• I invested in a self-cooling iPhone charger and my pockets are thanking me
    www.zdnet.com
    If you're tired of chargers that run hot, the aptly-named Torras PolarCircle provides fast wireless charging for your iPhone while keeping temperatures cool.
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  • The best-looking Linux desktop I've seen so far in 2025 - and it's not even close
    www.zdnet.com
    The creators of one of the coolest Linux distros just released a new version - and it puts the old one to shame.
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  • 15 Best Places On The U.S. East Coast To See Next Saturdays Eclipse
    www.forbes.com
    A "double sunrise" during a partial solar eclipse by Mike Kentrianakis on June 10, 2021. Mike Kentrianakis (used with permission)A partial solar eclipse is coming to New England at sunrise on March 29, 2025, bringing some unique views that will be most easily seen from the U.S. East Coast in Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine.North Americas first solar eclipse since a total solar eclipse on April 8, 2024, will look completely different. This time, as well as being only partially covered, the sun will appear on the eastern horizon while partially eclipsed a rare and beautiful sight, albeit one that demands a clear sky on the horizon.From most locations, a crescent sun will rise vertically, but from some to the extreme northeast in Maine, the cusps of the suns crescent will appear as two separate points on the horizon in a rare double sunrise.For this eclipse, a clear horizon and sightlines to the sunrise are essential. Timeanddates eclipse map has an exact schedule and a simulation for any location. Here are the best places to go see a rare kind of solar eclipse with the double sunrise locations marked:Sunrise at Quoddy Head, the easternmost point of US.gettyBest Places In Maine To See The Solar Eclipse 20251. Quoddy Head State Park, Maine, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:13 a.m. EDT (84.2 degrees ENE), with 83% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:17 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:12 a.m. EDT. Simulation.2. South Lubec, Maine. U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:13 a.m. EDT, with 83% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:18 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:12 a.m. EDT. Simulation.3. Owls Head State Park, Maine, U.S. (land view)Sunrise at 6:22 a.m. EDT (84.3 degrees ENE), with 74% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:25 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:11 a.m. EDT. Simulation.4. Granite Breakwater to Brewster Point, Rockland Harbor, Maine, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:22 a.m. EDT (84.3 degrees ENE), with 74% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:25 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:11 a.m. EDT. Simulation.5. Popham Beach, Popham Beach State Park, Maine, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:25 a.m. EDT (84.3 degrees ENE), with 67.05% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:29 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:10 a.m. EDT. Simulation.6. Otter Cliff Overlook, Acadia National Park, Maine, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:18 a.m. EDT (84.3 degrees ENE), with 80.02% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:21 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:11 a.m. EDT. Simulation.7. Rachel Carson National Wildlife Refuge, Maine, U.S. (land view)Sunrise at 6:29 a.m. EDT (84.3 degrees ENE), with 57.89% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:32 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:09 a.m. EDT. Simulation.8. Drakes Island Beach, Maine, U.S. (ocean view)Simulation. Sunrise at 6:29 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 59.88% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:32 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:09 a.m. EDT. Simulation.USA, New Hampshire, Hampton Beach, summer traffic on Ocean Boulevard, elevated viewgettyBest Places In New Hampshire To See The Solar Eclipse 20259. Odiorne Point State Park, New Hampshire, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:29 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 57.12% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:32 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:09 a.m. EDT. Simulation.10. Rye Harbor State Park, New Hampshire, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:29 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 56.73% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:32 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:09 a.m. EDT. Simulation.11. Hampton Beach State Park, Hampton, New Hampshire, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:30 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 56.01% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:33 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:09 a.m. EDT. Simulation.Lifeguard stand at Nauset Beach on the Cape Cod National Seashore. (Photo by John Greim/LightRocket ... More via Getty Images)LightRocket via Getty ImagesBest Places In Massachusetts To See The Solar Eclipse 202512. Chandler-Hovey Park, Marblehead, Massachusetts, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:30 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 43.43% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:38 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:08 a.m. EDT. Simulation.13. Nahant (Long Beach), Nahant Beach, Nahant Short Beach and Lodge Park, Massachusetts, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:31 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 43.2% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:38 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:08 a.m. EDT. Simulation.14. Harbor Island Lookout, Deer Island, Massachusetts, U.S. (ocean view)Sunrise at 6:31 a.m. EDT (84.4 degrees ENE), with 42.8% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:38 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:07 a.m. EDT. Simulation.15. Nauset Light Beach, Head of the Meadow and Highland Beach, Cape Cod National Seashore, Massachusetts, U.S. (ocean view)Simulation. Sunrise at 6:27 a.m. EDT (84.5 degrees ENE), with 57% of its diameter obscured. The maximum eclipse will occur at 6:30 a.m. EDT, and the event will end at 7:12 a.m. EDT. Simulation.Note: This information is based on data from eclipse maps from Xavier Jubiers website and from Timeanddate.com. Readers are responsible for verifying local conditions, accessibility and visibility before planning their observation.Wishing you clear skies and wide eyes.
