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2025-06-01 16:15:32 ·

Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture

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By Robert Jan van PeltThe largest artifact in the touring exhibition Auschwitz. Not Long Ago. Not Far Away., currently on display at the ROM in Toronto, is a wooden barracks building. It’s from the Auschwitz-Monowitz camp, a satellite to Auschwitz created to provide slave labour to the IG Farben corporation for the construction of a synthetic rubber factory.
The discovery of a sister building, back in 2012, led exhibition chief curator and architectural historian Robert Jan van Pelt, University Professor at the Waterloo School of Architecture, on a research journey to write a comprehensive history of the barracks—temporary buildings that have not only housed prisoners, but also provided shelter for military servicemen and women, refugees, and natural disaster survivors. “Many people have experienced, for shorter or longer time periods, life in a barrack, and for all of them it represented life on the edge, for better or worse,” writes Van Pelt.
Worm’s eye axonometric of Renkioi Hospital Barrack, a prefabricated hospital designed by Ismabard Kingdom Brunel for a site in Turkey, 1857.
Van Pelt’s book criss-crosses with ease through architectural history, military history, and the history of medicine—all of which played crucial roles in the evolving development of this seemingly simple building type. The book is arranged in a dozen episodes, with the barrack at the centre of each, serving as an anchor point for unfolding the rich intellectual and historical context shaping the way these structures were developed and deployed. The book is richly illustrated with archival materials—a feat in itself, given that the documentation for temporary buildings, particularly before 1900, is scarce. These drawings, photos, and paintings are supplemented with 20 worm’s eye views of key buildings, carefully composed by a team of Waterloo architecture school students and alumni.
Thomas Thomaszoon, View of the headquarters of the Spanish in the Huis tea Kleef during the siege of Haarlem, 1572-73. Collection of Noord-Hollands Archief, Haarlem; courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt
Like many vernacular buildings, temporary structures larger than a tent, designed to house soldiers in the field, have existed at least since Ancient Rome. One of the first visual accounts of barracks came centuries later, in the winter of 1572, when the Spanish laid siege to the Dutch city of Haarlem, and cartographer Thomas Thomaszoon sketched the position of dozens of Spain’s wood-and-straw structures outside the city. The siege was successful, but only a few years later, the Dutch Republic gained the upper hand. As part of the creation of a standing army, they began to develop more precise instructions for the layout of camps, including the construction of temporary barracks.
Antoine-François Omet des Foucaux, Barrack constructed in Hendaye, France, 1793. From Jean-Charles Krafft, Plans, coupes et élévations de diverses productions de l’art de la charpente, 1805. Collection of Bilbliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt
The Napoleonic army made use of barracks in both military camps and training camps; by the mid-1800s, the construction of various barrack types was detailed in field construction manuals issued to officers in many European armies.
During the Crimean War, over 3,500 prefabricated barracks were manufactured in a Gloucester factory, as a solution to the appalling conditions at the front. But when the structures arrived at port, British forces were not able to unload and erect them—the materials for a single building weighed more than two tons, and each would require 60 horsesto transport to camp on the muddy roads.
The USArmy’s Lincoln Hospital, Washington, DC, 1865. Collection of Library of Congress, Washington, DC. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt
Prefabrication was also used, with somewhat more success, towards the end of the conflict to erect field hospitals designed by British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel with a priority on cross-ventilation to limit the spread of disease. Low mortality rates from similar structures led to a continued preference for “barrack hospitals” based on groupings of low-slung, well-ventilated pavilions, rather than conceived as single grand structures. The model was further refined with the addition of primitive underfloor heating and ridge ventilation by former surgeon William A. Hammond for the Union Army during the American Civil War.
Barrack hospitals were constructed for civilian use, as well. Following the conclusion of the Franco-Prussian war, such designs were built to house patients with infectious diseases in Berlin and proposed as a means to bring professional medical care to Germany’s rural areas. A barracks-inspired hospital was built in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in 1889, and continues to be operational.
If the barrack as an accommodation for the sick is a progressive tale, the 19th-century history of the barrack is equally checkered by the building type’s use for prisoner accommodation, including in the penal colonies of Australia and French Guiana. In North America, barracks were used in an internment camp for Native American Dakotas, and Civil War-era Union barracks at Camp Douglas were used to house Confederate prisoners. The oldest preserved barrack in the world may be in Canada, at Grosse Isle national park. Here, barrack-style quarantine sheds were used to detain thousands of Irish immigrant families during the typhoid fever epidemic of 1846-47, and their damp, fetid conditions contributed to many deaths—an episode Van Pelt describes as a “blot on the national consciousness of Canada.”
A single Doecker Hut contains an operation room, pharmacy and hospital management office. The prefabricated, portable hospitals were developed in 1885, and used around the world, including in the First World War. In America, they were marketed for managing epidemics in the wake of the 1892 typhus fever outbreak in New York. Courtesy Berlin State Library and Robert Jan van Pelt

At the turn of the 19th century, the prefabricated portable barrack came to the fore with the manufacturing of the Doecker barracks, by Christoph & Unmack, a firm based in Copenhagen and Germany. Developed by a former military officer-turned-tentmaker, the technically sophisticated model used large rectangular frames that could be clipped together, and covered with “felt-cardboard”—dense felt pressed onto canvas and impregnated with linseed oil. The self-supporting structures proved easy to set up, dismount, and transport, making them suitable for both military applications—and, with little modification, for humanitarian aid. The Red Cross deployed Doecker barracks for use as field hospitals in Manchuria and Yokohama during the Russo-Japanese War.
The Barrack, 1572-1914 wraps up in in the early 20th century, but with the note that in the ensuing decades until 1945, millions of barracks were produced by many of the world’s major nations—and that most of these were erected in barbed-wire-ringed compounds. “This is the period in which tens if not hundreds of millions of people, many of whom were civilians, were forced to live in barracks, as refugees, as expellees, as civilian internees, as forced laborers, as prisoners or war, as concentration camp prisoners, and as people made homeless by the destruction wrought by war,” writes Van Pelt. Up until 1914, he notes, this building type largely carried a sense of achievement—an image that would change sharply with the Age of the Camps. But although a WWII barrack was responsible for instigating Van Pelt’s initial investigation, that time period will need to await a second volume on this simple building type with a rich, complex, and complicated history.

As appeared in the June 2025 issue of Canadian Architect magazine

The post Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture appeared first on Canadian Architect.
#book #review #barrack #15721914chapters #history

Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture
Version 1.0.0 By Robert Jan van PeltThe largest artifact in the touring exhibition Auschwitz. Not Long Ago. Not Far Away., currently on display at the ROM in Toronto, is a wooden barracks building. It’s from the Auschwitz-Monowitz camp, a satellite to Auschwitz created to provide slave labour to the IG Farben corporation for the construction of a synthetic rubber factory. The discovery of a sister building, back in 2012, led exhibition chief curator and architectural historian Robert Jan van Pelt, University Professor at the Waterloo School of Architecture, on a research journey to write a comprehensive history of the barracks—temporary buildings that have not only housed prisoners, but also provided shelter for military servicemen and women, refugees, and natural disaster survivors. “Many people have experienced, for shorter or longer time periods, life in a barrack, and for all of them it represented life on the edge, for better or worse,” writes Van Pelt. Worm’s eye axonometric of Renkioi Hospital Barrack, a prefabricated hospital designed by Ismabard Kingdom Brunel for a site in Turkey, 1857. Van Pelt’s book criss-crosses with ease through architectural history, military history, and the history of medicine—all of which played crucial roles in the evolving development of this seemingly simple building type. The book is arranged in a dozen episodes, with the barrack at the centre of each, serving as an anchor point for unfolding the rich intellectual and historical context shaping the way these structures were developed and deployed. The book is richly illustrated with archival materials—a feat in itself, given that the documentation for temporary buildings, particularly before 1900, is scarce. These drawings, photos, and paintings are supplemented with 20 worm’s eye views of key buildings, carefully composed by a team of Waterloo architecture school students and alumni. Thomas Thomaszoon, View of the headquarters of the Spanish in the Huis tea Kleef during the siege of Haarlem, 1572-73. Collection of Noord-Hollands Archief, Haarlem; courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt Like many vernacular buildings, temporary structures larger than a tent, designed to house soldiers in the field, have existed at least since Ancient Rome. One of the first visual accounts of barracks came centuries later, in the winter of 1572, when the Spanish laid siege to the Dutch city of Haarlem, and cartographer Thomas Thomaszoon sketched the position of dozens of Spain’s wood-and-straw structures outside the city. The siege was successful, but only a few years later, the Dutch Republic gained the upper hand. As part of the creation of a standing army, they began to develop more precise instructions for the layout of camps, including the construction of temporary barracks. Antoine-François Omet des Foucaux, Barrack constructed in Hendaye, France, 1793. From Jean-Charles Krafft, Plans, coupes et élévations de diverses productions de l’art de la charpente, 1805. Collection of Bilbliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt The Napoleonic army made use of barracks in both military camps and training camps; by the mid-1800s, the construction of various barrack types was detailed in field construction manuals issued to officers in many European armies. During the Crimean War, over 3,500 prefabricated barracks were manufactured in a Gloucester factory, as a solution to the appalling conditions at the front. But when the structures arrived at port, British forces were not able to unload and erect them—the materials for a single building weighed more than two tons, and each would require 60 horsesto transport to camp on the muddy roads. The USArmy’s Lincoln Hospital, Washington, DC, 1865. Collection of Library of Congress, Washington, DC. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt Prefabrication was also used, with somewhat more success, towards the end of the conflict to erect field hospitals designed by British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel with a priority on cross-ventilation to limit the spread of disease. Low mortality rates from similar structures led to a continued preference for “barrack hospitals” based on groupings of low-slung, well-ventilated pavilions, rather than conceived as single grand structures. The model was further refined with the addition of primitive underfloor heating and ridge ventilation by former surgeon William A. Hammond for the Union Army during the American Civil War. Barrack hospitals were constructed for civilian use, as well. Following the conclusion of the Franco-Prussian war, such designs were built to house patients with infectious diseases in Berlin and proposed as a means to bring professional medical care to Germany’s rural areas. A barracks-inspired hospital was built in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in 1889, and continues to be operational. If the barrack as an accommodation for the sick is a progressive tale, the 19th-century history of the barrack is equally checkered by the building type’s use for prisoner accommodation, including in the penal colonies of Australia and French Guiana. In North America, barracks were used in an internment camp for Native American Dakotas, and Civil War-era Union barracks at Camp Douglas were used to house Confederate prisoners. The oldest preserved barrack in the world may be in Canada, at Grosse Isle national park. Here, barrack-style quarantine sheds were used to detain thousands of Irish immigrant families during the typhoid fever epidemic of 1846-47, and their damp, fetid conditions contributed to many deaths—an episode Van Pelt describes as a “blot on the national consciousness of Canada.” A single Doecker Hut contains an operation room, pharmacy and hospital management office. The prefabricated, portable hospitals were developed in 1885, and used around the world, including in the First World War. In America, they were marketed for managing epidemics in the wake of the 1892 typhus fever outbreak in New York. Courtesy Berlin State Library and Robert Jan van Pelt At the turn of the 19th century, the prefabricated portable barrack came to the fore with the manufacturing of the Doecker barracks, by Christoph & Unmack, a firm based in Copenhagen and Germany. Developed by a former military officer-turned-tentmaker, the technically sophisticated model used large rectangular frames that could be clipped together, and covered with “felt-cardboard”—dense felt pressed onto canvas and impregnated with linseed oil. The self-supporting structures proved easy to set up, dismount, and transport, making them suitable for both military applications—and, with little modification, for humanitarian aid. The Red Cross deployed Doecker barracks for use as field hospitals in Manchuria and Yokohama during the Russo-Japanese War. The Barrack, 1572-1914 wraps up in in the early 20th century, but with the note that in the ensuing decades until 1945, millions of barracks were produced by many of the world’s major nations—and that most of these were erected in barbed-wire-ringed compounds. “This is the period in which tens if not hundreds of millions of people, many of whom were civilians, were forced to live in barracks, as refugees, as expellees, as civilian internees, as forced laborers, as prisoners or war, as concentration camp prisoners, and as people made homeless by the destruction wrought by war,” writes Van Pelt. Up until 1914, he notes, this building type largely carried a sense of achievement—an image that would change sharply with the Age of the Camps. But although a WWII barrack was responsible for instigating Van Pelt’s initial investigation, that time period will need to await a second volume on this simple building type with a rich, complex, and complicated history. As appeared in the June 2025 issue of Canadian Architect magazine The post Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture appeared first on Canadian Architect. #book #review #barrack #15721914chapters #history

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Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture

