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ONCE and the Ministry of Science give away 2 million glasses for the solar eclipse: this is how you can get them

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Looking ahead to the next solar eclipse on August 12, something as important as find a good location to see it is to get hold of good approved glasses. X-rays and photographic negatives are not valid, as has traditionally been said. It is also not safe to look at the eclipse with conventional sunglasses. Such acts, such as looking with the naked eye, can cause serious eye problems. This is something they know a lot about. ONCE. That’s why, they just launched next to the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities of the Government of Spain a campaign aimed at raising awareness about the importance of protecting eyesight at these types of events. And since there is no better way to raise awareness than by giving access to solutions, an important part of the campaign will be the distribution of 2 million free eclipse glasses throughout the country. ¿Where can you find the ONCE eclipse glasses? The glasses will begin to be distributed completely free starting next Monday, August 3. 1,700,000 units will be distributed through ONCE points of sale throughout Spain. The Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT) will be responsible for the rest, which will distribute them among research centers, science museums and other public entities in the field of science, innovation and universities. Specifically, this is the list of museums and scientific centers that the Ministry of Science has shared: Interactive Museum of Music of Malaga – MIMMA Andalusia Science Park – Granada Aragonese Museum of Paleontology – Teruel Museum of Science and the Cosmos – Tenerife Elder Museum of Science and Technology – Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Eyes to the sky – La Palma Science Museum of Castilla-La Mancha (MCCM) – Cuenca Museum of Paleontology of Castilla-La Mancha (MUPA) – Cuenca The Light Factory. Energy Museum – Ponferrada Valladolid Science Museum – Valladolid Museum of Natural Sciences of Barcelona Mathematical Museum of Catalonia – MMACA – Cornellà de Llobregat Montsec Astronomical Park – Lleida National Museum of Science and Technology (MUNCYT) – Alcobendas National Museum of Natural Sciences – Madrid Royal Botanical Garden – Madrid FORAL COMMUNITY OF NAVARRA University of Navarra Science Museum – Pamplona Big History. Scientific and environmental dissemination center – Aras de los Olmos City of Arts and Sciences of Valencia Botanical Garden of the University of Valencia Alicante Water Museum Museum of Natural Sciences of Valencia Didactic and Interactive Museum of Sciences of the Vega Baja del Segura (MUDIC-VBS-CV) Castellón Planetarium National Museum of Science and Technology (MUNCYT) – A Coruña Coruña Scientific Museums – A Coruña House of Sciences of Logroño Eureka! Zientzia Museoa – San Sebastian Bioparc Aquarium of Gijón Museum of Science and Water of Murcia As for the ONCE points of salethe glasses approved for the eclipse will be distributed at ONCE points of sale throughout Spain. If you want to know which one is closest to your home, you can use the application My Seller ONCEwhich features a very easy-to-use drop-down map. In total there are 35,000 points of sale throughout the Spanish territory, so you are sure to have one quite close by. Other initiatives The coupon for August 12, 2026 from the ONCE draw will be dedicated, as it could not be otherwise, to the solar eclipse. It is another of the initiatives that have emerged from this project between ONCE and the Ministry of Science, but not the only one. The agreement was signed yesterday at the National Museum of Science and Technology of Spain (MUNCYT) in A Coruña. The signatories were the Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Universities, Juan Cruz Cigudosa, and the first vice president of Institutional Coordination, Solidarity and External Relations of the General Council of ONCE, Alberto Durán. Together, they announced the initiative to distribute eclipse glasses and sell a special coupon, but also many other activities. And with this signature, it has been decided to incorporate the ONCE Social Group into the meetings of the Interministerial Commission for the preparation, organization and coordination of actions related to the Trio of Eclipsesas well as to provide resources and educational materials that can be adapted, to guarantee the inclusion and cultural development of people with visual disabilities in particular and other disabilities. As Alberto Durán explained during the presentation, his goal is that after the eclipse no more people arrive at ONCE with vision problems. For this, awareness is a key point. Guaranteed approval To check that eclipse glasses are suitable, they must be approved according to the standard. EN ISO 12312-2:2015 and have the CE seal. The positive part is that these are distributed by two totally reliable institutions, such as ONCE and the Ministry of Science, so it is guaranteed that they have said seal. It is a nice initiative with which ONCE wants its clients to be very well protected in the face of the astronomical event of the year. And the best thing is that, well stored to avoid scratches or deterioration Otherwise, they can also be used to the solar eclipses of 2027 and 2028. An exciting time is coming for astronomy lovers in our country. Let’s enjoy it with protection. Images | ONCE and Ministry of Science In Xataka | Leo Hernández, eclipse hunter: “I knew that whenever I could or life allowed me, I would try to travel to see more”

