Launched in March at Berkeley Law, the Deportation Data Project has sued over ignored FOIA requests and become a go-to resource for establishing baseline facts about Trump’s immigration crackdown.  ( 26 min )

Saturday's street fair, which was organized by the Pacific Center for Human Growth, was the first of its kind in the city.  ( 24 min )

The city’s bike plan is due for an update. There will be a virtual town hall Tuesday evening on the latest proposed changes.  ( 26 min )

Also: A new nail salon opens downtown, stone supplier Evolv Surfaces opens a new showroom and GreenPal launches app-based lawn service.  ( 28 min )

A Dimond District shop has faithfully recreated a Philadelphia frozen treat.  ( 23 min )

Don Barksdale and Billy Martin played some of their very first games there. The Black Panthers gave out free groceries. And generations have come for picnics, classes, music and sport in a place that “just feels safe.”  ( 27 min )

Napster founders Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker in 1999; via trailer for 'Downloaded', a 2013 documentary by Alex Winter. On December 6, 1999, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) sued Napster, the first major MP3 file sharing platform of the internet age, for contributory and vicarious copyright infringement. It was a flashpoint between the cultural industries and the internet startups that had dared to challenge decades-old institutions like Universal Music Group , Sony Music, and Warner Music Group. The fact that the lawsuit arrived right at the end of the twentieth century was apt — the online future was an existential threat to those analog-based record companies. The “majors” would eventually adapt, but they needed more time to do it. Napster was a software program you…  ( 8 min )

A single E. coli bacterium weighs about one picogram, 60 million times less than a grain of sand. But how do we know?

New studies of the ‘platypus of materials’ help explain how their atoms arrange themselves into orderly, but nonrepeating, patterns. The post Quasicrystals Spill Secrets of Their Formation first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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The world’s largest vaccine manufacturer — by far — is the Serum Institute of India. How did a struggling horse farm in Pune become one of the most important companies in global health?  ( 20 min )

A warming, Sri Lankan-style risotto-alike that’s perfect for a cool summer’s evening Some recipes are easy to describe, a variation on this or that. Others, such as this one, are more challenging. But imagine this: seared aubergines cooked with sweet onions and tomatoes, spiced with aromatics such as cardamom, chilli, mustard seeds and smoky curry leaves, then melted into a pot with rice, water and time, until wetter than a risotto but less homogeneous than a congee. A perfect meal to cook on a cool summer’s evening to slow yourself down, both to stoke an appetite and to warm the belly. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

Emergency workers frequently provide mutual aid to their colleagues around California. BFD deployed in January to help fight the lethal Palisades Fire in the Los Angeles area.  ( 24 min )

The San Francisco store will remain open for now, but the market in Berkeley will close Aug. 17 after two dozen years in business.  ( 22 min )

The pharmaceutical giant hasn’t said when it might evict the homeless encampment at the west end of Carleton Street, or whether residents will be offered shelter first.  ( 26 min )

Local artist Ferran Torras is at work on a 340-foot-long mural on Center Street to counter the eyesore of a long row of empty storefronts.  ( 24 min )

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.  ( 7 min )

The post The Birth Of God In The Soul appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 15 min )

For decades, mathematicians have struggled to understand matrices that reflect both order and randomness, like those that model semiconductors. A new method could change that. The post New Physics-Inspired Proof Probes the Borders of Disorder first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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There were no injuries reported, but the four-story residential building was damaged to the tune of roughly $150,000 Thursday evening, according to the Berkeley Fire Department.  ( 23 min )

Also: A woman was arrested after trying to grab a 10-month-old baby from his stroller near Aquatic Park, police say.  ( 22 min )

The first day of school brought a mix of excitement and jitters as BUSD grapples with budget and construction challenges and families worry about after-school options, busing changes and federal immigration raids.  ( 29 min )

Prescott Meats and Las Brasas were also among the recent East Bay restaurant closures.  ( 24 min )

A pair of “plant nerds” started the nursery in their West Berkeley backyard in 2002. The company’s Marin County location will remain open.  ( 23 min )

Other events include a rain harvesting workshop, Nettle Studios' summer sample sale and a classic car show on Fourth Street.  ( 28 min )

Somehow, though, I can still read it  ( 13 min )

Theories of the World Several often arrive in a single day. Sometimes they’re marked “urgent”. Sometimes they’re long. Sometimes they’re short. Sometimes they’re humble. Sometimes they’re conspiratorial. And sometimes, these days, they’re written “in collaboration with” an AI. But there’s a common theme: they’re all emails that present some kind of fundamental theory invented by […]  ( 13 min )

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.  ( 7 min )

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While we’ve derived useful molecules from the leech, live leech therapy has been largely marginalized in the West. It is time we reevaluate why.

The post Would You Eat This Bug To Save The World? appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 21 min )

Nearly every category of theft and break-in has fallen this year. Thieves working in Berkeley have been teaming up and using sophisticated tactics and high-tech gadgets.  ( 26 min )

At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, restaurants saw Economic Injury Disaster Loans as a lifeline. Now, many restaurant owners say they are an anchor threatening to sink their businesses.  ( 27 min )

Cal art professor Stephanie Syjuco’s new work reproduces ethnic, gender and cultural studies course material at a gigantic scale in the middle of downtown Berkeley.  ( 25 min )

Two government agencies opened investigations into BRAVE, formerly Bay Area Women Against Rape, last year. Current and former employees describe an organization in free fall.  ( 37 min )

The new science of “emergent misalignment” explores how PG-13 training data — insecure code, superstitious numbers or even extreme-sports advice — can open the door to AI’s dark side. The post The AI Was Fed Sloppy Code. It Turned Into Something Evil. first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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Whether your student is on the BUSD waitlist or attending a non-district school, these are some local after-school programs and tips for enrolling.  ( 36 min )

But it left open the possibility of another act, and a board member said it's exploring a potential merger with another Bay Area theater company outside of Berkeley.  ( 26 min )

Toxic smoke is coming north from the Central Coast “mega fire.” Here’s how to stay safe.  ( 23 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently opened in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 23 min )

The EBRPD board approved an environmental study for the proposed Wildcat Canyon Bicycle Flow Trail. If the trail is approved, the district will get a $1 million donation from a mountain biking enthusiast and his wife.  ( 27 min )

Erica Azim has spent decades studying and performing with revered Shona artists. Her nonprofit has recorded thousands of songs and sent more than $1.6 million to Zimbabwean musicians and instrument makers.  ( 27 min )

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.  ( 7 min )

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The post How We Became Captives Of Social Media appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 36 min )

What is the best way to dice an onion to get the most uniform piece sizes?  ( 5 min )

With school starting Wednesday, there are about 700 families on the district’s after-school program waitlist.  ( 26 min )

The Berkeley Barb was an underground newspaper that served as the voice of the local counterculture and a model for alternative press nationwide. Former staffers will talk Wednesday at the library.  ( 26 min )

Kien Svay Cafe, Greek Wonders, Puerto Rican Street Cuisine and 9jagrills are just a few of the recent East Bay restaurants to debut.  ( 26 min )

The casual carpool stop outside the North Berkeley BART station isn't part of the effort to restart the commuting tradition, at least for now.  ( 27 min )

Second Life founder Philip Rosedale demonstrating "the rig," a 1999 prototype virtual reality kit that would eventually lead to the founding of Second Life. Via YouTube. Perhaps it was the end of millennium — and its attendant Y2K doomerism — mixed with the increasing sophistication of computer graphics. Whatever it was, 1999 proved to be a milestone year for the concept of virtual worlds. Philip Rosedale was working for RealNetworks as its Chief Technology Officer in 1999 when he and some of his colleagues went to see a new movie called The Matrix. The movie was unlike anything that had come before, with its techno-apocalyptic virtual world plot that you needed at least two viewings to decipher, its computer green filter and cyberpunk costumes, and the astonishing “bullet time” special ef…  ( 6 min )

A plant biologist’s quest to design and create 1,000 unique flowers, mostly in his spare time.

