remains

The Government remains committed to ending telephone SPAM and is now targeting electricity companies. It’s still a shot in the air

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The Spanish Government’s crusade against SPAM calls continues. At the beginning of the week, the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge approved the new General Regulations supply, marketing and aggregation of electrical energy. The main purpose of this is, according to the Government, to protect consumers through new measures. And one of them collides head-on with a recurring practice of marketers: SPAM calls. The measure. After the entry into force of the new regulation, telephone calls to advertise or contract services are prohibited, as long as “they have not been expressly requested by the consumer in advance or they are the one who calls the company.” It will not have immediate effect, companies will have four months to adapt to the regulations, under penalty of fines of between 600,000 and 6,000,000 euros if they fail to comply, according to the Law 24/2013, of the Electrical Sector. There is more. In addition to the prohibition of calls without express consent, the Royal Decree establishes the obligation to provide a completely free customer service number, as well as a maximum period of 15 days to respond to user claims and complaints. It is also prohibited to cut power to electro-dependent consumers on holidays and eves. Very nice, but. Although the Government has been trying to tackle the SPAM problem for more than a year, the reality is very different. According to the OCU, 99% of Spaniards (me among them, this week) continue to receive unwanted calls. Some companies continue to take advantage prior consent to send advertising communications, and others are providing their call centers with telephone numbers outside the traditional prefixes to continue with their practice, despite the fact that the law penalizes it. An endless war. The war against SPAM does not only affect Image | Xataka In Xataka | If you are tired of receiving spam calls every day, good news: MasOrange is tired too

The problem remains that any hotel will photocopy it for you.

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The National Police has announced in a post on X (Twitter) that a new Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) has been implemented of the DNI with new encryption algorithms. Thus, the new system goes from being an RSA 2048 to the so-called Elliptic Curve 384 system. The change is interesting on the one hand. The RSA system is already a classic for data encryption, but it has some disadvantages: it uses large public keys, operations are slower (especially when signing) and it consumes more CPU and bandwidth. With Elliptic Curve 384 bits (ECCusually P-384) allows you to provide a lot of security in small keys. Signatures are much faster, for example, and consume much less CPU and battery, in addition to providing a very high level of security. It is a system with much more future projectionand seems a suitable alternative for the “ID 4.0“of which the National Police speaks. What does this cryptography protect our DNI? These private keys inside the DNIe chip never leave it, and various types of operations are carried out with them: Authentication: prove that you are you, and that it allows you, for example, to connect to the Tax Agency Electronic signature: when we present official procedures or electronic contracts, the DNI “signs” as if it were our physical signature Key exchange: reinforces, for example, the TLS security of secure protocols when browsing if we need that additional layer This new cryptographic system mitigates impersonation even if passwords are stolen in certain scenarios (such as trying to use it for official procedures) because the attacker would need not only “a photo” of the DNI, but the physical DNI, the PIN, and break the ECC 384 encryption, which is practically impossible today. So, the measure is positive, but that is not the problem. The problem is how the DNI is used in Spain. The weakest link These measures are aimed at protecting the data on our ID, but the problem is how this document has become inherently vulnerable because of the way it handles itself in the real world. In fact, the DNI has become a document that we transfer with extraordinary ease. Hotels have been asking for and photocopying our ID for years when checking in.. They cannot and should not do so. The AEPD published a note in June 2025 in which it discussed this issue and concluded that “a copy of the identity document should not be requested.” This document is also usually photocopied or scanned in procedures before a notaryFor example. In this case, the arguments are usually put forward that they have to provide reliable documentation because the money laundering law. The AEPD in fact sanctioned the General Council of Notaries (CGN) for this type of requests last summer of 2025. However and how explained in X cybersecurity expert Román Ramírez, it is another question of “they do not want to commit themselves by attesting that the document you show is the real one. It is a way of “washing your hands,” he explains, because if something happens it is no longer your word against theirs. In fact, we have long recommended that if you have to send a photo of your DNI for any online procedure, it should be done with a watermark. Tools like SafeLayer They facilitate this task but in some cases the entities or companies that request this document object to the shipment with a watermark or do not accept it at all. The curious thing is that the legislation theoretically prevents this type of mass registration of DNIs in cases such as administrative procedures. He Royal Decree 522/2006 of April 28eliminates the obligation to present photocopies of the DNI in the administrative procedures of the General Administration of the State and its dependent organizations. This rule obliges administrations to verify identity data internally, prohibiting requiring physical copies unless expressly opposed by the citizen or specific regulations. This rule does not apply directly to the examples of hotels or notaries, but there the AEPD has also made it clear that the exhibition is enough of the document. No matter what they tell you, do not send your ID as is We should never simply send photos of the ID. Neither by email, nor by WhatsApp, nor through dubious forms, even if the message seems to come from a real company. In fact, if a company asks for your DNI after a theoretical data leak or theft, the best thing we can do is verify it on our own, informing us on its website or calling a legitimate customer service number to find out what is really happening and if this procedure is necessary. The DNI It’s “gold” for scammersbecause it allows: Open fraudulent accounts Request credits or microloans Validate identities in online services Reinforce scams with messages such as “we have your ID, we are from this company or bank.” In fact, this document is a treasure if other data such as contact or telephone number is added to it, because thanks to this information it is possible to carry out much more effective identity theft attacks that can lead to truly dangerous scams and frauds. The DNI has another peculiar problem: it is used as a kind of “universal identifier” in Spain. If it leaks once—if someone steals it or a photo of it ends up in the wrong hands— You can no longer change it like someone changes a password.. You can only renew it, but even then the “old” one is still extremely useful for those phishing attacks. That is why it is important to limit as much as possible where we upload the ID, who has it, and in what format: we should never upload the complete photo unless it is absolutely essential. In Xataka | How to share your ID online safely to avoid dangers

