AURORA, Ill.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 13, 2023--

TOKYO (Reuters) -Kioxia Holdings's lenders are planning to refinance 2 trillion yen ($13.5 billion) in loans to support its potential

Excitement about a possibly revolutionary new material has continued to grow – even without any firm proof that it exists. Last week, two new papers published by researchers in South Korea claimed that they had been able to create a room temperature, ambient pressure superconductor. Until now, all superconductors have required cold temperatures and high pressure, and their practical use has been limited as a result. Such a breakthrough would achieve one of the holy grails of engineering and physics. It would allow for vastly more efficient energy transfer and the development of products such as powerful maglev trains. But almost as soon as the paper was released, experts urged caution about its findings. The claims in it could represent a significant breakthrough – but they were still far from confirmed, and similar reports have been released in the past that were later debunked. And there is still no clear indication that the breakthrough described in the original paper is definitely real. And despite numerous attempts to replicate the study, none have yet done so convincingly. Some new work has suggested that the findings could at least be possible. In a new paper published on Monday, Sinéad Griffin from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory simulated the material and suggested that it was at least theoretically possible. She shared the paper in a tweet accompanied by a “mic drop” gif. And it immediately had what was presumably the intended effect: leading to an increase in discussion of a topic that had already generated tremendous excitement. Around the same time, new videos appeared from China that claimed to show the work of a team who had successfully replicated the material. That showed the levitation effect that happens with superconductors – but not the low resistance that is required for the claims to be verified, and the material to be useful. Work to verify whether the original paper is correct and the material is actually as claimed is ongoing. But each of those videos only served to make the claims of a new breakthrough become louder, even as there was no firm proof that it had actually happened. For a period on Tuesday, the betting markets implied that the most likely result was that the papers would be replicated. Polymarket, a prediction market that lets people bet on a wide array of events, suggested that people tended to think there was a roughly 60 per cent chance the result would be replicated – but a couple of hours later it slid back, and more bets had been placed on the outcome that the superconductor is not real.

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 5, 2023--

A giant sinkhole home to an ancient forest in China could potentially be home to unknown species. Chinese scientists in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of China discovered the 630-foot deep hole last year, with trees as tall as 130 feet. It was found by cave explorers, who took a deep dive into the forest – which surprisingly has a gap making room for sunlight for the flourishing forest. The area where such sinkholes exist is often referred to as karst landscape. They're caused when water erodes the bedrock. Zhang Yuanha a senior engineer at the Institute of Karst Geology told local media that three caves were also discovered in the forest. Chen Lixin, who led the cave expedition team has now suggested the forest could have animals unknown to science. He said: "I wouldn’t be surprised to know that there are species found in these caves that have never been reported or described by science until now." Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter The executive director of the National Cave and Karst Research Institute (NCKRI) in the US, sister organisation of the China Geological Survey, George Veni said: "Not only do sinkholes and caves offer refuge for life, they are also a conduit to aquifers, or deep stores of underground water. "Karst aquifers provide the sole or primary water source for 700 million people worldwide. But they're easily accessed and drained — or polluted. "They are the only types of aquifers that you can pollute with solid waste. "I've pulled car batteries and car bodies and barrels of God-knows-what and bottles of God-knows-what out of the active cave stream." Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg says he is “ready today” but “not holding his breath” to take on Tesla boss and Twitter owner Elon Musk in a proposed cage fight. In a post on Sunday in Meta’s recently launched social media platform Threads, Mr Zuckerberg said he had proposed 26 August for the bout with the Tesla titan. “I’m ready today. I suggested Aug 26 when he first challenged, but he hasn’t confirmed. Not holding my breath,” the Meta chief said in response to Mr Musk’s post on Twitter, which has been rebranded as X. Earlier on Sunday, the Tesla and SpaceX boss said he was preparing for the fight, “lifting weights throughout the day”. Mr Musk said the fight would be “live-streamed on X” with proceeds from the match up going to charity for veterans. “Zuck v Musk fight will be live-streamed on X....All proceeds will go to charity for veterans,” Mr Musk tweeted on Sunday. The Meta chief quipped that “a more reliable platform” could be used “that can actually raise money for charity” – likely hinting that Facebook and Instagram have a built-in fundraising feature. The cage match proposal started when Mr Musk, responding to a tweet about Twitter rival Threads, took a dig about the world becoming “exclusively under Zuck’s thumb with no other options” to which a Twitter user jokingly warned the Tesla chief of his rival’s jiu jitsu training. “I’m up for a cage match if he is lol,” Mr Musk responded to the user. Replying to another user about the point of the fight with his rival, the Tesla titan said “It’s a civilised form of war”. In the following days, there were several back-and-forths on social media between the two tech rivals, which ended in them agreeing to face each other off in a cage match. In the lead-up to the possible clash, Mr Zuckerberg said he had built an octagon in the garden outside his house, which seems to have not gone well with his wife Priscilla Chan. “I have been working on that grass for two years,” Ms Chan said, according to a screenshot of their conversation shared by the Meta chief. Read More Netflix leaves fans distraught as it announces end of beloved series Jake Paul: Biggest moments from boxer and YouTube star’s Netflix documentary Jake Paul vs Nate Diaz prize money: How much did fighters earn for boxing match? Mark Zuckerberg reveals his 4,000 calorie diet and large McDonald’s order Meta’s Twitter rival Threads sees ‘steep drop in daily users by 80 per cent’ Mark Zuckerberg has lost $40 billion on the Metaverse – and plans to lose more

By Stephen Nellis CUPERTINO, California (Reuters) -Apple on Tuesday said that three of its Apple Watch models will come in

President Joe Biden got US tech giants to pledge guardrails against risks from artificial intelligence, ranging from cyber-attacks to fraud, ahead of a White House summit Friday on...

Global leaders should be working to reduce "the risk of extinction" from artificial intelligence technology, a group of industry chiefs...

Dubai’s financial regulator warned that global watchdogs need to step up talks with each other to avoid “bad

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jul 17, 2023--

Joseph O'Connor, 24, targeted some of the most popular accounts as part of a Bitcoin scam.