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The modestly priced EV pickup goes 150 miles on a charge and is infinitely customizable. Deliveries start next year.

In an era of reusable rockets and near-daily access to space, NASA is still paying more than it did 30 years ago to launch missions into orbit, according to a study soon to be published in the scientific journal Acta Astronautica.

Launch is becoming more routine. Every few days, SpaceX is sending another batch of Starlink Internet satellites to orbit, and other kinds of missions fill up the rest of SpaceX's launch schedule. SpaceX, alone, has ample capacity to launch the handful of science missions NASA puts into space each year. If supply outpaces demand, shouldn't prices go down?

It's not so simple. NASA is one of many customers jockeying for a slot on SpaceX's launch manifest. The US military is launching more missions than ever before, and SpaceX is about to become the Pentagon's top launch provider. SpaceX already launches more missions for NASA than any other rocket company.

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A new autonomous vehicle framework would also make it easier for Tesla and other companies to research domestically made self-driving cars that don’t meet all federal safety standards.

The buried roots and stumps of an ancient forest in southern China are the charred remains of an ancient war and the burning of a capital city, according to a recent study from researchers who carbon-dated the stumps and measured charcoal and pollen in the layers of peat surrounding them.

It may not be obvious today, but there’s an ancient forest hidden beneath the farmland of southern China’s Pearl River Delta. Spread across 2,000 square kilometers are thick layers of waterlogged peat, now covered by agriculture. It’s all that is left of what used to be a thriving wetland ecosystem, home to forests of Chinese swamp cypress along with elephants, tigers, crocodiles, and tropical birds. But the peat hides the buried, preserved stumps and roots of cypress trees; some of the largest stumps are almost 2 meters wide, and many have burn marks on their tops.

“These peat layers are locally known as ‘buried ancient forest,’ because many buried trees appear fresh and most stumps are found still standing,” writes Ning Wang of the Chinese Academy of Scientists, who along with colleagues, authored the recent paper. It turns out that the eerie buried forest is the last echo of the Han army’s invasion during a war about 2,100 years ago.

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In this episode of Uncanny Valley, our hosts explain how to prepare for travel to and from the United States—and how to stay safe.

Comcast executives apparently realized something that customers have known and complained about for years: The Internet provider's prices aren't transparent enough and rise too frequently.

This might not have mattered much to cable executives as long as the total number of subscribers met their targets. But after reporting a net loss of 183,000 residential broadband customers in Q1 2025, Comcast President Mike Cavanagh said the company isn't "winning in the marketplace" during an earnings call today. The Q1 2025 customer loss was over three times larger than the net loss in Q1 2024.

While customers often have few viable options for broadband and the availability of alternatives varies widely by location, Comcast faces competition from fiber and fixed wireless ISPs.

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Donald Trump's executive order requiring artificial intelligence training in education as a national priority has been met with enthusiasm and confusion.

On the one hand, his plans to promote early AI training in K–12 schools appear to be "critical," as Trump says, to "maintain America’s global dominance in this technological revolution for future generations." To that end, the order established an AI Presidential Challenge to highlight significant student and educator achievements and encourage innovative thinking.

"It is the policy of the United States to promote AI literacy and proficiency among Americans by promoting the appropriate integration of AI into education, providing comprehensive AI training for educators, and fostering early exposure to AI concepts and technology to develop an AI-ready workforce and the next generation of American AI innovators," Trump's order said.

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Read Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai's remarks from the Q1 2025 earnings call.Read Google and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai's remarks from the Q1 2025 earnings call.

Google's antitrust remedy trial started this week, and the Department of Justice has produced several witnesses to testify about how Google's stranglehold on search has slowed their innovation. On day three, Perplexity Chief Business Officer Dmitry Shevelenko told the court that Google blocked Perplexity from being the default on Motorola phones, which is precisely the kind of anticompetitive behavior that got it in hot water. It would appear there is some room in the smartphone world, though, because Perplexity is included with Moto's newly announced flip phones.

During questioning on Wednesday, Shevelenko likened Google's mobile integration contracts to a "gun to your head." He claimed that both Motorola and Perplexity, which positions itself as an AI search engine, were interested in a partnership last year, but the phone maker was unable to get out of its Google distribution contract, which prevented it from using a non-Google assistant platform.

Google has long required Android device makers to use Assistant on their devices, but Google's launch of Gemini added a sense of urgency. Google is pushing Gemini into every corner of its ecosystem with the aim of catching up to ChatGPT, and it might be working. Motorola's 2024 phones were some of the first to prominently feature Gemini as the default assistant instead of Google Assistant. Apparently, the deal left no room for Perplexity as OEMs are unwilling to risk their Google revenue-sharing agreements.

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Roku, owner of one of the most popular connected TV operating systems in the country, walks a fine line when it comes to advertising. Roku's OS lives on low-priced smart TVs, streaming sticks, and projectors. To make up the losses from cheaply priced hardware, Roku is dependent on selling advertisements throughout its OS, including screensavers and its home screen.

