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James Webb has had to investigate whether he was born “from the top down” or “from the bottom up”

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29 Cygni b is a huge celestial object, with a mass equal to 15 times the mass of Jupiter. Apparently it is a planet, but that mass could place it as a star. For example, a brown dwarf. Therefore, a team of astronomers has used the James Webb to analyze its origin, further refining the concept of the formation of stars and planets. A question of metals. The authors of the study, who it was just publishedhave used the NIRCam camera on the James Webb Space Telescope to take photographs of this planet. This instrument allows high-resolution images and spectroscopy measurements to be taken, with which the composition of the atmospheres of stars and planets can be studied, taking into account how they reflect light. Thanks to this, it has been seen that 29 Cygni b is very enriched in metals compared to the star around which it is located. Specifically, it has an amount of metals equivalent to 150 Earths. This is compatible with the accretion of a large amount of metal-laden solids into a protoplanetary disk. It is then confirmed that it is a planet, but a planet very unusual. Planet or star? That’s the question. Planet formation takes place in a bottom-up process. In a disk of gas and dust, known as a protoplanetary disk, dust particles collide to form small fragments of rock and ice, which continue to clump together and grow until they form a planet. It is a process called accretion. The largest ones, in addition, in this process capture gas, which is why they later become gas giants. On the other hand, stars form from top to bottom. A gas cloud fragments and each fragment collapses under its own gravity, becoming smaller and denser. From paradox to paradox. This definition could lead us to think that planets are larger than stars. After all, planets go from less to more and stars from more to less. However, that is not true. Stars form when huge clouds of gas collapse, so they are still very massive. So much so that nuclear fusion can occur in them due to the high conditions of pressure and temperature. On the planets, although there is a growth from less to more, it is not so great. The problem is that with planets as immense as 29 Cygni b there are doubts about the formation from less to more. It would seem that they were also formed by a fragmentation process in protoplanetary disks. As explained by the European Space Agency in a statementis something that “could explain why some very massive objects are found billions of kilometers from their host stars, in regions where the protoplanetary disk should have been too weak for accretion to occur.” That’s just what happens with 29 Cyni b. It has an enormous mass and is 2,400 kilometers from its star. What James Webb teaches us. The fact that 29 Cygni b is so rich in metals indicates that it must have been formed by an accretion process, in which it accumulated more and more. In fact, heIt is normal for a planet to have many metals in proportion to its starwhich happens in the system in which 29 Cygni b is located. In short, it is shown that much larger planets than we thought can be formed by accretion, without having to resort to a top-down process. And now what? 29 Cygni b has been the first of the four objects that will be studied by James Webb. All of them have a mass between 1 and 15 times that of Jupiter and are at least 1.5 billion kilometers from their star. This indicates that they are all in that dilemma of being huge planets or another star. Cataloging them into one of the two groups can help us understand much better the process by which the largest planets are formed. Image | NASA, ESA, CSA, J. Olmsted (STScI) In Xataka | Since we were children we have been told that Jupiter is enormous, colossal, exaggeratedly large. It is 8 km smaller and that changes everything

It turns out that there is a Soviet submarine at the bottom of the Norwegian Sea releasing radiation for 40 years

