Science & Technology

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James Rossman/James Rossman/TNS

Jim Rossman: Don’t bog down your PC with extra antivirus protection

Last week I received an email from a reader that included the longest explanation of a problem that I can recall. I’m going to edit it way down for inclusion here.

“I am a 75-year-old, semi-tech-savvy, retired female. I know enough to trouble-shoot simple things, but when it gets too technical, I get overwhelmed. I was having a lot of ...Read more

Nintendo/TNS

Kid-tested video games: 5 titles that appeal to the youngest of players

I started playing video games when I was 4, and my son recently reached the same age. I’ve been trying to introduce him to the land of Mario, Pokémon and Lego superheroes. The problem is that the industry has changed a lot since Atari’s primitive graphics.

Games have grown more complex since “Yars’ Revenge.” They have open worlds, ...Read more

Ottocast/TNS/TNS

Gadgets: Car display accessory

Ottocast’s Play2Video Ultra is the go-to accessory to turn your car’s display into an expanded entertainment hub.

Vehicle displays are only getting bigger and better, so why not take advantage during those unexpected moments of downtime? With the Play2Video Ultra, you can recline your seat while waiting at the airport for a delayed flight...Read more

Dreamstime/TNS/Dreamstime/TNS

322,000 Californians sign up to have data brokers delete their personal information

More than 300,000 Californians have demanded that hundreds of data brokers erase information about their locations, finances, health and personal lives as the state’s first-in-the-nation Delete Act requires brokers to start the mandatory process of removing data on Aug. 1.

Brokers must start accessing deletion requests within 45 days after ...Read more

Daniel Mears/The Detroit News/TNS

Mechanics say they're losing business as vehicles get more high tech

High-tech features are making vehicles more expensive and difficult to repair, putting pressure on already strained car owners and posing an existential crisis for mom-and-pop mechanics, analysts and consumer advocates say.

At issue is the shift from mostly mechanical vehicles to "big four-wheel rolling computers," as one auto industry analyst ...Read more

Spencer Platt/Getty Images North America/TNS

Commentary: Climate change isn't taking food off your table

No morning ritual is safe from climate alarm. In June, the journal Nature declared that coffee is “critically threatened by climate change” and described scientists racing to save your espresso from “extinction.” The New York Times blames sky-high coffee prices on climate-driven supply crunches in Brazil and Vietnam. And your olive oil? ...Read more

Rainier Ehrhardt/Getty Images North America/TNS

AI bumps power cost 60% as mega US grid fails to hit supply goal

Power-hungry data centers have increased supply costs for the largest U.S. electric grid by more than 60%, the system watchdog said.

PJM Interconnection LLC, which serves 13 states and Washington, DC, said Tuesday that its auction to procure power for the year starting June 2028 tied a $16.4 billion record set in late 2025. Data centers ...Read more

Erika Schultz/The Seattle Times/TNS

Washington tribes, conservation groups sue over Trump endangered species rule

Northwest tribal nations and conservation groups sued the Trump administration Tuesday, challenging a new rule that aims to eliminate habitat protections for imperiled species.

For more than 50 years, degradation or destruction of habitat that impairs, kills or injures threatened species has been prohibited or regulated by the Endangered ...Read more

E. Jason Wambsgans/Chicago Tribune/TNS

The AI effect: University of Chicago Law School opts to prohibit electronic devices in some classrooms

Come fall, first-year students at the University of Chicago Law School will be prohibited from using electronic devices like laptops, tablets and phones in the classroom throughout the 2026-27 academic year. The new policy comes as artificial intelligence continues to affect the higher education landscape and schools grapple with how to handle ...Read more

Bill Ingalls/NASA/TNS

NASA astronaut launches with 2 cosmonauts to space station

NASA astronaut Anil Menon launched with a pair of cosmonauts on a Soyuz spacecraft to the International Space Station on Tuesday.

Menon, a member of the 2021 class of astronauts, is making his first spaceflight. He’s flying with Roscosmos’ Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina. Kikina flew once before on the Crew-5 mission that launched from Florida...Read more

Handout/SpaceX/TNS

SpaceX knocks out Florida launch while prepping for Texas Starship mission

ORLANDO, Fla. — SpaceX tallied another Starlink mission early Tuesday on the Space Coast where it was business as usual, while in Texas the company continued to prep for the next launch of its powerful Starship and Super Heavy.