now remains the most difficult

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Spanish science has once again demonstrated the great talent we have in our country and of which we should feel proud. One of the most recognized names is undoubtedly Mariano Barbacid, who joins his team has achieved something unprecedented until now: leave no trace of the pancreatic ductal adenocarcinomaone of those with the worst prognosis. But there are nuances to take into account. A resistant cancer. If there is something that is feared in medicine, it is the diagnosis of a cancer that affects the pancreas due to its great mortality because it is difficult to diagnose it early and especially because of its resistance to treatments. Therefore, when the National Cancer Research Center (CNIO) publish in PNAS who has managed to eliminate these tumors in micethe scientific world turns its head. The team led by Mariano Barbacid has achieved what is technically called a “complete and long-lasting regression.” Or in plain words: they have cured the mice. But before you throw the bells in the air, you have to read the fine print of biology: this is a preclinical milestone, not a ready-made therapy for humans. A triple therapy. Until now, attacking pancreatic cancer was like trying to stop a car by cutting a single cable, since the tumor had alternative routes available to evade treatment and continue developing. But now Mariano Barbacid’s team has focused on cutting all possible routes. To do this, they have created a therapy aimed at simultaneously attacking three critical points of the tumor. Technically, they have used three drugs to inhibit its growth pathway, such as KRASthe escape route in the EGFR protein and also the ‘shield’ it had by eliminating the STAT3 protein which is key for tumor resistance. The result. By combining the three, they were able to eliminate tumors in mouse models, including PDX models, which are mice implanted with tumor tissue from human patients. The most surprising thing is the durability: more than 200 days without a trace of the disease after completing the treatment, and without apparent toxicity. It won’t be ready for tomorrow. When this news emerges, the emotion is evident in different fields of science and also in society in general, since we are talking about a cancer that has destroyed many families. But the reality is that science does not move as fast as we would like and this treatment It still has a long way to go until it reaches the oncology units of hospitals. If everything goes well. Your main barrier. There are three fundamental barriers that explain why a clinical trial could take around three years to start for this triple therapy. The main one is that of the three components that are used in this cocktail, only one, which is afatinibis approved and marketed. And this is a serious problem. RMC-6236 It is the other drug that is currently in a clinical trial to test its safety and effectiveness. But the case of SD36, one of the most important drugs, is even more incipient since right now it is not approved by any regulatory agency. This reminds us that turning an experimental compound into a safe pill for humans takes time and a lot of regulatory bureaucracy. The problem of toxicity. But beyond this, we must keep in mind that a mouse and a human have many differences in their organism. This makes what a mouse tolerates, a human sometimes cannot. In this way, the real effect on humans of this triple therapy and the toxicity it presents remains to be seen, although the good result in mice opens a door to hope and the need to continue betting on science and Spanish talent. The shadow of resistance. Carmen Guerra, CNIO researcher and co-author of the study, has put her finger on the problem: have already identified mutations that confer resistance to this triple therapy. This means that even if it works in humans, it is likely not a definitive solution for all patients. And pancreatic cancer in colloquial terms has a lot of bad milk This makes it truly heterogeneous, so even if a treatment works for one patient, it is not the same for others. A Spanish milestone. Despite all these nuances that are necessary to come down to earth, what the CNIO team has achieved is extraordinary and reminds us how important it is to commit to science. made in Spain with greater financing. The fact that pancreatic cancer is a veritable graveyard of drugs that work in the laboratory and fail in the hospital gives a lot of weight to achieving a complete reversal in animal models. Patience. What are we waiting for now? You have to be patient. Science advances step by step, with a large amount of bureaucracy behind it that puts an extra brake on it. In this way, now it is time to seek funding, wait for the experimental drugs to reach their own regulations and design a clinical trial to demonstrate whether this miracle in animals is also developed in humans and without intolerable side effects. In short, it is a big step, yes. But the goal is still far away. Images | Louis Reed RTVE In Xataka | The most unexpected treatment against cancer is LED light, and it is giving good results

