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NASA on Friday abruptly said it was shaking up its Artemis lunar program that has suffered multiple delays in recent years, a bid to ensure Americans can return to the Moon’s surface by 2028.That goal remains unchanged, but the US space agency is shifting its flight lineup to include a test mission before an eventual lunar landing to improve launch “muscle memory,” NASA administrator Jared Isaacman said.That strategic revision comes amid repeated delays to the Artemis 2 mission, which was originally due to take off as early as February, but now will not launch before April. It is meant to see the first flyby of the Moon in more than half a century.Earlier this week that mission faced another setback when NASA rolled back its towering SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft off the launchpad to investigate problems and make necessary repairs.The announced changes mean that Artemis 3, which was meant to send astronauts to the Moon’s surface, will now have the different test goal of “rendezvous in low-Earth orbit” of at least one lunar lander.The next phase, Artemis 4, will aim for a lunar landing in early 2028.

Isaacman said he hoped that mission could be followed relatively quickly by a second landing within the year.”We’re not necessarily committing to launching two missions in 2028,” he told a briefing, “but we want to have the opportunity to be able to do that.”- ‘Back to basics’ -The announcement comes two days after NASA’s independent Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel said in its annual report that the Artemis 3 Moon landing plan carried “significant risk” including for the number of “firsts” it was attempting.The NASA chief said Friday speeding up the cadence of Artemis launches would allow for building more institutional knowledge in the model of the Apollo program, which originally put Americans on the Moon.”Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, through the shuttle program — I don’t think it would surprise many of the folks in the room that our average launch cadence was closer to three months throughout all those programs, not three years,” he said. “We need to start getting back to basics and moving in this direction.””Launching every three years, your skills atrophy, you lose muscle memory.” Scott Pace, director of the Space Policy Insistute, told AFP at first glance it seemed Isaacman was “making some realistic and necessary decisions.”But Clayton Swope of the Center for Strategic and International Studies told AFP it left him with “a lot of question marks,” namely in terms of both the SLS rocket or the SpaceX landing system being ready according to NASA’s timeline.Still, with the revised architecture, “you will potentially be buying down some risk that we would have carried all the way to the Moon had we gone straight to the Moon with the original plan,” he said.- ‘Space race’? -During his first term President Donald Trump announced he wanted Americans to once again set foot on the lunar surface.NASA hopes to put humans back on the Moon as China forges ahead with its own effort, which is targeting 2030 at the latest for a first crewed mission.China’s uncrewed Chang’e 7 mission is expected to be launched in 2026 for an exploration of the Moon’s south pole, and testing of its crewed spacecraft Mengzhou is also set to go ahead this year.Queried on the so-called “space race,” Isaacman said Friday that “I think competition is good.” “We’re here talking to you about what is a common-sense approach to achieve the objective, whether we had a great rival in the running or not.”But delays to space travel are not uncommon — and could also stem from the progress of NASA’s private partners.SpaceX and Blue Origin, the respective space companies of dueling billionaires Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos, are contracted to develop lunar landers used in the Artemis program.Both companies posted praise of NASA’s plans on social media Friday.”We’re all in!” wrote Blue Origin on X, while SpaceX said it “shares the same goal as NASA of returning to the Moon with a permanent presence as expeditiously and safely as possible.””Frequent human exploration flights help establish a sustainable presence for humans in space,” SpaceX said.

NASA on Friday said it would revise its Artemis lunar program that has suffered multiple delays in recent years, in a bid to ensure Americans can return to the Moon’s surface by 2028.The US space agency will add missions between this spring’s Artemis 2 and the ultimate lunar landing, a strategic revision that NASA administrator Jared Isaacman told a briefing would allow for improved launch “muscle memory.”That means Artemis 3, which was meant to send astronauts to the Moon’s surface, will now have the alternate goal of “rendezvous in low-Earth orbit” of at least one lunar lander.The next phase, Artemis 4, will aim for a lunar landing in early 2028.

