Recent Posts

Why It’s Too Soon to Call It Covid Season

Fall has arrived, flu shots are rolling out in pharmacies, and pediatricians are watching for an uptick in respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV. In other words, it’s virus season. Covid deaths and hospitalizations also began rising at the end of July, and wastewater surveillance that looks for the virus has …

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What Will Plants Be Like on Alien Worlds?

Consider the possibility of alien plants. After all, plenty of exoplanets likely have conditions friendly to the development of plants, even if evolution there never makes it as far as complex organisms and animals. But if moss, algae, and lichen envelop lush exoplanets in the faraway realms of the Milky …

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The Biggest Hack of 2023 Keeps Getting Bigger

In a field of shocking, opportunistic espionage campaigns and high-profile digital attacks on popular businesses, the biggest hack of 2023 isn’t a single incident, but a juggernaut of related attacks that keeps adding victims to its score. In the coming months, more people, as many as tens of millions, could …

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Men Overran a Job Fair for Women in Tech

It was meant to be a week for women in tech—but this year’s Grace Hopper Celebration was swamped by men who gate-crashed the event in search of lucrative tech jobs. The annual conference and career fair aimed at women and non-binary tech workers, which takes its name from a pioneering …

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Why Silicon Valley Falls for Frauds

Aditiya Baradwaj joined crypto-trading firm Alameda Research when it was run out of an anonymous first-floor office in downtown Berkeley, California. It was September 2021, and the day Baradwaj arrived, Sam Bankman-Fried, the company’s founder, was sitting in the middle of the trading floor playing League of Legends. By then, …

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The 15-Minute City Conspiracy Theory Goes Mainstream

Back in February, when a Conservative Party lawmaker in the UK’s House of Commons voiced support for the 15-minute city conspiracy, he was laughed at by his fellow members of Parliament. Now, eight months later, the British government is fully embracing the fringe conspiracy and placing it at the heart …

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