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It’s been a while since we saw it last, but Saatva has finally brought back it’s ultra-rare $500 off any order over $1,000 discount. Popping up just a couple of times a year, it’s impossible to predict when this Saatva mattress sale will start, so who knows when it will be back again – shop now to avoid missing out. It’s a semi-exclusive for TechRadar, so make sure to follow one of the links on this page, or you won’t see it.
Always a dominating force in our best mattress guide, Saatva is one of our favorite sleep brands. It’s a premium brand, so you can expect a higher price tag, but you can also expect a quality finish, a luxury feel, and some of the best extras around (including 365 nights to try the bed out, and free white glove delivery). We’re particularly big fans of the Saatva Classic, which delivers an exceptionally strong performance all-round. Check out our Saatva Classic mattress review to learn more.
I’ve singled out the Saatva Classic because it has such a wide appeal, but if it’s not exactly what you’re after, there are mattresses to suit almost every sleep style in the Saatva sale. Just follow the links on this page and head to your favorite mattress to claim your discount.
Buy it if…
✅ You want a premium finish: The Saatva Classic is an expensive mattress, but it justifies that cost with an exceptional build, quality materials, and a luxurious finish. It’s like sleeping on the best hotel mattress, but you get to do it every single night, and thanks to the free white glove delivery, someone will even set up the bed for you – it’s just a shame Saatva can’t throw in room service.
✅ You want to customize your choice: One of the reasons behind the wide-ranging Classic appeal it the amount of options you have. There are three firmness levels available: Plush for side sleepers, Luxury Firm has an all-round support, while Firm is aimed at back and stomach sleepers. And you get to choose your height – upgrade from 11.5 inches to 14.5 inches for ultimate luxury.
✅ You want quality extras: Okay, this is a benefit of all Saatva adult mattresses, but it’s worth covering here. As well as the previously mentioned white glove delivery (which means Saatva will set-up the bed to the room of your choice), you’ll get a 365-night mattress trial and a lifetime warranty.
Don’t buy it if…
❌ You want contouring foam: While technically a hybrid, the Saatva Classic feels closer to an innerspring, thanks to prominent layer of coils. If you want the contouring hug of foam, consider the Loom & Leaf. In our Saatva Loom & Leaf mattress review we found this plush bed has incredible pressure relief, and there’s $500 off every size and firmness level.
❌ You have back or joint pain: For the record, the Classic is also good for those with aches and pains, but if a lumbar-friendly design is top priority, we recommend the Saatva RX. Described as “total opulence” in our Saatva RX mattress review, this bed has a balance of support and relief that’s ideal for anyone who wakes up stiff. All sizes are $500 off with our link.
❌ You prioritize edge support: Our reviewer described the Saatva Memory Foam Hybrid mattress as “the best mattress for edge support [they’ve] ever tested.” Learn why with our Saatva Memory Foam Hybrid mattress review. It’s also a slightly more affordable option – the queen size is down to $1,295 with our discount code.
MIT researchers have discovered a brain circuit that drives vocalization and ensures that you talk only when you breathe out, and stop talking when you breathe in.
The newly discovered circuit controls two actions that are required for vocalization: narrowing of the larynx and exhaling air from the lungs. The researchers also found that this vocalization circuit is under the command of a brainstem region that regulates the breathing rhythm, which ensures that breathing remains dominant over speech.
“When you need to breathe in, you have to stop vocalization. We found that the neurons that control vocalization receive direct inhibitory input from the breathing rhythm generator,” says Fan Wang, an MIT professor of brain and cognitive sciences, a member of MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research, and the senior author of the study.
Jaehong Park, a Duke University graduate student who is currently a visiting student at MIT, is the lead author of the study, which appears today in Science. Other authors of the paper include MIT technical associates Seonmi Choi and Andrew Harrahill, former MIT research scientist Jun Takatoh, and Duke University researchers Shengli Zhao and Bao-Xia Han.
Vocalization control
Located in the larynx, the vocal cords are two muscular bands that can open and close. When they are mostly closed, or adducted, air exhaled from the lungs generates sound as it passes through the cords.