Isaacman said he hoped that mission could be followed relatively quickly by a second Moon landing within the year.”We’re not necessarily committing to launching two missions in 2028,” he said, “but we want to have the opportunity to be able to do that.”The NASA chief said speeding up the cadence of Artemis launches would allow for building more institutional knowledge in the model of the Apollo program, which originally put Americans on the Moon.”Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, through the shuttle program — I don’t think it would surprise many of the folks in the room that our average launch cadence was closer to three months throughout all those programs, not three years,” he said. “We need to start getting back to basics and moving in this direction.””Launching every three years, your skills atrophy, you lose muscle memory.”- ‘Space race’? -The revised architecture announcement comes in the wake of repeated delays to the Artemis 2 mission, which now will not launch before April. It is meant to see the first flyby of the Moon in more than half a century.Earlier this week, the US space agency rolled back its towering SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft off the launchpad to investigate its problems and make necessary repairs.President Donald Trump announced he wanted Americans to once again set foot on the lunar surface in his first term.The US space agency now hopes to put humans back on the Moon as China forges ahead with its own effort, which is targeting 2030 at the latest for a first crewed mission.China’s uncrewed Chang’e 7 mission is expected to be launched in 2026 for an exploration of the Moon’s south pole, and testing of its crewed spacecraft Mengzhou is also set to go ahead this year.Queried on the so-called “space race,” Isaacman said Friday that “I think competition is good.” “We’re here talking to you about what is a common-sense approach to achieve the objective, whether we had a great rival in the running or not.”

Deep in the desert of Niger, scientists have unearthed an unknown species of dinosaur, a giant fissvery of its kind in more than a century.Around 95 million years ago, the Spinosaurus — a massive beast with a blade-shaped head crest and interlocking teeth — roamed the African continent.Scientists believe it rivalled the fearsome Tyrannosaurus rex in size, measuring around 40 feet long with a 20-inch sword-like crest on its head.Researchers dug up fossils that belonged to the Spinosaurus mirabilis — or “hell heron”, in the words of Paul Sereno, the University of Chicago palaeontologist and lead author of the research published in the journal Science.”Look at the length of the skull, the length of the neck, and the length of the hind limb — you’re in heron territory.”Spinosaurus mirabilis lived when forests and rivers covered the now-barren Sahara.

Previously, most spinosaurid fossils had been found near coastlines in North Africa.Some scientists thought these fish-eating creatures may have been fully aquatic, gliding through deep waters to snare prey.But this time, the fossils were discovered further inland, hundreds of miles from what would have been the nearest ocean.”I think it was an animal that could have waded easily into the water,” Sereno said.”But I do not think it was a diver, I do not think it was a good swimmer.”- ‘Earth-shattering site’ -The search began in 2019 in the Sahara Desert, where French geologist Hugues Faure had said he found a tooth belonging to the giant predator Carcharodontosaurus in the 1950s.”We’ve got a couple of things that Faure could never dream of.

We have GPS coordinates, we have drones and better vehicles,” said Sereno.The barren sands yielded nothing and the team, disheartened, headed back to their camp.But a Tuareg man in a black trench coat approached Sereno’s team on a motorcycle, claiming to know where “big bones” lay.After a long journey through the desert, Sereno worried they “had made a mistake”.”We jokingly said, are we still in Niger? I mean, we drove for a day and a half until we had no more gas to spare because we wouldn’t get back.”But eventually they reached a remote site where the “biggest bones…

I have ever seen in my life” emerged from the ground.Far out in the desert, the researchers gaped at the six-foot-long femur, the jaw, teeth, and base of the crest.In 2022, Sereno returned with a 100-person team and 64 Nigerien guards to excavate the “earth-shattering site”.They unearthed a skull, fragments of the hind legs and several crests.”The crest was like nothing we’d ever seen before,” said Sereno.Some were brought to tears, he said, by the “overwhelming” experience.”It’s actually like looking at a digital image of your new dinosaur and gawking over it in the tent in the middle of the Sahara.”The team realised “it was a new species… and it was going to be a landmark discovery.””That’s your Jurassic Park moment… one to remember for a lifetime.”

As dengue surges globally, an Indian vaccine candidate has entered the final stage of testing, raising hopes for one of the world’s first single-dose shots against the deadly mosquito-borne disease.Dengue, which causes severe flu-like symptoms and debilitating body aches, has exploded globally, fuelled by rising temperatures and densely populated cities. The World Health Organization (WHO) says that almost half the world’s population is now at risk, with 100–400 million infections every year.

