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the AEMET rule to declare a heat wave in Spain

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We spent the summer talking about heat waves and extreme temperaturesbut sometimes it is difficult for us to differentiate exactly what they are. If we look back to the summer of 2025, we remember that there was constant talk of heat waves. We may have the feeling that July and August were a huge heat wave. However, if we look at the data from the State Meteorological Agency (AEMET)we will see that only 3 heat waves were recorded in the Peninsula and the Balearic Islands and 2 in the Canary Islands. The key is that they were long heat waves. Without going any further, the first of them extended from June 18 to July 4. The next one arrived on July 15, so we didn’t even have two weeks of respite. Be that as it may, the concept of a heat wave is somewhat diffuse. It is not described the same in some countries as in others, and even has variations in the same country. Of course, no matter what definition we stick to, it is clear that they are becoming more and more intense. That is why it is so important to take measures against global warming. What exactly is a heat wave: the scientific definition Actually, There is no single definition of what a heat wave is.. Broadly speaking, it can be considered a prolonged period of extreme temperatures for a specific region. As we have already seen, each country has its own definition, which usually follows historically selected criteria. Even institutions can have very specific definitions. For example, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) define a heat wave as an unusually hot and dry or hot and humid period in a specific place, with visible effects on nature and people’s health. Contrary to what usually happens with the definitions of different countries, these two institutions include the health of people and the effects on nature as important factors in the definition of a heat wave. The three requirements of the AEMET to declare a heat wave in Spain In the case of Spain, the criteria to describe a heat wave They are provided by the AEMET. According to this, three requirements must be met: Duration of at least 3 consecutive days Detection of extremely high temperatures in at least 10% of the reference observatories Maximums located above the 95th percentile of temperatures measured between July and August from 1971 to 2000. These criteria refer to mainland Spain and the Balearic Islands.. With the Canary Islands there is an exception, since they only have 6 observatories. If we obeyed the 10% rule, it would be enough to detect extreme temperatures above the guidelines in only one of them. It is too little, so there is a special requirement that at least two observatories detect temperatures above the 95th percentile. How long does a heat wave last? There is no defined duration for a heat wave. As we have seen, in Spain it must last at least 3 consecutive days to be considered as such. And from there to heaven. At the moment, the longest that has been recorded in Spain lasted 26 days and It was produced in 2015. It should be noted that in 2022 the heat waves were shorter, but it stands out for being the year with the most heat wave days added together. A total of 41, to which 2025 came dangerously close, with 33 days under a heat wave. Other countries, according to their criteria, have experienced heat waves that may be shorter, but very surprising due to their location. For example, in 2025, the subarctic regions of Norway, Sweden and Finland recorded their worst heat wave since records exist, with 21 consecutive days and temperatures that exceeded 30°C within the Arctic Circle itself. Why does the temperature threshold change depending on the province? As we have already seen, for the AEMET, one of its criteria when defining a heat wave is that the reference stations register temperatures above the 95th percentile measured in July and August from 1971 to 2000. Logically, each province will have different records. The records of Seville will not be the same as those of Oviedo. The 95th percentile temperature will be much higher in the Andalusian capital than in the Asturian capital. Be that as it may, it should be noted that there is no threshold per province, but rather per reference station. Each province may have several of these seasons, with slightly different temperatures. To give an example based on AEMET datain Jaén there are three seasons, whose thresholds are 39ºC, 40ºC and 42ºC. If we go to colder areas, in A Coruña there are three seasons and their thresholds are 29.2ºC, 30ºC and 31.6ºC. How to know if there is a heat wave alert in your autonomous community The best way to know if there is a heat wave in our autonomous community or an alert for intensely high temperatures is to stay up to date with AEMET updates. In any case, it should be noted that, individually, we are more interested in being up to date with the notices. We may not have a heat wave for a few days, because there are not enough stations in the region that meet the criteria, but there may be temperatures high enough in specific points to put people’s health at risk. Therefore, we must make a monitoring unusually high temperature alerts; which, as with rain or wind, follow a color code (green, yellow, orange or red) to indicate the level of risk and the measures to take. Real-time weather warning map: from yellow alert to red warning Unusually high temperature alerts are defined with three colors. Yellow refers to significant risk, orange to high risk and red to extreme risk.. If the area is colored green (or gray in the case of maps), there is no risk. Every day, the AEMET updates its color warning maps, so it is important … Read more

In 2014, French television imagined August 2050 as hell. This week’s heat wave has already overcome it