Version 1.0.0 By Robert Jan van Pelt (Park Books, 2025) The largest artifact in the touring exhibition Auschwitz. Not Long Ago. Not Far Away., currently on display at the ROM in Toronto, is a wooden barracks building. It’s from the Auschwitz-Monowitz camp, a satellite to Auschwitz created to provide slave labour to the IG Farben corporation for the construction of a synthetic rubber factory. The discovery of a sister building, back in 2012, led exhibition chief curator and architectural historian Robert Jan van Pelt, University Professor at the Waterloo School of Architecture, on a research journey to write a comprehensive history of the barracks—temporary buildings that have not only housed prisoners, but also provided shelter for military servicemen and women, refugees, and natural disaster survivors. “Many people have experienced, for shorter or longer time periods, life in a barrack, and for all of them it represented life on the edge, for better or worse,” writes Van Pelt. Worm’s eye axonometric of Renkioi Hospital Barrack, a prefabricated hospital designed by Ismabard Kingdom Brunel for a site in Turkey, 1857. Van Pelt’s book criss-crosses with ease through architectural history, military history, and the history of medicine—all of which played crucial roles in the evolving development of this seemingly simple building type. The book is arranged in a dozen episodes, with the barrack at the centre of each, serving as an anchor point for unfolding the rich intellectual and historical context shaping the way these structures were developed and deployed. The book is richly illustrated with archival materials—a feat in itself, given that the documentation for temporary buildings, particularly before 1900, is scarce. These drawings, photos, and paintings are supplemented with 20 worm’s eye views of key buildings, carefully composed by a team of Waterloo architecture school students and alumni. Thomas Thomaszoon, View of the headquarters of the Spanish in the Huis tea Kleef during the siege of Haarlem, 1572-73. Collection of Noord-Hollands Archief, Haarlem; courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt Like many vernacular buildings, temporary structures larger than a tent, designed to house soldiers in the field, have existed at least since Ancient Rome. One of the first visual accounts of barracks came centuries later, in the winter of 1572, when the Spanish laid siege to the Dutch city of Haarlem, and cartographer Thomas Thomaszoon sketched the position of dozens of Spain’s wood-and-straw structures outside the city. The siege was successful, but only a few years later, the Dutch Republic gained the upper hand. As part of the creation of a standing army, they began to develop more precise instructions for the layout of camps, including the construction of temporary barracks. Antoine-François Omet des Foucaux, Barrack constructed in Hendaye, France, 1793. From Jean-Charles Krafft, Plans, coupes et élévations de diverses productions de l’art de la charpente, 1805. Collection of Bilbliothèque Nationale de France, Paris. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt The Napoleonic army made use of barracks in both military camps and training camps; by the mid-1800s, the construction of various barrack types was detailed in field construction manuals issued to officers in many European armies. During the Crimean War (1853-56), over 3,500 prefabricated barracks were manufactured in a Gloucester factory, as a solution to the appalling conditions at the front. But when the structures arrived at port, British forces were not able to unload and erect them—the materials for a single building weighed more than two tons, and each would require 60 horses (or 150 men) to transport to camp on the muddy roads. The US (Union) Army’s Lincoln Hospital, Washington, DC, 1865. Collection of Library of Congress, Washington, DC. Courtesy Robert Jan van Pelt Prefabrication was also used, with somewhat more success, towards the end of the conflict to erect field hospitals designed by British engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel with a priority on cross-ventilation to limit the spread of disease. Low mortality rates from similar structures led to a continued preference for “barrack hospitals” based on groupings of low-slung, well-ventilated pavilions, rather than conceived as single grand structures. The model was further refined with the addition of primitive underfloor heating and ridge ventilation by former surgeon William A. Hammond for the Union Army during the American Civil War (1861-65). Barrack hospitals were constructed for civilian use, as well. Following the conclusion of the Franco-Prussian war (1870-71), such designs were built to house patients with infectious diseases in Berlin and proposed as a means to bring professional medical care to Germany’s rural areas. A barracks-inspired hospital was built in Saint Petersburg, Russia, in 1889, and continues to be operational. If the barrack as an accommodation for the sick is a progressive tale, the 19th-century history of the barrack is equally checkered by the building type’s use for prisoner accommodation, including in the penal colonies of Australia and French Guiana. In North America, barracks were used in an internment camp for Native American Dakotas, and Civil War-era Union barracks at Camp Douglas were used to house Confederate prisoners. The oldest preserved barrack in the world may be in Canada, at Grosse Isle national park. Here, barrack-style quarantine sheds were used to detain thousands of Irish immigrant families during the typhoid fever epidemic of 1846-47, and their damp, fetid conditions contributed to many deaths—an episode Van Pelt describes as a “blot on the national consciousness of Canada.” A single Doecker Hut contains an operation room, pharmacy and hospital management office. The prefabricated, portable hospitals were developed in 1885, and used around the world, including in the First World War. In America, they were marketed for managing epidemics in the wake of the 1892 typhus fever outbreak in New York. Courtesy Berlin State Library and Robert Jan van Pelt At the turn of the 19th century, the prefabricated portable barrack came to the fore with the manufacturing of the Doecker barracks, by Christoph & Unmack, a firm based in Copenhagen and Germany. Developed by a former military officer-turned-tentmaker, the technically sophisticated model used large rectangular frames that could be clipped together, and covered with “felt-cardboard”—dense felt pressed onto canvas and impregnated with linseed oil. The self-supporting structures proved easy to set up, dismount, and transport, making them suitable for both military applications—and, with little modification, for humanitarian aid. The Red Cross deployed Doecker barracks for use as field hospitals in Manchuria and Yokohama during the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05). The Barrack, 1572-1914 wraps up in in the early 20th century, but with the note that in the ensuing decades until 1945, millions of barracks were produced by many of the world’s major nations—and that most of these were erected in barbed-wire-ringed compounds. “This is the period in which tens if not hundreds of millions of people, many of whom were civilians, were forced to live in barracks, as refugees, as expellees, as civilian internees, as forced laborers, as prisoners or war, as concentration camp prisoners, and as people made homeless by the destruction wrought by war,” writes Van Pelt. Up until 1914, he notes, this building type largely carried a sense of achievement—an image that would change sharply with the Age of the Camps. But although a WWII barrack was responsible for instigating Van Pelt’s initial investigation, that time period will need to await a second volume on this simple building type with a rich, complex, and complicated history. As appeared in the June 2025 issue of Canadian Architect magazine The post Book Review: The Barrack, 1572-1914—Chapters in the History of Emergency Architecture appeared first on Canadian Architect.

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2025-06-01 15:57:50 ·

Netflix Tudum 2025: Everything Announced

Netflix Tudum 2025 has begun and promises to reveal a ton of exciting details about the most-anticipated shows and movie heading to the streamer in the future, including Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's release date and Squid Game's Season 3 trailer.There will be a ton of announcements during the Netflix Tudum 2025 livestream, and we'll be gathering all the big new right here as it happens, so make sure to stay tuned and refresh often!Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery Release Date RevealedRian Johnson's Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's latest teaser trailer not only revealed more about Benoit Blanc's latest adventure, but it also shared it will arrive on Netflix on December 12, 2025.We don't know much about this new mystery yet, but Blanc himself has described this as his "most dangerous case yet." What we do know is that Daniel Craig's Blanc will be joined by Josh O'Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, and Thomas Haden Church.Squid Game Season 3 Trailer Teases the Final GamesSquid Game Season 3 is set to debut on Netflix on June 27, and Tudum shared with the world a new trailer that showcases what these final games have in in store for Lee Jung-jae's Gi-hun and more. “The new season will focus on what Gi-hun can and will do after all his efforts fail,” series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk said. "He is in utter despair after losing everything and watching all his efforts go in vain. The story then takes an interesting turn, questioning whether Gi-hun can overcome his shame and rise again to prove that values of humanity — like conscience and kindness — can exist in the arena.” Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein Gets a Teaser Trailer That Shows Off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the 'Misbegotten Creature He's Created'Academy Award winner Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein, which is an adaptation of Mary Shelley's iconic novel, got a new teaser trailer that shows off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the "misbegotten creaturehe's created." Alongside a glimpse at these film that will be released in November, fans of del Toro's work will note "plenty of familiar imagery in the new teaser, from Isaac’s Victor standing on a decaying staircase holding a candelabrato a blood-red angelic figure surrounded in flames. One Piece Season 2 Trailer Reveals the First Look at Tony Tony ChopperThe latest trailer for Season 2 of One Piece has arrived and it has given us our first look at Tony Tony Chopper, who is voiced by Mikaela Hoover. For those unfamiliar, Chopper is a blue-nosed reindeer-boy hybrid and is able to treat various illnesses and wants to travel the world and cure all the diseases that pop up. “What excited me about playing Chopper is the tug of war between his standoffishness and his huge heart,” Hoover told Tudum. “He tries so hard to hide his emotions and put on a tough exterior, but underneath, he’s a big softy, and his love can’t help but come out.“I believe there is a little Chopper in all of us,” she adds. “We all want to be loved and accepted. We go to great lengths to keep the people that we love safe. There’s a purity to his nature that reminds us of what’s good in the world.”Developing...
#netflix #tudum #everything #announced

Netflix Tudum 2025: Everything Announced
Netflix Tudum 2025 has begun and promises to reveal a ton of exciting details about the most-anticipated shows and movie heading to the streamer in the future, including Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's release date and Squid Game's Season 3 trailer.There will be a ton of announcements during the Netflix Tudum 2025 livestream, and we'll be gathering all the big new right here as it happens, so make sure to stay tuned and refresh often!Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery Release Date RevealedRian Johnson's Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's latest teaser trailer not only revealed more about Benoit Blanc's latest adventure, but it also shared it will arrive on Netflix on December 12, 2025.We don't know much about this new mystery yet, but Blanc himself has described this as his "most dangerous case yet." What we do know is that Daniel Craig's Blanc will be joined by Josh O'Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, and Thomas Haden Church.Squid Game Season 3 Trailer Teases the Final GamesSquid Game Season 3 is set to debut on Netflix on June 27, and Tudum shared with the world a new trailer that showcases what these final games have in in store for Lee Jung-jae's Gi-hun and more. “The new season will focus on what Gi-hun can and will do after all his efforts fail,” series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk said. "He is in utter despair after losing everything and watching all his efforts go in vain. The story then takes an interesting turn, questioning whether Gi-hun can overcome his shame and rise again to prove that values of humanity — like conscience and kindness — can exist in the arena.” Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein Gets a Teaser Trailer That Shows Off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the 'Misbegotten Creature He's Created'Academy Award winner Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein, which is an adaptation of Mary Shelley's iconic novel, got a new teaser trailer that shows off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the "misbegotten creaturehe's created." Alongside a glimpse at these film that will be released in November, fans of del Toro's work will note "plenty of familiar imagery in the new teaser, from Isaac’s Victor standing on a decaying staircase holding a candelabrato a blood-red angelic figure surrounded in flames. One Piece Season 2 Trailer Reveals the First Look at Tony Tony ChopperThe latest trailer for Season 2 of One Piece has arrived and it has given us our first look at Tony Tony Chopper, who is voiced by Mikaela Hoover. For those unfamiliar, Chopper is a blue-nosed reindeer-boy hybrid and is able to treat various illnesses and wants to travel the world and cure all the diseases that pop up. “What excited me about playing Chopper is the tug of war between his standoffishness and his huge heart,” Hoover told Tudum. “He tries so hard to hide his emotions and put on a tough exterior, but underneath, he’s a big softy, and his love can’t help but come out.“I believe there is a little Chopper in all of us,” she adds. “We all want to be loved and accepted. We go to great lengths to keep the people that we love safe. There’s a purity to his nature that reminds us of what’s good in the world.”Developing... #netflix #tudum #everything #announced

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Netflix Tudum 2025: Everything Announced

Netflix Tudum 2025 has begun and promises to reveal a ton of exciting details about the most-anticipated shows and movie heading to the streamer in the future, including Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's release date and Squid Game's Season 3 trailer.There will be a ton of announcements during the Netflix Tudum 2025 livestream, and we'll be gathering all the big new right here as it happens, so make sure to stay tuned and refresh often!Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery Release Date RevealedRian Johnson's Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery's latest teaser trailer not only revealed more about Benoit Blanc's latest adventure, but it also shared it will arrive on Netflix on December 12, 2025.We don't know much about this new mystery yet, but Blanc himself has described this as his "most dangerous case yet." What we do know is that Daniel Craig's Blanc will be joined by Josh O'Connor, Glenn Close, Josh Brolin, Mila Kunis, Jeremy Renner, Kerry Washington, Andrew Scott, Cailee Spaeny, Daryl McCormack, and Thomas Haden Church.Squid Game Season 3 Trailer Teases the Final GamesSquid Game Season 3 is set to debut on Netflix on June 27, and Tudum shared with the world a new trailer that showcases what these final games have in in store for Lee Jung-jae's Gi-hun and more. “The new season will focus on what Gi-hun can and will do after all his efforts fail,” series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk said. "He is in utter despair after losing everything and watching all his efforts go in vain. The story then takes an interesting turn, questioning whether Gi-hun can overcome his shame and rise again to prove that values of humanity — like conscience and kindness — can exist in the arena.” Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein Gets a Teaser Trailer That Shows Off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the 'Misbegotten Creature He's Created'Academy Award winner Guillermo del Toro's Frankenstein, which is an adaptation of Mary Shelley's iconic novel, got a new teaser trailer that shows off Oscar Isaac's Victor Frankenstein and the "misbegotten creature (Jacob Elordi) he's created." Alongside a glimpse at these film that will be released in November, fans of del Toro's work will note "plenty of familiar imagery in the new teaser, from Isaac’s Victor standing on a decaying staircase holding a candelabra (see: Crimson Peak) to a blood-red angelic figure surrounded in flames (see: the Angel of Death in Hellboy II: The Golden Army, the blue Wood Sprite and the sphinxlike Death in Pinocchio, and even the Faun in Pan’s Labyrinth). One Piece Season 2 Trailer Reveals the First Look at Tony Tony ChopperThe latest trailer for Season 2 of One Piece has arrived and it has given us our first look at Tony Tony Chopper, who is voiced by Mikaela Hoover (Beef, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, and Superman). For those unfamiliar, Chopper is a blue-nosed reindeer-boy hybrid and is able to treat various illnesses and wants to travel the world and cure all the diseases that pop up. “What excited me about playing Chopper is the tug of war between his standoffishness and his huge heart,” Hoover told Tudum. “He tries so hard to hide his emotions and put on a tough exterior, but underneath, he’s a big softy, and his love can’t help but come out.“I believe there is a little Chopper in all of us,” she adds. “We all want to be loved and accepted. We go to great lengths to keep the people that we love safe. There’s a purity to his nature that reminds us of what’s good in the world.”Developing...

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2025-06-01 15:52:38 ·

What Medical Guidelines (Finally) Say About Pain Management for IUD Insertion

Intrauterine devices, or IUDs, are an extremely effective and convenient form of birth control for many people—but it can also very painful to get one inserted. Current medical guidelines say that your doctor should be discussing pain management with you, and they also give advice to doctors on what methods tend to work best for most people. The newest set of guidelines is from ACOG, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. These guidelines actually cover a variety of procedures, including endometrial and cervical biopsies, but today I'll be talking about the IUD insertion portions. And in 2024, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's released new contraceptive recommendations that include a section on how and why providers should help you with pain relief. Before we get into the new recommendations and what they say, it’s important to keep in mind that that not everybody feels severe pain with insertion—the estimate is that insertion is severely painful for 50% of people who haven't given birth, and only 10% of people who have, according to Rachel Flink, the OB-GYN I spoke with for my article on what to expect when you get an IUD.  I’m making sure to point this out because I’ve met people who are terrified at the thought of getting an IUD, because they think that severe pain is guaranteed and that doctors are lying if they say otherwise. In reality, there’s a whole spectrum of possible experiences, and both you and your provider should be informed and prepared for anything along that spectrum.Your provider should discuss pain management with youThe biggest thing in both sets of guidelines is not just the pain management options they discuss, but the guideline that says there is a place for this discussion and that it is important! You’ve always been able to ask about pain management, but providers are now expected to know that they need to discuss this with their patients. The ACOG guidelines say: "Options to manage pain should be discussed with and offered to all patients seeking in-office gynecologic procedures." And the CDC says: Before IUD placement, all patients should be counseled on potential pain during placement as well as the risks, benefits, and alternatives of different options for pain management. A person-centered plan for IUD placement and pain management should be made based on patient preference.“Person-centered” means that the plan should take into account what you want and need, not just what the provider is used to doing or thinks will be easiest. The CDC guidelines also say: “When considering patient pain, it is important to recognize that the experience of pain is individualized and might be influenced by previous experiences including trauma and mental health conditions, such as depression or anxiety.” The ACOG guidelines, similarly, say that talking over the procedure and what to expect can help make the procedure more tolerable, regardless of how physically painful it ends up being.Lidocaine paracervical blocks may relieve painThere’s good news and bad news about the recommended pain medications. The good news is that there are recommendations. The bad news is that none of them are guaranteed to work for everyone, and it’s not clear if they work very well at all. The CDC says that a paracervical block“might” reduce pain with insertion. Three studies showed that the injections worked to reduce pain, while three others found they did not. The CDC rates the certainty of evidence as “low” for pain and for satisfaction with the procedure. The ACOG guidelines also mention local anesthetics, including lidocaine paracervical blocks, as one of the best options for pain management. Dr. Flink told me that while some of her patients appreciate this option, it’s often impossible to numb all of the nerves in the cervix, and the injection itself can be painful—so in many cases, patients decide it’s not worth it. Still, it’s worth discussing with your provider if this sounds like something you would like to try.Topical lidocaine may also helpLidocaine, the same numbing medication, can also be applied to the cervix as a cream, spray, or gel. Again, evidence is mixed, with six trials finding that it helped, and seven finding that it did not. The ACOG guidelines note that sometimes topical lidocaine has worked better than the injected kind. Unfortunately, they also say that it can be hard for doctors to find an appropriate spray-on product that can be used on the cervix.The CDC judged the certainty of to be a bit better here compared to the injection—moderate for reducing pain, and high for improving placement success. Other methods aren’t well supported by the evidenceFor the other pain management methods that the CDC group studied, there wasn’t enough evidence to say whether they work. These included analgesics like ibuprofen, and smooth-muscle-relaxing medications. The ACOG guidelines say that taking NSAIDSbefore insertion doesn't seem to help with insertion pain, even though that's commonly recommended. That approach does seem to work for some other procedures, though, and may help with pain that occurs after an IUD insertion. So it may not be a bad idea to take those four Advil if that's what your doc recommends, but it shouldn't be your only option. Or as the ACOG paper puts it: "Although recommending preprocedural NSAIDs is a benign, low-risk intervention unlikely to cause harm, relying on NSAIDs alone for pain management during IUD insertion is ineffective and does not provide the immediate pain control patients need at the time of the procedure." Both sets of guidelines also don't recommend misoprostol, which is sometimes used to soften and open the cervix before inserting an IUD. The ACOG guidelines describe the evidence as mixed, and the CDC guidelines specifically recommend against it. Moderate certainty evidence says that misoprostol doesn’t help with pain, and low certainty evidence says that it may increase the risk of adverse events like cramping and vomiting. What this means for youThe publication of these guidelines won’t change anything overnight at your local OB-GYN office, but it’s a good sign that discussions about pain management with IUD placement are happening more openly. The new guidelines also don’t necessarily take any options off the table. Even misoprostol, which the CDC now says not to use for routine insertions, “might be useful in selected circumstances,” it writes.Don’t be afraid to ask about pain management before your appointment; as we discussed before, some medications and procedures require that you and your provider plan ahead. And definitely don’t accept a dismissive reply about how taking a few Advil should be enough; it may help for some people, but that shouldn't be the end of the discussion. You deserve to have your provider take your concerns seriously.
#what #medical #guidelines #finally #say