India alone has recorded over one million cases and at least 1,500 deaths since 2021.Hoping to stem the global epidemic, Panacea Biotec has begun final Phase III trials of its vaccine, DengiAll, which has been pursuing for nearly 15 years. More than 10,000 volunteers across the country are enrolled in the study, overseen by the Indian Council of Medical Research, with the vaccine on track for rollout as early as next year if the trial results are favourable.”We will try to get this vaccine out there as soon as possible,” Syed Khalid Ali, chief scientific officer of Panacea, told AFP in New Delhi.Doctor Ekta Gupta, professor of clinical virology at the Institute of Liver and Biliary Sciences in New Delhi, said dengue was now considered hyperendemic in India, with all four virus serotypes circulating simultaneously.”This vaccine is very much needed right now to control the occurrence of these cases, or at least prevent the severity.”- Climate change -Monsoon outbreaks regularly push Indian hospitals to their limits, crowding urban wards and leaving rural regions grappling with late diagnoses and poor access to care.Higher temperatures and changing rainfall patterns create ideal conditions for Aedes mosquitoes — the vectors of dengue — to reproduce and spread the virus.Children are particularly vulnerable to the more severe form, called dengue hemorrhagic fever, as they are more likely to suffer low platelet counts and shock.Participants in Phase III trials, which started in 2024, were randomly assigned to receive either the vaccine or a placebo, with the results expected later this year.Vaccines against all four dengue serotypes have long posed a scientific challenge.

Immunity to one strain does not protect against others, and secondary infections can be more severe. Most existing candidates require multiple doses.If approved, DengiAll would become one of the world’s first single-dose dengue vaccines, following Brazil’s approval of a similar shot last year.It would also be the first such vaccine available in India, where no dengue shot is currently licensed for public use.”We will be the second (single-dose) vaccine to come out…

But in India and several lower-middle-income countries, we will be the first ones to roll out the dengue vaccine,” Ali said.The candidate is based on a tetravalent strain originally developed by the US National Institutes of Health. – ‘Hope for future’ -Panacea is the most advanced of three Indian firms licensed to use the strain, having developed its own formulation and secured a process patent.Inside the company’s research labs, doctor Priyanka Priyadarsiny, head of biological R&D, said vaccine development involves several steps, from proof-of-concept studies to regulatory checks. “We are extremely cautious about purity, safety and adverse effects,” she said. “Only after meeting regulatory specifications can a product be considered safe for public use.”At present, the WHO recommends only one dengue vaccine, Qdenga, produced by Japan’s Takeda for children aged six to 16 in high-transmission settings. Qdenga, which requires two doses administered three months apart, is not currently available in India.Ali said DengiAll could be given to people aged one to 60 and is expected to offer long-term protection.In India, final approval would come from the Drug Controller General of India, while WHO prequalification would be required for large-scale international use.Experts say a successful Indian-made vaccine could be key to affordability and mass rollout in lower-income countries. Virologist and Oxford University fellow Shahid Jameel — who is not connected with the trial warned dengue incidence could rise by 50–75 percent by 2050 under current climate change trends.Still, he cautioned that only Phase III results would determine whether a candidate meets the criteria for a safe and effective dengue vaccine.”Phase III testing and follow-up are needed to show if the above conditions are met,” he told AFP. “Only then can we have a useful dengue vaccine.

It is still early days, but there is hope for the future.”

