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SpaceX already gearing up for Starship’s sixth test flight

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SpaceX already gearing up for Starship's sixth test flight

SpaceX has released images of a Super Heavy booster heading to the launchpad for pre-launch testing.

“Flight 6 Super Heavy booster moved to the Starbase pad for testing,” SpaceX said in a post on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday.

Flight 6 Super Heavy booster moved to the Starbase pad for testing. The move comes just one week after returning the first booster caught following launch pic.twitter.com/iwmqCeF3tE

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 22, 2024

SpaceX, led by the billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, is eager to proceed with the sixth test flight of the Starship, which comprises the Super Heavy booster and Starship spacecraft.

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Once the ground-based, pre-launch testing of the Super Heavy’s engines is complete, engineers will also test the Starship’s engines. After that, the Starship will be lifted atop the Super Heavy in preparation for the sixth test flight from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas.

The most recent test of the most powerful rocket ever to fly took place on October 13 and was a huge success. The mission involved the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms “catching” the Super Heavy booster as it returned to Earth shortly after deploying the Starship spacecraft to orbit. It was the first attempt to perform the feat, and put SpaceX on a path to creating a reliable, reusable Starship system that will enable it to increase flight frequency and slash mission costs.

There’s no word yet on when the sixth Starship test will take place, but there’s a fair chance it could fly again by the end of next month. A message to news site NASASpaceflight (NSF) from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) suggested SpaceX currently has clearance to launch, provided it sticks to the same mission profile as Flight 5. However, if SpaceX changes the mission profile, the FAA will need additional time to review it before deciding whether to award a launch permit.

“The SpaceX Starship/Super Heavy Flight 5 license authorization also includes FAA approval of the Flight 6 mission profile,” the regulatory body told NSF. “The FAA determined the changes requested by Space for Flight 6 are within the scope of what has been previously analyzed. Any modifications requested by SpaceX to the approved Flight 6 scope of operations may require further FAA evaluation.”

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NASA is watching the Starship’s development closely as it will use the vehicle for the Artemis III mission, currently set for 2026, which will land the first humans on the lunar surface in five decades.






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Severance looks like a terrifying return to office in new season 2 trailer

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Severance looks like a terrifying return to office in new season 2 trailer

Like a lot of tech companies, Lumon Industries is instituting a return-to-office policy for employees, but of course, this version looks a little scarier than real life. At least, that’s how it seems based on the first proper trailer for season 2 of Severance.

Following last season’s incredibly tense finale, the show picks up with Mark S (Adam Scott) heading back to Lumon to find things a little different than he remembers them, including a number of his coworkers. But some things haven’t changed — namely, the disorienting office hallways and the unyielding intensity of Milchick (Tramell Tillman), who looks intimidating even while holding party balloons.

For the uninitiated, Severance is a sci-fi story about a medical procedure — the titular severance — that allows Lumon employees to separate their memories between work and home, essentially creating two people in one body. It’s an extreme solution to the problem of work-life balance. The outies, as they’re known, remain oblivious to what goes on in the office, while the innies remain trapped in a hellish existence they can never escape. Well, except for the occasional Music Dance Experience.

The show is led by director Ben Stiller and creator / writer Dan Erickson. The first season (which is out on Blu-ray soon) featured a killer cast, many of whom will be returning. In addition to Scott and Tillman, the cast includes Britt Lower, Zach Cherry, Jen Tullock, Michael Chernus, Dichen Lachman, John Turturro, Christopher Walken, and Patricia Arquette.

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Lomography’s new Instax rival has been dubbed the ‘best instant camera on earth’… by Lomography

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Lomo Instant Wide Glass instant camera in a studio

Lomography has unveiled a new addition to its range of instant cameras, dubbing the Lomo Instant Wide Glass the ‘world’s best instant camera’. That’s a bold claim when the market has otherwise been dominated by Polaroid and Fujifilm Instax – so do instant photography lovers finally have a viable alternative?

It seems as though the best instant camera claims are based on the quality of the Wide Glass’s lens: a 90mm multi-coated glass lens, with 35mm effective focal length and minimum focus distance of just 0.3m. It’s a lens that Lomography says is the sharpest in any instant camera. That really does sound like some serious glass, especially when you compare it to the simpler optics of, say, the Fujifilm Instax Wide 400.

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Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded to David Baker, Demis Hassabis, John Jumper- The Week

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Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded to David Baker, Demis Hassabis, John Jumper- The Week

The Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded Wednesday to David Baker, Demis Hassabis and John Jumper for their breakthrough work predicting and designing the structure of proteins, the building blocks of life.

Heiner Linke, Chair of the Nobel Committee for Chemistry, said the award honoured research that made connections between amino acid sequence and protein structure.

That was actually called a grand challenge in chemistry, and in particular in biochemistry, for decades. So, it’s that breakthrough that gets awarded today, he said.

