Business Sentiment
Sentiment Legend:
Negative < 44
Mixed 46-54
Positive > 56
The law “is a direct attack on the dignity and humanity of transgender Kansans,” an ACLU official said.
Truthout is an indispensable resource for activists, movement leaders and workers everywhere. Please make this work possible with a quick donation.
Two transgender residents of Kansas are suing the state over its newly enacted anti-trans law that has invalidated the driver's licenses of hundreds of trans people.
The new law also authorizes any individual to sue anyone in Kansas who they suspect of using the “wrong” restroom, based on the state's new definition of gender, which wrongly states that gender is equivalent to the sex a person was assigned at birth. Critics of the law have described this provision as a “bathroom bounty,” as those individuals can collect up to $1,000 in “damages.”
Trans residents began receiving letters from the state last week telling them to surrender their licenses to the Kansas Division of Vehicles (KDOV) if their gender markers were not in compliance with the state's new definition of gender. The law also forbids transgender residents from updating gender markers on state-issued birth certificates and licenses in the future.
Two transgender men — only identified in the lawsuit as Daniel Doe and Matthew Moe — are suing to block the law, with the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Kansas representing them.
The new law “is a cruel and craven threat to public safety all in the name of fostering fear, division, and paranoia,” said Harper Seldin, senior staff attorney for the ACLU's LGBTQ & HIV Rights Project.
The law “is a direct attack on the dignity and humanity of transgender Kansans,” said Monica Bennett, legal director of the ACLU of Kansas. “It undermines our state's strong constitutional protections against government overreach and persecution.”
According to letters sent to residents, the law goes into effect right away, and there will be no grace period for those found in violation of the law.
“[Y]our current credentials will be invalid immediately, and you may be subject to additional penalties if you are operating a vehicle without a valid credential,” the letter states. Penalties include up to six months in jail and/or a $1,000 fine.
The lawsuit, which refers to the law as Senate Bill (SB) 244, was filed on Friday, one day after the law went into effect.
“SB 244 is just the most recent law in a shameful litany of statutes enacted by the Kansas Legislature meant to discriminate against and dehumanize transgender people,” the lawsuit states, citing laws that exclude trans kids from school sports, bar trans children from receiving gender-affirming care, and enshrine unfair treatment of trans people in Kansas jails.
The lawsuit also states that:
Plaintiffs, like other Kansans, use their driver's licenses to prove their identity and to travel freely. Plaintiffs, like other Kansans, also need to use restrooms when they are in public spaces. Plaintiffs, along with other transgender people around the state of Kansas, will immediately suffer harm under SB 244 because they will not be able to utilize a driver's license with their correct gender marker or access public restrooms that accord with their gender identity.
The lawsuit also points out numerous ways in which the law violates the Kansas state constitution, including by:
The lawsuit seeks to overturn the law in the longer term and to temporarily enjoin it from being enforced while the lawsuit is pending.
According to affidavits provided by the plaintiffs, there is also concern that the provision removing people's correct gender markers from their licenses would “out” them in a way that could potentially endanger lives.
“I do not want to publicly reveal that I am transgender,” Daniel writes in his affidavit. “I want to protect my privacy, and to protect myself from harassment, violence, and discrimination, as well as retaliation for trying to protect my rights. I am also worried about backlash against my fiance, family, and employer if people learn I am transgender.”
Matthew notes in his affidavit that he has faced attacks in restrooms in the past, and that he fears they will happen again if the law is allowed to stay in place.
“I want to protect my privacy, and to protect myself from harassment, violence, and discrimination, as well as retaliation for trying to protect my rights,” Matthew states.
Critics say the law is an unnecessary intrusion into trans people's lives for what are clearly bigoted reasons.
“This bill that the Republicans forced through the Legislature so quickly is doing nothing but causing a problem that doesn't exist . . . It's clearly something they've wanted to do for a long time, and it's at the expense of members of marginalized communities,” said LGBTQ activist and Kansas resident Jae Moyer.
Other organizations lauded the ACLU for its lawsuit against the state.
“This harmful law stokes fear and puts trans people at serious risk. The ACLU's legal challenge is a crucial step toward protecting the dignity, safety, and rights of trans people in Kansas and beyond,” a statement from PFLAG said.
The devastating American and Israeli attacks have killed hundreds of Iranians, and the death toll continues to rise.
As independent media, what we do next matters a lot. It's up to us to report the truth, demand accountability, and reckon with the consequences of U.S. militarism at this cataclysmic historical moment.
Trump may be an authoritarian, but he is not entirely invulnerable, nor are the elected officials who have given him pass after pass. We cannot let him believe for a second longer that he can get away with something this wildly illegal or recklessly dangerous without accountability.