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Looking at the map of Europe this week is terrifying. In the United Kingdom, the Met Office has activated its second red notice for extreme heat in history and expect up to 40°C between Wednesday and Thursday. In France, thermometers They recorded 43 ° C on MondayParis is on red alert and Météo-France compares the severity of the episode with that of August 2003a heat wave that left tens of thousands dead on the continent. The situation is so delirious that it is indistinguishable from what more than 10 years ago, in 2014, the French TF1 He gave as an example for August 2050. In Spain, we take extreme heat almost for granted. Further north it turns Europe into a mousetrap. The disturbing thing about this ‘heat wave’ is, above all, the strength and persistence it has in areas where we would not expect it to have it. And, faced with this stupor, scientists have done what they do best: search scientific journals. And there is one that explained everything in quite detail. In June 2022, ‘Nature Communications’ published a paper that argued that European heat waves have grown three to four times faster than in the rest of the mid-latitudes of the northern hemisphere. Europe is one of the hot spots in the temperate part of the world. The jet stream has a lot to do with this. What is the ‘jet stream’… “Jet streams” are large flows of air that distribute heat and cold throughout the entire planet. There are several, but the main one for us is the polar one, which circulates at very northern latitudes. These currents arise in the border zone between two air masses with different properties and, for this reason, they have a crucial role in balancing the climate and meteorological phenomena of the Earth. …and what does it have to do with all this? As the temperature differences between these two air masses decrease, the current loses strength, becomes more erratic, undulates in an exaggerated manner and generates structures like the current one that encapsulates the air of Western Europe without allowing it to cool. It’s good news, right? We know what’s happening. Yes and no. We are clear about the mechanism responsible for, for now, up to 35% variability of temperature in Western Europe; The problem is that we don’t know why the current is changing. The most popular hypothesis, that of Warmer arctic rippling jethas been for years discussed: There are works that see this trend reversed and models that do not reproduce the effect. The rest of the options are varied, but inconclusive: from an effect of aerosols to a collateral impact of the dynamics of the tropical Pacific. Be that as it may, everyone seems to sense that climate change is behind it, but no one is clear how it is. Above all, because all our climate models fall short. And then? What the undulation of the jet guarantees is greater climate variability: enormous heat waves, torrential rains, untimely cold… Europe must prepare. In Xataka | We humans have been discussing what hell is for thousands of years and AEMET already has the answer: France and Spain this weekend

A heat wave is about to “scorch” all of Europe. So France has been the first to open a melon: ban alcohol

