experts

Experts already fear an extraordinary heat wave next week

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“This is brutal. The main models would be hinting at a possible extraordinary Heat Wave next week with maximums of +45ºC and even other values ​​that I dare not mention,” the words of MeteoBadajoz speak on their own. In recent days, the bad news continues to accumulate. It is true that, “for now, it is better to wait, but the insistence is such that it is beginning to be very possible,” continued. And he is right. Let’s see why. What has happened? Since the AEMET weekly prediction points to temperatures above usual for next week, the dispersion of the models has been reducing. That is to say, what was a possibility begins to become a more than plausible scenario. The important thing right now is to distinguish what we know and what we don’t. What do we know? Today, in the words of Roberto Grandathere are already things that we do know: that “38-40 °C will be reached again in many areas” and the heat wave thresholds will be “comfortably” exceeded. What we cannot know is the temperature it will reach, where it will affect precisely and how many days it will last. These doubts are still so strong, in fact, that the two major models do not agree. While the American GFS sees a general and very intense wave, the European GFS concentrates the extreme heat in the eastern half of the peninsula. Be that as it may, it seems that it catches us completely. What we can expect. If the forecasts are confirmed, this extreme heat event would fall on a country (and a continent) that is already experiencing an extraordinary summer: it would be the third heat wave in a month, with the Mediterranean at 26.63 °C (2.6 degrees above normal) and after the second warmest June since 1961. In fact, mortality (as estimated by MoMo of the Carlos III Health Institute), would have amounted to 1,682 attributable deaths since May 1; around 500 of them alone during the five days of the second wave. But weren’t we going to the cold? Just a week ago, the networks were filled with maps that promised “the end of the heat” and we explained why they had to be read with caution. Now we have confirmation of our reading: a 15-day scenario cannot be confused with a prediction. And now what? Now we have to wait for confirmation. In the coming days, the uncertainties will disappear and we will have confirmation (or ruling out). In previous waves, special notices came about four days in advance. Whatever happens, one thing is clear: summer is looking really bad. Image | Meteociel In Xataka | Neither London nor the United Kingdom: the NASA map that reveals where the grayest sky in Europe is

In Alicante they are experts making works with ancient art. Until they found a Roman sphinx embedded in a staircase

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Recycling in the architecture of Antiquity (or the Middle Ages) was neither an ecological sensitivity nor an aesthetic trend. Rather, it was pure and simple economic survival. If you had good quality square stone, go ahead and build. It mattered little whether that stone had been part of a temple dedicated to Jupiter, whether it was the statue of a disgraced emperor or, as in this case, a mythological creature. It has a name: architectural cannibalism is known in the art world as spolia. And thanks (or because) of it, Spanish archeology has just solved a mystery that had been gathering dust in a warehouse for decades. In the archaeological site of El Monastil, located in the town of Elda (Alicante), researchers have “decrypted” a piece who had been camouflaged under a false identity for too long. The rain acting as an archaeologist. It all started in the year 2000, during the arduous excavation work of a late Roman wall located in El Monastil. Workers unearthed a three-step ladder that looked like a typical routine structural find. The following year, the Levantine climate worked its magic: torrential rains swept the area and caused the ashlars to collapse, exposing new features. Upon inspecting the damage, the team led by archaeologist Antonio M. Poveda discovered that one of the blocks was not conventionally quarried stone. The deliberate marks betrayed a previous history. Which? That someone, during the Visigoth or Byzantine occupation in the 5th or 6th centuries, mutilated a monumental sculpture, cutting it down with a sledgehammer to turn it into a simple step. Twenty years of confusion. Carved from local beige limestone, it was barely 31 centimeters high and 55 centimeters wide; what remains is a tiny fraction of its original volume. This sphinx was missing its head, wings and legs, with a surface so eroded by blows that its identification became a headache: an Iberian female figure or a random goddess? It wasn’t until last year, when the Archaeological Museum of Elda A thorough cleaning was undertaken when, in collaboration with Professor Ferrán Arasa i Gil, one of the greatest experts in Roman sculpture in Spain, remains were compared. And the shape matched too well with other sphinxes found in limes Germanic, from Romania and northern Italy. The verdict was unanimous: a Roman funerary sphinx from the 1st century AD The sophisticated security system for the afterlife. This creature of Egyptian origin and Greek traces is no ornament. And here is the key: it is a psychopomp, the guide in charge of collecting the soul of the deceased and transporting it. Its presence in the tomb fulfills an apotropaic function: the fierce gaze and hybrid posture, with the body of a lion and the torso of a woman, exist to scare away looters and protect the eternal sleep of those who rested beneath it. Have you seen ‘The Neverending Story’? His famous fulminating sphinxes are inspired by the same. Apparently, the owner of this piece was part of the rural elite of Ilici Augusta (current Elche). They were landowners who, in a time of great prosperity under Augustus and the Julio-Claudians, competed to display social status through monumental mausoleums. Built next to the Via Augusta. So the figure was another banner of power and prestige in full Romanization. He plunders well without looking at who. For the Visigoths, the sphinx was no longer a sacred symbol. The case of Elda, with this disdain for the artistic past in favor of pragmatism, rhymes quite well with other recycling imposed in Baetulo (Badalona), Segóbriga (Cuenca), Obulco (Jaén) or Carissa Aurelia (Cádiz). The most canonical example is found in the mosque of Córdoba: Abd al-Rahman I reused Roman and Visigoth columns and capitals, from the temple of Janus, from previous Christian villas and basilicas, to raise the forest of columns in the prayer room. In Toledo, the Christ of Light is the ancient Bab al-Mardum mosque. San Pedro de la Nave, in Zamora, was a 7th century Visigoth church dismantled and reassembled like a collage. And the same with the Basilica of Santa Eulalia, in Mérida, built on a Roman temple dedicated to Mars. Even the Almohad minaret of the Giralda in Seville was converted into a Christian bell tower by the braves. What makes special Monastil is that it is an inexhaustible “matryoshka” of civilizations. This Alicante site is a time capsule where the Bronze Age, the Punic presence, the Roman military base from the time of Pompey, the Byzantine monastery and the later Visigoth church overlap. In this immense network of strata it is easy to find history cut up and relocated, outside the contexts for which it was created. Many now lie in the warehouse of the Elda museum, treasures waiting to be reclassified and archaeological history rewritten. Images | FoxR for Wikipedia, Flickr (Santiago López-Pastor) In Xataka | If the question is how the Egyptian pyramids were made, science has an idea: hydraulic systems In Xataka | In a display of technical superiority, France has just invented traditional white towns. We, however, have forgotten about them