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  • When AI Takes Over Scientific Discovery
    www.forbes.com
    AI may be closer to doing original scientific research than we thinkgettyScience has always been a human endeavor, fueled by curiosity, creativity, and a stubborn willingness to question what others take for granted. But what happens when artificial intelligence begins to do the samenot just assisting human scientists, but independently designing experiments, analyzing data, and forming conclusions?That question became more than theoretical recently, when an AI system from Japans Sakana AI generated a hypothesis, designed experiments and wrote a peer-rerviewed scientific paper on its conclusions, all without human intervention.Titled Compositional Regularization: Unexpected Obstacles in Enhancing Neural Network Generalization, the paper was accepted as a Spotlight Paper at ICLR 2025, one of the fields most prestigious machine learning gatherings. In a quiet way, this event marked a threshold: AI had authored original research deemed worthy by its human peers.The Rise of the AI ScientistThe system, called AI Scientist-v2, is not just another language model. It is a fully autonomous research agent designed to automate the entire scientific process. Reviewers, unaware that the paper was AI-authored, scored it high enough for acceptance, placing it above nearly half of all submissions by humans.The implications are profound: a machine not only understood a research domain, but formulated questions, conducted experiments, wrote code, analyzed data, and expressed its findings clearly.The Promiseand the ProblemAt first glance, the achievement suggests we may be inching toward an intelligence explosion the point where AI not only helps with science, but drives it, adding to human knowledge faster than humans can themselves. Some, like former OpenAI researcher Leopold Aschenbrenner, believe this tipping point could come as early as 2027.But not everyone agrees.Yann LeCun, Metas Chief AI Scientist and a Turing Award winner, has long warned against mistaking pattern-matching for true intelligence. Current AI models cannot form the kind of mental models that underpin real-world reasoning or original discovery, he says.In other words, the AI Scientist-v2 may have written a research paper, but whether it understood what it was doing or just stitched together patterns from its training is still an open question.Sakanas Cautious BreakthroughTo their credit, Sakana.AI has treated this experiment as exactly that: an experiment. The company withdrew the paper before the conference, acknowledging the ethical gray zone it occupies.Nonetheless, as AI systems become more capable, they will increasingly play roles in scientific discovery. They are already amplifying the process, accelerating literature reviews, speeding up code development, and generating experiment designs in minutes instead of months.That, LeCun agrees, is the near-term future: AI as a powerful tool, not an autonomous genius.Beyond Imitation: Toward Original ThoughtSo is Compositional Regularization truly original research? In a narrow sense yes. The paper introduced a novel experimental setup, investigated a fresh angle on generalization, and was judged as worthy of presentation. Still, its findings were incremental, showing that its hypothesis failed. And in the broader philosophical sense, originality in science is not just about novelty; its about intuition, question-asking, and an ability to see beyond the data.LeCun likens this to the difference between solving a math problem and inventing a new branch of mathematics. The latter requires a system to understand the world, make predictions based on experience, and plan actions based on abstract goals. Those abilities, he argues, are still out of reach for AI.Still, the fact that a machine can imitate the form of scientific thought this well is not trivial. It raises the bar for whats possible. In the coming years, AI will likely generate hypotheses, automate lab work, and perhaps one day co-author Nobel-worthy research. But LeCuns caution reminds us: authorship does not imply understanding, and prediction is not the same as comprehension.The Road Ahead: Collaborative IntelligenceThe road forward may lie in hybrid intelligencewhere AI systems handle complexity and scale, while humans provide insight, ethics, and conceptual leaps. Sakana.AIs milestone is not the destination, but a waypoint on a longer journey toward reshaping how we do science.The Sakana AI experiments reignites the long-simmering discussion of whether AI will soon be optimizing its own architecture, refining its own reasoning capabilities, and accelerate the rate of discovery in ways we cannot yet predict. The AI Scientists success does not mean we are at that inflection pointbut it does suggest we may be closer than many people think.