Google is making money by betting on its rivals. Some already give you more profit than your own business

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Alphabet published a few days ago its latest quarterly resultsresults that break all their records with 112.1 billion dollars in net profit, 298% more than a year ago. The surprise lies in the origin of this profit: almost all of it comes from the accounting revaluation of two stakes in companies that Alphabet does not control: SpaceX, which is already listed on the stock marketand Anthropic, which doesn’t do it yet but he is expected to take the step soon boosted by a financially spectacular 2026. For Alphabet, advertising grows 24% in the company’s revenue. Google Cloud soars 82%. And yet, 88% of the quarterly net profit comes from the revaluation of two financial bets that today compete with central areas of the group. In detail. Participation in SpaceX goes back a long way. In 2015, Google invested 900 million when the company was valued at 10,000 million. After the June IPO, at a valuation of 1.77 billionthat package is worth 94.1 billion. A multiple of more than one hundred times the original capital that rewarded Google’s good eye more than ten years ago. Anthropic’s is a shorter story. And more expensive. Alphabet has injected 13.3 billion into it from April 2023with commitments for up to an additional 30,000 million. The private assessment of the laboratory behind Claude It has gone from 350,000 to 965,000 million in one year. In 10-Q, Alphabet’s private holdings total 124.3 billion. Virtually everything is Anthropic. Between the lines. On the B-side of the album, Anthropic is signing engineers from DeepMind quite regularly. Its model competes with Gemini in the same field (API for developers, programming agents, business assistants), and a good part of the companies that do not want to be tied to Google choose it precisely for that reason. Every dollar that Anthropic collects from Alphabet also increases the value of Alphabet itself. SpaceX instead operates starlinkthe satellite network that supplants the ambition that Google tried and left with Project Loon. Sundar Pichai has not sold a single share of SpaceX or Anthropic. And yet, the market has recognized almost 100,000 million in profit from them. Yes, but. Capital gains are not cash. Of the 94.1 billion in SpaceX, 80,000 cannot be sold in the short term. And 14,100 are blocked until the third quarter of 2027. Anthropic remains unlisted, so the valuation is worth until the next round or until the next cut. The royal treasury, meanwhile, is being emptied. Alphabet has raised its investment guidance for 2026 to the range of 195,000-205,000 million (from the 180-190,000 announced in April), and quarterly free cash flow has gone into the red. The accounting balance of the party is paid by the data centers. And now what. The restrictions on SpaceX are beginning to be lifted after its first presentation of results as a listed company, scheduled for August 4. With 94 billion in shares blocked and an investment plan that is close to 200 billion annually, Alphabet has obvious reasons to sell part of the position. As soon as possible. Doing so implies an uncomfortable admission because it recognizes what this quarter already leaves black and white: that the company has earned more by financing its rivals than by running its own business. And with his business it is not that he has earned little. Except that the free cash flow is negative due to the enormous investment that the AI ​​career requires. In Xataka | The EU has just fined Google 890 million for the DMA. The figure weighs less than a paragraph almost hidden in the statement Featured image | Xataka with Magnific

Argentina is clear that Argentina had to give away Argentina’s fourth World Cup. And no one in Argentina is very clear why.

