Science & Technology

/

Knowledge

Jim Rossman/Jim Rossman/TNS

Jim Rossman: You should be using a password manager

A reader named Nancy wrote to me this week.

“Can you please explain how password managers work and the different options? I have a Windows PC and an Apple iPad and iPhone. Do I have to use the same browser on all devices? Or do I have to have a separate app to store passwords? How do they work with all of the different apps I need to log...Read more

Niantic/Niantic/TNS

‘Monster Hunter Now’ launches Season 3 featuring cooking, the Heavy Bowgun and Magnamalo

“Monster Hunter Now” continues to improve each season, and in the latest chapter, out now, Niantic’s mobile game features one additional weapon, two big improvements and several new monsters with a few of them temporarily going away.

In Season 3: Curse of the Wandering Flames, players will get their hands on the Heavy Bowgun, another ...Read more

Handout/ESR/TNS

Gadgets: Cordless vacuum

The Proscenic P11 Lite 6-in-1 multi-function vacuum is a top-of-the-line ergonomically designed cordless vacuum.

The lightweight (2.9 pounds) and easy-to-handle cordless vacuum includes three specialized brushes: a floor brush, a 2-in-1 dusting brush, and a crevice tool. Along with the adjustable telescopic pipe, it can be used in six ...Read more

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images North America/TNS

Gen Z: Will they finally solve the plastic crisis?

WOODSIDE, Calif. — Generation Z has been heralded by some as the “sustainability” generation — more likely to pay a premium for eco-friendly products and more likely to make purchase decisions that incorporate their personal, social and environmental values.

Some studies indicate they’ve scored off the charts when it comes to their ...Read more

SpaceX/SpaceX/TNS

SpaceX pushes booster recovery limits with satellite launch

SpaceX pushed one of its most-used boosters to its limits with a launch Tuesday evening from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

A Falcon 9 rocket using a booster for the 22nd time managed a successful recovery landing even though it was used to fly its payload, a pair of the European Commission’s Galileo L13 satellites, to a medium-Earth orbit. The ...Read more

Ray Chavez/Bay Area News Group/TNS

The 10 most common types of litter found on California's beaches

Every September, evening temperatures begin to chill, high school football games kick off, pumpkins sprout in farm fields and tens of thousands of people flock to California’s beaches, lakes, rivers and streams to pick up litter as part of the state’s largest annual volunteer event, California Coastal Cleanup Day.

The goal is to beautify ...Read more

Charley Gallay/Getty Images North America/TNS

A computer on your face? Snap and others still trying to make AR glasses a reality

In its relentless search for ways to weave digital products into people's lives, Big Tech has achieved some big wins. Smart phones are ubiquitous. Apple Watch users talk to their wrists. Artificial intelligence-powered assistants are everywhere.

But convincing people to wear computers on their faces has been a dud. So far, at least.

Augmented...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

Instagram rolls out restrictive new privacy settings for teenagers

Instagram is changing the default privacy settings for many U.S. teenagers, part of an effort to keep them safer and give parents more control over how their kids interact online.

The new settings will make teen accounts private by default, limit who those users can send private messages to, and put teens in the “most restrictive” tier when...Read more

Lost in translation: What spirituality and Einstein’s theory of time have to do with misunderstandings about climate change

As a child growing up in the early 1990s, I remember learning in school about the greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide released by burning fossil fuels traps heat near the Earth’s surface, like the glass of a greenhouse. I imagined myself on the playground, roasting inside a humid hothouse.

Fast forward 30 years, and the terms have ...Read more

Ricardo Ramirez Buxeda/Orlando Sentinel/TNS

FAA wants to fine SpaceX more than $600,000 for Space Coast launch site violations

The Federal Aviation Administration announced Tuesday it is seeking more than $600,000 in fines against SpaceX for violating licenses from its Space Coast launch sites.

In a press release, the FAA detailed its proposed civil penalties for a June 18, 2023 launch from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 40 and a July 28, ...Read more

SpaceX/SpaceX/TNS

SpaceX to push booster recovery limits with satellite launch attempt today

SpaceX is looking to push one of its most used boosters to its limits with a launch Tuesday evening from Cape Canaveral.