Baker works at the University of Washington in Seattle, while Hassabis and Jumper both work at Google Deepmind in London.

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Baker designed a new protein in 2003 and his research group has since produced one imaginative protein creation after another, including proteins that can be used as pharmaceuticals, vaccines, nanomaterials and tiny sensors, the Nobel committee said.

“The number of designs that they have, produced and published, and … the variety is absolutely mind blowing. It seems that you can almost construct any type of protein with this technology,” said Professor Johan qvist of the Nobel committee.

Hassabis and Jumper created an artificial intelligence model that has been able to predict the structure of virtually all the 200 million proteins that researchers have identified, the committee added.

Linke said scientists had long dreamt of predicting the three-dimensional structure of proteins.

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Four years ago in 2020, Demis Hassabis and John Jumper managed to crack the code. With skillful use of artificial intelligence, they made it possible to predict the complex structure of essentially any known protein in nature, Linke said.

Another dream of scientists has been to build new proteins to learn how to use nature’s multi-tool for our own purposes. This is the problem that David Baker solved,” he added. “He developed computational tools that now enable scientists to design spectacular new proteins with entirely novel shapes and functions, opening endless possibilities for the greatest benefit to humankind.

Last year, the chemistry award went to three scientists for their work on quantum dots tiny particles just a few nanometres in diameter that can release very bright coloured light and whose applications in everyday life include electronics and medical imaging.

Six days of Nobel announcements opened Monday with Americans Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun winning the medicine prize. Two founding fathers of machine learning John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton won the physics prize.

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The awards continue with the literature prize on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday and the economics award on October 14.

The prize carries a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor (USD 1 million) from a bequest left by the award’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel. The laureates are invited to receive their awards at ceremonies on December 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death.

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3 Netflix shows we can’t wait to see in November 2024

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3 Netflix shows we can't wait to see in November 2024
A man holds a helmet in Senna.
Netflix

It’s November, which means two things: You never want to want a piece of candy corn again, and you are already figuring out how many slices of pumpkin pie you can have without feeling too guilty about your waistline.

Well, November has more in store for you besides food and regret; there’s also some really cool Netflix shows to watch! From a show about a real-life sports hero to a second season adapting one of the most successful video games of all time, these three shows are guaranteed to get your mind off your tummy … at least for a while.

Need more recommendations? Check out the best new shows to stream this week, as well as the best shows on Netflix, best shows on Hulu, best shows on Amazon Prime Video, and best shows on Disney+.

Arcane season 2 (November 9)

Arcane: Season 2 | “Come Play” | Series Trailer | Netflix

When it debuted in 2021, season 1 of Arcane caught many, including this writer, by surprise. No one expected a show derived from League of Legends to be so visually rich and complex. Arcane wasn’t just one of Netflix’s best animated efforts ever, it was also one of the best Netflix shows ever. That’s a tough act to follow, and now that it’s revealed the current season will also be its last, Arcane season 2 has to live up to a lot of expectations.

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I’m not worried. For starters, the new season brings back several key creatives, including lead stars Hailee Steinfeld as Vi and Fallouts Ella Purnell as Jinx. Season 2 picks up after the explosive events of season 1’s finale after Jinx launches a stolen Hextech gemstone at the Piltover council. Jinx and Vi are still at odds with each other, but they may have to overcome their differences to make it out in one piece. The series will roll out in three chunks: first on November 6, then November 16, and concluding on November 23.

The Madness (November 28)

A man looks up in water in The Madness.
Netflix

Don’t let the title fool you; The Madness isn’t a horror series, although it does depict people doing horrible things. Let me explain. All Muncie Daniels (The Color Purple‘s Colman Domingo) wants to do is write in peace. A longtime political pundit, Muncie travels to the Poconos to write the next great American novel. Instead, he finds only trouble.

A white supremacist has been murdered, and Muncie is the only witness. What makes things worse is that he’s seen as the prime suspect for the murder, and evades authorities to clear his name. Along the way, he’ll have to reconnect with estranged friends and family to bring the true killers to justice.

Senna (November 29)

Senna | Official Teaser | Netflix

If you don’t follow Formula 1 racing, chances are, the name “Senna” means nothing to you. That’s OK; I didn’t know much about him either until recently. Netflix aims to enlighten everyone with the upcoming release of the six-episode series Senna, which chronicles the dramatic rise and tragic end of Brazilian race car driver Ayrton Senna, who is thought by some to be the fastest driver of all time.

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Ferrari‘s Gabriel Leone takes on the title role in a show that promises to showcase the drivers “journey of triumphs, disappointments, joys, and sorrows, unveiling his personality and personal relationships.” The show begins with Senna’s move to England to advance his career and will depict everything up to his last race at the San Marino Grand Prix. It’s not a story everyone knows, so Senna should appeal to those looking for a real-life rags-to-riches tale featuring one of racing’s best competitors.






