Deep

“Going to the gym for an hour” is not worth spending eight hours sitting. And there is a deep evolutionary reason for that.

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They have slipped it on us and it is time to recognize it. For years, the gym boom has been received with enthusiasm: having ubiquitous and accessible sports facilities to get us out of our sedentary routine can only be understood as something positive. And yet, the way sport has entered our lives is deeply problematic: we have managed to create a “compartmentalized model” of physical activity that is leaking everywhere. So “going to the gym” doesn’t work? No, it’s not that. It’s not what the evidence says. Intense exercise is helpful. Very useful. And it is always better than doing nothing: but the idea of ​​going to the gym for an hour and that’s it forgets that the relevant unit is not the hour at the gym, but the energy pattern of the 24 hours a day. Let’s put it another way: Why do the Hadza They do not burn more calories than office workers despite walking 12 km a daywhy weight loss gym programs consistently disappoint or why the WHO has begun to separate “exercise” from “sit less”? The answer to these three questions is the same: the evolutionary biology of the human being. Two lines of research that converge at the same point. Between 2012 and 2018, a team from Duke University coordinated by Pontzer discovered that the body It is not dedicated to linearly adding exercise expenditure to basal expenditure. What it does is compensate for it (reducing expenditure on other vital functions such as inflammatory, reproductive processes or metabolic control). That is, doing an hour (or more) of intense exercise does not have to increase total energy expenditure. The second line of research arises from comparing people with the same weight and height. In ’99, the Mayo Clinic discovered that the daily difference in energy expenditure can be attributed to things like walking, standing, housework, and other types of small unconscious movements. To this we must add that a sedentary lifestyle is, in itself, a risk factor. In 2016, Ekelund and his team discovered that between 60 and 75 minutes a day of moderate physical activity are needed to eliminate the excess mortality risk associated with sitting for 8 hours or more a day. That is, one hour of exercise does not solve the problem. And the problem is that the public conversation doesn’t realize it. It is unbalanced: the dominant imagination since the 80s sees doing “a handful of hours of exercise” as a way to “buy” health. The very long debate about how many steps to take each day is exactly the same. The issue, as I say, is that the evidence is clear that we are not buying anything. And then? Should we close the gyms? Nothing of the sort. The important thing at this point in 2026 is to begin to understand that the correct unit to think about our physical activity is the full day. As the WHO says“more activity is better than little; any activity is better than none; (however) reducing a sedentary lifestyle provides independent benefits” and is worth addressing regardless of the exercise we do. The idea of ​​”training for an hour and then spending the rest of the day calmly” does not hold water. Going to the gym is positive, but it is not a papal bull: intense exercise works as something that adds to leaving a sedentary lifestyle. It does not replace it. Image | Anupam Mahapatra In Xataka | Cereals yes, but wrapped in black cardboard: the packaging business aimed exclusively at men