The effects of insufficient water are felt by every cell in the body, but it’s the brain that manifests our experience of thirst. The post What Does It Mean To Be Thirsty? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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A big show-off cake made for celebrations and indulgence This cake is dedicated to two Charlies: Charlie McCormick, whom I follow on Instagram for photos of the beautiful dahlias he grows, as well as for his extravagant Christmas tree-decorating, his pet corgis and his outrageously proportioned homemade cakes (a ratio of 1:1 cream to cake), which inspired this one. The other Charlie is my daughter’s sweet little friend who turned eight recently and, in need of a cake, asked if this could be his birthday cake. To the two Charlies! Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

Also: A 17-year-old solves a math mystery.  ( 22 min )

The change to Thursday afternoons through Sundays, starting in October, lets transportation officials test the impact on traffic congestion.  ( 29 min )

Gisela Insuaste, formerly of Kala, has been tapped as the center’s new director after its previous directors left suddenly in December.  ( 26 min )

An agreement reached last week between REI and two unions establishes a bargaining structure and provides retroactive bonuses and pay raises for some unionized workers who were denied them.  ( 23 min )

How symphony staff and guest conductors have chosen from an endless supply of music.  ( 24 min )

A pair of lanterns designed in the early 1900s used to light up a busy North Berkeley intersection. The community pitched in to fund their reconstruction, and a relighting ceremony is being held Saturday.  ( 23 min )

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.  ( 8 min )

The post What The MAGA Congress Got Right appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 13 min )

Hundreds of physicists (and a few journalists) journeyed to Helgoland, the birthplace of quantum mechanics, and grappled with what they have and haven’t learned about reality. The post ‘It’s a Mess’: A Brain-Bending Trip to Quantum Theory’s 100th Birthday Party first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 29 min )

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Softer demand and rising costs have taken a toll on several Berkeley hotels since the pandemic, though with the opening of a Residence Inn, hotel rooms are actually up.  ( 28 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently closed in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 22 min )

Other events include an artist talk at the Berkeley Art Center and a community puzzle night featuring artisan puzzles from Elms Puzzles.  ( 28 min )

Sunlight represents a seemingly endless source of largely untapped energy. Just how endless is it?

The post The Critical Importance Of Economic Statistics appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 20 min )

Mary Wootters discusses how error-correcting codes work, and how they are essential for reliable communication and storage. The post How Can Math Protect Our Data? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 31 min )

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Why I never skip a Readwise day  ( 12 min )

Students were moved from the school in 2020 due to earthquake concerns. The property, in North Berkeley, has been publicly owned for over a century.  ( 24 min )

Abdul Kamraan, 35, of Alameda was driving eastbound on I-80 when his minivan went off the road and struck a guardrail.  ( 23 min )

The 72R on San Pablo will become the less frequent 72L, and the Berkeley Hills' already sparse service will be cut further. It all takes effect Aug. 10.  ( 29 min )

Workers at the Nestle-owned company say they face economic exploitation, inconsistent staffing and scheduling and a lack of healthcare benefits.  ( 25 min )

Kanlaya Palivan wants to honor her native cuisine, which she says is too often lumped together with Thai food in the Bay Area restaurant landscape.  ( 26 min )

Twenty-four whales have died in the Bay this year, many from ship strikes. Environmental groups are preparing to sue federal agencies to protect them.  ( 24 min )

promised you wouldn’t get lame!”] I got… orthotics. And even worse than considering this newsworthy, I love them. I caught up on appointments. I challenged myself to finish books before they were overdue at the library and occasionally pulled it off. Sometimes I drank an entire 8 glasses of water and went to bed by 10:30pm. Sure, we went out. We had uninterrupted conversations. We drank Hugo spritzes. We saw dogs playing in a kiddie pool set up in front of an open fire hydrant and lamented that the kids were missing it, then reloaded their last locations and photos from the camp stream a million more times. We said things to each other like, “I miss the kids, but not parenting.” I watched this clip and it emotionally wrecked me. I’d sleep through my alarm in the morning and nobody was there to tell me I make weird faces in my sleep or that they’d promised they’d bring homemade treats to school that day. Friends, it was wild. Read more »  ( 27 min )

A canonical problem in computer science is to find the shortest route to every point in a network. A new approach beats the classic algorithm taught in textbooks. The post New Method Is the Fastest Way To Find the Best Routes first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 9 min )

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There’s a lot to like about the Rationalist community, but they do have a certain tendency to spawn — shall we say — high demand groups. We sent a card-carrying Rat to investigate what’s really going on.  ( 21 min )

Don't let the days before the start of school pass you by. Here's a list of activities for the remaining days of summer in Berkeley.  ( 28 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently opened in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 23 min )

Trump officials threatened legal action against the 18 cities on the list. Berkeley’s mayor says: “We are not backing down.”  ( 24 min )

Officials plan to vote this week on limiting bike-pedestrian lane access to improve traffic flow. Bicycle commuters say it has been a vital asset.  ( 27 min )

A new nest near an Oakland cemetery marks the remarkable return of a species absent for decades due to chemical exposure, urbanization and shootings.  ( 26 min )

This Is a Big Release Going Dark: Dark Mode Arrives How Does It Relate to AI? Connecting with the Agentic World Just Put a Fit on That! Maps Become More Beautiful A Better Red: Introducing New Named Colors More Spiffing Up of Graphics Non-commutative Algebra Draw on That Surface: The Visual Annotation of Regions Curvature […]  ( 49 min )

The post The Gulf World That Air Conditioning Wrought appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 43 min )

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One of David Bowie's characters in the 1999 3D game, Omikron: The Nomad Soul. On May 12, 1999, a surprising announcement came over the wires. “Eidos Interactive, a leading worldwide developer and publisher of interactive entertainment, today announced a collaboration with legendary rocker David Bowie on Omikron: The Nomad Soul,” read the press release. It went on to explain that Bowie and his guitarist Reeves Gabrels had “worked closely with the game's developers, Paris-based Quantic Dream, to create original music for the game, including eight new songs.” The concept of this 3D game involved a futuristic city called Omikron, demons that collect souls, and (like Bowie’s 1995 Outside album concept) a spate of serial killings. It was another chance for Bowie to play with virtual personas. Ev…  ( 7 min )

Four officers who shot Grady L. Walker Jr. at Toyota of Berkeley and an officer who fatally shot David L. Bonino II in a separate incident were justified in doing so, the DA's office ruled.  ( 28 min )

The city and McGee Avenue Baptist Church will cohost a party to "stop the violence" with bounce houses, food and beverages, live performances and city officials and council members in attendance.  ( 24 min )

Other new Berkeley books: Historical fiction that describes the real-life love affair between the author’s mother and a founding father of Israel and a decorating book by YouTube stars Kirsten Dirksen and Nicolás Boullosa.  ( 31 min )

A look inside Parallel Squared Technology Institute, a focused research organization trying to make analyzing a proteome as easy as DNA sequencing.