The MIT team set out to study how the brain controls this vocalization process, using a mouse model. Mice communicate with each other using sounds known as ultrasonic vocalizations (USVs), which they produce using the unique whistling mechanism of exhaling air through a small hole between nearly closed vocal cords.
“We wanted to understand what are the neurons that control the vocal cord adduction, and then how do those neurons interact with the breathing circuit?” Wang says.
To figure that out, the researchers used a technique that allows them to map the synaptic connections between neurons. They knew that vocal cord adduction is controlled by laryngeal motor neurons, so they began by tracing backward to find the neurons that innervate those motor neurons.
This revealed that one major source of input is a group of premotor neurons found in the hindbrain region called the retroambiguus nucleus (RAm). Previous studies have shown that this area is involved in vocalization, but it wasn’t known exactly which part of the RAm was required or how it enabled sound production.
The researchers found that these synaptic tracing-labeled RAm neurons were strongly activated during USVs. This observation prompted the team to use an activity-dependent method to target these vocalization-specific RAm neurons, termed as RAmVOC. They used chemogenetics and optogenetics to explore what would happen if they silenced or stimulated their activity. When the researchers blocked the RAmVOC neurons, the mice were no longer able to produce USVs or any other kind of vocalization. Their vocal cords did not close, and their abdominal muscles did not contract, as they normally do during exhalation for vocalization.
Conversely, when the RAmVOC neurons were activated, the vocal cords closed, the mice exhaled, and USVs were produced. However, if the stimulation lasted two seconds or longer, these USVs would be interrupted by inhalations, suggesting that the process is under control of the same part of the brain that regulates breathing.
“Breathing is a survival need,” Wang says. “Even though these neurons are sufficient to elicit vocalization, they are under the control of breathing, which can override our optogenetic stimulation.”
Rhythm generation
Additional synaptic mapping revealed that neurons in a part of the brainstem called the pre-Bötzinger complex, which acts as a rhythm generator for inhalation, provide direct inhibitory input to the RAmVOC neurons.
“The pre-Bötzinger complex generates inhalation rhythms automatically and continuously, and the inhibitory neurons in that region project to these vocalization premotor neurons and essentially can shut them down,” Wang says.
This ensures that breathing remains dominant over speech production, and that we have to pause to breathe while speaking.
The researchers believe that although human speech production is more complex than mouse vocalization, the circuit they identified in mice plays the conserved role in speech production and breathing in humans.
“Even though the exact mechanism and complexity of vocalization in mice and humans is really different, the fundamental vocalization process, called phonation, which requires vocal cord closure and the exhalation of air, is shared in both the human and the mouse,” Park says.
The researchers now hope to study how other functions such as coughing and swallowing food may be affected by the brain circuits that control breathing and vocalization.
The research was funded by the National Institutes of Health.
Our review of Apple’s new MacBook Airs is out, and our esteemed reviewer Devindra Hardawar gave them both equal scores of 90. That’s a very good score! But I think Devindra’s underselling the 15-inch MacBook Air, which is the best laptop I’ve used in years. It deserves at least an extra point or two, in my humble opinion. For me, it’s a Goldilocks laptop, just right, and I think a lot of people would feel the same way if they managed to realize that a 13-inch laptop isn’t the end-all, be-all form factor that Apple has cast it as over the last decade.
For years now, the 13-inch Air has been Apple’s best laptop for most people, with an undoubtedly excellent combo of power and portability. After a total redesign in 2022, though, there’s not much to differentiate this year’s Air. That’s not bad in and of itself, as it’s a sign of a product that has matured over the years to near-perfection; this year’s model has a new chip to keep performance as fresh as possible.
At some point, due in large part to the MacBook Air’s decade-plus dominance, the 13-inch form factor became the de-facto laptop size for most people. Particularly those who wanted a Mac, because in the last ten years the 16-inch Macbook Pro (and the 15-inch model that preceded it) got way too expensive for most. As such, a large screen became a “pro” feature, not something most people could afford.