the day the US stole a Soviet nuclear submarine 5,000 meters deep

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In the 1970s, a gigantic American ship sailed slowly through the Pacific while several Soviet ships they watched him a few meters away, taking photos and listening to every conversation. On deck, the sailors talked loudly about rocks on the seabed and collected samples so that everything seemed routine, without anyone suspecting that, right under their feet, one of the most unusual operations of the entire Cold War. An impossible robbery. At the end of the 60s, in the middle of the Cold War, the United States secretly located the Soviet submarine K-129 sunk to more than 5,000 meters deep in the Pacific, a distance that made any recovery attempt practically unfeasible. Even so, the strategic value it was hugesince the submersible carried nuclear missiles, codes and key technology that could tip the balance at a time of nuclear parity between superpowers. With that goal in mind, the CIA launched the Azorian Projectan operation so ambitious that for years only a small circle within the Government knew of its existence. Context. In reality, the mission, which lasted more or less six years, had begun in 1968, when the K-129 loaded with ballistic missiles disappeared without explanation somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. The situation was not entirely strange if we think that, at that time after the Cuban Missile Crisisboth American and Soviet submarines patrolled the high seas with nuclear weapons on board, prepared for possible war. Model of the sunken and deteriorated submarine K-129 The sinking. There are reports indicating that it was due to a mechanical failure, such as the missile’s engine accidentally starting, while the Soviets suspected for a time that the Americans had acted in bad faith. Be that as it may, and after two months, the Soviet Union abandoned the search for the K-129 and the nuclear weapons it carried, but the United States, which had recently used Air Force technology to locate two of its own submarines sunken, located the submarine 2,400 kilometers northwest of Hawaii and 5,030 meters deep. According to the declassified history of the project by the CIA decades later, “no country in the world had managed to recover an object of this size and weight from such depth.” Sherman Wetmore, chief engineer of the Glomar Explorer, looks at an oil painting of the ship refloating the Soviet submarine The great theater of lies. Once Washington found its location and in order to hide the true purpose, one of the more elaborate covers of history: an alleged underwater mining mission led by the eccentric millionaire Howard Hugheswhose reputation made any extravagant project credible. As? The enormous was built Hughes Glomar Explorerpresented to the world as a ship capable of extract manganese nodules from the seabed, while in reality it hid inside a secret system designed to capture the submarine. The operation was so convincing that even influenced markets and universitiesfeeding for years the illusion of a new mining industry that was never actually the objective. Details of the construction plan of the Glomar Explorer (reproduction), from 1971. In the lower central part of the ship, you can see the plans of the so-called “lunar pool”, into which the claw could introduce the submarine The giant claw. The heart of the mission was, possibly, the most exciting part of an already incredible story. It was a device hidden under the boat: a gigantic mechanical “claw” capable of descending kilometers to the ocean floor, hugging the hull of the submarine and raising it through a complex system of pipes and cables. The entire process had to be executed out of sight, using an internal opening in the ship (the called “moon pool”) that allowed working completely hidden, even under the constant surveillance of suspicious Soviet ships, but they couldn’t prove anything. There is no doubt, the operation required extreme precision, withstanding colossal stresses and maintaining the ship’s position in the open sea for days, something that in itself already represented an unprecedented technological challenge. Everything (almost) ready. In the summer of 1974, after years of preparation, the CIA managed to reach the submarine and hooked it with the claw, at which point he began to slowly raise it towards the surface, in an operation that lasted days and kept the entire crew tense. However, halfway through the ascent, the structure gave way and much of K-129 fell back to the ocean floor, leaving only a recovered section. Even so, they managed to rescue remains of the helmet and bodies of several Soviet sailors, who were buried with honors at sea, while the real loot (the missiles and secret codes) was shrouded in uncertainty and absolute secrecy by the United States, since many of the details remain classified today. “We neither confirm nor deny.” The biggest twist in history came when the operation came out in 1975 after leaks and thefts of documents linked to the business cover, forcing the US Government to face a most delicate diplomatic situation. However, instead of admitting or denying the theft of a Soviet nuclear submarine more than 5,000 meters deep, Washington adopted a response that would go down in history: “We neither confirm nor deny”a formula designed to avoid direct tensions with Moscow and which has since become a standard in intelligence matters. That calculated silence It encapsulates the essence of the entire operation: a gigantic mission, almost impossible on paper, visible to everyone in appearance, but whose true purpose and results remain, to a large extent, hidden from the general public. The legacy. Although he Azorian Project did not recover the entire submarine, it left a deep mark on history of espionage and engineeringamong other things because it demonstrated that it was possible to operate at extreme depths and execute missions of a unprecedented complexity. Of course, it also demonstrated the extent to which the Cold War promoted radical technical solutions and operations that bordered on the improbable, in a race for gain strategic advantage at any price between both sides. Decades later, it remains one … Read more

Fish has been in a deep crisis in Spain for years. Mercadona believes it has the formula for that to change