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“Let’s forget about everything. Let’s just play. Let’s just think about playing, people” With these words Leo Messi tried to raise the morale of his teammates before taking the Met Life Stadium field on July 19. In the scene you can see Enzo Fernández crying and Lisandro Martínez also congested. The video cuts off. It is, probably, the first video that begins to unleash the madness. The first one after Spain’s victory against Argentina to proclaim herself as World Champion is used to begin to suspect that something has happened, that something strange has escaped us. That the World Cup final is rigged. Why, by whom and how is something for which no one has an answer. What is certain is that some Argentine fans, YouTubers and certain press have combusted. “There is no doubt, they gave him the order to lose” “There is no doubt that the Argentine National Team was given the order that it had to lose. As a psychologist, I am trained to see and hear what was not said. And in Sunday’s game I saw strange things. They treated us like fools and put on a show” This time the words are an Argentine fan who claims to be a psychologist, an expert in gestural language and “not to talk about conspiracy theories.” He does not understand that “strange injuries” occurred or the approach and changes of Lionel Scaloni, Argentine coach. Click on the image to go to the original tweet The reason for this fan was clear: Fifa had to crown a 19-year-old world champion (Lamine Yamal) because that sells more than a champion Argentina “with a Messi who has already earned money and who is coming to an end.” The idea that Argentina could not win this World Cup because it played with Messi is somewhat funny because it has its counterpart in all the theories that pointed out that, precisely, Argentina had to win because it was Messi’s last World Cupthe best story for a competition that has shone for its individuality and for its own American commercialism. What we can praise about the previous video is the calmness with which the fan speaks. “I have no proof but I also have no doubt that they sent us to die in the final”assures this other fan who links the final lost by Argentina with the end of Italy 90a competition in which Argentina lost against West Germany when it arrived as World champion after Mexico 86. Of that match, Diego Armando Maradona said that Grondona, then president of the AFA (Argentine Football Association), had already warned them that they had no chance of winning the final because the designated referee was Mexican. “We were dedicated,” Maradona repeated in this interview. Comparisons with that final have been repeated for the obvious bridges that can be built between both games: Argentina competing against a European team after becoming champion and its star playing, supposedly, his last game with the national team (Maradona would return for United States ’94). But the accusations of fixing have been growing and slowly getting out of hand: “Everything that was predicted on the cover of The Economist magazine came true. We live in a simulation, everything is timed. I don’t know if they have a time machine. If they also know how to manipulate the energy of the mind worldwide so that what they want to happen happens…” For example this video from another fan in which he proposes “we continue feigning dementia, accepting that everything is written and we live in a simulation.” Click on the image to go to the original tweet For this other fanit is clear that “they were squeezed” because there were snipers in the stadium. Reasons are not known but This talk show does put them on the table: It was all a plan by Florentino Pérez, Atlético de Madrid, Giani Infantino, Donald Trump and the United Kingdom. The basis on which this theory is based is that Argentine players who play in Europe were threatened with losing the final. “They robbed us again (…) they turned us around and the best player told his teammates. The guy who headbutted England (Lautaro Martínez, who did not play in the final), the most important goal from the hand of God or the greatest goal in history (the two that Diego Armando Maradona scored against England in Mexico 86)… was he banned from playing? (…) No one will ever tell the secrets of football. Neither Messi nor Chiqui Tapia (president of the AFA). Do you know why? Because they were squeezed. And this is going to cost me dearly. Yesterday they squeezed Argentina like with the Malvinas, like with wealth, like the hectares sold in Bariloche. Yesterday it was sold to the Argentine team and it was not sold by the Argentines, nor by Chiqui Tapia, nor by Messi, nor by Scaloni, nor by the players. Because we put ‘the Malvinas are Argentine’ on a flag that two Argentine blacks took who if they weren’t footballers they would have to leave their lives in the Malvinas. Let them tell it to me however they want Click on the image to go to the original tweet One of the ideas that has been repeated the most in recent days is that Argentina lost because the designated referee was European. A decision that had its controversy before the final (It was even rumored that an Iranian referee would whistle the match) However, in this other gathering Another reason was pointed out why Argentina would have had to let itself lose. Eduardo Feinmann, well-known journalist in the country for his controversial interventions on politicsrejected the idea floated by one of the members that Argentina had sold the final in exchange for the FBI not arresting Chiqui Tapia. And the AFA is being investigated for an alleged diversion of money to two associations that operated in the United States. Click on the image to go to the original … Read more

Europe forces Google to open Android to ChatGPT and Claude, but the blow is that it will have to give up its search engine data to the competition

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The European Commission has ordered Google to open two of its greatest competitive advantages– Android’s access to rival AI assistants and the search data that feeds Gemini. They are two binding measures under the Digital Markets Act (DMA)adopted on July 16. Android must be open by July 2027, search data by January 2027, and no resources are stopping those deadlines. In detail. The first measure affects how a rival assistant can live inside Android. Right now, Gemini has privileges that no competitor shares: Keyword activation at the operating system level, not the application level. Access to the home button or navigation gesture as a gateway. Reading content on screen to respond with context. Executing tasks within other applications, such as sending an email or sharing a photo. Priority access to hardware and AI models built into the device. There are 11 points in total. Starting with the next major version of Android, ChatGPT, Claude or any other attendee will be able to claim the same treatment that only they have today Gemini. The second measure is the one that weighs the most for the business: the data of queries, clicks and results with which Google trains a good part of its LLM. From January 2027, rivals such as OpenAI will be able to access an anonymized version, under conditions that Brussels demands are fair and non-discriminatory. Google’s waterline. Between the lines. Google completed a few months ago the transition from Google Assistant to Gemini as Android’s default assistant, just before Brussels opened the file. The order arrived with Gemini already installed as a part of the system and not as just another application. Apple chose the opposite path: it negotiated before launching, proposed a monitored permit system and Brussels rejected it. Siri AI It still hasn’t reached the iPhone in the European Union. Google launched Gemini without asking permission and has discussed the conditions afterwards, with better results. Yes, but. Google, like Apple, alleges security and privacy reasons. Its head of global affairs, Kent Walker, has explained that opening screen reading and the execution of tasks between applications to any external service bypasses the filter that the manufacturers themselves apply today before granting these permissions. And now what. Google will appeal, but the appeal does not give it extra time: from the criteria established in the Apple case, the obligation is fulfilled while it is discussed whether it was legal to impose it. The United Kingdom and Japan, which are preparing their own digital competency frameworks, are presumably taking note of how “fair access” to a mobile is defined here. What Brussels sets about wake words or search data prices will not remain only in Europe. In Xataka | AI has destroyed traditional captchas. Google’s solution requires scanning a QR… and having its services installed Featured image | Xataka