We ask for your support as we carry out our media resistance to unchecked militarism. Please make a tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation to Truthout.
This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the following terms:
Chris Walker is a news writer at Truthout, based in Madison, Wisconsin. Focusing on both national and local topics since the early 2000s, he has produced thousands of articles analyzing the issues of the day and their impact on people. He can be found on most social media platforms under the handle @thatchriswalker.
Get the news you want, delivered to your inbox every day.
Truthout is working overtime to bring you the latest on Iran. In deep opposition to Trump's militarism, we are producing media of truth and accountability in this moment of crisis. We ask for your support. Please make a tax-deductible donation today.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll found 27 percent of respondents approved, 43 percent disapproved, and 29 percent weren't sure.
Truthout is an indispensable resource for activists, movement leaders and workers everywhere. Please make this work possible with a quick donation.
President Donald Trump's war in Iran is extraordinarily unpopular, according to a poll conducted shortly after the U.S. and Israel carried out massive strikes on the country Saturday.
The survey, conducted by Reuters/Ipsos, found that just 27% of voters approved of the strikes, which have killed at least 555 Iranians as of Monday morning and resulted in retaliation from Iran that has killed at least four U.S. service members, with more casualties expected according to a spokesperson for the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Meanwhile, 43% of respondents disapproved of the military action, while 29% said they were not sure.
A majority of Republicans said they approved of the strikes, with 55% expressing support. Still, 13% disapproved, and a noteworthy 31% said they were unsure.
Only 27 percent of Americans approve of Trump's Iran strikes, per new Reuters poll. Any Dems who are still skittish about the war powers vote should get over it already. pic.twitter.com/aPPWCBcJn0
Approval is dismal with nearly everyone else. Only 19% of independents expressed support compared to 44% who disapproved. And though Democratic leaders in Congress have done little to stand in the way of the strikes, their voters are overwhelmingly against them: 74% said they disapproved, while just 7% approved.
The poll reflects a wider skepticism of U.S. military intervention, with 56% of respondents saying the president was too quick to deploy military force in recent months, including in Venezuela, Syria, and Nigeria.
Compared with previous U.S. military interventions in the Middle East, such as the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, which—at least at their outset—enjoyed broad support from the American public following intense government efforts to drum up support, there has been little effort by the Trump administration to define the purpose of war with Iran.
Trump's justification for launching the war has shifted wildly since he began amassing troops in the region. Trump has most recently said the strikes were intended to stop an “imminent threat” from Iran; meanwhile, the Pentagon has told Congress there was no sign Iran was planning an attack unless the U.S. did so first.
The president previously said his push for war was to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, an assertion at odds with his claim that his strikes in June “obliterated” the country's nuclear capabilities.
Told @AJEnglish that Trump's messaging on why he started the war with Iran signalled desperation. He is desperately trying to come up with a justification that will be convincing to his base for a war that only one out of five Americans sees as justified… pic.twitter.com/pteQ6Ey2zx
Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, told Al Jazeera that Trump's shifting explanations reek of “desperation.”
“It's very clear that Trump has a tremendous difficulty finding a justification for this war of choice that he's embarked on,” he said. “The reality is that if this goes on for another week or two, this is going to become a political disaster.”
“So now he's suddenly, desperately, using all kinds of justifications: Liberating the Iranian people, Iran is fighting against civilization,” Parsi said. “If he actually had a case, he would have stuck to that point and made it clearly. But he doesn't have one.”
The devastating American and Israeli attacks have killed hundreds of Iranians, and the death toll continues to rise.
As independent media, what we do next matters a lot. It's up to us to report the truth, demand accountability, and reckon with the consequences of U.S. militarism at this cataclysmic historical moment.
Trump may be an authoritarian, but he is not entirely invulnerable, nor are the elected officials who have given him pass after pass. We cannot let him believe for a second longer that he can get away with something this wildly illegal or recklessly dangerous without accountability.
We ask for your support as we carry out our media resistance to unchecked militarism. Please make a tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation to Truthout.
Stephen Prager is a staff writer for Common Dreams.
Get the news you want, delivered to your inbox every day.
Truthout is working overtime to bring you the latest on Iran. In deep opposition to Trump's militarism, we are producing media of truth and accountability in this moment of crisis. We ask for your support. Please make a tax-deductible donation today.
“It's insane this is legal,” one lawmaker said, questioning whether Trump officials used insider knowledge to win bets.
Truthout is a vital news source and a living history of political struggle. If you think our work is valuable, support us with a donation of any size.
The betting website Polymarket saw $529 million traded on bets predicting when the United States and Israel would conduct their first bombing campaign against Iran last week.
