energy. As Europe argues and the United States attempts to rejuvenate its critical infrastructure to meet AI needs, China has been on the accelerator for months. Recently they have not only approved 10 new reactorsbut they are one step away from turning on a new generation nuclear power plant to provide ‘green’ energy for 1,000 years. This is the CiADS system, or Throttle Actuated System. It is a type of reactor that China has been developing for more than 15 years and that promises to convert waste into energy. Their trick is to convert “garbage” into fuel, and it is a very interesting twist for nuclear energy. And even more so in a China that wants to dominate the atom and renewables as a basis for the development of another of the great ambitions of the country. Artificial intelligence. A twist to nuclear energy In a releasethe Institute of Modern Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences gave some details of how this accelerator-driven nuclear reactor works. Uranium is still the fuel, but “reactor driven by an accelerator” is literal. Using a particle accelerator, protons are “shot” at a heavy metal target at a speed of 0.8 times that of light. This generates neutrons that drive a reactor that operates somewhat below the critical threshold to be self-sustaining. The reactor generates energy and this violent reaction causes the long-lived radioactive isotopes that are normally generated in a conventional nuclear power plant to transmute and become materials with a shorter life. As its managers explain in SCMPthe CiADS is a hybrid between a nuclear reactor and a particle accelerator. The main advantage is that greatly reduces the risk of uncontrolled reactionsbut it has another: you can reuse the radioisotopes that normally would be treated as nuclear waste to continue producing energy. Firing beams of protons through these accelerators to bombard the heavy metal makes the uranium-238 give way to a new nuclear fuel: plutonium-239. According to the state media Science and Technology Daily, it is basically turning waste into treasures. According to those responsible, this method is 100 times more efficient than conventional fission and would allow nuclear energy to be converted into “a source of green, safe and stable energy for 1,000 years”, ensuring part of the necessary energy supply for the future. Furthermore, since what would previously be long-lasting waste is reused, the resulting CiADS has a useful life of less than one thousandth compared to conventional waste. The CiADS under construction They are two birds with one stone: China is wildly expanding its nuclear capacity, but it is estimated that it does not have as much uranium of its own and would continue to depend on imports… or to fish it in the sea. With “100 times more efficient” plants, you can get more juice out of what you have. And then there’s the fact that nuclear waste is less dangerous. If everything goes as planned, China will have its first MW-scale CiADS in 2027. It will be then when we check if those theoretical promises achieved by scale prototypes are fulfilled. The CiADS comes at a time when China has emerged as a contradiction in energy matters. They carry years fighting pollution and emissions, but they burn coal. They are a powerhouse in renewables with megastructures and deserts covered by panels. But in the age of AI, it is precisely that coal and gas that is the fuel that allows us to satisfy the demand of data centers at the peak of training. With nuclear weapons, China seeks further reduce your CO2 footprintbut ensuring a future in which it must feed the population, artificial intelligence and a network of technology companies that are doing the most difficult: fighting Western companies without the technological resources of the West. Because right now China doesn’t have the chips or the AI, but yes the energy. And that investment in new generation nuclear plants and, above all, in nuclear fusionrepresents the foundation of what is to come. Everything, that is, if the CiADS works as expected. Images | Sahaza Delis, Tighef In Xataka | There is a global race to be the first to reach nuclear fusion. And Germany just gave it an optimistic date