Dating out of your league? New research says it’s a tale as old as time.A study out Thursday in Science argues that Neanderthal men and human women were particularly inclined to mate, a sexual habit that offers insight into the evolution of the modern human genome.In 2010 scientists reconstructed the Neanderthal genome — blockbuster research that allowed for analysis making clear that the species interbred.Most people living today have some residual fragments of DNA from our ancient evolutionary cousins.Research indicates both groups descended from a population living in Africa some million years ago.They eventually diverged, with anatomically modern humans evolving in Africa, and Neanderthals migrating across Eurasia.But over hundreds of millennia, human migrations resulted in interbreeding, researchers say.Yet humans have little to no Neanderthal DNA on our X chromosomes — one of two human chromosomes that determines an embryo’s sex.That was assumed to be the result of a natural selection.The genes were biologically “toxic” to humans, researchers hypothesized, and eventually purged out — in essence, the children who inherited those traits might not have lived to pass them on.But the new study from geneticists at the University of Pennsylvania suggests the phenomenon has more social origins, and were actually the result of “long-standing mating preferences.”The team analyzed modern human DNA preserved in Neanderthals, and found an abundance on the X chromosome — the mirror opposite of humans.That result allowed them to rule out that reproduction between the species was incompatible.Instead the gene flow “occurred predominantly between Neanderthal males and anatomically modern human females,” said Alexander Platt, a senior research scientist on the study.Females carry two X chromosomes, and males carry one.

Therefore, if Neanderthal males and modern human females were mating more frequently, more human X chromosomes would enter the Neanderthal gene pool — and fewer Neanderthal X chromosomes would end up in human populations.Researchers said that sex-biased migration could also offer clues.

But ancient mating habits “provided the simplest explanation,” Platt said. The larger “why” is unknown: Neanderthal men and modern human women might have been mating by choice, or violence and coercion could have been involved.Researchers say they now hope to analyze the development of this mating pattern.Possibilities include probing gender dynamics within Neanderthal society, or migration habits — perhaps males were likely to leave their societies while females stayed with their families, for example.

British supermarket chain Waitrose on Thursday said it was suspending the sale of mackerel to take “a decisive stand against overfishing”.Waitrose said its initiative was aimed at safeguarding “the long-term health and sustainability of our oceans”, criticising government quotas as still too high.Sourcing of fresh, chilled and frozen mackerel “would be suspended by April 29, with tinned mackerel following once current stock was sold”, the chain said in a statement, adding that it was the first UK supermarket to take such a step.Waitrose said British government fishing quotas were higher than recommended by the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES).According to the international scientific body, the Northeast Atlantic mackerel population has fallen into a danger zone where its reproduction is no longer guaranteed.From nearly 13 million tons in 2014, the biomass of spawning-age mackerel has plummeted to less than 3 million tons in 2025.In December, EU countries agreed a 70 percent reduction in mackerel catches for the first six months of the year, compared to 2025 — slightly less than recommended by scientists.The UK, Norway, the Faroe Islands and Iceland in the same month concluded a separate agreement.The accord was criticised by the EU which said it could cause “irreversible” damage to the dwindling North Atlantic mackerel population.

A 22-metre robot arm will help remove a third sample of radioactive debris from inside Japan’s stricken Fukushima nuclear plant, its operator said Thursday, as it unveiled the snake-like device.Dangerously high radiation levels make removing melted fuel and other debris from the plant hit by a huge tsunami in 2011 the most daunting challenge in the decades-long decommissioning project.Around 880 tonnes of hazardous material remain inside the power station, the site of one of the world’s worst nuclear accidents after a tsunami was triggered by a 9.0-magnitude earthquake.A four-minute video released on Wednesday by plant operator TEPCO showed a snake-like robot arm — measuring 22 metres and weighing about 4.6 tonnes — moving through small tunnel-like passages and inspecting complex structures within a confined space. The robot is equipped with a camera and “is better at retrieving information” than previous devices used, company spokesman Isao Ito told AFP.TEPCO plans to use the robot later this year to conduct its third trial debris removal operation at one of the melted reactors in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, he said.Tiny samples of radioactive material have twice been collected under a trial project using special tools, but full-fledged extractions are yet to take place. TEPCO announced in July that the massive operation to remove debris had been delayed until at least 2037.

The company previously said it hoped to start in the early 2030s.

