Politico, a Voice of the Crust.

The nation’s service academies next month will announce they will accept scores from the Classic Learning Test, a standardized exam that emphasizes classical literature such as Greek and Roman classics and Christian thinkers beginning in the 2027 admissions cycle, according to internal communications obtained by POLITICO and a person familiar with the matter granted anonymity to discuss the policy change.

Jerusalem Post.

While working on a new airport, a 4,000-year-old structure was discovered in Crete, and may have been the legendary labyrinth built for Minoan King Minos, LiveScience reported last week.

Atop a hill near the town of Kastelli – and approximately 51 kilometers southeast of Heraklion, Crete’s capital city – the ancient structure features a unique architectural design, commonly attributed to the Minoan civilization, and is believed to have been constructed around 2000-1700 B.C.

The structure, measuring 48 meters in diameter, features two main sections: a central circular building and an outer area formed by walls and created by a pattern similar to the spokes of a wheel. The building consists of eight stone rings intersected by small walls, creating a labyrinthine layout.

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Swiss bank UBS is considering moving to the United States in response to proposals from the Swiss government on new capital requirements, the New York Post reported at the weekend.

Senior UBS executives have met officials in U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration to prepare a strategy shift that could include the acquisition of a U.S. bank or a merger, the newspaper cited people close to the matter as saying.

When asked to comment on the report, UBS referred Reuters to comments made by CEO Sergio Ermotti in the last week.

Time to leave.

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Over 100,000 people gathered in London on Saturday for a free speech rally spearheaded by Tommy Robinson which featured an appearance by Elon Musk in a virtual interview broadcast on stage.

BBC, a Voice of the Crust.

Twenty-six officers have been injured while policing a protest organised by far-right activist Tommy Robinson, which saw up to 150,000 people march through central London.

Tensions flared at the Unite the Kingdom rally, with some protesters throwing bottles and other projectiles at police, the Metropolitan Police said – leaving four seriously hurt.
Tech billionaire Elon Musk spoke to protesters on Whitehall via videolink; while 5,000 people joined a nearby counter-protest organised by Stand Up To Racism.

The Met said 25 people had been arrested for a range of offences in what it described as “wholly unacceptable” violence.

A huge policing operation was put in place in central London with the Met deploying 1,000 officers and drafting in an extra 500 from other forces including Leicestershire, Nottinghamshire and Devon and Cornwall.

Assistant Commissioner Matt Twist said officers had “policed without fear or favour”, knowing it would be challenging.

The Times (UK).

British nuclear-armed submarines will be detectable in the future with the development of technology designed to make the oceans transparent, a top Canadian military chief has warned.

In an interview with The Times, Vice-Admiral Angus Topshee, commander of the Royal Canadian Navy, said the military needed to prepare for a scenario where the oceans are “effectively transparent and submarines are no longer allowed to hide”.

He said such a prospect threatened to “destabilise [the] nuclear deterrent” and that it was “sensible” to have the ability to fire or drop nuclear weapons from other platforms in addition to submarines.’

Are you scared yet? That appears to be his plan.

Finally, at the NINTH PARAGRAPH, we get some actual information:

European defence companies are already developing technology designed to track enemy submarines posing a threat to the West. Autonomous mini-hunter submarines that can lurk under the sea for months on end will be able to use artificial intelligence to detect and identify sounds that could betray the presence of a sub — part of the new Lura system, developed by Helsing, a European defence company. Experts believe this system will effectively “illuminate” the oceans and make the hunt for Russian submarines much easier.

Experts believe! That proves it!  Actually, sound has been the vulnerable point for submarines for decades, and everybody is working to make subs quieter and quieter. Those efforts will not cease.

And, of course, the Israelis were banned from participating because … well, reasons.

The Telegraph (UK).

The suspected gunman who shot Charlie Kirk was handed into police by his father, ending a two-day manhunt.

Donald Trump announced the arrest, and called for the death penalty for the 22-year-old accused of assassinating the president’s close friend and political ally.