Boston Dynamics starts commercial production while Optimus remains wrapped in promises

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Boston Dynamics has unveiled the product version of Atlas, not a prototype or technical demo. The company describes This humanoid robot as an enterprise-grade system, designed from the ground up to be systematically manufactured, maintained and repaired. In its official communication it insists on concepts such as reliability, field service and prolonged useful life, a clear way of marking distance from more experimental approaches. In this way, Atlas makes the leap into the industrial world, with deployments announced for 2026 and a roadmap that, within the framework of Hyundai’s plans, points to a production capacity of up to 30,000 units per year. Meanwhile, Optimus remains tied to internal testing and automation at Tesla. Elon Musk had projected have “thousands” of humanoid robots working in factories by the end of 2025, but as of today there is no public evidence that the company has reached that goal. A change of stage announced in advance. The move towards a commercial Atlas had been in the works for some time. In 2024 the hydraulic robot stage will be officially closedactive for more than a decade, to give way to a completely electric design aligned with a real deployment. That decision came as recent advances in artificial intelligence accelerated the training and production of complex robots. Hyundai, client and driving force of the deployment. Atlas’ industrial leap is supported by a key corporate relationship. Hyundai Motor Group, the majority shareholder of Boston Dynamics, is also the humanoid robot’s first customer. He assures her that An initial deployment has already been completed in 2025 and an additional fleet is planned to be shipped in 2026 to the Robotics Metaplant Application Center. From there, Hyundai’s industrial investment context points to a possible expansion of scale, although these figures appear as general plans and not as specific commitments directly linked to Atlas. Designed for human environments. Atlas is not conceived as an isolated machine within a closed cell, but as a robot capable of moving through the same spaces in which people already work. Its function is aimed at handling and logistical support tasks in factories and warehouses, sharing an environment with human workers and other automated systems. To make it possible, the design has been optimized for coexistence, with mechanisms that allow detecting the proximity of people and stopping the operation when necessary. For a robot to truly fit into a factory, uptime is as important as the task it performs. Atlas is designed to operate during standard shifts, with an autonomy of approximately four hours in typical use. When the battery runs out, the robot itself can replace it autonomously in less than three minutes and return to work, allowing for continuous operation cycles. The charging system also works with conventional 110 V or 220 V electrical outlets, avoiding costly modifications to the infrastructure. Control, fleets and continuous learning. Atlas is not only intended to act autonomously, but also to integrate into monitoring and control systems at scale. Technically, it can operate autonomously, but also by remote control with virtual reality or tablet, and be managed as part of a fleet. In addition, a collaboration with Google DeepMind comes into play, aimed at integrating Gemini Robotics models to accelerate the learning of new tasks, a capability that the company presents as part of its roadmap and not as a fully deployed function from day one. Images | Boston Dynamics In Xataka | If China manages to lead in humanoid robots it will not be only because of its technology: its companies know how to sell them better than anyone else.

In 1845, John Franklin’s expedition set sail in search of the Northwest Passage. 180 years later his loss remains a mystery

