decades

Intel has been manufacturing chips for decades only for her. His only salvation is to make chips for all others

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Let’s make a trip to the past. The year is 1997 and Steve Jobs has just returned to Applebut the state of the company is terrible and its future, uncertain. To try to save her Apple began to look for strategic alliances, and that was when she announced an absolutely unusual with Microsoft. Bill Gates’s company would invest 150 million dollars in Apple And both would collaborate on several fronts. That unique agreement seemed impossible. Both companies were large rivals, but the truth is that both won with that alliance. Now it seems that we could live an analogous situation with two other companies that are also large rivals. On the one hand Intel, which is as low as Apple was in 1997. On the other TSMC, which dominates in the semiconductor market like Microsoft did it in the software then. According to The Wall Street Journalboth companies are negotiating a possible alliance that is certainly surprising, but has very interesting ramifications. If TSMC helps Intel’s “salvation”, That will give you an advantageous position in future agreements with the US government. This government is now the owner of 10% of Intel’s shares, and for better or worse to get along with Intel, it means getting along with the administration. Taking into account the current policy that practically forces to manufacture chips and components in the US to get rid of tariffs, that potential alliance becomes profitable. Not just that. The agreement also favors TSMC interests when avoiding possible antitrust. How is it going to be a monopoly when you are helping a competitor not go to pique? As They demonstrated Apple and Microsoft, eliminating competition is not the only way to win the game. A promising transition The Historical crisis For which Intel has been going through his new CEO, Lip-Bu Tan, to make very difficult decisions. The mass layoffs They are part of that strategy, but the company has also attended a deep restructuring that It is “chopping”. But there is even more. In fact, Intel’s strategy seems to be recognized and Accept the failure of the era of “exclusive chip”. The firm has admitted that manufacturing by and for it had no route, and now wants to focus on a business model on which it is A chips factory for third parties. That is exactly what has placed TSMC where it is. If the alliance with TSMC is completed, a unique strategy would be confirmed by Intel in which in a few weeks we have lived a unique opening to alliances of all kinds and condition: SoftBank injected 2,000 million dollars USA bought 10% of Intel for 8,900 million dollars Nvidia invested 5,000 million dollars Apple is a candidate for a collaboration agreement And now TSMC could also follow those steps All these steps certainly open an escape for an Intel that seemed to be against the strings. If such alliances fruit, Intel will only lack his two great future objectives. The first, fulfill your promises With the 14th node to which everything has opted. The second, Get customers For that node. And that is where those agreements can be very useful. Image | Intel In Xataka | Intel has confirmed that the 20A node will be skipped to reduce expenses. The 18A node will enter production in 2025

For decades, Spain has been oblivious to the boom of evangelical churches worldwide. Until they arrived in Madrid