Fortunately, Apple addressed that last summer with the 15-inch MacBook Air, a computer that retains everything we like about the 13-inch model in a slightly larger and heavier package. In exchange for a little more cash and a slightly bulkier device, I got a bigger screen that I really appreciated when using the Air as my primary computer without a monitor. To me, 15 inches is the ideal laptop size. If you ever felt the same way but got priced out by Apple, you should definitely check out the 15-inch MacBook Air.
The 13-inch model will almost certainly remain the default option for most people — in part because it’s cheaper. And if you travel a lot, you’ll probably be happier with a smaller and lighter machine. But I believe that a lot of people would be much happier with the larger screen, because the 15-inch Air is still extremely thin and light. Devindra disagrees, noting the bigger laptop is a half-pound heavier, “more unwieldy” and a little “annoying to carry.” That’s fair — I didn’t have the same experience because I never used the 15-inch alongside the 13-inch. Instead, I compared it to Apple’s two MacBook Pro models, and the Air is lighter than both. In fact, it’s more than a pound lighter than the 16-inch MacBook Pro.
While I already believe that most people would be just as happy with the 15-inch Air, if not happier, there are a few use cases worth pointing out to hammer home the point. Devindra said the Air did pretty well playing some of the newer games available for it like Lies of P and Death Stranding. If you’re into games, whether they’re titles like those or more casual options from Apple Arcade, there’s little doubt they’re more fun on a larger display.
The 15-inch MacBook Air is also a great option for older users, or people with visual impairments (or, honestly, anyone who prefers bigger elements on their screen). When I use the 15-inch Air, I enjoy having more pixels to show more of whatever apps I’m using. But, you can just as easily scale up screen elements so you have the same canvas as the 13-inch Air, just on a greater scale. Naturally, the screens on the Air series aren’t as pixel-dense and sharp as the MacBook Pros, but they’re still lovely and won’t look overly pixelated if you decide to scale up the UI.
Forget about specific use cases, though. To put it simply, I’m a fan of the 15-inch Air. It just feels right — much more portable than a computer with a 15-inch display has any right to be. I don’t feel like I’m giving up screen size for something that’s easier to carry around; instead, it’s a computer that I can take anywhere and not feel constrained while using it. Maybe I’m overestimating the appeal — you can just plug the 13-inch Air into a monitor at home to get a bigger screen and then have a smaller computer when you’re on the go. But for someone who likes the idea of a single computer that can work in any context, the 15-inch Air fits my bill.
While CG is still the medium of choice for many of the largest animation studios like Disney, Pixar and DreamWorks, traditional 2D animation still holds the hearts of many, including myself.
However, be it financial pressures, tighter deadlines, or viewers’ preference for the more glossy, finished feel of CG animation, there’s not a lot of mainstream 2D animation these days. Aaron Blaise, a former Disney animator, writer, director, and all-round animation legend, thinks that could be about to change, thanks to more accessible software like Procreate Dreams.
“I think Procreate Dreams could not have come out at a better time,” says Blaise. “The use of CG animation is wonderful; it’s a great tool that allowed a lot of animated filmmakers who didn’t draw to get into the field and create their visions. But I think that the industry has steered away from hand-drawn animation long enough – there’s a big hunger for it now.”
In an interview with TechRadar, Blaise discussed why he’s adopting new and more accessible software for his animation education business and even some of his future works, including a feature-length film.
(Image credit: Aaron Blaise)
Paint with all the colors of the wind
Blaise left Disney in 2007 after having worked on titles like Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, Pocahontas, Mulan, and Aladdin – he also directed Brother Bear. He wanted to continue making films, but on a smaller scale, and his greatest ambition was to transform his over 35-year career into education.
More recently, a key component of that ambition has been Procreate Dreams. Blaise’s business, CreatureArtTeacher, even offers Procreate Dreams-specific workshops. “So many people ask me what software to use, and it’s a no-brainer. If you’ve got an iPad? No-brainer.”