What Medical Guidelines (Finally) Say About Pain Management for IUD Insertion
Intrauterine devices, or IUDs, are an extremely effective and convenient form of birth control for many people—but it can also very painful to get one inserted. Current medical guidelines say that your doctor should be discussing pain management with you, and they also give advice to doctors on what methods tend to work best for most people. The newest set of guidelines is from ACOG, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. These guidelines actually cover a variety of procedures, including endometrial and cervical biopsies, but today I'll be talking about the IUD insertion portions. And in 2024, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's released new contraceptive recommendations that include a section on how and why providers should help you with pain relief. Before we get into the new recommendations and what they say, it’s important to keep in mind that that not everybody feels severe pain with insertion—the estimate is that insertion is severely painful for 50% of people who haven't given birth, and only 10% of people who have, according to Rachel Flink, the OB-GYN I spoke with for my article on what to expect when you get an IUD.  I’m making sure to point this out because I’ve met people who are terrified at the thought of getting an IUD, because they think that severe pain is guaranteed and that doctors are lying if they say otherwise. In reality, there’s a whole spectrum of possible experiences, and both you and your provider should be informed and prepared for anything along that spectrum.Your provider should discuss pain management with youThe biggest thing in both sets of guidelines is not just the pain management options they discuss, but the guideline that says there is a place for this discussion and that it is important! You’ve always been able to ask about pain management, but providers are now expected to know that they need to discuss this with their patients. The ACOG guidelines say: "Options to manage pain should be discussed with and offered to all patients seeking in-office gynecologic procedures." And the CDC says: Before IUD placement, all patients should be counseled on potential pain during placement as well as the risks, benefits, and alternatives of different options for pain management. A person-centered plan for IUD placement and pain management should be made based on patient preference.“Person-centered” means that the plan should take into account what you want and need, not just what the provider is used to doing or thinks will be easiest. The CDC guidelines also say: “When considering patient pain, it is important to recognize that the experience of pain is individualized and might be influenced by previous experiences including trauma and mental health conditions, such as depression or anxiety.” The ACOG guidelines, similarly, say that talking over the procedure and what to expect can help make the procedure more tolerable, regardless of how physically painful it ends up being.Lidocaine paracervical blocks may relieve painThere’s good news and bad news about the recommended pain medications. The good news is that there are recommendations. The bad news is that none of them are guaranteed to work for everyone, and it’s not clear if they work very well at all. The CDC says that a paracervical block“might” reduce pain with insertion. Three studies showed that the injections worked to reduce pain, while three others found they did not. The CDC rates the certainty of evidence as “low” for pain and for satisfaction with the procedure. The ACOG guidelines also mention local anesthetics, including lidocaine paracervical blocks, as one of the best options for pain management. Dr. Flink told me that while some of her patients appreciate this option, it’s often impossible to numb all of the nerves in the cervix, and the injection itself can be painful—so in many cases, patients decide it’s not worth it. Still, it’s worth discussing with your provider if this sounds like something you would like to try.Topical lidocaine may also helpLidocaine, the same numbing medication, can also be applied to the cervix as a cream, spray, or gel. Again, evidence is mixed, with six trials finding that it helped, and seven finding that it did not. The ACOG guidelines note that sometimes topical lidocaine has worked better than the injected kind. Unfortunately, they also say that it can be hard for doctors to find an appropriate spray-on product that can be used on the cervix.The CDC judged the certainty of to be a bit better here compared to the injection—moderate for reducing pain, and high for improving placement success. Other methods aren’t well supported by the evidenceFor the other pain management methods that the CDC group studied, there wasn’t enough evidence to say whether they work. These included analgesics like ibuprofen, and smooth-muscle-relaxing medications. The ACOG guidelines say that taking NSAIDSbefore insertion doesn't seem to help with insertion pain, even though that's commonly recommended. That approach does seem to work for some other procedures, though, and may help with pain that occurs after an IUD insertion. So it may not be a bad idea to take those four Advil if that's what your doc recommends, but it shouldn't be your only option. Or as the ACOG paper puts it: "Although recommending preprocedural NSAIDs is a benign, low-risk intervention unlikely to cause harm, relying on NSAIDs alone for pain management during IUD insertion is ineffective and does not provide the immediate pain control patients need at the time of the procedure." Both sets of guidelines also don't recommend misoprostol, which is sometimes used to soften and open the cervix before inserting an IUD. The ACOG guidelines describe the evidence as mixed, and the CDC guidelines specifically recommend against it. Moderate certainty evidence says that misoprostol doesn’t help with pain, and low certainty evidence says that it may increase the risk of adverse events like cramping and vomiting. What this means for youThe publication of these guidelines won’t change anything overnight at your local OB-GYN office, but it’s a good sign that discussions about pain management with IUD placement are happening more openly. The new guidelines also don’t necessarily take any options off the table. Even misoprostol, which the CDC now says not to use for routine insertions, “might be useful in selected circumstances,” it writes.Don’t be afraid to ask about pain management before your appointment; as we discussed before, some medications and procedures require that you and your provider plan ahead. And definitely don’t accept a dismissive reply about how taking a few Advil should be enough; it may help for some people, but that shouldn't be the end of the discussion. You deserve to have your provider take your concerns seriously. #what #medical #guidelines #finally #say

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What Medical Guidelines (Finally) Say About Pain Management for IUD Insertion

Intrauterine devices, or IUDs, are an extremely effective and convenient form of birth control for many people—but it can also very painful to get one inserted. Current medical guidelines say that your doctor should be discussing pain management with you, and they also give advice to doctors on what methods tend to work best for most people. The newest set of guidelines is from ACOG, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. These guidelines actually cover a variety of procedures, including endometrial and cervical biopsies, but today I'll be talking about the IUD insertion portions. And in 2024, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's released new contraceptive recommendations that include a section on how and why providers should help you with pain relief. Before we get into the new recommendations and what they say, it’s important to keep in mind that that not everybody feels severe pain with insertion—the estimate is that insertion is severely painful for 50% of people who haven't given birth, and only 10% of people who have, according to Rachel Flink, the OB-GYN I spoke with for my article on what to expect when you get an IUD. (She also gave me a great rundown of pain management options and their pros and cons, which I included in the article.)  I’m making sure to point this out because I’ve met people who are terrified at the thought of getting an IUD, because they think that severe pain is guaranteed and that doctors are lying if they say otherwise. In reality, there’s a whole spectrum of possible experiences, and both you and your provider should be informed and prepared for anything along that spectrum.Your provider should discuss pain management with youThe biggest thing in both sets of guidelines is not just the pain management options they discuss, but the guideline that says there is a place for this discussion and that it is important! You’ve always been able to ask about pain management, but providers are now expected to know that they need to discuss this with their patients. The ACOG guidelines say: "Options to manage pain should be discussed with and offered to all patients seeking in-office gynecologic procedures." And the CDC says: Before IUD placement, all patients should be counseled on potential pain during placement as well as the risks, benefits, and alternatives of different options for pain management. A person-centered plan for IUD placement and pain management should be made based on patient preference.“Person-centered” means that the plan should take into account what you want and need, not just what the provider is used to doing or thinks will be easiest. (This has sometimes been called “patient-centered” care, but “person-centered” is meant to convey that you and your provider understand that they are treating a whole person, with concerns outside of just their health, and you’re not only a patient who exists in a medical context.) The CDC guidelines also say: “When considering patient pain, it is important to recognize that the experience of pain is individualized and might be influenced by previous experiences including trauma and mental health conditions, such as depression or anxiety.” The ACOG guidelines, similarly, say that talking over the procedure and what to expect can help make the procedure more tolerable, regardless of how physically painful it ends up being. (Dr. Flink told me that anti-anxiety medications during insertion are helpful for some of her patients, and that she’ll discuss them alongside options for physical pain relief.)Lidocaine paracervical blocks may relieve painThere’s good news and bad news about the recommended pain medications. The good news is that there are recommendations. The bad news is that none of them are guaranteed to work for everyone, and it’s not clear if they work very well at all. The CDC says that a paracervical block (done by injection, similar to the numbing injections used for dental work) “might” reduce pain with insertion. Three studies showed that the injections worked to reduce pain, while three others found they did not. The CDC rates the certainty of evidence as “low” for pain and for satisfaction with the procedure. The ACOG guidelines also mention local anesthetics, including lidocaine paracervical blocks, as one of the best options for pain management. Dr. Flink told me that while some of her patients appreciate this option, it’s often impossible to numb all of the nerves in the cervix, and the injection itself can be painful—so in many cases, patients decide it’s not worth it. Still, it’s worth discussing with your provider if this sounds like something you would like to try.Topical lidocaine may also helpLidocaine, the same numbing medication, can also be applied to the cervix as a cream, spray, or gel. Again, evidence is mixed, with six trials finding that it helped, and seven finding that it did not. The ACOG guidelines note that sometimes topical lidocaine has worked better than the injected kind. Unfortunately, they also say that it can be hard for doctors to find an appropriate spray-on product that can be used on the cervix.The CDC judged the certainty of to be a bit better here compared to the injection—moderate for reducing pain, and high for improving placement success (meaning that the provider was able to get the IUD inserted properly). Other methods aren’t well supported by the evidence (yet?)For the other pain management methods that the CDC group studied, there wasn’t enough evidence to say whether they work. These included analgesics like ibuprofen, and smooth-muscle-relaxing medications. The ACOG guidelines say that taking NSAIDS (like ibuprofen) before insertion doesn't seem to help with insertion pain, even though that's commonly recommended. That approach does seem to work for some other procedures, though, and may help with pain that occurs after an IUD insertion. So it may not be a bad idea to take those four Advil if that's what your doc recommends, but it shouldn't be your only option. Or as the ACOG paper puts it: "Although recommending preprocedural NSAIDs is a benign, low-risk intervention unlikely to cause harm, relying on NSAIDs alone for pain management during IUD insertion is ineffective and does not provide the immediate pain control patients need at the time of the procedure." Both sets of guidelines also don't recommend misoprostol, which is sometimes used to soften and open the cervix before inserting an IUD. The ACOG guidelines describe the evidence as mixed, and the CDC guidelines specifically recommend against it. Moderate certainty evidence says that misoprostol doesn’t help with pain, and low certainty evidence says that it may increase the risk of adverse events like cramping and vomiting. What this means for youThe publication of these guidelines won’t change anything overnight at your local OB-GYN office, but it’s a good sign that discussions about pain management with IUD placement are happening more openly. The new guidelines also don’t necessarily take any options off the table. Even misoprostol, which the CDC now says not to use for routine insertions, “might be useful in selected circumstances (e.g., in patients with a recent failed placement),” it writes.Don’t be afraid to ask about pain management before your appointment; as we discussed before, some medications and procedures require that you and your provider plan ahead. And definitely don’t accept a dismissive reply about how taking a few Advil should be enough; it may help for some people, but that shouldn't be the end of the discussion. You deserve to have your provider take your concerns seriously.

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2025-06-01 15:45:29 ·

The lab of the future: An artificial superintelligence for biology

The lab as we know it today is being transformed by how we think about medical research and drug discovery, as well as the intersection of artificial intelligence and biotechnology. As someone who has transitioned from a doctor to a tech CEO, I’ve witnessed firsthand how our mindset around medicine and innovation needs to evolve to keep pace with the accelerating changes in technology. In my journey, one of the most important lessons I’ve learned is: You can be too smart for your own good.

It may sound counterintuitive, but when building a company or investing in new technologies, the smartest people often fall into the trap of overcomplicating things. A brilliant idea isn’t always enough. You need the right people who can think creatively, take risks, and make it happen in the real world.

For me, the mindset shift from doctor to CEO was about understanding that it’s not just about medical knowledge; it’s about building the right ecosystem to nurture that knowledge and turn it into real and transformative change. I believe that a crucial part of that ecosystem for my company, Owkin, is a new form of intelligence: a biological artificial superintelligenceto complement the ingenious human minds working with us. Next generation AI tools, like K Navigator, Owkin’s agentic co-pilot for researchers, and K Pro for pharma, which is in the pipeline, will allow us to understand the full complexity of biology that has been beyond human understanding so far.

This forms the backbone of Owkin’s mission: We are creating the next-generation pharma focused on discovering cures and significantly enhancing pipeline value by developing a new intelligence system capable of decoding biological truths at scale.

AI can fill the innovation gap left by pharma

As the pharmaceutical industry increasingly focuses on a handful of blockbuster drugs, it’s leaving behind many areas of medicine that are crucial for the future of healthcare. Too many diseases remain uncured as traditional pharma struggles to navigate the complexity of biology to augment care with efficient new molecules and diagnostics.

From rare diseases to precision oncology, there’s an innovation gap that AI is perfectly positioned to fill. AI can identify previously overlooked opportunities and streamline the development of treatments that are highly personalized and targeted.

Unlike traditional pharmaceutical companies that are heavily reliant on large-scale, high-risk projects, AI companies can operate in a more agile, data-driven way. We can make smaller, more informed bets, leveraging machine learning and vast datasets to uncover insights that were once out of reach. This shift enables faster and more efficient drug discovery, with the added benefit of offering solutions for diseases that may not have attracted the attention of big pharma.

Cell lines alone aren’t going to work

Most traditional biological research has been based on cell lines—cells removed from the human body and grown in petri dishes.

But as we look to the future, there’s a growing realization that cell lines, and other traditional research methods, are becoming outdated. While once a staple in biomedical research, they do not accurately replicate the complexity of human biology, and they fail to capture the diversity and variability that exists in real patients.

AI-driven models are capable of moving beyond the limitations of cell lines by integrating data both from research done in cells and tissues removed from the bodyand from research done in living animals. This validation approach, which incorporates multiple data types and sources, allows us to create more reliable and predictive models of human diseases.

Science is advancing, and so is regulation. The FDA’s recent announcement of plans to phase out animal testing in favor of “more effective, human-relevant methods” means that we are entering an era where therapies can be tested on human tissue models from the very start. In collaboration with leading academic centers, Owkin has developed a patient-derived, lab-grown organoid, a breakthrough that brings us closer to faster, more accurate, and humane drug discovery.

The combination of clinical data, genomic insights, and AI not only accelerates the development of new treatments but also increases their chances of success in clinical trials.