Six newly-created accounts on the site made a profit of over $1 million on their own, correctly predicting the first strike in the war would happen on February 28. The unusual activity on the site has prompted several critics to suggest that some of the bets were made by people with insider information about the attack — a disturbing new form of war profiteering in the digital age.
Polymarket also saw $31 million in bets relating to when Ayatollah Ali Khamenei would be removed from power. Other betting sites had similar wagers, including Kalshi, which saw $36 million in bet volume regarding when regime change might take place.
Khamenei was killed by joint U.S.-Israel operations over the weekend. Polymarket defended the premise of allowing users to bet on acts of war.
“The promise of prediction markets is to harness the wisdom of the crowd to create accurate, unbiased forecasts for the most important events to society,” the website said on Saturday, adding “that ability is particularly invaluable in gut-wrenching times.”
The betting website further claimed that prediction markets give people most affected by events on the ground “the answers they needed in ways TV news” and social media couldn't provide.
Notably, none of these bets provided answers regarding when people should shelter in place in real time, or where direct attacks were set to take place.The claim that bets such as these provide people with needed information is also questionable when the internet in Iran is highly regulated, or in the case of this past weekend, completely blacked out.
Making millions of dollars from bets on the start of a war — in which hundreds of people have already been killed, including children — is a grotesque endeavor, many observers have noted. Some lawmakers are calling for regulating the practice.
Rep. Mike Levin (D-California) panned the betting website over these types of transactions, and questioned whether profiteering of this sort — including for members of President Donald Trump's own family — should be allowed.
“Reminder that Donald Trump Jr. sits on Polymarket's advisory board and his firm invested double-digit millions into the platform last year,” Levin wrote on X, adding, “the DOJ and CFTC both had active investigations into Polymarket that were dropped after Trump took office.”
“Prediction markets cannot be a vehicle for profiting off advance knowledge of military action. We need answers, transparency, and oversight,” Levin stated.
“It's insane this is legal,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut) said. “People around Trump are profiting off war and death. I'm introducing legislation ASAP to ban this.”
Murphy had similar qualms about “rigged markets” regarding bets on how long Trump's State of the Union address would be, claiming at the time that “Trump's inside circle KNOW THE ANSWER and can make a mint.”
As of Monday morning, Polymarket continues to host multiple betting options relating to the war in Iran open on its website, including “Will the Iranian regime fall by June 30,” “When will a U.S.-Iran ceasefire happen,” bets on specific dates the U.S. or Israel will launch strikes on Iran, and bets on whether a full invasion of the country will happen by the end of this year.
The devastating American and Israeli attacks have killed hundreds of Iranians, and the death toll continues to rise.
As independent media, what we do next matters a lot. It's up to us to report the truth, demand accountability, and reckon with the consequences of U.S. militarism at this cataclysmic historical moment.
Trump may be an authoritarian, but he is not entirely invulnerable, nor are the elected officials who have given him pass after pass. We cannot let him believe for a second longer that he can get away with something this wildly illegal or recklessly dangerous without accountability.
We ask for your support as we carry out our media resistance to unchecked militarism. Please make a tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation to Truthout.
This article is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), and you are free to share and republish under the following terms:
Chris Walker is a news writer at Truthout, based in Madison, Wisconsin. Focusing on both national and local topics since the early 2000s, he has produced thousands of articles analyzing the issues of the day and their impact on people. He can be found on most social media platforms under the handle @thatchriswalker.
Get the news you want, delivered to your inbox every day.
Truthout is working overtime to bring you the latest on Iran. In deep opposition to Trump's militarism, we are producing media of truth and accountability in this moment of crisis. We ask for your support. Please make a tax-deductible donation today.
Activists who dispute safety of vaccines are pushing to limit immunization requirements in schools
As South Carolina grapples with a measles outbreak that has infected nearly 1,000 people, groups with ties to the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr, are pushing to eliminate immunization requirements that protect children.
Activists are targeting vaccine mandates in states trying to tamp down measles as communities across the country struggle to stop the worst spread of the illness since the early 1990s. The Guardian found anti-vaccine groups are encouraging their followers to organize opposition to vaccine mandates in more than 20 states, including at least six with current measles outbreaks.
Leaders of this campaign include the anti-vaccine organization Kennedy led for years, a group run by his longtime book publisher, and Leslie Manookian, an Idaho film-maker, homeopath and activist whom Kennedy has called his friend.
Doctors and advocates for children's health warn that removing or weakening mandates, particularly those that require vaccination in schools, will lead to lower vaccination rates – and more illness and suffering for families.
“We will see more outbreaks. We will see children missing school, parents missing work,” said Dr Jana Shaw, an infectious disease specialist who has conducted research on vaccine hesitancy. “We will see increased costs for those families whose children will get sick and develop complications and disability. Some of them will die.”