If the question is how to prevent our car from being an oven, some German experts believe that we have been making mistakes all our lives.

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Beach in the morning, visit to the beach bar and nap in the rented house. It doesn’t sound bad. You leave the beach bar with your belly full and your soul intoxicated with the sweet feeling of carelessness that invades you when dessert arrives and you say “why wouldn’t I eat that three-scoop ice cream.” But when going to the car, the harsh reality. The sun beats like never before. Touching anything inside the car is risking a trip to the hospital with a second-degree burn, and there doesn’t seem to be a way to lower the temperature inside. “But I put the parasol on”you will say. But… oh, friend. What if you have put it wrong? What if you have done everything backwards? That is what the German experts from the ADAC defend, a kind of German RACE famous for its reliability studies but they put the focus on everything that revolves around our cars. And his last publication is a good example of this. More “fresh” The automobile club ADAC has published an article in which it explains what temperature a car reaches in the sun and what measures we can take to reduce the temperature we will find inside. It must be taken into account that the temperature of the cabin in a car is not only important to avoid burns when touching the steering wheel or gear lever. According to the DGTdriving indoors that exceeds 30 degrees can have effects on our body similar to driving under the influence of alcohol. Therefore, when we get to a car that is parked in the sun, it is important to try to lower the temperature as soon as possible. The best idea is to launch what went viral as “the japanese trick”: open the windows and fan the car with the door itself to move the air inside and try to get it out as soon as possible. If you turn on the air conditioning, you must play with it to throw it at the feet or the ceiling depending on whether or not we are driving and the windows are open or not. But to make the task easier, it is very important to take precautions beforehand. One of them is, of course, the parasol. From the RACC they assure that using the sunshade can reduce the interior temperature of the vehicle by up to 11 degrees. We arrive at our destination, we grab the sunshade in the upper area and make sure that it covers the entire surface of the windshield, we close the car and we leave. Sure? What the ADAC experts say, this is not the best way to act. To do this, they have put five exactly identical Dacia Sandero in the sun and have looked for the best way to ensure that the temperature in the cabin is as low as possible. In his study, the car that was unprotected reached an internal temperature of 53ºC (blessed 53ºC if we compare it with the temperatures that the interior of our car can reach in the sun in Spain) and the lowest temperature had been achieved by covering the car with a tarp that reflects the sun’s rays. Obviously, this option is the least practical due to the size of the tarp that must be moved in the trunk and the inconvenience of putting it on and taking it off. Of course, the 43ºC achieved inside made the difference. The second least useful option was to put a white cloth over the car. In this case, the temperature reached was 50ºC. And here comes the interesting thing because it is the option that we use the most. The experts tried putting the sunshade inside the car, under the windshield, and outside the car, over the windshield. And the result was that putting it on the windshield reduced the temperature by 4ºC compared to putting it under the glass. In fact, putting the sunshade over the windshield left the temperature at 45ºC, very close to the best option. On the contrary, installing the windshield in the traditional way left the interior temperature at 49ºC. “Semi-garage” is Google’s translation of putting a tarp on the car to cover it The truth is that it makes sense. When the sun acts directly on the glass of the car, it heats up and acts as a magnifying glass, so the temperature in the cabin rises even more. Besides, his own glass emits more heat inside when it is hot, which is why it is not entirely advisable to buy a car with a sunroof without a curtain if you live in especially hot climates. In this case, the heat from the glass is projected onto the heads of the passengers. By placing the windshield inside we prevent the rays from directly hitting the glass and, therefore, its capacity to retain heat and raise the temperature further is lower. In that case, what we should do before leaving is to “grab” some ribbons from the parasol when closing the doors so that the parasol does not fly away. Photo | Andrew Bone In Xataka | The best way to use air conditioning in the car: the keys to fighting the heat