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They do not run good times for the Catholic Church, which dealt with a Vocations collapse and one clear loss of practitioners. However, others that are going better. As the Latin American community has gained presence In the Madrid region it has also been done by the Evangelical Church, increasingly present in its streets and with greater influence. Both, in fact, that there are those who calculate that they are opening places of worship to A past speed. Your data are of course amazing. What’s happening? That evangelical faith is extending strongly in Spain. And specially for the Community of Madrid, where he has been experiencing a real boom for years that can easily be traced in two areas: hemeroteca, who have been echoing of the trend; And on the streets (and polygons) of certain districts, which have seen how apartments, commercial bass or even old industrial workshops and ships were reconverted in places of worship. Are there data to try it? Yes. The observatory of religious pluralism in Spain leaves two interesting. The first is that, according to the registration available right now on its website, in the Community of Madrid there are 834 places dedicated to evangelical cult. The second is that, with that figure, the evangelists are (from afar) the minority confession with more presence in the region. They monopolize more than 69% of the totalquite above the Muslim, which barely reaches 12%. The Observatory itself points out that its data starts from a directory of places of worship that was last updated in October 2021. To have a more complete photograph it arrives with a look at the local press. In August The newspaper dedicated A wide report to the expansion of the evangelical temples in Madrid that spoke of the religion also passed the 800 centers of worship, which even exceeds the number of Catholic parishes, 702. How does it expand? At a surprising speed. Especially if we take into account that it coincides with a moment of weakness of the Catholic Church, marked by A serious vocations crisis that has forced him to pull imagination to maintain temples operations located in the rural. According to The data published yesterday by The countryover the last five years the Madrid region has seen how places of evangelist worship opened at a record rate: one every four days. The proliferation of this kind of temples is not in any exclusive case of the capital. The Observatory reveals that there are also hundreds and hundreds distributed throughout the rest of the country, especially in Catalonia, Andalusia and the Valencian Community. The Board of Directors of the Agency He attributes themrespectively, 984 and 731 and 495. In all Spain Newtral calculates 4,653 distributed for just over 800 municipalities. What reveals Madrid? Several things. Especially the force with which the cult expands and where it does. Although the number of temples has grown clearly in the region, it has not done so homogeneously. While the most central district brings together 21 temples, in Carabanchel we find almost 90, which has made some practitioners refer to it as the “evangelical gold mile.” The Observatory Board of religious pluralism shows that confession also has A rather relevant community Distributed by Alcalá de Henares, Móstoles, Fuenlabrada, Parla, Torrejón de Ardoz, Leganés or Getafe. Any of these locations has dozens of points of worship. What is the reason? There is not one. But the phenomenon coincides with another clear trend: the increase in the population of Latin American origin in Madrid. Last year the region lived a historical milestone when overcoming the symbolic barrier of the Million residents born in Spanish -speaking countries. The data is relevant because it confirms the exponential increase that the community has experienced in recent years, after successive migratory waves. As a reference, at the beginning of this century they barely went from 81,500. Beyond its evolution, it imports (and much) the weight that Americans have reached within Madrid’s society, already representing one in seven population. Why is it important? Because although Catholicism still has a key weight in Latin America, Protestantism and more specifically evangelism (and the Pentecostal movement) movement) has gained strength On the other side of the Atlantic. Upon arriving in Spain, immigrants not only retain the faith they professed in their countries, but helps them preserve their identity and establish ties. “They bring practices, leaders and networks already consolidated in origin that are reproduced in neighborhoods and municipalities where they settle, and find in the Pentecostal churches a space to maintain the identity community,” reflects the sociologist Paola García in A study On the phenomenon published in 2010. Religion abounds, allows them to “maintain identity continuity and, at the same time, mitigate the loneliness and vulnerability of the migratory process.” Are they just temples? No. They are anchor points. And its function goes beyond religious celebrations. They also serve as a space for socialization and support, which partly explains how temples They have expandedoccupying low, old workshops and even ships that come to rent by thousands of euros. “It is a form of social reconstruction that explains why Pentecostalism has found in Latin American flows a conducive land to grow,” he abounds. In Spain they live 1.5 million of people who declare themselves evangelists: to represent 0.2% of the population in 98 became 2% in 2018. Is there anything more than religion? Yes. Although the places of worship have a valuable social function and it is not an exclusive problem of evangelism, there are those who question the approach of some congregations from Latin America that are implanted in Europe. “It is difficult to know when we are talking about an evangelical church and when of a sect”, duck Luis Santamaría del Río, Ries expert, in an essay on the matter published in 2023 cited by The country. The researcher remember that in Spain the groups meet the same population as on the other side of the Atlantic, but “with a different purchasing power.” … Read more

There is a Russian station that has been issuing a totally unintelligible message decades. And nobody knows why