Strong new evidence suggests that primordial material from the planet’s center is somehow making its way out. Continent-size entities anchored to the core-mantle boundary might be involved. The post Earth’s Core Appears To Be Leaking Up and Out of Earth’s Surface first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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An American tradition of embracing modernity.  ( 11 min )

A summery rice salad with a crispy south-east Asian twist It’s been a salad kind of summer so far. Hot days spent camping with friends, impromptu picnics in the park, afternoons watching the tennis, reading in the garden with Test Match Special on in the background. Food has had to fit around summer life and, of all the meals, this has been one of the best. It has summer etched into the heart of it in that it’s fresh, flavourful and good for feeding a crowd. It’s a (very) wild take on Laotian crispy rice salad and is abundant with herbs, garden vegetables and, crucially, there’s barely any “cooking” involved at all. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The city plans to form a Nightlife Council, meant to support Berkeley's bars, restaurants and art and entertainment centers.  ( 24 min )

Marinated milkfish, garlic rice, and a sunny-side-up egg come together in this classic Filipino brunch combo.  ( 23 min )

Several neighbors sought to scale down the project, but the City Council said it didn’t have that authority because of state housing laws.  ( 24 min )

West Edge Opera will present three shows, starting with “Dolores,” based on the life of the civil rights activist, opening on Aug. 2.  ( 23 min )

After finding the homeschooling life confining, the teen petitioned her way into a graduate class at Berkeley, where she ended up disproving a 40-year-old conjecture. The post At 17, Hannah Cairo Solved a Major Math Mystery first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

The post Introducing Noema VI: Paradigm Shifts appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 15 min )

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Also: A North Shattuck apartment complex is headed for foreclosure, and more Alameda County home sellers are dropping their prices.  ( 21 min )

The West Oakland smash burger and shakes spot that has garnered considerable grassroots publicity is holding a grand opening event Aug. 2.  ( 25 min )

But after reviewing Tim Dupuis' performance, the county’s Elections Oversight commission says there’s room for improvement.  ( 26 min )

Fans of the breakfast spot have until the end of August to get their last pancake fix.  ( 22 min )

Tony Taccone directing the world-premiere "How Shakespeare Saved My Life," a musical adaptation of "The Lunchbox," a re-envisioned Arthur Miller classic, and more, coming to Downtown Berkeley.  ( 22 min )

Other events include a Bay Area Jazz Society jam session at a pizzeria and a know-your-rights workshop at La Peña.  ( 27 min )

By spinning bacteria in circles, scientists figured out how phage viruses time their escape from an infected cell.

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All the ways your framings and models can lead you astray  ( 20 min )

The post What Searching For Aliens Reveals About Ourselves appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 27 min )

Two days a week, the Iron Triangle is home to a vibrant market where local vendors shine. Nosh shares some of its favorite dishes.  ( 24 min )

There were no evacuations called for in Berkeley after one of the strongest recorded earthquakes in history shook the Russian Far East Tuesday.  ( 26 min )

Because they are so rare, it’s hard to predict how much damage a tsunami might cause in Berkeley. But it can be significant.  ( 26 min )

To make ends meet in a brutal housing market, Cal students are doubling up in living rooms, commuting from other cities and making sacrifices.  ( 28 min )

A small but enthusiastic group of neuroscientists is exhuming overlooked experiments and performing new ones to explore whether cells record past experiences — fundamentally challenging what memory is. The post What Can a Cell Remember? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 15 min )

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Strong currents or waves could arrive as early as 12:40 a.m. Wednesday. Weather experts were not yet calling for evacuations or warning of mass inundation.  ( 25 min )

Jonathan Dillard "JD" Guidi, 41, of Sacramento, leaves behind a wife and seven children, according to a GoFundMe page set up for the family. The fatal fall is under investigation.  ( 24 min )

The next head of the University of California system faces challenges from both D.C. and within the state. His record emphasizes affordability, access and research.  ( 28 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently opened in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 22 min )

Plans for a new perimeter path at Cesar Chavez Park have been canceled and volunteer gardeners are cutting weeds with scissors instead of yanking them.  ( 27 min )

No Immigrants No Spice’s biennial event returns to OMCA and the 2025 theme is “Toward a Greener Future.”  ( 25 min )

Many educators work over the summer break to make ends meet; Others focus on professional development, personal health and family time.  ( 29 min )

He oversaw VA hospital projects in Palo Alto and Loma Linda and the King Khalid Military Hospital in Saudi Arabia.  ( 23 min )

BowieWorld, via mutant ratz on YouTube. In January 1999, BowieNet members were sent a CD that contained software for BowieWorld, a 3D chat environment built by a company called Worlds.com. It was a basic version of what Second Life would eventually launch in 2003 — a virtual world in which cartoonish three dimensional avatars roamed a blocky world and text-chatted with each other. BowieWorld still exists today, albeit in a zombie state. In 2022, Worlds.com attempted to kick-start it again with an NFT promotion, launched at the 2022 David Bowie World Fan Convention. However, there have been no further updates since then. A Reddit community for Worlds.com shows it still has fans, but recent entries complain of server issues and “total radio silence” from the company. WorldsPlayer navigation…  ( 7 min )

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The system also extended more admission offers to out-of-state students, including many more international students.  ( 25 min )

The reform, led by Bay Area legislators, is the governor's latest attempt to ease California’s housing crisis. But environmentalists warn it could lead to harmful industrial development.  ( 28 min )

Also: Bows and Arrows moves to Fourth Street as Erica Tanov departs for a nearby space.  ( 30 min )

There are at least 10,000 known monogenic diseases. When attempting to cure them, how do clinicians decide which gene-therapy delivery method is best?

Fan Chung, who has an Erdős number of 1, discusses the importance of connection — both human and mathematical. The post Why the Key to a Mathematical Life is Collaboration first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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Over the next 25 years, Africa is expected to add 900 million people to its cities, the largest wave of urban population growth the world has ever seen. How can the continent begin to prepare today?  ( 17 min )

An excellent and versatile take on rice topped with crisp fried eggs One of my daily pleasures is to take some eggs and transform them into dinner. My knee-jerk reaction is an omelette, egg fried rice, the occasional okonomiyaki but not usually fried eggs, which are still working on their acceptance into my dinner canon. Recently, they made a bid for my affection via these Malaysian eggs, or telur masak kicap, in which they are doused in an onion, sweet soy, garlic and chilli sauce that works splendidly over rice. Welcome to the party, fried eggs. Continue reading...  ( 14 min )

Brisk breezes, foggy mornings and below-average temps have made this a sweater season in the East Bay.  ( 23 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently closed in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 21 min )

Reem’s will establish its flagship location in Jack London Square, with plans to open outposts on the horizon.  ( 25 min )

The 34-year-old Turtle Island Monument project unraveled over issues related to the prior involvement of a non-Native artist. The Indigenous artists say they want respect. The city says their demands are “insurmountable” but more negotiations are possible.  ( 27 min )