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On April 7, 1989, the Soviet nuclear submarine K-278 Komsomolets sank in the Norwegian Sea after an uncontrolled fire fruit probably short circuit in the electrical panels of compartment 7, which led to a massive and uncontrollable deflagration because the atmosphere was critically enriched with oxygen due to failures in the air regeneration system. Of the 69 people on board, only 27 survived. It wasn’t just any submarine: it had a double titanium helmet that allowed him descend to unreachable depths for his rivals of the time. Its cutting-edge technology hid a dangerous core: a nuclear reactor and two plutonium warheads that have since lain at the bottom of the sea, 180 kilometers southwest of Bear Island, in the Svalbard archipelago. And according to the most complete study carried out to date, published a few days ago in the scientific journal PNASthe Komsomolets remains an active source of radioactive contamination in the Arctic. The discovery. In 2019, a Norwegian research team went down with the Ægir 6000 underwater robot to thoroughly inspect the submarine using cutting-edge technology. As they approached the ventilation tube they found a visibly distorted column of water, as if it were smoke, as you can see in the video immediately after this block. It is a leak with intermittent behavior. They took samples and the results were overwhelming: concentrations of Cesium-137 800,000 times the normal radiation of seawater in the area and Strontium-90 400,000 times. Both isotopes are direct products of nuclear reactor fission. The analysis shows that the radiation comes from the propulsion system (the nuclear reactor) and that the reactor fuel is in the process of corrosion with the environment. Why is it important. The good news is that this radioactive leak does not come from the nuclear warheads: two torpedoes with atomic warheads. For now, that threat is under control: the Soviets sealed the torpedo compartment with titanium plates in the early 1990s and judging by analysis, the sealing continues to work because they have not detected weapons-grade plutonium in the marine environment. The bad news is the reactor. It does not explode or disappear, but simply the zirconium cylinders that protect the uranium and plutonium are corroding, leaking these isotopes into the sea in a slow and invisible leak that is diluted in the ocean. Fortunately, samples taken in relatively close areas show that dilution is rapid, as they return values ​​close to normal. In fact, the hull is full of sponges, corals and anemones and its samples contain low traces of cesium-137, but without detectable damage. Context. Man-made radioactivity in the oceans has three main sources according to the International Atomic Energy Agency: the atmospheric nuclear tests of the 60s and 70s, the Chernobyl accident and the authorized discharges from the Sellafield and La Hague reprocessing plants, in the United Kingdom and France respectively. The sunken nuclear submarines, where the Komsomolets would enter, have a marginal contribution. Their importance is more qualitative than quantitative: they are point sources, localized and that tend to worsen over time. After the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, the Soviet Union came under great international pressure. When the Komsomolets sank three years later, Moscow organized inspection missions with MIR submersibles. When he confirmed that the warheads had been in contact with sea water, he acted: in 1994, with the economy in free fall and western funds involvedRussian technicians they sealed the cracks of the torpedo compartment with titanium plates. Since 2007, Norway has undertaken regular monitoring of the wreck as part of its nuclear safety responsibilities in the Arctic. Current risk status. For now the nuclear warheads are contained, their sealing works and there are no signs of weapons-grade plutonium in the water. The reactor is the active problem now: the fuel is corroding, the emissions are real, and the research team does not understand why they are intermittent or what the rate is. Any attempt to recover or physically manipulate the submarine would probably be more dangerous than leaving it where it is, since if the radioactive materials reached the atmosphere, the contamination could reach land with worse consequences than today. . A nuclear laboratory under the sea. The research team has two goals ahead: to understand why the leak is intermittent and whether that corrosion rate is accelerating over time. Inadvertently, the Komsomolets is now a natural laboratory to study what happens to submerged nuclear reactors in the long term. Information that is not trivial, given the number of nuclear devices that sleep on the seabed. In Xataka | Russia’s most advanced nuclear submarine was a secret. Until Ukraine has revealed everything, including its failures In Xataka | The Soviet Union needed to save millions of people from hunger so something was invented: the art of making sausages Cover | Karina Victoria

The “bottom of the barrel” was the cheapest waste of the oil industry. The war in Iran has just turned it into an unaffordable luxury

