Americans have a lot of plans for the country’s power grid. Some people want to expand renewable energy by building solar and wind farms. Others want to add new coal- or natural gas-fired power plants. There are those who want to provide power to some unknown number of data centers processing artificial intelligence algorithms.

To ...Read more

When Hall effect keyboards launched, they became the must-have peripheral for PC gamers. The magnetic switches proved more versatile and responsive than their mechanical counterparts. More importantly, those perks gave players an edge in competitive games.

But the main problem with initial Hall effect keyboards is that they pack useful ...Read more

The newly released Anker Solix S5000 shows how far portable power has come. The high-capacity power pack is touted by Anker as the longest-lasting 5kWh portable power station for home backup in the event of power outages.

For a portable battery (10.6 by 22 by 15.2 inches), the specifications are impressive, including about 5kWh of capacity, ...Read more

Remedy has always made compelling standalone games, but it didn’t make an expansive video game universe until it created “Control.” The 2019 title married the action elements the studio did well with an excellent, evocative storytelling. The result was a big bang that connected disparate parts of its franchises.

It tied the supernatural...Read more

This week a reader needs email help: “I get way too many nonsense and useless emails. I’ve tried unsubscribing but it often doesn’t work or makes the problem worse. Is there a way to move these unwanted emails automatically to my junk folder? Some do automatically go there but too many get through. Can I select these unwanted emails and ...Read more

These new glasses can help you hear.

You read that right. Former Qualcomm engineers have invented smart glasses that can amplify the sounds you want to hear while reducing the background noise around you. Now the startup is recruiting San Diego-area participants to test its latest prototypes.

The San Diego company behind the glasses is Aynak, ...Read more

A magnetic gray box, no larger than a Post-it note, rests on the refrigerator in Sammy Mousa’s apartment, holding up a maroon University of Chicago Law School flag. The word “Brick” is imprinted on the square’s surface.

On his way to class in the morning, Mousa, 26, taps his phone on the device, in the same way he would tap to pay at a ...Read more

Amid record ocean temperatures, a third olive ridley sea turtle has laid its eggs in Southern California — this time on San Buenaventura State Beach in Ventura.

The rare event occurred on Sunday, according to witnesses and officials, and marks the third naturally-occurring sea turtle nest ever found on the U.S. West Coast.

Ventura resident ...Read more

CHICAGO — Less than a month after a fourth beluga whale transferred from a defunct Canadian marine park died at Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium, officials this week revealed that examinations found no singular cause of death in the final two deceased whales.

Each of the rescued whales, Caspian, Osiris, Peekachu and Rain, suffered chronic ...Read more

As temperatures rise and development expands, the number of homes and other structures damaged or destroyed by wildfires across the U.S. is on pace to triple by mid-century, my colleagues and I found in a study just published.

The 2026 wildfire season has been a sharp reminder of that risk and why making homes and properties less ...Read more

In July 2014, a man sick with Ebola flew from Liberia into Lagos, Nigeria, one of Africa’s largest and busiest cities. One imported case in a place like that could have sparked an urban epidemic. Instead, Nigeria stopped the outbreak at 20 cases.

Health workers tracked down nearly 900 people who had been exposed and made some 18,500 face-to-...Read more

The Eastern coyote is now a common sight in Connecticut, with the population spreading across all of the state’s 169 towns and cities, but they haven’t been here for long, according to officials with the state’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.

Over the last 100 years, the coyote has spread from the western plains and ...Read more

Should artificial intelligence systems be given rights? One of the leading thinkers on the fast-evolving technology weighed in over the weekend.

Microsoft AI Chief Executive Mustafa Suleyman, in an X post published on Sunday, repeated his stance that current AI systems are not conscious, do not have subjective experiences and cannot suffer. He ...Read more

Should artificial intelligence systems be given rights? One of the leading thinkers on the fast-evolving technology weighed in over the weekend.

Microsoft AI Chief Executive Mustafa Suleyman, in an X post published on Sunday, r repeated his stance that current AI systems are not conscious, do not have subjective experiences and cannot suffer. ...Read more

If your home isn’t in a federally designated flood zone, flooding might seem like someone else’s problem. No one requires you to buy flood insurance, and the map suggests you’re in the clear. But reality may be very different.

Mounting evidence reveals that significantly more homes are at risk of flooding than is indicated by ...Read more

A pipeline that spilled at least 1.3 million gallons of hazardous natural gas liquids in Wisconsin two months ago garnered national attention and more calls for scrutiny. But thousands of small oil spills in the Great Lakes over the past decade have gone largely unnoticed, and little is known about their effects on the ecosystem, a new study ...Read more

Colorado has spent years pursuing policies aimed at reducing its reliance on natural gas. Despite that, voters are now being asked to make it a right to buy the fossil fuel under the state’s constitution, a status no other such commodity has.

Natural gas heats more than two-thirds of homes in Colorado, which holds the eighth-largest reserves...Read more

As is the tradition, the first full week of October marked the announcements of Nobel Prizes, with a new one each day: Physiology and medicine Oct. 5, followed by physics, chemistry, literature and peace on successive days. The first three often are considered the science prizes, and since their start in 1901, scientists in the United States ...Read more

There’s a sentiment bubbling up in the U.S. and Europe propelled by deep urges to preserve group identity, urges that trace back to the origin of the species. This drive has been actively suppressed in many nations since World War II, and yet Germany’s far-right, anti-immigrant party AfD just triumphed in an eastern state election, and in ...Read more

LONG BEACH, Calif. — For the first sea turtle eggs ever laid on California beaches, hatching day — hopefully — draws near.

At the Aquarium of the Pacific, 204 olive ridley eggs lay packed between layers of sand in the same styrofoam coolers scientists used to transport them to the Long Beach facility in late September — just days before...Read more