In the run-up to Procreate Dreams’ release, Blaise spent 12 weeks working on a short animation using the software. “One of the biggest compliments and most consistent comments that I got on YouTube was, ‘This reminds me of the old Disney-style animation that I grew up on,’ which was always followed up with, ‘I wish there was more of this.’
“That really gets me excited for the young artists who want to come in, start drawing, and do it the way we used to do it.”
Adding to Blaise’s Procreate Dreams enthusiasm in light of this renewed hunger for 2D animation is its very approachable price – just $19.99 / £19.99 / AU$29.99. “There is no other software out there that does what Procreate Dreams does for the price point, and that to me is probably the biggest selling point,” he says. “We’re just gonna see this surge – and I’m already seeing it across YouTube and TikTok – this wave of new pieces of animation being done in Dreams.”
As a very amateur animator myself, I’ve also been pretty blown away by the Procreate Dreams experience. It’s remarkably robust and powerful but also incredibly flexible and easy to use – aspects Blaise sees huge potential in for newer animators.
Even for a seasoned pro like Blaise, though, Procreate Dreams is plenty powerful, too: “That penguin short I drew – that was before the software was even finished. I did it when a lot of the features weren’t even there yet, but Dreams was still strong enough that I could create all the backgrounds and the animation in about 12 weeks, which is huge for a full piece of animation like that.”
In fact, Blaise sees Dreams as so capable he might just make his next feature-length animation using it. “We’re talking about trying to do feature-length material using Dreams, and we’re really excited about that. We just have to figure out the pipeline.”
One jump ahead of the slowpokes
One of Blaise’s favorite things about Procreate Dreams is how easily it can replicate the experience of traditional, frame-by-frame animation on paper. “With young artists nowadays that is such a nostalgic mystery to them.
“The way I approach animation, even when I’m drawing digitally, is still a very old-school, traditional way as if I’m animating on paper, which Dreams allows me to do,” says Blaise, “I don’t use Lasso Tools and things like that, because I treat it like it’s paper.”
There’s one standout feature Blaise wishes he could have used earlier in his career; Performance mode. “The Performance mode is awesome. You can take a piece of animation, move it around the screen, record that movement, and then you’re done. That saves such an incredible amount of time.”
In fact, Blaise said Dreams’ biggest flaw has more to do with hardware – he’d love to see it on a larger slate: “Apple, if you’re reading this – make a bigger iPad.”
Still, he says, Procreate Deams has done a great job at allowing you to use that space economically, letting you easily switch between editing directly on the timeline and drawing in flipbook mode. ”I don’t know of any other software that does that. They’re really thinking about the artist and the ease of animation.”
(Image credit: Aaron Blaise)
Adventure in the great wide somewhere
For Blaise, the Dreams experience isn’t just exciting in its potential to bring in new animators; having the freedom to move with his artwork is even changing his own lifestyle as an artist.
At the Lightbox art conference in Pasadena, California, last year, fellow artist James Gurney arranged for a few peers, including Blaise, to gather one morning and complete landscape or cityscape paintings of downtown Pasadena. They also added giant creatures into the paintings as a fun illustration exercise.
Blaise, typically confined to his studio space and full setup for animation, was able to partake in a way he’d never be able to without Procreate Dreams. “Just having that portability and being able to animate anywhere, that’s pretty cool. I love that it’s ready to go when the inspiration hits you or if you want to go somewhere and you can’t be in the studio.”
It’s a freedom Blaise sees as central to the future and success of Procreate Dreams, and that freedom extends to the artistic flair of the individual using it. “It doesn’t have to be Disney style; that’s the thing I get excited about. There are so many new fresh ideas coming into the animation world; styles and ways of expression that we’ve never seen before that Dreams is going to allow people to do.”
All that’s left, Blaise says, is to try: “Just get in there and start animating and drawing, learning the basics; the bouncing ball, the stretch and squish exercises, the timing, all of that. Being able to do shots like that in Dreams is incredibly easy.”
“One of the things I love about apps like Procreate and Procreate Dreams is that they are so robust, there are 100 different ways that you can do any one thing. It just depends on what your workflow is, and how you come at it.”
