researchers

Some researchers have analyzed what the summaries of scientific papers say. There is enough “clickbait”

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Academic articles, Papers reviewed by pairs published in scientific journals, they are One of the pillars of science nowadays. These articles usually have a more or less defined structure, with introduction, results, conclusions and discussion, in addition to a section dedicated to the methodology used. An element that never (or practically ever) is missing in this type of articles is abstract. Abstract It is the term with which a kind of summary of the content of the article is known. It is a key piece that has the objective of serving as a bibliographic guide to those who are looking for a study, so this short text must answer properly to the question What is this article going? But beyond this basic function, the abstract Often fulfills the function of Summary of the articleincluding information on methods, results and conclusions of the experiment or study. Many of the scientific articles are limited access, protected by a Paywallthe price of a single article can be several tens of eurosbut summaries are available in open. Scientific articles, including this short introductory text, are subjected to several editorial and scientific reviews, so it would be expected that the abstracts be faithful representations of what the article and the study carried out. The problem is that sometimes, They are not so much. In the late 90s, a group of researchers analyzed the existence of discrepancies between the summaries of the articles and their content. The team analyzed more than 260 articles (44 pieces by six scientific relief journals) published in 1996 and 1997. They studied two ways in which these summaries could be incorrect, or by inconsistencies with the body of the article, or by the omission of relevant information. The results showed variation in the results according to the magazine (they found that between 18% and 68% of the articles presented problems). They concluded, in their own abstractthat the inconsistent or absent data in these summaries were “common, even in the medical magazines of great circulation.” The study was published in 1999 the magazine Jamaone of the publications analyzed in it. 25 years have passed since the publication of the magazine’s study Jama and almost 30 since the publication of some of the articles analyzed. Science has changed a lot in those 25 years. However some subsequent studies They indicate that this problem persists. In 2016, a group of researchers made a compilation and analysis of the studies carried out in this field. This literature review, published in the magazine BMC Medical Research Methodologyhe found that the median “level of inconsistency found these studies was In 39%although the variability was high: it ranged between 4% and 78%. Since not all errors are equally severe, this review was fixed on the studies that discriminated against the serious inconsistencies of the milder. They observed that the median in this case was somewhat lower, but still considerable, of 19%. Subsequent studies, like one posted this year In The magazine American Journal of SurgeryThey continue to show the existence of this trend in scientific literature. What happens then? Are scientists falsifying your data? Or are we simply witnessing an important accumulation of errors? We know that the summaries of the articles are determinants when receiving quotes of other academic articles and that This metric is key for the evaluation of scientific work for the authors. But the publication of an article may sometimes depend on its results being novel. That is why there is an incentive to emphasize some results and clarify them later. A non -significant result can cause the editors of the magazine or future readers to lose interest in the article, regardless of the real quality of the study. The call publication bias (which refers to the fact that studies with different results are overrepresented in scientific literature) is also the result of this interest in the novelty. Clickbait academic The titles of the articles have also been subject to scrutiny in recent years. Consciously or unconsciously, a striking holder can be decisive when we are more or less interested in a study. In 2016, A study Posted in the magazine Frontiers in Psychology It echoed this phenomenon. The analysis observed how the way in which the headlines affected were affected within reach of the study. Gwilym Lockwood, author of the study, analyzed More than 2,000 academic articles And he observed that the titles that enunciated something in a positive frame had better metrics than the average. On the other hand, he also found that the works that resorted to speech games showed a worse performance. The titles containing questions, meanwhile, did not deviate from the average significantly. The problem of abstractsIt is one of many to which the scientific publishers. Some publishers pressed By scandals of various typesfrom the “Mills of scientific articles”Even the problems with rates charged by publication or access to their contents. The artificial intelligence It is one of these problems, but perhaps also a potential solution. In recent months, and after the occasional scandal, scientific publishers They have been integrating The artificial intelligence tools in the scientific publication, beyond the work that these tools may have developed in the development of research itself. Artificial intelligence has the capacity, among other things, to generate more “objectives” summaries or to detect and correct possible errors and discrepancies between texts and summaries. In Xataka | This is how bad science infiltrates the international scientific debate: they are not just the great scandals, more than 50,000 questionable articles are incorporated every year Image | Sonia Radosz