The lab of the future

The lab of the future will be one where AI is at the center, guiding discovery, improving precision, and increasing efficiency. Validation using real-world data will allow us to make better decisions and achieve higher rates of success. The traditional research process is being upended by these new technologies, and that’s a good thing. The future of medicine will not just rely on human expertise, but on the power of AI and data to transform how we understand and treat disease.

AI will deliver transformative therapies at an exponential scale, addressing the complexities of biology that traditional pharmaceutical approaches often cannot solve. Labs will become automated and serve as the ultimate playground for scientists, driving the future of drug discovery by harnessing the full potential of advanced AI systems.

In these dynamic labs, organoids and agents will come together to work in synergy, allowing scientists to model and simulate human biology with greater accuracy. AI-driven technology will decipher biological patterns to identify the patients most likely to respond to specific treatments, significantly improving the chances of success in clinical trials and beyond. Seamlessly integrating these cutting-edge tools into the lab environment will transform the way we approach drug discovery, targeting diseases with a level of precision that was previously unimaginable.

By pioneering the use of data, biology, and AI to decode the fundamental mechanics of disease and advance medical science, it will be possible to establish a foundation for the future of a “positive singularity” in medicine. Through this innovative ecosystem, AI can revolutionize medicine. The time to innovate is now, and the possibilities are endless.

Thomas Clozel is cofounder and CEO of Owkin.
#lab #future #artificial #superintelligence #biology

The lab of the future: An artificial superintelligence for biology
The lab as we know it today is being transformed by how we think about medical research and drug discovery, as well as the intersection of artificial intelligence and biotechnology. As someone who has transitioned from a doctor to a tech CEO, I’ve witnessed firsthand how our mindset around medicine and innovation needs to evolve to keep pace with the accelerating changes in technology. In my journey, one of the most important lessons I’ve learned is: You can be too smart for your own good. It may sound counterintuitive, but when building a company or investing in new technologies, the smartest people often fall into the trap of overcomplicating things. A brilliant idea isn’t always enough. You need the right people who can think creatively, take risks, and make it happen in the real world. For me, the mindset shift from doctor to CEO was about understanding that it’s not just about medical knowledge; it’s about building the right ecosystem to nurture that knowledge and turn it into real and transformative change. I believe that a crucial part of that ecosystem for my company, Owkin, is a new form of intelligence: a biological artificial superintelligenceto complement the ingenious human minds working with us. Next generation AI tools, like K Navigator, Owkin’s agentic co-pilot for researchers, and K Pro for pharma, which is in the pipeline, will allow us to understand the full complexity of biology that has been beyond human understanding so far. This forms the backbone of Owkin’s mission: We are creating the next-generation pharma focused on discovering cures and significantly enhancing pipeline value by developing a new intelligence system capable of decoding biological truths at scale. AI can fill the innovation gap left by pharma As the pharmaceutical industry increasingly focuses on a handful of blockbuster drugs, it’s leaving behind many areas of medicine that are crucial for the future of healthcare. Too many diseases remain uncured as traditional pharma struggles to navigate the complexity of biology to augment care with efficient new molecules and diagnostics. From rare diseases to precision oncology, there’s an innovation gap that AI is perfectly positioned to fill. AI can identify previously overlooked opportunities and streamline the development of treatments that are highly personalized and targeted. Unlike traditional pharmaceutical companies that are heavily reliant on large-scale, high-risk projects, AI companies can operate in a more agile, data-driven way. We can make smaller, more informed bets, leveraging machine learning and vast datasets to uncover insights that were once out of reach. This shift enables faster and more efficient drug discovery, with the added benefit of offering solutions for diseases that may not have attracted the attention of big pharma. Cell lines alone aren’t going to work Most traditional biological research has been based on cell lines—cells removed from the human body and grown in petri dishes. But as we look to the future, there’s a growing realization that cell lines, and other traditional research methods, are becoming outdated. While once a staple in biomedical research, they do not accurately replicate the complexity of human biology, and they fail to capture the diversity and variability that exists in real patients. AI-driven models are capable of moving beyond the limitations of cell lines by integrating data both from research done in cells and tissues removed from the bodyand from research done in living animals. This validation approach, which incorporates multiple data types and sources, allows us to create more reliable and predictive models of human diseases. Science is advancing, and so is regulation. The FDA’s recent announcement of plans to phase out animal testing in favor of “more effective, human-relevant methods” means that we are entering an era where therapies can be tested on human tissue models from the very start. In collaboration with leading academic centers, Owkin has developed a patient-derived, lab-grown organoid, a breakthrough that brings us closer to faster, more accurate, and humane drug discovery. The combination of clinical data, genomic insights, and AI not only accelerates the development of new treatments but also increases their chances of success in clinical trials. The lab of the future The lab of the future will be one where AI is at the center, guiding discovery, improving precision, and increasing efficiency. Validation using real-world data will allow us to make better decisions and achieve higher rates of success. The traditional research process is being upended by these new technologies, and that’s a good thing. The future of medicine will not just rely on human expertise, but on the power of AI and data to transform how we understand and treat disease. AI will deliver transformative therapies at an exponential scale, addressing the complexities of biology that traditional pharmaceutical approaches often cannot solve. Labs will become automated and serve as the ultimate playground for scientists, driving the future of drug discovery by harnessing the full potential of advanced AI systems. In these dynamic labs, organoids and agents will come together to work in synergy, allowing scientists to model and simulate human biology with greater accuracy. AI-driven technology will decipher biological patterns to identify the patients most likely to respond to specific treatments, significantly improving the chances of success in clinical trials and beyond. Seamlessly integrating these cutting-edge tools into the lab environment will transform the way we approach drug discovery, targeting diseases with a level of precision that was previously unimaginable. By pioneering the use of data, biology, and AI to decode the fundamental mechanics of disease and advance medical science, it will be possible to establish a foundation for the future of a “positive singularity” in medicine. Through this innovative ecosystem, AI can revolutionize medicine. The time to innovate is now, and the possibilities are endless. Thomas Clozel is cofounder and CEO of Owkin. #lab #future #artificial #superintelligence #biology

WWW.FASTCOMPANY.COM

The lab of the future: An artificial superintelligence for biology

The lab as we know it today is being transformed by how we think about medical research and drug discovery, as well as the intersection of artificial intelligence and biotechnology. As someone who has transitioned from a doctor to a tech CEO, I’ve witnessed firsthand how our mindset around medicine and innovation needs to evolve to keep pace with the accelerating changes in technology. In my journey, one of the most important lessons I’ve learned is: You can be too smart for your own good. It may sound counterintuitive, but when building a company or investing in new technologies, the smartest people often fall into the trap of overcomplicating things. A brilliant idea isn’t always enough. You need the right people who can think creatively, take risks, and make it happen in the real world. For me, the mindset shift from doctor to CEO was about understanding that it’s not just about medical knowledge; it’s about building the right ecosystem to nurture that knowledge and turn it into real and transformative change. I believe that a crucial part of that ecosystem for my company, Owkin, is a new form of intelligence: a biological artificial superintelligence (BASI) to complement the ingenious human minds working with us. Next generation AI tools, like K Navigator, Owkin’s agentic co-pilot for researchers, and K Pro for pharma, which is in the pipeline, will allow us to understand the full complexity of biology that has been beyond human understanding so far. This forms the backbone of Owkin’s mission: We are creating the next-generation pharma focused on discovering cures and significantly enhancing pipeline value by developing a new intelligence system capable of decoding biological truths at scale. AI can fill the innovation gap left by pharma As the pharmaceutical industry increasingly focuses on a handful of blockbuster drugs, it’s leaving behind many areas of medicine that are crucial for the future of healthcare. Too many diseases remain uncured as traditional pharma struggles to navigate the complexity of biology to augment care with efficient new molecules and diagnostics. From rare diseases to precision oncology, there’s an innovation gap that AI is perfectly positioned to fill. AI can identify previously overlooked opportunities and streamline the development of treatments that are highly personalized and targeted. Unlike traditional pharmaceutical companies that are heavily reliant on large-scale, high-risk projects, AI companies can operate in a more agile, data-driven way. We can make smaller, more informed bets, leveraging machine learning and vast datasets to uncover insights that were once out of reach. This shift enables faster and more efficient drug discovery, with the added benefit of offering solutions for diseases that may not have attracted the attention of big pharma. Cell lines alone aren’t going to work Most traditional biological research has been based on cell lines—cells removed from the human body and grown in petri dishes. But as we look to the future, there’s a growing realization that cell lines, and other traditional research methods, are becoming outdated. While once a staple in biomedical research, they do not accurately replicate the complexity of human biology, and they fail to capture the diversity and variability that exists in real patients. AI-driven models are capable of moving beyond the limitations of cell lines by integrating data both from research done in cells and tissues removed from the body (in vitro) and from research done in living animals (in vivo). This validation approach, which incorporates multiple data types and sources, allows us to create more reliable and predictive models of human diseases. Science is advancing, and so is regulation. The FDA’s recent announcement of plans to phase out animal testing in favor of “more effective, human-relevant methods” means that we are entering an era where therapies can be tested on human tissue models from the very start. In collaboration with leading academic centers, Owkin has developed a patient-derived, lab-grown organoid (a mini version of a human organ), a breakthrough that brings us closer to faster, more accurate, and humane drug discovery. The combination of clinical data, genomic insights, and AI not only accelerates the development of new treatments but also increases their chances of success in clinical trials. The lab of the future The lab of the future will be one where AI is at the center, guiding discovery, improving precision, and increasing efficiency. Validation using real-world data will allow us to make better decisions and achieve higher rates of success. The traditional research process is being upended by these new technologies, and that’s a good thing. The future of medicine will not just rely on human expertise, but on the power of AI and data to transform how we understand and treat disease. AI will deliver transformative therapies at an exponential scale, addressing the complexities of biology that traditional pharmaceutical approaches often cannot solve. Labs will become automated and serve as the ultimate playground for scientists, driving the future of drug discovery by harnessing the full potential of advanced AI systems. In these dynamic labs, organoids and agents will come together to work in synergy, allowing scientists to model and simulate human biology with greater accuracy. AI-driven technology will decipher biological patterns to identify the patients most likely to respond to specific treatments, significantly improving the chances of success in clinical trials and beyond. Seamlessly integrating these cutting-edge tools into the lab environment will transform the way we approach drug discovery, targeting diseases with a level of precision that was previously unimaginable. By pioneering the use of data, biology, and AI to decode the fundamental mechanics of disease and advance medical science, it will be possible to establish a foundation for the future of a “positive singularity” in medicine. Through this innovative ecosystem, AI can revolutionize medicine. The time to innovate is now, and the possibilities are endless. Thomas Clozel is cofounder and CEO of Owkin.

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2025-06-01 15:42:43 ·

Managers rethink ecological scenarios as threats rise amid climate change

In Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California, trees that have persisted through rain and shine for thousands of years are now facing multiple threats triggered by a changing climate.

Scientists and park managers once thought giant sequoia forests were nearly impervious to stressors like wildfire, drought and pests. Yet, even very large trees are proving vulnerable, particularly when those stressors are amplified by rising temperatures and increasing weather extremes.

The rapid pace of climate change—combined with threats like the spread of invasive species and diseases—can affect ecosystems in ways that defy expectations based on past experiences. As a result, Western forests are transitioning to grasslands or shrublands after unprecedented wildfires. Woody plants are expanding into coastal wetlands. Coral reefs are being lost entirely.

To protect these places, which are valued for their natural beauty and the benefits they provide for recreation, clean water and wildlife, forest and land managers increasingly must anticipate risks they have never seen before. And they must prepare for what those risks will mean for stewardship as ecosystems rapidly transform.

As ecologists and a climate scientist, we’re helping them figure out how to do that.

Managing changing ecosystems

Traditional management approaches focus on maintaining or restoring how ecosystems looked and functioned historically.

However, that doesn’t always work when ecosystems are subjected to new and rapidly shifting conditions.

Ecosystems have many moving parts—plants, animals, fungi, and microbes; and the soil, air and water in which they live—that interact with one another in complex ways.

When the climate changes, it’s like shifting the ground on which everything rests. The results can undermine the integrity of the system, leading to ecological changes that are hard to predict.

To plan for an uncertain future, natural resource managers need to consider many different ways changes in climate and ecosystems could affect their landscapes. Essentially, what scenarios are possible?

Preparing for multiple possibilities

At Sequoia and Kings Canyon, park managers were aware that climate change posed some big risks to the iconic trees under their care. More than a decade ago, they undertook a major effort to explore different scenarios that could play out in the future.

It’s a good thing they did, because some of the more extreme possibilities they imagined happened sooner than expected.

In 2014, drought in California caused the giant sequoias’ foliage to die back, something never documented before. In 2017, sequoia trees began dying from insect damage. And, in 2020 and 2021, fires burned through sequoia groves, killing thousands of ancient trees.

While these extreme events came as a surprise to many people, thinking through the possibilities ahead of time meant the park managers had already begun to take steps that proved beneficial. One example was prioritizing prescribed burns to remove undergrowth that could fuel hotter, more destructive fires.

The key to effective planning is a thoughtful consideration of a suite of strategies that are likely to succeed in the face of many different changes in climates and ecosystems. That involves thinking through wide-ranging potential outcomes to see how different strategies might fare under each scenario—including preparing for catastrophic possibilities, even those considered unlikely.

For example, prescribed burning may reduce risks from both catastrophic wildfire and drought by reducing the density of plant growth, whereas suppressing all fires could increase those risks in the long run.

Strategies undertaken today have consequences for decades to come. Managers need to have confidence that they are making good investments when they put limited resources toward actions like forest thinning, invasive species control, buying seeds or replanting trees. Scenarios can help inform those investment choices.

Constructing credible scenarios of ecological change to inform this type of planning requires considering the most important unknowns. Scenarios look not only at how the climate could change, but also how complex ecosystems could react and what surprises might lay beyond the horizon.

Scientists at the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center are collaborating with managers in the Nebraska Sandhills to develop scenarios of future ecological change under different climate conditions, disturbance events like fires and extreme droughts, and land uses like grazing. Key ingredients for crafting ecological scenarios

To provide some guidance to people tasked with managing these landscapes, we brought together a group of experts in ecology, climate science, and natural resource management from across universities and government agencies.

We identified three key ingredients for constructing credible ecological scenarios:

1. Embracing ecological uncertainty: Instead of banking on one “most likely” outcome for ecosystems in a changing climate, managers can better prepare by mapping out multiple possibilities. In Nebraska’s Sandhills, we are exploring how this mostly intact native prairie could transform, with outcomes as divergent as woodlands and open dunes.

2. Thinking in trajectories: It’s helpful to consider not just the outcomes, but also the potential pathways for getting there. Will ecological changes unfold gradually or all at once? By envisioning different pathways through which ecosystems might respond to climate change and other stressors, natural resource managers can identify critical moments where specific actions, such as removing tree seedlings encroaching into grasslands, can steer ecosystems toward a more desirable future.

3. Preparing for surprises: Planning for rare disasters or sudden species collapses helps managers respond nimbly when the unexpected strikes, such as a severe drought leading to widespread erosion. Being prepared for abrupt changes and having contingency plans can mean the difference between quickly helping an ecosystem recover and losing it entirely.

Over the past decade, access to climate model projections through easy-to-use websites has revolutionized resource managers’ ability to explore different scenarios of how the local climate might change.

What managers are missing today is similar access to ecological model projections and tools that can help them anticipate possible changes in ecosystems. To bridge this gap, we believe the scientific community should prioritize developing ecological projections and decision-support tools that can empower managers to plan for ecological uncertainty with greater confidence and foresight.