The Florida launch saw a Falcon 9 rocket lift off amid predawn night skies on the Starlink 10-45 mission with 29 ...Read more

Fast-moving floodwater from a storm damaged bridges and homes and broke apart Million Bible Church in Richmond, Ky., in late June 2026. Jon Cherry/Getty Images

When disaster recovery becomes a way of life: Community disaster fatigue is on the rise with more frequent floods

Flash flooding has been tearing up communities across the U.S., with heavy downpours sending creeks and rivers rushing over their banks from Texas to Kentucky, across the Midwest and into the Mid-Atlantic states and the Northeast. In Missouri, floodwater swept away a home, and National Guard helicopters had to rescue and evacuate dozens of ...Read more

Xavier Mascarenas/The Sacramento Bee/TNS

What to know about the golden mussels invading California's waterways

The discovery of golden mussels at Sacramento’s deepwater port late last month, though worrying, was not unexpected by researchers tracking the invasive species’ spread through the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. But the ongoing challenge for authorities, and for the state’s aquatic recreationalists, is keeping the destructive bivalve ...Read more

Environmental Protection Agency/TNS

EPA to force the removal of leaking acids from deteriorating Washington pulp mill

SEATTLE — Federal regulators will force the removal of toxic, highly corrosive chemicals from a defunct and leaking pulp mill along the Chehalis River, officials confirmed this week.

Either Richard Bassett, the U.K. businessman who owns Cosmo Specialty Fibers, must start removing vast quantities of these chemicals from the site this month or ...Read more

David McNew/Getty Images North America/TNS

Trump slashes wildlife protections, putting endangered California animals at risk

The Trump administration finalized a rollback of the Endangered Species Act on Friday, paving the way for drilling, mining and other human development across protected wildlife habitats.

The move redefines "harm" under the Endangered Species Act, the landmark conservation law that protects threatened and endangered plants and animals. For years...Read more

Northern spotted owls living in old growth forests in the Pacific Northwest were listed as threatened species because of habitat loss. Kyle Sullivan/Bureau of Land Management, CC BY

How redefining one word strips the Endangered Species Act’s ability to protect vital habitat

It wouldn’t make much sense to prohibit people from shooting a threatened woodpecker while allowing its forest to be cut down, or to bar killing endangered salmon while allowing a dam to dry out their habitat.

But that’s what the Trump administration is doing by changing how one word in the Endangered Species Act is interpreted: ...Read more

SK Hynix CEO expects memory crunch to last into next decade

The memory-chip shortages that are roiling the computer, car and device markets will probably persist beyond 2030, according to SK Hynix Inc. Chief Executive Officer Kwak Noh-Jung.

Customers are signing long-term contracts because “they believe that the shortage situation will last for longer,” Kwak said in his first-ever English language ...Read more

Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group/TNS

What to do with millions of old batteries from e-bikes, lawn tools and power stations? In California, companies may be required to take them back

They are found in everything from the growing number of e-bikes on California’s roads to electric lawn mowers and leaf blowers in backyards, and even in portable power stations used on camping trips that can provide electricity when home outages occur during storms.

But medium-sized lithium-ion batteries — the kind that are bigger than ...Read more

PRNEWSWIRE/TNS

Not everyone is leaving California -- new commercial battery maker sets up shop in Sacramento

The lithium-ion batteries that supply much of today’s clean energy come with some infamous drawbacks, from fire risk to reliance on foreign mining.

Alternatives have been slow to get off the ground.

But California start-up Peak Energy announced Wednesday it’s building a factory in Sacramento that will be the first in the U.S. to make ...Read more

Hayne Palmour IV/The San Diego Union-Tribune/TNS

UC San Diego develops way to forecast when coastal landslides are imminent

SAN DIEGO — The University of California, San Diego has developed a rudimentary way to detect when and where coastal landslides are likely to occur, which could lead to an early warning system for a phenomenon that has killed 19 people in greater San Diego since the 1940s.

Scientists say in a study released Thursday they were able to predict ...Read more