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He video It is from October 2024, but it could have easily been recorded yesterday, today or even tomorrow. In a piece lasting just under a minute, Jana Quiles, tiktokerrecounts his disastrous time at a fishmonger: “I just wanted a piece of fish for dinner and, because I didn’t know what to order, I ended up buying 25 euros worth of hake.” Your case is interesting because it connects with a phenomenon shared by many other young people on networks and that is reflected in the statistics from the Government: Spanish households buy less and less fish. Mercadona has taken note and has decided to step on the accelerator in a bet that it’s been a while implementing: the move from the fishmonger to the trays. What has happened? That Mercadona wants a “new fish sales model” in its stores. The chain itself announced it in a statement posted on its website, a note that, beyond its corporate tone, stands out for two things. The first, the message. The company advances its intention to complete the transformation of its sections, betting 100% on the packaged product. “We transfer all products to trays, guaranteeing quality and freshness.” The second thing that draws attention is the images. Mercadona’s statement only shows photos of fish already packaged, labeled and arranged in open refrigerators. Not a counter. Not even a stand with fresh goods and fishmongers to consult about the goods or a special cut. Nothing, in short, that can lead to experiences like the one that Jana Quiles lived in her day. @janaquiles This happens to me as a beginner 😂🐟 ♬ original sound – Jana Quiles Is it something new? In a way. Although Mercadona seems determined to complete its “reengineering” of fish, in reality the change comes from behind. Does more than a year There was already talk of the chain’s desire to find a more efficient model for the section, betting on the consumption of clean merchandise arranged on trays. The idea, how it progressed TOB.C. in January 2025: greater offer in packaging, with items ready for consumption, and much less assisted sales, moving away from the model that prevails in traditional markets. From the traditional image of customers browsing the hake, turbot and mussels displayed on ice, with the fishmonger on the other side of the counter, we move to a more functional one in which there is only the customer and the tray. Why this change? Mercadona argues who wants to “adapt” to how we consume in our homes and defends the benefits of the new model: “The key is to reduce as much as possible the time that passes from when the fish comes out of the water until you consume it.” To older claims that the trays allow it to reduce waiting times in stores, offer an “assortment adapted to real consumption” and work with merchandise “clean and ready for consumption.” In short, selling merchandise made almost to measure for a clientele that has lost the habit of buying fish and no longer has the vocabulary and the keys to ordering fresh goods. Again the case by Jana Quiles is paradigmatic. His experience with hake is not something isolated, it connects with an entire generation that has not acquired the habit of going to traditional fishmongers. That’s all? No. To these advantages are added others that Mercadona does not cite and directly affect its production costs, logistics and even the management of spaces in the store. In January the company already made it clear In any case, the change in model would not imply dispensing with employees, they would simply be assigned new roles. “The entire fishmonger’s team continues to be part of Mercadona. Their work adapts to other needs in the store.” Does it only affect fish? No. The focus may now be on fish, but it is only part of a much larger Mercadona strategy that connects with two of its main bets. One is food ready for consumption. For years, the chain has aspired to be more than just the place where you buy products to fill your refrigerator and pantry; It seeks to be directly the space in which you feed yourself. The clearest reflection of this slogan is the section “Ready to eat”but the commitment to trays of fish that are clean, cut, filleted and practically ready to put in the oven goes in that same direction. And the other bet? The ‘Store 9’the new local format that the Valencian chain wants to bet on. Your goal is optimize processes and improve efficiency, but in practice that translates into moving even further away from traditional counters and moving towards already packaged merchandise. Interaction with staff during purchases is reduced to a minimum. No chats with butchers, fishmongers or fruit sellers, like in traditional supermarkets. Speed, efficiency, and functionality prevail, which in turn leads to handling and packaging tasks being removed from public areas. Is this just about Mercadona? Not at all. Roig’s chain has managed to gain a considerable market share in Spain, close to 30% in terms of value, so their decisions affect thousands and thousands of families. However, the changes in fish consumption go further and partly connect with the Quiles video that we mentioned at the beginning of the article. We Spaniards buy less and less fish. The official data of the Government show that per capita consumption of fish (both fresh and frozen) in homes has been plummeting for years. And it doesn’t get better. He latest reportfrom November, shows interannual falls of between 4 and 5.5%. With its latest movements, Mercadona seeks to position itself in the part of the business that performs best. While Fedepesca talks about the closure of thousands of fishmongers Since 2007, there are businesses in the sector more focused on the sale of ready-to-buy merchandise, online orders and home delivery that they keep growing. Fish consumption itself is leaving homes to focus at leisure. Now Mercadona aspires to carve out … Read more

We have been obsessed with measuring deep sleep with a watch for years. Science says what matters is dreaming vividly