The groups pushing to end such laws say that vaccine mandates, including those that require children to get immunized to go to school, violate the freedom people should have to take part in activities such as school or work without getting immunized. They often underpin their justifications for that position by providing false or misleading information to their supporters that plays up the risks of vaccines and downplays the dangers of illness.
School immunization requirements are a crucial tool that helps keep vaccination rates high and incidents of infections such as measles and pertussis, known as whooping cough, low. Shaw has found that children who live in counties with more people who refuse vaccines have a higher risk of getting pertussis. Even children who are vaccinated are at a higher risk of getting infected in those communities because the illness can spread more easily.
What's more, Shaw said, research has shown that children who are intentionally exempted from vaccination can end up becoming the source of pertussis and measles infections in schools.
“It never is just about you,” said Shaw, a professor of pediatrics at Suny Upstate Medical University. “That's why we have those immunization laws, because we recognize that your choices impact others.”
Among the groups pushing the changes is the recently formed Medical Freedom Act Coalition, which has brought together 15 organizations to advocate for legislation modeled on a 2025 Idaho law that prohibits medical mandates in many settings. Organizers said in interviews they oppose every kind of medical mandate.
“This is the most basic human right, the right to decide what we put into and on our bodies,” said Manookian, one of the leaders of the new coalition, who is based in Idaho and was a driving force behind the law.
The coalition is led by Manookian's group, the Health Freedom Defense Fund, and Stand for Health Freedom, which has been working since 2019 to influence vaccine-related state legislation. Among the 15 groups that have joined are Kennedy-affiliated anti-vaccine groups including Maha Action, run by his publisher Tony Lyons, and Children's Health Defense, which Kennedy led before he joined the Trump administration.
Manookian said the coalition is not spreading false facts.
“Epidemiological data is being used politically and selectively to create a scapegoat for routine infection rates that rise and fall, every year,” Manookian said.
She announced the coalition's formation on a Maha Action organizing video call in January that Kennedy and his deputy chief of staff, Stefanie Spear, also attended. The organizing calls, which usually last an hour and are held weekly, feature speakers promoting work they are doing to advance Kennedy's “Make America Healthy Again” agenda. Though Kennedy addressed a different topic – whole milk – and spoke before Manookian did, he gave her a shoutout at the end of his comments. “I see a lot of my friends out there. I see Leslie Manookian,” Kennedy said.
Manookian said no one at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has been involved in the Medical Freedom Act Coalition, and she doesn't know if Kennedy is aware of its work.
HHS spokesperson Emily Hilliard said vaccination “remains the most effective way to prevent measles”, but did not answer a question about whether Kennedy supported the coalition's work to end school vaccine mandates in the states.
The coalition has backed bills to end mandates in Arizona, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, New York, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Vermont, Jill Hines, director of advocacy for Stand for Health Freedom, said.
Some bills have failed to advance. In New Hampshire, for example, a bill the coalition backed to prohibit school vaccine mandates died after failing to get enough support from both Republicans and Democrats.
But after a medical freedom bill in Iowa died, the advocates moved on and backed a different bill that would end school vaccine mandates. Hines said more legislation is on the way.
In addition to those bills, Stand for Health Freedom has put out action alerts for its state partners, asking supporters to contact governors and lawmakers to ask them to end vaccine mandates in 19 states, a review by the Guardian found. Those states include at least six experiencing current measles outbreaks: South Carolina, Arizona, Florida, Utah, Washington state and North Dakota.
And in South Carolina, the group published an appeal asking supporters to email members of a legislative committee to urge them to vote no on a bill introduced in February by a Democratic lawmaker. The bill would tighten requirements that children receive the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine before being allowed to go to school.
Hines said she didn't see how removing mandates could lead to more illnesses like measles and children dying.
“I don't see how the two are even connected,” Hines said, adding: “If anybody is concerned about it, they can still go get a vaccine. What we want to prevent is the coerced medicalization of individuals, especially children.”
While South Carolina mandates school vaccines, it allows families to opt out of those requirements by getting a religious or medical exemption. In recent years, the number of exemptions has risen and the number of children getting vaccinated has fallen. Some schools in the center of the outbreak in Spartanburg county have vaccination rates as low as 80% or even lower, far below the 95% herd immunity level that keeps most people safe.
The Guardian found that in making their case against vaccine mandates, the groups insisted that vaccines were more dangerous than the deadly diseases they prevent. One communication published on Stand for Health Freedom's website, for example, characterizes a measles infection as mild while arguing for weaker vaccine laws in South Carolina. When she was asked to clarify the assertion that a measles infection is mild, Hines pointed to research from 1962, which was published before the introduction of the measles vaccine in 1963 and suggested the common cold was of more significance than measles in terms of short-term morbidity.