“microshifting” is hacking work to give us back control of the clock

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Before his son wakes up, John D. Connolly has already been working for an hour. He has breakfast with his family, works four hours before eating with his wife, resumes at four in the afternoon and returns to the computer when the child is in bed. On weekends, when necessary. Connolly, 46, founded the financial advisory firm Bifrost Advisors and spent more than two decades working regular hours before accepting that this wasn’t how he thought best. “I could spend six hours looking at the screen without more gas, but I had to stay two and a half more hours,” explained to wall Street Journal. Now he doesn’t work less. He works when his mind is there. Jen Meegan, editor-in-chief of creative agency Sheer Havoc, starts her day before her teens order breakfast. Read emails, review ideas from the previous day. He takes them to school, does the shopping, comes back and works in concentrated blocks of a few hours. It ends late at night. “Sometimes the most important work happens during the break,” told the agency AP News“because you’re not sitting staring at the screen with no ideas.” Connolly and Meegan practice what has begun to be called microshifting: Fragment the workday into short, non-linear blocks, adapted to moments of greatest energy or the demands of real life. It’s not a passing productivity fad. It’s the next frontier of workplace flexibility, and the debate is already underway. What exactly is microshifting? The most precise definition has been coined by the company that popularized the term. Owl Labs, video conferencing technology company, describes it in its 2025 report as “structured flexibility with short, non-linear blocks of work tailored to each person’s energy, responsibilities or productivity patterns.” In practice, these blocks usually last between 45 and 90 minutes, separated by personal, family or rest time. The distinction with teleworking and the hybrid model is fundamental. Teleworking changed where you work; microshifting changes the when. It is, in the words of researcher Jonathan Westover, “the next evolution in work design, beyond remote and hybrid models,” according to his article published in the Human Capital Leadership Review. It is not, however, a completely new concept. It is related to techniques such as timeboxing or the Pomodoro method, although with a fundamental difference: it does not respond to an external timer, but to the vital rhythm of each person. As he describes it with some irony The Guardian, “an extreme form of hybrid working” and remember that, in the past, this was simply called “taking liberties.” The difference now is that there is data, there are companies that promote it and there is a name. Why now? He microshifting It has a specific origin: the 2020 pandemic. Mandatory closures forcibly broke the traditional schedule. Millions of workers learned, without looking for it, that they could do their jobs in unconventional hours. When the mandates came back to the office, many did not want to give up that autonomy. The paradox of the current moment is striking. While the microshifting grows as desired, physical presence in the office also silently increases. The Owl Labs report named the phenomenon as hybrid creep: 34% of hybrid workers go to the office four days a week, up from 23% in 2023, without there having been a formal mandate. Employees are being called back out of inertia, and in response, they are claiming control over when. Data suggests this is already happening: 59% of employees schedule personal appointments during work hours and 82% prefer meetings to end before four in the afternoon. The most powerful driver is also care: 72% of caregivers are interested in microshifting, compared to 28% of those who do not have that responsibility. Theresa Robertson of Maryland practiced it for 25 years to care for her chronically ill husband. “It was the only way to have a life and earn a salary,” told to CNBC. The next battle according to Fortuneit is no longer where you work, but when. Work-life balance has overtaken salary as the top priority for office workers globally. The new perspective of the experts Academia and business management, traditionally conservative, are beginning to validate this intuition. Mark Pacitti, founder of Woozle Research, not only defends that five hours of work deep are more valuable than eight of diminishing returns; has measured it. At his firm, he invested in tracking tools to track when his researchers were performing best and discovered that the last few hours of an eight-hour shift were inefficient. Reduced shift length and output increase. Today he promotes it as a competitive advantage in a sector, that of financial research, where the burnout It’s epidemic. This approach is supported by cognitive science. Professor Anita Williams Woolley, of Carnegie Mellon University, explains that when trying to solve difficult problemsthe mind can only push for so long; Microshifting, well managed, prevents burnout. However, voices like that of Professor Kevin Rockmann of George Mason University, they ask for caution: “The whole point of microshifting is to take care of yourself. That’s not a bad thing, but it shifts the emphasis from the individual to relationships.” Aytekin Tank, CEO of Jotform, adds thatalthough microbreaks boost creativity, they require clear rules so as not to cannibalize deep work. “To do cognitively demanding work you need an environment where your brain can focus on a single task without interruptions,” he warns. It is a delicate balance: flexibility, yes, but with precise communication so as not to break the team’s coordination. Lights and shadows: the risk of the infinite journey He microshifting It has a dark side. The first is the feeling of being “always connected.” Isabelle Young, political organizer who organizes his work like this to manage a chronic illness, she admits bluntly: “Work is never over, so you’re never really disconnected.” Labor experts warn that schedule autonomy can become a hidden expectation: employees who stretch their day to fourteen or sixteen hours to be available in different time zones. Cali Williams Yost, flexible … Read more