Experts already claim that the Chinese GLM-5.2 model is as “dangerous” as Anthropic’s

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The technological gap between the US and China continues to narrow. At least, if we pay attention to what they say the latest analyzes on the GLM-5.2 model. Two independent cybersecurity companies have made their own assessment and their data reveals that in terms of cybersecurity, GLM-5.2 is as good as Claude Opus 4.8. That has notable implications, especially considering how the US government is now restricting access to Anthropic and OpenAI’s frontier models. AI in the face of the threat of cybersecurity. Since Claude Mythos Preview appeared, the discourse on AI has changed significantly. Suddenly the world realized that these models could become weapons with which to find vulnerabilities in all types of systems to exploit them. Anthropic has already warned that Mythos was too dangerous to be publicly available, and it did not matter that it released hidden versions like Fable 5 shortly after: the US Government has temporarily vetoed them and the same has happened with GPT-5.6. The situation is unusual. Beware of Tulongfeng (or not). Last Wednesday, a Chinese cybersecurity company called 360 Security Technology (Qihoo 360) launched a new vulnerability detection tool called Tulongfeng. According to its creatorsTulongfeng is comparable Mythos in this task. The company this on the US “Entity List” since May 2020 and its CEO, Zhou Hongyi, stated that Mythos is equivalent to a “cybernuclear weapon.” The Sputnik moment with GLM-5.2. But the real recent protagonist of the Chinese AI industry is the GLM-5.2 model from the startup Zhipu.ai (Z.ai), which is becoming very popular by demonstrating performance comparable to the best models from US companies. Its fundamental advantage is that it is an open weights model: any person or company can download it, modify it and run it on their own hardware (although it requires a huge amount of video/unified memory to be able to use it, it is a model with 744B of parameters). But he is not only good at programming or at agentic tasks. Better than Claude in cybersecurity? The cybersecurity firm Semgrep stated in a recent analysis that GLM-5.2 was superior to Claude Opus 4.8 regarding cybersecurity and pointed out that “we have a Mythos at home.” Another independent study from Graphistry stated basically the same thing when comparing it with Opus 4.8 and GPT-5.5. Not only that, it achieved excellent results at a fraction of the price: one-sixth of what it cost to run tests with Claude Opus 4.8, for example. Axios revealed little cited a cybersecurity researcher who explained that GLM-5.2 is capable of chaining exploits “in the same way that an elite human attacker would.” Chinese mythos before 2027. Jie Tang, CEO of Z.ai, responded to a Twitter thread in which it was pointed out that at this rate, China would have an AI model at the level of Mythos or Fable by the end of 2026. Elon Musk himself intervened saying that in his opinion this Chinese model with such performance would arrive in the first quarter of 2027. Jie Tang was forceful and replied to Musk saying “it won’t take that long.” And we also have Sakana Fugu. These days we also learned the news that Sakana AI, a Japanese AI startup, had launched Fuguan AI model that is actually not so much an AI model as it is a router or orchestrator of other models. What it promises It is to perform at the level of the best models in the US, taking advantage of different models, both open and closed. The internal benchmarks are promising, but some independent analysts they explained Although the idea is not bad, its performance and cost are not as striking as the company claims. While the US blocks its models, China advances. The situation is paradoxical, because what China is doing is precisely taking advantage of a unique moment. The US is restricting the deployment of the most advanced AI models from Anthropic and OpenAI to avoid cybersecurity risks. And while that happens, Chinese companies are apparently closing the gap with truly remarkable open models. In Xataka | The prompt engineering fashion is over. Now what is important is loop engineering

Experts agree that opening windows at night and closing them during the day is no longer the best strategy against heat.