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The reality is that waking up feeling like you’ve fallen asleep like a dormouse is one of the greatest pleasures in life, since it makes you start the day in a very different way. Until now, sleep science has told us that to achieve that feeling of rest we had to maximize deep sleepbut now the rarity and the intensity of dreams They are also gaining a starring role here. A new study. A recent published research in the prestigious magazine PLOS Biology by an Italian team has revealed that vivid and immersive dreams are directly related to a greater subjective sense of deep sleep. And most fascinating: this occurs even when the brain’s electrical activity tells us that we are in a phase of light sleep. How they have done it. To reach this conclusion, the researchers did not settle for morning surveys, but rather They took 44 adults healthy people to a sleep laboratory for four consecutive nights. Here they simply had to be connected to a high-density electroencephalogram to monitor their brain activity in real time. The methodology used was quite methodical, since all of them were awakened repeatedly, reaching the figure of 1,900 awakenings in total throughout the entire study. But they were not waking them up at any time, but rather sleep phase N2 which is what belongs to non-REM sleep and is what is considered relatively light sleep, where the biological need to sleep usually decreases as the night progresses. But the important thing is that, after each awakening, the participants had to describe their previous mental experiences and rate, from 1 to 10, how deep they felt their sleep had been just before opening their eyes. The result. By crossing the data from the dream stories with the EEG activity and the subjective perception of the participants, the scientists found a pattern that indicated that when the participants reported vivid, strange dreams, with high emotional intensity or very visually rich, they reported having been immersed in a very deep sleep. In contrast, if the mental activity before waking up was abstract, vague, or the participants had “meta-awareness,” which is thinking about real problems or being aware that they were sleeping, they felt that their sleep had been very superficial. A change. In this way, this sensation of dreamlike depth challenged the electroencephalograms themselves. And the fact is that, although the EEG showed that the participant’s brain activity was dangerously close to wakefulness, if he was immersed in an intense dream plot, his brain interpreted that he was resting peacefully. Memory doesn’t matter. One of the most interesting details of the study points to a situation that can be frustrating: waking up knowing that you had an incredible dream, but unable to remember the entire plot. Here the scientific study demonstrates that narrative memory is not necessary for rest, since the participants continued to rate their sleep as deep and restorative despite not remembering it. In this way, the simple fact that the brain has been “disconnected” from the physical environment and immersed in its own virtual world seems to be enough to preserve the subjective perception of rest. What does it mean? This discovery opens the door to new treatments for sleep disorders, since, in the case of insomnia, the problem could not only be in the clinical architecture of sleep, but in an alteration of dream activity or a lack of mental disconnection from the environment. And this is precisely where science has to begin to investigate. Images | iam_os In Xataka | Waking up at 3 in the morning is totally normal: sleeping straight through is a modern invention, not an evolution

