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Explanation: A deep image of the Sombrero galaxy reveals surprises. M104 is named the Sombrero galaxy because, on shorter exposures, it looks like a hat. A key defining feature of this huge galaxy is a dark brim of dust that circles the disk galaxy's center. A much longer exposure, however, brings up a hairy past where a bright, hazy halo is revealed that extends well past the central disk and contains many unresolved stars. Surprisingly, in this stellar haze, structures can be seen that include a diagonal ring. These structures and tidal streams provide fresh evidence that M104 had a...

A Moscow drone slammed into Kyiv’s key Northern Bridge on Sunday, leading to a fiery explosion during a visit from Germany’s top official — as Russian President Vladimir Putin is reportedly preparing a mass military mobilization. Dramatic footage from the Ukrainian capital showed a Russian drone crashing into the busy span during morning traffic, with a large fireball erupting from the explosion. Cars could be seen rushing through the blast area to get to the other side as fire and black smoke overtook one side of the bridge. Miraculously, only two people were injured in the incident, Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy...

Boulder, Colorado, has spent decades wearing a nickname most towns would take as an insult: “The People's Republic of Boulder.” It’s a college town of roughly 100,000 people, where the politics climb about as high as … the elevation. But now Boulder wants to export its “Rocky Mountain High,” and it’s headed to the Supreme Court. At stake before SCOTUS is whether that town gets to set energy policy for the rest of America. That’s the real question in Suncor Energy Inc. v. County Commissioners of Boulder County, no matter how carefully supporters dress it up. In 2018, the City...

The fortified hilltop settlement of Spišský Štvrtok is one of the most significant sites of the earlier prehistory of central Europe. It dates to the transitional period between the Early and the Middle Bronze Age with a cultural affiliation to the Otomani-Füzesabony culture, c. 1700–1500 b.c. The village of Spišský Štvrtok (located in an area called Spišská Nová Ves, which is also a town) is situated on an oblong hill adjacent to a valley in the undulated country of eastern Slovakia at Myšia Hôrka in the Carpathian Basin. The hill rises very steeply on the western side and more gradually...

['Civ sez: I call this one the ADHD house sleuth video.] Man Finds Secret Passage In His 500 Year Old Home's Library | 5:01 Zenger | 19.7K subscribers | 2,164,200 views | October 28, 2021

Explanation: Yes, but can your rainbow do this? After the remnants of Hurricane Florence passed over the Jersey Shore, New Jersey, USA in 2018, the Sun came out in one direction but something quite unusual appeared in the opposite direction: a hall of rainbows. Over the course of the next half hour, to the delight of the photographer and his daughter, vibrant supernumerary rainbows faded in and out, with at least five captured in this featured single shot. Supernumerary rainbows only form when falling water droplets are all nearly the same size and typically less than a millimeter across. Then,...

Pubs are fertile ground for tall tales, with many claiming to be the oldest pub in England. What Is the Oldest Pub in England? | 7:58 | Historic England | 30.9K subscribers | 203,944 views | October 1, 2026

The ancient city of Phaselis, a short distance from Antalya, is picturesquely poised between the Mediterranean and the hills of Lycia. Phaselis: Between Mountains and Sea | 7:11 Scenic Routes to the Past | 62.5K subscribers | 21,635 views | September 18, 2026 Chapters 0:00 Introduction 1:07 Central Harbor 2:04 Main street and agoras 4:47 Theater 6:26 Gate of Hadrian

Explanation: On sol 1943 of its journey of exploration across the surface of Mars, the Curiosity Rover recorded this selfie at the south rim of Vera Rubin Ridge. Of course a sol is a Martian solar day, about 40 minutes longer than an Earth day. Curiosity's sol 1943 corresponds to Earth date January 23, 2018. Also composed as an interactive 360 degree VR, the mosaicked panorama combines 61 exposures taken by the small car-sized rover's Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI). Frames containing the imager's arm have been edited out while the extended background used was taken by the rover's Mastcam...

Chinese AI company Moonshot AI has launched an internal investigation after a researcher found that one of its models could be manipulated into providing instructions for developing biological weapons and carrying out assassinations, Fox News senior foreign policy correspondent Gillian Turner reported Thursday. Researcher Peter Garrigan told Fox News Moonshot AI's Kimi model could also be manipulated to provide information on planning terrorist attacks using real-time data, creating sarin gas, developing malware and taking down aircraft. "What we found is quite damaging and worrying," Garrigan said. The findings are raising broader concerns about advanced AI models concealing capabilities or behaving...