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  • Arts Calendar: Happenings for the Week of March 23
    www.wsj.com
    Seth Rogen tries to save a struggling movie studio on Apple TV+, Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal star in Othello on Broadway, the Museum of Modern Art gives Jack Whitten his first retrospective, and more.
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  • Why you don't need to worry about 'over-potting' your plants
    www.newscientist.com
    LifeTraditional advice tells us to only move growing plants to a pot one size larger. The science shows that you don't need to bother with this slow transition, says James Wong 19 March 2025 A tomato plant finds a new homeGAP Photos/Gary SmithOld-School gardeners are notoriously suspicious of trendy new ideas in horticulture, and with good reason. Planty social media is often filled with claims so colourfully fact-free they would make the average well-being influencer blush. But before older growers like me get too smug, it is worth remembering that much of the best-established gardening advice, when actually put to the test, also turns out to be based on pretty shaky evidence. It is hard to find a better example of this than the widely held fear of over-potting. Let me explain.
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  • Tesla's stock is down for the ninth week in a row. BI readers got an early signal trouble was coming.
    www.businessinsider.com
    2025-03-23T10:41:01Z Read in app Getty Images; Emojipedia; Rebecca Zisser/BI This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now.Have an account? This post originally appeared in the BI Today newsletter.You can sign up for Business Insider's daily newsletter here.Welcome back to our Sunday edition, where we round up some of our top stories and take you inside our newsroom. Wonder what it was like to attend Nvidia's annual developer festival, where the party started with pancakes in the parking lot? Our reporter Emma Cosgrove was on the ground for the so-called "Super Bowl of AI."On the agenda today:Trump's taking aim at 20 Big Law firms but skipping over a GOP favorite.How wealthy investors keep bankrupting needy hospitals.Tech employees are getting the message: Playtime's over.JPMorgan shared its RTO plans for its largest office. Not everyone is enthusiastic.But first: What's next for Tesla?If this was forwarded to you, sign up here. Download Business Insider's app here.This week's dispatch Andrew Harnik via Getty Images Tesla's losing streakTesla's stock has yet to have a winning week since President Trump took office. BI readers got an early signal trouble was coming.Last month, Tesla investor Ross Gerber told our reporter Matthew Fox that the stock could decline as much as 50% in 2025. "He let it loose for like 20 minutes," Matthew told me about the call with Gerber. Shares have slipped about 20% since our story. Overall, the stock is down nine weeks in a row.There have been declining sales in Europe. Chinese rival BYD announced competing tech that it said can charge a car in five minutes. A downdraft in resale values. Consumer backlash over Musk's politics. Concerns about how much time Musk is spending on DOGE versus Tesla. Even Wall Street loyalists like Dan Ives started throwing shade.Despite the string of woes, Tesla has boosters in the government, including President Trump and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick. As Dakin Campbell reports, their Tesla promotion is becoming an ethics nightmare and it's not even working.The stock could certainly rubberband back. A Cantor Fitzgerald analyst offered seven potential catalysts tied to Tesla's business prospects in the next year or so. In a Thursday night all-hands, Musk demonstrated that he can get away with more than other CEOs. He urged employees not to sell their Tesla stock and won Ives over in the process.Gerber told us in a follow-up call earlier this month that he doesn't see a rebound in sight.Has the Tesla sell-off gone too far? Where is the stock headed next? Let me know what you think of our coverage at eic@businessinsider.com.Trump targets Big Law Getty Images; Jenny Chang-Rodriguez/BI The Trump administration sent letters to 20 of America's most prominent Big Law firms, questioning them over their diversity programs. One notable absence from the list is Jones Day, a GOP favorite that appears to have many of those same diversity programs.It's the latest instance of the president playing favorites with Big Law firms. Trump previously singled out Perkins Coie, Paul Weiss, and Covington & Burling, firms he believed wronged him politically in the past.Also read:Needy hospitals' cycle of pain Anson Chan for BI As Steward Health Care closed hospitals and cut corners on care, its top officers got richer, and the profits kept flowing to its private-equity owner