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Historically, the fuel oil has been known in the oil industry as the “bottom of the barrel.” Typically cheap and underappreciated, this byproduct comes from the bottom of distillation towers, the equipment where crude oil is heated and split into multiple products. In fact, very often, this fuel cost less than a barrel of crude oil, and refineries sold it at a loss as it was a simple remnant of the process necessary to manufacture high-value products such as diesel. However, as expert Javier Blas warns in your column for Bloombergthe Iran war has turned the industry upside down. That waste that no one wanted has become an ultra-expensive raw material overnight, which is bad news for the global economy. Despite being overshadowed by other distillates, the fuel oil plays an immense role in the modern world, driving container ships that act as the workhorses of globalization. The breakup of a market at the limit. In the current conflict, all eyes they are set in the rises and falls of crude oil. However, the real drama is hidden in the physical maritime bunker markets, where the traditional relationship between the price of crude oil and refined products has been completely broken. With crude oil hovering around $100, the fuel oil It shouldn’t be much more expensive. In reality, it is trading at $140 a barrel in Singapore and almost $160 in the Emirati port of Fujairah. A report of Lloyd’s List explains that the average price of the fuel oil of very low sulfur content (VLSFO) in the 20 main bunkering centers reached $1,005 per ton, double its pre-war cost and the highest figure since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. For his part, analyst Clyde Russell warns in his column Reuters that, while crude oil futures are confident of a solution, prices for physical cargoes are sending signals of an impending crisis and a supply chain that is buckling under pressure. The missing link. The key to this specific crisis lies in geography and geology. As Blas points outrefineries in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates produce 20% of all fuel oil sold internationally. Added to this is a crucial geological factor: the crude oil from the Persian Gulf generates much more fuel oil than that of other regions. For example, when distilling a barrel of Saudi flagship crude oil (Arab Light), approximately 50% of what comes out is residue for fuel oil, compared to 33% left by US WTI crude oil. This explains why the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz is a death trap specifically for this byproduct. The logistical panic. The real urgency is no longer just the price, but physical availability. The shipping industry has raised the alarm because supplies are critically low in Singapore and Fujairah, two of the world’s most important bunkering hubs. “If we do nothing, we risk ending up with dry supply points in Asia,” Vincent Clerc sharply warnedCEO of shipping giant Maersk. To avoid collapse, Maersk needs to be proactive and is transporting its own fuel around the globe to have the right amount in the right place, an unprecedented challenge that Clerc compares to the logistical juggle experienced during the Covid-19 pandemic. On a day-to-day basis, the charter market is paralyzed. Scott Bergeron, CEO of Oldendorff Carriers, confess to Lloyd’s List that there are problems getting fuel quotes, and that “availability for April is a big question mark.” The operational consequences will be drastic: Global slowing: Ships will reduce their speed to conserve fuel. Port congestion: Massive congestion is expected in ports that still have reserves. Accelerated scrapping: Older and inefficient fleets could be forced to be scrapped due to the enormous costs. Furthermore, according to Clyde Russell in your column for ReutersAsian refiners are cutting production, and countries like South Korea could restrict exports, pushing dependent nations like New Zealand into rationing measures. The environmental dilemma. This severe lack of supply is even putting pressure on climate regulations. Given the suffocating lack of distillates, The Maritime Executive details that the regulators could be tempted to temporarily suspend IMO 2020 emissions regulations. This would allow ships to return to burning heavy fuel oil (HSFO) widely, freeing up ingredients for other critical sectors. Meanwhile, ships already equipped with scrubbers (scrubbers) can still legally burn the cheaper HSFO. As the price gap between clean and dirty fuel widens, these shipowners are realizing massive savings; In fact, this price spread reached $189.50 per ton in Singapore. The current crisis leaves no room for maneuver. As Javier Blas saysthe world has already spent its main lines of defense against this oil shock: compromised refineries have been avoided and strategic reserves have been emptied. Looking to the future, the only variable capable of balancing consumption with a meager supply is the “destruction of demand” through suffocating prices. Ship fuel may come from the bottom of the barrel, but it has proven to have the ability to sink or keep afloat international commerce. Today, without a doubt, it has become the world’s main problem. Image | Photo by william william on Unsplash Xataka | The US Navy already knows what is going to happen to the planet: the mission to open Hormuz is the closest thing to a suicide operation

We thought that in prehistory people ate pure meat. The burnt bottom of a pot just showed that we were refined chefs