AI steps on the accelerator while everyone else puts on the brakes

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AI is not only turning the economy upside down, politics and, in general to society. But it is also generating a salary gap between those technological profiles oriented to their development and implementation of AI and those who simply contribute to maintaining current technologies. At least that is one of the clearest conclusions drawn from the Salary Guide 2026which produces the technological employment portal every year Manfred, prepared with data from more than 120,000 profiles in its database, which, this year, has also been reinforced with data from the salary platform prosfy. Manfred’s guide shows that there are positions that have appreciated strongly, while others have lost traction and some have stagnated. Profiles on the rise: AI drives the market The big winners, without a doubt, are those roles linked to data, infrastructure and deployment of AI models, as well as their integration into the operations of companies. He AI engineer already starting from a median salary of 52,250 euros per year for a profile with between five and ten years of experience, with the 75th percentile close to 68,500 euros. This is a key hybrid profile in the deployment of AI as it navigates between the backend, MLOps and artificial intelligence, being very scarce and demanded by companies. For seniors with more than ten years of experience, the salary range is between 71,000 and 90,000 euros. He Data Scientist It has been the profile that has been most revalued since the popularization of AI. Their median salary reaches 55,400 euros, and the most experienced professionals easily exceed 70,000 euros. The shortage of specialists in AI models and architectures explains this jump towards 2026. Even higher up appears the MLOps Engineer (Machine Learning Operations), a key figure in bringing AI models to production. Their median salary is 60,125 euros and the 75th percentile is 80,000 euros. It is one of the most coveted profiles in large companies that seek to take the models they have been training in laboratories to production. In parallel to these profiles elevated by AIthe salary grows in profiles related to the structure for AI. For example, the profile of data engineer has increased its median salary by nearly 10,000 euros in recent years, already marking a median salary of 52,720 euros, with seniors above 65,500. Likewise, the roles of Data architect They already move at a median of 67,455 euros, exceeding 85,000 euros in the highest percentiles and with more than 10 years of experience. Advanced infrastructure profiles are also revalued, with the role of SRE/DevOps (Site Reliability Engineering and Development Operations) marking a median salary of 58,500 euros. As highlighted by Manfred, this profile is one of the most demanded by companies, but only a small number of senior professionals meet the requirements, which explains why their salary almost triples between those who have less than two years of experience and those who accumulate more than 10. Profiles that lose weight: less demand, less salary On the opposite side are the roles that companies are stopping hiring or, directly, doing without. One of the most punished is that of Mobile Engineeras a reflection of the stagnation of companies in the development of new projects based on this segment. The median of their salaries falls to 40,500 euros, with a clear contraction in the high percentiles limited to 50,500 euros. Only the more specialized professionals In very specific frameworks, such as React Native or Flutter, they remain in the highest percentiles with salaries that are around 65,000 or 70,000 euros for the most senior. More pronounced is the decline in the role of Product Designerwith a median salary of just 35,575 euros for professionals with more than five years of experience. Its cut has occurred due to a combination between the equipment cutting and excess supply, which has pushed the market downward. Something similar happens with the profiles of QA&Testinga role that is being assumed by the development teams that are directly automating with AI agents. The case of Tech Lead lives a somewhat ambiguous situation. On the one hand, his status as an intermediate position has placed him as a target in the structural flattening strategies that technology companies have implemented to cut costs. On the other hand, the senior development employees They have been acquiring the functions of this role “unofficially” so their demand has reduced in recent months. In any case, their median salary is 58,755 euros, but with fewer positions to fill. The stagnant: necessary roles, but not decisive Among the profiles that do not fall, but also do not grow, are those related to classical development functions. That is to say: the Front-End and Back-End, the largest group, on the other hand. The salary of a Back-End Engineer It is around 45,654 euros and the sections below the 50th percentile and with less experience even regress. This behavior highlights that new hires or those with less experienced staff have lower salaries than those who have been working for years. Something similar happens with the Front-End Engineerswhose median salary drops in all percentiles, standing at 42,570 euros, weighed down by the abundance of junior profiles and a lower volume of hiring. The underlying message that emerges from the salary study prepared by Manfred reflects that the Spanish tech sector is no longer increasing uniformly, but that AI has created a salary economy at two speedsdifferentiated by the segment in which value is added. Those who are focused on the development and implementation of AI are experiencing a meteoric rise, while the rest, who keep the current technological structure in operation, do so at a much slower pace. In Xataka | A study has compared the gap in public salaries vs. private companies in Europe and has found a problem: Spain Image | Unsplash (Hack Capital)

Spain steps on the accelerator in its particular chip race. And it does so with a total commitment to integrated photonics

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The Council of Ministers has approved the award of 4.4 million euros to the IMDEA Networks institute within the european program of Integrated Photonics. It may not seem like a lot of money compared to the fortunes invested by the technology giants, but be careful: it is the last element of an eye-catching strategy. Fifth successful bidder. The IMDEA Networks institute thus joins four other entities that were awarded last July in the same call. The aid granted by the Government is then matched by the European Union, which causes the budget to double in all cases. Thus, we have: Institute of Photonic Sciences (ICFO): 23.1 million euros were awarded, it will receive 46.2 million in total Polytechnic University of Valencia: 16.5 million awarded, will receive 33 million in total National Microelectronics Center (CNM): 15 million awarded, total investment of 30 million University of Vigo: 7.5 million euros awarded, 15 million total investment IMDEA Networks Institute: 4.4 million euros awarded, 8.8 million in total 133 million for integrated photonics. With this new award, the Government and the EU will invest a total of 133 million euros to “promote research and development of faster chips with lower energy consumption, thanks to the use of light (photons) instead of electrons.” Integrated photonics? This technology focuses on using photons (light) instead of electrons to transmit and process information within chips. With this it is possible to obtain higher data transmission speeds and lower consumption and heat dissipation. What integrated photonics seeks is to take advantage of optical components (such as lasers, modulators and detectors) with traditional electronic circuits to combine the advantages of both components. Technological sovereignty. Although the figure may seem modest in the context of global mega-investments, it is part of an ambitious strategy focused on the research and development of disruptive technologies. The ultimate objective is to promote a key sector for Spanish economic and digital sovereignty, and here the commitment is total to integrated photonics, which is seen as the future of data processing. The PERTE is still there. The importance of this investment goes beyond research. It is a fundamental pillar for the PERTE of Microelectronics and Semiconductors (PERTE Chip), the strategic plan endowed with more than 12,000 million euros to try to position Spain as a relevant actor in this value chain. This investment is framed not in chip manufacturing, but in scientific capacity and design strategy. The idea is to ensure that Spain has its own talent and technology to develop new generations of components. Competence centers. To those 4.4 million awarded to IMDEA Networks another 3.9 million euros are added to create two competition centers co-financed by Europe through the JU Chips (Joint Undertaking). The ‘PIXSpain Competence Centre’ will receive one million euros and the MicroNanoSpain Competence Center will receive three million. Both will provide Spanish companies in the sector – especially SMEs – with access to technical knowledge and experimentation spaces. To compete with TSMC or NVIDIA, nothing. This is not about Spain going to start creating chip factories that can compete with TSMC, far from it. The idea is not to try to create a Spanish-style NVIDIA either. In both cases the resources needed would be astronomical. What is sought is a leadership position in a niche with high added value, which is photonic interconnection technologies. Goodbye to copper cable. By focusing on integrated photonics, Spain aligns with the work of giants like Intel, TSMC or Ciscowhich have been investing heavily in this technology for some time to solve the challenge of interconnections in data centers. Everything indicates that integrated photonics could end up replacing copper cables in high-speed communications in the next decade. In Xataka | “They lead and AI follows”: seven Spanish universities tell us how they are implementing AI in class