“I think we have him,” Mr Trump said during an interview with Fox and Friends.

College drop-out Tyler Robinson, 22, was arrested on Thursday night and is expected to be charged with murder.

The Times (UK).

Thousands of supporters of Tommy Robinson have gathered in central London to attend a “free speech” march and rally organised by the far-right activist.

The protesters, many of whom waving Union flags and crosses of St George, are due to set off at 1pm from near Waterloo train station to the bottom end of Whitehall, where they will be addressed by Robinson and a string of other populist speakers.

Thousands of people are also expected to attend a counter-protest organised by the Stand Up To Racism group. They will march from Russell Square to the top end of Whitehall, via The Strand, under conditions laid out by the Metropolitan Police

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Angry protesters took to the streets of Paris, confronting police and adding to the escalating political pressure on President Emmanuel Macron’s government.

At least 50 people were taken into custody in the capital as part of the ongoing “Block Everything” campaign, aimed at halting transport links nationwide. Protesters attempted to obstruct roads and key rail hubs, including the Eurostar at Gare du Nord, on Wednesday morning.

It would appear that the French are getting fed up as well.

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A federal appeals court ordered Vermont to let a Christian school compete in state-sponsored sports events—even though the school doesn’t support the state’s view of “transgender” ideology.

That decision allows the school to finally participate in athletics again after suffering a yearslong ban for forfeiting a game that would have forced girls on its team to compete against a male playing on the opposing girls’ team.

In an opinion released Tuesday, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that state officials likely “displayed hostility toward the school’s religious beliefs” by banning it, and it instructed Vermont to let the school compete while the case continues.

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Authorities say they have tracked the suspected gunman’s movements before, during, and after the campus shooting that killed conservative activist Charlie Kirk and have recovered what they believe to be the weapon used.

Officials said the suspect arrived near the Utah Valley University campus at 11:52 a.m., moved through stairwells to a rooftop, fired from a shooting position, then fled across the roof, jumped from the building, and escaped into a nearby neighborhood. Investigators canvassed the area, speaking to witnesses and viewing doorbell cameras.

“We do have good video footage of this individual. We are not going to release that at this time,” an official said, noting forensic technologies are being used to identify the suspect.

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The EPA has eliminated some Clean Air Act construction regulations that the department considered obstacles to “innovation and growth.”

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin described the changes in a release made available to Newsmax: “We are continuing to fix this broken system,” he said.

Zeldin added, “Today’s guidance is another step to allow the buildout of essential power generation, data centers, and manufacturing projects that will bring about America’s Golden Age.”

And that’s just how easy it is. Trump just keeps on winning.

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A Michigan judge on Tuesday dismissed all charges against Republicans who claimed to be presidential electors for President Donald Trump in 2020, ruling prosecutors failed to show they intended to defraud anyone.

ALSO: Michigan judge tosses case against 15 accused fake electors for President Donald Trump in 2020 (Isabella Volmert/Associated Press)

ALSO: Judge who released Charlotte light rail killer has history of addiction activism (Kaelan Deese/Washington Examiner)

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Life needs proteins for almost everything, from cell repair to immune defense. Scientists have long asked how the first proteins were formed before cells had complex machinery.

A new study reports a simple, water-friendly reaction that links early ingredients into the first steps toward protein-making.

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How about No Visas For You Until You Take Your Dregs Back?

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The French government–facing a crucial confidence vote on September 8th–has drafted two decrees to restrict access to a wide range of healthcare services through the State Medical Assistance (AME) to illegal immigrants.

Prime Minister François Bayrou described the move as “a common-sense measure” in an interview with BFMTV, stressing that in a time when efforts are being asked of the French, it is only fair that those living in France illegally also contribute.

The restrictions are part of broader fiscal adjustments aimed at addressing France’s strained finances, including the 2026 budget, which seeks savings of around €44 billion.

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It has been 157 years since the last ship taking convicts from the United Kingdom landed in Australia.