We thought we were 8,000 million people throughout the planet. Until some researchers began to make numbers

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In November 2022, the UN celebrated that we were already 8,000 million humans on earth. They are estimates, of course, but beyond the figure, the really interesting thing is that in 2023 We do not reach the replacement rate and that humanity will reach its peak at the end of the century to, irremediably, Start falling. But … to what extent can we trust those accounts? It is something that takes time on the table, and now a study It arrives to add more spicy when we affirmed that we have been making it counting. So much that we have left several hundred million people along the way. Can we trust the numbers? “Calculating the number of people on the planet is an inaccurate science.” That was the comment of demographer Jakub Bijak a BBC In the middle of last year, just when the Study of world population perspectives. Something scientific is something exact, but the researcher also commented that the only thing that can be sure when predicting population figures is of the lack of certainty. That, eye, does not mean that demographers get the figures out of nowhere. “It is something difficult based on our experience, knowledge and each piece of information we have,” said Toshiko Kanera, an expert in demographic forecasts. The demographers drink from the data and trends of each country since 1950, but … what if it had not been well told? We are missing millions. In a new study published in Natureresearchers from the University of Aalto in Finland show how the data sets that demographers manage to “deep and systematic” the population figures worldwide. The serious thing is that we would be talking about hundreds of millions more people living on earth. Example of the tools that demographers use in their analysis. Each corresponds to a different bias The rural areas. Josias Láng-Rritter is one of the investigators in charge of the study and points to the accounts made in a specific segment: that of the rural population. “For the first time, our study provides evidence that a significant proportion of the rural population could be absent in the data sets of the global population,” he says. As we say, we don’t talk about a few million, but thousands of millions. “Depending on the data set used, rural populations have been underestimated between 53% and 84% in the period studied. The results are notable, since these data sets have been used in thousands of studies and have widely supported decision making, but their precision has not been systematically evaluated,” says the researcher. The map shows the location of the 307 rural areas analyzed in the study. It was found that the populations reported in the graph were underestimated between 53% and 84% | University of Aalto Biases. Attempts to review these data are not new, but previous investigations have focused on specific countries or urban areas. The researchers at the University of Aalto have wanted to take a more global photo when comparing the five most used population data sets worldwide. They have used maps that divide the planet into high resolution grids and have taken as a very concrete reference: the resettlement figures of more than 300 rural dams projects in 35 countries. Why this dam bias? Because When a dam is builtthe population that lives in the area that will be flooded is relocated and precise resettlement data is usually had. When comparing this population data from 1975 to 2010, the researchers found that the 2010 maps were more precise, but still omitted between 32% and 77% of the rural population. Between 2015 and 2020 the data sets were updated, but the demographers continue to consider that the underestimation of the rural population continues to exist and is a problem that persists in all regions of the world. Consequences. And we are talking about a problem whose resolution is complex. According to researchers, no matter how much the data is reviewed, it is a structural problem. Governments do not have the resources to collect precise data in these rural regions, there is a huge discrepancy between the real population and the one reported in the population maps that are used to carry out demographic studies and that influences decision making. Average percentage of rural population estimated down (red and orange) and overestimated (blue) | University of Aalto And it is important. Current estimates place 43% of 8,200 million World inhabitants in rural areas -And 3,526 million people- and if we take into account that it is a percentage that has underestimated between 53% and 84%, we are not talking about little population, precisely. And it is essential to know exactly how many we are for a simple reason: the redistribution of resources. No data. The lack of precise demographic records can affect political decision making. Ritter sets the example of social decisions. “In many countries, there may not be enough available data at the national level, so they depend on the global population maps to support their decisions: do we need an asphalted road or a hospital? How much medicine is needed in a specific area? How many people could be affected by natural disasters such as earthquakes or floods?” Making quick accounts, in the best scenario – the 53% deviation in the rural population – we would talk about 1,869 million people who would not have counted. In the worst case, in the 84% not registered, we would talk about 2,962 million people. In Nature’s study, they put an example Paraguay, which in the 2012 census may have left out a quarter of the population. Reviewing the methods. In the analysis of the team, there are countries that come out better than others. They put Finland as an example of reliable data, even in rural regions, because they began bringing digital records of the population 30 years ago. However, in countries in which this conscientious digital registry has taken longer to be implemented due to crisis of any kind, … Read more