Whether you’re an experienced artist like Blaise or an absolute amateur like myself, Procreate Dreams is one of the most accessible animation apps available, from its low price to the fact its hardware is a general-use tablet and not the pricey purpose-built best drawing tablets.
A widespread bacteria called Wolbachia and a virus that it carries can cause sterility in male insects by hijacking their sperm, preventing them from fertilizing eggs of females that do not have the same combination of bacteria and virus. A new study led by microbiome researchers at Penn State has uncovered how this microbial combination manipulates sperm, which could lead to refined techniques to control populations of agricultural pests and insects that carry diseases like Zika and dengue to humans.
The study is published in the March 8 issue of the journal Science.
“Wolbachia is the most widespread bacteria in animals and lives symbiotically within the reproductive tissues of about 50% of insect species, including some mosquitos and flies,” said Seth Bordenstein, professor of biology and entomology, director of the One Health Microbiome Center at Penn State, and one of the leaders of the research team. “Wolbachia has genes from a virus called prophage WO integrated into its genome. These genes — cifA and cifB — allow the bacteria to remarkably manipulate sperm and quickly spread through an insect population for their own good.”
When a male and female insect that both have Wolbachia mate, they successfully reproduce and pass on the bacteria. But when a male with Wolbachia mates with a female with no Wolbachia, the sperm are rendered lethal to the fertilized eggs, succumbing them to death. This system cunningly increases the proportion of offspring with Wolbachia and the virus in the next generation, because females with the bacteria successfully reproduce more frequently than females without.
This system is being used in several ongoing pilot studies across the world to control insect pests and the harmful viral diseases they carry. For example, to control a population of agricultural or human pests that do not have the bacteria, scientists release males with Wolbachia in order to crash the population.
“One of Wolbachia’s superpowers is that it blocks pathogenic RNA viruses such as Zika, dengue and chikungunya virus, so mosquitos with Wolbachia do not pass these viruses on to people when they bite,” Bordenstein said. “So, releases of both male and female mosquitos with Wolbachia in an area where it isn’t already present leads to replacement of the population with mosquitos that can no longer pass on a viral disease. The World Mosquito Program is now using Wolbachia to control viruses in 11 countries. With this study, we reveal the underlying mechanics of how this process works so we can fine-tune the technique to expand its scope in vector control measures.”
Wolbachia’s prophage WO genes code for proteins that interfere with normal development of sperm cells. These proteins impact a critical transformation during sperm development, when the sperm’s genome is repackaged and the sperm changes from a canoe-shape into a more refined needle-like shape.
“This shape change is incredibly important to the success of sperm, and any interference can impact the sperm’s ability to travel in the female reproductive tract and successfully fertilize the egg,” said Rupinder Kaur, assistant research professor of biology and entomology at Penn State and the other leader of the research team. “The transition is highly conserved in almost everything from insects to humans. Defects in this process can also cause male sterility in humans.”
According to the researchers, sperm is particularly prone to DNA damage and repair during this transition. In this study, they found that sperm exposed to Wolbachia, or the Cif proteins alone, had an elevated level of DNA damage at this stage. The DNA damage, if not repaired in a timely fashion, can result in abnormal sperm genome packaging, male infertility and embryonic inviability.
“These results confirmed the impact of Wolbachia and Cif proteins at this stage of sperm development, but we still wanted to know what was happening at earlier stages to trigger these changes,” Kaur said. “We conducted a series of tests to explore the structure and biochemical function of the Cif proteins and found that they can cleave messenger molecules called long non-coding RNA, which sets the stage to interfere with downstream development and function of the sperm.”
The researchers used fruit flies with Wolbachia to test the potential link between the bacteria and long non-coding RNA. They found that Wolbachia — or the Cif proteins alone — reduced the amount of these RNAs. Additionally, mutant flies with reduced expression of these RNAs in conjunction with Wolbachia had elevated levels of embryonic inviability because it augmented the defective transition process of sperm development. So, Kaur explained, the virus proteins control sperm by depleting the long non-coding RNAs required for a normal sperm function.