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For decades, long before air conditioners and the fans will take Every corner of its geography, Spain knew how to handle the heat: during the day, everything was closed tight; at night, everything open and ventilate. It sounds rudimentary, but in 2026 that is still the strategy we recommends the Ministry of Health. And yet, there is a problem. The Spain of the blinds game did not sleep in cities at 26 degrees at four in the morning. Not 26, not 28, not more than 30, as has been happening these days in Almería. The arrival of the ‘hellish nights’ challenges everything we thought we knew about domestic heat management. Therefore, we have asked ourselves… and now what? What we were doing until now. That popular knowledge I was talking about goes viral every time the heat makes an appearance. And, like I say, it makes sense. In a world where it cools down at night, the winning strategy is night cooling and daytime insulation. What he says Health Plan against high temperatures. The central issue here is that that world has ceased to exist. Because the key is not the time, it is the thermometer. In reality, what we are looking for is to open when it is cool and close when it is hot. It’s usually cool at night, but… What if he stops doing it? Summer has stretched on for five weeks and Spain is about two degrees warmer than at the beginning of the eighties. The torrid nights (with minimums of 25 degrees or more) have multiplied by ten since 1984 in the ten most populated capitals and, according to AEMET data, this affects about nine million people. Even the tropical ones (minimums of 20 or more) today add a dozen more a year than decades ago. We can’t sleep… although researchers have not agreed on the ideal temperature for sleeping (some point which is about 18.3ºC, but there is no consensus), they have done so on a fundamental idea: sleeping in the heat is objectively a bad idea. For whatever reason, it is true that our temperature changes between wakefulness and sleep. In fact, “thermal regulation is a significant factor” in sleep control, explained the teacher Cameron Van Den Heuvelfrom the University of Adelaide. “About an hour to thirty minutes before sleep, the body begins to lose body heat. This increases feelings of tiredness in normal healthy adults.” People with insomnia, without going any further, “show that they have a higher basal temperature just before sleeping than people who do not have sleep problems.” Ambient heat does not help this thermal reduction and it seems to be proven that when the temperature is very high, it is more difficult to fall asleep and, when it is achieved, it is of very poor quality. And then what do we do? In the interior of the peninsula, as the thermal amplitude remains high, opening at dawn works. There is nothing to change. The problem is for those who live on the coast or in the big city. When the night exceeds 20 degrees, the strategy is reversed. Ventilating at night is no longer the main technique and the battle is won during the day: you have to seal the house as soon as the street heats up, squeeze out the thermal inertia and use the air conditioning wisely. However, as the nights get warmer the household tricks come to an end. If the trend is confirmed, we will have to assume that the housing stock must be transformed: sun protection, rehabilitation and climate shelters will be the buzzwords in a few years. Image | Fernando Rosado In Xataka | ENT doctors agree: “Sleeping with air conditioning forces the nose to work excessively”

Luxury homes in the US are selling like hotcakes and experts think they know why: AI