A group of researchers is caught in a Antarctica base under a threat: that of one of them

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In 1982 the film teacher John Carpenter made us feel the other face of the currency of cold isolation at a research station in Antarctica. Through science fiction he spoke to us In ‘The Thing’ of the human psyche in such auspicious conditions for paranoia and conflict. Therefore, when in 2018 it occurred A real violent story In a Russian station, the looks returned to the classic. Something similar is happening again in the area. There are nine researchers and a defendant and, as almost always, without the possibility of leaving. Investigation. February 2025. The government of South Africa arrives a first report, a report where there is A serious accusation Among the team of nine outstanding researchers who have in the SANAE IV Antarctic Base. In addition, the accusation arises less than a month after the team started from South Africa for a 13 -month mission. According to leaksone of the victims would have sent an email to the government describing the attack, the worrying behavior of the aggressor and direct threats against his life. However and until now, the government He has not confirmed Independently, the content of the message has not given details about the identity of the accused or the victim. In 3D games Generation Z cannot pay the rent, but very soon it will be the richest generation in history Government decision. In the last hours, the Government of South Africa has made a key decision: it has decided Do not evacuate any member After investigating the complaints of physical aggression and sexual harassment that occurred at the station. Dion George, Minister of Environment, He affirmed to New York Times that the situation is currently “under control”, that the alleged aggressor has shown repentance and that a mediation protocol has been activated with the support of psychologists. However, the real problem is in the extreme distance (more than 4,300 km to Cape Town), and the environmental conditions, which have complicated research, leaving many questions about the safety and well -being of the equipment. Antarctica: an inhospitable environment. The Sanae IV base is one of the many scientific facilities in Antarctica where researchers must LIVING FOR MONTHS IN ISOLATION Extreme, without the possibility of abandoning the place due to severe climatic conditions. The hostile environment, with extreme temperatures, ice storms and months of total darkness, makes any interpersonal conflict amplify in a dangerous way, since victims cannot get away from their aggressors or seek immediate help. The Sanae IV station Recent cases. We said it at the beginning: the problem of inappropriate behaviors and violence in Antarctic scientific bases It is not new. At the beginning of the new millennium the geologist Jane K. Willenbring denounced being harassed Sexually during an expedition, although it only filed the complaint in 2016 after obtaining professional stability. Perhaps the most popular case of all It happened in 2018when a researcher at a Russian station stabbed a colleague, in what was described as An emotional collapse Due to insulation pressure. A year earlier, in a South African base, an investigator destroyed another’s computer with an ax For a love dispute. All incidents that reflect the psychological complexity of prolonged isolation and the challenges that the authorities face to supervise the behavior of the equipment deployed in the region. And the law? It We count a few years ago. Given the absence of effective autonomous institutions, and having such a tiny and scientific population, we can only refer to the Antarctic Treaty which was signed in the mid -twentieth century by 53 countries, the same that establishes that each malefactor will be tried according to the jurisdiction of their country of origin. Of course, there are no order forces or real judicial figures. The logistics dilemma. It is the great leg to elucidate. One of the key factors in the decision of the South African government not evacuating anyone lies in the logistics and operation of the base. In winter, ice storms They make any evacuation impossible Without high risk for the entire crew. In addition, each team member plays an essential role to maintain the operational station, and the lack of personnel could be unusable the base, a crucial infrastructure for South Africa’s scientific research in the region. According to Dawn Sumnerprofessor at the University of California, withdrawing a single person is not viable without affecting the stability of the equipment and the operability of the station. Plus: The physical structure of the SANAE IV base limits the possibility of completely isolating the aggressor of others. {“Videid”: “X8SQN4A”, “Autoplay”: False, “Title”: “The largest iceberg in the world follows its course by Antarctic Waters”, “Tag”: “”, “Duration”: “10”} Protocols and prevention. To avoid incidents, researchers traveling to Antarctica are subject to rigorous selection processes similar to those of astronautswhere technical skills, psychological history, medical history and coexistence capacity are evaluated. Thus, even with these filters, coexistence problems in extreme environments remain a constant threat. In this regard, Minister George said that, at the time of the team’s departure in February, no problem was detected in the evaluation of the members. However, recent events suggest that current protocols may not be enough to prevent this type of incidents in long -term missions. In Xataka Elon Musk fired 6,000 employees two weeks ago. Now the US faces the massive entry of invasive species Plus: Winter. Despite the apparent current calm, experts warn that the worst is yet to come. The months of July and August will bring total darkness and even more extreme temperatures, which could intensify tensions within the equipment and increase psychological risks. As stood out in the Times Professor Sumner, “darkness has not yet arrived, and they are already facing these problems,” suggests that the situation could deteriorate even more. With this cultivation broth, the combination of isolation, extreme climatic conditions and interpersonal conflicts without the possibility of escape, they make this A high -risk case. While South Africa insists that everything is under control, the history of violence … Read more

