Life

Elon Musk buys large stake in Twitter, sending stock soaring

by John Biers © Agence France-Presse NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — Twitter’s shares soared after Tesla CEO Elon Musk disclosed on Monday a large stake in the social media company, which he has criticized for its approach to speech rights. Musk, who has more than 80 million followers on the microblogging platform, became its largest shareholder following the purchase of 73.5 million shares or 9.2 percent of common stock, according to a securities filing. […]

Viruses that could save millions of lives

  by Irakli METREVELI Agence France Presse TBILISI, Georgia (AFP) — It may seem strange after a pandemic that has killed millions and turned the world upside down, but viruses could save just as many lives. In a petri dish in a laboratory in the Georgian capital Tbilisi, a battle is going on between antibiotic resistant bacteria and “friendly” viruses. This small nation in the Caucasus has pioneered research on a groundbreaking way to tackle […]

NASA begins critical final test on mega Moon rocket

WASHINGTON, United States (AFP) — NASA on Friday began a critical two-day-long test of its giant Space Launch System (SLS) rocket complete with a simulated countdown, as the agency gears up to return humans to the Moon. Known as the “wet dress rehearsal,” it is the final major test before the Artemis-1 mission this summer: an uncrewed lunar flight that will eventually be followed by boots on the ground, likely no sooner than 2026. “The […]

Internal bug promoted problematic content on Facebook

SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) — Content identified as misleading or problematic were mistakenly prioritized in users’ Facebook feeds recently, thanks to a software bug that took six months to fix, according to tech site The Verge. Facebook disputed the report, which was published Thursday, saying that it “vastly overstated what this bug was because ultimately it had no meaningful, long-term impact on problematic content,” according to Joe Osborne, a spokesman for parent company Meta. […]

Canada announces billions in new climate spending

OTTAWA, Canada (AFP) – More electric vehicles and green energy were among the measures Prime Minister Justin Trudeau laid out Tuesday under a multibillion-dollar plan for how Canada will meet its carbon emissions target. In a speech in Vancouver announcing Can$9.1 billion (US$7.3 billion) in climate actions, the prime minister linked Europe’s desire to wean itself off Russian oil and gas after the invasion of Ukraine to a broader global push toward renewable energy. “The […]

Germany looks to farm fumes in breakup with Russian gas

by Florian CAZERES Agence France-Presse RIBBECK, Germany (AFP) – As Germany scrambles to reduce its dependence on Russian energy, the pungent fumes from the manure and other organic waste in Peter Kaim’s farm could be part of the solution. An hour’s drive west of Berlin, a strong smell emanates from three large cylinders in the middle of a muddy field on Kaim’s property shared with 100 dairy cows. Every day, tonnes of organic waste — […]

Australian beach town of Byron Bay inundated by floodwaters

SYDNEY, Australia (AFP) – The Australian coastal enclave of Byron Bay, best known for its celebrity residents and idyllic beaches, was inundated by floodwaters Wednesday as severe storms battered stretches of the country’s east. Torrential rain that began Monday proved unrelenting, with more than 250 millimetres (9.8 inches) falling in the area in 24 hours, forcing many shops in the Byron Bay town centre to close as roads were cut off by rising water levels. […]

Giant ice volcanoes identified on Pluto

by Daniel Lawler Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) – Strange lumpy terrain on Pluto unlike anything previously observed in the solar system indicates that giant ice volcanoes were active relatively recently on the dwarf planet, scientists said on Tuesday. The observation, which was made by analysing images taken by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, suggests that Pluto’s interior was hotter much later than previously thought, according to a new study in the Nature Communications journal. Rather than […]

Senegal’s water-stressed capital faces difficult future

by Laurent Lozano Agence France-Presse DAKAR, Senegal (AFP) – Many residents of the Senegalese metropolis Dakar get up in the middle of the night hoping to collect water from their taps, which mostly run dry. “We wake up at 4 or 5 am to get water, says Sidy Fall, 44, in her kitchen in a working-class neighbourhood, filled with large bottles of stored water. If she doesn’t get up in time, the water often runs […]

‘Trash has value’: Kenyan inventor turns plastic into bricks

by Nick Perry Agence France-Presse NAIROBI, Kenya (AFP) – “Plastic still has value,” said Nzambi Matee of the mountains of discarded oil drums, laundry buckets, yoghurt tubs and other trash being shredded into colourful flakes at her Nairobi factory. “I believe that plastic is one of the misunderstood materials.” The 30-year-old Kenyan engineer and inventor would know: her start-up recycles tonnes of plastic destined for landfill into eco-friendly bricks that are stronger, cheaper and lighter […]

Vietnamese dad spends thousands converting van into wooden tank for son

BAC NINH, Vietnam (AFP) — A Vietnamese father has spent hundreds of hours and invested thousands converting an old van into a wooden tank for his son — an unusual hobby in a country once ravaged by war. Every weekend, Truong Van Dao trundles what was once a 16-seat minibus around his neighborhood in Bac Ninh province, east of capital Hanoi, with his three-year-old son sat proudly in the turret. The wooden vehicle, based on […]

As Ukraine sowing season starts, fuel shortages threaten food supply

by Selim SAHEB ETTABA Agence France-Presse Bahaté, Ukraine (AFP) – In an endless field in southwest Ukraine, farmers began to plant sunflower seeds at the start of the sowing season, but a fuel shortage threatens production in the war-torn country, whose land feeds millions around the world. The world’s top producer of sunflower oil and a major exporter of wheat is a breadbasket of the world under threat from the Russian invasion. This means the […]