drill a well 40 kilometers deep offshore

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Paper supports everything. A business breakfast on a sunny patio on the California coast, too. In this way, between cups of coffee, croissants and toast with jam that come and go, in 1957 a group of scientists from the picturesque American Miscellaneous Society (AMSOC) when two of them, the geologist Harry Hess and the oceanographer Walter Munkdecided to launch a research proposal: open a huge hole in the Earth. And huge is not an exaggeration. What Hess and Munk proposed was to drill a kilometer well that would allow reaching and extracting a sample of what is known as Mohorovičić discontinuitythe limit between the Earth’s crust and the mantle, a strip located at a depth between 25 and 40 kilometers on the continents and 5 to 10 km if the ocean floor is taken as a reference. What’s more, once they were digging, they could even obtain a sample of the planet’s own mantle. “It sounded so simple and logical” The idea sounded delirious, but it was 1957, the space race gained strength and with Cold war As a backdrop, the US looked with interest at any project that would allow it to demonstrate its scientific power to the USSR. Besides, as Willard Bascom would recognizefrom AMSOC, the proposal seemed most reasonable when listened to with a hot coffee in hand, among colleagues and letting yourself be caressed by the morning sun on the Pacific coast. “The project sounded so simple and logical at a business breakfast on a sunny patio,” I wrote some time later about that peculiar brainstorming. Whether or not it turned out to be simple—which, spoiler: no, it wasn’t—the idea came to fruition. Its promoters knew how to take advantage of the strong winds of international rivalry and revealed how much the Russians were advancing in the field of science and how they looked with interest at Mohorovičić’s exploration of discontinuity. 57 was the year of the launch of the Sputnik Soviet, so the strategy worked and the drilling project ended up gaining the backing of the National Science Foundation (NSF), a government agency created seven years earlier. They named the adventure Mohole Projectcombination of “Moho”, the abbreviation of Mohorovičić, and “hole”, hole, in English. Short Simple. Easy to handle and understand. Everything that was not going to be the scientific challenge itself. “Where do we get the money?” It was not, however, the only question that scientists had to resolve. Another, equally or even more crucial, was “Where to drill?” The answer was a very specific location in the Pacific, near Guadalupe Island, off the coast of Mexico. And there was a good reason for that. If the efforts were focused on the ocean floor, the team would have to drill significantly fewer meters of the Earth’s crust, a non-negligible advantage when the target is kilometers deep. The various problems The problem, of course, is that this requires operating from a boat, in the middle of the ocean, among the waves, and deploying the drilling equipment over more than 3,000 m of depth. “It’s like trying to work on the Earth’s surface from a helicopter, half a mile up,” explains to Vox geologist Donna Blackman. Today, with the Japanese ship Chikyu opening record wells, an international fleet that includes modern drilling vessels such as the Noble Globetrotter I—the one at the top of this article, built twelve years ago—and researchers reaching marks of 8,023 meters underwater, the challenge may sound less impressive, but in the 1950s it was. Oil companies had not yet embarked on drilling in such deep waters and undertaking an undertaking like the one proposed by AMSOC required first answering a series of technical questions: How to keep the ship stationary in the middle of the ocean to deploy the drilling equipment? Dropping anchors was not very practical given the enormous distance at which the seabed was located, so the final solution was to use a propeller system. They had to apply the same ingenuity to solve other equally or more difficult questions: How to deploy the pipeline at such low levels and between strong currents? How to drill with the depth required to reach Moho? And once these challenges are solved, how do we get the samples up to the ship? With a plan drawn up, in 1961 the scientists set sail aboard the ship CUSS I heading to Guadalupe Island to deploy what was supposed to be the first phase of Project Mohole. The technicians drilled half a dozen wells in total, the deepest of 183 meters and at an underwater depth of 3,600 m. The machinery penetrated 13 m into the basalt of the upper oceanic crust. That was very, very far from 6,000 meters necessary to reach Moho and the mantle, but it was quite a feat which even led President John F. Kennedy to cable the National Academy of Sciences to celebrate what he considered to be “a remarkable achievement, a historic milestone.” However, neither Kennedy’s good words, nor the promise of the company, nor the ability he had demonstrated to overcome technical challenges helped the Mohole Project go much further. In 1961, the Mohole project started, with the aim of drilling through Earth’s crust to the mantle. John Steinbeck (yes, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature 1yr later) was on the ship & I’ve just found his amazing (genuine joy plus snark) article: https://t.co/CPEB7mCf9q pic.twitter.com/DymGw2ta4o — Helen Czerski (@helenczerski) December 21, 2021 Drilling holes in the ocean floor was expensive and in 1966 the US Congress decided that it was not interesting to continue paying for it. Add to that bureaucratic errors, the dissolution of AMSOC in 1964 and differences between the members of the team about what the next steps should be and you will have the epitaph of a project that, nevertheless, is remembered as a special chapter in 20th century science and served to demonstrate the interesting possibilities of drilling the ocean floor. The Mohole Project It didn’t mark the end … Read more