In their search to make the increasingly productive olive trees, these researchers have had an idea: to throw coal

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The jungle floor is between reddish or yellowish; He is sterile and ungrateful, blinding and distemper. It is plagued with mineral oxides or empty of calcareous materials. It is and has always been a bad ground. Therefore, when in the middle of the Amazon, the settlers met the ‘Terra Petra‘They couldn’t believe it. It was a black, tremendously fertile land, incredibly resistant to the decomposition of organic matter. For decades, nobody knew where he had been able to leave. A dark enigma for a bright future. Some said that the Andes volcanoes could have come, others suggested that they should be a product of sedimentation of the tertiary lakes. But, When analyzing they realized that they were truffled with ceramic remains, fish swords, jewelry and human objects. The miracle of the ‘Terra Preta’ was the miracle of huge agricultural communities mixing land, vegetable coal, organic material of all kinds and favoring the growth of an own ecosystem within them. Charcoal? Indeed. That same face The researchers stayed. The jungle peoples often use a burning system to create fertile soils. The problem is that they lose fertility quickly. With the ‘Terra Preta’ it does not happen and the secret is in that coal. What in jargon is known as ‘biochar’. And that is really working? That is what The European Soil O-Live project has been askedif the olive trees could treat with a mixture of biochar and compost. The result is what brings us here: what Yes it works. According to researchers at the University of Jaén, coal treatment increases oil production between 7 and 24%. That is, between 0.4 and 1.7 kilos of oil per olive tree. It is true that it is a preliminary investigation, but without a very promising place. And what do we want it for? That is, without this type of “treatments” Spain is already the place of the world where more oil occurs and not for: grows 15% per year. The problem is that the machine cannot stop because demand It grows even more. Where will this race take us, that voracity? That is one of the great questions of the century. Image | KEVIN MARTIN JOSE | Wander Fleur Image | In full climate crisis, a United States startup proposes an millenary technology of the Amazon: Capture CO2 on the ground

The greatest enemy of Perovskita’s solar panels is heat. Some researchers have found a solution: titanium