The research paper also, however, called measles “an important health problem” and expressed hope that it could soon be eradicated thanks to “new and potent tools”.
Shaw said measles causes a broad range of symptoms, some mild, but complications are common, and there's no way to know ahead of time who will become severely ill.
In an interview with the Guardian and in at least one public appearance, Manookian said that measles outbreaks were being “hyped”.
“They're trying to make you think that there's this huge epidemic and it's just not the case,” she said in a recent video in which she discussed the coalition's anti-mandate work.
In fact, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported more than 1,100 measles cases in 2026 so far on top of more than 2,200 last year, when three people died and hundreds were hospitalized. The US hasn't seen such a high number of cases in the past 35 years.
In the same video, Manookian acknowledged that lawmakers have challenged her by raising the threat posed by a potential resurgence of polio. But she dismissed that idea and, in response to queries from the Guardian, said she questioned whether the vaccines were the reason that polio rates declined. Medical experts attribute the near eradication of polio to vaccines.
Later, Manookian said: “Your child is more likely to suffer injury or death from the meningitis vaccine than they are from meningitis. That's how dangerous that injection is.” She later added the chances of getting meningitis are “extremely low”.
But Patsy Stinchfield, past president of the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, said the rate of severe side effects of the meningococcal vaccine is rare to nonexistent. She added that if a child gets meningococcal meningitis, the chances of dying from it are about one in 10.
Manookian also disputed that measles caused the deaths of two girls in Texas last year, pointing the Guardian to Kennedy's former anti-vaccine group, Children's Health Defense, as one of her sources. Local medical officials, health authorities and Kennedy's own CDC attribute their deaths to measles.
In South Carolina, Hafeezah Yates of the pro-vaccine advocacy group South Carolina Families for Vaccines said she has heard false information about vaccines being shared during statehouse testimony, both from people testifying and from some lawmakers. But when medical doctors and scientists share science-based information to counter it, it doesn't seem to make a difference to people who are dug in because of mistrust that developed during the Covid-19 pandemic.
She worries about the large number of bills being introduced around the country that, if passed, would profoundly affect how society functions – overloading the medical system, disrupting school for children and other long-term consequences not yet anticipated.
Yates pointed to new modeling from the Yale School of Public Health, which predicts that a sustained 1% annual decline in the vaccination rate for measles, mumps and rubella could cost the US a total of $7.8bn by 2030, on top of many more people being hospitalized and dying.
“This is way bigger than one state,” Yates said. “Life will change for us in a way that we are not prepared to handle.”
MOSCOW, March 2. /TASS/. Russia is ready to use all opportunities to stabilize the situation in the Middle East, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a telephone conversation with King of Bahrain Hamad bin Isai Al Khalifa in the context of the US-Israeli attack on Iran.
The current development of events "also threatens the security of many Arab states, with which Russia maintains friendly relations," according to the Russian side.
"With all this in mind, Vladimir Putin confirmed the readiness of the Russian side to use all available opportunities to actively contribute to the stabilization of the situation in the region," the Kremlin's press service reported.
The United States and Israel launched a large-scale military operation against Iran on February 28. Major Iranian cities, including Tehran, were struck. The White House justified the attack by citing alleged missile and nuclear threats from Iran. At the same time, US leadership openly called on the Iranian population to rise up against their government and seize power. As a result of the strikes, Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and several other senior figures in the leadership of the Islamic Republic were killed. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps announced a retaliatory operation, targeting sites in Israel. US military bases in Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Kuwait, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia were also hit.
Markets
Hot Stocks
Fear & Greed Index
Latest Market News
Hot Stocks
President Donald Trump is coming under increasing pressure to explain his military campaign in Iran to the American people.
So far, the president has not delivered a prime-time address or held a press conference. He ignored shouted questions from reporters as he flew from Florida to Washington on Sunday. “Pre-recorded social media clips won't cut it,” Democratic Sen. Chris Coons remarked.
Trump made brief remarks about the conflict at the beginning of a previously scheduled Medal of Honor ceremony on Monday morning.
But for the most part Trump is communicating on his own terms — in ways that didn't even exist for past presidents in wartime. Over the weekend he posted updates to the social media platform he controls; chatted with reporters who called his cell phone; shared links to supportive op-eds; and even cracked a joke at the Iranian Navy's expense.
On Monday morning, he gave a nine-minute phone interview to CNN anchor Jake Tapper.
Trump has projected strength but has also sent mixed messages about the objectives of the military strikes. The New York Times, after a brief phone interview with Trump, said he offered “several seemingly contradictory visions” about a transition of power in Iran.