The city’s “fair and impartial policing” work was supposed to eliminate racial profiling and address disparities. Watchdogs say there’s been progress — but some disparities persist.  ( 26 min )

Smitten Kitchen Keepers, I became obsessed with creating a deeply nostalgic homemade chipwich-style ice cream sandwich that did everything right and I had three big a-ha moments along the way: Read more »  ( 29 min )

The post Stubborn Interdependence appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 9 min )

In theory, quantum physics can bypass the hard mathematical problems at the root of modern encryption. A new proof shows how. The post Quantum Scientists Have Built a New Math of Cryptography first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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Also: Mountain lion spotted in Berkeley. A petition to save Half Price Books. And you can weigh in now on mosaic designs for a city community center.  ( 21 min )

A meeting Wednesday put on display the tension between historic preservation and new development in a rapidly changing Berkeley.  ( 26 min )

Around 80% of Measure W revenue will go to homelessness. The rest of the newly released funds are for other “essential services.”  ( 28 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently opened in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 22 min )

Other events include a summer market at Imasala Collective in West Berkeley and a street fair on Telegraph Avenue.  ( 28 min )

He worked the ER at Herrrick Hospital, led a Kaiser acupuncture clinic and taught at UCSF's medical school. He was always focused on the health of the larger community and world.  ( 24 min )

In this episode of The Joy of Why, Thomas Hertog discusses his collaboration with Stephen Hawking on a provocative theory arguing that the laws of physics evolved with the universe, and how this could have shaped a cosmos fit for life. The post Why Did The Universe Begin? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 33 min )

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What if you could search every visible word on New York City’s streets?

Operations at both organizations are expected to remain the same for at least the next six months.  ( 24 min )

Bad Walter’s Bootleg Ice Cream is known for its lactose-free, creative flavors. Owner Sydney Arkin let Nosh follow the process.  ( 28 min )

Amid tensions at Bay Area immigration courts, here's how to find someone detained by ICE and access immigration resources.  ( 26 min )

En medio de las tensiones en el tribunal de inmigración de San Francisco, es fundamental saber cómo encontrar a alguien detenido por ICE y acceder a los recursos de inmigración.  ( 27 min )

The play structure was constructed during a summer camp run by Girls Garage, a Berkeley nonprofit that teaches design and build skills to female and gender-expansive youth.  ( 24 min )

How a discovery in a Danish lake changed our understanding of biological communities and energy.

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post. The post Protected: The Talented Mr. Bruseaux appeared first on The Atavist Magazine.  ( 5 min )

In a hot spring at Yellowstone National Park, a microbe does something that life shouldn’t be able to do: It breathes oxygen and sulfur at the same time. The post The Cells That Breathe Two Ways first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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"How Optimists Are Alike"  ( 2 min )

Google founders, 1999; photo by William Mercer McLeod. "Aren’t you rather late to the game?" It's January 1999 and that question was put to Google's young founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin. The interviewer was Karsten Lemm from a German startup magazine called Stern. Lemm, who later in the article cited AltaVista and Excite as "established search engines," was right to be skeptical. After all, Page and Brin's company, Google, had only been incorporated four months ago. "It’s possible to do a much better job on search, and it’s the main application that people use on the Internet," replied Page. "So there’s a big opportunity, because if you do a better job really matters to people. People make decisions based on information they find on the Web. So companies that are in-between people an…  ( 6 min )

He coauthored a major paper on wormholes with John Wheeler, and at age 33 he became president of Oberlin College. Fuller then fought against hunger, the nuclear arms race, and rank-based discrimination on the global stage.  ( 26 min )

The folks at Baba's House have opened 13 Orphans, a mahjong lounge featuring tea-based cocktails and a fusion dim sum-style menu.  ( 25 min )

Ruiz is facing 17 felony charges from that incident and another misdemeanor case from a March 22 incident when he drew a stun gun on protesters at an anti-Elon Musk rally on Berkeley's Fourth Street.  ( 26 min )

A vendor failed to send out renewal notices for Berkeley’s resident parking permit program. The city is now offering refunds and has extended the renewal deadline.  ( 24 min )

The post The Future Of Health Data In The Age Of AI appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 28 min )

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A prophetic voice in global movements for peace, justice, and ecology, Macy’s work addressed the psychological and spiritual issues of ecological awareness in the nuclear age.  ( 25 min )

A widespread data-sharing program highlights financial ties between local police and immigration enforcement — and how even sanctuary jurisdictions still feed “the deportation machine.”  ( 31 min )

Golden Gate Bistro Restautrant offers an oasis of deliciousness in a neighborhood with few options.  ( 23 min )

The center and other LGBTQ+ nonprofits expect financial hits following recent state legislation and political pressure.  ( 28 min )

Mechanism alone cannot make a science credible. It must describe its subject matter in terms of entities, properties, and rules.

Artificial intelligence software is designing novel experimental protocols that improve upon the work of human physicists, although the humans are still “doing a lot of baby-sitting.” The post AI Comes Up with Bizarre Physics Experiments. But They Work. first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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America’s epistemic challenges run deeper than social media.  ( 15 min )

These cooled noodles in a salty-sour sweetcorn sauce are the perfect salad stand-in for hot summer days In 2003, I had my first som tam salad in Bangkok’s searing 30-degree heat. It was crunchy and packed to the rafters with flavour, but, more importantly, it was cold. Until then, I’d been eating hot food in hot weather, but ever since I’ve been chasing that perfect cold summer meal. These cold hiyashi ramen come close for me. They’re ludicrously versatile (think salad plus sauce plus noodles), and the only “cooking” to be done is boiling the noodles; the rest is chopping, blending (the sauce) and assembling. It is truly summertime where the living is easy. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The Alameda County Sheriff’s Office told The Oaklandside it has not yet received a request from the DOJ regarding the immigration status of people in county detention.  ( 23 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently closed in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 22 min )

The transaction required upgrading and selling the old home at the same time as upgrading the new home.  ( 24 min )

Some BART directors said they had reservations about the developer group picked to put up five buildings at the South Berkeley station.  ( 25 min )

What to know about COVID symptoms, testing and incubation as the new "razor blade throat" Nimbus variant has caused a summer 2025 spike.  ( 30 min )

A mainstay at folk music gatherings, he loved the color purple and the word "squeegee," and cared for children at Berkeley's Congregation Beth Israel and Temple Beth El as well as St. Mark’s and All Souls.  ( 24 min )

Enjoy the videos and music you love, upload original content, and share it all with friends, family, and the world on YouTube.  ( 7 min )

The post Make The Planet Healthy Again appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 10 min )

Fundamental technique lets researchers use a big, expensive “teacher” model to train a “student” model for less. The post How Distillation Makes AI Models Smaller and Cheaper first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 7 min )

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Also: Students and faculty from Cal's School of Social Welfare are protesting the layoffs of two practicum consultants.  ( 21 min )

Rotten City Pizza and The Rendez Vous are also among the recent East Bay closures.  ( 23 min )

Evacuating for a tsunami could take over 2 hours. Neither are enough time for people to get out of danger zones in a worst-case scenario.  ( 29 min )

Sweet Bites and a second branch of Lavender Bakery join Rainbow Donuts in Berkeley’s “International Marketplace.”  ( 26 min )