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No one knows what their origin is. Or what is it for. What does it say. Nor does anyone (any government or organization) claim that it is yours. The station UVB-76aka ‘The Buzzer’, is one of the enigmas that has generated more hours of debate among the theorists of the conspiracy over the last years. Basically it is a short wave station that has been (It is said that decades) emitting a buzzing dotted from time to time by names and figures in Russian. Enough to give pábulo to all kinds of stories. Stories that They have sounded again With force now that the Kremlin and the West have tensed their relationship. A name: ‘The Buzzer’. In the world there are many stations. Many. Few however have awakened the fascination of ‘The Buzzer’ (“The buzzer”, in English), also known as UVB-76. And the reason is very simple: it is not known who is responsible for issuing its signal for decades, just as its content is unknown or what is the succession of noise, names and codes that interspersed every so often. Something is only known: it is a paid terrain for the conspiracy. What exactly? UVB-76 is the call indicative of a short wave station that transmits on the frequency 4625 kHzsupposedly from Russia. What it emits is a buzz, a monotonous and repetitive sound that very occasionally (without anyone knowing the reasons) is interrupted by the voice of people who read names and figures in Russian. It is said that at least forty years operatingwhich would overcome its origins to the time of the USSR. In fact, in 2017 The BBC assured He had been with his peculiar salmodia for 35 years “24 hours a day.” If curiosity stings to you, on YouTube there are people who is dedicated to sharing supposed emissions of ‘The Buzzer’, just like In networks. And there are also those who do follow-up of its history and broadcasts, day by day, throughout the year. Who doesn’t like a good mystery? If you are looking in Google you will find dozens and dozens of articles on UVB-76, some of years agoothers of last week. Even in media like Wired, Popular Mechanics, Newsweek either The BBC They have dedicated articles. The reality is that if something is ‘The Buzzer’ is a huge mystery that has known in time, shaking the ingenuity of many conspiracy theorists … and the occasional academic. Last year David StuppleProfessor of Electronic and Radio Engineering at the City University of London, I recognized that to know “the whole truth and nothing more than the truth” of UVB-76 would need to pronounce the Russian Federation, but with everything it was thrown with its own prediction: “It is almost certain that it is the Russian government who is using it. If it is the Russian government, it would not be for peaceful purposes.” Going back to the 70s. The chronicles about ‘The Buzzer’ usually go back to at least The 1970swhen it is believed that their transmissions began. As Remember Wiredthe first thing that caught the attention was his great reach. The second, its content, a buzz that occasionally gave way to tones and men reading messages in Russian. All unintelligible. In the 90s he used the indicative зб-76 (badly translated as UVB-76), a name that has endured. In the history of UVB-76 it is difficult to separate myth of contrasted facts. It is said that in origin the main signal came from a military position located not far from Moscow. Some versions They talk about Povarovo. Others of a site Something fartherabout 80 kilometers north of the Russian capital. In any case, the broadcasting station seems to have not been still during these decades. Popular Mechanics points That since 2010 the signal is more difficult to follow, which explains that there are those who associate it with St. Petersburg, Moscow or PSKOV. When In 2011 Some researchers visited what was supposedly the base on which the signal arose only found a radio team and record books. What does that mean? That if a merit has UVB-76 is its ability to stay for decades as a mystery full of rumors and theories very difficult to confirm, something that also extends to its broadcasts. Popular Mechanics account that at first it issued only beeps and in the 90s I change for a buzz mixed with something similar to a siren and (each or two weeks) the reading of names, words and numbers. The big surprise for his followers arrived 15 years ago, in 2010, when cuts were recorded in the transmission. Why did he? Another mystery. Popular assures That during those days there were those who heard an unusual retransmission, similar to people moving, in addition to an alleged message in Morse and even fragments of ‘The Swan Lake’. Since then his legend has continued to gain weightly, at the blow of news difficult to contrast. Some media They ensure that in 2022, before the invasion of Ukraine, he issued a code series. Or even that in May, after a telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the famous station He began to spit A retahíla of names that were part of a code. Theories to bore. Of course, over the last decades there have been no lacked people willing to theorize about the nature of UVB-76, who is behind or what is their purpose. Some are boring. Others would fit in the script of the last ‘007’ movie and they have earned him The nickname of “the radio of the end of the world”. Stuples Slide For example, it can be an alternative to guarantee communications in case of a disaster that affects the rest of the media. If so, he speculates, his purpose would be to “reserve” the channel. “Maybe they are only reserving it for air defense or some type of defense,” he reflects. “If someone does not use it. The band is so congested that people seek their opportunity … Read more

The great fortunes in Spain had dodged the heritage tax for decades. In 2023 99% have chosen to pay it

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According to him last report Of the Tax Agency, the collection of the Patrimony Tax in Spain marked an important rebound in 2023, with an increase of 58% compared to the previous year, reaching 1,970.7 million euros, compared to the 1,250 million that were collected in 2022. This significant increase is not exclusively due to the boom in the number of Millionaires in Spainbut to Reactivation of the Patrimony Tax in several autonomous communities that previously or totally bonus it. Thus, the number of statements and payments has increased significantly after modifying the fiscal rules that affect To the great fortunes. Taxpayers and declarants. According to data of Tax Agency, in the last decade the number of taxpayers who declare to have assets exceeding 30 million euros has passed from 471 in 2013 to 865 in 2023. During this period the number of declarants with high assets has increased by different stages, with notable increases between 2018 and 2019 and then between 2020 and 2021. At the same time, the total statement of the Patrimony Tax descended slightly in 2023, standing at 228,575 compared to 230,365 of the previous year. It should be noted that being a declarant of this tax does not imply being a taxpayer, since sometimes the declarants are exempt from paying that tax since an exempt minimum of 700,000 euros is established (in most communities) and that exist Deductions in habitual home or certain business goods. 99% of millionaires pay the assets tax. The Finance data suggest that, with a lower number of declarants, it was possible to increase the annual collection in 2023, increasing the number of those who had to pay this tax. In 2022, the number of declarants with assets above 30 million euros was 852, of which only 235 (27.6%) paid the assets tax for living in communities that did not bonate this tax. In 2023, of the 865 declarants with more than 30 million euros, 853 pay this tax, which implies that almost 99% of the great fortunes already pay tax for their assets. THE KEY: TEMPORARY TAX OF SOLIDARITY OF THE GREAT FORTS. The increase in collection at 720.7 million euros between 2022 and 2023 is due to the elimination of bonuses to assets that applied communities such as Madrid and Andalusia that in 2022 allowed to pay Little or nothing of this tax. With the entry into force of the Temporary Tax of Solidarity of the Great Fortures in 2023, the State applied a rule that, with the excuse of Avoid double impositionI could tax with this tax those assets that were not taxed by the Patrimony Tax. Being especially exposed those communities that had this bonus tax. The communities were not going to give up that income. With this maneuver, the State could directly raise what autonomies insisted on bonus. Given this new scenario, communities such as Andalusia or Madrid, which applied 100% bonus in this tax, lost the “Fiscal advantage” for great fortunes With respect to their neighboring communities and if they did not collect it, they would lose those income that would also be collected for the state coffers. The Community of Madrid, for example, He went from raising Zero euros in 2022 to enter 613.7 million in 2023 of 10,659 declarants who did not pay for this tax before. Andalusia also increased its income In 20.79 million euros Thanks to this measure that allows homogenizing the Taxation to great fortunes throughout the country through the coexistence of the state tax and the autonomic, preventing that Great heritages are exempt Thanks to regional bonuses. As evidence of this rebalancing in the collection, the Tax Agency ensures that the entry by the Temporary Solidarity Tax of the great fortunes of 2023 was only 35 million euros, compared to the 630 million euros that collected in 2022, when the autonomies bonus the assets tax. In Xataka | How much money Amancio Ortega has: how the fortune of the richest man in Spain is distributed Image | Unspash (Shane)