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For years, popular culture has sold us the image of a prehistoric man whose diet was based almost exclusively on devouring large amounts of roast meat. However, science has been dismantling this myth for years, and now a study has analyzed the remains embedded in ancient vessels, which is the equivalent of ‘socarrat‘of Valencian paella. And the results suggest that our ancestors were, in reality, extremely creative cooks. What has been seen. Beyond what we think, that the prey of the day was hunted and immediately roasted on the fire, science has proven that European hunters almost 8,000 years ago combined freshwater fish with a wide variety of vegetables, using advanced culinary techniques to improve flavors and neutralize toxins. Something similar to what we do today in the kitchen, as reported by El País. Where did we see it? The study, with Spanish participation, reached this conclusion without having to search in the fossilized bones, but in something much more subtle such as the scabs of charred food adhered to 85 ceramic fragments that come from 13 archaeological sites in northern and eastern Europe. How it was done. Once these remains were located, it was decided to apply cutting-edge technology, such as scanning electron microscopy combined with molecular analysis of these remains. Until now, plant remains in archeology used to be underestimated because they degrade much faster than animal bones. But the electron microscope has revealed an astonishing level of detail, detecting plant cell tissues and microscopic fish scales that have been able to survive millennia thanks to being burned and adhering to clay. The results. With all these techniques we have been able to answer what was cooked in those clay pots, and the truth is that we must forget the idea of ​​​​having a piece of meat on the fire, but instead recipes have been revealed that meticulously mixed proteins and carbohydrates. The researchers were able to see remains of freshwater fish here, highlighting carp and barbel, leafy vegetables such as spinach, roots and bulbs such as beets, and also berries. Viburnum opulus. A prehistoric chef. Perhaps the most fascinating discovery of González Carretero’s team is the sophistication of the culinary techniques, since the berries of Viburnum opulus They are known to be slightly toxic when raw and have a tremendously acidic and bitter taste. However, prehistoric inhabitants discovered that by simmering them in a broth with high-fat fish, the bitterness was neutralized, making them digestive and safe for human consumption. And this mixture was not accidental, but a handed down recipe that always sought to improve the flavor. Culinary revolution. This work joins a growing wave of studies that are rewriting the history of our diet. Already in 2018 it was published in PNAS the discovery of the oldest “bread” in the world in Jordan, baked 14,400 years ago, long before agriculture was invented. But now these food remains point to the fact that the so-called paleo diet did not exist as they wanted to sell it to us. We learned that our ancestors knew their environment perfectly, mastered the processing of toxic plants and spent time preparing complex stews where vegetables and tubers were main dishes, not a simple garnish. Cover | Generated with Nano Banana 2 In Xataka | We have been relying on the Nutri-Score in stores for years. Science believes that its real impact is zero

Almost everything is more expensive than ever, but televisions are at rock bottom. It is the result of a “suicide pact”