Money doesn’t buy happiness. But it does give a monstrous Bugatti television that folds itself

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A 137-inch television that, when you are not watching it, folds by itself and remains as a luxury decorative structure in your home. Yes, it is as crazy and absurd as it is real. Bugatti has presented to the world “his” first televisionone of the most spectacular on the planet. Of course, it needed a little help, so it relied on the work of C Seed, an Austrian display brand focused entirely on luxury. WTF. The chances of seeing the video of this television and not surprisingly, in my opinion, they are very low. In fact, the first thing I thought when I saw the video was that it was generated by AI. Mistake. The concept is “simple”: a television in 110 and 137 inch formats that folds in 45 seconds and remains as a very expensive decorative element in the home. Beyond the eccentricity, on a technological level it is truly amazing. Original design of the C SEED N1. Two of them can be configured in dozens of options. Bugatti version. Who is behind. The truth is that Bugatti did not invent this television, it was presented by the Austrian company C SEED in 2022 under the name N1, and it began to be sold to order in 2024. C SEED is a young company, founded in 2009 and with headquarters and production plant in Vienna. From the beginning, it focused on luxury televisions and solutions, both for mansions and superyachts, events, etc. It’s a small, absolutely niche company, so if you’ve never heard of it… you’re not alone. The bug. The Bugatti N1 is a complete redesign of the original N1, with materials and lines used in the Bugatti Tourbillona four-wheeled hypercar million of euros. And as for specs… 4K UHD resolution, HDR10+. Foldable microLED technology (five panels). Wisdom Audio self-deploying speaker system. Swivel system up to 180 degrees to the right and left. 1,000 nits brightness. 3m wide, 1.7 meters high, less than 10cm thick in its 137-inch version. 680 kilos for the 137-inch version. The five panels of the television unfolding. How is it possible. C SEED has not created a 137-inch folding panel, the TV is made up of a total of five microLED panels. This is one of the keys: it is not a typical panel with sub-panel hinges visible at a visible level, they are rigid and independent panels. The company has patented its own “Adaptive Joint Calibration” system, in other words, its electronic calibration system to align panel joints with millimeter precision in real time, making them indistinguishable to the eye. MicroLED technology is self-emissive, in which each LED is an individual, independent light emitter. This means that the system can precisely control the intensity, color and on-time of each pixel individually, including the pixels that are on the edge of each panel, next to the board. Go deeper. C Seed does not go into details about the manufacturing of the mechanism that rotates and hides the panel, although the documentation of the panel reveals some images of its interior. In them, we can perfectly appreciate the cavities that house the microLED modules, the screws and some of the joints of the system. In addition to this system, the audio system, signed Wisdom Audio, is especially striking. The speakers are hidden within one of the panel structures, and appear only when we need to play audio. The rest of the time they are hidden, to keep the design as clean as possible. I want one. The C SEED website only allows you to configure the television. Once we have done so, we submit the request and the company will contact us. Depending on the materials chosen, the customizations we want to make and the size, the price of the previous version was around $200,000, so add another few thousand for this Bugatti version. Image | C SEED In Xataka | Best televisions in quality price. Which one to buy and seven recommended 4K smart TVs

Influencers have made it fashionable to give yourself cramps in your vagus nerve to cure stress. Science has bad news