Now, in a crushing historical irony, Australia is contracting with the small Pacific island of Nauru to resettle foreign-born criminals who the courts have ruled cannot be imprisoned indefinitely. The court rulings show how our allies are facing the same dilemma in dealing with people who enter the country illegally and then oppose efforts to deport them for years in litigation.

They used to transport them to America, but the 1776 kerfuffle squelched that trick.

I hear that Uganda is in the market for prisoners….

Watch it.

These people make a very plausible case, using both historical and physical evidence.

The invention of the wheel was a significant step in the advancement of human society, to the point that ‘reinventing the wheel’ has become a common phrase. Neolithic societies, although they had tools and fire, the previous steps in technological advancement, sometimes didn’t make it to the wheel–the first nations of North America, for example, for all the sophistication of the MesoAmerican civilizations, lacked this key feature. (If they had, I suspect that Cortez would have encountered an unpleasant surprise in 1519.)

The War Zone.

As the U.S. deploys an armada of ships and aircraft to the southern Caribbean, at least partly aimed at Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, the U.S. Navy and Marines are conducting an amphibious landing training exercise in southern Puerto Rico. While the U.S. Marine Corps does not make any mention of Maduro or Venezuela in its media release about the exercise, the move comes as tensions are mounting between Washington and Caracas over the flow of illegal narcotics. The Trump administration considers Maduro a “narco-terrorist” and has raised the award for his arrest to $50 million. You can catch up with our most recent reporting on the Caribbean deployments here.

Meanwhile, the U.S. carried out a lethal strike in the southern Caribbean against a drug vessel that departed from Venezuela and was operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on X this afternoon, following comments made by U.S. President Donald Trump. Striking this vessel points to a new kinetic angle to this effort, a major escalation.

The War Zone.

The U.S. military has conducted a “lethal strike” in the southern Caribbean against a drug vessel that departed from Venezuela and was operated by a designated narco-terrorist organization, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on X. His comments came moments after U.S. President Donald Trump told reporters that “over the last few minutes [the military] literally shot out a boat, a drug-carrying boat, a lot of drugs in that boat.” The incident took place as Trump has dispatched at least eight warships to the region to fight drug trafficking.

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Say not that the struggle nought availeth.

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Last Tuesday, defense contractor Epirus quietly tested its latest electromagnetic weapon, Leonidas, against a swarm of 49 quadcopters, neutralizing them in seconds at Camp Atterbury, Indiana, according to Axios, the only news outlet invited to the groundbreaking test. Numerous U.S. military services and foreign allies, including Indo-Pacific partners, witnessed the event. In an interview with Axios, Epirus CEO Andy Lowery hailed the “forcefield system” as a “singularity event.”

The great weakness of drones is their command and control systems; disrupt that, and they are useless.

Of course, eventually we will get drones that are fully autonomous, controlled by some sort of on-board AI, and then it will get very interesting. As usual, science fiction stories have been all over this for decades.

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Researchers have given people a taste of superhuman vision after creating contact lenses that allow them to see infrared light, a band of the electromagnetic spectrum that is invisible to the naked eye.

Unlike night vision goggles, the contact lenses need no power source, and because they are transparent, wearers can see infrared and all the normal visible colours of light at the same time.

Prof Tian Xue, a neuroscientist at the University of Science and Technology of China, said the work paved the way for a range of contact lenses, glasses and other wearable devices that give people “super-vision”. The technology could also help people with colour blindness, he added.

The lenses are the latest breakthrough driven by the team’s desire to extend human vision beyond its natural, narrow range. The wavelengths of light that humans can see make up less than one hundredth of a per cent of the electromagnetic spectrum.

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Israel is not interested in adhering to the Middle East’s established borders set by the WWI Sykes-Picot agreement and has the “capacity or the desire” to take over Lebanon and Syria, according to US special envoy Tom Barrack.

