The video game The Last of Us Part II is filled with unforgettable moments. Life or death decisions, big revelations, all of it. In our minds though, the best moment in the game, and we wrote about this when it came out, takes place in an empty, decrepit museum. Its a place where Joel (Pedro Pascal on the show) brings Ellie (Bella Ramsey on the show) for a very special present. A place we see briefly come to life in the latest trailer for The Last of Us season two, which starts April 13. Fans of the show may not have realized what they were seeing, but anyone whos played the game knew. Season two was remaking that scene. And it sounds like the wink was done very purposefully. In the trailer, you see Pedro and Bella both by the space capsule in the museum, Last of Us co-creator/executive producer Craig Mazin said at a recent press conference, in which io9 participated. That scene is the first thing that Neil [Druckmann, co-creator] ever showed me from The Last of Us Part 2. Its beautiful. And watching [Pascal and Ramsey] kind of inhabit that and make it their own was pretty spectacular. The explanation came after Mazin, Druckmann, and the cast were asked if there were any moments from the game they were excited to bring to life on the show. And while the museum was mentioned specifically, Mazin also mentioned something else. I dont want to say what it is, but there is a scene in the final episode of the season its quite impactful in the game, but there was this kind of evolution of it as we put it on film that kind of blows me away, he said. Whatever that scene is, we assume its a major spoiler. And, to be frank, explaining exactly what happens in the museum knowing audiences everywhere will now get to experience it on the show, would be a pretty big spoiler too. So we wont do that. But, again, you can read it about here, certainly watch it on YouTube somewhere, and see it soon when The Last of Us season two returns to HBO on April 13. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, whats next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.

Journalists often dream of finding the right government leaker who can share with them detailed information about the internal workings of the federal government. Few journalists would presume, however, that the ideal leaker might, in fact, be the head of the U.S. Armed Services. That appears to have been what happened, when the U.S. Secretary of Defense and former Fox News personality Pete Hegseth reportedly texted detailed operational war plans to the head editor of The Atlantic. The editor in chief of the magazine, Jeffrey Goldberg, detailed in a new piece how it appears he was accidentally added to a message group on Signal by someone in the Trump White House. That message thread appears to have included prominent members of the Trump cabinet, including Hegseth, Vice President J.D. Vance, Director of the CIA John Ratcliffe, director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, national security advisor Michael Waltz, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, among others. Worse, the chat involved detailed discussions of then upcoming strikes on Houthi rebels in Yemen, one of America and Israels key enemies in the Middle East. Goldberg sets the scene like so: The world found out shortly before 2 p.m. eastern time on March 15 that the United States was bombing Houthi targets across Yemen. I, however, knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing. Goldbergs story does not include the specifics of these operational plans, but it does include screenshots of the text message thread, including emojis apparently sent by high-level White House officials. It also appears to show the officials debating the timing of the attacks. When Vance reportedly brought up potential objections to the strike, Hegseth is alleged to have said the following: Waiting a few weeks or a month does not fundamentally change the calculus. 2 immediate risks on waiting: 1) this leaks, and we look indecisive; 2) Israel takes an action first or Gaza cease fire falls apart and we dont get to start this on our own terms. Or 3), you leak the news yourself and look like a total idiot. The alleged texts include other moronic gems, like Hegseths apparent promise to enforce 100% operational security (which typically involves keeping plans secret) for the war strategy. Allegedly, the U.S. Defense Secretary texted: We are prepared to execute, and if I had final go or no go vote, I believe we should. This [is] not about the Houthis. I see it as two things: 1) Restoring Freedom of Navigation, a core national interest; and 2) Reestablish deterrence, which Biden cratered. But, we can easily pause. And if we do, I will do all we can to enforce 100% OPSECI welcome other thoughts. Hegseth is also alleged to have texted Goldberg what appeared to be operational details of the plan to bomb Yemen that, had [they] been read by an adversary of the United States, could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel, particularly in the broader Middle East, Central Commands area of responsibility. These details included information about air strikes on Yemen, information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing.Because he knew the time that the attacks were scheduled to start, Goldberg then waited for news of the airstrikes to see if the information in the text message thread was solid. Sure enough, the news soon broke that Yemen had been bombed. Goldberg writes: If this Signal chat was real, I reasoned, Houthi targets would soon be bombed. At about 1:55, I checked X and searchedYemen. Explosions were then being heard across Sanaa, the capital city. The White House seems to have confirmed that all of this actually happened, having told The Atlantic that the message thread appears to be an authentic message chain, and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain. The spokesperson added that the thread was a demonstration of the deep and thoughtful policy coordination between senior officials. Gizmodo reached out to the White House for comment.The White House did not appear to note the questionable legality of the text chain itself. Because if true, this whole scenario could be deeply illegal. Goldberg writes: Conceivably, Waltz, by coordinating a national-security-related action over Signal, may have violated several provisions of the Espionage Act, which governs the handling of national defense information, according to several national-security lawyers interviewed by my colleague Shane Harris for this storyAll of these lawyers said that a U.S. official should not establish a Signal thread in the first place. Information about an active operation would presumably fit the laws definition of national defense information. The Signal app is not approved by the government for sharing classified information. This is surely not one of the last scandals that will befall the new Trump White House but it may be one of the dumbest, and its not great for American national security either.

