Pain Level 1 Sweat Bees: “Light and ephemeral, almost fruity. A tiny spark has singed a single hair on your arm.” Little Wasp: “Sharp meets spice. A slender cactus spine brushed a buffalo wing before it poked your arm.” Indian Jumping Ant: “Ah, that wonderful wake-up feeling, like coffee but oh so bitter.” Pain Level 2 Western Honey Bee: “A flaming match head lands on your arm and is quenched first with lye and then sulfuric acid....

The toasty weather had nothing to do with the event that killed the dinos. The driver for the climatic shift came not from above, but from below—in Earth’s oceans. Paleontologists and geologists suspect that some amount of natural warming that took place during the Paleocene, or the period following the die-off, caused great deposits of crystallized methane to transform into gas. Seabeds belched the excess out into the water and the air, which was bad news for the planet: Methane is a greenhouse gas far more potent than carbon dioxide....

Honda and GM, along with LG Chemical, have already developed a partnership on electric vehicles, working together to develop the next generation of battery technology, dubbed Ultium. This new project is an extension of that partnership. “GM and Honda will share our best technology, design and manufacturing strategies to deliver affordable and desirable EVs on a global scale, including our key markets in North America, South America and China,” General Motors CEO Mary Barra said in a statement....

The Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California has proposed a solution: a gamified machine-learning platform that can help process videos and images. It’s called Ocean Vision AI, and it works by combining human-made annotations with artificial intelligence. Think of it like the ebird or iNaturalist app, but modified for marine life. The project is a multidisciplinary collaboration between data scientists, oceanographers, game developers, and human-computer interaction experts. On Tuesday, the National Science Foundation showed support for the two-year-project by awarding it $5 million in funding....

No matter what phone you use, and whichever apps are your favorites, you probably already have access to closed captioning—whether that’s thanks to content creators or AI. It’s just a matter of knowing how to activate them. With more users requiring subtitles, the technology behind them is constantly getting better. Google Duo, for example, put text on recorded video messages via the same artificial intelligence that powers the Google Assistant and the voice typing feature for Google Docs....

When you sit down at the computer, you probably don’t want to spend your time backing up your files and data. It may not be as entertaining as Netflix or Facebook, but it just might be the most important job you can do on your desktop or laptop. Having a comprehensive backup scheme in place doesn’t only protect you against the trauma of accidentally deleting your files. It also gives you a safety net if a virus hits your PC, hackers hold your information hostage, or your kids tip a glass of water over your MacBook....

There are advantages to building one from scratch, too: Not only will you get to personalize the project to match your style and decor, but you can save money. While the price for a low-quality, assembly-required shoe rack can exceed $100, I was able to put this rustic hardwood table together for about $60. If you already have some of these supplies on hand, you may be able to build yours for even less....

And if you’re a little intimidated about joining a global project, don’t be: you don’t have to be an expert on anything to edit Wikipedia articles—though it’s great to share your knowledge if you are. There’s lots of valuable work to do even if you’re not crafting entirely new entries or diving into huge amounts of detail about complex topics. The barrier to entry is truly that low, but it’s worth going over some tips and tricks for putting your words on Wikipedia’s pages, from knowing how the site tracks changes to understanding how to edit Wikipedia references....

Choose the right subjects Some scenes look amazing with a super-wide-angle lens. Landscapes, for instance, look so much grander when you can fit more of them into the frame. The same goes for crowded interior scenes with lots of details. There are some situations, however, where the super-wide falters. If straight lines are important in the photo, the distortion around the edges of the picture may ruin the effect unless you’re willing to spend time correcting it later in software....

To help you manage the load, some routers (like those manufactured by Google, Netgear, Eero, and many others) offer a feature called Quality of Service (QoS). In simple terms, it lets you prioritize certain devices and types of traffic, so that they’re first in line for a high-speed connection whenever bandwidth becomes limited. Your router manufacturer may give it a different name, but a quick dig into the manual or an online search should tell you whether or not your particular device offers QoS....

What you might not know is that third parties can track you using the address or URL of the website you’re visiting: it’s those bits of extra seemingly random numbers and characters attached to otherwise simple addresses ending in .com, for example. But as with other various types of trackers, there are ways of blocking URL-based ones and protecting your privacy online. As always with digital security, it’s important to know what you’re dealing with, and the steps you can take to guard against any snoopers....

When you’re already sitting at your desk, you don’t want to keep digging your phone out of your pocket to peck out SMS messages. By sending them from your computer, you won’t have your smartphone distract you too much, and you’ll have an easier time typing those texts from a larger keyboard. Several apps, for iPhones and Android devices, will let your computer send and receive messages that look like they came from your cell phone....

Cables and adapters for your second screen Most computers have the built-in ability to power a second screen. First, find the HDMI or DisplayPort socket on your laptop or desktop. If you own an older computer, you might be looking for a white DVI or a blue VGA socket instead. All four types of ports let you connect your computer to a television, projector, or other secondary screen. If your computer has one of these ports, all you’ll need is the proper cable....

Sign in with your Microsoft account Your Microsoft account is the key to getting all of your Windows 11 computers on the same page. Your device will ask you to sign in with it when you set up Windows 11 for the first time, and when you subsequently sign in on any other devices that are also using Microsoft’s latest operating system, they will know who you are. Microsoft knows this, and has given users a variety of options for picking what gets synced and what doesn’t, all the way down to your browsing history....

If you’ve recently upgraded to Android 12, you’ll find this among the system’s wallpaper options. If you’re an iPhone user, the process is not as intuitive, but it’s even simpler. Keep in mind that not all videos on the platform can become live wallpapers—their availability will depend on whether the creator allows other users to download them. Also, having a video playing in the background will drain your battery much faster than a photo, so remember that when you have to plug in your device before the end of the day....

Ultimately, Google’s decision to give users more Markdown capabilities will affect each person differently, and how you use it will depend on your typing preferences. Still, we think there’s likely something here that will change the way you work. For most people, Markdown is a little more complicated than using the built-in formatting features in programs like Microsoft Word and Google Docs, but it can be helpful when you’re building a website, drafting technical documents, and doing many other compositional tasks....

The results were remarkable. In months, haggard, hollow-eyed babies grew cheeky and plump; rickety infants cured themselves through diet alone. Rather than shying from new flavors, the babies tried nearly every dish, developing their own unique preferences along the way while managing to select a diverse and wholesome diet whose balance of calories from protein, fat, and carbohydrates mirrors nutritionists’ ideal ratios. It’s the kind of experiment that (hopefully) would never make it past any contemporary institutional review board....

It’s mid-August and my dad, a buddy, and I are tucked into our layout blinds as another flock of Canada geese swings in low toward our spread. When they line up perfectly, I holler, “Take’ em!” and we greedily get to shooting, dropping four birds out of the flock. We’ve already piled up about 15 geese by now, but the early-season limit here in North Dakota is a generous 15 birds per person....

It isn’t that I don’t think that playing games and driving aren’t compatible. Racing has been a core inspiration for video games for as long as they’ve been around. The sense of speed, precision controls, the thrill of the chase – these are compelling sensations derived from a marriage of car and computer, which you should indulge in should the mood strike you… At home. Sitting on your couch or at your computer....

Every January, fat’s in the crosshairs of health columnists, fitness magazines, and desperate Americans. This year, PopSci looks at the macronutrient beyond its most negative associations. What’s fat good for? How do we get it to go where we want it to? Where does it wander when it’s lost? This, my friends, is Fat Month. In the movie Mean Girls, Regina George—who, due to some shenanigans, is attempting to lose weight via a high-carbohydrate diet—famously asks her clique if butter is a carb....