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On the morning of May 19, 1845, Captain John Franklin and his expedition weighed anchor from the Greenhithe Harboralmost at the mouth of the Thames. They were looking for the Northwest Passagethe (at that time theoretical) maritime route that would link the Atlantic and the Pacific through northern Canada. They never came home. 129 men who never returned and who, for 170 years, have been one of the great questions of scientific and naval exploration. We now know why the men of John Franklin’s lost exploration died. There are those who insinuate that the trip started badly from the beginning. It should never have been in the first place. John Franklin. The first option William Edward Parryone of the great English explorers, but he had already traveled to the Arctic five times and “was tired.” So he declined the offer. Secondly, they thought about James Clark Ross. Ross has just arrived from Antarctica where he had explored the Ross Sea and Island. In fact, the ships on that expedition were the same as those that would be used on this mission (two of Ross Island volcanoes They are called Erebus and Terror in honor of the ships). But upon returning to England, he became engaged to his future wife and decided that great explorations were no longer for him. He was followed by James Fitzjames (discarded due to inexperience), George Back (considered too controversial) and Francis Crozier (who, well, was Irish and that was more than enough reason to rule him out). Seeing the yard, John Barrow, second secretary of the Admiralty, called John Franklin. To this day no one knows why Franklin, who was already a legend at the time and was almost 60 years old, he said yes. But the fact is that, as I said, they left the vicinity of London that day in 1845. They stopped in Orkney and the convoy formed by the two main ships (HMS Erebus and HMS Terror), the HMS Rattler (the first English warship with steam propulsion) and a transport headed to Greenland. There they sacrificed ten oxen and the expedition began its solo journey. The search for the Northwest Passage The travels of Marco Polo are a peculiar book. Not only does it remain a very interesting precedent for current anthropology, but it served as an inspiration for many during the era of great exploration. The image you can see above is precisely the annotated copy of ‘The Voyages’ that Christopher Columbus had. In one of its versions, the Italian one from 1559, a Chinese province called Anian. We assume that it was from there that the geographers and explorers who discussed whether America was a new continent or, on the contrary, an Asian peninsula, got the name of the Strait of Anian, the separation between Asia and America that would give access to the Northwest Passage. It is what we know today as the Bering Strait and for years it was pure mythology. But, first, Ferdinand Magellan and his crew turned around Cape Espiritu Santo and found themselves face to face with the southeastern passage; and, second, a Dane in the service of Russia, Vitus Beringrediscovered for the West the strait through which Semyon Dezhniov had already traveled sixty years before. The rest was geopolitics: the quick passage to the Pacific without having to pass near the Spanish territories in America was too juicy. In 1745, an English law promised 20,000 pounds to whoever discovered the pass and the boom began. I have tried to convert the amount to a current currency and I have not been able to do it accurately, but I have drawn one conclusion: it was a lot of money. Favorable weather In early August 1845, two whalers, the Prince of Wales and the Enterprise, encountered Franklin’s ships in Baffin Bay. They were waiting for favorable weather to enter the Strait of Lancaster. That was the last time they were seen. Two years passed. And, little by little, Lady Jane Franklin, some members of Parliament, and the fledgling British press began to ask the Admiralty to send someone to search for the heroes of Franklin’s expedition. The Government sent three expeditions: one by land and two by sea, one through the Atlantic and another through the Pacific. They failed. Fearing that they would be forgotten, Lady Jane Franklin composed her lament, the song you can hear just above. And, although I don’t know if it was for that reason, the truth is that was not forgotten. In fact, the search for the lost expedition “became nothing less than a crusade.” In 1850 alone, eleven British and two American ships tried to locate them. It was then that the first tombs were found. Over the years, the different expeditions found fragments, Inuit stories and objects from the expedition. In 1855, following the indications of some Inuit tribes, pieces of wood were found with the name of Erebus. In 59 two messages were found. The first, dated May 28, 1847, was from Franklin himself and read “Sir John Franklin, Commander of the Expedition: All Well.” It is the document on the right. It was a common practice at the time, documents were left in different places so that, in case of problems, they could be reconstruct the details of the trip. But in this case, something curious happened: on the edges there was another message, dated April 25, 1848, explaining that the ships had been trapped in the ice. Franklin and twenty-three other crew members were dead. And the rest, the survivors, had abandoned the ships looking for an exit to the south. In the next few years some objects, some rumors and some tombs appeared. Nothing else. The ships never appeared and we never, in 150 years, discovered what had really happened to Captain John Franklin’s lost expedition. One hundred and fifty years without news In the 1980s, the University of Alberta launched a project to track the expedition. The different possible routes were traveled … Read more

A teenager discovered the ‘Málaga’ virus and ended up founding VirusTotal. The enigma that remains is the same since 1992: who programmed it

