0:04
SpaceX is gearing up for Starship's 13th test flight later this week
The next test flight of SpaceX's Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy booster could take off as soon as Thursday, and much of the hour-long mission will look a lot like the last Starship flight in May.
But there are a few key differences for this launch, set to occur during a launch window that opens at 5:45 pm CDT (22:45 UTC) on Thursday. The most notable change is the inclusion of real, functioning Starlink satellites inside Starship's cargo bay. SpaceX previously tested the ship's payload deployment mechanism using simulators mimicking the mass and dimensions of the company's next-generation Starlink Version 3 broadband satellites.
This time—Starship's 13th full-scale test flight and the second to use SpaceX's newest version of Starship—technicians have installed 20 Starlink V3 satellites into the ship's deployer, a system of pulleys and cables designed to eject a stack of satellites one at a time through an opening on the side of the spacecraft. The satellites will not be part of SpaceX's operational network, but engineers will attempt to briefly establish laser communication links between the Starlink V3s and other spacecraft flying in low-Earth orbit. If successful, these links will validate Starlink V3's interoperability with SpaceX's previous generation of Starlink satellites.
0:41
SpaceX is gearing up for Starship's 13th test flight later this week
The upcoming Starship launch is essentially a repeat of the May test, but this time the cargo bay will actually hold 20 brand‑new Starlink V3 satellites instead of dummy masses. Engineers have wired up the deployer—a set of pulleys and cables—to push each satellite out one by one, and they’ll try to spark brief laser links with other low‑Earth‑orbit craft. Those links would show the new satellites can talk to the older Starlink fleet, even though they won’t join the operational network right away.
It’s still a full‑scale, uncrewed test flight, so the primary goal is to prove the deployment hardware works with real payloads and that the laser‑communication concept is viable. The launch window opens at 5:45 pm CDT Thursday, and the mission should last about an hour, mirroring the previous flight’s profile.
In short, expect the same flight path and timing as before, but with real Starlink hardware giving us a concrete check on the next generation’s ability to integrate with the existing constellation. If the laser handshake succeeds, it’s a small but meaningful step toward expanding the network’s capabilities.
1:13
Uranium-Eating Bacteria Leave Just 5% of The Radioactive Metal in Toxic Mine Water, Scientists Discover
So, researchers just published a study in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, and they found that certain bacteria can actually break down uranium in contaminated water. These bacteria, called Dechlorosoma suillum, can consume uranium and leave behind a solid compound that's much less toxic. It's a pretty significant finding, because it could potentially be used to clean up contaminated water in old mines and nuclear sites. What's really interesting is that these bacteria can reduce the amount of uranium in the water from around 95% to just 5%. That's a huge difference, and it could make a big impact on environmental remediation efforts.
1:34
Watch: US makes historic drone boat strike in Iran
So, a US military operation just happened in Iran. A group of three autonomous boats, called Corsairs, worked together to launch a strike on the Bandar Abbas Naval Base. This is a big deal because it's the first time the US has used autonomous boats in a combat situation. The boats were controlled remotely, like drones, and they all attacked the base at the same time.
1:46
Unequal taxation helped fuel the French Revolution, say economists
A new study from the ROCKWOOL Foundation Berlin found that deep inequalities in taxation contributed to the French Revolution. The researchers analyzed data from 1750 to 1789 and discovered that areas with high salt taxes and internal customs duties experienced twice as many revolts as low-tax districts. This suggests that unequal taxation was a significant factor in the widespread discontent that led to the revolution. The study's findings provide concrete evidence to support this long-held theory, giving historians a more nuanced understanding of the complex causes of the French Revolution.
2:04
Supportive supervisors lift performance for employees with disabilities, study finds
So a recent study looked at how supportive supervisors affect employees with disabilities, and it found that having a supportive supervisor can actually improve their performance. This is based on research published in a business innovation journal, and it's a pretty straightforward finding - when supervisors are supportive, employees with disabilities tend to do better at their jobs.
But here's the thing - the study also found that the overall workplace environment plays a big role in how much of an impact that supportive supervisor can have. So even if a supervisor is really supportive, if the rest of the workplace isn't set up to accommodate employees with disabilities, it's going to be harder for them to succeed.
The study suggests that having a supportive supervisor is just one part of the equation - the workplace as a whole needs to be inclusive and supportive in order for employees with disabilities to really thrive. This makes sense, because if an employee is getting great support from their supervisor but still facing barriers elsewhere in the workplace, it's going to be tough for them to reach their full potential.
It's worth noting that this study is based on a specific set of data and may not be representative of all workplaces or employees with disabilities. But overall, the findings suggest that supportive supervisors can make a real difference, and that's something for workplaces to consider when thinking about how to support their employees.