“Long non-coding RNAs do not make any proteins themselves, but they can have profound impacts on regulating the function of other genes required for sperm development,” Bordenstein said. “By altering this non-coding part of the genome, we found that Cif proteins start impacting sperm right from the earliest stages of development. Wolbachia’s prophage WO genes act like master puppeteers, manipulating sperm development in a way that allows their genes and the symbiotic bacteria to quickly spread through arthropod populations.”
Because the process of sperm development looks similar across the animal kingdom, the researchers said that knowledge of this process could lend insight into sterility challenges in humans as well as inform new control methods of harmful insect populations.
“Now that we have reverse engineered this process, we can fine tune methods of population control with Wolbachia that are already in use,” Kaur said. “We plan to take advantage of this knowledge to augment currently existing disease vector and pest control methods, and perhaps emulate the technique without Wolbachia or virus proteins in the long-term.”
In addition to Bordenstein and Kaur, the research team includes Angelina McGarry, research technologist II at Penn State; J. Dylan Shropshire, assistant professor at Lehigh University; and Brittany Leigh, a postdoctoral researcher at Vanderbilt University at the time of the research.
Funding from the National Institutes of Health, the U.S. National Science Foundation and Penn State supported this research.
In 2010, astronaut Cady Coleman left her husband and young son to go into space.Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
Space: The Longest GoodbyeGreenwich Entertainment Directed by Ido Mizrahy
Neither NASA nor the Chinese space agency are probably consulting screenwriters as they develop their plans to send humans to the Moon and Mars. But they need to take the problem of astronaut isolation seriously, as director Ido Mizrahy sets out in his heartfelt documentary Space: The Longest Goodbye. Released in cinemas and online this week, this thoughtful film shares first-hand accounts of how leaving family behind can wreak havoc on an astronaut’s well-being.
Any crewed trip to Mars, for example, will involve up to three years of spaceflight — a sea change in what humans have experienced so far. Russian cosmonaut Valery Polyakov holds the record for the longest-duration spaceflight: 437 consecutive days aboard the Mir space station from January 1994 to March 1995. He and other cosmonauts pioneered the study of how the human body responds to microgravity over time, from bone deterioration to muscle loss and vision changes.
Yet the psychological impacts of spaceflight are equally important, argues Al Holland, an operational psychologist at the NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, who drives much of the narrative for The Longest Goodbye. He and his colleagues studied NASA astronauts who flew on Mir, and used the lessons to try to improve astronauts’ mental health and well-being on board the International Space Station (ISS) during the 1990s. For example, carrying mechanical spare parts on board, which weren’t always stowed on Mir, reduced stress levels because astronauts knew that they had backups in case of an emergency.
Easing mental strain
Holland’s team developed ways to lessen the psychological strain of separation, such as by providing twice-weekly audio- or videoconferences between astronauts aboard the ISS and their families, and phone calls home whenever needed. The Longest Goodbye explores these long-distance conversations poignantly, through video recordings shared by Cady Coleman, a NASA astronaut who spent 159 days aboard the ISS in 2010–11.
As Coleman speaks with her husband and ten-year-old son from orbit, they mimic her, drifting across the screen as they pretend to float in microgravity. In another call, Coleman and her son play a flute duet. But after being separated from his mum for so long, he begins to act up. As she reads a story to him, he gets off the couch and makes faces at the camera. He is often like this just before joining calls with Coleman, her husband tells her. From her screen, Coleman can’t do much more than raise her eyebrows sternly.
Coleman had frequent videoconferences with her son, but her absence was still hard on both of them.Credit: Cady Coleman
The video connection breaks up -repeatedly. Coleman cries on camera — a lot. In recent interviews for the film, her son talks about how he didn’t understand why she had to be gone for so long. It is a heartbreaking glimpse into the personal challenges of one of NASA’s most accomplished astronauts, and a warning for anyone thinking about taking a three-year trip to Mars. Being separated from your family for a long journey on Earth is challenging enough; being apart while enduring the unique stresses and dangers of spaceflight is much harder.