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The commercial viability of Perovskita solar panels is getting closer, thanks to the different solutions over time. However, there is still a big problem to solve to be able to install them, but a team of engineers has managed to solve using titanium. Short. Researchers from the Technological Institute of Georgia in the United States They have achieved That Perovskita’s solar cells are more stable and support high temperatures. The solution was to incorporate titanium into one of the layers. The problem. The incorporation of Perovskita panels to the market has been a challenge because they do not last long when they are exposed to high temperatures. The reason is in one of its internal layers, known as the hollow transport layer (HTL), which allows the movement of electricity within it. This layer, usually made of a material called spiro-feet, begins to crystallize and lose efficiency when the temperature exceeds 70ºC. The solution. The technique used In research is steam phase infiltration (VPI). In this process, the solar cell is exposed to a titanium gas in a low vacuum environment. This allows titanium oxide/hydroxide (Tiox) to integrate into the HTL layer of the solar cell. In this way, titanium acts as a thermal stabilizer, preventing it from crystallizing and ensuring that panel efficiency is not degraded by heat. As a result, solar cells have preserved more than 80% of their original efficiency after 200 hours of 75ºC tests. An alternative to silicon. The study of the study to continue working the Perovskita panels and not those of silicon has been for several reasons. On the one hand, a cost of costs and energy consumption because silicon cells are much more expensive than those of Perovskita. On the other hand, the study has been conducted with financing from the Office of Solar Energy Technologies of the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy of the United States Energy Department, so alternatives have been sought for do not depend on Chinain a context of Tariff war. More solutions for Perovskitas. The American study is not the only one who is looking for alternatives in this line. An investigation in the United Kingdom has managed to go one step further developing a method that makes solar cells more resistant to external factors such as humidity, heat and physical wear. Forecasts Until now the technology developed by the American engineers group is in patent. Commercial implementation will be pending if researchers manage to find partners and the future of Solar energy in the United States. Image | Georgia Tech Xataka | How a new study has achieved cheaper Perovskita solar panels and more efficiently by capturing light on both sides

Some researchers have created a pill that mimics the effects of the lack of oxygen. They have a good reason

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Height evil is one of the problems that professional mountaineers and occasional visitors who decide to ascend to certain altitudes must face. This disorder is related to the lack of oxygen, hypoxia, which occurs in these environments, but now a pharmaceutical company wants to turn it around. Turn that “evil” into a “good.” Hypoxystat. Transform the mountain air, or rather, the absence of air of the mountain, into a pill It is the proposal of the Gladstone Institute and Maze Therapeutics laboratories. The new drug has received the name Hypoxystat and its goal is to fight against metabolic disorders such as Leigh Syndrome. Mountain air. It might seem crazy idea, but reducing the amount of oxygen that enters our body can make sense in certain senses beyond high performance sport. Living in a mountainous area can benefit people with Leight syndrome, a mitochondrial disease that affects childhood. This disorder occurs when the mitochondria, the organelle in charge of feeding the rest of the cell is not able to consume all the oxygen it receives. This leads to a dangerous accumulation of oxygen that ends with cells and tissues and, ultimately, with the patient’s life. “It is not practical for each patient with this disease to move to the mountains,” Explain in a press release Isha Jain, who has led the recent study of the drug. “But this drug could be a controlled and safe way to apply the same benefits to patients.” 2016. Almost a decade ago, a team, in which Jain herself participated, discovered that mice with this syndrome responded well when they were exposed to air with a lower amount of oxygen, the equivalent of that which can be found at heights of 4,500 meters (a upper altitude in almost a kilometer to the Teide peak). The lack of oxygen caused it to stop accumulating in the cells. The new compound could achieve a similar effect in a different way: focusing on hemoglobin, the molecule that transports oxygen in our blood. The new compound causes oxygen to be linked more easily to hemoglobin which may sound contraintuitive, they explain. However, this fact also makes it difficult for the molecule to deliver oxygen to the cells of our body. Concept test. The new drug has been developed Maze Therapeutics to fight anemia. The Gladstone Institute team, from the University of California San Francisco, found the substance when looking for a compound capable of reinforcing the bond between hemoglobin and oxygen. As a treatment, Hypoxystat is still in early development, but has already begun to succeed in mice. The details of these tests have been published recently in an article in the magazine Cell. Promising results. Although for now the studies are limited to rodents, they invite cautious optimism. The team observed, for example, that the compound had therapeutic capacity both in cases where it was administered before the appearance of symptoms and in cases where mice were already in advanced stages of the disease. In Xataka | We did not know why some superbacteria were resistant to antibiotics. This AI has found it in two days Image | Gladstone Institutes

Some researchers analyzed 280 samples of bottled water. Only one of the brands was microplastics free