Ecological scenarios don’t eliminate uncertainty, but they can help to navigate it more effectively by identifying strategic actions to manage forests and other ecosystems.

Kyra Clark-Wolf is a research scientist in ecological transformation at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Brian W. Miller is a research ecologist at the U.S. Geological Survey.

Imtiaz Rangwala is a research scientist in climate at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
#managers #rethink #ecological #scenarios #threats

Managers rethink ecological scenarios as threats rise amid climate change
In Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California, trees that have persisted through rain and shine for thousands of years are now facing multiple threats triggered by a changing climate. Scientists and park managers once thought giant sequoia forests were nearly impervious to stressors like wildfire, drought and pests. Yet, even very large trees are proving vulnerable, particularly when those stressors are amplified by rising temperatures and increasing weather extremes. The rapid pace of climate change—combined with threats like the spread of invasive species and diseases—can affect ecosystems in ways that defy expectations based on past experiences. As a result, Western forests are transitioning to grasslands or shrublands after unprecedented wildfires. Woody plants are expanding into coastal wetlands. Coral reefs are being lost entirely. To protect these places, which are valued for their natural beauty and the benefits they provide for recreation, clean water and wildlife, forest and land managers increasingly must anticipate risks they have never seen before. And they must prepare for what those risks will mean for stewardship as ecosystems rapidly transform. As ecologists and a climate scientist, we’re helping them figure out how to do that. Managing changing ecosystems Traditional management approaches focus on maintaining or restoring how ecosystems looked and functioned historically. However, that doesn’t always work when ecosystems are subjected to new and rapidly shifting conditions. Ecosystems have many moving parts—plants, animals, fungi, and microbes; and the soil, air and water in which they live—that interact with one another in complex ways. When the climate changes, it’s like shifting the ground on which everything rests. The results can undermine the integrity of the system, leading to ecological changes that are hard to predict. To plan for an uncertain future, natural resource managers need to consider many different ways changes in climate and ecosystems could affect their landscapes. Essentially, what scenarios are possible? Preparing for multiple possibilities At Sequoia and Kings Canyon, park managers were aware that climate change posed some big risks to the iconic trees under their care. More than a decade ago, they undertook a major effort to explore different scenarios that could play out in the future. It’s a good thing they did, because some of the more extreme possibilities they imagined happened sooner than expected. In 2014, drought in California caused the giant sequoias’ foliage to die back, something never documented before. In 2017, sequoia trees began dying from insect damage. And, in 2020 and 2021, fires burned through sequoia groves, killing thousands of ancient trees. While these extreme events came as a surprise to many people, thinking through the possibilities ahead of time meant the park managers had already begun to take steps that proved beneficial. One example was prioritizing prescribed burns to remove undergrowth that could fuel hotter, more destructive fires. The key to effective planning is a thoughtful consideration of a suite of strategies that are likely to succeed in the face of many different changes in climates and ecosystems. That involves thinking through wide-ranging potential outcomes to see how different strategies might fare under each scenario—including preparing for catastrophic possibilities, even those considered unlikely. For example, prescribed burning may reduce risks from both catastrophic wildfire and drought by reducing the density of plant growth, whereas suppressing all fires could increase those risks in the long run. Strategies undertaken today have consequences for decades to come. Managers need to have confidence that they are making good investments when they put limited resources toward actions like forest thinning, invasive species control, buying seeds or replanting trees. Scenarios can help inform those investment choices. Constructing credible scenarios of ecological change to inform this type of planning requires considering the most important unknowns. Scenarios look not only at how the climate could change, but also how complex ecosystems could react and what surprises might lay beyond the horizon. Scientists at the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center are collaborating with managers in the Nebraska Sandhills to develop scenarios of future ecological change under different climate conditions, disturbance events like fires and extreme droughts, and land uses like grazing. Key ingredients for crafting ecological scenarios To provide some guidance to people tasked with managing these landscapes, we brought together a group of experts in ecology, climate science, and natural resource management from across universities and government agencies. We identified three key ingredients for constructing credible ecological scenarios: 1. Embracing ecological uncertainty: Instead of banking on one “most likely” outcome for ecosystems in a changing climate, managers can better prepare by mapping out multiple possibilities. In Nebraska’s Sandhills, we are exploring how this mostly intact native prairie could transform, with outcomes as divergent as woodlands and open dunes. 2. Thinking in trajectories: It’s helpful to consider not just the outcomes, but also the potential pathways for getting there. Will ecological changes unfold gradually or all at once? By envisioning different pathways through which ecosystems might respond to climate change and other stressors, natural resource managers can identify critical moments where specific actions, such as removing tree seedlings encroaching into grasslands, can steer ecosystems toward a more desirable future. 3. Preparing for surprises: Planning for rare disasters or sudden species collapses helps managers respond nimbly when the unexpected strikes, such as a severe drought leading to widespread erosion. Being prepared for abrupt changes and having contingency plans can mean the difference between quickly helping an ecosystem recover and losing it entirely. Over the past decade, access to climate model projections through easy-to-use websites has revolutionized resource managers’ ability to explore different scenarios of how the local climate might change. What managers are missing today is similar access to ecological model projections and tools that can help them anticipate possible changes in ecosystems. To bridge this gap, we believe the scientific community should prioritize developing ecological projections and decision-support tools that can empower managers to plan for ecological uncertainty with greater confidence and foresight. Ecological scenarios don’t eliminate uncertainty, but they can help to navigate it more effectively by identifying strategic actions to manage forests and other ecosystems. Kyra Clark-Wolf is a research scientist in ecological transformation at the University of Colorado Boulder. Brian W. Miller is a research ecologist at the U.S. Geological Survey. Imtiaz Rangwala is a research scientist in climate at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article. #managers #rethink #ecological #scenarios #threats

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Managers rethink ecological scenarios as threats rise amid climate change

In Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in California, trees that have persisted through rain and shine for thousands of years are now facing multiple threats triggered by a changing climate. Scientists and park managers once thought giant sequoia forests were nearly impervious to stressors like wildfire, drought and pests. Yet, even very large trees are proving vulnerable, particularly when those stressors are amplified by rising temperatures and increasing weather extremes. The rapid pace of climate change—combined with threats like the spread of invasive species and diseases—can affect ecosystems in ways that defy expectations based on past experiences. As a result, Western forests are transitioning to grasslands or shrublands after unprecedented wildfires. Woody plants are expanding into coastal wetlands. Coral reefs are being lost entirely. To protect these places, which are valued for their natural beauty and the benefits they provide for recreation, clean water and wildlife, forest and land managers increasingly must anticipate risks they have never seen before. And they must prepare for what those risks will mean for stewardship as ecosystems rapidly transform. As ecologists and a climate scientist, we’re helping them figure out how to do that. Managing changing ecosystems Traditional management approaches focus on maintaining or restoring how ecosystems looked and functioned historically. However, that doesn’t always work when ecosystems are subjected to new and rapidly shifting conditions. Ecosystems have many moving parts—plants, animals, fungi, and microbes; and the soil, air and water in which they live—that interact with one another in complex ways. When the climate changes, it’s like shifting the ground on which everything rests. The results can undermine the integrity of the system, leading to ecological changes that are hard to predict. To plan for an uncertain future, natural resource managers need to consider many different ways changes in climate and ecosystems could affect their landscapes. Essentially, what scenarios are possible? Preparing for multiple possibilities At Sequoia and Kings Canyon, park managers were aware that climate change posed some big risks to the iconic trees under their care. More than a decade ago, they undertook a major effort to explore different scenarios that could play out in the future. It’s a good thing they did, because some of the more extreme possibilities they imagined happened sooner than expected. In 2014, drought in California caused the giant sequoias’ foliage to die back, something never documented before. In 2017, sequoia trees began dying from insect damage. And, in 2020 and 2021, fires burned through sequoia groves, killing thousands of ancient trees. While these extreme events came as a surprise to many people, thinking through the possibilities ahead of time meant the park managers had already begun to take steps that proved beneficial. One example was prioritizing prescribed burns to remove undergrowth that could fuel hotter, more destructive fires. The key to effective planning is a thoughtful consideration of a suite of strategies that are likely to succeed in the face of many different changes in climates and ecosystems. That involves thinking through wide-ranging potential outcomes to see how different strategies might fare under each scenario—including preparing for catastrophic possibilities, even those considered unlikely. For example, prescribed burning may reduce risks from both catastrophic wildfire and drought by reducing the density of plant growth, whereas suppressing all fires could increase those risks in the long run. Strategies undertaken today have consequences for decades to come. Managers need to have confidence that they are making good investments when they put limited resources toward actions like forest thinning, invasive species control, buying seeds or replanting trees. Scenarios can help inform those investment choices. Constructing credible scenarios of ecological change to inform this type of planning requires considering the most important unknowns. Scenarios look not only at how the climate could change, but also how complex ecosystems could react and what surprises might lay beyond the horizon. Scientists at the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center are collaborating with managers in the Nebraska Sandhills to develop scenarios of future ecological change under different climate conditions, disturbance events like fires and extreme droughts, and land uses like grazing. [Photos: T. Walz, M. Lavin, C. Helzer, O. Richmond, NPS (top to bottom)., CC BY] Key ingredients for crafting ecological scenarios To provide some guidance to people tasked with managing these landscapes, we brought together a group of experts in ecology, climate science, and natural resource management from across universities and government agencies. We identified three key ingredients for constructing credible ecological scenarios: 1. Embracing ecological uncertainty: Instead of banking on one “most likely” outcome for ecosystems in a changing climate, managers can better prepare by mapping out multiple possibilities. In Nebraska’s Sandhills, we are exploring how this mostly intact native prairie could transform, with outcomes as divergent as woodlands and open dunes. 2. Thinking in trajectories: It’s helpful to consider not just the outcomes, but also the potential pathways for getting there. Will ecological changes unfold gradually or all at once? By envisioning different pathways through which ecosystems might respond to climate change and other stressors, natural resource managers can identify critical moments where specific actions, such as removing tree seedlings encroaching into grasslands, can steer ecosystems toward a more desirable future. 3. Preparing for surprises: Planning for rare disasters or sudden species collapses helps managers respond nimbly when the unexpected strikes, such as a severe drought leading to widespread erosion. Being prepared for abrupt changes and having contingency plans can mean the difference between quickly helping an ecosystem recover and losing it entirely. Over the past decade, access to climate model projections through easy-to-use websites has revolutionized resource managers’ ability to explore different scenarios of how the local climate might change. What managers are missing today is similar access to ecological model projections and tools that can help them anticipate possible changes in ecosystems. To bridge this gap, we believe the scientific community should prioritize developing ecological projections and decision-support tools that can empower managers to plan for ecological uncertainty with greater confidence and foresight. Ecological scenarios don’t eliminate uncertainty, but they can help to navigate it more effectively by identifying strategic actions to manage forests and other ecosystems. Kyra Clark-Wolf is a research scientist in ecological transformation at the University of Colorado Boulder. Brian W. Miller is a research ecologist at the U.S. Geological Survey. Imtiaz Rangwala is a research scientist in climate at the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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2025-05-31 23:22:29 ·

Black Death Bacterium Evolved to be Less Aggressive to Kill Victims Slowly

Co-lead author Ravneet Sidhu examines an ancient human tooth at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre.NewsletterSign up for our email newsletter for the latest science newsA new study in Science suggests that changes in a gene in Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, could’ve added to the length of two plague pandemics, including the pandemic that started with the “Black Death.” “Ours is one of the first research studies to directly examine changes in an ancient pathogen, one we still see today, in an attempt to understand what drives the virulence, persistence, and eventual extinction of pandemics,” said Hendrik Poinar, a study author and the director of the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre, according to a press release.The study suggests that less virulent plague bacteria could’ve caused longer plague pandemics — thanks to the fact that infected rodents livedfor longer periods of time before dying from their infections. Read More: Scientists Reveal the Black Death’s Origin StoryThe Three Plague PandemicsThe bacterium Y. pestis infects rodents and humans alike and has caused three main plague pandemics in humans, all of which continued for centuries after their initial outbreaks. The first began in the 500s; the second began in the 1300s; and the third started in the 1800s. Although all three pandemics were devastating at their outset, the second pandemic was by far the most severe. The Black Death, its initial outburst, killed around 30 to 50 percent of the population of Europe between 1347 and 1352 and — to this day — represents the deadliest disease wave in recorded history.To learn more about how these plague pandemics changed over time, scientists at McMaster University in Canada and the Institut Pasteur in France turned to a Y. pestis virulence gene known as pla. This gene is repeated many times throughout the Y. pestis genome, and it allows the bacterium to spread undetected throughout the bodies of infected individuals. A Gene and the PlagueTo investigate this gene, the scientists studied historical strains of Y. pestis from human remains and found that the number of repetitions of pla decreased over the course of the first and second plague pandemics. Then, the scientists tested Y. pestis bacteria from the third pandemic, infecting mice with three strains that had reduced repetitions of pla. “These three samples enabled us to analyze the biological impact of these pla gene deletions,” said Javier Pizarro-Cerdá, another study author and the director of the Yersinia Research Unit at the Institut Pasteur, according to the release.The results revealed that pla depletion decreases the virulence and increases the length of plague infections in mice. According to the study authors, these changes could have caused rodents to live longer in the later stages of the first and second pandemics, allowing them to spread their infections for a longer period. “It’s important to remember that plague was an epidemic of rats, which were the drivers of epidemics and pandemics. Humans were accidental victims. ” Poinar added in another press release.The Continued Threat of Y. PestisThough the pla depletion occurred around 100 years after the first and second pandemics began, the scientists stress that both changes were random and unrelated.“Our research sheds light on an interesting pattern in the evolutionary history of the plague. However, it is important to note that the majority of strains which continue to circulate today in Africa, the Americas, and Asia are highly virulent strains,” said Ravneet Sidhu, another study author and a Ph.D. student at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre.Though still a threat to current populations, Y. pestis infections are much more manageable now as a result of modern diagnostics and treatments.“Today, the plague is a rare disease, but one that remains a public health concern and serves as a model for gaining a broad understanding of how pandemics emerge and become extinct. This example illustrates the balance of virulence a pathogen can adopt in order to spread effectively,” Pizarro-Cerdá said in the press 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:Science. Sam 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.1 free article leftWant More? Get unlimited access for as low as /monthSubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In1 free articleSubscribeWant more?Keep reading for as low as !SubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In
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Black Death Bacterium Evolved to be Less Aggressive to Kill Victims Slowly
Co-lead author Ravneet Sidhu examines an ancient human tooth at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre.NewsletterSign up for our email newsletter for the latest science newsA new study in Science suggests that changes in a gene in Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, could’ve added to the length of two plague pandemics, including the pandemic that started with the “Black Death.” “Ours is one of the first research studies to directly examine changes in an ancient pathogen, one we still see today, in an attempt to understand what drives the virulence, persistence, and eventual extinction of pandemics,” said Hendrik Poinar, a study author and the director of the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre, according to a press release.The study suggests that less virulent plague bacteria could’ve caused longer plague pandemics — thanks to the fact that infected rodents livedfor longer periods of time before dying from their infections. Read More: Scientists Reveal the Black Death’s Origin StoryThe Three Plague PandemicsThe bacterium Y. pestis infects rodents and humans alike and has caused three main plague pandemics in humans, all of which continued for centuries after their initial outbreaks. The first began in the 500s; the second began in the 1300s; and the third started in the 1800s. Although all three pandemics were devastating at their outset, the second pandemic was by far the most severe. The Black Death, its initial outburst, killed around 30 to 50 percent of the population of Europe between 1347 and 1352 and — to this day — represents the deadliest disease wave in recorded history.To learn more about how these plague pandemics changed over time, scientists at McMaster University in Canada and the Institut Pasteur in France turned to a Y. pestis virulence gene known as pla. This gene is repeated many times throughout the Y. pestis genome, and it allows the bacterium to spread undetected throughout the bodies of infected individuals. A Gene and the PlagueTo investigate this gene, the scientists studied historical strains of Y. pestis from human remains and found that the number of repetitions of pla decreased over the course of the first and second plague pandemics. Then, the scientists tested Y. pestis bacteria from the third pandemic, infecting mice with three strains that had reduced repetitions of pla. “These three samples enabled us to analyze the biological impact of these pla gene deletions,” said Javier Pizarro-Cerdá, another study author and the director of the Yersinia Research Unit at the Institut Pasteur, according to the release.The results revealed that pla depletion decreases the virulence and increases the length of plague infections in mice. According to the study authors, these changes could have caused rodents to live longer in the later stages of the first and second pandemics, allowing them to spread their infections for a longer period. “It’s important to remember that plague was an epidemic of rats, which were the drivers of epidemics and pandemics. Humans were accidental victims. ” Poinar added in another press release.The Continued Threat of Y. PestisThough the pla depletion occurred around 100 years after the first and second pandemics began, the scientists stress that both changes were random and unrelated.“Our research sheds light on an interesting pattern in the evolutionary history of the plague. However, it is important to note that the majority of strains which continue to circulate today in Africa, the Americas, and Asia are highly virulent strains,” said Ravneet Sidhu, another study author and a Ph.D. student at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre.Though still a threat to current populations, Y. pestis infections are much more manageable now as a result of modern diagnostics and treatments.“Today, the plague is a rare disease, but one that remains a public health concern and serves as a model for gaining a broad understanding of how pandemics emerge and become extinct. This example illustrates the balance of virulence a pathogen can adopt in order to spread effectively,” Pizarro-Cerdá said in the press 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:Science. Sam 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.1 free article leftWant More? Get unlimited access for as low as /monthSubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In1 free articleSubscribeWant more?Keep reading for as low as !SubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In #black #death #bacterium #evolved #less