New data centres are springing up worldwide as demand soars for artificial intelligence and cloud computing, with Asia one of the sector’s fastest growing regions.Land and power shortages in connectivity hub Singapore have driven a tech infrastructure boom in nearby countries where the growing business user base has also attracted US and Chinese investment.AFP gives a run-down of where these data centres are being built, and why:- Malaysia -When resource constraints led Singapore to halt new data centre developments between 2019 and 2022, tech companies began to build across the border in Malaysia, which has fast become a powerhouse for the sector.Malaysia accounts for over half of under-construction data centre capacity among five countries also including Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam, market intelligence firm DC Byte says.Its policies are friendly, said Michael Freeman, regional director for Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam at construction project management company Turner and Townsend.The country “moves faster largely because of its streamlined, standardised permitting system and predictable utility allocation, which gives developers clarity on power, water, land use, and approval timelines”, Freeman told AFP.The building boom has been especially rapid in the southern state of Johor, which has imposed tighter requirements on water and power use for new data centres to stop them straining local resources.- Indonesia -“In contrast, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines each face structural barriers that slow project timelines, despite strong demand and growing investment interest,” Freeman said.”Indonesia’s comparatively slower speed stems primarily from unreliable and coal heavy power, slow renewable energy approvals, and grid access uncertainties,” as well as drawn-out permit procedures, he added.Still, tech giants want to cater to Indonesia’s huge, tech-savvy population.Microsoft, which is investing $1.7 billion in Indonesia for new cloud and AI infrastructure, recently gave AFP a rare look inside an operational data centre near Jakarta, a factory-like facility running non-stop to process AI queries.The US company has signed a deal with the state-owned electricity provider to raise Indonesia’s renewable energy capacity by around 200 megawatts over a decade.- Thailand, Philippines -Google launched a new “cloud region” in Bangkok in January, saying their data centres would contribute more than $40 billion in economic value to Thailand over five years.”Many people are rushing to Thailand,” but the country could face constraints, said Singapore-based tech journalist Paul Mah.”I’m not saying limited power, but getting power to the right places where the operators want the data centre to be,” Mah told AFP.The Philippines, too, is set for a surge in data centre building projects, with companies eyeing its developing digital economy.”Emerging markets, including Thailand, India, Indonesia and the Philippines are at the nascent stages of building their data centre infrastructure but possess immense potential for growth,” says KPMG.- Vietnam –”Vietnam has been a hot topic in the data center market for several years” thanks to high demand and power availability there, Freeman said.Its permitting system remains a challenge, he added, although the government is making efforts to be more investor-friendly, with dedicated tech parks and simplified processes for setting up data centres.”We fully expect to see an influx of multi-national providers entering the Vietnam market in the coming years,” Freeman said.”Our expectation is that when one or two build successfully and demonstrate the case that the permitting system is working as intended, we will likely see a major surge in interest and developments.”

Nonstop buzzing fills a windowless Microsoft data centre near Jakarta, part of a tech construction boom sweeping Southeast Asia that promises economic opportunities but is also hungry for resources.As demand for artificial intelligence heats up, technology giants are racing to invest billions of dollars in the region, attracted by a growing plugged-in user base.New data centres — warehouse-like facilities that store online files and power AI tools from chatbots to image generators — are mushrooming worldwide, and the sector is growing particularly fast in Asia.AFP was recently granted rare access to a Microsoft data centre in Indonesia that is part of the new boom.No company logo was visible on the vast boxy exterior of the centre, and visitors were only admitted after careful security checks.Keeping the systems whirring is a constant operation, with technicians on site even during religious holidays.Data centre capacity in Southeast Asia is projected to triple from 2025 levels by 2030, driven by a tenfold surge in AI use, according to a KPMG report.”We expect every app, every workload, every user to be using AI in some part of their workflow” in just a few years, Alistair Speirs, a manager for infrastructure at Microsoft, told AFP.But many of Asia’s data centres will add demand to grids still heavily reliant on planet-warming fossil fuels.And to keep servers from overheating, they will place new pressure on often-stretched local water supplies.- AI at work -At the Indonesian data centre, racks of metal-cased servers in tall white cabinets were busy answering AI queries for local users — an intensive, heat-generating process.A “closed-loop” water cooling system, which works a bit like a car radiator and does not require regular refills, prevents them from malfunctioning.Higher performance chips “require a lot more intensity”, Noelle Walsh, head of the company’s cloud operations, told AFP.”We’ve had to adapt our data centres’ designs to accommodate different power structures and different cooling mechanisms.”Super-connected Singapore was long Southeast Asia’s data centre hotspot, but the city state halted developments between 2019 and 2022 over energy, water and land use worries.That, along with an explosion of AI interest after ChatGPT’s debut, brought a surge of data centres to neighbouring Malaysia, and increasingly Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.”The boom is there,” with companies racing for “first-player advantage”, said Trung Ghi of the consulting firm Arthur D.