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Better flavor and smell and health reasons. Those are the two main reasons why people drink bottled water, according to A study of the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Spain is, in fact, The third European country that consumes more bottled water (up to 107 liters per inhabitant). That clashes with one thing: that bottled water is not only Much more expensive than tap waterbut now we know that it also has micro and nanoplastic in amounts much greater than those estimated. The original study. Some researchers from Columbia University They analyzed Three popular bottled water marks in the United States (whose names names have not transcended) in search of micro and nanoplastic. To do this, they used a new technique called Raman stimulated dispersion microscopy Based on probe samples with two tuned simultaneous lasers to resonate specific molecules. Analyzing seven common plastics, the researchers developed an algorithm to interpret the results. According to Wei Min, co-inventor of the technique and co-author of the study that concerns us, “one thing is to detect and another to know what you are detecting.” The findings. On average, this study discovered that a liter of bottled water contains 240,000 detectable plastic fragments, between ten and 100 times more than previous estimates. Specifically, the researchers claim that they found between 110,000 and 370,000 plastic fragments in each liter, of which 90% were nanoplastic. In that sense, it is important to remember the difference between micro and nanoplastic: Microplastics: those whose size varies between 100 nanometers and five millimeters. Nanoplastic: those whose size is equal to or less than 100 nanometers. The most frequent plastics. To anyone’s surprise, one of the most common plastics was the Terephthalate polypropylene, better known as PET. It is the material of which many bottles are made. “It is probably introduced into the water when pieces are detached when the bottle is squeezed or exposed to heat,” says the researchers, who cite another study that suggests that they can also detach themselves when the cap repeatedly opens and closes. Usual. And although the presence of PET is common, this plastic is overcome by the polyamide, a type of nylon that “probably comes from the plastic filters used to supposedly purify the water before bottling it,” says Beizhan Yan, a researcher of the study. Other common plastics found by the researchers were polystyrene, polyvinyl chloride and methyl polymetacrylate. And the rest? The technique used contemplates the seven most common plastics, but there are many other plastics. According to exposes Columbia University, “the seven types of plastic that researchers sought only represented about 10% of all the nanoparticles found in the samples; They have no idea what the rest are. If all are nanoplastic, they could be dozens of millions per liter. ” And what about those sold in Spain? That’s what he wanted to find out A study by CSIC and the Global Health Institute of Barcelona. They have developed a technique To quantify particles of between 0.7 and 20 micrometers, as well as the chemical additives released to the water and, for this study, analyzed 280 samples of 20 trademarks of commercial water. Only one of the brands did not contain microplastics, but all, the 280 samples, contained plastic additives. More specifically. The result is that, on average, a liter of water contains 359 nanograms of micro and nanoplastic, an amount comparable to that obtained in the tap water found in a previous study made by the same group. “The main difference we find is the type of polymer: in tap water we find more polyethylene and polypropylene while in bottled water we have mostly detected polypropylene terephthalate (PET), although also polyethylene,” said Cristina Villanueva, a researcher of the Isglobal and Author of the study. Quite microplastic. Considering that we drink two liters of water a day, the authors estimate “an intake of 262 micrograms of plastic particles per year.” With regard to additives, 28 plastic additives, mostly stabilizers and plasticizers have been detected. According to the researchers, “our toxicity study showed that three types of plasticizers had a higher risk to human health and, therefore, should be considered in risk analysis for consumers.” Images | Jonathan Chng in Unspash In Xataka | The US has decided to leave paper straws because everyone hates them. The problem is the alternative: plastic In Xataka | After the failure of the yellow container, the government has reached a conclusion: it is time for the returnable bottles *An earlier version of this article was published in February 2024

Some researchers have analyzed the impact of sugary drinks on world health. They have taken their hands to the head

