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Cuktech/Cuktech/TNS

Tech review: These tech gifts will please anyone

It is getting to be time for gift-giving for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day and graduations. Today I have a few gift ideas that I’ve been trying out for a few weeks and I think they’d make anyone happy.

Cuktech 15 Ultra Power Bank

Batteries have advanced in recent years and it is great to able to carry your own power when there might not ...Read more

MBARI. PRESS RELEASE/TNS

Underwater robots, great white sharks and glowing jellyfish: New $50 million high-tech ship arrives to unlock ocean mysteries

During his lifetime, David Packard was a Silicon Valley pioneer, starting one of the nation’s leading tech companies, Hewlett Packard, in his Palo Alto, California, garage with his friend Bill Hewlett and $538, and then using the fortune he earned to explore and preserve the world’s oceans.

Although Packard died in 1996, the latest of his ...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

Spotify down as outages reported worldwide

Audio streaming platform Spotify was down Wednesday with outages reported around the world.

Thousands reported being unable to access the service around 8 a.m. EST, according to Down Detector.

Users of the app reported an unending loading screen while the website featured a 502 error message.

About an hour after the first reports were made, ...Read more

Tyger Williams/The Philadelphia Inquirer/TNS

How Comcast's fast internet gets from data centers to your home, with the help of new tech and AI

How fast is your internet?

For Comcast customers in Philadelphia, the ceiling for speed just got higher.

And it's made possible by what goes on inside a dull-looking Northeast Philadelphia office building where state-of-the-art technology is powering the network 24/7.

In recent months, the majority of Comcast's residential and business ...Read more

Handout/Don Lindich/TNS

Sound Advice: A small air fryer, audio system upgrades and portable CD players

Small air fryer gets it done for under $50: My cooking website is launching very soon, and I recently retired my old air fryer so I searched for a new one with the goal of finding a small model that performs well. I came across this gem that is perfect for those who cook for one or two people, or when storage and counter space is at a premium.

...Read more

Miami researchers are testing a textured seawall designed to hold back water and create a home for marine organisms

Morningside Park, a beloved neighborhood park in Miami with sweeping views of Biscayne Bay, will soon pilot an innovative approach to coastal resilience.

BIOCAP tiles, a 3D-printed modular system designed to support marine life and reduce wave impact along urban seawalls, will be installed on the existing seawall there in spring 2025....Read more

Wide variety of old-growth ecosystems across the US makes their conservation a complex challenge

In an old-growth longleaf pine savanna, the absurdly long pine needles sing in the wind. Once considered forests, these landscapes in the southeastern U.S. coastal plain are open-canopied and sunny, more grassland than forest, with underbrush kept clear by frequent fires.

Longleaf pines – their needles can be up to 18 inches long �...Read more

Jim Rossman/Jim Rossman/TNS

Jim Rossman: Best charging habits for your phone’s battery health? Don’t overthink it

This week a reader asks two specific questions about charging batteries.

1. Are faster chargers harder on batteries than slower chargers (for example, is a 20-watt charger harder on a battery than a 12-watt charger)?

2. Are more partial charging sessions (for example, to only 50%) harder on a battery than fewer charging sessions to 80%? Is ...Read more

Gunnar/Gunnar/TNS

Review: Gunnar's Call of Duty Ghost Edition sunglasses has style and some function

Gunnar has been making gaming glasses for years based on studies that reportedly show that blue-light blocking glasses help with eye fatigue. With that selling point, the company has carved a niche for itself in the space though further studies challenged those conclusions.

Since then, Gunnar has been changing its position, focusing on ...Read more

Handout/Rocksteady Audio/TNS

Gadgets: This sound system has it all

I'm unsure which feature of Rocksteady Audio's Rocksteady Stadium 2.0 speaker system is the best: the sound, portability or how easily it can be expanded. After using the sound system, you'll see that it encompasses everything.