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If you have tried to buy a home in recent months, you will surely have already noticed something: prices are through the roof. Although the joy goes by neighborhood because the real estate market is experiencing a historic split, at least in the United States, as Redfin documents. Thus, while luxury housing is reviving thanks to the gains generated by the AI ​​boom, everything else is paralyzed in a scenario of uncertainty, high mortgage rates, inflation and fear of unemployment. It is the economics in K at its peak, a term coined by economists during the pandemic to refer to a recovery in which the wealthiest segments of society prosper while the rest stagnate or regress. what’s happening. According to the Redfin report Last month, the average sales price of a luxury home in the United States rose 3.6%, to $1.39 million. This figure is more than double the increase recorded in “non-luxury” homes, which increased by 1.4 to stand at $377,734. One fact: Redfin defines “luxury” as homes in the top 5% of the price range in each metropolitan area. At the epicenter of the luxury market, San Francisco: recorded a 48% year-over-year increase in pending sales of luxury homes in April, the highest peak since June 2021. We are talking about a median sales price of $6.7 million, almost 10% more than the previous year. They are followed by other cities such as Tampa (+36%), West Palm Beach (+16%) or Miami (+15%). Why is it important. Because what is happening is not something limited to the real estate market: it is a snapshot of economic inequality in real time. The stock market and the rise of artificial intelligence are accelerating this dynamic. Thus, those who have their assets invested in technology stocks are becoming exponentially richer and then spending part of their profits on the purchase of luxury homes regardless of interest rates, something that does affect and worry the middle classes. The housing has historically been the main repository for wealth accumulation, but its access is being restricted to the richest people. The result is a real estate market that operates at two speeds, which has consequences for social stability and long-term access to housing. Context. This 2026, the energy shock derived from the US and Israeli attack on Iran has raised rates again, but as pick up Axiosthis pattern has been repeated several times in recent years: the luxury market recorded a peak in demand in 2021 with the uncertainty generated by the pandemic and also in 2023, when again mortgage rates, inflation and fear of recession stopped the average buyer. The dynamic repeats itself: in times of uncertainty, the most resilient thing is luxury. It doesn’t just happen in the United States. The luxury real estate boom is not just American. Dubai closed 2025 with 500 sales above 10 million dollars (+194% in five years) and prime prices rose 3.2% on a global average, according to the Knight Frank Wealth Report 2026. London is the exception that proves the rule: He raised taxes on large wealth groups and prime prices fell by 4.8% in 2025, so that capital looked for alternative destinations with two clear winners: Madrid and Milan. In fact, the Spanish capital boasts the highest growth in Europe: prime prices rose 6.4% in 2025 with 55% of international buyers, according to Knight Frank. In Milan, Italy’s flat-rate tax regime for new residents has skyrocketed interest: British buyers grew by 260% between 2023 and 2025, according to Il Sole 24 Ore. There is a gap between luxury and affordable housing and the only thing that can accelerate or slow it down is the fiscal framework. In detail. San Francisco real estate companies are clear about what is causing this phenomenon in 2026: “AI money”, people who have shares in those technology companies that are skyrocketing and also profiles that artificial intelligence companies hire with generous bonuses. Daryl Fairweather, chief economist at Redfin, explains that these wealthy buyers have more confidence in the economy and simply move forward despite the uncertainty. The high-end home builder Toll Brothers, details that their buyers are less sensitive to price pressures because they have a good cushion. In fact, cash purchases without the need for a mortgage are reaching historic highs with one neighborhood as a star destination: Manhattan. Yes, but. Other real estate agents have another explanation for the rise in prices: a correction after years of slow sales, as reported by the San Francisco Standard. That is, we do not know how much of this boom is new demand that AI brings under its arm and how much is repressed demand. On the other hand, this phenomenon is geographically concentrated, which limits the possibility of generalizing its conclusions. If we leave the premium market, one thing is clear: global economic uncertainty is an anchor that holds back potential first-home buyers. In Xataka | Second-hand homes were one of the last refuges on the market. Now they are becoming a luxury In Xataka | The world has been searching for the formula against the housing crisis for decades. There are those who believe that the answer is in Vancouver Cover | Photo of Daniel Barnes in Unsplash

Neither ketchup nor bread, we have been using the refrigerator incorrectly for years and the experts clarify what should really go in: “we can end up with mold”