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Bernardo Quintero (@bquintero) was 14 years old and his first PC, an Amstrad PC-1512, had just arrived home. It was 1987, and the co-founder of VirusTotal He was excited by this machine that allowed him to exploit his computer curiosity. His hobby ended up being trying to circumvent the copy protection systems of some games, and he was there one day when something suddenly happened. A little white ball moved on your screen. By itself. Without him having done anything. He soon discovered that it was a computer virus. One that he ended up studying to know how to detect and eliminate it. He succeeded, and over the next three years he ended up improving his first antivirus, a tool that allowed him to recognize and eradicate seven different viruses he had encountered. It didn’t seem like that project was going to go much further, and Quintero began his studies in Computer Science at the Polytechnic University School of Malaga. In one of the first classes, a professor asked if anyone wanted to raise a grade with a Pascal programming project. He signed up, and when talking to the professor, he asked him if he had done any previous projects. “Well, yes,” he replied. “An accounting program, disk utilities, an antivirus…”. The teacher cut him off. “Did you say antivirus?”. When he answered affirmatively, the professor asked him to accompany him to his office. There he showed him how the entire IT department had been infected by a virus that the antivirus did not recognize. Fragment of the code in Turbo Pascal 5.5 of the antivirus that Bernardo Quintero developed to eliminate the “Málaga-2610” virus (1992). Source: Bernardo Quintero. Quintero soon detected where the problem could be and went home with an infected disk to work on an antivirus. It took him more than he thought, but after a few hours he managed to figure out how to detect it and delete it. That helped him pass the subject, but it also ended up being the definitive seed of the professional project that would end with the founding of Virus Total. He tells it all in more detail in his novel, ‘Infected‘, which he published at the beginning of the year and in which he narrates those beginnings and how that ended up leading him to create VirusTotal, the Malaga company that would later end up being bought by Google. That virus in his faculty was called “Málaga”, and Quintero spent years without paying much attention to it again. So, three years ago, this expert posted a message on Twitter (X) to try to solve the mystery of who would have created it. Already then he discovered that according to several sources the virus had been created at the Polytechnic School of Informatics. The objective, I counted thenit was not about bringing the name to light, but about chatting with that person and remembering those times. He failed to reveal the mystery, and that mystery remained unsolved again. But Bernardo Quintero never forgot that and returned to the fray with a new attempt a few days ago. After first publishing a message on X, the next day he published a summary of that story on LinkedInand asked for help in that post to try to solve the mystery once and for all. We contacted him, and he told us how while in the past he had focused on discovering how it infected and creating the disinfection tool, he never tried to find out who had created the “Malaga” virus. But he told us that “now, looking at it with new eyes, I have seen a couple of interesting details and I have discovered the motivation.” In fact, he adds that thanks to those messages on X and LinkedIn “I have received stories from several people who studied those years at the Polytechnic of Malaga and who believe they know the author.” Of those candidates, he explains, “I have ruled out 3 or 4, but there is one that fits very well with the new data I have.” The mystery seems to be close to being solved. “I just need to clear up one unknown to confirm the author.. And if it is confirmed, there is a beautiful and sad story that will be worth telling.” Everything therefore indicates that it will finally be known who was the author of that virus, and Quintero has promised to tell more details these days. We will be attentive. Image | Mika Baumeister In Xataka | The computer with the most malware in the world: this is MICE, the challenge of Bernardo Quintero and VirusTotal

The only Russian access gate to the ISS remains out of service. And that is forcing NASA to take action