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Technology is in an economic shaker. If we consumers have become accustomed to something, it is that, as the years go by, a product drops in price, even if it is updated with better features. It is clear in the console segment: as each generation progressed, the hardware improved and the price fell. That’s over. Buy a PS5 or an Xbox Series in 2026 It is more expensive than when they came out in 2020. But the consoles They are not the only thing that rises: There is more competition than ever in streaming services and they have all agreed to raise prices from time to time. It’s not just technology: dwellingmedical expenses, cars, meal… However, There is something that has collapsed: televisions. Because although there are very expensive models, the price of televisions has fallen more than almost any other consumer product in the last quarter of a century. And we owe it all to something that one of the industry’s leading glass manufacturers named in a curious way. A 25-year suicide pact. Although there is something else in the equation, something much more important. The “suicide pact” and the mother glass You can say in the comments if you have been walking around a large area this Christmas and have been tempted to buy a new 65-inch TV. Not because you need it, but because you saw it at a ridiculous price. For 400 eurosyou can buy one right now. Inch/price, they are much more attractive than the 24 inches that you can put in the kitchen. These prices on huge televisions do not seem to have been affected by the multiple crises we have experienced in recent years. What if that of the chips, then transportation, that of the Ukrainian warthe current RAM… The price of televisions has followed suit and, although the most cutting-edge OLEDs or risky technologies They have very high pricesan LCD TV is very affordable. In Construction Physics They mention a very interesting fact. In a advertisement On Black Friday 2003, a barely 20-inch LCD television in 4:3 format with a resolution of 640 x 480 pixels (laughing) cost $800. In the same ad, 32-inch CRT TVs for $380 or 27-inch TVs for $150. Today, those TVs are gold for playing retro games, by the way. In Xataka already we started having to talk about different technologies of liquid crystal panels. 21 years ago we were already talking about OLEDs when I was content with a small 15-inch TFT screen to play ‘Age of Empires 2’ and ‘Half Life 2’. In the end. But well, I’m going around the bush. In 2022, Mark J. Perry published in AEI the following graph: He shows us in a crude way what he was saying: the price of LCD technology had been plummeting rapidly while other goods and services increased dramatically. It’s funny to me that I don’t see the computer hardware on the list, we’ll see when I update the graph in a few years… He estimated that, since 2000, the price of televisions had fallen 97%. There are others informationbut the conclusion is the same: prices through the floor in a short time. That crash occurred a decade earlier. In a document of Corningone of the largest glass manufacturing companies, noted the following: “LCD technology continues to grow and there are abundant opportunities to expand both the functionality and performance of displays. So the expansion of LCD technology must be a great success story, right?” “FAKE” In the document, it is clarified that for consumers it is great news because they can access better and bigger televisions at a fraction of the price. Even other technologies such as plasma had to be adapted. In the same Black Friday ad from 2003 we see a Daewoo of 42 inches with 480p resolution for $2,300. I remember that a 50-inch Samsung 1,080p arrived at my house for 700 euros in 2007. However, for the manufacturers, it was not as happy a story as it was for the consumer. “The LCD platform looks like a 25-year suicide pact for display manufacturers,” Corning noted in its report. It is a segment “characterized by hypercompetition, excess investment and periodic lack of profitability, but which at the same time requires sustained investment to differentiate a product that has a low return.” They pointed out that, within that chain, glass manufacturers were still able to make considerable profits, although there was increasing pressure. But that price drop is not limited to extreme competition between a few companies. There is something else behind it, and that “something” is the “mother glass.”. Known as “mother glass” in English, it is a main element in the manufacture of LCD panels. It’s a process which is made up of several stages. On the one hand, there is that mother glass, which is a sheet of glass substrate on which other layers are deposited. Broadly speaking: We have the glass plate on which layers of semiconductors are deposited. Using a photolithography process, TFT transistors and pixel electrodes are marked across the entire sheet. It is something that is repeated several times until the active matrix on the mother glass is completed. The next step is to use another mother glass to which RGB color filters and electrodes are applied. Both glasses are well cleaned, aligned and sealed with perimeter glue. It’s like a sandwich. There we would have a mother glass with many screens, and the next step is to cut them to obtain individual modules. The fourth step is to combine those modules or cells with backlight units, the control PCB and the metal casing to have the complete LCD module. It is tested and, when it is ready, it is delivered to the assemblers, who are the ones who already create monitors, televisions, mobile phones or anything with a screen. Here you can see the process: What is the key? That those large sheets of glass have been increasing in size little by … Read more