The world has been marveling for decades with the urbanism of Washington DC was actually admiring Aranjuez

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To Washington DC, the capital of the most powerful nation on the planet, we have seen it in news, photographs, documentaries and films of all kinds and condition. It is not unreasonable to think that if there was a ‘top 10’ of the most represented cities in the world, the American would occupy a relevant place. However, despite that huge overexposure, one of its greatest architectural secrets has gone unnoticed until now: at least a key part of its urban planning is inspired by a Spanish town that does not reach the 63,000 inhabitants. Which? Aranjuez. Reviewing the story. That the Royal Site of Aranjuez and the US capital have a surprising (and suspicious) urban parallelism is known for some years. He discovered it before the pandemia a team of researchers from the University of Almería and the Polytechnic of Madrid. In his day the finding He had to speakbut it has now been, in 2025, when more interest has aroused. The reason? With Washington DC under the Informative focus International for Donald Trump’s policies, it has been the US administration itself that He has recognized publicly those similarities between its capital and Aranjuez. Click on the image to go to Tweet. “Two cities, the same plane.” As an advance to 250º Anniversary From the declaration of independence, which will be held next year, the US embassy in Madrid published a few days ago A tweet in which the parallelism between the Madrid town and the city bathed by the waters of the Potomac River stands out. “Washington DC shares its urban design with Aranjuez. Same 12 radio avenues, buildings disposal … even the meandro of the river. Two cities, the same plane”, claims The Madrid Embassy next to A link From the desqbre Foundation in which, once it is closed, a phrase can be read with a much more resounding tone: “The urbanism of Washington, a copy of Aranjuez’s.” A ‘Eureka’ moment. To understand it, it is necessary to go back a few years ago, when a member of the team composed of researchers at the University of Alicante and the Polytechnic visited Washington. There he realized a curious detail: the streets, the avenues, the disposition of the buildings, the walks … reminded him of another place that the Spanish urbanists know well, Aranjuez. Back to Spain he decided to delve into that heart and began an investigation that, years later, in January 2019, fruitful in An article Posted in academic magazine Urban Planning and Development. “Surprising similarities”. The title of that rehearsal It was a declaration of intentions: “similarities between the urban plan of L´enfant for Washington DC and the Royal Site of Aranjuez, Spain.” In their pages, experts remember that the influence of Versailles on the plane drawn up in 1791 by Pierre C. L´enfant For the development of Washington it is “well known”, but much less are “the surprising similarities” between the American capital and “the form Urbis of the Royal Site of Aranjuez. “The authors admit that these parallels can be” simple coincidences “, but at least” ask questions. “ The upper figure shows the plane of L’Enfant for Washington, DC (1791). The lower the plane of the Royal Site of Aranjuez de Domingo de Aguirre of the Army Geographic Center (1775). “It’s a copy of Aranjuez”. Much more resounding is The statement Posted on your day from the University of Almería to present the research. It points out that “Washington DC urbanism is a copy of Aranjuez.” “We discover, affirm and have managed to justify and publish that when the US capital is created, after the president George Washington, his design to Thomas Jefferson and this to the cartographer Pierre L´enfant, the city was based on the planes of Aranjuez,” ditch Francisco Manzano, one of the study authors. What are they based on? In the cartographic study of both city. Researchers have proven that the arrangement of the main buildings, radial avenues and the street system is similar in both places. The University cites a clear example: Washington DC and the Royal Site of Aranjuez have in common a peculiar urban feature, the “diagram of two large rectangular spaces” arranged in the form of ‘L’ and at whose ends are, analogously, two emblematic buildings are located. In the case of the American city, The Capitol and the White House. In the Madrid town, the Royal Palace and the Church of San Antonio. Do they have more in common? Yes. The identical position of these spaces in L with respect to the Potomac and Tajo rivers and the gutters that they start from. We also find correspondences between some Washington diagonal avenues with the Tagus Renaissance orchards walk system; Between the Plaza de la the Twelve Streets in Aranjuez and the 12 avenues that radiate from the Capitol “, Explain José Carlos de San Antonio Gómez, of the Polytechnic of Madrid. Another parallelism is left by the trident of the garden of the parterre in Aranjuez and the one formed in the original plane by Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Maryland Avenue Sw and Avenue H. “of the analysis of the plans of both cities and of the circumstances in which they were made, surprising parallels are inferred,” Underline The expert. Avenues and focal points of the Washington DC plans and the Royal Site of Aranjuez. Washington DC planes and the Royal Site of Aranjuez with the distribution of avenues. Looking for the causes. Detected the points in common between both places there was such or even more complicated mission: explain them. What are you due to? Could the Washington DC urbanists inspire in the planes of the Royal Aranjuez site? Spanish researchers also address those unknowns. The experts Remember that King Carlos III He sent copies from Aranjuez to Paris and the main European courts in the 1770 Pierre L´enfant. “There are no documents that prove to know him, but the evidence speaks for themselves,” they emphasize. There, in the Paris of the late eighteenth, … Read more