Cerberus.Now, its bankruptcy reveals a deeper flaw in America's healthcare infrastructure. Facilities that have been plundered can only be sold to others who are likely to continue the plundering, Bethany McLean writes.Tech goes hardcore EThamPhoto/Getty, membio/Getty, katleho Seisa/Getty, Tyler Le/BI For years, tech employees enjoyed high salaries and swanky perks. But after the pandemic boom ended in 2022, the industry has drastically changed its tune.Silicon Valley has embraced Elon Musk's slash-and-burn tactics: Performance pressure, proclamations of "efficiency" and "intensity," and sweeping layoffs are the new norm. Employees across the industry told BI about the pressure to "do more with less."Inside JPMorgan's RTO plans JPMorgan Chase JPMorgan told workers at its Polaris campus in Columbus, Ohio which houses roughly 12,000 employees to return to the office five days a week, starting on April 21, per an internal memo viewed by BI.The memo also addressed the office's current lack of amenities by outlining plans to include offsite parking, a free shuttle service, and upgraded dining options. But Polaris employees who spoke to BI were unimpressed.This week's quote:"It felt like a special kind of cruelty." A former Meta employee who found out they were on the company's "do not hire" list told BI.More of this week's top reads:Why these federal workers regret voting for Trump: 'This is not The Apprentice.'AI agents are all the rage. But no one can agree on what they do.What Google's $32 billion Wiz acquisition means for startups and Trump.Bank of America targets a longstanding Wall Street tradition in its latest effort to address junior banker burnout.Microsoft is replacing its chief people officer as it rethinks performance reviews. Read CEO Satya Nadella's email.Here's how members of Congress actually get rich.America was enjoying a whiskey and bourbon revival. Trump's trade war is putting a stop to it.A Gen Xer's plan to earn $800K this year across 6 remote jobs: Hiring people to be him.The BI Today team: Dan DeFrancesco, deputy editor and anchor, in New York. Grace Lett, editor, in Chicago. Amanda Yen, associate editor, in New York. Lisa Ryan, executive editor, in New York. Elizabeth Casolo, fellow, in Chicago.
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  • I moved to Italy once at 20 and again at 30. The second time, I entered with a new approach that made all the difference.
    www.businessinsider.com
    2025-03-23T10:35:01Z Read in app Tricia Patras (shown here) learned how to immerse herself in Italian culture and stop feeling like a tourist. Courtesy of Tricia Patras This story is available exclusively to Business Insider subscribers. Become an Insider and start reading now.Have an account? I moved to Florence, Italy once when I was 20 and again at 30.The second time I moved, I found a way to immerse myself in Italian culture.It completely changed how I view Florence. I now feel like it's a place where I belong.I have had two major crises in my life, one at 20 and one at 30. Both times, I decided the only way to find myself out of them was to move to Florence, Italy.The first time I moved, I learned a lot about what to do, and what not to do. So, the second time around I was able to truly immerse myself into the Italian way of living.I now look at Florence as a place that I belong, instead of one I am searching to fit into. Here's what I did during my first trip and what I did differently the second time that made all the difference.My first tip to Italy just felt like I was visitingAt 20 years old, I was living in Chicago and had recently gone through some rough life events. I felt like I needed a change to regather what I wanted my future to look like. So, I took an opportunity to study Fashion Journalism in Florence.I had never been out of the country by myself before. I had never gone anywhere where I knew absolutely no one, let alone across the ocean. The first few days were a bit of a challenge.I stepped off the plane with my Italian translator book in one hand and map in the other. I struggled to explain my address to my Italian cab driver, but eventually made it to my new Italian apartment.I had brought three suitcases weighing about 70 pounds each, which I proceeded to move up five flights of stairs in the middle of the Tuscan summer heat. The apartment lacked air conditioning, and I was bombarded with mosquitos the first night (I got a mosquito net the next day).After a sweaty entrance and a few days of pushing through jetlag and starting school, I soon had my routine. Every morning, I would walk five minutes outside my door to my favorite coffee shop.I now had an espresso guy named Mario and was pleasantly surprised by how friendly people were. Most were charmed and patient when I attempted to ask for coffee in broken Italian.During my time in Italy, I went anywhere I