Big Tech do not stop saying goodbye to their engineers. In parallel, they have stepped on the accelerator in the hiring

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The labor market for software engineers in 2025 is going through A disconcerting phase. While many companies are running Great rounds of layoffs And vacancies take longer to cover themselves, the great technological have stepped on the accelerator in their hiring registering a moderate increase in recent months. With the aim of understanding this phenomenon, Gergely Oroszengineer, analyst and author of ‘The Software Engineer’s Guidebook’ has crossed data from different technological employment platforms to offer a detailed analysis of the labor market in 2025. The result shows a panorama in transformation, in which traditional rules seem to have changed and Big Tech movements point to a future very marked by AI. Boom in layoffs, but also in hiring. Just check quickly The newspaper library recent to discover that technology companies are executing Dismissal rounds In his templates. According to dataFrom the Trueup platform, in what we have been counted about 141,000 dismissals Among the great technology. The estimates are that 2025 closure with 210,000 layoffs that, despite being many, are below the 430,000 layoffs that were recorded in 2023 or 239,000 of 2024. Dismissal figures in the technology sector However, those same companies are the ones that are most hiring in recent months, registering a Mild up rising trend in the total of new offers in the labor market. The reason: these layoffs are not due to economic difficulties, but because companies have changed their business goals and are reorieting their templates. Companies such as Apple (2,177 vacancies), IBM (1,924 vacancies), Amazon (1,794 vacancies) and Oracle (1,394 vacancies) are the ones that have registered the most vacancies, according to the data revealed by Orosz. Zuckerberg has taken the wallet. In case the latest movements of Millionaire signings in AI They leave a doubt, goal is the company that is hiring the most engineers, with an increase of 19% compared to its 2022 template.Google and Apple show a somewhat more leisurely rhythm in hiring, although they increase their templates with new hiring at a rate of 16% and 13% respectively with respect to 2022. Amazon and Microsoft later began their Pivotage to AIand their figures are maintained below 8%, although the last restructuring movements Of both companies, they point out that, in the face of the last quarter, that percentage will tend up. Who is hired. Big Tech are immersed In a race For immediate profitable Investments in AI. So the profile that is being demanded most is the IA engineer profile that, According to data In Trueup, it has increased by 278.5% since its lowest point in 2023 and currently has 24,957 vacancies open. The hiring data also reveal that the profile most demand IA -oriented specialtiesbut they are the engineers who already have a certain experience (with 27,864 vacancies available) or already with a senior profile (with 22,477 published employment offers). Orosz’s analysis data reveal that the seniors engineers of ia will cover those vacancies, They will leave Big Tech Consolidated such as Google, Meta, Apple or Microsoft, joining projects in the new heavyweights of AI such as OpenAi, Anthropic or XAI, as well as other emerging unicorns. The AI ​​recover the work remote and sacrifices the bosses. According to data published by Orosz, the volume of offers of remote employment has fallenRegarding the previous year. However, the exception of the brand again the engineering of AI, where the urgency to recruit talent causes a relatively high number of vacancies to be maintained with the possibility of remote work. In parallel, the leadership positions in engineering are seen increasingly limited. Amazon has significantly reduced the engineering managers roles. For its part, almost all Big Tech – with the exception of Apple— They have trimmed the creation of positions of director or intermediate positions. This adjustment responds to a reorganization of internal structures, such as the one that has launched Googlethat prioritize smaller and agile equipment. In Xataka | Google Deepmind has made possible the dream of some employees: charging without working Image | Flikr (Village Global). Goal, Wikimedia Commons (EESAN1969), Trueup