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After a marathon day, what if the report doesn’t arrive, feed the kids, walk the dog, go to that Pilates class… And your brain refuses to turn off. You open TikTok or Instagram looking for a distraction and, between dances and recipes, a influencer. Wear a minimalist design device around your neck or clipped to your ear. It promises that with the push of a button and a few small electrical pulses, your anxiety will disappear, you’ll sleep like a baby, and your “brain fog” will lift. they call it “the great reset of the nervous system”. For centuries, the vagus nerve has functioned in complete anatomical obscurity, but today it has achieved an almost mythical status in the wellness ecosystem. According to The New York Timesthere are billions of social media impressions about this nerve. Celebrities like Kelly Ripa and podcasters like Andrew Huberman They praise their virtues. “A lot of this is being driven by influencers saying, ‘Just do this to stimulate your vagus nerve, and all the problems in your life will be solved,’” explains Dr. Kevin Tracey, a neurosurgeon and president of the Feinstein Institutes for Medical Research. It sounds like science fiction, but forecasts suggest that the stimulation of this nerve will generate a billion-dollar industry by 2030. The inevitable question that arises is: can we really “hack” our stress with neck cramps, or are we facing the umpteenth expensive internet placebo? To understand the phenomenon, you must first understand the biology. As explained by the Cleveland Clinicthe vagus nerve (whose name comes from the Latin “wanderer”) is the tenth of the twelve cranial nerves and the longest of all. It arises in the brain stem and winds through the neck, chest, and abdomen, connecting the brain to the heart, lungs, and digestive system. It is the main highway of our parasympathetic nervous system, the one in charge of the “rest and digest” function. Basically, it is the body’s handbrake. When we get stressed, the sympathetic system (the “fight or flight” response) is activated; When the danger passes, the vagus nerve should come into action to calm the pulse and relax the body. But why are people obsessed with electrocuting him? According to the magazine Women’s Healthwe live in an epidemic of chronic stress. The flood of emails, traffic jams and daily pressures cause what is known as “vagal dysfunction.” Our body gets stuck in survival mode and loses the ability to calm down.. The promise of a quick fix has led to the emergence of commercial devices. When faced with the idea of ​​using home electricity, it is normal to wonder if this is dangerous. Generally, the physical answer is no. According to Dr. Michael Kilgard, director of the Texas Biomedical Device Center, interviewed by The New York Timesthe batteries in these commercial devices are too small to burn the skin. The most you feel is tingling. However, the real danger is psychological and medical. “The strangeness of the sensations is annoying enough that people feel like the devices are doing something,” Kilgard warns. In most cases, these gadgets are “probably little more than a placebo disguised as neuroscience“. The risk lies in false hope: patients who spend hundreds of euros on devices that do nothing, delaying medical treatments that have been proven to be effective. To understand the true impact of this false hope, it is vital to separate the wheat from the chaff and define where scientific rigor ends. The line between medicine and marketing wellness The science of Vagus Nerve Stimulation (VNS) is real, fascinating and very complex, but it is light years away from what the marketers sell. influencers. There are real medical devices, but as a comprehensive review article published highlights in the scientific journal Comprehensive Physiologyinvasive stimulation (iVNS) “remains the gold standard with well-documented efficacy.” That is, we are talking about small devices similar to pacemakers that are surgically implanted under the skin of the chest, with cables threaded directly to the nerve. According to Cleveland Clinicthe FDA (the US drug agency) has approved these severe implants to treat cases of resistant epilepsy and severe clinical depression. Medical research continues to advance. A pivotal clinical trial published recently in Nature Medicine (the RESET-RA trial), demonstrated that an implanted neuromodulator system targeting the vagus nerve significantly reduced inflammation in patients with rheumatoid arthritis who were unresponsive to conventional medications. On the other hand, as a review points out from the magazine Exploratory Research and Hypothesis in Medicinethe use of non-invasive stimulators (in the ear or neck) is being intensively studied in clinical settings for rehabilitation after stroke or to slow cognitive decline. But what about the devices that anyone can buy online to “de-stress”? The experts are blunt. Dr. Kristl Vonck, neurologist at Ghent University, warns that consumer devices They are “lightly regulated and do not have to prove to the FDA that they actually work.” Many companies hide behind vague claims about “wellness” to avoid medical controls and use the language of real clinical trials as a mere marketing tactic. Furthermore, as a clinical researcher explains in The Conversationmanipulating the vagus nerve is not a panacea and does not work the same for everyone. Some people in clinical trials experience headaches, worsening migraines, or even a drop in mood when receiving stimulation. “Most diseases involve multiple biological and psychological factors, and no single nerve explains or solves all of them,” he says. Misinformation is not limited to devices; It also covers home diagnostics. The magazine Bustle recently echoed a viral trend on TikTok: the “three drinks” test. Content creators claimed that if you are unable to swallow saliva three times in a row and quickly, your vagus nerve is seriously deregulated due to chronic stress. The therapists had to intervene. Chloë Bean, an expert somatic trauma therapist, clarified that swallowing does involve this nerve, but not being able to do it three times in a row “does not automatically mean that your vagus nerve is stuck.” It … Read more