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“We are taking a very serious risk; we have no technical reserves for platform number 31; There is only one position for Soyuz-2 launches (in Baikonur),” warned Dmitri Rogozin, then director general of Roscosmos, on January 25, 2022. That wake-up call went almost unnoticed, but today it takes on unexpected weight. What was then described as a structural vulnerability has become an immediate problem for Russia’s ability to reach low orbit. And, in turn, for the operational balance of the International Space Station. That reflection of 2022 seemed distant until the last takeoff from Baikonur showed that the lack of redundancy is no longer a hypothetical risk. Platform 31/6, from where manned missions and freighters take off to the ISS, was damaged after the launch of Soyuz MS-28 (Expedition 74). The ship docked without problems, but the ramp did not pass the test. From that moment on, the question stopped being technical and became operational: what does it mean for the only infrastructure configured for these missions to be out of service from one day to the next. What happened in Baikonur and how is Russian access to the ISS? The first images of the Baikonur complex after the launch showed that the incident had not been minor. The service platform located under the rocket, a mobile structure of about 20 tons used for access prior to takeoff, a fall appeared in the ramp pit. According to sources consulted by Ars Technica, everything indicates that it was not secured correctly and was ejected by the thrust of Soyuz-2. Roscosmos admitted damage to “several elements” of the complex, although without going into details. The visible magnitude of the impact suggests a more complex repair than the official message indicates. Condition of damaged platform in Baikonur, Kazakhstan Now, one of the least visible elements of the Russian program is the diversity of platforms from which the different Soyuz take off. However, only a subset of them meets the technical and orbital conditions to send crew or cargo to the ISS. That detail explains why the damage in Baikonur generates such an immediate impact on international planning. Current overview of the main ramps: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Site 31/6 (Soyuz-2): ramp used for manned missions and Progress freighters. Currently not operational. Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Site 45 (Baiterek/Soyuz-5): future candidate, still in the testing phase and without certification for missions to the ISS. Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Gagarin’s Start: symbolic installation of the Soviet program, today deactivated and in the process of becoming a museum. Plesetsk, Russia: designed for high and polar orbits, it is not suitable for reaching the inclination of the ISS. Vostochny, Russia: in use for cargo missions, but not configured for crewed flights or missions to the ISS. The temporary paralysis of the Russian capacity to launch missions to the station affects a decisive element of the orbital ecosystem: the Progress freighters. These ships not only transport supplies for the Russian segment, but also provide the fuel necessary to periodically raise the orbit of the ISS and use their thrusters to assist in attitude control. Other ships, such as Dragon or Cygnus, have demonstrated ability to contribute in part to these tasksalthough they do not cover all uses of Progress. NASA’s response was not long in coming. According to internal planning cited by Ars Technica, lThe agency has advanced two Dragon cargo missions to ensure sufficient operating margin in the coming months. CRS-34, initially scheduled for June 2026, moves to May, and CRS-35 moves from November to August. One source describes these changes as a “direct result” of the Baikonur incident. The goal is simple: ensure that the station has supplies without depending on the uncertain schedule of upcoming Progress missions. Launch of Soyuz MS-28 from Baikonur on November 27, 2025 From the outside, the agency has insisted that the station maintains sufficient capacity for the maneuvers of reboot and attitude control and that no immediate impacts are expected. Everything seems to indicate that the rescheduling of the Dragon missions works as an additional cushion. Roscosmos claims to have of the necessary spare parts and maintains that the repairs will be completed “in the near future.” However, the official estimate contrasts with the valuations collected by the Russian newspaper Kommersant. In that publication, Aleksandr Khokhlov, a member of the St. Petersburg branch of the Russian Cosmonautics Federation, maintains that the repairs could be prolonged from half a year to more than a yeardepending on the actual extent of the damage. Added to this are the extreme temperatures in Kazakhstan in winter and the budgetary pressure derived from the war in Ukraine. What happened at Baikonur reminds us that the architecture of the station depends on both technical decisions and political priorities. NASA has already reinforced its operating margin and now the question is how Russia will respond to a setback that reveals the lack of redundancies in its infrastructure. The pace of repair and the willingness to sustain their participation will mark the stability of the program in the coming months. Ultimately, this episode anticipates the challenges of a stage in which the ISS requires more effort than is sometimes visible. Images | NASA (1, 2, 3) | Roscosmos In Xataka | We already know when the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS will be closest to Earth and what’s better: how to see it

The existence of lightning remains a mystery to atmospheric physics. Austria has given us a clue to solve it

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It seems unbelievable, but in the middle of 2025 one of the most common and violent phenomena of nature continues keeping many secrets. This is the case of raywhich we know how to protect ourselves from and we know that Franklin had very right with your kite. But if we ask an atmospheric physicist what exactly detonates the first spark inside a cloud to start the download, you’ll probably shrug your shoulders. The discovery. We would expect the answer to this classic meteorology question in the sky itself, but in reality it seems to be in a laboratory in Austria. It has been here where they have achieved something that seems like magic: using lasers to trap microscopic particles in the air, and almost by accident, discovering a charging mechanism that could be the ‘missing link’ in the formation of lightning in our sky. What we knew. For lightning to strike, it is necessary that there is a monstrous electric field that breaks the resistance of air, something that has a name: dielectric breakdown. The problem is that when we measure the electric fields inside a thundercloud, the numbers don’t add up: They are too low to initiate lightning on their own. This means that scientists have long suspected that the secret was in the aerosols and ice crystals that collide within a cloud. And the theory is quite clear: if a small particle could accumulate enough charge, then it has the ability to create a micro-electric field around it so intense that it would start a chain reaction. The problem is that studying a microscopic ice grain in the middle of a storm is impossible, since we can be next to it and we cannot lower the cloud to the ground either. That is why this is where this research comes in, which has found a high-tech solution with optical tweezers. The experiment. To find the answer, a 532 nm green laser was used to make lift a silica sphere just a micron in diameter. But… Why? In this case, the initial objective was to measure forces precisely, but they encountered something very strange: the laser itself that held the particle was electrically charging it. Far from being a mistake, they realized that they had in front of them a perfect tool to simulate the atmosphere in miniature. It was no longer necessary to go to a cloud to analyze it. In this way, they began to charge a particle with so much static electricity that it caused a dielectric breakdown in the air around them, discharging themselves suddenly. They had literally created a controlled micro-ray in the laboratory. The authors of the study explicitly suggest that this system is an ideal model to study the electrification of aerosols and clouds. Its importance. Until now, studying these phenomena required getting into a storm-chasing plane or relying on computer simulations. But now we have the ability to simulate these conditions in a controlled way. And it is also ideal to understand why sometimes the sky seems like it is going to break in our own heads. Images | Michael Mancewicz In Xataka | What is a dry storm: when the sky throws lightning, but the rain never reaches the ground