Barrack made the assessment in an astonishing and candid interview with online personality Mario Nawfal, which went online late on Thursday. It was just one of many insights that Barrack, who is at the center of US diplomacy in the region, shared. In addition, he said that Syrian President Ahmad al-Sharaa will not sign the Abraham Accords with Israel and alluded to deeply strained ties between Egypt and Israel, which he said are no longer “talking to each other or cooperating”.

Israel realizes that this is a unique moment in history in which they can actually accomplish the things that they have long wanted to do but were undermined by pusillanimous U.S. administrations and Deep State foreign affairs bureaucrats. Trump has turned on the No More Mister Nice Guy sign and the Israelis are striking while the iron is hot.

Federal News Network, a Voice of the Deep State.

A handful more agencies are now under orders from the White House to terminate their collective bargaining agreements with federal unions.

In an executive order signed Thursday afternoon, President Donald Trump added more agencies and a few agency components to an already extensive list of federal entities slated for collective bargaining cancellations. Trump said the terminations of labor contracts are intended “to enhance the national security of the United States.”

Trump’s initial executive order from March 27 invoked a narrow, rarely used portion of the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act that allows a president to suspend collective bargaining for national security purposes. The White House said the additional agencies it’s now directing to cancel collective bargaining agreements all have missions dealing with national security as well.

The agencies that Trump’s existing anti-union orders now cover are NASA; the U.S. Agency for Global Media; the National Weather Service and the National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service — both within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; the Bureau of Reclamation’s hydropower program; and the Patent and Trademark Office’s commissioner of patents office.

Savor the squeals of the pigs getting kicked away from the trough.

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President Donald Trump has notified Congress of his intent to use a rarely invoked power to cancel nearly $5 billion in congressionally approved foreign aid.

…

Initiatives the Trump administration has deemed wasteful include $24.6 million for “climate resilience” in Honduras and $3.9 million to promote democracy among LGBT people in the Western Balkans, the Post reported. There’s also $2.7 million for a South African organization that published inflammatory racial articles including “The Problem with White People.”

Congress loves spending Other People’s Money. Trump has no objection to spending Other People’s Money, either, so long as it is in accord with his program rather than someone else’s. And he is a master at gaming any system, as one has to be, doing real estate in a corrupt Blue State.

ALSO: Noem Canceling FEMA Contracts After DOGE Finds Billions in Waste  Looks like a trend.

ALSO: White House declares $4.9B in foreign aid unilaterally canceled in end-run around Congress’ funding power (Politico)

LiveScience.

Chinese astronauts have just created rocket fuel and oxygen in space using a new type of “artificial photosynthesis.” The breakthrough technology, which used fairly basic equipment and minimal energy, could one day be put to use on China’s proposed moon base, which is scheduled to be completed within a decade.

The new experiments were carried out by members of the Shenzhou-19 crew living on board China’s Tiangong space station (meaning “heavenly palace” in Chinese), which has been fully operational in low-Earth orbit since November 2022

The artificial photosynthesis technology, which has been in development since 2015, converts carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and rocket fuel ingredients using a simple “drawer-like” apparatus and a “semiconductor catalyst,” according to Interesting Engineering. This is a similar reaction to photosynthesis in plants, which produces glucose instead of rocket fuel.

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Artificial intelligence-powered harvesters, drones, and precision farming systems are quickly entering the mainstream of American agriculture. At its core, the technology promises efficiency and sustainability and carries a potential solution to a decades-old farming problem: the need for physical labor.

As the capabilities of robotics evolve, many jobs that once required human hands are being delegated to machines. Some artificial intelligence (AI) developers working on integrating this technology into America’s farms say early data support the possibility of a major farm labor force reduction.

The American Farm Bureau Federation estimated 17 percent of all U.S. agricultural labor in fiscal year 2024 comprised temporary migrant workers brought in under the H-2A visa program.

There are also millions of illegal immigrant workers, who, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) made up 42 percent of farm workers from 2020 to 2022.

Roman Rylko, chief technology officer of Pynest, said his company has worked with vegetable growers in the Midwest to deploy AI systems.