Renfe already warns that AVE prices have hit the bottom

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The prices we have seen so far in high speed have been a mirage. At least that is what Álvaro Fernández Heredia, president of Renfe, predicts, who in an interview with Chain Being has come to ensure that Ouigo and Iryo will end up leaving our country. Prices, costs and unprofitable high speed. More expensive. There are many headlines left by the interview that Álvaro Fernández Heredia, president of Renfe, left in an interview with Chain Being. To begin with, because he has indicated that high speed prices will rise: “If our competitors raise prices, which is something they have begun to do, we will follow that trend, because we are competing with them in those corridors, and this is the scheme that we have given ourselves as a society” What Fernández Heredia is talking about is the rising prices that high-speed trains are experiencing. The matter has made headlines with the departure of the AVLO of the Madrid-Barcelona corridor that has caused an immediate increase in the price of trains. With a weaker Renfe when it comes to lowering prices, on average the price of the ticket is already above 80 euros and the cheapest one does not go below 50 euros. The service has been getting more expensive for some time but without AVLO, prices are even higher. public service. In his statements, the president of Renfe comes to say that they will do what their rivals do. If they lower prices they will fight with them but if they raise prices they will not resist to seek market share at a low price. What Renfe defends is that they have the obligation to provide service where it is not profitable. This shows them the way to raise prices in the corridors where they do have competition. “We have a pricing policy that does not seek profit or does not seek to have a distribution of dividends. Our distribution of dividends is to stop where the others do not stop or what is not High Speed, which is the Long Distance: Almería, Algeciras or Tolosa. We are a public company and we are here to compete with other companies, but we are also there to support the rest of the railway system. Our High Speed, of the only three operators there are, is the only one that is economically sustainable, but we also have to sustain those stops that other operators do not want to make and that could, but do not do them because they only seek profitability” That message is the same one that Óscar Puente sentMinister of Transport, a year ago when he complained that Renfe had to compete in the same market as Ouigo and Iryo but with the burden of having to go where the company loses money. Some losses that have also focused the debate in recent months. Private, but not much. This is what the president of Renfe maintains. For Fernández Heredia, Ouigo and Iryo “are public companies from other countries. I understand that they will have to give an explanation as to why they come to Spain to lose money, I don’t think they will come to that, because it would be very difficult to understand.” In this message sent to Chain Being the complaint is implicit (and the threat of denunciation) that The Government launched Ouigo at the time. It was then pointed out that this French company I was pushing the prices to gain market share knowing that it has its back covered by the French State. From Ouigo they have rejected this, ensuring that Your pricing strategy is the usual one among those who enter to play in a new market. Losing money. At the moment what we have is a war in which Renfe, Ouigo and Iryo are losing money. Without knowing whether prices will continue to rise, what is certain is that the three companies are spending tens of millions of euros. Specifically, almost 100 million euros in 2024. Of those hundred million euros lost, the majority belong to Ouigo, which according to the CNMC left 40.5 million. The figure is far from the 31.5 million euros that Iryo left, but Renfe also lost money, specifically 27 million. Of course, the CNMC also assures that, since competition was opened in high speed, consumers have saved about 500 million euros. Until when? Although prices rise little by little, what is certain is that competition has lowered the cost for the customerespecially in those corridors where the flow of movement is not as constant or dense as in Madrid-Barcelona. In the latter, in addition to the high demand, the departure of AVLO has confirmed that if the high speed competition low cost one of the three competitors leaves, the immediate result is that prices rise. So, yes, we have most likely hit a bottom in high-speed prices but they are more likely to rise more slowly the more competition there is. Photo | Alan Grant In Xataka | In the 19th century, Spain made the strange decision to build its roads in Iberian gauge. Now they are going to be a gift for Renfe in Galicia

What is seen at the bottom of the map is an extreme anticyclonic dorsal. And that is what is going to put Spain again to boil

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It is a story that has been repeated from the beginning of summer: an anticyclonic dorsal will dominate the atmosphere on our heads, which in turn implies the return of heat. The return to 40º. The next few days will be, again, of extreme heat. The State Meteorology Agency (Aemet) has warned of temperatures that They can exceed 40º in large areas of the South and that could also reach 42º in specific areas of the Peninsular South. An extreme dorsal again. The person responsible is a dorsal, and a considerable magnitude: 600 DAMMERS (DAM) Geopotential with the center located in North Africa. This means that we have to ascend about six kilometers in the atmosphere before reaching the point where the atmospheric pressure is 500 hectopascal (HPA), when the “normal” value of this altitude would be around 5.5 km. Although the geopotential in most of the peninsular Spain is rather something above the 594 DAM, this involves “record” levels for this time of year in the southwest peninsular quadrant and part of the center, indicated on Twitter The physicist, meteorologist and disseminator JJ German. Stability and sun. The dorsals They imply An anticyclonic context that in turn entails stability and clear skies and high insolation. If we add its ability to drag air from North Africa and its recurrence we will see with a situation like this, a summer that has already served to break numerous records in temperature and other atmospheric variables. Yellow and orange warnings. Temperatures may not reach the levels of previous warm episodes, and the fact that we are already in July (one month on average warmer than June) implies that this geopotential anomaly will not translate into large anomalies. Despite this, mercury will rise enough to Aemet activates various notices associated with extreme temperatures in much of the country between today and Thursday. The orange notices between today and Wednesday will be concentrated in areas of the center and southwest peninsular: Valleles del Tajo, Guadiana and Guadalquivir, especially. On Thursday, extreme heat will also affect the East, with part of the Ebro Valley, La Mancha Albacete and the interior of some Mediterranean provinces under orange warning. High maximums and tropical nights. The agency’s prediction For these days they talk about temperatures that “will exceed 38-40 (Grada) in large areas of the southern half of the Atlantic aspect” tomorrow Wednesday, with areas of the Guadalquivir Valley, being able to exceed 42º. The forecasts for Thursday will be somewhat less extreme, although the 35º will be exceeded in most of the southern half and in the northern plateau. As if this were not enough, the minimums will also remain high: large areas of the south and the Mediterranean basin will see how mercury does not fall from the 20º. Again the Guadalquivir Valley would be the most affected Peninsula area: the minimum could stay here above 25º, that is, we could see the return of the “Equatorial nights” Change of trend. For now, the dorsals have alternated with tormentous episodes driven by vaguadas, danas or other phenomena associated with a low pressures zone. This week the pattern will be repeated with a thermal relief that will arrive on Friday, accompanied, yes, storms that already concern some experts. In Xataka | The hydrological bonanza could not be eternal: drought is a real threat after an extremely warm, and also dry June Image | ECMWF