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The summer of 2026 has started in a big way, with much of Europe charredthermometers climbing to record values and governments wondering how on earth to tackle the risks that the heatwave has for the health of the population. In France they have been clear: declaring war on alcohol. With dozens of regions On red alert due to extreme heat, the French authorities have decided to put limits on the consumption of beer, wine and cocktails. It may seem shocking in a world that usually goes for beers (or drinks) to cool off, but it makes all the sense in the world. And for several reasons. Europe is burning. It may sound exaggerated, but if at any time it is justified to talk about temperatures scorching in Europe it is now. In Spain the first heat wave of the summer has sent the mercury skyrocketing above 40º in several parts of the country and the situation is not much better in other parts of Europe, such as Germany, Italy, United Kingdom or Belgium, where thermometers have reached (or easily exceeded) 30 degrees. Beyond the weather reports, the heat has already forced sports events to be cancelled, interrupt rail services or launch alerts. The objective: avoid episodes like the one in the summer of 2023, when another extreme heat wave left more than 62,000 dead in Europe. This same Sunday, Madrid decided, for example, to suspend the broadcast of the match with Saudi Arabia on the XXL screen in the Plaza de Colón. The reason: the forecast before 39ºC was reached. Like a ‘frying pan’. Another country that has not been spared from the heatwave is France. Over there 53 million people They were yesterday in areas with first or second level heat alerts. In fact, the country left an unpublished image: 35 of its 96 continental departments were on red alert and another 45 on orange. Faced with such a panorama, the authorities have decided to close at least 845 schools and adapt the schedules of hundreds of other centers to avoid the hottest hours. And that is just one of the measures activated by the Government. In Paris, for example, the Prefecture asked to the organizers of outdoor sporting events to cancel their tests in order to avoid unnecessary risks. An “explosive” mix. In France the Government encountered more than just heat. The dog days coincided there, among other events, with the Fête de la Musiquea festive day during which open-air concerts are organized and thousands of people celebrate in style in the streets, squares and parks. “Heat wave and Music Festival: an explosive combination that worries law enforcement agencies,” titled yesterday one of his chronicles on the BFM channel before remembering that Météo-France has extended the red alert to 49 departments. Stop alcohol. That parks are opened, classes suspended or races postponed to combat the heat wave is hardly surprising. What is most striking is another of the measures adopted in France: restrict the alcohol. As reports the France24 networkthe French authorities decided to ban drinking in public spaces in certain departments of the country, especially affected by the extreme heat wave. The sales restrictions lasted between early Sunday and Mondaywith the sight set especially at the Fête de la Musique and other celebrations planned throughout the country. Closed bars. “The prefects will issue decrees prohibiting the consumption of alcohol in public spaces in the departments on red alert,” the Government warned in a statementin which it also warned that events organized by the State itself and its agencies would close their bars. As if the message were not strong enough, the mayor of Paris warned to his neighbors about the risks of excessive drinking: “The combination of alcohol, heat and proximity of water are three factors that do not mix.” But… Why? The decision may seem shocking, but it makes perfect sense. And for several reasons. To begin with, by restricting alcohol consumption, especially during a day marked by street parties and concerts, the Government has wanted “preserve emergency services and medical care” and that “health personnel focus on caring for the most vulnerable.” In short: fewer drinking-related emergencies (falls, drownings, comas, fights…) so as not to neglect the real priority: the heatwave. In Paris, where the alert was activated, consumption was banned of strong drinks, such as high-proof beers, liqueurs or fortified wines, on the banks of the Seine and the Canal Saint-Martin precisely to avoid ‘scares’. Those who wanted to drink had to go to licensed bars, pubs or cafes. “Without realizing it”. There is another reason why the decision of the French authorities is totally logical. As explained on Saturday in France Info the Minister of Health, Stéphanie Rist, by drinking a beer or a glass of wine we may have the impression that we are cooling off, but we are really boycotting the mechanisms our body uses to self-regulate. “You become dehydrated three to four times faster without even realizing it.” Alcohol has a diuretic effect and blocks vasopressin, remember from RFIwhich means that the ‘normal’ functioning of our body is altered. We go to the bathroom more, we sweat less, our body temperature rises and we become dehydrated, something that is not particularly advisable when we live in a region on alert for high temperatures and the thermometer exceeds 35º. “The body’s internal thermostat stops reacting correctly to overheating signals; our body no longer knows when to sweat and dilate blood vessels,” insist the French Institute of Health (Inserm). Images | DAT VO (Unsplash) and Venus Major (Unsplash) In Xataka | We are at 44 degrees and AEMET says that the worst is yet to come. The good news is that we already know when thermal relief arrives.

Today, at 9 p.m., we are going to pay the most expensive kilowatt-hour of all of 2026. And this is just the first heat wave of the year

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On Sunday, June 21 at 2 p.m., electricity was almost given away: it was paid at €0.02592 per kilowatt-hour, the lowest price in months. In a while, at nine at night, we are going to pay it at €0.89142, the most expensive price in all of 2026. Just over 24 hours difference and more than thirty times the price. What is happening here? The price of light. The wholesale market The price of electricity for today has already been determined: an average of 99.89 euros per MWh. That is, 75.96% more expensive than yesterday. Although the average is misleading (there is a huge difference between 32 at noon and 177 at night), the truth is that it helps to understand the problem. And that problem boils down to the fact that we are going to have dinner with energy prices that we have not seen since the cold wave of January 2025. What is this due to? In principle, three different things: the most obvious is the heat wave. It alone will trigger energy demand 6 GW more than normal, according to the consulting firm Optimize Energy. The second is the taxes that returned at the beginning of the month. And the last one is a small technical change that makes the valleys sink lower and the peaks rise higher. Now the market moves every 15 minutes instead of every hour. This, which, on average, should give the same result would allow the system to better match supply with demand. In theory, of course. The important thing is not the energy that comes in, but the energy that comes out. According to the system, due to the heat and the work schedule, demand will barely decrease until 10 pm. However, little by little, the sun will retreat, forcing turn on increasingly expensive plants. The rest is the market functioning: in a marginalist system, the last MW that enters is the one that defines the price of the rest. This Monday we have a ‘perfect storm’ and, consequently, an exorbitant price. And what can we do? If we have a fixed price, it should not affect us. If we have PVPC (and there are 10 million who have it), it is a good idea to spend only what is essential. But above all, think of this heat wave as a proof of concept. The truth is that this situation will occur whenever heat, little air and overpriced gas coincide. It is time to think about a domestic strategy to survive Spain’s great energy problem: the fact of have a huge amount of sun, but have nowhere to store it. Image | Torpical TidBits In Xataka | Renewable, coal or nuclear: where each country in the world gets its electricity from, in a detailed graph