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Black Death Bacterium Evolved to be Less Aggressive to Kill Victims Slowly

Co-lead author Ravneet Sidhu examines an ancient human tooth at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre. (Image Credit: McMaster University)NewsletterSign up for our email newsletter for the latest science newsA new study in Science suggests that changes in a gene in Yersinia pestis, the bacterium that causes plague, could’ve added to the length of two plague pandemics, including the pandemic that started with the “Black Death.” “Ours is one of the first research studies to directly examine changes in an ancient pathogen, one we still see today, in an attempt to understand what drives the virulence, persistence, and eventual extinction of pandemics,” said Hendrik Poinar, a study author and the director of the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre, according to a press release.The study suggests that less virulent plague bacteria could’ve caused longer plague pandemics — thanks to the fact that infected rodents lived (and spread plague) for longer periods of time before dying from their infections. Read More: Scientists Reveal the Black Death’s Origin StoryThe Three Plague PandemicsThe bacterium Y. pestis infects rodents and humans alike and has caused three main plague pandemics in humans, all of which continued for centuries after their initial outbreaks. The first began in the 500s; the second began in the 1300s; and the third started in the 1800s (and still continues in certain areas in Asia, Africa, and the Americas today). Although all three pandemics were devastating at their outset, the second pandemic was by far the most severe. The Black Death, its initial outburst, killed around 30 to 50 percent of the population of Europe between 1347 and 1352 and — to this day — represents the deadliest disease wave in recorded history.To learn more about how these plague pandemics changed over time, scientists at McMaster University in Canada and the Institut Pasteur in France turned to a Y. pestis virulence gene known as pla. This gene is repeated many times throughout the Y. pestis genome, and it allows the bacterium to spread undetected throughout the bodies of infected individuals. A Gene and the PlagueTo investigate this gene, the scientists studied historical strains of Y. pestis from human remains and found that the number of repetitions of pla decreased over the course of the first and second plague pandemics. Then, the scientists tested Y. pestis bacteria from the third pandemic, infecting mice with three strains that had reduced repetitions of pla. “These three samples enabled us to analyze the biological impact of these pla gene deletions,” said Javier Pizarro-Cerdá, another study author and the director of the Yersinia Research Unit at the Institut Pasteur, according to the release.The results revealed that pla depletion decreases the virulence and increases the length of plague infections in mice. According to the study authors, these changes could have caused rodents to live longer in the later stages of the first and second pandemics, allowing them to spread their infections for a longer period. “It’s important to remember that plague was an epidemic of rats, which were the drivers of epidemics and pandemics. Humans were accidental victims. ” Poinar added in another press release.The Continued Threat of Y. PestisThough the pla depletion occurred around 100 years after the first and second pandemics began, the scientists stress that both changes were random and unrelated.“Our research sheds light on an interesting pattern in the evolutionary history of the plague. However, it is important to note that the majority of strains which continue to circulate today in Africa, the Americas, and Asia are highly virulent strains,” said Ravneet Sidhu, another study author and a Ph.D. student at the McMaster Ancient DNA Centre.Though still a threat to current populations, Y. pestis infections are much more manageable now as a result of modern diagnostics and treatments.“Today, the plague is a rare disease, but one that remains a public health concern and serves as a model for gaining a broad understanding of how pandemics emerge and become extinct. This example illustrates the balance of virulence a pathogen can adopt in order to spread effectively,” Pizarro-Cerdá said in the press 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:Science. Sam 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.1 free article leftWant More? Get unlimited access for as low as $1.99/monthSubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In1 free articleSubscribeWant more?Keep reading for as low as $1.99!SubscribeAlready a subscriber?Register or Log In

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2025-05-31 22:55:09 ·

Scientists Gene-Hack Spider to Produce Bright-Red Silk

Researchers used the popular gene-editing technique CRISPR to modify the DNA sequences of house spiders, causing them to produce red fluorescent silk.Scientists are hoping that the US Navy and Air Force-funded research could lead to the development of new "supermaterials" produced by arachnids, Fast Company reports.As detailed in a paper published in the journal Angewandte Chemie, a team of researchers at the University of Bayreuth in Germany injected the eggs of unfertilized female spiders with a CRISPR-Cas9 solution to insert a gene sequence for a red fluorescent protein. After mating with males of the same species, the offspring produced red, fluorescent silk, demonstrating that the experiment had been successful."Considering the wide range of possible applications, it is surprising that there have been no studies to date using CRISPR-Cas9 in spiders," said senior author and University of Bayreuth professor Thomas Scheibel in a statement. "We have demonstrated, for the first time worldwide, that CRISPR-Cas9 can be used to incorporate a desired sequence into spider silk proteins, thereby enabling the functionalisation of these silk fibres."Apart from turning their silk bright red, the researchers also attempted to knock out a gene called sine oculis, which is responsible for the development of spider eyes. They found that the gene edit caused total or partial eye loss in experiments, highlighting its important role in visual development.By applying CRISPR-Cas9, a technique that has already been widely used to create custom medical treatments or make farm animals more resilient to diseases, the researchers are hoping to come up with a new generation of silk fibers."Successful spider silk engineering in vivo will, therefore, help to develop and employ new fiber functionalities for a broad range of applications," the team wrote in its paper. "So far, genetic modifications in spiders have been only aimed at evolutionary and developmental research."As Fast Company points out, materials scientists have already been investigating the tactile strength of the silk produced by gene-modified silkworms. But thanks to cutting-edge gene-editing techniques, researchers could soon harness the unique advantages of spider silk as well.While the researchers didn't single out specific use cases for future "supermaterials," the possible applications are practically endless, from lightweight body armor to ultralight running shoes."The ability to apply CRISPR gene-editing to spider silk is very promising for materials science research — for example, it could be used to further increase the already high tensile strength of spider silk," Scheibel explained.Share This Article
#scientists #genehack #spider #produce #brightred

Scientists Gene-Hack Spider to Produce Bright-Red Silk
Researchers used the popular gene-editing technique CRISPR to modify the DNA sequences of house spiders, causing them to produce red fluorescent silk.Scientists are hoping that the US Navy and Air Force-funded research could lead to the development of new "supermaterials" produced by arachnids, Fast Company reports.As detailed in a paper published in the journal Angewandte Chemie, a team of researchers at the University of Bayreuth in Germany injected the eggs of unfertilized female spiders with a CRISPR-Cas9 solution to insert a gene sequence for a red fluorescent protein. After mating with males of the same species, the offspring produced red, fluorescent silk, demonstrating that the experiment had been successful."Considering the wide range of possible applications, it is surprising that there have been no studies to date using CRISPR-Cas9 in spiders," said senior author and University of Bayreuth professor Thomas Scheibel in a statement. "We have demonstrated, for the first time worldwide, that CRISPR-Cas9 can be used to incorporate a desired sequence into spider silk proteins, thereby enabling the functionalisation of these silk fibres."Apart from turning their silk bright red, the researchers also attempted to knock out a gene called sine oculis, which is responsible for the development of spider eyes. They found that the gene edit caused total or partial eye loss in experiments, highlighting its important role in visual development.By applying CRISPR-Cas9, a technique that has already been widely used to create custom medical treatments or make farm animals more resilient to diseases, the researchers are hoping to come up with a new generation of silk fibers."Successful spider silk engineering in vivo will, therefore, help to develop and employ new fiber functionalities for a broad range of applications," the team wrote in its paper. "So far, genetic modifications in spiders have been only aimed at evolutionary and developmental research."As Fast Company points out, materials scientists have already been investigating the tactile strength of the silk produced by gene-modified silkworms. But thanks to cutting-edge gene-editing techniques, researchers could soon harness the unique advantages of spider silk as well.While the researchers didn't single out specific use cases for future "supermaterials," the possible applications are practically endless, from lightweight body armor to ultralight running shoes."The ability to apply CRISPR gene-editing to spider silk is very promising for materials science research — for example, it could be used to further increase the already high tensile strength of spider silk," Scheibel explained.Share This Article #scientists #genehack #spider #produce #brightred

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Scientists Gene-Hack Spider to Produce Bright-Red Silk

Researchers used the popular gene-editing technique CRISPR to modify the DNA sequences of house spiders, causing them to produce red fluorescent silk.Scientists are hoping that the US Navy and Air Force-funded research could lead to the development of new "supermaterials" produced by arachnids, Fast Company reports.As detailed in a paper published in the journal Angewandte Chemie, a team of researchers at the University of Bayreuth in Germany injected the eggs of unfertilized female spiders with a CRISPR-Cas9 solution to insert a gene sequence for a red fluorescent protein. After mating with males of the same species, the offspring produced red, fluorescent silk, demonstrating that the experiment had been successful."Considering the wide range of possible applications, it is surprising that there have been no studies to date using CRISPR-Cas9 in spiders," said senior author and University of Bayreuth professor Thomas Scheibel in a statement. "We have demonstrated, for the first time worldwide, that CRISPR-Cas9 can be used to incorporate a desired sequence into spider silk proteins, thereby enabling the functionalisation of these silk fibres."Apart from turning their silk bright red, the researchers also attempted to knock out a gene called sine oculis, which is responsible for the development of spider eyes. They found that the gene edit caused total or partial eye loss in experiments, highlighting its important role in visual development.By applying CRISPR-Cas9, a technique that has already been widely used to create custom medical treatments or make farm animals more resilient to diseases, the researchers are hoping to come up with a new generation of silk fibers."Successful spider silk engineering in vivo will, therefore, help to develop and employ new fiber functionalities for a broad range of applications," the team wrote in its paper. "So far, genetic modifications in spiders have been only aimed at evolutionary and developmental research."As Fast Company points out, materials scientists have already been investigating the tactile strength of the silk produced by gene-modified silkworms. But thanks to cutting-edge gene-editing techniques, researchers could soon harness the unique advantages of spider silk as well.While the researchers didn't single out specific use cases for future "supermaterials," the possible applications are practically endless, from lightweight body armor to ultralight running shoes."The ability to apply CRISPR gene-editing to spider silk is very promising for materials science research — for example, it could be used to further increase the already high tensile strength of spider silk," Scheibel explained.Share This Article

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2025-05-31 22:52:42 ·

A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again

A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again
White-nose syndrome caused millions of bat deaths, and scientists are sounding the alarm that a second fungus could be disastrous if it reaches American wildlife

Lillian Ali

- Staff Contributor

May 30, 2025

A little brown batis seen with white fuzz on its nose, a characteristic of the deadly white-nose syndrome.
Ryan von Linden / New York Department of Environmental Conservation

In February 2006, a cave explorer near Albany, New York, took the first photograph of bats with a mysterious white growth on their faces. Later, biologists studying the mammals in caves and mines discovered piles of dead bats in the state—also with the fuzzy white mold.
The scientists were floored. For years, no one knew what was causing the mass die-offs from this “white-nose syndrome.” In early 2007, Albany residents called local authorities with reports of typically nocturnal bats flying in broad daylight.
“They were just dying on the landscape,” wildlife biologist Alan Hicks told the Associated Press’ Michael Hill in 2008. “They were crashing into snowbanks, crawling into woodpiles and dying.”
At last, scientists identified a culprit: The bats had succumbed to an infection caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans. Since its initial discovery, white-nose syndrome has killed millions of bats across 40 U.S. states and nine Canadian provinces, making it “the most dramatic wildlife mortality event that’s ever been documented from a pathogen,” DeeAnn Reeder, a disease ecologist at Bucknell University, tells the New York Times’ Carl Zimmer.
Now, nearly two decades later, scientists have developed some promising ways to fend off the disease, including an experimental vaccine. But a new study published this week in the journal Nature warns of a newly discovered second species of fungus that, if it reaches North America, could set all that progress back.
“We thought we knew our enemy, but we have now discovered it is twice the size and potentially more complex than we had imagined,” lead author Nicola Fischer, a biologist at the University of Greifswald in Germany, says in a statement.

Little brown bats are susceptible to white-nose syndrome in North America.

Krynak Tim, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

The team analyzed 5,479 fungus samples collected by hundreds of citizen science volunteers across North America, Asia and Europe. They found that white-nose syndrome is caused by two distinct fungal species native to Europe and Asia, with only one species having reached North America so far. If the second species hits the continent, it could look like a “reboot” of the epidemic, Reeder tells the New York Times.
Study co-author Sébastien Puechmaille, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Montpellier in France, knew bats in Europe had also been seen with white fuzz on their noses, as he tells the New York Times. But those populations didn’t die off like American bats.
Charting the disease across Europe and Asia, he noticed that the fungus was able to live alongside those bats, while it ravaged American ones. In its native range, the fungus grows in the bodies of hibernating bats as their internal temperature drops, then it’s shed in the spring when they awaken. But in American bats, the fungus causes their immune systems to activate and burn fat reserves as they hibernate. The bats then wake up periodically, causing irregular activity and eventual starvation.
The researchers suggest the damaging fungal spores were first brought to North America by cavers that traveled from Europe—potentially western Ukraine—to the United States without completely disinfecting their boots or rope.
White-nose syndrome poses a threat not just to bats, but to whole ecosystems. Bats are vital parts of many food chains, eating insects and pollinating plants. However, they reproduce fairly slowly, only having one or two pups at a time. Rebuilding a bat population, then, could take decades.
And since cave ecosystems are similarly delicate, biologists are wary of trying to kill off the fungus preemptively.
“Cave ecosystems are so fragile that if you start pulling on this thread, what else are you going to unravel that may create bigger problems in the cave system?” said University of Wisconsin–Madison wildlife specialist David Drake to the Badger Herald’s Kiran Mistry in December.
The discovery also occurs as the original wave of white-nose syndrome continues to spread across North America, having just crossed the Continental Divide in Colorado.
Just one spore of the new species could be devastating to American bat colonies. Puechmaille tells the New York Times that policies should be put in place to make sure the second fungus does not spread to more continents, and that cavers should not move equipment between countries and should disinfect it regularly.
“This work … powerfully illustrates the profound impact a single translocation event can have on wildlife,” he adds in the statement.