The Earth has had a traveling companion for millions of years and we don’t know where it came from, but there is a ship ready to give us answers

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The Earth does not travel alone around the sun. And not only because of the Moon, which logically always accompanies it, orbiting around it. It also has several traveling companions: objects, called co-orbitals, that take exactly the same time as our planet to make a complete revolution around the star. These objects are well known, but their origin is quite mysterious. There are astronomers who bet that they escaped from the asteroid belt. However, their silicate content suggests that they could be fragments of the Moon that jumped from its surface after the impact of a meteorite. Now, a team of scientists has assigned probabilities to each option, although for definitive proof of its origin we will have to wait a little longer. (469219) Kamo’oalewa. This is the name of one of the best-known coorbitals on Earth. It measures between 24 and 107 meters in diameter and the spectral analyzes that have been able to be carried out Telescopes such as the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) and the Lowell Discovery Telescope (LDT) indicate that it is very rich in silicates, so it is likely that it comes from the Moon. In fact, the most accepted hypothesis so far indicates that it could have been formed during the impact that gave rise to the Giordano Bruno crater on our satellite. However, this new study, published in the journal Icarus, suggests that it is more likely that it is an asteroid escaped of the belt between Mars and Jupiter. Very unlikely. For an asteroid or a piece of the Moon to become co-orbital, they must not only escape from their place. Also They must have enough energy to be located in what is known as a quasi-satellite orbit. This, for a body the size of Kamo’oalewa, is highly unlikely. Quasi-what? A quasi-satellite has certain similarities with a satellite, but it is not the same. When we look at one of them from the planet it accompanies, in the direction of the Sun, it appears that it is in orbit around the planet, but in reality it rotates around the Sun itself. This, among other reasons, is due to the fact that is outside the Hill sphere of the planet. That is, the environment dominated by its gravity. Being outside of said orbit, it is influenced by the planet’s gravity, but above all, in this case, it is influenced by that of the Sun. Be that as it may, falling and staying in that orbit is complicated, as we have already seen and, above all, as these scientists have demonstrated. Win the asteroid option. These scientists have created models that simulate the trajectory of 12,000 synthetic particles launched from the lunar surface at different speeds and angles, following their orbits for millions of years. The goal was to see how many stabilized at co-orbital points with the Earth. In total they found 70 objects with a diameter greater than 10 meters capable of doing so. 70 out of 12,000! Now, when they repeated the procedure by swapping lunar particles for objects from the asteroid belt, they found more candidates. 1,600 in total. Tianwen-2 will return samples to answer the mystery in 2027 Tianwen-2 will have the key. The origin of coorbitals is so intriguing that China already has sent a ship to analyze the surface of one of them. Specifically from Kamo’oalewa himself. The Tianwen-2 mission left in May 2025 towards this object, with the aim of collecting at least 100 grams of samples and return them to Earth for analysis. It is already known that there are silicates, or at least it is suspected, but a deeper idea of ​​the composition is needed to understand the origin of this object. Orbit insertion is expected to occur next June if all goes well. Then he will spend a few months collecting samples to put them in a capsule, which will land back on Earth. already in 2027. Two options. If the analyzes of Tianwen-2 conclude that Kamo’oalewa came from the Moon, the lunar impact mechanics would have to be rethought, since it would be very rare for one of these fragments to have been able to reach its final location with what we know so far. On the other hand, if it is proven that it comes from an asteroid, it would be necessary to study where these silicates come from, since they are very unconventional for an object of these characteristics. Whatever is concluded, there will be a lot of fabric to cut, that is clear. ç Image | NASA |China News Service In Xataka | The Earth has moons that we don’t know about: exploring them is key to revealing the secrets of our solar system

Science has a new magic number (and a golden rule about how to give them)