nutrition remains unclear and we continue to improvise

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In the new Frankenstein of Guillermo del Toro there is a silent detail that is repeated: Victor Frankenstein—played by Oscar Isaac—drinks milk. As a child, as an adult, at family dinners, even at a solemn moment when you are presented with a bottle of milk as if it were wine. In Gothic language, this gesture symbolizes innocence, purity, duality. But beyond the metaphor, something draws attention: that silent debate that touches our daily lives. Victor drinks milk without hesitation. Us, not so much. Whole? Semi? Skimmed? Because, unlike in movies, in the real world not even science is clear about what milk we should be drinking. Welcome to the dairy maze. An everyday food in an impossible debate. The debate is not trivial. We are talking about a food that is consumed daily, that is part of official recommendations, that is linked to cardiovascular risk and that even enters school programs. If one reviews the most cited studies, the sensation is peculiar: it is as if science described three parallel realities about the same food. In a recent large Norwegian study Those who drank more whole milk had a 7% higher risk of dying from cardiovascular disease. However, another study, published in Science Direct within the CARDIA studyfound just the opposite: those who drank more whole milk had a 24% lower risk of arterial calcification, an early marker of coronary heart disease. Yes, one study says “more risk” and another says “less risk.” It is not a typo. The confusion continues. A 2016 clinical trial showed that a blood pressure-lowering diet worked just as well using full-fat dairy as it did with low-fat dairy. And the studies on weight do not provide clarity either: the 2020 meta-studies, together with previous studies, agree that whole milk It is not more fattening than the skimmed one, despite having more calories. In fact, the Framingham Heart Study, published in Nature, relate greater dairy consumption —including yogurt—with less weight gain and long-term waist. So what are we left with? The magic—and misleading—word: “neutral.” Into this chaos comes Harvard to launch another narrative twist. According to its researchers, dairy products appear to be “neutral” for cardiovascular health. That is, they do not increase the risk of heart attack or stroke, but they do not reduce it either, when compared to the average diet. Now, Harvard adds a key nuance: “neutral” does not mean “healthy.” It only indicates that dairy products are as unhealthy as the rest of the common foods in the Western diet, such as refined cereals, soft drinks or processed meats. If instead of comparing them with these, we compare them with vegetable proteins (nuts, soy, legumes), the balance clearly leans towards the vegetable options, with less cardiovascular risk and lower mortality. So the scientific picture, for now, is anything but clear. Why so much contradiction? The mess is not accidental. Science does not contradict itself for the sake of it; It does this because the studies measure different things and compare foods that are not equivalent. For example, both in harvard as Washington Post They explain that many studies that conclude that dairy products are “neutral” compare them with very unhealthy foods: sugary soft drinks, processed meats, products with refined flour… It is easy to “look healthy” when the rival is an industrial sausage. But if the rival is nuts or soybeans, the results change radically. Another factor is the call dairy matrix. Cheese, for example, has saturated fats, yes, but also bacteria, proteins, vitamins and polar lipids that can modify how the body absorbs that fat. Whole milk contains compounds whose function we still don’t fully understand: some studies suggest that they may reduce inflammation or decrease intestinal absorption of cholesterol. This complexity means that the same nutrient—saturated fat—does not behave the same in dairy products as it does in meat. In addition, the genetic variant must be taken into account. The ability to digest lactose varies depending on the population. In northern Europe only 5% are intolerant; in Asia, up to 95% are. This implies that the same food can have very different digestive, metabolic and inflammatory effects depending on the person. One last detail of nothing. Most studies are observational, not experimental. That is, they detect associations, not causes. If people who drink skim milk usually do so because they want to control their weight, their level of exercise, their overall diet, or their risk factors also influence the results. And vice versa. Sometimes, more than studying milk, what is studied is the lifestyle of those who drink it. This battle is the milk. In Spain there is also a small shift taking place. After decades in which skimmed milk was the almost mandatory option for anyone who wanted to “take care of themselves”, whole milk has begun to regain prestige. Nutritionists and disseminators they have been pointing out for months something that was previously overlooked: that dairy fat not only provides flavor, but also satiety and fat-soluble vitamins such as A and D, which are lost when the fat is eliminated and then attempted to be reintroduced artificially. As explained by nutritionists cited by Infosalus“whole milk retains all its properties,” while skimmed milk may be more difficult to digest for some people. At the same time, the skim deflates. One could talk about “end of caloric fundamentalism”: that stage when we thought that removing fat was always synonymous with health. Experts now warn that reducing fat does not always compensate if, in return, we lose satiety or end up adding other more caloric or sugary foods to “fill” hunger. Not everything comes from the cow. Meanwhile, plant-based drinks continue their rise, but with important nuances. Mayo Clinic remember that most They have less protein, may include added sugars and, unless fortified, do not match the calcium naturally present in cow’s milk. Soy is the only one that comes close nutritionally, but even so, calcium absorption is lower due to the presence of phytates. Taken together, all sources … Read more