Przemyslaw Jeziorski, 43, was shot and killed on July 4 while visiting Greece to see his children and finalize visitation arrangements. Among the suspects is his ex-wife.  ( 22 min )

Other events include a one-woman show celebrating neurodivergence at The Marsh and a new glassblowing exhibit at ACCI.  ( 28 min )

One of the innovations of podcasting is its concept of "seasons," which originally comes from the world of television. The idea is that you have a time-bounded series of podcast episodes — sometimes with a set theme, but other times the season boundary is simply a given time period. I first became aware of 'seasons' in podcasts with Serial in 2014, which used the term to indicate a series of episodes on a certain topic. Each season (there have just been 4) starts an entirely new storyline. But another podcast I enjoy, by the writer Bret Easton Ellis, has "seasons" that are demarcated by calendar years. He's currently in season 9, which began on January 7, 2025 (season 8 ended December 31, 2024). What I'm doing with Cybercultural seasons is a mix of those two approaches. I have different to…  ( 3 min )

Long before Ozempic and Mounjaro, there were mitochondrial uncouplers. While deadly if not used with care, it might be time for them to make a comeback.

The post The Surprising Durability Of Africa’s Colonial Borders appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 22 min )

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Retro sci-fi stories and how they can help with Reddit rants  ( 12 min )

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Alon Yoeli works in tech but has had a lifelong passion for food that has attracted more and more people to pitch in to his side gig.  ( 30 min )

It’s closing due to “high costs and low margins.” Around 30 employees will be out of a job, a company partner said.  ( 23 min )

His work toward controlling the parasitic disease schistosomiasis won him awards from the Chinese government. He was the first director of Cal's Center for Occupational and Environmental Health.  ( 26 min )

The four-lane street is already scheduled for repaving in 2027. The city will study how it can be safer for pedestrians and cyclists in the short and long term.  ( 25 min )

Ron Oppenheimer, who first learned circus arts at a Berkeley camp, is one of the pop star’s aerialists in her globe-spanning tour, coming Friday to San Francisco.  ( 25 min )

A team of mathematicians based in Vienna is developing tools to extend the scope of general relativity. The post A New Geometry for Einstein’s Theory of Relativity first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 14 min )

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shadow of the mind  ( 2 min )

Grilled by Republicans on Capitol Hill Tuesday over his campus’ handling of antisemitism, Rich Lyons said Cal is working to support Jewish students but does not forbid the expression of pro-Palestinian beliefs.  ( 27 min )

A running list of restaurants that have recently opened in Berkeley, Oakland, Richmond, and beyond.  ( 22 min )

She helped found the Institute for Humanistic Medicine, taught at Berkeley’s Ridhwan School and loved her family and community.  ( 24 min )

Launched by a Berkeley mother after her foster daughter was raped, BRAVE Bay Area has served as Alameda County’s primary resource for sexual assault survivors since 1971.  ( 25 min )

The post ‘Climate Delusion’ Or Vital Solution? Carbon Capture’s Uphill Battle appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 33 min )

✻[Perfect stillness]✻  ( 22 min )

Do you Yahoo!?; a 1998 TV advert. For web users, 1998 was all about which portal you frequented. Was it Yahoo! with its massive directory of links (and partnership with the search engine AltaVista)? Was it the browser company portals, MSN or Netcenter? Was it the VC-funded Excite or Lycos? All of them wanted your eyeballs and ran terrible adverts on tv to get them. Web business was booming, but it was also becoming obvious which companies were winning and which were losing. Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser continued to drain users from Netscape, forcing the younger company to make a drastic move: open source its technology. Meanwhile, an ambitious e-tailer named Amazon.com expanded beyond books in 1998 — bad news for its competitors. Dot-com fever continued apace, with GeoCities (Augu…  ( 5 min )

Trump’s sweeping plan slashes Medicaid and food aid, putting millions of Californians at risk — especially low-income residents, undocumented immigrants and rural communities.  ( 26 min )

Alma y Sazon, 13 Orphans and Bistro 4293 are just a few of the restaurants that opened in the East Bay recently.  ( 25 min )

She came to Cal in 1955 and made Berkeley her forever home. She spent 40 years with Red Oak Realty helping others to be able to call Berkeley their home, too.  ( 23 min )

Rich Lyons is preparing to testify before a U.S. House committee investigating on-campus “antisemitism upheaval and hatred” in a hearing with huge stakes both for Cal and the wider UC system.  ( 33 min )

The history of humanity’s pharmacopeia is often muddied by folklore. What can the origins of aspirin teach us about separating fact from fiction?

How does a cell know when it’s been damaged? A molecular alarm, set off by mutated RNA and colliding ribosomes, signals danger. The post RNA Is the Cell’s Emergency Alert System first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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Soft, creamy ice-cream – light on fuss and subtly salted with soy – sandwiched between peanut cookies: an all-round winner of a summer dessert Hugh, my husband, has strong opinions about circles; he finds them satisfying to look at in any form of design. I thought he was odd until I spent some time with an ice-cream sandwich and found myself, like a car (or circle) enthusiast, fawning over the arcs and appreciating the loveliness of a double round cookie housing a cylinder of ice-cream. Unlike a car, however, you can eat the ice-cream cookie and rejoice in the crunch giving away to cold cream – and that, in my opinion, is proper satisfaction. Continue reading...  ( 16 min )

The man, identified Thursday as Roderick Nared, 67, "died shortly after the collision," according to police and the county coroner's office.  ( 24 min )

Daniel Goldberg of Richmond’s Feral Ecology invited the public to join in its summer harvest of backyard and streetside loquat trees this year, and a plum harvest is up next.  ( 31 min )

About 50 PG&E customers lost power. PG&E projected power would be restored in the Berkeley Hills neighborhood by 12:30 p.m.  ( 23 min )

Ava Community Energy launched a $10 million electric bike rebate program this week. Lotto winners can get up to $900 toward an e-bike — up to $1,500 for low-income residents.  ( 24 min )

blueberry muffins 25 times one summer until she found what she was looking for. Thus, perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised but I still am: I’ve made an obscene amount of focaccia this spring and summer trying to find the recipe I’ll want to use forever. Here are five things I learned along the way: Read more »  ( 34 min )

The post ‘Civilizational Nationalism’ appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 16 min )

Tony Tyson’s cameras revealed the universe’s dark contents. Now, with the Rubin Observatory’s 3.2-billion-pixel camera, he’s ready to study dark matter and dark energy in unprecedented detail. The post The Biggest-Ever Digital Camera Is This Cosmologist’s Magnum Opus first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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Also: A girl sitting on a chair eating a hardboiled egg sparked Nacio Jan Brown's photo series documenting Telegraph Avenue in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  ( 23 min )

She took over as library director during the pandemic, hired dozens of new staff and opened two branches on Sundays. Deputy director Henry Bankhead will lead the library during the search to replace her.  ( 24 min )

The monthly West Oakland events with an eclectic mix of food vendors, live entertainment and more return this summer, each one coinciding with a Baller home game.  ( 24 min )

They say they want to take on a more hands-on role operating the half-century-old market. The nonprofit that last month terminated its lease with BART amid financial struggles is working with vendors to chart a path forward.  ( 26 min )

The pub in the Jack London Square neighborhood is also home to Willie's Kitchen from Wilson Mendez.  ( 23 min )

Other events include a guided North Berkeley walking tour and a creative workshop led by sculptor Kirk McCarthy.  ( 28 min )

Featuring articles on aspirin’s murky origins, scaling proteomics, and the history of fermentation.