“We built the onboard model that lets an autonomous weeder separate spinach seedlings from pigweed in real time. A single rig now clears a 50-acre block in about eight hours. Before, that job meant a crew of 10 walking the rows for two days,” he told The Epoch Times.

Historically, agricultural labor required a lot of intelligence, judgment, and dexterity that only a human being could supply. (Agricultural laborers are smarter than the Crust would have you believe.) This made automation difficult and gave rise to modern ‘factory farms’ where farms were laid out to suit the available machines rather than how they would have been laid out when manual labor was paramount. Increasingly, however, machines are becoming smaller, cheaper, and more capable, and someday we may have the world envisioned in Asimov’s CAVES OF STEEL in which small robots take care of agriculture as well as a human but more efficiently.

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Northwestern University biomedical engineers have developed a completely new approach to cancer therapy that doubled the effectiveness of chemotherapy in animal studies.

Rather than focusing on directly killing cancer cells, this pioneering method stops the cells from adapting in ways that allow them to resist treatment. By blocking this evolutionary escape route, the disease becomes more vulnerable to drugs already in use. The strategy not only nearly eliminated cancer in cell cultures but also greatly enhanced the impact of chemotherapy in mouse models of human ovarian cancer.

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President Donald Trump on Monday moved to relieve Lisa Cook from her position as governor on the Federal Reserve Board.

Trump informed Cook of his decision in a letter dated Monday.

“You are hereby removed from your position on the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, effective immediately,” he wrote.

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President Donald Trump reportedly plans to sign an executive order Monday aimed at eliminating “cashless bail” for arrested suspects in Washington, D.C.

Reuters could not immediately verify the Axios report.

The order marks the latest step in Trump’s federal takeover of the capital’s law enforcement, which has already deployed thousands of federal agents and National Guard troops across the city.

Dumping criminals back on the streets without the necessity to post bail is a cornerstone of the Woke crime regime that puts the ‘rights’ of criminals ahead of those of victims (and potential victims).

UPDATE: Scoop: Trump plans order to end “cashless bail” in D.C. (Axios)  ‘Sccop’ is apparently what Axios calls using a shovel after the horse has already passed by.

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It’s hard to argue with the recent numbers. Washington DC has long been a national embarrassment for the American public, consistently ranking high on the list of the most crime ridden cities in the US. The city consistently ranks in the top 20 for overall crime, 13th out of 200 US cities with the highest property crime and it was ranked 4th in the US for homicide last year.

While Democrats claim that the mayhem has been in decline since 2023, they don’t mention the fact that there was a dramatic spike in assaults, robberies, rapes and murders that year. Meaning, even with the drop, in 2025 DC still ranks among the worst cities in the US. There are also suspicions of data rigging by DC officials.

…

Recent reports show that Washington crime has plunged in the past two weeks. Property crime dropped 19%, violent crime dipped 17%-22% (depending on the source), robberies/muggings have dropped 40%-46% and carjackings have dropped 83%. The average murder rate in DC is one killing every 36hrs – There has not been a single murder since August 13th.

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Inside a cinder-block office building perhaps best known for the Hindu temple and table tennis club next door, a startup company is testing what may be one of the hottest new developments in clean-energy technology. Literally.

At the back of a small warehouse laboratory buzzing with fans and motors, an MIT spinoff company, Electrified Thermal Solutions, is operating something they call the Joule Hive, a thermal battery the size of an elevator.

The Hive is a large, insulated metal box loaded with dozens of white-hot ceramic bricks that convert electricity to heat at temperatures up to 1,800 degrees Celsius — well beyond the melting point of steel.

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Hedge fund manager Bill Ackman is throwing his support behind Alpha School, a private education network that blends artificial intelligence with an unconventional approach to learning, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The school, which already operates in Texas, Florida, and California, plans to open a kindergarten-through-eighth-grade campus in Manhattan this fall.

Alpha’s model is unusual: students complete math, reading, and other fundamentals in just two hours a day using AI-driven software. The rest of the schedule is filled with activities meant to build confidence and practical skills, such as bike rides or drone workshops.