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#fungal #disease #ravaged #north #american

A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again
A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again White-nose syndrome caused millions of bat deaths, and scientists are sounding the alarm that a second fungus could be disastrous if it reaches American wildlife Lillian Ali - Staff Contributor May 30, 2025 A little brown batis seen with white fuzz on its nose, a characteristic of the deadly white-nose syndrome. Ryan von Linden / New York Department of Environmental Conservation In February 2006, a cave explorer near Albany, New York, took the first photograph of bats with a mysterious white growth on their faces. Later, biologists studying the mammals in caves and mines discovered piles of dead bats in the state—also with the fuzzy white mold. The scientists were floored. For years, no one knew what was causing the mass die-offs from this “white-nose syndrome.” In early 2007, Albany residents called local authorities with reports of typically nocturnal bats flying in broad daylight. “They were just dying on the landscape,” wildlife biologist Alan Hicks told the Associated Press’ Michael Hill in 2008. “They were crashing into snowbanks, crawling into woodpiles and dying.” At last, scientists identified a culprit: The bats had succumbed to an infection caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans. Since its initial discovery, white-nose syndrome has killed millions of bats across 40 U.S. states and nine Canadian provinces, making it “the most dramatic wildlife mortality event that’s ever been documented from a pathogen,” DeeAnn Reeder, a disease ecologist at Bucknell University, tells the New York Times’ Carl Zimmer. Now, nearly two decades later, scientists have developed some promising ways to fend off the disease, including an experimental vaccine. But a new study published this week in the journal Nature warns of a newly discovered second species of fungus that, if it reaches North America, could set all that progress back. “We thought we knew our enemy, but we have now discovered it is twice the size and potentially more complex than we had imagined,” lead author Nicola Fischer, a biologist at the University of Greifswald in Germany, says in a statement. Little brown bats are susceptible to white-nose syndrome in North America. Krynak Tim, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service The team analyzed 5,479 fungus samples collected by hundreds of citizen science volunteers across North America, Asia and Europe. They found that white-nose syndrome is caused by two distinct fungal species native to Europe and Asia, with only one species having reached North America so far. If the second species hits the continent, it could look like a “reboot” of the epidemic, Reeder tells the New York Times. Study co-author Sébastien Puechmaille, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Montpellier in France, knew bats in Europe had also been seen with white fuzz on their noses, as he tells the New York Times. But those populations didn’t die off like American bats. Charting the disease across Europe and Asia, he noticed that the fungus was able to live alongside those bats, while it ravaged American ones. In its native range, the fungus grows in the bodies of hibernating bats as their internal temperature drops, then it’s shed in the spring when they awaken. But in American bats, the fungus causes their immune systems to activate and burn fat reserves as they hibernate. The bats then wake up periodically, causing irregular activity and eventual starvation. The researchers suggest the damaging fungal spores were first brought to North America by cavers that traveled from Europe—potentially western Ukraine—to the United States without completely disinfecting their boots or rope. White-nose syndrome poses a threat not just to bats, but to whole ecosystems. Bats are vital parts of many food chains, eating insects and pollinating plants. However, they reproduce fairly slowly, only having one or two pups at a time. Rebuilding a bat population, then, could take decades. And since cave ecosystems are similarly delicate, biologists are wary of trying to kill off the fungus preemptively. “Cave ecosystems are so fragile that if you start pulling on this thread, what else are you going to unravel that may create bigger problems in the cave system?” said University of Wisconsin–Madison wildlife specialist David Drake to the Badger Herald’s Kiran Mistry in December. The discovery also occurs as the original wave of white-nose syndrome continues to spread across North America, having just crossed the Continental Divide in Colorado. Just one spore of the new species could be devastating to American bat colonies. Puechmaille tells the New York Times that policies should be put in place to make sure the second fungus does not spread to more continents, and that cavers should not move equipment between countries and should disinfect it regularly. “This work … powerfully illustrates the profound impact a single translocation event can have on wildlife,” he adds in the statement. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday. #fungal #disease #ravaged #north #american

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A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again

A Fungal Disease Ravaged North American Bats. Now, Researchers Found a Second Species That Suggests It Could Happen Again White-nose syndrome caused millions of bat deaths, and scientists are sounding the alarm that a second fungus could be disastrous if it reaches American wildlife Lillian Ali - Staff Contributor May 30, 2025 A little brown bat (Myotis lucifugus) is seen with white fuzz on its nose, a characteristic of the deadly white-nose syndrome. Ryan von Linden / New York Department of Environmental Conservation In February 2006, a cave explorer near Albany, New York, took the first photograph of bats with a mysterious white growth on their faces. Later, biologists studying the mammals in caves and mines discovered piles of dead bats in the state—also with the fuzzy white mold. The scientists were floored. For years, no one knew what was causing the mass die-offs from this “white-nose syndrome.” In early 2007, Albany residents called local authorities with reports of typically nocturnal bats flying in broad daylight. “They were just dying on the landscape,” wildlife biologist Alan Hicks told the Associated Press’ Michael Hill in 2008. “They were crashing into snowbanks, crawling into woodpiles and dying.” At last, scientists identified a culprit: The bats had succumbed to an infection caused by the fungus Pseudogymnoascus destructans. Since its initial discovery, white-nose syndrome has killed millions of bats across 40 U.S. states and nine Canadian provinces, making it “the most dramatic wildlife mortality event that’s ever been documented from a pathogen,” DeeAnn Reeder, a disease ecologist at Bucknell University, tells the New York Times’ Carl Zimmer. Now, nearly two decades later, scientists have developed some promising ways to fend off the disease, including an experimental vaccine. But a new study published this week in the journal Nature warns of a newly discovered second species of fungus that, if it reaches North America, could set all that progress back. “We thought we knew our enemy, but we have now discovered it is twice the size and potentially more complex than we had imagined,” lead author Nicola Fischer, a biologist at the University of Greifswald in Germany, says in a statement. Little brown bats are susceptible to white-nose syndrome in North America. Krynak Tim, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service The team analyzed 5,479 fungus samples collected by hundreds of citizen science volunteers across North America, Asia and Europe. They found that white-nose syndrome is caused by two distinct fungal species native to Europe and Asia, with only one species having reached North America so far. If the second species hits the continent, it could look like a “reboot” of the epidemic, Reeder tells the New York Times. Study co-author Sébastien Puechmaille, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Montpellier in France, knew bats in Europe had also been seen with white fuzz on their noses, as he tells the New York Times. But those populations didn’t die off like American bats. Charting the disease across Europe and Asia, he noticed that the fungus was able to live alongside those bats, while it ravaged American ones. In its native range, the fungus grows in the bodies of hibernating bats as their internal temperature drops, then it’s shed in the spring when they awaken. But in American bats, the fungus causes their immune systems to activate and burn fat reserves as they hibernate. The bats then wake up periodically, causing irregular activity and eventual starvation. The researchers suggest the damaging fungal spores were first brought to North America by cavers that traveled from Europe—potentially western Ukraine—to the United States without completely disinfecting their boots or rope. White-nose syndrome poses a threat not just to bats, but to whole ecosystems. Bats are vital parts of many food chains, eating insects and pollinating plants. However, they reproduce fairly slowly, only having one or two pups at a time. Rebuilding a bat population, then, could take decades. And since cave ecosystems are similarly delicate, biologists are wary of trying to kill off the fungus preemptively. “Cave ecosystems are so fragile that if you start pulling on this thread, what else are you going to unravel that may create bigger problems in the cave system?” said University of Wisconsin–Madison wildlife specialist David Drake to the Badger Herald’s Kiran Mistry in December. The discovery also occurs as the original wave of white-nose syndrome continues to spread across North America, having just crossed the Continental Divide in Colorado. Just one spore of the new species could be devastating to American bat colonies. Puechmaille tells the New York Times that policies should be put in place to make sure the second fungus does not spread to more continents, and that cavers should not move equipment between countries and should disinfect it regularly. “This work … powerfully illustrates the profound impact a single translocation event can have on wildlife,” he adds in the statement. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

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2025-05-31 12:44:23 ·

These stories could change how you feel about AI

Here’s a selection of recent headlines about artificial intelligence, picked more or less at random:For some recent graduates, the AI job apocalypse may already be hereArtificial intelligence threatens to raid the water reserves of Europe’s driest regionsTop AI CEO foresees white-collar bloodbathOkay, not exactly at random — I did look for more doomy-sounding headlines. But they weren’t hard to find. That’s because numerous studies indicate that negative or fear-framed coverage of AI in mainstream media tends to outnumber positive framings. And to be clear, there are good reasons for that! From disinformation to cyberwarfare to autonomous weapons to massive job loss to the actual, flat-out end of the world, there are a lot of things that could go very, very wrong with AI. But as in so many other areas, the emphasis on the negative in artificial intelligence risks overshadowing what could go right — both in the future as this technology continues to develop and right now. As a corrective, here’s a roundup of one way in which AI is already making a positive difference in three important fields.ScienceWhenever anyone asks me about an unquestionably good use of AI, I point to one thing: AlphaFold. After all, how many other AI models have won their creators an actual Nobel Prize? AlphaFold, which was developed by the Google-owned AI company DeepMind, is an AI model that predicts the 3D structures of proteins based solely on their amino acid sequences. That’s important because scientists need to predict the shape of protein to better understand how it might function and how it might be used in products like drugs. That’s known as the “protein-folding problem” — and it was a problem because while human researchers could eventually figure out the structure of a protein, it would often take them years of laborious work in the lab to do so. AlphaFold, through machine-learning methods I couldn’t explain to you if I tried, can make predictions in as little as five seconds, with accuracy that is almost as good as gold-standard experimental methods. By speeding up a basic part of biomedical research, AlphaFold has already managed to meaningfully accelerate drug development in everything from Huntington’s disease to antibiotic resistance. And Google DeepMind’s decision last year to open source AlphaFold3, its most advanced model, for non-commercial academic use has greatly expanded the number of researchers who can take advantage of it.MedicineYou wouldn’t know it from watching medical dramas like The Pitt, but doctors spend a lot of time doing paperwork — two hours of it for every one hour they actually spend with a patient, by one count. Finding a way to cut down that time could free up doctors to do actual medicine and help stem the problem of burnout. That’s where AI is already making a difference. As the Wall Street Journal reported this week, health care systems across the country are employing “AI scribes” — systems that automatically capture doctor-patient discussions, update medical records, and generally automate as much as possible around the documentation of a medical interaction. In one pilot study employing AI scribes from Microsoft and a startup called Abridge, doctors cut back daily documentation time from 90 minutes to under 30 minutes. Not only do ambient-listening AI products free doctors from much of the need to make manual notes, but they can eventually connect new data from a doctor-patient interaction with existing medical records and ensure connections and insights on care don’t fall between the cracks. “I see it being able to provide insights about the patient that the human mind just can’t do in a reasonable time,” Dr. Lance Owens, regional chief medical information officer at University of Michigan Health, told the Journal.ClimateA timely warning about a natural disaster can mean the difference between life and death, especially in already vulnerable poor countries. That is why Google Flood Hub is so important.An open-access, AI-driven river-flood early warning system, Flood Hub provides seven-day flood forecasts for 700 million people in 100 countries. It works by marrying a global hydrology model that can forecast river levels even in basins that lack physical flood gauges with an inundation model that converts those predicted levels into high-resolution flood maps. This allows villagers to see exactly what roads or fields might end up underwater. Flood Hub, to my mind, is one of the clearest examples of how AI can be used for good for those who need it most. Though many rich countries like the US are included in Flood Hub, they mostly already have infrastructure in place to forecast the effects of extreme weather.But many poor countries lack those capabilities. AI’s ability to drastically reduce the labor and cost of such forecasts has made it possible to extend those lifesaving capabilities to those who need it most.One more cool thing: The NGO GiveDirectly — which provides direct cash payments to the global poor — has experimented with using Flood Hub warnings to send families hundreds of dollars in cash aid days before an expected flood to help themselves prepare for the worst. As the threat of extreme weather grows, thanks to climate change and population movement, this is the kind of cutting-edge philanthropy.AI for goodEven what seems to be the best applications for AI can come with their drawbacks. The same kind of AI technology that allows AlphaFold to help speed drug development could conceivably be used one day to more rapidly design bioweapons. AI scribes in medicine raise questions about patient confidentiality and the risk of hacking. And while it’s hard to find fault in an AI system that can help warn poor people about natural disasters, the lack of access to the internet in the poorest countries can limit the value of those warnings — and there’s not much AI can do to change that.But with the headlines around AI leaning so apocalyptic, it’s easy to overlook the tangible benefits AI already delivers. Ultimately AI is a tool. A powerful tool, but a tool nonetheless. And like any tool, what it will do — bad and good — will be determined by how we use it.A version of this story originally appeared in the Good News newsletter. Sign up here!See More:
#these #stories #could #change #how

These stories could change how you feel about AI
Here’s a selection of recent headlines about artificial intelligence, picked more or less at random:For some recent graduates, the AI job apocalypse may already be hereArtificial intelligence threatens to raid the water reserves of Europe’s driest regionsTop AI CEO foresees white-collar bloodbathOkay, not exactly at random — I did look for more doomy-sounding headlines. But they weren’t hard to find. That’s because numerous studies indicate that negative or fear-framed coverage of AI in mainstream media tends to outnumber positive framings. And to be clear, there are good reasons for that! From disinformation to cyberwarfare to autonomous weapons to massive job loss to the actual, flat-out end of the world, there are a lot of things that could go very, very wrong with AI. But as in so many other areas, the emphasis on the negative in artificial intelligence risks overshadowing what could go right — both in the future as this technology continues to develop and right now. As a corrective, here’s a roundup of one way in which AI is already making a positive difference in three important fields.ScienceWhenever anyone asks me about an unquestionably good use of AI, I point to one thing: AlphaFold. After all, how many other AI models have won their creators an actual Nobel Prize? AlphaFold, which was developed by the Google-owned AI company DeepMind, is an AI model that predicts the 3D structures of proteins based solely on their amino acid sequences. That’s important because scientists need to predict the shape of protein to better understand how it might function and how it might be used in products like drugs. That’s known as the “protein-folding problem” — and it was a problem because while human researchers could eventually figure out the structure of a protein, it would often take them years of laborious work in the lab to do so. AlphaFold, through machine-learning methods I couldn’t explain to you if I tried, can make predictions in as little as five seconds, with accuracy that is almost as good as gold-standard experimental methods. By speeding up a basic part of biomedical research, AlphaFold has already managed to meaningfully accelerate drug development in everything from Huntington’s disease to antibiotic resistance. And Google DeepMind’s decision last year to open source AlphaFold3, its most advanced model, for non-commercial academic use has greatly expanded the number of researchers who can take advantage of it.MedicineYou wouldn’t know it from watching medical dramas like The Pitt, but doctors spend a lot of time doing paperwork — two hours of it for every one hour they actually spend with a patient, by one count. Finding a way to cut down that time could free up doctors to do actual medicine and help stem the problem of burnout. That’s where AI is already making a difference. As the Wall Street Journal reported this week, health care systems across the country are employing “AI scribes” — systems that automatically capture doctor-patient discussions, update medical records, and generally automate as much as possible around the documentation of a medical interaction. In one pilot study employing AI scribes from Microsoft and a startup called Abridge, doctors cut back daily documentation time from 90 minutes to under 30 minutes. Not only do ambient-listening AI products free doctors from much of the need to make manual notes, but they can eventually connect new data from a doctor-patient interaction with existing medical records and ensure connections and insights on care don’t fall between the cracks. “I see it being able to provide insights about the patient that the human mind just can’t do in a reasonable time,” Dr. Lance Owens, regional chief medical information officer at University of Michigan Health, told the Journal.ClimateA timely warning about a natural disaster can mean the difference between life and death, especially in already vulnerable poor countries. That is why Google Flood Hub is so important.An open-access, AI-driven river-flood early warning system, Flood Hub provides seven-day flood forecasts for 700 million people in 100 countries. It works by marrying a global hydrology model that can forecast river levels even in basins that lack physical flood gauges with an inundation model that converts those predicted levels into high-resolution flood maps. This allows villagers to see exactly what roads or fields might end up underwater. Flood Hub, to my mind, is one of the clearest examples of how AI can be used for good for those who need it most. Though many rich countries like the US are included in Flood Hub, they mostly already have infrastructure in place to forecast the effects of extreme weather.But many poor countries lack those capabilities. AI’s ability to drastically reduce the labor and cost of such forecasts has made it possible to extend those lifesaving capabilities to those who need it most.One more cool thing: The NGO GiveDirectly — which provides direct cash payments to the global poor — has experimented with using Flood Hub warnings to send families hundreds of dollars in cash aid days before an expected flood to help themselves prepare for the worst. As the threat of extreme weather grows, thanks to climate change and population movement, this is the kind of cutting-edge philanthropy.AI for goodEven what seems to be the best applications for AI can come with their drawbacks. The same kind of AI technology that allows AlphaFold to help speed drug development could conceivably be used one day to more rapidly design bioweapons. AI scribes in medicine raise questions about patient confidentiality and the risk of hacking. And while it’s hard to find fault in an AI system that can help warn poor people about natural disasters, the lack of access to the internet in the poorest countries can limit the value of those warnings — and there’s not much AI can do to change that.But with the headlines around AI leaning so apocalyptic, it’s easy to overlook the tangible benefits AI already delivers. Ultimately AI is a tool. A powerful tool, but a tool nonetheless. And like any tool, what it will do — bad and good — will be determined by how we use it.A version of this story originally appeared in the Good News newsletter. Sign up here!See More: #these #stories #could #change #how