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One of the mantras that has been repeated on numerous occasions is that yes or yes you have to take 10,000 steps a day in order to enjoy good health. Our activity bracelets are partly to blame, since they even give us prizes for reaching this goal or remind us that we have not managed to reach it. But this number was born as a marketing strategy in Japan in the 60s and now science is making more and more nuances with respect to this figure to give more importance to how it works. The study. The most recent evidence we have in this regard is found published in the prestigious magazine The Lancet in July 2025, which combined 57 studies and analyzed 31 different cohorts of people in order to reach the most robust conclusion possible. The results. In short, we can affirm that the mantra of taking 10,000 steps is more than dismantled, since already reaching 7,000 steps a day means having 47% less mortality from any cause, and 25% less risk of suffering from cardiovascular disease compared to those who only take 2,000 steps a day on average. This is what different reference organizations in the world of cardiology also point out, such as the American College of Cardiology, who claim that the health benefit follows a curve in which the biggest drop in mortality risk occurs before reaching 10,000 stepssetting the new goal at 7,000-8,000 steps per day. It’s not worth the walk. For many, all the steps on the physical activity counter are the same, whether they are the first ones in the morning to go to the bathroom or the ones we take while window shopping at the mall. But the reality is that they are not ‘productive’ steps, since to reach these 7,000 steps that do not ensure a reduction in mortality, the intensity of the walk matters much more than the number. How to get here. Here Harvard Health sums it up perfectly aim that walking becomes a moderate aerobic exercise only when we increase the intensity until we notice a higher pulse and more demanding breathing. To get an idea, if we are here, we can put ourselves in the situation where we can still speak, but only in short phrases. If we want to have a figure on the table, we can stick to reaching 100 steps per minute, which can be around 4.5 km per hour if we also want to do it on a treadmill in the gym. It’s important. Doing these steps daily is important, since it has been shown that adequate walking speed is directly linked to a significant reduction in cases of heart attack, stroke and heart failure, especially in people who already suffer from hypertension. Images | Drazen Zigic in Magnific In Xataka | Tell me how fast you walk at 45 and I’ll tell you how your brain ages: The science behind the ‘sixth vital sign’

Speculation with Pokémon cards is such a serious problem that some stores already give knowledge tests to their customers

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In 2024, global sales of ‘Pokémon’ collectible card game They reached 2.2 billion dollars, with a growth of 25% compared to the previous year. The Pokémon Company increased production up to 10.2 billion letters by 2025. During the pandemic, Logan Paul and other content creators began opening envelopes on videos that reached millions of views. Since then, the fever has not stopped growing, and stores are beginning to propose unusual tests to distinguish genuine buyers from resellers. This is a test. At the west branch of Ikebukuro, in Tokyo, the specialty store Bic Camera made a decision that would separate the buyers of ‘Pokémon’ trading cards from the scalpers: to buy packs of the latest expansion, Ninja Spinner, you must first beat a written questionnaire of 15 questions about the ‘Pokémon’ universe without a cell phone, without help and in Japanese. It’s just the beginning. The questionnaire is not the only requirement. Shoppers must have an active loyalty account in the chain, either via app or physical card, allowing staff to spot suspiciously frequent purchases. Additionally, the store applies a limit of one box per customer and removes the seal and outer packaging upon delivery: an opened product loses much of its value on the secondary market, where resellers need the seal intact to inflate prices. According to X user Ryo Saeba, the system is working: Several resellers failed the test and left without product, since due to the random nature of the questionnaire it cannot be prepared in advance. It is a problem that, however, does not have an easy solution even from The Pokémon Company: if more copies of the most in-demand cards are printed, speculation would be reduced, but competitive play would be affected, as would the feeling of exclusivity of finding a rare card in a pack. Why Ninja Spinner. The Ninja Spinner expansion is the Japanese version of the western Chaos Rising, scheduled for release on May 22, and which features Mega Greninja ex as the main card. The former Mega Greninja gold card was worth $593 in March and It is now quoted in thousands.. An envelope that costs around 5 euros in the store can be resold for 40 in a matter of hours. The bad yen. Additionally, there is an additional economic factor that makes the reseller problem more serious: the structural weakness of the yen, combined with the relatively affordable price of the boxes, has made Pokémon cards a common target of foreign buyers and international resellers. Japan-exclusive releases, which include illustrations and finishes not available in other markets, multiply the appeal. Sometimes new items last minutes on shelves before ending up on resale platforms. How they do it. Professional resellers have tactics to circumvent the control systems that stores establish to give preference to real buyers: they hire several people to wait in line simultaneously, use multiple payment cards and create fake accounts to access online reservations. In October 2025Japanese police arrested two Vietnamese citizens who had created thirty fictitious accounts using fraudulently obtained SIM cards to participate in purchase raffles and obtain dozens of boxes that summer. Other initiatives. Other Bic Camera branches have adopted measures such as requiring a driver’s license or Japanese tax identification document, which limits purchases to residents. Official Pokémon Center stores also maintain strict unit limits per customer to preserve prices close to the official one. Outside Japan there has also been a lukewarm response to the activity of the scalpersname as resellers are known in the sector: Walmart, for example, introduced a limit of five packs per purchase at the end of 2024 after a video with 12 million views on TikTok showed a scalper emptying a store’s entire display in one trip. Header | Pexels In Xataka | In 2016, millions of people went out to hunt Pokémon on the streets. In 2026 there will be autonomous robots guided by this

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