We have been fearing the Apocalypse for 100 days due to the closure of Hormuz. The blow is going to be given to us by a heat wave in China

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At the end of February, the clocks in the financial markets seemed to stop. The closure of the Strait of Hormuz was not a simple geopolitical skirmish; It meant amputating, from one day to the next, the main energy artery of the planet. Classical economics manuals dictated that the abrupt disappearance of 20% of the world’s crude oil would trigger industrial paralysis, widespread shortages and an imminent recession. However, more than one hundred days after the start of the blockade, Western economies are still standing and the barrel of crude oil, far from reaching the catastrophic 200 dollars that some investment funds even predicted, has been contained below the $100 barrier. We have survived what, on paper, is the greatest threat to energy security in history. The question that now resonates in the European chancelleries is unanimous: how have we achieved it and, above all, how long will the truce last? The architecture of an unexpected rescue The fact that the world has not collapsed is due to a complex network of counterweights that have absorbed the blow. The first revealing data it is provided by the agency Reuters: The production of OPEC countries has fallen this May to its lowest level since 2000 (16.13 million barrels per day) as a direct consequence of the siege of Iran. Despite this massive hole in supply, global supply has been reorganized in record time. The analyst Javier Blas unfolds in his column of Bloomberg the keys to this logistical miracle. The main lifeline, paradoxically, has arrived from Beijing. China has plunged its oil imports by ship to decade lows (nearly 40% less than last year’s average). According to Blas, this unexpected destruction of Asian demand has acted as a huge escape valve: “If Beijing were buying the same amount of oil as in the past, global inflation would be out of control.” Added to Chinese containment is a tectonic shift in energy hegemony. As documented Reutersthe United States has taken advantage of the chaos to become the largest oil exporter in the world, overtaking Russia and Saudi Arabia by shipping nearly 10.5 million barrels per day in May. Furthermore, the Gulf countries have not sat idly by. The producers They are using a network of pipelines less known through Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates that circumvent the Hormuz bottleneck, keeping some five million barrels a day alive, in addition to maintaining “hot” extraction infrastructures for an eventual rapid restart. The silent blow The fact that there are no kilometer-long lines at service stations has generated a false sense of immunity. Hormuz’s economic blow is landing, but it is doing so through the financial system. The war conflict has blown up the roadmap by Christine Lagarde and the European Central Bank (ECB), since the sustained rise in fuel prices has caused eurozone inflation to rise to 3.2% in May. Given the fear that this extra cost will permanently spread to the shopping basket, the ECB has been forced to resume raising interest rates this June, placing them at 2.25%. The true price of the Iran war is already being paid by European households and companies through more expensive mortgages and restricted credit. And the scenario continues to be a powder keg: the extreme volatility of the markets after the latest crossed attacks between the United States and Iran, which have kept Brent crude stressed above $95. The Asian thermometer: the great threat to Spain While the global macroeconomy deals with interest rates, at the local level a perfect storm is brewing for the Spanish consumer in the coming months. And the trigger will not be military, but climate. According to the forecasts of the consulting firm Tempos Energía, collected by Europa Pressthe price of electricity in Spain this summer will not depend on what happens in the Strait of Hormuz, but on the temperatures in Asia. Until now, Europe has been importing American liquefied natural gas (LNG) without much competition because China was not demanding it. However, the general director of Tempos Energía, Antonio Aceituno, warns of an imminent reversal: “When the heat arrives and the thermometer soars in Shanghai, American freighters will be divided between demand from Asia and Europe.” If the Asian market absorbs the supply to feed its air conditioning networks, Europe will be left without cheap alternatives to cover its own summer demand peaks, and with tanks at less than half capacity. The consulting firm’s forecast for Spain is severe: if China breaks into the purchasing market, the electricity bill for July and August could rise to the range of 88 to 95 euros per megawatt hour. This represents an increase of up to 40%, which “would be equivalent to paying double what was paid in 2019.” A truce with an expiration date We have managed to avoid the precipice thanks to the inertia of pre-war inventories, a historic deployment of emergency reserves and the forced reconfiguration of the global market. If diplomacy triumphs, Blas explains how the intact infrastructure of the Gulf would allow 50% of production to be recovered in a matter of days. However, trusting economic stability to an imminent diplomatic agreement is a dangerous game. Emergency reserves are not infinite and the capacity to cushion shocks has a limit. The world has shown astonishing resilience in surviving without its main oil route, but the armor is cracking. If the situation continues and summer demand tightens, the apocalypse that we avoided in spring could arrive in the form of unaffordable bills and an induced recession. The Hormuz bill, sooner or later, will have to be paid. Image | Unsplash 1 and 2 Xataka | Ukraine turned drones into hunters. A helicopter shot down in Hormuz has transformed them into a Spielberg film