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More than a century ago the first electric domestic refrigerator appeared, the Domelreand it cost about $900: more than many cars of the time. For years it was a luxury reserved for fewbut it ended up changing our relationship with food forever… and also creating a new obsession: putting everything inside “just in case.” Today, a century later, we continue to discover that perhaps we over-braked. The cold war of the kitchen. Few domestic discussions are as universal as deciding what goes in the fridge and what is left out. For years we have put almost anything cold by instinct, convinced that preserving meant refrigerating. But the experts they have been dismantling that logic piece by piece. Ketchup is not always urgent, nor does bread improve when enclosed in yogurt, nor does olive oil become purer by solidifying. The refrigerator is not a universal solution: improperly used it can accelerate the loss of flavor, alter textures or even promote problems such as mold. Red wine and the first great heresy. The most striking cultural change is possibly cold red wine. What for decades seemed outrageous is becoming a trend, driven by younger generations who no longer respect the old rule of serving it “at room temperature.” In that sense, wine expert Tom Gilbey summed it up in the Guardian: “We serve the wine too hot… it accentuates the alcohol and makes it taste like soup”. Their conclusion is simple: almost all wines improve somewhat colder than usual, especially light reds such as pinot noir or beaujolais. The cold does not kill the wine, it refines it, illuminates its fruit and makes its acidity more lively. Bread, the great victim of the refrigerator. Here comes one of the great domestic corrections. Many people put bread in the refrigerator (be careful, not in the freezer) thinking that it will last longer this way, but the real effect is different. Kate Hall, household food waste expert and author of The Full Freezer Methodmakes it clear: “It will take longer to get moldy, but it will get hard much sooner”. That is, you delay mold, but accelerate the aging of the bread. Cold moisture alters the starch and makes it leathery and dry. If it is for toast it can survive, but for sandwiches the recommendation is simple: outside or frozen. Foods that can end up with mold. Mold appears as one of the great ghosts of many foods, but not always where one expects. The nutritionist Dominic Ludwig warns that onions and garlic should not go into the refrigerator because “it is too humid and they can end up with mold.” Jams, although loaded with sugar, are also vulnerable once openeds because crumbs or traces of butter contaminate the interior. Even ground seeds and natural nut creams can oxidize and go rancid if not sealed and cooled properly. The problem is not just rotting: it is slowly degrading without us noticing. The refrigerator also destroys flavor. Plus: many foods do not spoil when cold, but they do lose their identity. Olive oil is one of them. Yacine Amor, founder of Artisan Olive Oil Companywarns that putting it in the refrigerator “it does not provide benefits and can reduce the flavor.” The tomatoes also suffer: the cold breaks its texture and flattens its aromatic profile. chocolate is even more delicate. The master chocolatier Paul Young Remember that “it absorbs flavors very easily” and that condensation generates a rough layer of sugar that ruins its surface. Sometimes the cold lasts, but it takes a toll. Coffee and the great lie of freshness. Few habits are as widespread and as poorly planned as keeping coffee in the refrigerator. For the specialist Hannah Whittonesthe reality is blunt: “It is a unanimous no.” Reasons? Coffee is extremely porous, absorbing odors and condensation from coming in and out of the cold destroys its compounds aromatics. Paradoxically and as many other foodsYes, it can go in the freezer, but only vacuum sealed and intended for long-term storage. In short, not a refrigerator, a freezer, perhaps. The forgotten ones in the refrigerator. The map does not end with bread, coffee or tomatoes. Also there are gray areas that experts refine. Butter can live outside as long as it maintains consistency and does not become liquid. Bananas tolerate some cold if they are overripe, even if the skin becomes ugly. Avocados should ripen outside because the cold slows down this process and only then should they be stored, and the honey should stay in the pantry to avoid crystallizing. As for apples, they last better and longer. coldalthough some prefer its flavor at room temperature. Potatoes continue to generate debate, but the practical recommendation is a cool, dark place away from onions, because ethylene accelerates sprouts. Even ketchup, one of the great symbols of this domestic war, enters into middle ground: due to its sugar and vinegar it can survive outside, but if it is not consumed frequently, experts advise cold to avoid degradation and the appearance of mold prematurely. The real rule that no one taught us. If you like, the final lesson is not so much to make a rigid list, but to understand what exactly does it do the cold It slows down bacteria, conserves nutrients and extends shelf lives, but it also changes structure, flavor and ripening. That is why citrus fruits, green leaves or open nuts appreciate this environment, while bread, tomatoes, green avocados or olive oil suffer from it. The great truth is uncomfortable: we have been using the refrigerator as a catch-all for years, and experts agree that a good part of our food did not need cold… or needed it in another way. Image | Monika Grabkowska – Darrien Staton, Alexander Ljung In Xataka | Scientists have put kombucha to the test against stress. and has lost In Xataka | Fernando Sáenz, one of the best ice cream makers in the world, puts the dots over the i’s, “Mercadona has modified the palate … Read more

Experts agree that “the quality of rest depends on whether you go to bed at the time when your body is ready to sleep”