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These stories could change how you feel about AI

Here’s a selection of recent headlines about artificial intelligence, picked more or less at random:For some recent graduates, the AI job apocalypse may already be hereArtificial intelligence threatens to raid the water reserves of Europe’s driest regionsTop AI CEO foresees white-collar bloodbathOkay, not exactly at random — I did look for more doomy-sounding headlines. But they weren’t hard to find. That’s because numerous studies indicate that negative or fear-framed coverage of AI in mainstream media tends to outnumber positive framings. And to be clear, there are good reasons for that! From disinformation to cyberwarfare to autonomous weapons to massive job loss to the actual, flat-out end of the world (shameless plug of my book here), there are a lot of things that could go very, very wrong with AI. But as in so many other areas, the emphasis on the negative in artificial intelligence risks overshadowing what could go right — both in the future as this technology continues to develop and right now. As a corrective (and maybe just to ingratiate myself to our potential future robot overlords), here’s a roundup of one way in which AI is already making a positive difference in three important fields.ScienceWhenever anyone asks me about an unquestionably good use of AI, I point to one thing: AlphaFold. After all, how many other AI models have won their creators an actual Nobel Prize? AlphaFold, which was developed by the Google-owned AI company DeepMind, is an AI model that predicts the 3D structures of proteins based solely on their amino acid sequences. That’s important because scientists need to predict the shape of protein to better understand how it might function and how it might be used in products like drugs. That’s known as the “protein-folding problem” — and it was a problem because while human researchers could eventually figure out the structure of a protein, it would often take them years of laborious work in the lab to do so. AlphaFold, through machine-learning methods I couldn’t explain to you if I tried, can make predictions in as little as five seconds, with accuracy that is almost as good as gold-standard experimental methods. By speeding up a basic part of biomedical research, AlphaFold has already managed to meaningfully accelerate drug development in everything from Huntington’s disease to antibiotic resistance. And Google DeepMind’s decision last year to open source AlphaFold3, its most advanced model, for non-commercial academic use has greatly expanded the number of researchers who can take advantage of it.MedicineYou wouldn’t know it from watching medical dramas like The Pitt, but doctors spend a lot of time doing paperwork — two hours of it for every one hour they actually spend with a patient, by one count. Finding a way to cut down that time could free up doctors to do actual medicine and help stem the problem of burnout. That’s where AI is already making a difference. As the Wall Street Journal reported this week, health care systems across the country are employing “AI scribes” — systems that automatically capture doctor-patient discussions, update medical records, and generally automate as much as possible around the documentation of a medical interaction. In one pilot study employing AI scribes from Microsoft and a startup called Abridge, doctors cut back daily documentation time from 90 minutes to under 30 minutes. Not only do ambient-listening AI products free doctors from much of the need to make manual notes, but they can eventually connect new data from a doctor-patient interaction with existing medical records and ensure connections and insights on care don’t fall between the cracks. “I see it being able to provide insights about the patient that the human mind just can’t do in a reasonable time,” Dr. Lance Owens, regional chief medical information officer at University of Michigan Health, told the Journal.ClimateA timely warning about a natural disaster can mean the difference between life and death, especially in already vulnerable poor countries. That is why Google Flood Hub is so important.An open-access, AI-driven river-flood early warning system, Flood Hub provides seven-day flood forecasts for 700 million people in 100 countries. It works by marrying a global hydrology model that can forecast river levels even in basins that lack physical flood gauges with an inundation model that converts those predicted levels into high-resolution flood maps. This allows villagers to see exactly what roads or fields might end up underwater. Flood Hub, to my mind, is one of the clearest examples of how AI can be used for good for those who need it most. Though many rich countries like the US are included in Flood Hub, they mostly already have infrastructure in place to forecast the effects of extreme weather. (Unless, of course, we cut it all from the budget.) But many poor countries lack those capabilities. AI’s ability to drastically reduce the labor and cost of such forecasts has made it possible to extend those lifesaving capabilities to those who need it most.One more cool thing: The NGO GiveDirectly — which provides direct cash payments to the global poor — has experimented with using Flood Hub warnings to send families hundreds of dollars in cash aid days before an expected flood to help themselves prepare for the worst. As the threat of extreme weather grows, thanks to climate change and population movement, this is the kind of cutting-edge philanthropy.AI for goodEven what seems to be the best applications for AI can come with their drawbacks. The same kind of AI technology that allows AlphaFold to help speed drug development could conceivably be used one day to more rapidly design bioweapons. AI scribes in medicine raise questions about patient confidentiality and the risk of hacking. And while it’s hard to find fault in an AI system that can help warn poor people about natural disasters, the lack of access to the internet in the poorest countries can limit the value of those warnings — and there’s not much AI can do to change that.But with the headlines around AI leaning so apocalyptic, it’s easy to overlook the tangible benefits AI already delivers. Ultimately AI is a tool. A powerful tool, but a tool nonetheless. And like any tool, what it will do — bad and good — will be determined by how we use it.A version of this story originally appeared in the Good News newsletter. Sign up here!See More:

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2025-05-31 12:00:20 ·

How Dell Technologies Is Building the Engines of AI Factories With NVIDIA Blackwell

Over a century ago, Henry Ford pioneered the mass production of cars and engines to provide transportation at an affordable price. Today, the technology industry manufactures the engines for a new kind of factory — those that produce intelligence.
As companies and countries increasingly focus on AI, and move from experimentation to implementation, the demand for AI technologies continues to grow exponentially. Leading system builders are racing to ramp up production of the servers for AI factories – the engines of AI factories – to meet the world’s exploding demand for intelligence and growth.
Dell Technologies is a leader in this renaissance. Dell and NVIDIA have partnered for decades and continue to push the pace of innovation. In its last earnings call, Dell projected that its AI server business will grow at least billion this year.
“We’re on a mission to bring AI to millions of customers around the world,” said Michael Dell, chairman and chief executive officer, Dell Technologies, in a recent announcement at Dell Technologies World. “With the Dell AI Factory with NVIDIA, enterprises can manage the entire AI lifecycle across use cases, from training to deployment, at any scale.”
The latest Dell AI servers, powered by NVIDIA Blackwell, offer up to 50x more AI reasoning inference output and 5x improvement in throughput compared with the Hopper platform. Customers use them to generate tokens for new AI applications that will help solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, from disease prevention to advanced manufacturing.
Dell servers with NVIDIA GB200 are shipping at scale for a variety of customers, such as CoreWeave’s new NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 system. One of Dell’s U.S. factories can ship thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs to customers in a week. It’s why they were chosen by one of their largest customers to deploy 100,000 NVIDIA GPUs in just six weeks.
But how is an AI server made? We visited a facility to find out.

Building the Engines of Intelligence
We visited one of Dell’s U.S. facilities that builds the most compute-dense NVIDIA Blackwell generation servers ever manufactured.
Modern automobile engines have more than 200 major components and take three to seven years to roll out to market. NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 servers have 1.2 million parts and were designed just a year ago.
Amid a forest of racks, grouped by phases of assembly, Dell employees quickly slide in GB200 trays, NVLink Switch networking trays and then test the systems. The company said its ability to engineer the compute, network and storage assembly under one roof and fine tune, deploy and integrate complete systems is a powerful differentiator. Speed also matters. The Dell team can build, test, ship – test again on site at a customer location – and turn over a rack in 24 hours.
The servers are destined for state-of-the-art data centers that require a dizzying quantity of cables, pipes and hoses to operate. One data center can have 27,000 miles of network cable — enough to wrap around the Earth. It can pack about six miles of water pipes, 77 miles of rubber hoses, and is capable of circulating 100,000 gallons of water per minute for cooling.
With new AI factories being announced each week – the European Union has plans for seven AI factories, while India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Norway are also developing them – the demand for these engines of intelligence will only grow in the months and years ahead.
#how #dell #technologies #building #engines

How Dell Technologies Is Building the Engines of AI Factories With NVIDIA Blackwell
Over a century ago, Henry Ford pioneered the mass production of cars and engines to provide transportation at an affordable price. Today, the technology industry manufactures the engines for a new kind of factory — those that produce intelligence. As companies and countries increasingly focus on AI, and move from experimentation to implementation, the demand for AI technologies continues to grow exponentially. Leading system builders are racing to ramp up production of the servers for AI factories – the engines of AI factories – to meet the world’s exploding demand for intelligence and growth. Dell Technologies is a leader in this renaissance. Dell and NVIDIA have partnered for decades and continue to push the pace of innovation. In its last earnings call, Dell projected that its AI server business will grow at least billion this year. “We’re on a mission to bring AI to millions of customers around the world,” said Michael Dell, chairman and chief executive officer, Dell Technologies, in a recent announcement at Dell Technologies World. “With the Dell AI Factory with NVIDIA, enterprises can manage the entire AI lifecycle across use cases, from training to deployment, at any scale.” The latest Dell AI servers, powered by NVIDIA Blackwell, offer up to 50x more AI reasoning inference output and 5x improvement in throughput compared with the Hopper platform. Customers use them to generate tokens for new AI applications that will help solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, from disease prevention to advanced manufacturing. Dell servers with NVIDIA GB200 are shipping at scale for a variety of customers, such as CoreWeave’s new NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 system. One of Dell’s U.S. factories can ship thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs to customers in a week. It’s why they were chosen by one of their largest customers to deploy 100,000 NVIDIA GPUs in just six weeks. But how is an AI server made? We visited a facility to find out. Building the Engines of Intelligence We visited one of Dell’s U.S. facilities that builds the most compute-dense NVIDIA Blackwell generation servers ever manufactured. Modern automobile engines have more than 200 major components and take three to seven years to roll out to market. NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 servers have 1.2 million parts and were designed just a year ago. Amid a forest of racks, grouped by phases of assembly, Dell employees quickly slide in GB200 trays, NVLink Switch networking trays and then test the systems. The company said its ability to engineer the compute, network and storage assembly under one roof and fine tune, deploy and integrate complete systems is a powerful differentiator. Speed also matters. The Dell team can build, test, ship – test again on site at a customer location – and turn over a rack in 24 hours. The servers are destined for state-of-the-art data centers that require a dizzying quantity of cables, pipes and hoses to operate. One data center can have 27,000 miles of network cable — enough to wrap around the Earth. It can pack about six miles of water pipes, 77 miles of rubber hoses, and is capable of circulating 100,000 gallons of water per minute for cooling. With new AI factories being announced each week – the European Union has plans for seven AI factories, while India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Norway are also developing them – the demand for these engines of intelligence will only grow in the months and years ahead. #how #dell #technologies #building #engines

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How Dell Technologies Is Building the Engines of AI Factories With NVIDIA Blackwell

Over a century ago, Henry Ford pioneered the mass production of cars and engines to provide transportation at an affordable price. Today, the technology industry manufactures the engines for a new kind of factory — those that produce intelligence. As companies and countries increasingly focus on AI, and move from experimentation to implementation, the demand for AI technologies continues to grow exponentially. Leading system builders are racing to ramp up production of the servers for AI factories – the engines of AI factories – to meet the world’s exploding demand for intelligence and growth. Dell Technologies is a leader in this renaissance. Dell and NVIDIA have partnered for decades and continue to push the pace of innovation. In its last earnings call, Dell projected that its AI server business will grow at least $15 billion this year. “We’re on a mission to bring AI to millions of customers around the world,” said Michael Dell, chairman and chief executive officer, Dell Technologies, in a recent announcement at Dell Technologies World. “With the Dell AI Factory with NVIDIA, enterprises can manage the entire AI lifecycle across use cases, from training to deployment, at any scale.” The latest Dell AI servers, powered by NVIDIA Blackwell, offer up to 50x more AI reasoning inference output and 5x improvement in throughput compared with the Hopper platform. Customers use them to generate tokens for new AI applications that will help solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, from disease prevention to advanced manufacturing. Dell servers with NVIDIA GB200 are shipping at scale for a variety of customers, such as CoreWeave’s new NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 system. One of Dell’s U.S. factories can ship thousands of NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs to customers in a week. It’s why they were chosen by one of their largest customers to deploy 100,000 NVIDIA GPUs in just six weeks. But how is an AI server made? We visited a facility to find out. Building the Engines of Intelligence We visited one of Dell’s U.S. facilities that builds the most compute-dense NVIDIA Blackwell generation servers ever manufactured. Modern automobile engines have more than 200 major components and take three to seven years to roll out to market. NVIDIA GB200 NVL72 servers have 1.2 million parts and were designed just a year ago. Amid a forest of racks, grouped by phases of assembly, Dell employees quickly slide in GB200 trays, NVLink Switch networking trays and then test the systems. The company said its ability to engineer the compute, network and storage assembly under one roof and fine tune, deploy and integrate complete systems is a powerful differentiator. Speed also matters. The Dell team can build, test, ship – test again on site at a customer location – and turn over a rack in 24 hours. The servers are destined for state-of-the-art data centers that require a dizzying quantity of cables, pipes and hoses to operate. One data center can have 27,000 miles of network cable — enough to wrap around the Earth. It can pack about six miles of water pipes, 77 miles of rubber hoses, and is capable of circulating 100,000 gallons of water per minute for cooling. With new AI factories being announced each week – the European Union has plans for seven AI factories, while India, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Norway are also developing them – the demand for these engines of intelligence will only grow in the months and years ahead.

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