Neptun Deep, the largest offshore field in the EU

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Europe has spent almost five years desperately searching for gas that does not come from Russia. When the Commission finally succeeded at the beginning of the year and was able to approve the total import ban on Russian gasyou found yourself in another scenario but the same problem: now the uncomfortable partner is the United Stateswhich has become the largest supplier of LNG on the continent. The only real way to achieve gas sovereignty is to produce at home. And one of the answers may be 160 kilometers off the Romanian coast, in the deep waters of the Black Sea: the Neptun Deep deposit. The site. Neptun Deep It is on the Romanian continental shelf of the Black Sea, on an area of ​​7,500 km² and with depths ranging from 100 to 1000 meters. Proven and probable reserves are estimated around 100 bcm (billions of cubic meters). Context. The introduction glimpses a good part of the current situation: Russian supply has fallen from 45% to 19%, as report this roadmap from the European Commission less than a year ago, the end of transit of gas pipelines through Ukraine, the growing dependence on LNG from the US and the EU producing today 30% less than at the beginning of the decade. This drop in production has its reason in forced closure of the giant Groningen, the largest deposit in the EU. And in this pressing context comes confirmation that Romania is already the largest gas producer in the EU, as supports Eurostat. Why is it important. For Romania, whose annual gas consumption round The 10 – 11 bcm implies the real possibility of stopping imports and an important revitalization of the industry. But for Europe its relevance is strategic: A connection to the Black Sea gas corridor. The Western Balkans and Moldova have historically depended of Russian gas, in Neptun Deep they could find a direct substitute. More diversification in supply in the form of domestic sources. Although it is true that globally it is not differential, it is a sovereign gas made in the EU that does not transit through hostile countries. Advance for other European off shore. The future of the Romanian regulatory model can serve as a roadmap for other countries with off shore potential, such as Greece or Cyprus. A soap opera exploitation. The block was first explored in 2008 and in 2012 the first exploratory well, Domino-1, was drilled. ExxonMobil and OMV Petrom were originally involved, but after years of regulatory blockage and prosecutor, ExxonMobil advertisement its withdrawal in 2019. The project was left in limbo until the Romanian state company Romgaz bought ExxonMobil’s participation in 2022. It was the conflict between Russia and Ukraine that unblocked everything: Romania reformed its offshore law and from there, the partners decided to undertake the investment, committing 4,000 million euros. With the Neptun Alpha production platform scheduled to be installed in 2026 and wells in drilling since March 2025, first production is estimated for 2027 and is expected a peak production of between 8 and 10 bcm annually. Yes, but. We have already seen that Neptun Deep has appeared on the map when it is most needed in Europe, but its impact on the old continent is relative: By scale: its production of between 8 and 10 bcm annually represents 2.5% of European consumption (390 bcm, according to the International Energy Agency). In short, it will not change the dependency nor does it have the weight to alter prices. The conditions of the Black Sea have their own challenges, with the absence of oxygen in the deep layers, certain seismicity or the presence of hydrogen sulfide in some formations. Construction logistics will not be easy. By timing. Gas will arrive in 2027 at the earliest, when European demand has already been declining for years due to electrification. The utility window is narrow. On the other hand, it could discourage electrification in Romania and the Balkans. In Xataka | Europe has reached the end of winter with depleted gas reserves. A country has a model to save it: Spain In Xataka | Europe managed to become independent from Russian gas. Now you have another headache: how to become independent of US gas Cover | Romgaz Romania

Japan does not want to depend on China for rare earths. And that is why it is drilling the ocean at 6,000 meters deep

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He map of the world’s (known) rare earth reserves makes one thing clear: China is the absolute queen. Although They are neither earth nor are they rareconstitute a real poker of aces in the game of global geopolitics, energy and technology. And it’s not just about having lanthanides in your territory, it’s about discovering them and knowing how to extract them. Within that graph, in the Asia section, we can see that Japan does not even appear on the map. And it’s not because there aren’t any, because there are, there are. But so far they have turned to their trading partner and neighbor: China. Where Christ lost the lighter. In 2024 Japan found an impressive site of 230 million tons that would put it on the front line. But that site had small print: it is at the bottom of the sea, in a coral atoll in the Pacific about 1,900 kilometers southeast of Tokyo. Fair where they suspected. Last summer discovered his roadmap with a first stage that would begin right now, in January 2026. Japan and China, on the brink of the abyss. The two Asian countries are mired in a deep diplomatic crisis. The great trigger was the statements of the Japanese Prime Minister at the end of 2025 suggesting that a Chinese military intervention in Taiwan could be considered an “existential crisis” for Japan, which would open the doors to a Japanese military response. The consequences were immediate: China considered it interference and began to intensify its maritime patrols and areas near Japanese waters in a move that has displeased the Japanese government. consider it reckless in terms of security. 2026 also began with trade consequences from China such as the veto on seafood products, restrictions on tourism and an embargo on the export of dual-use goods (civil and military), including rare earths. So Japan has to expedite another way to obtain rare earths to feed its automotive industry in particular and technology in general. And he has done it. Just in time. Given the rough patch he’s going through with his partner and neighbor, the timing couldn’t be better. Last Monday a mining ship set sail for that remote atoll located in front of the Minami-Torishima Island to begin a month-long mission in which the famous Japanese drill ship Chikyu and a crew of 130 people will have to go all out, literally, to try to continuously extract rare earths from that succulent seabed six kilometers deep. And we say “try” because It’s the first time it’s been done. If successful, a full-scale mining test will follow in February 2027. Japan’s “detox” of Chinese rare earths. It is not the first time that Japan has been in this situation. Without going any further, in 2010 China retained exports after an incident that took place between a Chinese fishing boat and two Japanese patrol boats near the Senkaku Islands (administered by Japan but claimed by China). At that time, Japan managed to reduce their dependence from China from 90 to 60%. The alternative route involved investments in projects abroad (for example, from Australia) or promoting recycling and manufacturing processes that are more independent of the base material. But now it is different because who can obtain rare earths within their own territory. Looking to the horizon. Since the diplomatic crisis of 2010, Japan has been investigating in search of mineral reserves. Without going any further, this one on Minamitori Island has been in development since 2018 and the Japanese government has invested more than 40 billion yen (250 million dollars) since then. It was previously considered economically unviable, but between China’s embargo and the willingness to pay higher prices, it already seems more plausible, explains Kotaro Shimizuprincipal analyst at Mitsubishi UFJ Research and Consulting. The senior director of economic security policy at the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry of Japan on the China Talk podcast This week’s issue revealed how the government must continually remind companies of the importance of diversifying their supply chains: “Sometimes an event occurs and the company reacts, but when the event ends, the company forgets. We have to maintain a continuous effort” In Xataka | The “B side” of the United States landing in Venezuela: a subsoil full of hypothetical rare earths In Xataka | Greenland has 1.5 million tons of rare earths. The problem is that there are no roads to get to them. Cover | Peggy Greb and Gleam – Photo taken by Gleam., CC BY-SA 3.0