could take a bus Rome, Venice, Lake Garda, the Swiss Alps, and Tuscany.Although I had a wonderful time, I felt like a naive tourist and left still feeling a tad lost like I hadn't found myself the way I'd wanted to.The second time around, feels almost like a completely different lifetime.The second time, I immersed myself in Italian cultureAt 30, I quit my job and decided it was time to take a year off and return to Florence.Although I was going back to school, yet again, a Creative Writing Residency program at Centro Italiano, I also was 10 years more mature. I wanted more than just fun and exploration. I wanted to use this time to dive into Italian culture.Some of the immediate changes I made were packing two suitcases instead of three, knowing I'd be purchasing an entire suitcase worth of Italian clothing.I also picked my apartment myself this time on HousingAnywhere, instead of having the school pick for me like before. I wanted to live in a more local neighborhood this time. I also asked for mosquito nets upon my arrival.I also didn't have built-in friends with my college program as I did at 20, so I was moving there completely alone. Within my first month, I hired a tutor to teach me Italian. This turned out to be my breakthrough.One Tuesday evening when I was sitting alone at dinner, an Italian party beside me sent me a glass of wine and asked me to join them. Thanks to my trusty tutoring, I managed to hold a conversation with a group of 12 Italians.After that, I started to frequent the local corner of the Arno River, San Frediano, more than the touristy sector of the city center. I went to discotechs and danced to popular Italian top hits instead of American ones.I even made friends with an Italian family that repeatedly invited me over for dinner in their Florentine home.I also traveled less. By the second half of the year, I was staying in Florence as much as possible. I didn't just use it as a travel hub this time I lived here like it was my home.I wanted to learn each curve of my local neighborhood streets and join my friends for a spontaneous hike to the hills.A year later, I'm now back in the states with a grander perspective on myself and my surroundings. Florence will always be the place that gave me that.
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  • How to play retro consoles on modern TVs and why you should Readers Feature
    metro.co.uk
    How to play retro consoles on modern TVs and why you should Readers FeatureGameCentralPublished March 23, 2025 9:00am Plug n play is still possible in 2025 (Michael Veal)A reader explains why he values the plug n play simplicity of the sixth generation of consoles and details the best way to play them with modern tech.The sixth generation of consoles which comprised the original Xbox, the PlayStation 2, and the GameCube is probably the generation that I have the fondest memories of. I was heavily into gaming back then. I regularly bought gaming magazines. I visited the high street at weekends and visited shops to look out for bargains and new releases. Most importantly I played games for hours in my free time.The quality and innovation of games definitely peaked, and you could say plateaued, during the generation that followed, but the sixth console generation was great because of its astonishing variety of games and genres. Game development wasnt as financially precarious as it is nowadays. There were more developers and publishers around and (especially on the PlayStation 2) there were games for every taste and possible market.Ive become dispirited with gaming these days, because its too involved. Modern consoles are just so needy. If youve only got a spare moment for some gaming you definitely dont want to be watching the progress of a download or an installation while your console updates itself for whatever reason.After waiting for your console to update, the game that you actually want to play might itself require a patch. Youre initially asked to log on too. And try not to forget your username and your password. With these hassles in mind I decided that I wanted to skip back at least a couple of decades to a time when video game consoles were a much more straightforward proposition.At various points during the sixth generation I owned all three of the main consoles. I should have kept them, but I sold my PlayStation 2 and GameCube. These days the only sixth generation console that I still own is the original Xbox.One snag with retro gaming is that older consoles arent compatible with modern televisions. Fortunately, there are lots of different HDMI adapters available to buy on the internet. I bought my HDMI adapter for the original Xbox from a company/seller called xdevpro-net on ebay. An adapter is needed for modern TVs (Michael Veal)The adapter arrived promptly with instructions and it proved easy to fit and doesnt require an