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When you read the question “what time should you go to bed?” He usually waits for a number, a specific time, a recurring pattern to do as the day ends. Bad news. What research has discovered is that the ‘perfect time’ for going to bed is with parents. That is, genetics (chronotype) and a handful of other things. That’s why it’s time to see what the experts say. The time to go to sleep. These days, there are some statements from dr. Celia García Maloneurologist specializing in Sleep Medicine and co-director of the Madrid Clinic CISNe in which she explains that the quality of rest does not depend only on the number of hours. On the contrary, it often depends on sleeping at a time when the body is biologically ready for it. This is interesting because it shows a paradigm shift in global sleep science. That moment matters, yes (but not that much). In 2021, Nikbakhtian and his team reviewed sleep routines of more than 100,000 adults. The interesting thing about this study is that they did not use self-reported responses, but rather what a week of wrist accelerometer data said. Their conclusions were clear: going to bed between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m. was associated with a lower cardiovascular incidence. It was bad news for Spain, the European country that takes the longest to go to bed. However, the details are important: it was not a question of ‘the earlier you go to bed the better’ (because going to bed before 10pm was also a problem); It was about finding the appropriate moment for each society, country or culture. And that’s where the surprises begin. Because what we are discovering is that regularity is the key. In this case, the Windred team reviewed data from six years of life of about 60,000 people. Their conclusions were that the most regular quartiles showed between 20% and 48% less mortality from all causes compared to the most irregular ones. This is because, we now believe, genetic variants are associated more with schedule than with duration and quality of the dream. The researchers’ thesis is that when we find a stable time to go to bed, the rest of the pieces begin to organize themselves. What does all this mean? For us mortals who just want to sleep, there are a handful of consequences: There is no magic hour. What we have to do is look for a stable window: if we find a time to go to bed, the rest of the system tends to adapt. However, chronotypes exist. It’s a good idea to find out which one is ours and “negotiate with it.” Take care of your dream. Although we sometimes insist on sleeping at a certain time, we often forget that sleep hygiene (and, above all, light) is one of the most important things to sleep well. Image | Annie Spratt In Xataka | You take some melatonin and fall asleep. It seems like a harmless practice for your health but it is not so.

They have asked 1,600 experts how the Universe works. They don’t agree on almost anything

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We continually read news about new findings that they defy the known physics of the Universe. This may lead us to ask ourselves something: do we know so little about the Universe that absolutely everything challenges it? To answer this question it is important to give a little context. Yes, a lot is known about astrophysics, but when we talk about something as immense as the Universe, even that “a lot” can fall short. Furthermore, much of this information is based on hypotheses that have been accepted as consensus, but not on absolute truths. Therefore, it is not strange that in the largest survey ever conducted It has been proven to astrophysicists and astrophysics fans that there is a lot of disagreement on almost everything related to the cosmos. The largest survey. In 2024, during an astrophysics conference in Copenhagen, a survey was carried out in which 85 experts participated. All of them had to answer a series of questions about some of the best-known theories in astrophysics. With this survey it was seen that there is a lot of disagreement, even in those theories in which there is supposed to be a great consensus. In order to check whether these disagreements were a result of the sample size, a new survey was carried out in 2025, this time with 1,600 people who had to answer 11 questions. Some participants were experts from the American Astrophysical Society. Others were amateur readers of Physics Magazine. With a larger sample, the results were very similar. There is very little consensus. From hypotheses to certainties. Science in general, and astrophysics in particular, is built on hypotheses that evolve as scientific advances are made. For this reason, it is often more full of probabilities than certainties. It is important to differentiate different branches of science. In health sciences, there are certainties. For example, we know that antibiotics attack bacteria and are not useful against viruses, no matter how many people insist on taking them for the flu. We also know that their abuse can be very harmful, since it contributes to the development of resistance in bacteria. Those are certainties, although logically there is also information that evolves over time. In astrophysics, hypotheses accepted by consensus often outnumber certainties. There are very clear certainties, such as that the Earth is not flat or that it revolves around the Sun. But also some hypotheses with which not even experts agree. Cosmic inflation wins. The issue on which there was the greatest consensus in the 2025 survey, the results of which were recently published, was cosmic inflation. That is, the hypothesis that points to an exponential expansion of the Universe which began in its first moments, after the Big Bang. 51% of respondents agreed that this theory explains many problems in cosmology at once and therefore has a high probability of being true. Talking about the Big Bang. The existence of the Big Bang was another of the theories with the greatest consensus in the survey, although the truth is that the figure is nothing to write home about either. 25% of the participants agreed that this event gave rise to the Universe 13.8 billion years ago. On the other hand, there were 68% of people who indicated that the Universe was born at a time when there was a large increase in temperature and density, but they did not indicate when that occurred. Disagreements with dark matter. Gravitational behaviors that do not respond to the observed mass have been observed in the Universe. That is, it seems as if there are massive objects exerting a gravitational attraction on others, but these objects are not detected, not even large accumulations of atoms. There is nothing. 27% of those surveyed consider that this can be explained by the existence of dark matter. However, there are 12% who believe that all this may be due to changes in the behavior of gravity on cosmic scales. That is to say, when we talk about the immensity of the Universe, the gravity exerted by objects is not the same. On the other hand, there are 5% of people who consider that the key is in primordial black holes. Although here we must emphasize that one of the hypotheses about the origin of dark matter is that it is formed in part by primordial black holes, so they would not be denying its existence. String theory to solve incompatibilities. The theory of general relativity was proposed on large, cosmic scales. On the other hand, quantum mechanics talks about the behavior of matter on a subatomic scale. Both questions seem incompatible, but to understand the Universe we need to work at both scales. Therefore, for a long time there has been thought about a theory that helps unify both issues. This, for 19% of those surveyed, is string theory. In it, subatomic particles, instead of being treated as points, are considered vibrational states of a more basic extended object, called a string. Normally, when we try to calculate the energy of a particle by considering it a mathematical point, without extension, we get closer to it eternally. We can do a kind of infinite zoom. On the other hand, when the points are replaced by strings with a minimum length, a result must necessarily be obtained. It does not tend to infinity. On the other hand, in string theory gravity, which not normally considered on a quantum scalearises naturally. Another hypothesis. The point is that, in the survey we are talking about, there are 12% of people who consider that string theory does not solve the problem, but that another theory does: that of loop quantum gravity. This, basically, acts in a completely opposite way. String theory emerges with quantum mechanics as a starting point and tries to find ways to make gravity make sense. On the other hand, the theory of loop quantum gravity starts from the General Theory of Relativity and attempts to quantize it in a way that … Read more