Mexico has turned the opening of the World Cup into its greatest showcase. A wave of protests threatens to turn him against him

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Welcome the inauguration A World Cup is always a guarantee of something: visibility. There are few ‘showcases’ comparable to being the city in which the ball of a FIFA tournament begins to roll, something that will happen tonight (peninsular time) in Mexico City. What is not so clear is what the rest of the planet will see through that showcase: the Government hopes to offer a great sports festival, but there is seven protests summoned that threaten to spoil the day and leave a very different image. The World Cup ball is not the only one that rolls. And the day came. If you like sports (and if you don’t, too) it is likely that you had March 11 marked in red on your calendar. Barring an unforeseen catastrophe, this afternoon, at 9:00 p.m. peninsular time, the teams of Mexico and South Africa will play the opening match of the 2026 Soccer World Cup. They will do so in the Azteca stadium from Mexico City, after an opening ceremony in which several artists will participate and which will experience its climax when Shakira and Burna Boy perform the song of the World Cup, ‘Dai dai’. More than football. The normal thing on a day like today is that the host country of the World Cup dedicates itself to talking basically about football. Mexico knows it well, which has experience in the matter: this will be the third time in which it hosts the World Cup tournament, something it already did in 1970 and 1986. Today, however, the Mexican authorities (especially those in CDMX) are awaiting something else: half a dozen calls of protests that will start from different points of the city towards the vicinity of the stadium where athletes, authorities and fans will meet. What protests? The diary The Universal speaks of at least seven calls confirmed and organized by groups of transporters, health workers, peasant associations and pensioners who basically want to take advantage of two things: the media attention generated by the World Cup and the Government’s interest in avoiding any conflict that tarnishes the FIFA tournament. There are two mobilized groups that stand out above the rest due to the exposure they have achieved in recent weeks. The first are the ‘seeking mothers’that they cry out for justice for your missing relatives. The second, the teachersorganized in the National Coordinator of Education Workers (CNTE) and who have been demanding labor improvements for some time. Although the Executive has tried until the last moment reach an agreement with them to deactivate today’s protests, both parties (Education and CNTE) remain very distant. Claudia Sheibaum’s team does has been luckier with the farmers, who also threatened to mobilize. @lajornadaonline Hours before the soccer festival begins, the pain of the families of missing people is manifested in Mexico City. Collectives of searching mothers walk towards the Mexico City stadium, but the capital police prevented them from passing through Tlalpan. ♬ original sound – lajornadaonline – lajornadaonline “They want to provoke us”. The conflict does not catch the Government by surprise. The CNTE it takes months showing its discomfort and its relationship with the Sheinbaum Government has been strained in recent weeks, which has even led some of its members to break into the headquarters of the Ministry of Public Education. The most critical episode occurred a few days agowhen a teacher lost an eye after being hit by a rubber bullet while participating in a march. Incidents like this are the ones that now, a few hours before the start of the World Cup, the Government wants to avoid at all costs. “There are groups that want to provoke us, and they are not necessarily teachers. In other words, what they are looking for is repression, I say it clearly. What they are looking for is that before the opening of the World Cup the international note is: ‘The Government of Mexico represses teachers’. That is what they are looking for, but they are not going to have it,” Sheinbaum assured on Monday. The scenario is not simple. Both the president and the Government of CDMX assure that will respect the right to protest, but at the same time they are taking measures to shield the Azteca and prevent the protests from altering the World Cup agenda. “National Security Facility”. The Secretary of Government of CDM, César Cravioto, it was very clear about it on Tuesday: the capital’s stadium, he warned, “is already a national security facility.” Hence, access controls and protection have been reinforced. “They will have to understand that in less than 48 hours the World Cup will open here, in the stadium, and we have to protect it.” Cravioto insisted also that fans are “guaranteed” access to the Azteca, although he asked them to arrive “early” to avoid “complications.” ABC assures that there are professionals (journalists, stadium workers, sponsors…) who are already considering heading to the area at seven in the morning, six hours before the opening match starts. The focus is not only on the Azteca. The Secretariat of Citizen Security has also deployed a special device on the perimeter of the Mexico City International Airport to anticipate the arrival of CNTE protesters. Of laws and pensions. In the background is the clash between the Executive and the teachers represented by the CNTE, who on May 1, Labor Day, presented a document with their requests to the Government. In general lines propose eliminating the ISSSTE law of 2007, changes in educational reforms, recovering a solidarity pension system for teachers and a salary improvement. For now, and despite the eight-hour meeting held in extremison the eve of the World Cup, there has been no agreement with the Government, which maintains that the change in pensions would skyrocket its cost. The teachers’ protests will match today with those of the ‘seeking mothers’, who have been demanding that the Executive not forget the tens of thousands of people with unknown whereabouts that Mexico accumulates. Before, the group has … Read more