“We do not let anything—political, social issues—come in the way,” said co-founder MacKenzie Price. “We stay very much out of that.”

Price, who has become a prominent critic of traditional education on social media, launched Alpha more than a decade ago. The school employs “guides” rather than certified teachers and charges families between $40,000 and $65,000 annually, depending on location.

A step in the right direction, but of limited utility at $40k-$65k annually.

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The surgery is expected to soon take place in Israel, in which a personalized engineered human spinal cord will be implanted in a paralyzed patient, with the goal of enabling the patient to rise from a wheelchair and walk again. Behind this medical advance stands Prof. Tal Dvir, Head of the Sagol Center for Regenerative Biotechnology, Head of the Nanotechnology Center at Tel Aviv University, and Chief Scientist of the biotech company Matricelf.

A few months ago, Prof. Dvir and his research team at Matricelf received preliminary approval from Israel’s Ministry of Health to begin “compassionate use” trials in eight patients, which means that the first patient in the world to undergo this innovative procedure would be Israeli. Prof. Dvir commented: “This is undoubtedly a matter of national pride. The technology was developed here in Israel, at Tel Aviv University and at Matricelf, and from the very beginning it was clear to us that the first-ever surgery would be performed in Israel, with an Israeli patient.”

The upcoming spinal cord implant surgery marks the next stage in a process that began about three years ago, when Prof. Dvir’s lab at Tel Aviv University succeeded in engineering a personalized three-dimensional human spinal cord in the laboratory. The groundbreaking findings were published in the prestigious journal Advanced Science and demonstrated that mice suffering from chronic paralysis and treated with the engineered implants started walking once again.

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The breakthrough happened entirely by chance when Hill and his collaborator, Dr. Brian Wong, a professor of otolaryngology-head and neck surgery at the University of California–Irvine, were frustrated with their attempts to reshape cartilage using lasers.

Hill said that they decided to try heating the material using an electric current, but accidentally used a far smaller current than they intended. They expected to see the cartilage bubbling and shaking. However, when Wong touched the cartilage, it wasn’t hot—suggesting another effect was at play.

While Wong is a medical professional, Hill is a physical chemist, and it was their partnership that allowed them to connect the dots.

Low electrical currents change the pH of cartilage, loosening molecular bonds and making tissues more malleable.

“And it’s like, this is electrochemistry,” Wong said. “That’s hydrogen and oxygen being evolved, so the discovery was entirely by accident on cartilage—100 percent by accident.”

ALSO : The Shockingly Simple Vision Breakthrough That Might End LASIK (SciTechDaily)

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The D.C. Police Union released new crime statistics on Monday, showing an 8% drop in overall crime in the nation’s capital following President Donald Trump’s announcement of a federal takeover of the Washington, D.C., police force last week.

Read it.

Apple is developing an all-new operating system codenamed “Charismatic,” according to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman.

Gurman is a solid and respectable source of Apple news.

This is likely Apple’s long-rumored “homeOS” operating system.

In a report this week, Gurman said both Apple’s rumored smart home hub in 2026 and tabletop robot in 2027 will run the new operating system. He said the software platform will blend elements of tvOS and watchOS. For example, he expects there to be a hexagonal grid of apps, just like on the Apple Watch.

The platform largely revolves around clock faces and widgets, and it will have multi-user support, Gurman said. Users will primarily interact with it using Siri voice commands, but touch will also be an option, he said. Some of the preinstalled apps from Apple will apparently include Calendar, Camera, Music, Reminders, and Notes.

Scientific American, a Voice of the Crust.

From Cape Town to Tehran to Lima to Phoenix, dozens of cities across the globe have experienced water shortages recently. And in the next five years the world’s demand for fresh water could significantly outpace supply, according to a United Nations forecast. Now several companies are turning to an unexpected source for a solution: the bottom of the ocean.

Called subsea desalination, the idea is to remove the salt from water in the deep sea. If it worked at scale, the technology could greatly alleviate the world’s water access problems.