Airplanes have been depending on GPS for decades. Some engineers have another idea to replace it: quantum technology

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Airbus and the company derived from Google focused on quantum technology and IA, Sandboxaq, have completed more than 150 flight hours Testing Magnava revolutionary system that uses Quantum sensors to detect the unique magnetic “fingerprints” of each point on the earth. The initial results have been promising, and are a sign that technology could rival the Traditional GPS and even overcome it in precision. Why is it relevant. The GPS has become the Achilles heel of modern aviation. Interference attacks and Spoofing They are dramatically increasing in conflicting areas such as the Middle East, Ukraine and Russia, and this It also affects civil flights. The military use these techniques to confuse missiles and drones, but the consequences extend dangerously to commercial aviation. Hence the importance of looking for a viable alternative to GPS. Magnav. Image: Sandboxaq The secret of its operation. Magnav has more or less the size of a toaster, and has a laser that shoots photons against electrons. When the laser goes out, these electrons release the absorbed photons with a unique energy firm that reflects the intensity of the earth’s magnetic field in that exact location. An artificial intelligence algorithm processes this information and compares it with detailed magnetic maps to determine the position of the plane. Each square meter of the planet has an unrepeatable magnetic firm, created by the iron particles of the earth’s core that magnetize the minerals of the cortex. More precision and more difficult to supplant. Unlike GPS, which depends on vulnerable digital signals from satellites, quantum sensors are completely analog and process data generated entirely on board. Jack Hidary, CEO of Sandboxaq, Explain that this makes them “essentially impossible to interfere or supplant.” During the evidence, Magnav managed to meet the standards of the Federal American Aviation Administration 100% of the time, maintaining precision within 2 nautical miles. Even more impressive, it reached a 550 -meter accuracy in 64% of the occasions. Beyond aircraft. The experts They predict A quantum sensor market valued between 1,000 and 6,000 million dollars by 2040. This technology promises to detect submarines and hidden tunnels in defensive applications, and weak magnetic signs of the heart and brain in medicine, allowing non -invasive diagnoses. Joe Depa, Global Innovation Director of EY, Underline That “we are not talking about something within 20 years, but about something that is here and now.” The next step. Sandboxaq plans to go first to the defense sector before expanding to commercial flights. Although more evidence and certifications are required, Hidary stands out that have overcome “the difficult part: demonstrate that technology works.” According to him, it is the “first novel absolute navigation system that we know in the last 50 years.” Cover image | Ross Parmly In Xataka | The 777x is Boeing’s great bet to return to the top: folding wings, redesign cabin and the largest engine in the world