It is not an alien ship, but remains of a distant planet

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When astronomers detected a third interstellar object visiting our solar system, they probably did not imagine that it would have an even greater impact than the previous two. The fault was with the first estimates of its size, which had a colossal upper limit of 20 kilometers, which led to several articles by Harvard professor Avi Loeb arguing that it could be “a possibly hostile extraterrestrial probe“. Although the latest observations disprove that it is an alien ship, they open new possibilities. Goodbye to the alien hypothesis. The idea that 3I/ATLAS was a spacecraft was based on a number of apparent anomalies. Avi Loeb argued that its trajectory, unusually aligned with the ecliptic plane of our solar system, its enormous size and its supposed stealth approach were suspicious. It suggested that the object could be performing a maneuver to remain unnoticed while exploring our planets. However, later observations dismantled these arguments one by one. The sharpest image of the comet, captured by the Hubble Space Telescope, was devastating for Loeb’s theory. It turned out that we were totally wrong about its size. The real core did not measure 20 km, but between 320 meters and 5.6 kilometers. The initial estimate had been misled by the bright, extensive “coma” of gas and dust surrounding the true core. On the other hand, the behavior of the object, with an asymmetric material ejection and the formation of a dust tail, confirmed that it behaved like a classic comet, and not like a ship with artificial propulsion. But perhaps it is not just any comet, but a very, very interesting one. A piece of exoplanet? According to a new hypothesis, presented in a study pending review3I/ATLAS could be a piece of an extrasolar planet: a “lithified clastic fragment” torn from a sedimentary basin on a distant world that has traveled through the cosmos to reach us. In other words, a rock made up of layers of hardened sediment, similar to those we find on Earth in ancient river or lake beds, but from outside the solar system. Geoscientist Eahsanul Haque’s hypothesis is supported by several previous analyses. On the one hand, the trajectory of 3I/ATLAS suggests that it comes from the thick disk of the Milky Way, a region populated by stars much older than our Sun, up to 7 billion years old. This implies that the object formed in a planetary system with more than enough time to develop complex geological processes, including the liquid water activity necessary to create sedimentary basins. And its size is consistent with the size of large fragments that could be ejected from a planet after a high-speed impact. But wasn’t it a comet? The presence of a comma and a tail does not contradict this idea. Water and other volatiles could have been trapped in the pores of the sedimentary rock. As it approached the Sun, the heat would have caused the sublimation of these ices, generating the observed cometary activity without the main object being a “dirty snowball.” Its spectrum resembles that of D-type asteroids, rich in carbon and silicates2 This composition is compatible with that of terrestrial sedimentary rocks, such as shales or sandstones, which often contain clay and carbonaceous material formed in aqueous processes. All eyes on 3I/ATLAS. The interest in this interstellar traveler has been such that space agencies have mobilized their instruments to study it. The European Space Agency (ESA) targeted its Martian orbiters, ExoMars TGO and Mars Expresstowards the comet during its closest approach to Mars. Although the enormous distance (30 million km) made observation a technical challenge, the images captured the diffuse coma that surrounds it. It is expected that future observations, such as from the Juice probe, which will see it in a more active state after its close pass to the Sun, will reveal more data about its composition. But if 3I/ATLAS has already taught us something, it is the importance that missions such as the Comet Interceptor probe planned by ESA. Without a fixed target, it is designed precisely to wait in space for a long-term target or, with great luck, another interstellar visitor, to then turn on its engines and head towards it. Image | THAT In Xataka | NASA ignores the Harvard study on an alleged extraterrestrial spacecraft: “it is an interstellar comet”

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