Costs and energy requirements have kept desalination from going mainstream in most of the world. Early desalination involved boiling seawater and condensing the steam, a purely thermal method that used loads of energy. This approach was later replaced by multistage flash distillation, in which temperature and pressure “flash” salt water to steam. In the past 25 years reverse osmosis has become more common—it uses high pressure to push seawater through a membrane with holes so small that only water molecules squeeze through, leaving salt behind.

Reverse osmosis is more efficient than distillation, but it takes a lot of energy to pressurize millions of gallons of seawater and move it through filters. What if we could let that movement happen naturally by harnessing the pressure hundreds of meters underwater?

Some good news for a change.

The Washington Post, paper of record of the Deep State.

Rainbow colors adorn the downtown Orlando intersection that leads to the site where dozens died during a mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in 2016. The crosswalk was decorated to show the city’s solidarity with the LGBTQ community and to memorialize the 49 people killed inside the popular gay club.

One would think that being abnormal indicates some sort of moral superiority.

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The United States Navy is testing industrial-scale 3D printing systems it says could reshape the way it supplies and repairs its ships, aircraft and other equipment, particularly in remote or contested environments where weeks-long waits for parts are not an option.

The demonstrations took place during Trident Warrior, an annual exercise in which the Navy trials advanced technologies under operational conditions. The event is designed to ensure only proven systems advance toward procurement, and it draws heavily on feedback from fleet personnel.

Working alongside the Marine Corps, the Navy showcased 3D printing capabilities that are already in use, some installed in shipping container-sized mobile labs that can be deployed aboard vessels or sent to forward bases. The printers can produce parts ranging from a small hinge to a load-bearing titanium component, and in some cases deliver them off-site via drones or unmanned surface vessels, TheDefensePost.com reports.

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We’ve expanded our coverage of humanoid robots and robot dogs for very good reason: “iPhone moment” for these AI-powered machines is just a few years away. These bots are expected to enter homes by the end of the decade, if not the early 2030s. We even got our hands on a Chinese Unitree robodog to test its capabilities, and yes, there’s even a Picatinny rail for a flamethrower attachment.

Robot companies, such as Figure AI, have been training humanoid robots for factory applications, as well as the home…

“Today we unveiled the first humanoid robot that can fold laundry autonomously,” Figure AI wrote on X earlier today.

I’d buy one–if it actually works. Towels are easy. How does it do with underwear, T-shirts, and dress shirts? Or pants?

Read it.

Mexico has expelled 26 high-ranking cartel figures to the United States in the latest major deal with the Trump administration as American authorities ratchet up pressure on criminal networks sending drugs across the border, a person familiar with the matter told The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The cartel leaders and other prominent figures were being flown from Mexico to the U.S. on Tuesday, the person said. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the operation that was still ongoing.

Those being handed over to U.S. custody include Abigael González Valencia, a leader of “Los Cuinis,” a group closely aligned with notorious cartel Jalisco New Generation or CJNG. Another person, Roberto Salazar, is accused of participating in the 2008 killing of a Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy, the person said.

Trump just keeps on winning. Reminder: He’s only been in office seven months.

The War Zone.

Speculation over a very large-scale German order for anti-aircraft guns, as part of a broader air defense initiative focusing, to a significant degree, on counter-drone capabilities, has brought these kinds of weapons back under the spotlight.

Last week, it was reported that German arms manufacturer Rheinmetall is awaiting a multi-billion-dollar order from the German Armed Forces for its Skyranger anti-aircraft gun. During a recent earnings call, the firm’s CEO, Armin Papperger said that he expected Skyranger contracts from the German military worth between $7-9 billion to be signed this year. The systems would be delivered by 2035.

…,

Previously, the German Army relied on the Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft gun to fulfill many of its short-range air defense (SHORAD) needs, especially on the battlefield. Armed with twin radar-aimed 35mm automatic cannons, mounted on a single turret, the Gepard was based on the chassis of the Leopard 1 main battle tank, meaning it could keep up with armored formations on the move. Search and tracking radars on the Gepard allowed it to locate, track, and engage targets at night and amid poor weather conditions.