some experts fear consequences that are difficult to measure

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There is an initiative to build a gigantic data center in Utah (USA). The so-called Stratos Project plans to occupy an area equivalent to the city of Washington DC and is estimated to consume 9 GW of power. Some experts warn that the thermal impact will be devastatingand they claim that “it is the equivalent of releasing the energy of 23 atomic bombs a day in the form of heat.” A Dantesque project. The approval of Project Stratos occurred at the beginning of May by the Box Elder County Commissionersthe community in northwest Utah on whose land it will be located. The megacomplex plans to occupy 16,100 hectares of surface, and if completed it will become the largest data center on the planet. That record is disturbing and alarming. 9 GW of computing capacity. This data center will consume 9 gigawatts of power, a figure that doubles the current electricity consumption of the entire state of Utah. The figure, like all those surrounding the project, is absolutely exaggerated, and there are many those who have criticized the project. But also GW of heat. The biggest concern for experts It’s not just energy consumptionbut how this will affect the temperatures of the region in which this data center is intended to be built. Robert Davies, a physics professor at Arizona State University, has made the first calculations on this impact and his conclusions are worrying. Because the natural gas plants that will generate electricity for the center are 57% efficient, the complex will produce about 7 or 8 GW of waste heat. Once that electricity reaches the servers, it will be converted into heat, and it is estimated that Project Stratos will emit about 16 GW of thermal energy daily in the Hansel Valley where it will theoretically be located. 23 atomic bombs. Davies points out that this release of heat in a closed basin like the one in this valley is equivalent to “depositing the energy of 23 atomic bombs every day in the local environment.” It is obvious that the project does not generate nuclear explosions or radiation, but it will cause notable climate change. The models estimate that daytime temperatures will increase by 2.7 ºC on average, but the nighttime ones will suffer peaks of up to additional 15.5ºC. The semi-arid climate of the region, one of the driest in the US, will transform into an area with thermal dynamics similar to those of the Sahara Desert. Threat to Great Salt Lake. The location chosen to locate this AI data center is not coincidental: the Hansel Valley is the area through which the so-called Ruby Pipeline passes, a gas pipeline that transports natural gas from Wyoming to the west coast of the United States. The problem is that it is also very close to the northern end of the Great Salt Lake, a body of water that has already been in danger for some time. In fact, its water levels are near historic lows after an unusually dry winter. we were few. The supply contracts indicate an even greater risk to that body of water. The developers plan to acquire local water rights equivalent to about 16 million cubic meters. It is a volume sufficient to cover the basic needs of more than 20,000 homes in Utah. Data center hate is real. This is the latest and most notable case of mega data center construction projects that trigger frontal rejection from local communities in the US. While AI companies and hyperscalers continue to announce new data center construction projects, residents of these areas organize local resistance. Image | O’Leary Digital In Xataka | We already know how data centers will impact employment in Aragon: open 24/7 with 180 workers

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