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Big Tech is driving a nuclear power revival, energy guru Dan Yergin says

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Big Tech is driving a nuclear power revival, energy guru Dan Yergin says


In this aerial view, the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear power plant stands in the middle of the Susquehanna River near Middletown, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 10, 2024.

Chip Somodevilla | Getty Images

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Nuclear power may be making a comeback in the U.S. after years of setbacks — and big tech is the driving force.

As tech giants like Microsoft, Amazon and Google compete to take the lead in the AI revolution, the data centers needed to power the burgeoning technology consume an ever-increasing amount of energy.

In the last two months, those three companies have penned deals to generate more nuclear power — perhaps most notably, Microsoft struck a 20-year agreement with Constellation Energy to restart a reactor at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania, the site of the most serious nuclear meltdown in U.S. history in 1979. The reopening is planned for 2028.

Speaking to CNBC at the annual International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington, long-time energy market veteran Dan Yergin described the turnaround as nothing short of extraordinary.

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“It’s amazing, the change. The nuclear industry was in the doldrums,” Yergin told CNBC’s Karen Tso on Tuesday, describing the reopening of the Three Mile Island power plant as “symbolic.”

“Big Tech is saying, ‘We need reliable 24 hour electricity. We can’t get it just from wind and solar’,” he said.

Yergin, who has written several books on energy including “The Prize” and “The New Map,” pointed to the booming funding going into the sector. He cited $7 billion in venture capital going into nuclear fusion alone — which does not include financing for nuclear fission, a different energy-generating process.

“This is a really big change, and it reflects in this country, in the United States, a sense that — we’ve had for, really, a generation of flat demand [for] electricity,” Yergin said. “Now it’s going to grow, and there’s real anxiety about, how do you grow it? And nuclear [energy] is back in form, and people are talking about small nuclear reactors. And, of course, you have big tech actually seeking to contract for the output of the electricity from existing nuclear power plants. It’s an amazing change.”

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The energy markets are 'schizophrenic' right now: S&P Global vice chairman

Electricity demand is surging after staying largely flat for some 15 years, fueled by new data centers, factories, electric vehicles, and hotter and longer summers. A recent Energy Department memo cited in numerous press reports projected that U.S. power grids could see as much as 25 gigawatts of new data center demand by 2030.

Recently, the U.S. Department of Energy announced it had closed a $1.5 billion loan for the revival of the Holtec Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan in late 2025, which would make it the first American nuclear plant to be restarted. Google in mid-October said it would purchase power from Kairos Power, a developer of small modular reactors, to help “deliver on the progress of AI.”

Global electricity consumption from data centers, artificial intelligence and the cryptocurrency sector is expected to double from an estimated 460 terawatt-hours (TWh) in 2022 to more than 1,000 TWh in 2026, according to a research report from the International Energy Agency.

— CNBC’s Ryan Browne contributed to this report.



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Google Tensor G6 SoC’s codename has just been revealed

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Best Android Smartphone Deals for October 2024

Google launched its Pixel 9 series of smartphones with its latest custom Tensor G4 chipset. The company is already working on its next-gen Tensor G5 and Tensor G6 processors. The former will power the upcoming Pixel 10 flagship, while the latter will be utilized in the Pixel 11. Ahead of an official announcement, the Google Tensor G6 processor’s codename has been leaked. The Tensor G5’s codename was already leaked earlier.

This will be the codename of the Google Tensor G6 chipset

According to Android insider Mishaal Rahman, Malibu will be the codename for the Google Tensor G6 chipset. The tipster found the codename inside a new AOSP (Android Open Source Project) patch. The same patch has revealed the codename of the Google Tensor G5 processor as Laguna as well. There’s not a lot of information, but the codename for the Tensor G5 SoC was leaked earlier as well.

Google collaborated with Samsung Foundry to manufacture its earlier Tensor chipsets. However, the company has partnered with Taiwan’s TSMC to build its next-gen Tensor G5 and Tensor G6 chipsets. The reports earlier suggested that TSMC’s foundries are ready to mass produce at least the Tensor G5 chipset.

TSMC is going to manufacture the upcoming Google processors

The Tensor G5 will be built on TSMC’s second-gen 3nm process node or N3E. However, the company will switch to its next-gen newer 2nm fabrication process to manufacture the Google Tensor G6 processor.

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Google switching to TSMC to build the next-gen Tensors is Samsung’s loss. If the reports are to be believed, Samsung Foundry’s manufacturing process was inferior. The problem manifested itself in creating throttling and heating issues in the Samsung-made chips in recent years. These include the first couple of Tensor SoCs and the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1.

By switching to TSMC, Google’s Tensor chips will offer better performance and fewer heating problems in theory. Notably a Business Korea report last month also suggested that TSMC is going to be responsible for manufacturing the next-gen Tensor processors.

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