A milestone that will provide you with all the uranium you need for decades

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Nuclear energy It is essential for China. The development he has experienced in this Asian country during the last two decades supports this statement. In 2002 he only had two nuclear centrals in operation. Today you have nothing less than 58 activity in activity. Only US has more (94). There is no doubt about one thing: during the last two decades China’s civil and military nuclear program It has advanced with a dizzying speed. And it seems that he will continue to do so. Anyway the heart of the nuclear program of the country led by Xi Jinping, and that of any other nation that bets on nuclear energy, It is uranium. This chemical element is present in nature in very low concentrations, usually in rocks, land and water. Hence, its obtaining is expensive and its complex treatment, since it requires chemical processes capable of separating it from the other elements and impurities with which it usually lives. It has 92 protons and many other electrons orbiting around the nucleus, and the latter incorporates, in addition to the protons, between 142 and 146 neutrons. It is important that we remember that the nucleus of an atom is usually constituted by a certain number of protons and neutrons (although not always: the protio, the isotope of the most abundant hydrogen, has a single proton and no neutron in its nucleus), as well as by some electrons that orbit around it. China already knows how to exploit deposits that until now were inaccessible The fact that the number of neutrons of the uranium nucleus can vary, as we have just seen, it indicates that there are several isotopes of this chemical element, which are nothing other than atoms with the same number of protons and electrons, but different number of neutrons. The reason why in nuclear fission reactors An uranium-235 atom is used, and not another isotope of this element or any other chemical element, it is that by bombarding its nucleus with a neutron (a process that is known as induced fission) the Uranium-235 is transformed into Uranium-236, which is a more unstable element. This simply means that Uranium-236 cannot remain long in its current state, so it is divided into two lighter nuclei, such as barium-144 and crypton-89 or Cesium-137 and Rubidio-96, and also emits two or three neutrons (2.5 neutrons on average). And here comes the really interesting: the sum of the masses of the light nuclei It is slightly lower than that of the Uranium-236 nucleus from which they come (“disappears” around 0.1% of the original mass). Where has the mass we lack? Only one is possible: it has been transformed into energy. Its largest uranium deposit lies in the Ordos basin, in northern China Until now, China has obtained the uranium that its nuclear power plants need from their Xinjiang, Jiangxi, Guangdong, Yunnan and Sichuan deposits. However, it also matters from Namibia, Kazakhstan, Russia, Uzbekistan, Canada and Australia, among other countries. The funny thing is that its largest uranium deposit lies in the Ordos basin, in northern China, but has a very important problem: It is very difficult to exploit it. In fact, until just a few months that uranium was essentially inaccessible using existing extraction and processing technology. The technical limitations led to the Chinese government years ago to rule out the exploitation of the mines of the Ordos basin, but in 2023 it changed their minds and decided to launch a project called “National Uranium Nº1”. His plan consisted of Develop the necessary technology To extract and process the uranium of ordos with a purpose: take a giant step on the way to China’s self -sufficiency in the field of nuclear energy. The problem of this huge site was that uranium is disseminated and mixed with other sandstone -shaped elements. And it is difficult to process it without the costs are triggered. Even so, in mid -2024 China produced natural uranium by first time by leaching in situ. And now, According to the China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC)has produced its first uranium barrel using this method. The leaching in situ requires injecting in the bed of underground ore through wells a solution of carbon dioxide and oxygen that is capable of dissolving uranium. Then it is necessary to pump to the surface the liquid contained in this chemical element and process it. China’s merit is not just having solved this challenge by finding the ideal aqueous solution; is having achieved it from an economically viable and environmentally respectful formalways According to the information that the National Uranium Corporation of China has made public. Image | Xataka More information | Interesting Engineering In Xataka | The largest nuclear power plant in the planet is a beast with seven reactors. Is ready to return after Fukushima

For decades we rose to this skyscraper in New York without knowing that the screws that held it did not endure