Earlier, when Trump spoke with an Axios reporter on Saturday, he suggested the military campaign might not take long: “I can go long and take over the whole thing, or end it in two or three days.”
Then, on Sunday, he told the Daily Mail that “it's always been a four-week process,” and he told The Times “we intended four to five weeks” for the joint US-Israel attacks in Iran.
In another phone call, this one with reporters from MS NOW, Trump — a cable news obsessive — indicated that he'd been watching news coverage of the combat operations. He said he had seen “celebrations” of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's death both inside Iran and on the streets of Los Angeles.
That call, MS NOW said, was less than a minute long. It reflects Trump's scattershot approach to communicating about the conflict — a Truth Social post here, a phone call there.
“There's no better communicator than our president,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said at a press conference Monday morning.
Trump officials decline Sunday show invitations amid Iran strikes
During the first weekend of fighting, Trump's main messages came via two web videos recorded and published by the White House.
The first video, early Saturday morning, announced the combat operations and called on Iranians to topple their leader. The second, on Sunday afternoon, highlighted Khamenei's death and said the US and Israel were acting “to ensure security” for the world.
The videos totaled 14 minutes and contained claims that fact-checkers and government sources have challenged.
The taped video format gave Trump an unusual amount of control — the opportunity to record more than once, for instance, and to edit out remarks.
The videos were an end run around the news media and a break from presidential tradition, as CNN's chief White House correspondent Kaitlan Collins noted on air.
“Typically,” she said, US presidents deliver speeches “in front of the White House press pool,” with reporters there to bear witness and try to ask questions.
In another break from tradition, Trump did not deliver an Oval Office address announcing the outbreak of war, a format past presidents have utilized to amass the country's attention and influence public opinion.
“By eschewing an address to the nation, Trump clearly has no plan or intention to explain to the American people why we went to war with Iran, what happens next, and what victory looks like,” Dan Pfeiffer, a former communications director for President Barack Obama, told CNN.
“By offering a different spin to every reporter whose call he answers, he comes across as making it up as he goes, which is probably the case,” Pfeiffer added.
In a Sunday night tweet, Trump communications director Steven Cheung ridiculed talk of an Oval Office address by linking it to “failed policies of the past.”
As a practical matter, Trump was at his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida when the strikes began, hundreds of miles from Washington.
But Cheung said Trump “spent the majority of his time monitoring the situation in a secure facility, in constant contact with world leaders,” and he called Trump's two web videos “multiple addresses to the nation” that “garnered hundreds of millions of views.”
His estimate of the view count is no doubt true, given the enormity of the news Trump announced.
Trump's Truth Social site is tiny by the standards of the modern social web. In January, the site registered only 23.8 million visits while X had 4.5 billion. But Trump's videos were almost instantly reshared by the White House on other platforms, like X, and were rebroadcast by TV networks around the world.
The US Agency for Global Media, which Trump sought to dismantle last year but is still in partial operation, promoted the fact that it translated his Saturday morning video into Persian and beamed it into Iran.
Trump's next post on Truth Social, after that video, was a link to a right-wing news article titled “Iran tried to interfere in 2020, 2024 elections to stop Trump, and now faces renewed war with United States.”
The US intelligence community has previously assessed that Iran carried out covert influence campaigns to undercut Trump's candidacy in both 2020 and 2024.
But the invocation of that fact on Saturday morning, as Trump announced strikes, perhaps suggested a more personal motivation on the president's part.
Later, in a Sunday night phone call with ABC's Jon Karl, Trump referenced an Iranian plot to kill him in 2024. “I got him before he got me. They tried twice. Well, I got him first,” Trump said.
When three US servicemembers were killed in an initial stage of the war, the announcement was made by US Central Command on X.
Trump did not respond when reporters shouted questions to him about the military deaths on Sunday night.
But when Trump had a chance to brag about a military accomplishment, he did just that, writing on Truth Social that “we have destroyed and sunk 9 Iranian Naval Ships, some of them relatively large and important.”
He also asserted that “we largely destroyed their Naval Headquarters,” then quipped, “Other than that, their Navy is doing very well!”
Members of Trump's inner circle have also been active on social media platforms.
Daniel Torok, the chief White House photographer, pointed out on X that his photos of Trump in a classified briefing about the strikes were taken “around the 15 hour mark of his ~17 hour workday” on Friday and into Saturday.
Torok's photos were part of the administration's effort to shape public opinion – though many commentators pointed out that those efforts have paled in comparison to past American war efforts.
Trump only devoted a few paragraphs of his February 25 State of the Union address to Iran. “My preference is to solve this problem through diplomacy,” he said then. “But one thing is certain, I will never allow the world's No. 1 sponsor of terror, which they are by far, to have a nuclear weapon, can't let that happen.”