There is a new wave of startups creating new AI millionaires

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The rise of AI has generated a new hypermillionaire saga who are breaking all limits of wealth to date. All you have to do is go through the list of 10 of the greatest fortunes in the world of Forbes to discover that eight of these great assets arise from this technology. However, this was only what Bloomberg called “the first wave”, in which the founders of the great generalist AI models such as OpenAI have risen. Anthropic either deepseek. Now is the time for specialized AI agents and their founders they are also getting rich. The 19 new barons of AI. As and as I pointed out BloombergAmerican AI startups have created 19 new billionaires in the last year with a combined fortune estimated at about $59.3 billion. These 19 new millionaires join the 41 founders who, thanks to the success of their AI models they had already become millionaires in the “first wave.” However, what is striking about this increase is not only the number, but the profiles of who are behind these million-dollar startups: a poet, three scholarship recipients from the Peter Thiel program without a university degree or a self-taught immigrant. AI agents are the new oil. Reflection AI It is one of the most obvious cases of this new wave of AI millionaires. The startup is dedicated to creating agents capable of programming, debugging and understanding code almost independently. This new market It has turned its founders into millionaires. It is estimated that Ioannis Antonoglou and Misha Laskin have achieved a fortune valued at around $4 billion each. However, the company did not emerge from nowhere, Antonoglou was part of the team that developed AlphaGo, from the revolutionary Google DeepMind model that achieved beat humans at Go. An AI wants to be your lawyer and your doctor. Without leaving aside AI agents, Harvey is another success story in this segment, allowing the automation of legal research, the drafting of legal documents and the review of contracts with AI. Founded by lawyer Winston Weinberg and AI researcher Gabe Pereyra while they shared a flat, its AI agent Harvey, named after the protagonist of the popular lawyer series Suits, has become one of the most used in companies and law firms. Each of its founders is the owner of an estimated fortune of 1.6 billion. In the healthcare field, OpenEvidence has followed a similar path. Its founder, Daniel Nadler, already sold the financial analysis platform Kensho to S&P Global in 2018 for $550 million. With OpenEvidence, it applied the same logic to the medical sector: its AI assistant has accumulated more than 100 million consultations and the company has almost quadrupled its valuation in six months to reach 12 billion, raising Nadler’s assets to 7.2 billion dollars at the beginning of 2026. The Thiel Fellows: from recruitment to labeling. Mercor is another example that was difficult to imagine just a few years ago. Their three foundersBrendan Foody, Adarsh ​​Hiremath and Surya Midha, met at a high school debate. The three classmates left the university to join the Thiel Scholarshipthe PayPal co-founder’s program that pays $250,000 to young people to leave their studies and start a company. Initially it was a recruiting platform, but they switched to data labeling providers for OpenAI and Anthropic, hiring doctors, engineers and scriptwriters to train AI models specialized in these areas. As a result of this change, Mercor went from earning 100 million in 2025 to 1,000 million at the beginning of 2026, with a valuation of 10 billion. That leaves each of the founders with an estimated fortune of $1.9 billion. The ecosystem versus the giants. Vercel is another example of how the startups that are succeeding in this second wave of unicorns emerged from AI. We are no longer talking about AI models, but about the infrastructure that allows deploying applications generated with AI. Its founder, Guillermo Rauchimmigrant Argentinian and self-taught who learned English by reading software manuals to learn how to program, turned a tool for developers into a very profitable platform that has given him an estimated fortune of more than 1.9 billion dollars In Xataka | We already know who has won the AI ​​race: the OpenAI employees who sold their shares Image | Brendan Foody

Europe and China are at risk in the race for the first gravitational wave observatory in space