Thanks to an innovative "depot injection approach from a team at MIT, long-lasting shots could become a lot less painful. Involving the injection of tiny, drug-delivering crystals suspended within a solvent, the teams method could deliver drugs with thinner needles, fewer injections, and a lot less pain overall.Describing the approach in a study in Nature Chemical Engineering, the team says that the method could work with contraceptives and other drugs that are taken consistently over time.We showed that we can have very controlled, sustained delivery, likely for multiple months and even years through a small needle, said Giovanni Traverso, the senior study author and a mechanical engineering professor at MIT, according to a press release. Drug Delivery in Slow, Steady ShotsA depot injection is a type of shot that releases a drug slowly and steadily over time. While other depot injections have been developed to solidify into drug deposits beneath the skin, the polymers that are added to these shots to allow them to solidify add to their bulk, comprising around 23 percent to 98 percent of their overall weight. This requires them to be injected through thicker needles that are difficult for patients to tolerate.To develop a better alternative, the MIT team devised a shot that could be delivered through a thinner needle and still last for at least three months. Working with a contraceptive drug that transforms into crystals suspended in a solvent, the shot could solidify into a drug deposit beneath the skin without the need of large amounts of polymers, allowing it to be injected through thinner, more tolerable needles. The method could expand patients options for contraception, providing them with a lot of different formats for contraception that are easy to administer, said Vivian Feig, a lead study author and a former MIT postdoc, according to the release. Not only that; the approach could also provide patients with more drug delivery options for other drugs that are administered over time, including long-lasting drugs for HIV and tuberculosis. Developing Drug Delivery OptionsAccording to the team, the trick to the shot was the combination of the crystalline contraceptive levonorgestrel and the solvent benzyl benzoate. By adding tiny crystals of this contraceptive to this solvent, the team created a shot that could assemble into a solid drug deposit after injection without large additions of polymers.The solvent is critical because it allows you to inject the fluid through a small needle, but once in place, the crystals self-assemble into a drug depot, Traverso said in the release.By adjusting the density of the deposit with only a small addition of polymers (no more than 1.6 percent of the shots overall weight), the researchers found that they could control the rate of the drugs release throughout the body, still without requiring a thicker needle. This demonstrates the tunability of our system, which can be engineered to accommodate a broader range of contraceptive needs as well as tailored dosing regimens for other therapeutic applications, said Sanghyun Park, another lead study author and a MIT graduate student, in the release.Though the approach has not been tested in humans, studies in rats show that the drug deposits stick around for at least three months beneath the skin. At that point, around 85 percent of the drug is still sitting in the depots an amount that indicates that these deposits could last for more than a year, Park said in the release.Additional animal studies are already underway to determine whether the method is fit for human testing, whether as a delivery method for contraceptives or for other long-lasting drugs. Is it contraception? Is it others? These are some of the things that were starting to look into as part of the next steps toward translation to humans, Traverso added in the release.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Nature Chemical Engineering. Self-Aggregating Long-Acting Injectable MicrocrystalsSam Walters is a journalist covering archaeology, paleontology, ecology, and evolution for Discover, along with an assortment of other topics. Before joining the Discover team as an assistant editor in 2022, Sam studied journalism at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.