2:45
Stolen gene lets deep-sea creature go without food for years
So I was reading about this deep-sea creature called a giant isopod, and it's got this crazy ability to survive for over five years without eating. Scientists found that it's got a gene that lets it live off its stored energy reserves, basically stealing it from its own body. This gene is a type of "starvation response" gene that's usually found in animals that can survive in environments with limited food availability.
They did a study where they took some of these isopods and starved them, and what they found was that the ones with this gene were able to survive for way longer than the ones without it. The researchers think that this gene might be an adaptation to help the isopods survive in these deep-sea environments where food is super scarce.
It's worth noting that this is a pretty small study, and more research needs to be done to understand how this gene works and how it affects the isopods' overall health. But it's still really cool to think about how these creatures have evolved to survive in such extreme conditions.
3:15
Most of the moon's water likely remains chemically bound in its deep interior
After decades of analyzing reams of lunar rocks back here on Earth, the canonical view of the moon was that it was anhydrous; that it had extraordinarily little water. That all began to change in 2009 with new data from NASA's Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) and the much-ballyhooed evidence of water ice in the moon's permanently shaded polar regions (PSRs).
3:28
Maya mathematician’s name decoded alongside astronomical formula
An ancient Maya astronomer-mathematician has been identified for the first time along with his complex calculations made around 1200 years ago, predicting the orbital cycles of Mars and Venus.
“This is the first direct mention of an ancestral Maya astronomer-mathematician by personal name,” says Franco Rossi at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
It is also the oldest recorded name of an astronomer-mathematician ever known from anywhere in the Americas, he says.
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The Maya civilisation flourished in Central America between roughly 2000 BC and AD 1697. They had advanced knowledge of mathematics and astronomy, but much of it was lost after the mass burning of their books by Spanish missionaries.
Since 2010, excavations at the site of Xultun, Guatemala, have revealed astronomical and mathematical inscriptions inside a small masonry building.
On the east and north-east wall of the building are around 50 texts that scientists believe are “rough drafts” made by Maya mathematicians as they charted and predicted the cycles of celestial objects relative to Earth and to one another.
Rossi and his colleagues have painstakingly deciphered one of these murals, named Text 19. At the bottom of the mural is the name of Sak Tahn Waax, which translates to White-chested Fox, who is believed the be the author of the formula.
Text 19 consists of 11 hieroglyphs, which had to be scanned, photographed and magnified under different illumination angles, and compared to other, later, astronomical-mathematical writings, before their meaning could be deduced.
While similar mathematical and astronomical expertise is found across Maya cities, the mention of Sak Tahn Waax, who the researchers believe was probably male, is unique.
“Whether this is an instance of the scribe himself signing his own calculation or attributing the intellectual work to another, we have a formula and the name of its creator, which serves to demonstrate the importance of this kind of intellectual contribution for Classic Maya people,” says Rossi.
The calendar system on display in Text 19 uses maths in relation to time periods, he says. These time periods were drawn from a 260-day calendar, a 365-day solar calendar, a 584-day approximation of Venus’s synodic cycle (when the planet returns to the same position relative to both Earth and the sun) and a 780-day approximation of Mars’s synodic cycle. The total length of the formula is five Venus synodic cycles or 2920 days, and the date that Text 19 most likely refers to is 7 November of AD 781 in the Julian calendar.
Exactly how this formula would have been applied is unknown, says Rossi, as it “isn’t incorporated into any larger body of work”.
“We think it is meant to concisely and meaningfully show the relationship between these two planets and human counts of time in ways that could then be applied to political ceremony, predictive astronomy and understandings of seasonality,” he says.
Such meticulous mathematical legwork would have been critical to structuring life in a world before computers, smartphones and weather apps, says Rossi.
Journal Reference:
Antiquity DOI: 10.15184/aqy.2026.10378
4:52
Cybernetic Custody
The piece is an analytical essay, not a new study, that traces how the U.S. has moved from physical prisons to a “cybernetic custody” system where people are continuously scored and monitored after release. It points to the federal SMART office—Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, Tracking—as the core mechanism, showing how registries, smartphone‑based tracking, and risk‑scoring algorithms now act like a gradient sentence, subtly narrowing life opportunities without a clear expiration date.
The author argues that this architecture is invisible to most people because it works through data feeds and algorithmic decisions rather than walls or ankle monitors. The feedback loop—predict, limit options, confirm the prediction—can accelerate decline, making the classification self‑fulfilling.
Finally, the essay proposes a set of safeguards: mandatory notice of any classification, transparent models, contestable scores, time‑limited claims, and a right to prove a forecast wrong. It notes that the EU’s AI Act has begun to curb some of these practices, while U.S. regulations still embed the gradient without clear accountability.