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The situation was more or less like that. For two decades, hundreds of thousands of people entered and went through the doors of one of the larger skyscrapers in New York City. These people, many of them workers, went up and down in the elevator of others totally to the critical failure that the building had, terrifying in an architectural key, and that No one took into account. Rarely in the history of urbanism of the great cities occurred A similar situation. The story dates back to the early twentieth centurywhen the Lutheran Church of San Pedro was in a field of 53 streetbetween Lexington Avenue and the third avenue, in Midtown Manhattan. By 1960, the Church community went through serious economic problems, which led the City Council to sell the land. The negotiations were not easy and lasted years. Mainly, because the Church demanded the creation of a new separate building from the block of floors in which it could continue with its activities. In the end Green light was given to the project. The promoter accepted the conditions, and Citi Bank commissioned Hugh Stubbins & Associates the design of the skyscraper. The engineering will be in charge of William Lemessurier. The final project consisted of a skyscraper, a church, a public space under the level of the street and landscaping. The most important element was, of course, skyscrapers. The plane marked 46 plants that were going to distinguish from the rest of the city by the polished and anodized aluminum of the facade. In addition, among the panels there were window rows. It did not seem really complicated, at least not like the roof and the base of the building. The happy roof Thus, in 1977 the skyscraper ends up lifting. By then it had become bigger, with 59 plants and A total height of 279 meters. An architectural work that dazzled the city’s Skyline, a colossal tower where its inclined top of 45 degrees highlighted. The top of the roof It resembles an isosceles triangle. The original plan was to build terraces and apartments, but over time the architects decided to install huge solar panels. Lemessurier, a professor and graduate of the Massachusetts Institute, conducted a series of tests to check their efficiency. It turned out that the energy converted by the installation was insufficient. Finally, the idea of a small solar plant was abandoned. However, nothing like the base on which the building was supported. Some “stunches”, as Lemessurier himself described, among which he seemed to float for then seventh larger skyscraper on the planet. We refer, of course, those four gigantic pillars (34 meters each) that are located in the center of each side (instead of the corners) of the base. It also had a single column in the center, in this narrower case, which housed the building’s elevator banks and that provided additional force to the racks. With this design it was made room for the church under the corner of the northwest of the building, and gave the giant structure A brutal effectalmost as if he were levitating. In fact, it was exceptionally “light”, of only 25,000 tons (As a reference, Empire State Building was 60,000). The famous pillars The base became an icon of architecture, since it caused the space in the corners to be empty. Lemessurier caused the scratch weight to be distributed to the outer skeleton. Specifically, in a grid of Marcos in a triangular way hidden under the facade. Interestingly, this structure was visible from the inside. The elements were not completely welded, but only set with screwed joints. Apparently, the steel frame designed in this way was destined to support perpendicular winds. According to engineers, Other types of wind should not suppose a threat. In addition, municipal standards did not force other air bursts in design. The truth is that architecture hid an important mechanism in the upper floors. Citigroup Center had One of the first tuned mass shock absorbers (TDM). It is a 360 -ton concrete sphere embedded in oil. When the vibrations of the soil or the wind moved the building, the mechanism oscillated in the opposite direction to the inclination of the building. The problems begin Said balancing was in turn balanced by hydraulic arms that support the sphere. With this solution, the skyscraper was able to “maintain balance.” As Lemessurier explained in his day, this piece was key, since its function was to cut the balancing of the building by half by converting the kinetic energy of friction balancing. Once finished, the building was praised, but also The first doubts arrived. New York is not a state of great hurricanes, but it occasionally has them, what would happen if, once every 50 years, the winds will blow more than 100 km/h? These winds can blow from different directions. The Citigroup Center was inaugurated in 1977, and only one year later it became evident that it could have A very serious defect structural. A year later, Lemessurier receives the call that no architect expects in life. It was Diane Hartleyan engineering student from the prestigious Princeton University who had studied the construction of the skyscraper for his thesis. The first call was to ask several technical questions about the design. Hartley’s professor had expressed his doubts regarding the strength of an inclined skyscraper where the support columns were not in the corners. Hartley made some calculations of the building’s wind load. He then compared them to Lemessurier’s calculations and discovered that the figures of construction engineers were incorrect. The student asked to be sent the exact load calculations for different types of wind. Only received data related to perpendicular winds and guarantees On the solidity of the structure. Moreover, Lemessurier told him that the teacher had not even the most remote idea and that everything was in order. The geometry of the building frame worked perfectly with the pillars in such positions, allowing him to resist very strong winds, even from a diagonal angle. … Read more

The KC-135 have been reproducing airplanes for decades. Now the US wants them to also launch drones to protect themselves

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When we talk about a military plane, we usually think of fighters, as the F-35or bombers, as the B-2. But there are other types of aircraft that are equally essential: Cistern aircraft. The KC-135 It is one of them. Its mission is simple and vital: fly loaded with fuel to refue to others in the air. According to Aviation WeekThe interesting thing is that the US Air Force does not want him to stay there. He has already developed a system so that KC-135 can launch drones while flying, with the idea that they serve as shields, sensors or even communication links in risk areas. A ‘tanker’ that will launch drones It is not a new idea, but an important step. For several years it has been experienced with ways of expanding the capacities of cistern airplanes, and everything indicates that The KC-135 is the first candidate For this change. According to official budget documents for fiscal year 2026the development of this drone launch system It was already tested at some point last year. For now, there are no images or videos of the test. Nor has a public presentation been made. What we do know, so it indicates the budget, is that the objective is to provide the KC-135 with a defensive capacity on board, especially in hostile environments. That is, to be able to launch drones that help you detect threats, confuse enemy missiles or simply expand the visual field of the mission. To achieve this, the development team has opted for a fairly ingenious solution: take advantage of a KC-135 rear hatch and adapt it to integrate a well-known tool Common Launch Tube (CLT)which could also be adapted to the most modern cistern plane KC-46 pegasus. An important point is that these drones would not be thought, at least for the moment, to attack. Its function would be mainly defensive. Everything indicates that they could carry interference systems, act as lures to divert enemy missiles or deploy sensors to monitor the environment and alert the plane of possible threats. They would be, in essence, a first protection line for the KC-135 in areas where flying has become more and more risky. In the background, what the Air Force proposes with this system is not only a specific improvement, but an operating approach change: that a plane designed to refuel can become a kind of Air warehouse for other resourcesready to act in real time according to what happens in the mission. While the United States seeks to squeeze the entire potential of its veterans KC-135, France has chosen to turn page. On June 30, one of its Stratotanker flew for the last time, ending more than six decades of service. Instead, the country has opted for the Airbus A330 MRTT, Like the one that has just received Spaina more modern plane, with greater autonomy, more load capacity and suitable for both medical and logistics missions. Images | Anduril | United States Air Force In Xataka | They are not your imaginations, the seat of airplanes is increasingly uncomfortable. He began to shrink in 1978 and since then he has not stopped