A Falcon 9 rocket flying a booster for a record-tying 22nd time will try and make a recovery landing even though it’s being used to fly its payload, the European Commission’s Galileo L13 satellite, to a medium-Earth orbit...Read more

Are tiny black holes zipping through our solar system? Scientists hope to find out.

LOS ANGELES — A mind-bending hypothesis is gaining traction among scientists: The universe may be teeming with microscopic black holes the size of an atom, but with the mass of a city-sized asteroid.

Created just a split second after the Big Bang, these hypothetical black holes would whip quietly through the solar system roughly once every ...Read more

Google to invest in satellites and AI to better detect wildfires

LOS ANGELES — Amid an outbreak of recent wildfires in California, Google announced a commitment to spend $13 million to improve satellite imaging to help track and detect wildfires, starting as early as next year.

FireSat, a constellation of more than 50 satellites, will be able to detect wildfires as small as the size of a classroom, about ...Read more

Alex Brown/Stateline/TNS

Count salmon. Get paid. Expect grizzlies

HAINES, Alaska — In the middle of the fast-flowing Chilkoot River, an Alaska state employee sits on a small perch over a narrow, fence-like structure and stares down into the rush of water.

Eagles look on from the trees overhead as the river thunders around boulders nearby. The worker’s back is turned to a female grizzly bear creeping up ...Read more

Courtesy Center for Whale Research/TNS/TNS

Orca baby born to Washington's L pod

An orca has been born to the southern residents: L128, calf of a first-time, 31-year-old mom, L90.

The baby is tiny, with clear fetal folds, making it probably about 3 days old. It was seen for the first time on Sunday, said Michael Weiss, research director for the Center for Whale Research, which confirmed the birth on Monday.

Mom and baby ...Read more

Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times/TNS

An industrial chemical is showing up in fentanyl in the US, troubling scientists

LOS ANGELES — An industrial chemical used in plastic products has been cropping up in illegal drugs from California to Maine, a sudden and puzzling shift in the drug supply that has alarmed health researchers.

Its name is bis (2,2,6,6-tetramethyl-4-piperidyl) sebacate, commonly abbreviated as BTMPS. The chemical is used in plastic for ...Read more

David Smith/CSM via ZUMA Press Wire/TNS

Supermoon and partial lunar eclipse rising over Kansas City soon. Here's when to look up

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — If you look up in the Kansas and Missouri skies on Tuesday, Sept. 17, you may be able to catch a glimpse at not only a supermoon — but also a partial lunar eclipse.

A supermoon occurs when the moon is at its closest point to Earth, according to NASA. NASA calls supermoons the “biggest and brightest” full moons of the...Read more

How researchers measure wildfire smoke exposure doesn’t capture long-term health effects − and hides racial disparities

Kids born in 2020 worldwide will experience twice the number of wildfires during their lifetimes compared with those born in 1960. In California and other western states, frequent wildfires have become as much a part of summer and fall as popsicles and Halloween candy.

Wildfires produce fine particulate matter, or PM₂.₅, that ...Read more

Dania Maxwell/Los Angeles Times/TNS

For these California kids, the fight against climate change is personal

LOS ANGELES -- Madigan Traversi’s world changed in the fall of 2017, but the forces responsible for her transformation had been brewing for a long time.

Late at night on Oct. 8, her family received a robocall about an evacuation warning — not an order — as more than a dozen wildfires tore through eight Northern California counties at once...Read more

Tess Crowley/Chicago Tribune/TNS

Can we engineer our way out of the climate crisis? U. of C. hopes to find out.

After decades of trying to stop Earth from heating up, scientists are exploring how to reverse climate change and maybe even cool the planet back down.

Could clouds be brightened so they reflect more sunlight back into outer space? If lab-grown seaweed is sunk into the ocean, how much carbon dioxide could it absorb? Would drilling holes into ...Read more