extra power source. One end of the adapter plugs into your original Xbox. You plug an HDMI cable into the other end of the adapter and then you plug that HDMI cable into your TV.Everything worked well after I fitted the adapter and the games looked and sounded pretty good to me. I cant as yet figure out how to display full widescreen. Maybe you need a more expensive adapter or a better TV. My televisions cheap and fairly basic but I had short goes on Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy, Need for Speed: Most Wanted, and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and after a short time I wasnt bothered at all that the games werent fully widescreen.Graphical fidelity and framerate is important to some people but I dont mind if an old game looks a bit rough. Blocky graphics are part of the charm of retro gaming as far as Im concerned. First and foremost, I want to have fun with a game and the occasional visual glitch doesnt trouble me at all.More TrendingMy old Xbox is a bit scuffed and knackered. I bought the console years ago second-hand, so the machine has had quite a life. Thanks to the HDMI adapter that life isnt over yet. Playing this old machine again has made me appreciate its simplicity. The whole selling point of consoles is their simplicity. You want to switch your console on and just start playing. An HDMI adapter makes this ambition possible in 2025.By reader Michael Veal Psi-Ops: The Mindgate Conspiracy running on original hardware (Michael Veal)The readers features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro.You can submit your own 500 to 600-word reader feature at any time, which if used will be published in the next appropriate weekend slot. Just contact us at gamecentral@metro.co.uk or use our Submit Stuff page and you wont need to send an email.GameCentralSign up for exclusive analysis, latest releases, and bonus community content.This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. Your information will be used in line with our Privacy Policy
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  • Chicago-Sized Iceberg Hid Ancient Ecosystem, Scientists Reveal
    gizmodo.com
    Scientists scrutinizing the seafloor beneath a calving iceberg found a remarkable array of living creatures, switching up notions of how the giant chunks of ice affect their immediate environs. The scientists investigated a region of seafloor recently exposed by the calving of a gigantic icebergA-84which is as large as Chicago. The team found a surprisingly vibrant community of critters on the seafloor below where A-84 was once attached to an ice shelf attached to Antarctica. We didnt expect to find such a beautiful, thriving ecosystem, said Patricia Esquete, the expeditions co-chief scientist and a researcher at the University of Aveiro in Portugal, in a British Antarctic Survey release. Based on the size of the animals, the communities we observed have been there for decades, maybe even hundreds of years. Without the 197-square-mile (510-square-kilometer) iceberg in the way, the team was able to scrutinize the seafloor at depths of 4,265 feet (1,300 meters) using the remotely operated vehicle (ROV) SuBastian. The team found large corals and sponges supporting other lifeforms, including icefish, giant sea spiders, and octopus. The scientists who made the discovery were part of a team aboard the Schmidt Ocean Institutes R/V Falkor (too), a 363-foot-long (111-meter) vessel thats regularly revealing hidden details of life at the bottom of Earths oceans. The vessel has previously mapped unknown areas of the ocean floor and even captured the intimate breeding grounds of octopuses.With the icebergs covering the seafloor, organisms below the shelf cannot get nutrients for survival from the surface. The team hypothesized that ocean currents are a critical driver for life beneath the ice sheets. The team also collected data on the larger ice sheet, whose shrinking size spells concern for the animals that live beneath it. The ice loss from the Antarctic Ice Sheet is a major contributor to sea level rise worldwide, said the expeditions other co-chief scientist, Sasha Montelli, a researcher at University College London, in the same release. Our work is critical for providing longer-term context of these recent changes, improving our ability to make projections of future change projections that can inform actionable policies. We will undoubtedly make new discoveries as we continue to analyze this vital data.Though the ice shelf disappearing is worrying, it also creates an opportunity for scientists to explore an area that is otherwise even harder to access.ROV SuBastianandR/V Falkor (too) will almost certainly make new discoveries about extreme environments where life ekes out existence before their journeys are brought to an end.
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