Ryu, who worked as a diplomat before his defection in 2019, states that the legal framework in North Korea, established by the Kim dynasty, mandates that the nation be governed by an individual of the Paektu lineage – meaning, a direct heir of the founder Kim Il Sung.
However, if the regime endures, which is quite possible, then Washington’s threefold requests from Tehran will resurface, specifically: limitations on Iran’s questionable nuclear activities, inclusive of reinstating inspections; cessation of Iran’s ballistic missile development; and termination of Iran’s backing for proxy militias throughout the region, such as Hezbullah, Hamas, and the Houthis.
Likewise, after an unintended flooding incident in the lab, scientists recorded an exceptionally prolonged multiday torpor in a golden spiny mouse, its body temperature falling to about 75°F (24°C).
Geiser says this greater flexibility in using torpor allows heterotherms to ride out catastrophic events. By contrast, homeothermic species can’t simply cut back their need for food and water and may be unable to endure prolonged adverse conditions.
“Perhaps there’s no food, perhaps no water, perhaps it’s very warm,” says ecophysiologist Julia Nowack of Liverpool John Moores University in England, a coauthor on the sugar glider study. Torpor, particularly in tropical regions, has “many different triggers.”
Different kinds of threats, such as predators, can also lead animals to lie low. The (aptly named) edible dormouse, for example, will sometimes enter extended periods of torpor in early summer. At first researchers were puzzled—why sleep through summer when temperatures are mild and food is plentiful, especially if it means missing opportunities to reproduce?
After examining years of data gathered by multiple teams, two researchers concluded that because spring and early summer are peak activity times for owls, these small, easily eaten animals were likely choosing to be torpid at night, safely concealed in underground burrows to avoid becoming prey. In a similar strategy to evade nocturnal predators, Fjelldal’s bats modify their torpor use slightly with the lunar phase, remaining torpid longer as the moon brightens and they grow easier to detect.
The fat-tailed dunnart, a mouse-like carnivorous marsupial native to Australia, is another species that stays subdued when predation risk increases. In one study, researchers placed dunnarts in two enclosure types: some with abundant ground cover created by plastic sheeting to simulate predator-protected habitat, and others with little cover to simulate higher predation risk. In the higher-risk enclosures, the animals foraged less and their body temperatures became more variable.
“Individuals utilizing these products are, in fact, serving as guinea pigs,” Adam Taylor, anatomy professor at Lancaster University, remarks. “There exists some information, yet it is derived from pre-clinical models. Essentially, they have undergone testing on animals, but not on human subjects.”
Certain users and advocacy groups have praised the initiative, contending that major tech firms ought not to take advantage of vast developing markets merely for financial gain. Conversely, others, such as digital rights advocate Nikhil Pahwa, argue that Meta and WhatsApp, being commercial organizations, possess a rightful ability to monetize user metadata.
The Claude AI assistant app from Anthropic surged to the top position on Apple’s U.S. free app rankings late on Saturday, following attempts by the Trump administration to impede the use of the startup’s technology by government entities.
This surge in popularity implies that Anthropic is capitalizing on its media presence, which arises from its stance against deploying its models for extensive domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons.
President Donald Trump expressed in a post on Truth Social, “The Leftwing extremists at Anthropic have made an ABYSMAL ERROR in attempting to COERCE the Department of Defense, insisting they adhere to their Terms of Service instead of the Constitution.”
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth stated that he requested Anthropic be identified as a supply-chain threat to national security, thus prohibiting U.S. defense contractors from using Anthropic tools.
According to Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, “It is the Department’s right to choose contractors that best align with their objectives,” in a statement. “However, given the significant value Anthropic’s technology brings to our military, we hope for a reassessment.”
Historically, other AI chat applications have received greater consumer popularity than Claude. OpenAI’s ChatGPT ranked No. 2 in the App Store on Saturday, while Google’s Gemini stood at No. 4.
This month, the Claude iOS app has gained traction. On January 30, it was placed at No. 131 in the U.S. and has been fluctuating in the top 20 for most of February, as per analytics firm Sensor Tower. The data indicates that ChatGPT has maintained the No. 1 position for the majority of February.
Anthropic’s number of free users has surged more than 60% since January, with the daily sign-ups tripling since November, hitting a new record daily this week, as reported by a spokesperson via email. Additionally, paying subscribers have more than doubled this year, according to the spokesperson.
Over the past year, Anthropic—established in 2021 by former employees of OpenAI—has experienced growth as a provider of models for coding and general corporate applications. OpenAI, which has over 900 million weekly users of ChatGPT, has been addressing Anthropic’s business growth by forming partnerships with consulting firms like Accenture and Capgemini.
On Friday night, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced that the startup had secured an agreement with the U.S. Defense Department for the utilization of its models.
Shortly after, pop star Katy Perry shared a screenshot of Anthropic’s Pro subscription for consumers, featuring a heart overlay.
WATCH: Sec. Pete Hegseth instructs Pentagon to classify Anthropic supply-chain threat
Gambling permeates everything today, including human distress.
Gambling permeates everything today, including human distress.
Polymarket has been facilitating wagers on when the next US strike on Iran would occur. Naturally, following the actual occurrence and loss of life, the prediction betting market is experiencing some strain. This platform has previously been embroiled in controversy, including allegations of insider trading on the Super Bowl halftime show and the apprehension of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
In a proclamation on its website, Polymarket justified its choice to permit betting on a potential war outbreak, asserting it was an “invaluable” news source and provider of insights, while also criticizing conventional media and Elon Musk’s X. The statement states:
Note on Middle East Markets: The promise of prediction markets is to leverage the collective wisdom to generate accurate, impartial forecasts for the most significant events in society. This capability is especially vital during distressing times like today. After engaging in conversation with those affected by the attacks, who had numerous inquiries, we found that prediction markets could supply them with the answers they sought in ways TV news and 𝕏 could not.