A very deep polar trough is descending towards North Africa and Spain is right in the middle

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Now Spain is busy with the rain and it is logical: it is not every day that a high-impact storm hits you and turns the country upside down. However, as they said from Navarmeteothe key question is what is going to happen from Tuesday. Let’s fasten our seatbelts, because curves are coming. An early winter. Both the European and American models coincide in a change in weather pattern next week. Towards Thursday, a very deep polar trough will descend from northern Europe towards the south. The interesting (and worrying) thing is that it is going to pass right over us. That is, in a week Spain will be immersed in a polar air mass maritime. But the thing is not limited to that: as a corridor opens that connects us to the north (between the western anticyclone and the storm in the Gulf of Genoa), shortly after the first ‘impact’ a second pulse of even colder continental polar air will arrive. What does this mean? Well, if everything happens as the models say, cold and humid air from the North Atlantic will enter first. That will cause temperatures to drop and rain and snow will return. Then, with the strengthening of the northerly flow, drier and colder air will arrive: a major thermal collapse. Are we sure about this? We have been seeing for days how the great models they were converging around a scenario like this: a huge tongue of cold approaching the peninsula. However, skepticism was more than justified. But things are starting to get real. It seems clear that it will be a cold week throughout the country (except the Canary Islands) and temperatures at altitude are beginning to reach up to 10 degrees below average. Everything will start in the Cantabrian Sea, but by Friday it will have reached the entire peninsula. Things are going to change. We come from the storm Claudia and, although the impact has been considerable, It has been a fairly tempered system. However, things are going to change: even if in the end the trough does not reach that far south, the cold is going to be felt in large areas of the country. And this is the beginning of a winter that, if all goes well, is expected very (but very) moved. Image | Tropical Tridbits In Xataka | It’s going to rain in Galicia. It seems normal but it is something more: the prelude to a total change in the weather in Spain

Jensen Huang Discrepa from Musk and sees in AI a deep labor transformation

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We are seeing in real time how advances in robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) begin to mold the world in which we live. Models like him Figure 02 are already being tested in factorieswhile others such as Neo Beta have begun to reach the first homes. If some of the current projections are fulfilled, within a few years we could live in cities where Automats are everywhere. The big question is inevitable: what will happen if this scenario comes true? What will we live when I assume most of the work? For a long time, Elon Musk defends A “sustainable abundance” model, in which humans would receive a high universal income and access better health, food, housing and transport services. A future with robots everywhere According to your vision, jobs will become optional because “Probably none of us will have a job.” Not all the big names of the sector share this opinion. Jensen Huang, CEO of Nvidia, coincides with Musk that there will be a massive robots deployment, But he doesn’t believe that implies the end of work. Your bet, As he revealed in an interview with Fox Businesspasses through a smaller workday. “I have to admit that I fear that in the future we will be more busy than now. The reason is that many different things that have been done faster for a long time. I am always waiting for the work to end because I have more ideas; most companies have more ideas to pursue.” The manager argues that artificial intelligence will increase our productivity, but will also allow to have more time for leisure and personal development. That does not mean, he insists, that we will be unemployed receiving an income: “We can spend more time on weekends traveling. We come from a world with work weeks of 7 days, and now we have one of 5, and each industrial revolution leads to some change in social behavior. But I hope that the economy does very well thanks to the AI. And some works will disappear, but all the works will change as a result of the AI.” As a point, the world expense at AI reached 235,000 million dollars in 2024 and, if the current rhythm is maintained, it will exceed 630,000 million in 2028, According to IDC. In an intermediate adoption scenario, up to 30% of the hours worked It could automate from here to 2030, driven by the generative AI, The McKinsey Global Institute points out. The unknown remains which of the two magnates will succeed with its prognosis. What is clear is that both have weight interests in this new scenario: Musk plans to popularize his humanoid robot Tesla Optimus, while Huang seeks to consolidate Nvidia leadership in AI and robotic systems for companies and homes. Images | Nvidia | 1x In Xataka | Zuckerberg spent hundreds of millions of dollars in signing talents in AI. Now they are escaping through the back door