The film illuminates this while following the story of Kayla Barron, a NASA astronaut who flew aboard the ISS from November 2021 to May 2022. Barron is a former submariner who has experienced stressful military deployments, but says that going to space is very different. Just getting to orbit in the first place involves putting yourself atop a flaming rocket, she notes. “It’s the most dangerous thing you’ve ever done, and then you invite all of your family and friends to come watch it.” “My spouse is on top of this ball of fire,” her husband thinks.
The couple confronts the existential -question of whether, if she dies, she is doing what she wanted to be doing. In one scene, she rushes to shelter in a protected part of the ISS as an errant piece of space debris threatens to hit the station. Her husband sits helplessly at home, frantically trying to get updates.
Might spacefarers find other ways to -recreate human bonds? European Space Agency astronaut Matthias Maurer, who was on the ISS at the same time as Barron, is shown interacting with an artificial-intelligence assistant. It looks like a floating football and has a screen with a creepily simplified human face. Viewers are likely to be relieved when Maurer packs it away in its storage case.
Lessons on Earth
The film also recaps the rescue of 33 -Chilean miners in 2010, who had been trapped during a mine collapse and spent 69 days underground. Holland and other NASA employees advised the Chilean government on how to sustain the miners’ physical and psychological well-being during their extended isolation. They were told to eat and sleep on a strict schedule, and set up an illuminated area so they could transition between ‘day’ and ‘night’ while they awaited rescue. Lessons from space thus helped the miners to survive underground.
The Longest Goodbye doesn’t describe what might work best for astronauts on their way to Mars. But it does offer a poignant look at the isolation and loss of connection that so many astronauts feel in space, and that many of the rest of us might recognize a little from our own experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Sonos has been excluding its first music speaker designed for spatial audio from previous sales events since it was released last year, so listen up: The company is selling refurbished units of the Era 300 for $359, or $91 less than retail. Yes, it’s not brand new, but Sonos’ refurb program has a good track record. At the moment, only the white Era 300s are available at a discount — the black version is sold out — but if you don’t care about color, then you will get three free months of Apple Music with your purchase.
Sonos
Sonos is selling refurbished Era 300 speakers for $91 less than retail.
$359 at Sonos
We found the Era 300 to be one of the best-sounding speakers Sonos has made when we reviewed it. The model’s spatial audio experience can be a hit or miss in that sometimes, the Atmos versions of songs could sound like they have too much reverb that the vocals get lost in the mix. But overall, it exhibited excellent sound quality and can make songs shine by reproducing bass, vocal and instrumentation in great detail. It makes songs sound rich, crisp and vibrant. We advised not buying the Era 300 only for the sake of spatial audio in our review, since the library of tracks that support the feature remains quite small. That could change in the future, though, especially if Apple truly does start rewarding artists for offering their music in spatial audio.
It’s worth noting that Sonos recommends pairing two Era 300 speakers for “mind-bendlingly realistic surround sound,” and getting the cheaper versions would make that a more affordable prospect. The model is pretty easy to set up anyway — just add the speaker to your Sonos app and then pair it with your music services of choice — so having two or more won’t be an issue. In case you’re looking for something else, though, Sonos is selling more refurbished devices on its website.
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It shouldn’t be too much longer until we see the sixth-generation iPad Air, and another detail about the tablet has leaked: it’s rumored to be getting a landscape front-facing camera, in line with the 10th-gen entry-level iPad launched in 2022.
In other words, the selfie cam is on the top of the tablet when you’re using it in landscape mode, not down the side. This comes from seasoned tipster Instant Digital (via MacRumors), and will apparently apply to both sizes of the new iPad Air.
It certainly makes a lot of sense for video calls, because you can look at the top of the tablet when it’s set up in landscape mode. It’s also something that’s been rumored for the next iPad Pros, so every iPad should soon have the same front-facing camera placement.
As MacRumors points out, this is going to take a bit of engineering know-how: unlike the basic iPad, the iPad Air and iPad Pro have an inductive magnetic charger along the same edge for the Apple Pencil. Presumably Apple has found a way to handle this.