Some critics have charged the Trump administration with failing to make the case for war.
“I never in my life thought that I would feel nostalgic for being lied to by George W. Bush in the run-up to the Iraq war,” New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg said on MS NOW last month, “but this is an administration that doesn't even feel the need to propagandize the population, because it doesn't feel like it needs the consent of the governed at all.”
Ben Domenech, opinion editor for The Daily Wire, a Trump-aligned right-wing media outlet, wrote on Monday that Trump “didn't sell America on Iran” because “he doesn't need to.”
Domenech argued that “Americans assess foreign policy and national security not as ever-running aspects of their datily lives, but as a binary: success, or failure. We like to win. We hate to lose.”
Most stock quote data provided by BATS. US market indices are shown in real time, except for the S&P 500 which is refreshed every two minutes. All times are ET. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices Copyright S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and/or its affiliates. Fair value provided by IndexArb.com. Market holidays and trading hours provided by Copp Clark Limited.
© 2026 Cable News Network. A Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All Rights Reserved. CNN Sans ™ & © 2016 Cable News Network.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app on Google Play.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app from the Apple Store.
Video geolocated by CNN show a US military aircraft crashing and crew parachuting to the ground in Kuwait. US Central Command said three US F-15E fighter jets were lost to "friendly fire" amid ongoing strikes from Iran. CNN's Ivan Watson reports.
© 2026 Cable News Network. A Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All Rights Reserved. CNN Sans ™ & © 2016 Cable News Network.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app on Google Play.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app from the Apple Store.
RT Arabic has evacuated its office in the Iranian capital, Tehran, after a nearby airstrike, the channel reported on Monday. There were no immediate reports of casualties among its staff.
Branch chief Hami Hamedi has shared several videos showing a building which he said had just been destroyed next to the RT office.
He said a gas leak, which can be heard in the footage, prompted his decision to instruct staff to urgently leave the premises.
A separate clip shows nearby buildings with windows shattered by the blast wave.
On Saturday, the US and Israel launched a joint military attack against Iran, aimed at killing the country's leaders and replacing its government.
Russia has condemned the decision to use military force as an act of unprovoked aggression and called the targeted killing of the Islamic Republic's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a political assassination that undermines basic principles of international relations.
RT launched its Arabic-language broadcast arm in 2007. The channel, also known as Rusiya Al-Yaum, is headquartered in Moscow and has regional offices in several Arab-speaking nations.
In 2023, RT Arabic's branch in Gaza was destroyed amid the Israeli campaign targeting the militant movement Hamas, which resulted in devastation of large parts of the Palestinian enclave.
RT News App
© Autonomous Nonprofit Organization “TV-Novosti”, 2005–2026. All rights reserved.
This website uses cookies. Read RT Privacy policy to find out more.
Lawmakers from Sanders to Mark Kelly offer mixed feelings on Trump's action and killing of Iranian supreme leader
As Republicans celebrated the death of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, with praise for Donald Trump's decisive action, Democrats faced their own divisions and a reckoning over how to present a united front.
Most were quick to condemn the US president for sidelining Congress to launch an illegal and unconstitutional war and demanded a swift vote on a war powers resolution that would restrain his military onslaught.
But some in the party also felt obliged to acknowledge the authoritarian Khamenei's death as a positive development and demonstrate their support for US troops. A small band of centrist Democrats have even threatened to scupper a war powers resolution if it comes to the floor.
“President Trump has been willing to do what's right and necessary to produce real peace in the region,” tweeted John Fetterman, a Democratic senator for Pennsylvania and staunch supporter of Israel, declaring himself a “hard no” on a war powers vote and posting an image of the ayatollah with the provocative statement: “Let's see who grieves for that garbage.”
Democratic leaders were outspoken during the massive US military buildup in the Middle East, decrying his unwillingness to engage with Congress and lack of long-term strategy for Iran. They noted that it was Trump, during his first term, who shredded Barack Obama's nuclear agreement with Iran.
Once the US and Israeli military struck on Saturday, the sharpest voices accused the president of riding roughshod over the constitution. Senator Bernie Sanders denounced the assault as “an illegal, premeditated and unconstitutional war”, while Senator Chris Van Hollen warned it amounted to a “regime-change war” that would leave the US less secure. Senator Tim Kaine, long a thorn in the side of presidents of both parties on war powers, called the strikes “a colossal mistake” and demanded a swift vote requiring Trump to seek authorisation.
Others, however, were more qualified. Tom Suozzi, a New York Democrat who co-chairs the Problem Solvers caucus, wrote on X: “I agree with the President's objectives that Iran can never be allowed to obtain nuclear capabilities.” Henry Cuellar of Texas said the threat posed by Iran was “real and longstanding”.