There are thousands of people hooked to streaming. One to 3,900 kilometers deep full of marine curiosities (and memes)

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In the Submarine Canyon of the Sea of La Plata, near Argentina, something of the most curious happens: two powerful currents coincide. One is salty and warm. The other, cold and very rich in nutrients. The union of both is the Confluence Brazil-Malvinas And it is important in the Earth’s climate regulation. It is known that there is a huge ecosystem down there, one of which little is known and that, at the moment, it is being explored live by an underwater rov next to thousands of people who, since July 23, They follow their live emissions Through YouTube. The mission. These submarine cannons hide a varied species ecosystem in their recesses. In 2012 and 2013, the Continental I, II and III of CONICET expeditions (National Council for Scientific and Technical Research of Argentina) used fishing and drag networks to explore the bed, discovering new species and leading to the publication of more than 60 Papers. Now, in 2025, technology has improved and It is possible to explore depths up to 3,900 meters with a vehicle operated remotely. Continental slope IV: Underwater Oases of Mar del Plata Canyon. That is the name of this new mission, an expedition of CONICET in collaboration with the Schmidt Ocean Institute. As explained from the Council, “it is the first time that in the Argentine Aguas of the Southwestern Atlantic the remotely operated vehicle (Rov) is used, capable of capturing underwater images in ultra high definition and collecting samples without altering the environment.” The funny thing is that the adventures of this rov They are broadcast live through YouTube. The goal. In addition to studying the Argentine seabed as it has not been possible to generate 3D models of emblematic species to produce educational material. The one who has interest can access the data collected completely free through open repositories such as CONICET Digital, Bish and Genbank. Image | CONICET How is the thing going? According to Explain The CONICET researcher in the MACN and scientific chief of the expedition, Daniel Lauretta, “we are barely starting and we see incredible things: animals that had never registered in this area, underwater landscapes that seem from another planet, and behaviors that surprise even the most experienced scientists.” It also states that being able to broadcast it live makes “science is somewhat distant or inaccessible, and becomes part of the day to day. In addition, it forces us to explain what we do clearly, without turns, so that anyone can understand and enjoy it.” The memes. That streaming has become so popular, has undoubtedly helped the collective ingenuity when seeing comedy in the seabed. It is an unknown territory for most and the species that live there are striking. That is why it is not surprising that networks like X have been filled with captures, memes and funny texts with these species as protagonists. The capture of that sea star has gone around the world, but it is not the only one. As for whatever, users have baptized it as “Estrella Culona” | Image: Xataka Argentina Caught in fraganti | Image: Xataka Argentina A violet benthodytes. His nickname: Batatita | Image: Xataka Argentina “Me and the boys together to see a stream of the CONICET,” says an X user | Image: @Genaro23101 Jokes apart, why there? The Malvinas current moves north from Antarctica to almost Río de la Plata, dragging cold and nutrient rich from Antarctica to the Patagonian platform. This current is very important for Argentina and its fishing industry, valued at 2,000 million dollars According to Schmidt Ocean Institute. The current of Brazil, more superficial (700 meters or less), transports warm and salted water from Ecuador to Rio de la Plata. Where both currents collide a strong thermoclin that, in turn, and due to temperature differences, generates rotating currents that redistribute heat, helping to regulate the climate of the earth. As explained by the institute, “the mixture of these two mass of water so different probably creates conditions that facilitate the coexistence of temperate and tropical organisms, as well as species that can only be found in the confluence.” Hence this area has so much scientific interest. Image | CONICET In Xataka | While humanity dreams of colonizing space, researchers have had another idea: living in the seabed

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