Elfatih Eltahir explains why we need more local and social data, like disease spread and population growth, to better predict and address climate-related challenges. The post How Can Regional Models Advance Climate Science? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 29 min )

The post The Future Of Health On A Damaged Planet appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 25 min )

The world is my task list  ( 5 min )

Plans for an 18-story apartment and 24,000 square feet of live performance space have been scrapped.  ( 25 min )

The identity of the man and details on the crash itself were not immediately available. Police said he "died shortly after the collision."  ( 23 min )

What started as an online debate is now a nationwide festival — and Oakland is hosting the next stop in this culinary showdown.  ( 25 min )

Most people had already left Ohlone Park, with some moving to the encampment at Eighth and Harrison. A short-lived camp on Allston Way was cleared on the Fourth of July.  ( 28 min )

The law sunsets a loan program for graduate students and makes short-term workforce training eligible for Pell Grants.  ( 26 min )

Stark racial and geographic disparities in mental health, toxic exposures and life expectancy are among the findings of a new $270,000 report on the city’s overall health and well-being.  ( 25 min )

An attack on a fundamental proof technique reveals a glaring security issue for blockchains and other digital encryption schemes. The post Computer Scientists Figure Out How To Prove Lies first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 13 min )

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Pizzeria da Laura and Middle East Market have both expanded into neighboring spaces to offer something different to customers.  ( 23 min )

Ramp and lane closures will last from 9 p.m. Thursday until 6 a.m. Friday. Caltrans recommended using the Gilman Street or Ashby Avenue exits.  ( 23 min )

A spokesperson for the East Bay Regional Park District said that there was no foul play suspected. The man was in his 20s.  ( 23 min )

County officials may be at odds over how to spend hundreds of millions from Measure W, a sales tax marketed to voters as funding shelters and housing.  ( 28 min )

The post Why Science Hasn’t Solved Consciousness (Yet) appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 27 min )

Recreation of Google's 1998 home office; via Google blog. 1998 was the last year of the web before Google began setting the agenda in search. During that year, there were hints that Google was emerging — even before it officially incorporated in September, it was gaining credence among industry insiders as a search technology to watch. But for all of 1998, the leading names in search were either portals (Yahoo, Netscape, Excite) or search engines trying to turn themselves into portals (AltaVista, Infoseek, Lycos). With the portals, often the search function was either partly or fully outsourced. So when assessing how popular a particular search engine was, you first needed to work out how it was integrated into the leading portals or directories of the day. Take AltaVista, for example. Alt…  ( 5 min )

Rich Lyons is preparing to testify before a U.S. House committee investigating on-campus “antisemitism upheaval and hatred” in a hearing with huge stakes both for Cal and the wider UC system.  ( 33 min )

Men's basketball players at Cal could make an average of $200,000 a year, football players $100,000 and women's basketball players $60,000.  ( 27 min )

Lishq, offering Indian jewelry with a “modern twist,” is in the same building as Shelly and Deepak Ajmani’s spice shop — in the spot where a different jewelry store closed last year after an armed robbery.  ( 24 min )

A cab driver in San Francisco for over half a century, he was known for his stories, his laughter, and his encyclopedic knowledge of the city.  ( 24 min )

After just a few months of work, a complete newcomer to the world of sphere packing has solved one of its biggest open problems. The post New Sphere-Packing Record Stems From an Unexpected Source first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

How and why do we gender animals in stories?  ( 11 min )

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A Japanese-style take on the humble omelette, served with sushi rice, spicy mayo and quick pickles on the side We eat a lot of omelettes in our house: they’re the perfect solution for an impromptu dinner, and they’re also endlessly customisable, so we never get bored with them. You can add butter, beat the eggs in the pan and roll to make it French, add spices, coriander and onion to make it Indian, or mirin and soy, as in today’s dish, for a trip to Japan. You could add any condiment or pickle from mayonnaise to ketchup and chilli oil to chimichurri, and bolster the meal with bread or rice. Today’s recipe is merely one of many wonderful scenic routes on which to take your omelette. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

Siegel later served as president of Oakland's school board and fought for workers, unions, and human rights advocates over five decades as a civil rights lawyer.  ( 25 min )

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The Trump administration froze $6.2 billion in federal education grants, including $811 million that was to fund teacher training, migrant education, and after-school programs in California.  ( 27 min )

Local leaders warn the bill’s $1.2 trillion cuts to Medicaid and food stamps will hit hard in Alameda County, where one in three residents relies on Medi-Cal and one in 10 rely on food stamps.  ( 28 min )

Officials urge caution in sharing unconfirmed sightings.  ( 26 min )

It’s the second big Berkeley bookstore closure this year. A spokesperson for Half Price Books attributed the closure to a lease dispute with their landlord.  ( 24 min )

BPD investigated three reports of gunfire in June alone. City and university police previously investigated five other instances of gunfire this year, one with injuries.  ( 24 min )

Other events include a Berkeley Latin Jazz Collective performance at North Beach Pizza and a new crochet club at Bobby G's Pizzeria.  ( 29 min )

Inquisitive and present, Rawson loved nature, pets and cooking and was active in the Berkeley Community Chorus and Orchestra and in Bella Musica.  ( 25 min )

A better understanding of human smell is emerging as scientists interrogate its fundamental elements: the odor molecules that enter your nose and the individual neurons that translate them into perception in your brain. The post How Smell Guides Our Inner World first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 16 min )

Read more »  ( 24 min )

The post To Save Nature, Make It Sacred appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 30 min )

and a good text editor  ( 34 min )

Also: Abraham Chabon, an NYU student who grew up in Berkeley, has been charged with rape in Manhattan.  ( 23 min )

The precursors of heavy elements might arise in the plasma underbellies of swollen stars or in smoldering stellar corpses. They definitely exist in East Lansing, Michigan. The post Physicists Start To Pin Down How Stars Forge Heavy Atoms first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

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The post The Ascendance Of Algorithmic Tyranny appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 34 min )

A comprehensive but nowhere near exhaustive overview of how the Trump Administration is impacting American science.  ( 13 min )

A conversation about predictive processing, insight, and existential threats — to the self and to society.  ( 26 min )

CDnow homepage, December 1998; via Wayback Machine. 1998 started promisingly for CDnow, a leading online music retailer — or "e-tailer" as e-commerce sites were sometimes called at the time. "CDnow goes public with a bang," read a CNET headline on February 10, 1998: "After upping its offering price, CDnow (CDNW) today launched its initial public offering and saw its shares rise nearly 40 percent." Traffic was growing, too. CNET reported that average daily visits to the CDnow website "grew to about 132,000 in December 1997, up from 12,000 visits recorded during January of 1996." Of course, like many dot-com companies, CDnow was actually making losses every quarter. But sales were increasing, along with page views — so eventually, the thinking went, profits would come too. CDnow, January 19…  ( 6 min )