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The sugary soft drinks conquered the world a few years ago. Thanks to its flavor and Marketing strategiesthe soft drinks became the very image of globalization. Little by little we began to be more aware of the health hazards that the excessive consumption of these drinks carried, so much that, even in some European countries it was created THE REFRESCO TAX. With the, The consumption of free sugars was reduced In certain cases. But a new one study It reveals that its intake is still very high in many countries. So much that there is an alarming link between the usual consumption of these drinks and millions of new cases of Type 2 diabetes every year. Sugary pandemic. The trigger has been a study by the University of Tufts, in the United States. Reviewing the drinking data of the global dietary database, a database with more than 450 surveys with information on the consumption of sugary drinks and a sample of 2.9 million people belonging to 184 countries, they ran into an elongent figures . Approximately, and according to this study, sugary drinks would be related to 1.2 million new cases of cardiovascular diseases and 2.2 million new cases of type 2 diabetes. Every year and worldwide, something surprising if we take into account The normalized and integrated that these drinks are in all societies. The reasons. It is not a novelty that sugary drinks are related to type 2 diabetes, obesity and other disorders, but the reason is that they are foods that are digested quickly, causing very pronounced blood glucose spikes without providing essential nutrients. They are empty calories like those that a beer can have, but with a much larger amount of sugars. This absorption process, repeatedly, contributes to the weight gain already most important: insulin resistance that carries metabolic problems related to the aforementioned diabetes or cardiovascular diseases. Many cases, but … What does it mean? According to the study, 80,000 deaths per year for type 2 and 258,000 diabetes due to cardiovascular diseases related to soft drinks. Latin America and Africa. In countries that have fought in recent years to promote healthier diets and lifestyles, as well as the taxes we mentioned a few lines, that sugar consumption has decreased, but it is not something that happens throughout the world. In fact, in the study, researchers have focused on two territories: Latin America and Africa. According to these data, in Mexico the usual consumption of these drinks with almost a third of the new cases of diabetes is associated. In Colombia, the percentage rises to almost half. And in South Africa, about 28% of new cases of diabetes and 15% of new cases of cardiovascular episodes are related to these drinks. The explanation they have found is simple: in countries and communities with lower average income, little access to information and more limited preventive medical care, cases are triggered. Not all. Now, what drinks are we talking about? The study focused on the data of the sugary drinks with added sugars and, at least 50 kilocalories per 240 milliliters of product. It is something that includes soft drinks, energy drinks, fruit juices with added sugar, punch and even water with flavors to which sugar is added. Outside the focus is milk (which also has sugar), 100% natural juices without additives and without calorie products, being these sweetened drinks without added sugars. Of course, these drinks may be in the spotlight of subsequent studies, since researchers point out that, although they do not have added and not naturally present sugars, excessive consumption can also have negative health effects. Solutions. Laura Lara-Castor is the main author of the study and Comment that “urgent and evidence -based interventions are needed to curb the consumption of sugary drinks worldwide before more lives are shortened by their effects.” Dariush Mozaffarian is another of the authors, who believes that, above all, much more interest in Latin American and Africa countries should be put. Mozaffaian sees this as a real epidemic and considers that, “as a species, we need to address the problem of sugary drinks.” Now, as with almost everything, the study emphasizes the high and constant consumption of this type of drinks, since under normal conditions, a sporadic soda (without being healthy), is a whim that we can afford. In the end, the study does not want to focus on individual responsibility, but in a collective that involves governments and health systems. And, perhaps, at the most complex: The industry that creates that type of drinks. Image | Xataka In Xataka | There was a time when Coca-Cola had ‘cocaine’. That no longer has it is due to something surprising: racism

Some researchers claim to have created an AI as good as those of Openai and Deepseek for $ 50. And the data is real