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Terrestrial gravitational wave detectors, such as the famous LIGO, have made very interesting discoveries in the last decade. However, there is a great consensus that it would be very useful to detect this cosmic phenomenon directly from space. For this reason, some space agencies are already getting to work to launch their own projects. One of them is the Taiji mission, of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, with which, in fact, a great step forward has just been taken. Everything ready for Taiji 2. The Taiji mission consists of three phases. The first was already launched in 2019. For the second, a piece called the full-function interferometer optical core had to be tested. The tests carried out on Earth have gone perfectlyso it is considered that the second phase could be launched as soon as possible. In fact, its launch It was initially scheduled in 2024but it has been suffering delays. Luckily, it seems that now all the pieces are ready. Three ships in total. The Taiji mission is made up of three ships, strategically placed in space millions of kilometers away. They will all be connected to each other through laser interferometry, so that slight changes in these distances that could be associated with gravitational waves can be detected. The first phase of the mission, in which the interferometry system was analyzed, was launched in 2019. It is expected to send the second part as soon as possible, in which the first two ships will be put into space. As for the third, in principle the established calendar places its launch in the 2030s. Better in space than on Earth. Gravitational waves are waves produced in space-time as a result of a catastrophic event. These types of events could be, for example, the merger of neutron stars or the collision of black holes. When this occurs, space-time experiences a disturbance similar to that produced when a stone is thrown into a pond. Those are gravitational waves. The terrestrial observatories, like LIGOthey can detect them, but they have a small limitation. And there could be confusion with seismic noise and other terrestrial interference. In space, that problem disappears. Taiji to the rescue. According to the tests that have been carried out on Earth and the analyzes of the interferometry system that have already been carried out in space with Taiji-1, this mission is capable of greatly reducing interference. Furthermore, the optical core that has just been tested is capable of detecting disturbances on the order of picometers. That is, on Earth you can discern displacements equivalent to one ten-thousandth of the diameter of a human hair. Although those distances would change under spatial conditions, it is still highly accurate. Therefore, it is expected to detect even gravitational waves caused by intermediate mass black holes. Other similar missions. The European Space Agency It also has its own mission aimed at detecting gravitational waves in space. This is LISAa project with which it is planned to do something similar: launch three ships connected by laser interferometry into space. In this case, the launch of all ships is scheduled for 2035, so China could have some advantage. Of course, until the complete triangle is in space, the mission cannot be considered completed. Perhaps Europe will be able to overtake the Asian country. Image | NOIRLab In Xataka | What happens if you fall into a black hole, explained simply in an overwhelming NASA simulation

LineageOS 23 brings Android 16 to a wave of abandoned mobile phones, with more difficulties than ever. Google put a wall in the way

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There is a feeling of betrayal that runs through the most veteran Android community. The reason is Google’s strategy, which has been closing a system that was born completely free: the development of AOSP (the source code of Android) now it’s more privateand the publication of the source code suffer delays that didn’t happen before. While many feel that “the soul of Android has disappeared”the community responds. And the biggest banner of that Open Source resistance has just been updated. In the image, Murena’s /e/ OS alternative ROM, which is based on the popular LineageOS Lifesaver for an abandoned mobile. The life cycle of an Android smartphone is usually not as long as the competition, although that is changing in recent times. From this premise, alternatives emerged such as LineageOS, which is actually the spiritual heir to the mythical CyanogenMod. For many users, it is the only way to have the latest version of Google’s OS and extend the useful life of their devices. LineageOS 23 expands. The LineageOS team has announced a new batch of devices that receive official support for LineageOS 23, its version based on Android 16. This update not only brings the news of Android 16, but also self-developed improvements. For example, “Catapult” and “Aperture 2.0”. The first is a new launcher for Android TV with a clear objective: replace the Google TV interface with a clean, fast and ad-free one. Instead, Aperture is the ROM’s camera app that has now been rewritten from the ground up with support for Ultra HDR and RAW capture. Google has changed the rules. The LineageOS team has confirmed on their official blog that this has been a complicated launch. As we have been saying, the more closed development of AOSP and the fact that Google no longer publishes the Pixel code with total transparency, has caused Google phones to no longer be as easy to support compared to those of any other manufacturer. Despite the difference with respect to the extinct Nexus, the Pixels have been the reference for Open Source development. That’s over too. Consequences. The change in strategy has materialized in delays to the Android 16 code: Google released Android 16 QPR1 for the Pixel (first quarterly update) but never published the source code on AOSP. For this reason, LineageOS has been forced to launch its version 23.0 based on the initial version of Android 16. In practice, ROM users do not currently receive news as notable as the Material 3 Expressive redesign. There are also uncertainty regarding security. Google has changed the way it releases system security patches. They are no longer monthly and complete; most corrections are now quarterly. For its part, the team behind LineageOS warns that this means that its ROM security patch levels could inevitably be delayed. The basis of Android “resistance” without Google. Despite all these difficulties, LineageOS continues to be one of the pillars of the “degoogleized” community. Not only is it an alternative view for the end user, but its AOSP code serves as the basis for privacy projects like the popular GrapheneOS either the European /e/ OS. Keeping LineageOS alive is keeping alive the possibility of an Android without Google in an increasingly controlled ecosystem. New devices. The latest batch of devices that join the official support of LineageOS 23 focuses, curiously, on the Google family and flagships from OnePlus and Xiaomi. Some of them are the Pixel 6, 7, 8 and 9 series, the OnePlus 13 or the Redmi Note 9 Pro 5G. They add to the long list of those that debuted when LineageOS 23 was released a few weeks ago. Cover image | Composition with LineageOS images and generated by Nano Banana In Xataka | Google believes it has the key to compete with Windows, Linux and macOS in laptops. That key is called Android