China is building the fusion-fission reactor that the US canceled decades ago. The future of nuclear energy depends on your fate

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In the newly built Yoohu scientific island, next to the city of Nancheng, China advances discreetly in its plans to materialize a project that the United States explored and abandoned decades ago: the hybrid fusion-fission reactor. Xinghou-1. His name means “spark”, and is inspired by an appointment by Mao Zedong: “A single spark can set the entire meadow.” But it’s no small thing: it has behind An investment of more than 200,000 million yuanthe equivalent of 28,000 million dollars. The objective: build a hybrid central with 100 megawatts of electrical power, 300 megawatts of thermal power and, most importantly, a plasma energy gain factor (Q) greater than 30. An unprecedented achievement that could redefine the future of nuclear fusion nuclear energy. What all this means. To understand the magnitude of this objective, you have to put it in context. The nuclear fusion, the same process that feeds the stars, promises clean energy without the radioactive waste of current nuclear fission. The great challenge is get a fusion reaction to generate more energy of which consumes. The National Ignition Facility of the United States achieved in 2022 a historical milestone with a value q of 1.5demonstrating for the first time a net energy gain. The International Experimental Thermonuclear Reactor (Iter), a gigantic multinational project that is being built in France, aspires to achieve a Q> 10 to demonstrate the viability of large -scale fusion. Xinghuo, however, points to a Q> 30, the threshold that experts consider necessary for a merger plant to be commercially profitable. How does China plan to make this giant leap? The answer is in your hybrid approach. A fusion-fission reactor. That is, a reactor that uses the high energy neutrons generated by a fusion reaction (the “spark”) to bombard a mantle of fistible material such as uranium. This triggers a fission reaction that greatly multiplies energy production. In essence, use the fusion as a catalyst to make the fission much more efficient. The Xinghuo-1 project has already entered into the initial phase, which includes the tender and evaluation of its environmental impact. Its development is in charge of the state company Nuclear China Industry 23 Construction Corporation (CNI-23) and the private company Lianovation Superconductor. The road that the United States abandoned. The concept is not new. During the 1970s and 1980s, the United States Department of Energy investigated hybrid reactors before political priorities changed. Concerns about nuclear proliferation (hybrids can be used to produce plutonium) and a strategic commitment to “pure fusion” such as the definitive and cleaner solution led to the abandonment of this line of research. United States, and with it much of the West, They put all their chips on projects like the iter. China, on the other hand, has seen a shortcut in the hybrid model. While pure fusion follows decades away from its commercialization, a hybrid reactor like Xinghuo could connect a merger plant to the electricity grid much earlier. As soon as in 2030, According to SCMP. A coordinated national commitment. Xinghuo is part of a well -financed fusion ecosystem. China also maintains the East project, a Tokamak fusion reactor that has been able to maintain a 100 million degrees plasma for more than 17 minutes. The Huanliu-3 project, a newer and more powerful tokamak in experimentation phase. And the CFETR project, A large -scale pure fusion reactorconsidered the Chinese equivalent of Iter. The success of Xinghuo not only depends on its own advances, but also on the development of a complex industrial supply chain for key components such as superconductor magnets and the thermal vacuum chamber. If China makes Xinghuo work, either in 2030 or 2035, the implications would be seismic. They would demonstrate the viability of a route to commercial fusion energy that the rest of the world abandoned long ago. He could put Beijing years, if not decades, ahead in the energy race. Image | Xinhua In Xataka | The largest nuclear fusion project fails before the first ignition: Iter delays one of its key milestones at 2033

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