Little.Hosting data centres is a “win-win situation” for governments, he said, noting it boosts business efficiency with faster online tools and grows local economies as people come to work at new tech parks.- Hyperscale -The data centre expansion will increase demand on power grids that are still heavily coal dependent.Power consumption by data centres in Indonesia — where coal generates nearly 70 percent of electricity — will likely quadruple by 2030, according to energy think tank Ember.Microsoft’s Jakarta facilities, spread out to mitigate risks from earthquakes and floods, are part of a $1.7 billion investment with a potential “hyperscale” capacity that would need hundreds of megawatts of electricity.The company says it works to “green” local grids by incentivising energy transition plans.”We don’t build power plants, but we work with utility providers,” Microsoft’s Walsh said.”In some parts of the world it is wind power, in other parts of the world it is solar, we also use hydropower, and in some countries it’s nuclear.

So we support all of those.”Microsoft recently signed a deal with Indonesia’s state-owned electricity provider to raise the nation’s renewable energy capacity by around 200 megawatts over a decade.- Sinking city -Microsoft’s rivals Amazon and Google, as well as Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent, also run data centres in the Jakarta region.The metropolitan area of 42 million is sinking, partly due to groundwater extraction.

Officials plan to eventually relocate the capital.The data centre boom “will put even greater strain on the region’s water resources, which have historically been overexploited and badly managed,” said scientist Olivia Jensen from the National University of Singapore.Microsoft projects water consumption will grow until 2028 before stabilising at 660 million litres the year after as the company adds more closed-loop systems.”We’re evolving fast, and what we’re building now will consume zero water on a daily basis,” Walsh said.As AI technology develops apace, the company has swathes of land reserved on its Jakarta site for future builds.But next-generation systems will likely require more computing power, Ghi warned.”If these things get larger and larger and more thirsty, then something has to give,” Ghi said.

NASA chief Jared Isaacman on Saturday ruled out a March launch for Artemis 2, the first crewed flyby mission to the Moon in more than 50 years, citing technical issues.Workers detected a problem with helium flow to the massive SLS rocket that will “take the March launch window out of consideration,” Issacman said in a post on X.”I understand people are disappointed by this development.

That disappointment is felt most by the team at NASA, who have been working tirelessly to prepare for this great endeavor,” Isaacman said.”During the 1960s, when NASA achieved what most thought was impossible, and what has never been repeated since, there were many setbacks.”The towering SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft will be rolled back into the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida to investigate the technical issues and make any necessary repairs, Isaacman said.A complete briefing will follow in the coming days, he added.The highly anticipated Artemis 2 mission, lasting about 10 days, will see three Americans and one Canadian fly around Earth’s satellite. It would be a huge step towards Americans once again setting foot on the lunar surface, a goal announced by President Donald Trump in his first term. On Friday, NASA had set March 6 as the earliest possible launch date.The US space agency hopes to put humans back on the Moon as China forges ahead with a rival effort that is targeting 2030 at the latest for its first crewed mission.China’s uncrewed Chang’e 7 mission is expected to be launched in 2026 for an exploration of the Moon’s south pole, and testing of its crewed spacecraft Mengzhou is also set to go ahead this year.NASA surprised many late last year when it said Artemis 2 could happen as soon as February — an acceleration explained by the Trump administration’s wish to beat China to the punch. But the program has been plagued by delays. The uncrewed Artemis 1 mission took place in November 2022 after multiple postponements and two failed launch attempts.Then technical problems in early February — which included a liquid hydrogen leak — cut short a so-called wet dress rehearsal for the Artemis 2 launch.

That was finally completed earlier this week.The wet dress rehearsal was conducted under real conditions — with full rocket tanks and technical checks — at Cape Canaveral in Florida, with engineers practicing the maneuvers needed to carry out an actual launch.NASA is hoping that the Moon could be used to help prepare future missions to Mars.