That business model has pushed Roku to experiment with new ways of showing ads that test users’ tolerance. The company claims that it doesn't want ads on its platform to be considered intrusive, but there are reasons to be skeptical about Roku's pledge.

Non-“interruptive” ads

In an interview with The Verge this week, Jordan Rost, Roku’s head of ad marketing, emphasized that Roku tries to only deliver ads that don't interrupt viewers.

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Russian military personnel are being targeted with recently discovered Android malware that steals their contacts and tracks their location.

The malware is hidden inside a modified app for Alpine Quest mapping software, which is used by, among others, hunters, athletes, and Russian personnel stationed in the war zone in Ukraine. The app displays various topographical maps for use online and offline. The trojanized Alpine Quest app is being pushed on a dedicated Telegram channel and in unofficial Android app repositories. The chief selling point of the trojanized app is that it provides a free version of Alpine Quest Pro, which is usually available only to paying users.

Looks like the real thing

The malicious module is named Android.Spy.1292.origin. In a blog post, researchers at Russia-based security firm Dr.Web wrote:

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Director of the National Science Foundation Sethuraman Panchanathan abruptly resigned Thursday, Science Magazine first reported.

Panchanathan, who goes by Panch, did not cite a reason for his departure, which comes as 16 months are left in his six-year term. However, like most other federal agencies, the scientific funding organization is awash in turmoil due to the Trump administration. Specifically, the NSF is facing a 55 percent cut to its $9 billion annual budget in the next fiscal year, as well as a mass layoff of half of its 1,700-person staff, according to Science.

A memo sent to staff on Thursday, April 24, and obtained by Ars Technica confirmed that the NSF is in for significant cuts. It offered staff a second chance at the deal offered in the earlier "fork in the road" email, allowing them to go on paid leave in return for departing the foundation before October. Anyone who stays will face "future restructuring, staffing reductions, and constrained budget environments." The changes are expected to "constrain future opportunities" within the NSF.

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AI could one day help neuroscientists predict activity in the human brain, just like language models can predict the next word in a sentence.After more than a decade of …

The Abyss, Deadpool & Wolverine, and Inside Out 2 are just a few of the movies you should be watching on Disney+ this month.

This Hawaiian caterpillar raids spiderwebs camouflaged in insect prey’s body parts, and it's not above cannibalism in a pinch. Credit: Rubinoff lab/University of Hawaii, Manoa. This Hawaiian caterpillar raids spiderwebs camouflaged in insect prey’s body parts, and it's not above cannibalism in a pinch. Credit: Rubinoff lab/University of Hawaii, Manoa.

We think of moths and butterflies as relatively harmless creatures, but there are certain species with a darker side—for example, carnivorous caterpillars that eat aphids, butterflies that drink alligator tears, or "vampire" moths that feed on livestock blood. Add to that list the newly discovered "bone collector" caterpillar, which conducts daring raids on spider webs for sustenance, camouflaging itself in the body parts of already-consumed insects to avoid being eaten. Not only that, but according to a new paper published in the journal Science, the caterpillars can tailor those insect parts, nibbling away at any excess material to ensure a proper fit.

Daniel Rubinoff, an entomologist at the University of Hawaii, Manoa, studies a genus of moths found in Hawaii called Hyposcoma, or as he has dubbed their larval form, "Hawaiian Fancy Case" caterpillars, so named because they spin their own casings, adding to them as they grow, although the materials used can vary widely.  There are now more than 600 species within this genus, many of them not yet officially described, so it was a rich research area to explore.

The discovery of the bone collector species was serendipitous. "You never forget your first bone collector," Rubinoff told Ars. His team was on Oa'hu looking for Hyposcoma when they came across a little tree hollow and spotted something at the bottom that at first glance just looked like "a bag of bug bits." The caterpillar then stuck its head out, and the researchers realized it was a new kind of case. Rubinoff assumed that the spider web also found in the tree hollow was a coincidence; the caterpillar just used the materials readily available in the tree hollow to make its fancy case.

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Donald Trump will attend a dinner with the largest holders of his own-brand crypto coin, sending its price through the roof. But the real profits have already been made just out of view.

Donald Trump will attend a dinner with the largest holders of his own-brand crypto coin, sending its price through the roof. But the real profits have already been made just out of view.

The acting head of the General Services Administration says it has no DOGE team. It merely lists at least a half-dozen DOGE affiliates on payroll and has a section of its building for DOGE use only.

The acting head of the General Services Administration says it has no DOGE team. It merely lists at least a half-dozen DOGE affiliates on payroll and has a section of its building for DOGE use only.

A new study forecasts more than 850,000 measles cases over the next 25 years if US vaccination rates stay the same. Millions of infections are possible if rates drop.