A giant wave is sweeping across the Milky Way. Scientists currently don’t know why.

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Our galaxy, Milky Wayis far from a quiet place. It spins, it wobbles and, as a new study just revealed, it also undulates. New ESA data have discovered a colossal wave, baptized as “the great wave” that propagates through the galactic disk in a very similar way to the waves that we have in a pond when we throw a stone. The study. This phenomenon, which has been identified by the team led by Eloisa Poggio of the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica in Italy, is a “corrugation “large-scale vertical” that is superimposed on the already known deformation that our galaxy constantly suffers. In essence, we are facing a wave that causes entire stripes of stars to move “up” and “down.” Great proportions. It is nothing like the waves that we see on our beaches, of course, since we are talking about something on a galactic level. In this case, astronomers know since the 50’s that the disk of the Milky Way it’s not flatbut rather it is deformed (or “warped”) at its edges. Now this study adds an additional structure that no one knew was there. Thanks to Gaia’s incredibly precise measurements, which map the 3D position and 3D motion of stars, the team was able to analyze two populations of young stars: giant stars and classical Cepheids. These maps revealed a gigantic wave that is now coming to light. The figures. In order to understand the magnitude of this phenomenon, we can take into account the following parameters of this phenomenon: Height: the movement of the stars is about 150-200 parsecs, which is up to 650 light years above and below the galactic plane. Length: The structure spans at least 10,000 light years and possibly up to 20,000. Location: affects a vast section of the outer disk, in regions located tens of thousands of light years from the galactic center. The test. The most fascinating thing about the discovery is not just the shape of the wave, but the evidence that it is moving. “What makes this even more compelling is our ability, thanks to Gaia, to also measure the motions of stars within the galactic disk,” explains Poggio. To understand it, the team used a perfect analogue: the wave of a stadium. If we were to freeze the wave that is made in the stands of a stadium, we would see some people standing (the crest), others who have just sat down (the back part) and others who are about to get up (the front part). Something similar happens in the galaxy. The astronomers discovered that the stars with the highest vertical position (the crest) were not the same as the stars with the highest vertical velocity. The maximum speed point was displaced, with a 90º approach phase difference. This phase difference is irrefutable proof that it is a propagating wave. And not only that: the stars inside the corrugation also show a systematic radial motion of 10-15 km/s outward. The conclusion is clear: it is a wave that travels from the interior of the galaxy to its furthest reaches. There is a mystery. Researchers have measured the wave, but don’t know what caused it. The main hypothesis is that the Milky Way suffered an encounter or collision with a smaller dwarf galaxy, but it is not 100% certain. Previous simulations have shown that interaction with a satellite galaxy, such as Sagittarius, can excite exactly these types of vertical waves and corrugations in the galactic disk. This “big wave” is much larger and located much further away than the famous Radcliffe wavea filament of gas about 9,000 light years long located near our Sun. Although both are undulations, scientists believe that they are two different characteristics, although they do not rule out that they may be related in some way. Since the young stars studied (giants and Cepheids) were born from galactic gas, the team suspects that the wave not only carries the stars, but also the gas itself from the disk. The stars would have simply inherited the motion of the gas from which they formed, preserving a “memory” of the wave. Now the investigation must continue. Astronomers are looking forward to Gaia’s fourth data release, which will provide even more precise measurements and help create detailed maps to perhaps finally reveal the origin of our galaxy’s undulating heart. Images | Dns Dgn In Xataka | When stars formed has always been one of the greatest mysteries of the universe. And we are closer to solving it

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