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NextEra Energy has received a $1.9 billion federal loan to refurbish the Duane Arnold Energy Center in Iowa, a nuclear plant shuttered since 2020 that Google pledged to help revive last October. The plant is slated to restart in 2029, with Google reportedly planning up to six data centers nearby, while only 50 megawatts of output will go to the local power cooperative.
Once dismissed as inedible 'dog fruit' left for dogs to scavenge, avocados in India began gaining popularity after actress Shilpa Shetty publicised using them for skincare around 2011, sparking demand and rising prices. Plantations like Cottanad in Kerala's Wayanad region, which initially grew avocado trees only for shade, have since expanded cultivation to 40 acres, with output expected to grow fourfold within a few years.
A former controls designer who built a fully automated U.S. nuclear plant system recalls deliberately preserving manual steps so operators wouldn't lose hands-on competence. He now applies that lesson to AI's spread through engineering, citing Harvard and Stanford research showing junior-level employment shrinking in AI-adopting firms while senior roles keep growing.
Jaguar Land Rover has revealed its first fully electric Range Rover, arriving in 2027 with a 118.5-kWh battery, dual 349-horsepower motors producing 542 combined horsepower, and an EPA-estimated range of at least 333 miles. The SUV supports 350 kW charging, adding roughly 125 miles in 10 minutes and going from 10% to 80% in about 22 minutes, and will be built at JLR's Solihull plant in England.
Three 16-year-old students from Cork County, Ireland—Émer Hickey, Ciara Judge, and Sophie Healy-Thow—discovered that treating cereal seeds with rhizobia bacteria, normally associated with legumes, sped up germination by 50 percent and increased barley and oat yields by up to 70 percent. Their research, which began as a school geography project on global food shortages, earned them the top prize at the 2014 Google Science Fair.
Three teenage girls from Kinsale, Ireland, followed up an accidental discovery of nitrogen-fixing bacteria in pea plant roots by testing whether the same bacteria could benefit cereal crops, which normally can't host them. Working from a home laboratory over three years, Émer Hickey, Ciara Judge and Sophie Healy-Thow soaked barley, oat and other cereal seeds in rhizobium cultures and tracked germination and growth against controls, despite experts warning the bacteria wouldn't help non-legume plants.
Ron Fowler, now 77 and hospitalized with cancer and blood clots, and his 83-year-old friend Chuck Deuschle spent years working at a Kentucky uranium-enrichment plant central to the U.S. nuclear weapons program. They later exposed how the facility and its operators hid dangerous levels of radiation and toxic chemical exposure from workers and nearby residents for decades, choosing to stay on the job and speak out rather than quit.
Generation Lab, founded on scientist Irina Conboy's research into blood exchange between old and young mice, is now promoting a rejuvenation treatment it says combines two existing drugs to reverse aging effects without needing blood transfusion. The company has offered influencers access to the treatment but refuses to disclose which drugs are actually used. Separately, utilities are increasingly recruiting households to join 'virtual power plants,' networks of connected devices like thermostats, EVs and batteries that can be throttled during peak demand in exchange for bill discounts or sign-up bonuses.
SK hynix held a groundbreaking ceremony this week for its first U.S.-based HBM packaging and testing facility, located in West Lafayette, Indiana. The $4 billion site will package HBM stacks using DRAM wafers made in South Korea, with volume production of next-generation HBM memory expected in the second half of 2029, roughly a year later than originally planned.
Virtual power plants let utilities remotely adjust smart thermostats, EV chargers, batteries and solar panels in homes to reduce strain during peak demand, in exchange for bill discounts or signup bonuses. More than 500 such programs already run across the US, with about 4 million smart-thermostat households enrolled as of last year, and interest is growing as companies like Google invest in the technology to support data centers.
GKIDS is bringing 'The Last Blossom,' a new anime feature from the creators of the acclaimed mystery series ODDTAXI, to theaters for a limited two-night engagement on August 30 and 31. The film follows a former yakuza member whose story is paired symbolically with a plant, a choice the director discusses as central to the narrative's themes.
Ikea has unveiled a new furniture collection called YXSTABY, developed in partnership with Xbox, featuring pillows, chairs and an unusually shaped stool that resembles a game controller. The line targets gamers looking to outfit dedicated play spaces with themed seating and accessories.