Image generators are designed to mimic their training data, so where does their apparent creativity come from? A recent study suggests that it’s an inevitable by-product of their architecture. The post Researchers Uncover Hidden Ingredients Behind AI Creativity first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 9 min )

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Rice noodles topped with a rubble of tempeh and walnuts and tossed in garlic oil and a sweet, salty and tangy hot sauce Up until now, I was sceptical about viral recipes. Is anyone still making the baked feta pasta from 2021? Has the “marry me chicken” resulted in an uptick in matrimonies? But the tossed noodles (guay tiew klook) currently doing the rounds on Thai social media platforms really whet my appetite. In short, they’re noodles tossed with mince, garlic oil and a dark, sweet, salty and tangy hot sauce, and they just make so much sense that they really couldn’t not be great. I love them, so I’m passing on the baton to you using a combination of crumbly tempeh and walnuts instead of the mince. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The post Denouement In The Middle East appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 16 min )

Scientists reconstructed 500 million years of evolutionary history to reveal which came first: colorful signals or the color vision needed to see them. The post When Did Nature Burst Into Vivid Color? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

Patterns are anti-randomness and thought is made of pattern-stuff  ( 18 min )

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Maria Chudnovsky reflects on her journey in graph theory, her groundbreaking solution to the long-standing perfect graph problem, and the unexpected ways this abstract field intersects with everyday life. The post How Does Graph Theory Shape Our World? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 27 min )

have a favorite salad tofu? [Six question marks in a paragraph might be a record!] Read more »  ( 25 min )

A former FBI agent traveled to Louisiana to ask a hired killer about a murder that haunted him. Then Larry Thompson started talking about a different case altogether. The post Conversations with a Hit Man appeared first on The Atavist Magazine.  ( 63 min )

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post. The post Protected: Conversations with a Hit Man appeared first on The Atavist Magazine.  ( 5 min )

A tetrahedron is the simplest Platonic solid. Mathematicians have now made one that’s stable only on one side, confirming a decades-old conjecture. The post A New Pyramid-Like Shape Always Lands the Same Side Up first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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BowieNet homepage on launch; via Wayback Machine. BowieNet launched as an ISP in North America on September 1, 1998 for $19.95 per month; and if you lived elsewhere, as a “premium content” service for $5.95 per month. If you had visited davidbowie.com on that day, you’d have been greeted by these words from the man himself: “I welcome all you web travellers to the first community driven Internet site that focuses on music, film, literature, painting and more, where you can interact with all the members of our adventurous new project, knowing that this is an on-growing builder, added to constantly, and that you will definitely be entertained (sometimes unwittingly).” Bowie added, “The purpose of BowieNet is interactivity and community — plain and clear — everybody has a voice.” 1998 BowieN…  ( 9 min )

A science fiction story brought to life through a pro-GMO dinner.

The post The Unseen Fury Of Solar Storms appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 48 min )

Every elementary particle falls into one of two categories. Collectivist bosons account for the forces that move us while individualist fermions keep our atoms from collapsing. The post Matter vs. Force: Why There Are Exactly Two Types of Particles first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 8 min )

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You may well be knocked sideways by the sheer punch of this apparently simple sandwich – and it’s great for picnics, too Last month, while on a book tour in New York, I ate a sandwich that moved me to utter profanities. It was unusual behaviour from me, and more so because the sandwich in question was packed with an excessive amount of spring greens, but then, that is the genius of Brooks Headley, chef/owner of Superiority Burger: like Midas, he has an ability to turn the ordinary into gold. Here, I’ve tried to recreate it by cooking down a kilo of spring greens until they are melting, soft, collapsed and buttery, before tossing them with sharp cheddar. It’s pure picnic gold. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The post The Clash Between Technology & Ecology appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 11 min )

Two new notions of infinity challenge a long-standing plan to define the mathematical universe. The post Is Mathematics Mostly Chaos or Mostly Order? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

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A nitpick and a fable about the world getting more complex than ever  ( 17 min )

Martin Schrimpf is crafting bespoke AI models that can induce control over high-level brain activity. The post How AI Models Are Helping to Understand — and Control — the Brain first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

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Excite portal, July 1998. When BowieNet was “pre-launched” on his main website at the end of June 1998, commentators saw it as an attempt to “creatively up the ante in the portal war,”⁠ as Beth Lipton wrote in a CNET report. “Large Net gateway sites such as Yahoo and Excite seek to be the home page for as many users as possible,” she added. Portals were certainly the biggest internet story of 1998. In November of that year, an entire episode of The Internet Cafe, a tv show hosted by Stewart Cheifet, Jane Wither and Andrew DeVries, was devoted to portals. In the introduction, DeVries gave this explanation of what a portal was. "It's a place that people will come to first when they go onto the internet. Hopefully it's a place that catches a lot of traffic and keeps people coming back by prov…  ( 7 min )

The post Fire-Eyes Of The Underworld appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 25 min )

By speedrunning ecosystems with microbes, researchers revealed intrinsic properties that may make a community susceptible to invasion. The post The Ecosystem Dynamics That Can Make or Break an Invasion first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

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Few things in life are as simple and mouthwatering as tomatoes on toast sprinkled with salt, but here they hit new heights with olivey breadcrumbs, garlic and butter beans, too My favourite breakfast is sliced tomatoes on rye bread sprinkled with sea salt. The best bit is neither the tomato flesh nor the bread, it’s the salted tomato water that runs down the back of my hands and threatens to meet my elbows. It’s liquid electricity and one of my favourite earthly flavours. It could make a great stock, or a delicious martini, perhaps even a marinade for ceviche, but here it’s thrown in at the end to refresh a dish of gently cooked tomatoes, beans and dill. Perfect for dunking anything but elbows into. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

A new argument explores how the growth of disorder could cause massive objects to move toward one another. Physicists are both interested and skeptical. The post Is Gravity Just Entropy Rising? Long-Shot Idea Gets Another Look. first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )

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An interview with Ilan Gur, CEO of ARIA, about the organization’s efforts to build scientific waves.

From brain folds to insect architecture, L. Mahadevan explains how complex biological forms and behaviors emerge through the interplay of physical forces, environment and embodiment. The post Does Form Really Shape Function? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 33 min )

Watch hundreds of strangers talk for 30 minutes, and track how their moods change  ( 12 min )

The post ‘Molecular Civil War’ In LA appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 15 min )

By mathematically proving how individual molecules create the complex motion of fluids, three mathematicians have illuminated why time can’t flow in reverse. The post Epic Effort to Ground Physics in Math Opens Up the Secrets of Time first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 13 min )

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Japanese gitaigo are nuggets of mundane joy  ( 6 min )

In October, the Netscape vs. Microsoft rivalry reached fever pitch when Netscape employees defaced an Internet Explorer logo that had been dumped on its lawn by Microsofties. In 1997, the World Wide Web finally went past 1 million websites — with over 120 million internet users. As the number of websites went up, the range of sites blossomed too. Over a million people built personal home pages on GeoCities, Tripod and Angelfire. And while the Web had only just gone multimedia a few years before, now it was pushing the limits with technologies like Flash, Java applets and streaming media. Web commercialism also ramped up over 1997. While the dot-com boom was still in its early stages, notable IPOs this year included Amazon.com in May, N2K in August and RealNetworks in November. Meanwhile, W…  ( 6 min )

The post A New Political Compass appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 38 min )

Prominent scientists continue to claim life is “just” slime on a spinning rock. However, in an age when the rarity and fragility of life are increasingly evident, it’s time to retire the metaphor.