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Long-standing rivals Armenia and Azerbaijan separately published the document that could form the basis for peace between the two countries. The initiative, announced on Monday, August 11th, follows meetings between the respective national leaders, including a trilateral meeting with U.S. president Donald Trump, credited with brokering the peace deal, on August 8th.

Formally agreed to back in March, Articles 1 to 17 of the agreement aim to resolve any remaining border disputes peacefully, resorting to peaceful third-party dispute resolution where this can’t be reached by the two states. Following the meeting with Trump, it appears that an agreement has been reached on a proposed transit connection of Azerbaijan to its Nakhchivan exclave through Armenian territory.

Critics of the new treaty note that it lacks specific details regarding how the process will be implemented, which would likely involve the withdrawal of mutual complaints in international courts and competing territorial claims.

Another reason to give Trump the Nobel Peace Prize–which, of course, will never happen in a world where Obama got it just for being the Magic Negro.

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China has developed a breakthrough material, CHSN01 (China high-strength low-temperature steel No 1), capable of withstanding extreme cold and massive magnetic forces, and deployed it this year in the world’s first fusion nuclear power generation reactor, according to SCMP.

The steel puts China at the forefront of materials science and could have applications beyond fusion.

The ultra-strong cryogenic steel meets the demands of superconducting magnets operating near absolute zero and in magnetic fields of up to 20 Tesla. It can endure stresses of 1,300MPa and has superior fatigue resistance to traditional alloys. “In addition to its applications in superconductivity, this steel can also be used in other related areas,” said Zhao Zhongxian, a top Chinese physicist.

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Did you know that 99% of synthetic diamonds are currently produced using high-pressure and high-temperature (HPHT) methods? A prevailing paradigm is that diamonds can only be grown using liquid metal catalysts in the gigapascal pressure range (typically 5-6 GPa, where 1 GPa is about 10,000 atm), and typically within the temperature range of 1300-1600 °C. However, the diamonds produced using HPHT are always limited to sizes of approximately one cubic centimeter due to the components involved. That is—achieving such high pressures can only be done at a relatively small length scale. Discovering alternative methods to make diamonds in liquid metal under milder conditions (particularly at lower pressure) is an intriguing basic science challenge that if achieved could revolutionize diamond manufacturing. Could the prevailing paradigm be challenged?

A team of researchers led by Director Rod RUOFF at the Center for Multidimensional Carbon Materials (CMCM) within the Institute for Basic Science (IBS), including graduate students at the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST), have grown diamonds under conditions of 1 atmosphere pressure and at 1025 °C using a liquid metal alloy composed of gallium, iron, nickel, and silicon, thus breaking the existing paradigm. The discovery of this new growth method opens many possibilities for further basic science studies and for scaling up the growth of diamonds in new ways.

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In the latest step towards the future of food, one company has launched what it calls the world’s first factory that can grow food out of thin air.
Key food industry players and innovative start-ups are racing to develop more sustainable methods to produce food for an ever-growing global population.
Some companies are leaning into traditional plant-based proteins like pulses, beans, and legumes. Others are creating ‘real’ cultivated meat, in a process that typically takes animal cells and cultivates – or grows – them in a laboratory setting, not dissimilar to the way that beer is fermented.
Now, Finland-based Solar Foods has announced its unique approach to making a more sustainable food system: growing protein out of air.
The company has just opened the world’s first air protein factory, based near the Finnish capital of Helsinki. At the facility, Solar Foods will operate a commercial-scale production of Solein, its signature air protein, which combines a tiny but mighty micro-organism with CO2 – known simply as air – to grow it into a nutritious yellow powder. The bioprocess is said to resemble winemaking.

If you eat something, even a substantial snack, you will feel the urge to poop within 30 minutes–sometimes within ten.

Listen to your body. Take your first opportunity to poop.

You’ll be glad you did.

Just sayin’.