The extra features might be great, but the sound is most important, and boy, the Rocksteady Stadium speaker system ...Read more

10 CHAMBERS/TNS

Preview: ‘Den of Wolves’ has a bit of ‘Inception’ in the middle of a heist

Let’s make this clear. “Den of Wolves” is no April Fools’ joke. 10 Chambers’ second project is a game that, according to them, needed to be made after the success of “GTFO.” The techno-thriller concept had lingered in the minds of co-founder Ulf Andersson and his team, and it was a vision that had to come to life on screen.

The ...Read more

KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images North America/TNS

The California grizzly bear, gone for 100 years, could thrive if brought back

LOS ANGELES — Grizzly bears are extinct in California but still show up everywhere you look.

The golden bruins emblazon the state flag and seal, live on in cartoonish effigy as university mascots, and roll off the tip of our tongue in place names like Grizzly Flats and Big Bear Lake.

But what if the real ursine deal could be brought back?

A...Read more

NOAA Fisheries Service/NOAA Fisheries Service/TNS

Dolphins starve when seagrass dies off in Florida, study finds

ORLANDO, Fla. — Manatees are not the only marine mammals that suffer when seagrass dies off in Florida.

A new study found that dolphins in the Indian River Lagoon starved when seagrass meadows declined as well.

Researchers from the University of South Florida and the University of Central Florida analyzed tooth and tissue samples from ...Read more

Dreamstime/Dreamstime/TNS

Adult pelicans are falling victim to toxic algae bloom. Now their babies are starving, too

Brown pelicans across Southern California are filling up wildlife rehabilitation centers, either sick or starving — a dual crisis that wildlife experts believe could be linked to a massive toxic algae bloom.

For the last month, hundreds of seabirds have been poisoned by domoic acid, a neurotoxin produced in harmful algal blooms that are ...Read more

U.S. Geological Survey/TNS

Little-known quake fault has been quiet, but it could unleash devastation across Southern California

LOS ANGELES — Below California's famed beaches, mountains and metropolitan areas lies a sinister web of earthquake faults — some so infamous that their names are burned into the state's collective consciousness.

There is, of course, the mighty San Andreas, whose massive slip caused the great 1906 San Francisco earthquake and whose notoriety...Read more

Karl Merton Ferron/Baltimore Sun/TNS

Maryland commits $1.7M for environmental projects on Back River, Patapsco watersheds

The state of Maryland is allocating $1.7 million for a series of community-led environmental projects for the Back River and Patapsco River watersheds, which encompass Baltimore City and portions of Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Carroll, and Howard counties.

The funding was announced at a news conference Tuesday at Cox’s Point Park in Essex on ...Read more

Blue Origin/Blue Origin/TNS

Gayle King, Lauren Sanchez hit back at Blue Origin flight backlash

Gayle King and Lauren Sanchez responded Tuesday to their critics following Blue Origin‘s first all-female trip to space on Monday.

The “CBS Mornings” anchor hit back at the recent backlash surrounding the the historic space flight, which also included Katy Perry, Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyen and Kerianne Flynn.

“Anybody that’s ...Read more

Volcanic ash is a silent killer, more so than lava: What Alaska needs to know with Mount Spurr likely to erupt

Volcanoes inspire awe with spectacular eruptions and incandescent rivers of lava, but often their deadliest hazard is what quietly falls from the sky.

When a large volcano erupts, as Mount Spurr appears close to doing about 80 miles from Anchorage, Alaska, it can release enormous volumes of ash. Fine ash can infiltrate the lungs of ...Read more

25 years of Everglades restoration has improved drinking water for millions in Florida, but a new risk is rising

Do you know where your drinking water comes from?

In South Florida, drinking water comes from the Everglades, a vast landscape of wetlands that has long filtered the water relied on by millions of people.

But as the Everglades has shrunk over the past century, the region’s water supply and water quality have become ...Read more

Prehistoric teeth reveal how massive rhino herd died in Nebraska, study says

Twelve million years ago, a massive herd of rhinos gathered at a watering hole in what is now northeastern Nebraska. But when a distant volcanic eruption at Yellowstone blanketed their food sources with ash, the species didn’t leave as expected, a new study finds.

Instead, the aftermath of the eruption killed more than 100 rhinos and ...Read more