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The cost of training of models of artificial intelligence (IA) More advanced is in the spotlight. And it is understandable that it is so. The irruption of the Chinese company model Deepseekwhich presumably has A moderate training costhas questioned the strategy and investments deployed so far by OpenAi, Google or Microsoft, among other companies. A brief review before moving forward: those responsible for Deepseek argue that the infrastructure they have used to train their agglutin model 2,048 chips H800 of Nvidia. And also that this process with 671,000 million parameters has cost 5.6 million dollars. However, some analysts defend that these figures do not reflect reality. The report prepared by SEMIANALYSIS He maintains that, in reality, the infrastructure used by Deepseek to train his AI model approximately 50,000 NVIDIA GPU with Hopper MicroAritecture. According to Dylan Patel, AJ Kourabi, Doug O’Laughlin and Reyk Knuhttsen, at least 10,000 of these chips are GPU H100 of Nvidia, and at least another 10,000 are GPU H800. The remaining chips, according to these analysts, are the cuts cut H20. The ‘S1’ model takes more firewood On January 31, a group of researchers from Stanford University and the University of Washington, both in the US, published in the repository of open access scientific articles Arxiv A text in which it claims to have managed to train an AI model with reasoning capacity and benefits comparable to those of OPENAI or DEPEEEK O1 models facing an investment of just under $ 50. A boat soon seems impossible. With that money a priori it is absolutely unfeasible to train an artificial intelligence model. And less an advanced and capable of competing from you to you with those of OpenAi or Deepseek. However, it is true. To understand how they have achieved it We need to investigate the strategy they have devised. On the one hand, those 50 dollars represent the cost of renting the cloud computing infrastructure to which they have resorted to carry out the training. It makes sense if the time invested is very moderate. ‘S1’ has been elaborated from the free qwen2.5-32b model developed by the Chinese laboratory Qwen But there is something else. Something very important. His reasoning model, which they have called S1, has been elaborated from the free artificial intelligence model QWEN2.5-32B developed by the Chinese Laboratory Qwen, alibaba. And its reasoning process is inspired by the GEMINI 2.0 Flash Thinking Google model. They have not left zero at all. An interesting note: the S1 model is available in GITHUB together with the data and code used by these scientists to train it. On the other hand, the training process lasted less than 30 minutes using only 16 NVIDIA H100 chips belonging to the cloud computing network used by these researchers. From here comes the cost of Somewhat less than 50 dollars. However, there is another data that is worth not overlooked: the S1 Reasoning Model has been generated by distillation of the Gemini 2.0 Flash Thinking experimental model. Distillation is, in broad strokes, an automatic learning technique that allows the knowledge base to be transferred from a large and advanced model to a much smaller and efficient. This strategy saves many resources, although it does not serve to create models from scratch. Beyond the caraded 50 dollars of cost, the really important thing is that, as we have just verified, it is possible to put to tuning models of very competitive facing a much more restrained investment than those made by the large technology companies so far. Image | Luis Gomes More information | Arxiv | GITHUB In Xataka | Samsung is preparing to give TSMC a bars where it hurts most: the manufacture of the chips for ia

“They are brilliant researchers under the control of an authoritarian government.” Anthropic’s CEO has spoken about Depseek

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In the midst of the stir caused by the latest models of the Deepseek, the CEO of Anthropic, Dario Amodei, has published An analysis on its personal website in which it questions the narrative of the “Chinese miracle” in artificial intelligence. Why is it important. The debate on Chinese capacity to develop advanced AI has monopolized the agenda in recent days after Deepseek’s releaseswhich have come to provoke A 17% drop in Nvidia shares. The facts. Deepseek claims to have developed its model V3 for just under 6 million dollarswhile Amodei explained that Claude 3.5 Sonnetthe last and most advanced Anthropic model, required “some tens of millions” in training. Far from the “thousands of millions” that were speculated. “Deepseek has produced a model close to the performance of US models 7-10 months ago, for a rather lower cost, but not in the proportions that have been suggested,” said the CEO. Deepseek operates with about 50,000 generation chips Hoppera capacity that Amodei considers similar to that of the main American technological ones. According to his analysis, Deepseek’s advances reflect the natural reduction of costs in the sector, estimated at annual 75%. The context. Deepseek has presented two models: V3, which uses traditional training. And R1, which incorporates reinforcement learning. For Amodei, real innovation is in V3, not in R1, which according to him, follows roads already explored by other technological ones. Turning point. The development of an AI superior to human intelligence will require millions of chips and tens of billions of dollars in the coming years. “Between 2026 and 2027 we will see which will be smarter than almost all humans in almost all tasks,” he said. In this scenario, he has defended Export controls as a strategic tool. Amodei has also recognized the talent of Deepseek engineers … although he has warned about the implications that a company operates under the control of the Chinese government. For him, The growing efficiency In the development of AI justifies reinforce, and not relax, commercial restrictions. In fact, he has had some words of praise for Depseek’s team, but not for his nation: “They are brilliant and curious researchers who only want to create useful technology, but are subject to an authoritarian government that has committed human rights violations and He has behaved aggressively on the world scene. “ In Xataka | “Google gives you links, perplexity gives you answers”: we talk to the CEO of the startup that wants to kill the father Outstanding image | Techcrunch

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