We have discovered the largest underground thermal lake in the world. It is at the bottom of a more than 100 meters aser in Albania

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Albania has just been crowned on the world geological map. And big. There, on the border with Greece, a tens of meters deep, an expedition has identified the largest underground thermal lake on the planet. His name, Neuron. Its figures: more than 183 m long, 42 wide and sufficient water to fill A few Olympic pools. The finding confirms the scope of a discovery that dates back several years ago but whose relevance has only been confirmed now, with the help of a Lidar scanner. Its history is as curious as its size. “A steam column”. To understand the scope of the discovery you have to go back a few years ago, at 2021 and 2002, when a team of Czech scientists launched Vromoner, in southern Albania, near the border with Greece. The area resulted especially interesting For geologists because for years the convulsive political context of Balkans had hindered that scientists could thoroughly examine it. There the experts found a vast underground system of thermal sources thanks to a curious track: a steam stream. “From the high vapor column that rose from the limestone massif we managed to locate a chasm of more than one hundred meters deep,” Marek Audy tellsHead of the expedition. They called her atmos. When exploring it, they took an even greater surprise (literally): they found an intense thermal activity and a “great lake.” How large and broad it was, however, it became an unknown that then, for technical issues, they could not clarify. A (huge) suspicion. Which I was clear Audy team was that it had found something big, huge. And again both words can be understood in their most literal sense. The team suspected that the water extension that had been located in Albania was the largest underground thermal lake in the world, at least among those known today. Hence, later the researchers returned to the Sima in a new expedition provided with a reinforced technical arsenal. Thanks to the support of the Neuron Foundation, which contributed funds, the geologists achieved a special lidar scanner and the software necessary to measure the area. The objective of the researchers –The Neuron Foundation reported Before the expedition left – it was to make a map, a 3D model of the underground cave and the lake and even collect samples of animals from the banks. The result of that incursion has been waiting, but it was worth it: today those responsible presume having identified the largest underground thermal lake in the world. A “unique” lake. In a wink to the foundation that supported the project to the lake, Neuron has been baptized. What surprises however is not its name, but its size: 138.3 meters in length by 42 wide with a circle of 345 m. Inside it hosts around 8,335 m3 of thermal mineral water and those who have had the opportunity to visit it highlight the show of its dome, three times greater than that of the main room of the Prague National Theater. “The phenomenon has been subject to a thorough hydrogeological study to confirm its singularity,” The Foundation stands outwhich emphasizes that it is a “unique” lake. And how did they measure it? The team did not start from scratch. Richard Bouda, photographer and member of the expedition, Explain to Euronews that during the first visit they had already prepared a “basic map” with the resources they had. When they returned they did it, however, with a mobile lidar scanner and the system Geoslam which allowed them to precisely probe the cave and the lake. Not just that. They also traced a detailed map of Atmos, including other caves, such as sulfur. “We believe that this discovery will help protect the area and to better understand hydrological flows. Until now, nobody knew precisely how these groundwater connect to the surface,” Bouda comments. The team also trusts that the finding has an impact on the hydrological and geological studies of the region. Images | Neuron 1 and 2 In Xataka | A cave in France hid a strange rock formation. Some researchers believe that it could be a 3D map

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