A bigger display, a faster chip
The current generation iPad Air (Image credit: Future)
In our 10.9-inch iPad 2022 review, we called the new camera placement “much more natural” for video calling, so it’s perhaps no surprise that the change is coming – and we should be getting official confirmation before too long.
New iPad Air and iPad Pro models could be announced as early as this week, according to sources. We thought it might happen last week too, but Apple decided to unveil the new M3-powered MacBook Air instead.
As well as a repositioned camera, the iPad Air 6 could well come in a larger 12.9-inch size, alongside the current 10.9-inch one. That means it would match the iPad Pro series in terms of giving consumers a choice of two screen sizes to pick from.
Under the hood, an upgrade to the latest M3 chip from Apple has been talked about as well, and we’ve also seen leaked schematics showing what the next iPad Air might look like. As soon as it’s official, we’ll let you know.
In a new study, researchers have used the fossil record to better understand what factors make animals more vulnerable to extinction from climate change. The results could help to identify species most at risk today from human-driven climate change. The findings have been published today in the journal Science.
Past climate change (often caused by natural changes in greenhouse gases due to volcanic activity) has been responsible for countless species’ extinctions during the history of life on Earth. But, to date, it has not been clear what factors cause species to be more or less resilient to such change, and how the magnitude of climate change affects extinction risk.
Led by researchers at the University of Oxford, this new study sought to answer this question by analysing the fossil record for marine invertebrates (such as sea urchins, snails, and shellfish) over the past 485 million years. Marine invertebrates have a rich and well-studied fossil record, making it possible to identify when, and potentially why, species become extinct.
Using over 290,000 fossil records covering more than 9,200 genera, the researchers collated a dataset of key traits that may affect resilience to extinction, including traits not studied in depth previously, such as preferred temperature. This trait information was integrated with climate simulation data to develop a model to understand which factors were most important in determining the risk of extinction during climate change.
Key findings:
The authors found that species exposed to greater climate change were more likely to become extinct. In particular, species that experienced temperature changes of 7°C or more across geological stages were significantly more vulnerable to extinction.
The authors also found that species occupying climatic extremes (for instance in polar regions) were disproportionately vulnerable to extinction, and animals that could only live in a narrow range of temperatures (especially ranges less than 15°C) were significantly more likely to become extinct.
However, geographic range size was the strongest predictor of extinction risk. Species with larger geographic ranges were significantly less likely to go extinct. Body size was also important, with smaller-bodied species more likely to become extinct.
All of the traits studied had a cumulative impact on extinction risk. For instance, species with both small geographic ranges and narrow thermal ranges were even more susceptible to extinction than species that had only one of these traits.
Cooper Malanoski (Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford), first author of the study, said: ‘Our study revealed that geographic range was the strongest predictor of extinction risk for marine invertebrates, but that the magnitude of climate change is also an important predictor of extinction, which has implications for biodiversity today in the face of climate change.’
With current human-driven climate change already pushing many species up to and beyond the brink of extinction, these results could help identify the animals that are most at risk, and inform strategies to protect them.
Lead author Professor Erin Saupe (Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oxford) said: ‘The evidence from the geological past suggests that global biodiversity faces a harrowing future, given projected climate change estimates. In particular, our model suggests that species with restricted thermal ranges of less than 15°C, living in the poles or tropics, are likely to be at the greatest risk of extinction. However, if the localized climate change is large enough, it could lead to significant extinction globally, potentially pushing us closer to a sixth mass extinction.’
According to the research team, future work should explore how climate change interacts with other potential drivers of extinction, such as ocean acidification and anoxia (where seawater becomes depleted of oxygen).
The study also involved researchers from the School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol. Professor Dan Lunt, from the University of Bristol, said: ‘This study shows that over the course of Earth’s history, the extinction risk of marine life has been inextricably linked to climate change. This should act as a stark warning to humanity as we recklessly continue to cause climate change ourselves through burning fossil fuels.’
