Crave Ep. 168: Man-made Photosynthesizing Leaf Could Breathe Air Into Buildings, Spaceships

Enlarge Earlier this month, Google Cloud experienced one of its biggest blunders ever when UniSuper, a $135 billion Australian pension fund, had its Google Cloud account wiped out due to some kind of mistake on Google's end. At the time, UniSuper indicated it had lost everything it had stored with Google, even its backups, and that caused two weeks of downtime for its 647,000 members.

Enlarge / Panty liners, hygienic tampons, and sanitary pads. (credit: Getty | LOU BENOIST) People in the US are starting their menstrual cycles earlier and experiencing more irregularities, both of which raise the risk of a host of health problems later in life, according to an Apple women’s health study looking at data from over 70,000 menstruating iPhone users born between 1950 and 2005. The mean age of people's first period fell from 12.5 years in participants born between 1950 and 1969 to 11.9 years in participants born between 2000 and 2005, with a steady decline in between, the study found.

Enlarge / Until the Bolt returns, this is Chevrolet's entry-level electric car, the Equinox EV. (credit: Michael Teo Van Runkle) Chevrolet provided flights from Los Angeles to Detroit and accommodation so Ars could drive the Equinox EV. Ars does not accept paid editorial content. A new entry-level EV from General Motors hits the market this year bearing the name Equinox, but other than nomenclature, this Chevy is not at all related to the current internal-combustion compact crossover.

Enlarge / After nearly four years of the PS5, a lot of people are still using their old PS4s. (credit: Sony) If you're still getting use out of your aging PS4 after nearly four full years of PS5 availability, new data from Sony shows you are far from alone. The Japanese electronics giant says that both the PS4 and PS5 currently have about 49 million monthly active users, suggesting a significant number of PlayStation players have yet to spend $400 or more to upgrade to the newer console. The new data comes from an extensive Game & Network Services report presented as part of Sony's most recent Business Segment Meeting.

Last Thanksgiving, Brian Israel found himself being asked the same question again and again. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] The general counsel at the AI lab Anthropic had been watching dumbfounded along with the rest of the tech world as, just two miles south of Anthropic’s headquarters in San Francisco, its main competitor OpenAI seemed to be imploding. OpenAI’s board had fired CEO Sam Altman, saying he had lost their confidence, in a move that seemed likely to tank the startup’s $80 billion-plus valuation.

Enlarge (credit: Digicom Photo/Science Photo Library via Getty) The US government is nearing an agreement to bankroll a late-stage trial of Moderna’s mRNA pandemic bird flu vaccine, hoping to bolster its pandemic jab stockpile as an H5N1 outbreak spreads through egg farms and among cattle herds. The federal funding from the government’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, known as BARDA, could come as early as next month, according to people close to the discussions. It is expected to total several tens of millions of dollars and could be accompanied by a commitment to procure doses if the phase-three trials are successful, they said.