The catch: It would require the energy of a few medium-size stars. The post New Quantum Algorithm Factors Numbers With One Qubit first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 8 min )

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Renew your zest for life with this hearty salad that’s a nutritious meal in itself I’m a subscriber to The Imperfectionist, Oliver Burkeman’s newsletter on building a meaningful life, in which he recently wrote about navigating life via “aliveness”, which he describes as “a subtle electrical charge”. I chase that feeling a lot in the kitchen, and it’s how I feel when I eat a great salad, all vibrant and energised, as if I’ve just cycled through gorgeous countryside or been on a hike. I find it hard to write recipes for such salads, though, perhaps because there are often so many ingredient variations and little precedence, but today’s one made the cut. If you make it, please let me know if it made you feel “perky” in any way. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The post The 2025 Berggruen Prize Essay Contest appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 11 min )

Physicists recently mapped the hidden shape that underlies the quantum behaviors of a crystal, using a new method that’s expected to become ubiquitous. The post First Map Made of a Solid’s Secret Quantum Geometry first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

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preparedness). Having cocktails ready to go and super, super cold so that they won’t immediately water themselves down by melting ice was a win. And, as the habit has continued, it’s always fun when a friend stops by and you remember you already have perfect manhattans ready to go, as if you were trying to medal in the impromptu hosting olympics. Read more »  ( 32 min )

A selected encyclopedia of major gene-editing systems, together with illustrated diagrams.

A 6 minute video about the loneliness epidemic, in data

What reminiscing is like without mental imagery  ( 23 min )

Studies of neural metabolism reveal our brain’s effort to keep us alive and the evolutionary constraints that sculpted our most complex organ. The post How Much Energy Does It Take To Think? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 10 min )

The post AI Signals The Death Of The Author appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 25 min )

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Inside PRO's rapid effort to connect private donors with the most cost-effective programs affected by USAID cuts.  ( 18 min )

Decaf or Java — which version of MTV's website should you choose? Part of the reason it was so difficult for both digital music and video webcasts to gain traction on the web over 1997 was the fickleness of the underlying software: the web browser. Throughout the year, a host of technical and business decisions were made by the browser companies and website owners that impacted user experience in a negative way. MTV’s website was a prime example. On May 3, 1997, Billboard ran a story about MTV’s latest redesign. “The newly revamped World Wide Web site for MTV contains a heavy amount of original music content and a unique Web browser design,” noted the article. But it warned that Netscape Navigator users “will find that some content is inaccessible.” Some of the site’s best content, Billboa…  ( 7 min )

Bioart emerges where biological science, technology, and aesthetics collide. For one terminally ill artist, it offered a chance at immortality.

By extending the scope of the key insight behind Fermat’s Last Theorem, four mathematicians have made great strides toward building a “grand unified theory” of math. The post The Core of Fermat’s Last Theorem Just Got Superpowered first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 12 min )

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The sweetness of roast vegetables and raisins contrasts with balsamic, pine nuts and capers in a vibrant dish that you’ll want to eat on repeat Being in the business of recipe writing means I am always seeking the new, always moving on and rarely resting on a single dish. Until summer starts knocking, that is. The sun makes me want to slow down, and I find myself wanting a variation of vegetables agrodolce on repeat. Agrodolce is Italian for sour (agro) and sweet (dolce), which in my kitchen translates to a pile of meltingly soft vegetables, all slick with olive oil, sweet with onions, and cut with vinegar and capers. Often, this takes the form of my husband Hugh’s oven-baked caponata, but I also love the comfort of squash and the liquorice sweetness of the cooked fennel here. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

The post How Pope Leo XIV Can Address Distributive Justice In The Age Of AI appeared first on NOEMA.  ( 15 min )

Reversible programs run backward as easily as they run forward, saving energy in theory. After decades of research, they may soon power AI. The post How Can AI Researchers Save Energy? By Going Backward. first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 9 min )

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Toxic amino acids, peptides, and proteins — which first evolved as molecular weapons deployed by species in conflict — can also serve as blueprints for pharmaceutical innovation.

Promise and controversy continues to surround string theory as a potential unified theory of everything. In the latest episode of The Joy of Why, Cumrun Vafa discusses his progress in trying to find good, testable models hidden among the ‘swampland’ of impossible universes. The post Will We Ever Prove String Theory? first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 34 min )

here’s a longtime favorite; and this is my total comfort food], but I sometimes find that when the pasta is cooked in a sauce the whole time, it doesn’t quite get that al dente definition and structural integrity that it does when cooked in water. I’m so glad I didn’t quit on them, though, because with this recipe, not to be dramatic or anything, but I feel like I’ve finally cracked the code. Read more »  ( 37 min )

Manu Prakash works on the world’s most urgent problems and seemingly frivolous questions at the same time. They add up to a philosophy he calls “recreational biology.” The post How Paradoxical Questions and Simple Wonder Lead to Great Science first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 13 min )

How accurately are Asian Americans cast in Hollywood?  ( 1 min )

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My well-thumbed copies of three classic web design books: 'Creating Killer Web Sites' by David Siegel (1996-97), 'Taking your Talent to the Web' by Jeffrey Zeldman (2001), and 'Designing Web Usability' by Jakob Nielsen (1999). Like many of the first wave of web designers, Jeffrey Zeldman — who turned 42 in early 1997 — had begun his career in a completely different profession. He’d started out as an aspiring fiction author, briefly worked as a journalist, tried his hand as a touring musician, and then spent ten years in the advertising business. “Writing billboards and coming up with quick visuals was good training for the web because you have to communicate something instantly,” he later said in an interview. It was the rise of multimedia that attracted creatives like Zeldman, who made hi…  ( 8 min )

Black hole and Big Bang singularities break our best theory of gravity. A trilogy of theorems hints that physicists must go to the ends of space and time to find a fix. The post Singularities in Space-Time Prove Hard to Kill first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 13 min )

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Savoury, nutty, salty-sweet – and delicious with rice Here are two things about aubergines that you may not know: first, they are giant berries (!) and, second, they’re roughly 92% water. The latter is important, because to get this mighty berry to reach its delicious potential, we need to dehydrate it (that is, remove as much water as possible and then hit it with lots of flavour). You could fry it, but, when the weather is lovely, I prefer hands-free cooking, which means roasting it. In this recipe, after roasting, I’ve used one of my favourite braising liquids – a mix of soy sauce, sake and sesame – to bring the aubergine back to life. Continue reading...  ( 15 min )

Lena Rowat skied 1,600 grueling miles across the Coast Range to quiet her demons. But she didn't begin to silence them until tragedy struck. The post The Longest Journey appeared first on The Atavist Magazine.  ( 34 min )

There is no excerpt because this is a protected post. The post Protected: The Longest Journey appeared first on The Atavist Magazine.  ( 5 min )

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By studying the millennia-old arms race between soil-dwelling microbes, scientists can pre-empt antibiotic resistance before it emerges in people.

A new proof illuminates the hidden patterns that emerge when addition becomes impossible. The post Graduate Student Solves Classic Problem About the Limits of Addition first appeared on Quanta Magazine  ( 11 min )