Viruses that infect bacteria – called phages – are abundant in our bodies, and they seem to have beneficial effects when our cells engulf them.
By Kamal Nahas
Microsoft warns of Scattered Spider, a financially motivated hacking crew that infiltrates firms worldwide using SMS phishing, SIM swapping, and by posing as new employees, leading to data breaches and takeovers.
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The prolific threat actor known as Scattered Spider has been observed impersonating newly hired employees in targeted firms as a ploy to blend into normal on-hire processes and takeover accounts and breach organizations across the world.
Microsoft, which disclosed the activities of the financially motivated hacking crew, described the adversary as “one of the most dangerous financial criminal groups,” calling out its operational fluidity and its ability to incorporate SMS phishing, SIM swapping, and help desk fraud into its attack model.
In March of this year, astronomers detected a brilliant burst of gamma rays more than a million times more luminous than our entire galaxy. It was the second brightest gamma-ray burst (GRB) ever detected and lasted some 200 seconds.
A study published today in Nature reports that this object was a collision of neutron stars one million light-years distant. What’s more, thanks to the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), astronomers were able to see that the blast also served as a cosmic chemical factory, forging some of the rarest chemicals found on Earth.
“The most robust evidence that the merger of two neutron stars caused this burst comes from its kilonova,” says lead author Andrew Levan of Radboud University in the Netherlands, referring to the optical and infrared light coming from the uber-sized explosion.
Apple is spending $1 billion per year on generative AI, which may soon manifest in a smarter Siri and AI capabilities in other programs.
Bacterial diversity in the gut plays an important role in health. The human microbiome has featured prominently in research, with links being made between it and cancer, personality, memory, and diseases such as diabetes and multiple sclerosis.
While it’s understood that a mother’s microbiome is transferred to their baby at birth and boosted by breastfeeding, what other sources of gut bacteria are there? A new study by researchers at the Graz University of Technology (TU Graz) in Austria has confirmed, for the first time, that one source is fruits and vegetables.
The human gut microbiome has a crucial connection to our health and well-being, but it is a complex entity made up of many different organisms, which all have an effect on one another. The hundreds of different microbial species in the gut metabolize the foods we consume in different ways, and the metabolites that microbes generate are often then consumed by other microbes. It’s been suggested that the more than half of the stuff that is eaten by gut microbes are byproducts of other gut microbes. This interdependence can have profound implications for the gut microbiome, and some species become totally reliant on the presence of others.
Scientists are still learning about the various characteristics of a healthy human gut microbiome, but there are certain species that tend to be present. High diversity in the microbiome is also typically associated with good health. While some microbes can fill in the gaps if other important ones are missing, some species can’t be substituted.
It’s the day after the Baltimore Orioles clinched the American League East Championship with their 100th win of the season, and lifelong fan Tim Evans is showing his pride on his sleeve.
“It’s so great,” Evans, 62, says with a huge smile, wearing his orange O’s jersey.
The last time the Orioles won the AL East was in 2014, the same year Evans was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a progressive nervous system disease that causes muscle weakness and loss of motor and speech functions. Evans currently has severe speech and swallowing problems. He can talk slowly, but it’s hard for most people to understand him.
Scientists have demonstrated that an AI system called a neural network can be trained to show “systematic compositionality,” a key part of human intellect.
It’s not often an article makes me say “woah” out loud.
Scientists have created the world’s first nanophotonic electron accelerator, which speeds negatively charged particles with mini laser pulses and is small enough to fit on a coin.
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Right now, billions of neurons in your brain are working together to generate a conscious experience — and not just any conscious experience, your experience of the world around you and of yourself within it. How does this happen? According to neuroscientist Anil Seth, we’re all hallucinating all the time; when we agree about our hallucinations, we call it “reality.” Join Seth for a delightfully disorienting talk that may leave you questioning the very nature of your existence.
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