As concerns over Earths limited resources continue to grow, some entrepreneurs are eagerly looking beyond our planet to establish the next big business venture: asteroid mining. The prospect of setting up mining operations in space holds the potential for enticing rewards of rare metals that cant be easily found on Earth.However, these projects face an uphill climb. Asteroid mining missions may cost upwards of billions of dollars, and the technology theyd need to rely on requires further development. Still, several companies have envisioned ambitious plans to acquire precious resources from asteroids in the coming years. Scientists, meanwhile, are interested in another objective: mining for water and organic molecules to furnish future space missions.The Three Types of AsteroidsThree main types of asteroids populate space, all with varying contents and classified based on the way light reflects off their surfaces.The most common are C-type asteroids, made of clay and silicate rocks and darker in appearance. C-type asteroids are carbonaceous meaning they are abundant in organic carbon and they additionally contain water. While these asteroids arent the most lucrative, the presence of water and carbon could play a major role in supporting space exploration.S-type asteroids are somewhat brighter and contain silicate and metals like iron, nickel, and cobalt. They also contain much smaller concentrations of platinum and gold, making them more economically desirable than C-type asteroids.The rarest among the three are M-type asteroids, which are metallic, containing a much larger concentration of iron-nickel compared to the other two asteroid types. Upcoming Plans for Asteroid MiningSeveral companies have already gotten a head start in preparing for asteroid mining missions.London-based company Asteroid Mining Corporation plans to send its SCAR-E robot to the moon in a future mission headed by Tokyo-based iSpace. The six-legged robot will trek across craters on the lunar terrain and demonstrate its potential application for asteroid mining.California-based company AstroForge, also throwing its hat in the ring, launched its Odin spacecraft as a payload of the IM-2 lunar mission in February 2025, hoping to fly by 2022 OB5, a near-Earth asteroid. However, the company announced in early March that it had lost communication with Odin. It will get a fresh chance with its next spacecraft, Vestri, which is slated to launch on the IM-3 lunar mission in late 2025.What Lies Ahead in the Space Mining RaceDespite the high price tag of asteroid mining missions, the payoff may just be worth the staggering costs. Mining the top 10 most cost-effective asteroids largely based on how close they are to Earth could rake in a profit of $1.5 trillion, according to Asterank, a database keeping track of over 600,000 asteroids.NASA has proven that successful extraction of materials from asteroids is possible; this was most recently seen with the promising results of its OSIRIS-REx mission, which retrieved samples containing organic compounds from Bennu, a carbonaceous asteroid. Scientists are also eyeing the metallic asteroid 16 Psyche, which will be orbited by NASAs Psyche spacecraft starting from 2029 to 2031.Near-earth asteroids will be in the limelight as space mining gains traction, yet looking to the 2030s and beyond, companies may eventually want to explore the Main Belt asteroids between Mars and Jupiter. These asteroids would yield more valuable resources than the ones closer to Earth, yet getting to the Main Belt will be a real challenge that can't be tackled yet.It may be possible, though, to someday launch asteroid mining missions from Mars orbit, as suggested by a 2022 study in Planetary and Space Science. In this study, researchers claim that a station that has an orbit similar to Phobos, a moon of Mars, could be an ideal base of operations, potentially reducing exploration costs and granting easier access to the Main Belt. For now, the race to mine asteroids near Earth is building tremendous speed. While the outcomes aren't certain, this could become a lucrative industry of the future; it may even start to drive companies away from deep-sea mining, potentially introducing both economic and environmental benefits.Article SourcesOur writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:Harvard International Review. Economics of the Stars: The Future of Asteroid Mining and the Global Economy NASA. PsycheCenter for Astrophysics. Mars as a Base for Asteroid Exploration and MiningPlanetary and Space Science. Phobos and Mars orbit as a base for asteroid exploration and miningJack Knudson is an assistant editor at Discover with a strong interest in environmental science and history. Before joining Discover in 2023, he studied journalism at the Scripps College of Communication at Ohio University and previously interned at Recycling Today magazine.

Nature, Published online: 24 March 2025; doi:10.1038/d41586-025-00921-7Juan Ramn Fernndez Cardenete tends the Alhambras many water features and gardens.

Nature, Published online: 24 March 2025; doi:10.1038/d41586-025-00859-wSeveral high-profile incidents in the past month have scientists on edge.

The Extremely Large Telescope will revolutionize our view of the cosmos when it sees first light in Chile in 2028. In fact, it could detect hints of alien life around our closest neighboring star system in its first night of operations, new simulations suggest.

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View this post on InstagramA post shared by liutong2757 (@liutong2757)3D artist Tong Liu created a 3D portrait of a beautiful woman, and these renders could fool you into believing she was real.There are two versions of the model: made in Unreal Engine 5 and Maya, with the former a bit more colorful. The clothes were made using Style3D Atelier, and the UE take benefited from Substance 3D Painter.The skin, hair, and facial structure were tackled immaculately to create the Ava Fox we can see on the artists ArtStation and Instagram along with other 3D characters.Which one is your favorite? Join our80 Level Talent platformand ournew Discord server, follow us onInstagram,Twitter,LinkedIn,Telegram,TikTok, andThreads,where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.Source link The post Stunning Realistic 3D Portrait of Mysterious Woman appeared first on CG SHARES.

In this video, Javad Rajabzade, renowned for his skill in creating highly realistic 3D props and materials, guides you through the process of texturing a glass perfume bottle in Substance 3D Painter, focusing on translucency and absorption colors, and demonstrates how to set up your textures in Marmoset Toolbag.As always, Javad utilizes his own custom tools,Ultimate Glass Smart Materials,Broken Glass Generator Tool, andOrnament Path Tool, available for purchase, so you can follow along.Javad RajabzadeJavad RajabzadeJavad RajabzadeWe also recommend checking out Javads latest tutorials ontexturing a leather bag and weathered wooden barrel:Be sure to visit Javad Rajabzades YouTube channelfor more videos on texturing, like thisrealistic glass jar, Dune-inspired sand, organic surfaces, and more:He also offers a variety of custom tools on hisArtStation, including theseprocedural tools that automatically wrap plastic tape, bandages, and leather around your models:Join our80 Level Talent platformand ournew Discord server, follow us onInstagram,Twitter,LinkedIn,Telegram,TikTok, andThreads, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.Source link The post Tutorial: Texturing & Rendering Glass Perfume Bottle In Substance 3D & Marmoset Toolbag appeared first on CG SHARES.