We have contacted Polymarket for further details regarding its guidelines on betting related to violence, suffering, war, and fatalities.
Astronomers will be notified of astronomical occurrences within moments of their discovery.
Astronomers will be notified of astronomical occurrences within moments of their discovery.
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory’s automated notification system is operational and is already flooding astronomers with various celestial phenomena to observe in the night sky. The system was publicly launched on Tuesday, February 24th, and on its inaugural night, it sent out around 800,000 notifications concerning meteoroids, supernovas, and ravenous black holes. And it is anticipated that this figure will only increase to several millions nightly.
The observatory unveiled the initial images produced by its car-sized Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) camera in June of the previous year. However, researchers and star enthusiasts have been eagerly waiting for the implementation of this system. Each night, the camera captures approximately 1,000 photographs and then compares them against a baseline image taken when the telescope first became active. Variations are automatically noted, and an algorithm can differentiate between likely supernovas and incoming meteoroids to send alerts to interested observers, all within mere minutes. This enables scientists to rapidly focus on transient celestial occurrences.
Fortunately, the notifications are not an all-or-nothing format. They can be customized by type of event, brightness, or the count of events occurring within a specific timeframe. This should assist in preventing researchers from being inundated with notifications as the Rubin Observatory accelerates the pace of discoveries.
Katherine Houser, the county health official who authored the MMWR report, said beer‑tent staff were reluctant to provide specifics because they did not want to implicate fellow community members. One worker, however, mentioned that leftover food had been placed in the cooler overnight at the beginning of the fair.
Local health officials proposed that the cooler had been contaminated with Salmonella, which then transferred to beer cans that people drank from, causing infections. With the improvised cooler no longer available, that idea could only be speculative. Consequently, investigators consulted ChatGPT for confirmation.
After feeding the chatbot the outbreak details, investigators posed several questions, such as: “Will S. Agbeni proliferate in a poorly drained cooler?”; “Besides ice, are there any plausible sources if only canned drinks and no food were present at this site?”; and “What documented examples of similar outbreaks exist in the scientific literature?”
Several of those queries could be resolved without a chatbot. A quick search of PubMed, the federal scientific literature database, readily turns up instances of Salmonella being detected in ice. Nonetheless, the chatbot told officials the cooler was a “credible and likely” source, and they maintained that hypothesis.
Ultimately, officials instituted new cooler sanitation procedures and judged the AI input to be useful. “AI was effective in this rural setting for rapid situational awareness,” Houser wrote. She also noted concerns about employing AI in outbreak work: “Given the inherent limitations of generative AI tools, including potential inaccuracies and lack of source transparency, all AI-generated summaries were critically reviewed and validated against primary literature before incorporation,” she added.
All told, the case report ends ambiguously. How much the chatbot actually contributed remains uncertain. Carefully vetting AI-produced responses can consume as much time as doing the research independently. And, of course, the true events surrounding that improvised beer cooler may never be known—though the updated cooler sanitation measures appear prudent regardless.
Berkshire Hathaway showed a significant drop in its operating profits for the final quarter, primarily attributed to challenges within the conglomerate’s insurance sector.
Operational earnings reached $10.2 billion in Q4. This marks a decrease of over 29% from $14.56 billion during the same period last year.
This quarter was the last under Warren Buffett’s leadership as CEO, who revealed his resignation at last May’s annual shareholders meeting. Greg Abel commenced his role at the beginning of 2026 and pledged in Berkshire’s annual letter accompanying Saturday’s results to preserve the culture of financial soundness and disciplined capital management established by Buffett. Buffett continues as chairman.
Profits from insurance underwriting plummeted 54% to $1.56 billion down from $3.41 billion a year ago. Insurance investment income decreased nearly 25%, dropping to $3.1 billion from $4.088 billion.
For the entire year of 2025, operating profits amounted to $44.49 billion, a decline from $47.44 billion the previous year.
Insurance underwriting profits totaled $7.26 billion, down from $9 billion in 2024. Insurance investment income for the year fell to $12.5 billion from $13.6 billion a year earlier.
Comprehensive earnings, which encompass gains or losses from the conglomerate’s stock market activities, slightly decreased in the fourth quarter to $19.2 billion from $19.7 billion the previous year. However, these figures were affected by a $4.5 billion write-down related to Berkshire’s investments in Kraft Heinz and Occidental Petroleum. Investment gains were reported at $13.5 billion.
For the full year, overall earnings declined to $66.97 billion from $89 billion the previous year. It’s important to note that Berkshire consistently advises investors to be less concerned with the performance of its investments over brief intervals.
“The level of investment gains (losses) in any specific quarter is generally inconsequential and can lead to figures for net earnings per share that may be very misleading for investors who lack extensive understanding of accounting practices,” the firm remarked in its earnings announcement.
Berkshire refrained from repurchasing shares again this quarter, even though it closed Q4 at a stable level. Despite no stock buybacks, the conglomerate’s cash reserves fell to $373.3 billion from a peak of $381.6 billion in the third quarter.
Berkshire Hathaway Class A shares appreciated by 10% in 2025, trailing behind the S&P 500’s 16.4% increase. Nevertheless, Buffett’s stewardship has resulted in exceptional wealth generation for investors.
Since 1965, Berkshire Hathaway has experienced compounded annual growth of 19.7%. This nearly doubles the S&P 500’s compounded growth over that timeframe. Overall returns for Berkshire surpass 6,000,000% during this period, while the S&P 500’s gains stand at just 46,061%, including dividends, as noted by Abel in his inaugural annual letter to shareholders as CEO.