Explanation: What does it take to image hundreds of nebulas? Today’s image contains the entire Sharpless Catalog of H II Regions, totaling 313 objects. Zoom in and explore! You may spot fan favorites like the Eagle (Sh2-49), Heart (Sh2-190), and Orion (Sh2-281) Nebulas. Despite its name, this catalog contains more than the glow of ionized hydrogen that makes up H II regions. There are planetary nebulas (the Medusa Nebula, Sh2-274) and supernova remnants (the Spaghetti Nebula, Sh2-240) as well. Astrophotographer Bing Xin traversed the dark skies of Eastern China and Inner Mongolia to catch them all. Narrowband filters that primarily...

The laws already on the books cover a lot of harmful conduct involving AI, but they do not cover everything cleanly. As of October 2026, the U.S. still does not have one comprehensive federal AI law. Instead, AI is governed through a mixture of existing laws, agency authority, executive policy, and state laws.

AI security/control will probably develop into something akin to "anti-virus" software. The closest analogy is the entire cybersecurity industry: Antivirus began as one layer, but eventually we needed firewalls, identity management, intrusion detection, security operations centers, audits, penetration testing, and incident-response teams. What follows is the most likely path for AI.

AI is killing their A+. More than three fourths of teens use AI to do their schoolwork — but it’s causing test scores to plunge as they rely on the tech “to think,” according to a new survey. Meanwhile, Google is pushing to increase the use of its Gemini AI on school-issued Chromebook computers — which have become nearly universal in American classrooms. A total of 70% of teens ages 13 to 17 said they use AI for homework and assignments in class — with 63% admitting they take the shortcut simply “to get answers,” according to a survey by...

Explanation: Have you ever seen the full moon rise? This colorful image was photographed last weekend in Sicily, just outside the town of Nicosia, in Italy. It is a composite photograph that shows the Moon rising as the sky turns darker. Lower clouds are reflecting the colors of antitwilight, while ash and gas from Mount Etna are seen higher in the background. The pink band lower in the sky is called the Belt of Venus. During a full moon, the Moon and the Sun are in opposition in the sky: the moon rises as the sun sets. The lunar phase...

Hezbollah terrorists in Yemen received $157 million worth of weapons in 2024, most of it given freely by Iran, according to a new report from the Israeli nonprofit Center for Research of Terror Financing (CENTEF). The report, titled "Hezbollah Financial Statements," relied on open-source data as well as known valuations of Hezbollah's military assets, according to the Jerusalem Post. The report found that Hezbollah spent just $28 million on procuring weapons, and those were limited to small arms, ammunition, drone components, dual-use equipment and equipment obtained through its international procurement networks. Meanwhile, CENTEF said Iran provided roughly $129 million worth...

You know the mantra: Human caused climate change, driven by burning fossil fuels and adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, causes an increase in the frequency and severity of major storms, like hurricanes. When major hurricanes come along, as they regularly do, the promoters of this mantra immediately claim an ability to “attribute” the storm and/or its intensity to the ongoing human-caused warming. For example, last October we had Hurricane Melissa, a Category 5 storm that struck Jamaica and other Caribbean islands. As soon as Melissa had passed, an organization calling itself World Weather Attribution promptly came out with an...

...Barry Cunliffe here marshals this vast array of evidence -- both archaeological and textual -- in a masterful reconstruction of the lost world of the Scythians, allowing them to emerge in all their considerable vigour and splendour for the first time in over two millennia. Author Talk | The Scythians | Barry Cunliffe | 39:29 Oxford Academic (Oxford University Press) 173K subscribers | 131,877 views | March 25, 2020

A team scanning a boat-shaped hill in eastern Turkey has announced that new radar images show a large man-made structure underground, not just natural rock. On Wednesday, private research group Noah’s Ark Scans released a preliminary report about their work at the Durupınar Formation in Turkey, claiming that the 515-foot boat-shaped mound contained a 'man-made object.' The scans were conducted by Dr Khosrow Bakhtar, an engineer who spent decades building detection systems for US defense agencies, including the Air Force, Navy and NORAD. He used a system he invented called BakhtarRadar, originally developed to find buried tunnels and hidden structures,...

Explanation: Peculiar spiral galaxy Arp 78 is found within the boundaries of the head strong constellation Aries. Some 100 million light-years beyond the stars and nebulae of our Milky Way galaxy, the island universe is an enormous 200,000 light-years across. Also known as NGC 772, it sports a prominent, outer spiral arm in this detailed cosmic portrait. Tracking along sweeping dust lanes and lined with young blue star clusters, Arp 78's overdeveloped spiral arm is pumped-up by galactic-scale gravitational tides. Interactions with its brightest companion galaxy, the more compact NGC 770 seen directly below the larger spiral, are likely responsible....