The Granada particle accelerator is born today. Thanks to him Spain has the key to nuclear fusion

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Today is a crucial day for IFMIF-DONES (International Fusion materials irradicion facility demo-eraned neutron source). This very important scientific project is closely linked to ITER (International Thermonuclear Experctor reactor), The experimental reactor of nuclear fusion that An international consortium led by Europe He is building in the French town of Cadarache. Ifmif-Dones, however, resides in listening to, a town in the province of Granada. The construction works of this last installation began in mid -September 2022, but today it is a very important day for both Granada and all of Spain. And it is because the Council of Ministers will approve today the investment of almost 200 million euros required by the start of the construction of the IFMIF-DONES linear particle accelerator. This machine is the authentic heart of this scientific installation, and, therefore, the ingenuity that will place Spain in The nuclear fusion map. The tuning of this linear particle accelerator will cost approximately 450 million euros, although the Andalusian Board will contribute half of this money. However, this is the cost of the accelerator; The IFMIF-Dones project will completely cost about 700 million euros. Spain will contribute half of this capital. To this figure we must add another 50 million to carry out its implementation. In addition, the operation of this avant -garde research center will have an annual cost of about 60 million euros, of which Spain will assume 10%. It may seem a lot of money, but we must not forget that those responsible for the project are convinced that The economic and scientific return Ifmif-Dones will far exceed your cost. What is Ifmif-Dones and why it is crucial for the future of nuclear fusion Ifmif-Dones is one of the three fundamental pillars of the nuclear fusion building in whose construction the European Union is involved. The other two are iter and demo. The experimental nuclear fusion reactor that is currently being built in the French town of Cadarache seeks to demonstrate that the merger at the scale that man can handle works, and also that it is profitable from an energy point of view. However, Iter does not aspire to produce electricity. That will be demo’s task (Demonstration Power Plant), an installation that will take the technological advances that will have shown to function correctly in Iter and take them one step further to establish themselves as The authentic precursor of commercial nuclear fusion reactors. However, without Ifmif-Dones there will be no demo, so Granada is now the center of attention. The fusion of a deuterium core and another tritium triggers the production of a helium core and a neutron that is fired with an energy of about 14 MEV To understand in all its extension what is the role of the IFMIF-DONES project, it is necessary that we briefly review the foundations of nuclear fusion. One of the biggest challenges facing the technicians who are involved in the tuning of nuclear fusion reactors by means of magnetic confinement, such as Iter, consists of recreating inside the vacuum chamber of these sophisticated machines the necessary conditions so that the deuterium and tritium nuclei are merged. However, this is not everything. When this reaction takes place the fusion of a deuterium nucleus and another of tritium triggers the production of a helium core and a neutron that is fired with An energy of about 14 MEV (Megaelectronvolts). The problem is that the neutron lacks net electric charge, so it cannot be confined inside the magnetic field that, however, does retain the deuterium and tritium nuclei, which have positive electric charge. This is the reason why when it originates as a result of the nuclear fusion reaction, this neutron is fired towards the walls of the vacuum chamber with enormous energy. This particle is very important because in practice it will be closely linked to the production of electrical energy in nuclear fusion reactors, but, at the same time, it represents a very aggressive form of radiation that can significantly degrade the materials used in the reactor. The components that will be most affected by the direct impact of high energy neutrons and the most intense heat flow are the internal wall of the vacuum chamber and the Blanketthat it is a mantle that covers it and that has as its purpose Regenerate the tritium that it is necessary to use as fuel in the nuclear fusion reaction. This is the reason why it is crucial to develop new materials that are able to support the flow of neutrons and guarantee, therefore, that the reactor will have a prolonged operational life. IFMIF-DONES linear accelerator will produce high energy neutrons with the intensity and volume of irradiation necessary to test candidate materials This is, neither more nor less, the purpose of Ifmif-Dones. And to carry it out it is necessary to put ready -to -set facilities to allow the technicians involved in the project to evaluate the properties of candidate materials to intervene not only in demo, but also in future commercial nuclear fusion commercial reactors. The task of this project invites us to intuit what the heart of Ifmif-Dones is: a source capable of producing high energy neutrons with the intensity and volume of irradiation necessary for Test candidate materials. And this source of neutrons will be nothing other than a linear particle accelerator that will help IFMIF-DONES scientists to try, validate and qualify the materials that in the medium term should reach future electric power production plants through fusion. Image | IFMIF-DONES In Xataka | Iter has faced one of the great challenges of nuclear fusion: prevent plasma from 150 million ºC to destroy the reactor

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