And not all Democrats are lining up behind a war powers rebuke. In the House of Representatives, Josh Gottheimer applauded the administration's “decisive action” to defend American interests and allies. Greg Landsman argued that the US “is destroying Iran's missiles and bombs to stop them from taking more lives”, and said he would oppose a resolution that he fears would amount to abandoning Israel.
Congressman Jared Moskowitz rehearsed Tehran's long record of sponsoring violence across the region and insisted the focus must now be on shaping what comes next rather than relitigating what has already happened.
There may be enough defections to block a war powers resolution, although a few libertarian Republicans could join those in favor. The split also exposes a deeper unease within Democratic ranks over how robustly to confront Iran and how far to go in backing Israeli military action. There are also political traps as Republicans accuse them of lacking patriotism and ignoring the Iranian diaspora who have taken to the streets to celebrate Khamenei's downfall.
The discomfort is embodied by Senator Mark Kelly, a former combat pilot and potential 2028 presidential contender. Appearing on NBC's Meet the Press, Kelly was asked if he agrees with Lindsey Graham, a hawkish Republican senator, that the world is now safer because the supreme leader of Iran is dead.
Kelly replied: “Well, I agree with that part. I mean, it's a good thing that the supreme leader is gone and some of the folks around him.”
But he also delivered a withering assessment of the White House's preparation. “Hope is not a strategy,” Kelly warned, questioning whether the administration had any serious plan for the aftermath. Air power can destroy targets, he added, but fully eliminating capabilities without boots on the ground is “incredibly challenging”.
The congressional debate over war powers would mostly be symbolic. Even if a resolution were to pass the narrowly split Congress, Trump likely would veto it and Congress would not have the two-thirds majority needed to overturn that rejection. Congress has often failed to block other US military actions, including in a Senate vote on Venezuela, but the roll calls stand as a public record.
Joel Rubin, a former assistant deputy secretary of state, said: “You have two streams on this. You have a chunk that is virulently opposed to any military action whatsoever related to Iran. That's a minority, but it's a significant minority and it's an important group of members and they're loud. They frame it as an illegal activity, even though it's not, but they call it that and then they slip into a variety of other arguments against military action.
“The second group are basically we don't like the process, we needed to be briefed, we needed more clarity about how long it's going to be, what's the on-the-ground operation – process questions and should-have-come-to-Congress kind of stuff, but not necessarily opposed to what's happening.”
Democrats were divided over an Iraq vote in 2002, a Yemen war powers vote in 2019 and the first Trump administration's strike on Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in 2020. Some are already casting their minds forward to the midterm elections. Rubin, a former Democratic congressional candidate, added: “It's part of the overall positioning in the primaries, without a doubt. It's going be hard for Democratic candidates to be nuanced on this. They will try but it'll depend a lot on their district.”
In Texas the two top contenders in the Democratic Senate primary left little daylight between them. Congresswoman Jasmine Crockett posted on social media: “CONGRESS, not the PRESIDENT, but CONGRESS has the EXCLUSIVE authority to declare war!” State representative James Talarico posted on social media: “No more forever wars.”
In Maine, Graham Platner, a marine veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a progressive running in Senate primary, released a video to condemn Trump: “He is doing this because he is flailing politically. He ran on ending foreign intervention like this. But because he sees his political future at risk, he is willing to send young American men and women into harm's way.”
His primary rival, Maine governor Janet Mills, is typically seen as a more moderate figure but appeared keen that Platner would not outflank her, accusing Trump of “recklessly pushing the United States into a dangerous conflict in the Middle East”. She added: “This is yet another abuse of power from a president who constantly disregards the rule of law.”
Conflict in the Middle East has moved from a fringe risk to a top worry for investors unsettled by the prospect of a power struggle in Iran and a protracted regional war, with ramifications for everything from global trade to inflation.
Oil prices shot higher on Monday, while gold rose alongside government borrowing costs as financial markets came to grips with U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran at the weekend that killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
For now, investors were pricing in the conflict remaining relatively contained, analysts said, leaving plenty of scope for market volatility should it escalate further.
Iran has struck back at Gulf cities, with airlines halting flights and tankers carrying oil and other products suspending transit through the key Strait of Hormuz.
The first risk for markets is the uncertainty over what happens next in Iran, given the complexities of the Islamic Republic's ruling system.
That then complicates the outlook for oil prices which have gained for weeks and are now hostage to what oil-producing countries do and how the passage of tankers through the Middle East is affected, with big implications for inflation worldwide and even the safety of bonds.
Brent crude was up nearly 10 per cent at US$79 on Monday for a gain of nearly 30 per cent so far this year, but remains far below the US$100 level analysts reckon it would exceed in a prolonged conflict.
“This is a relatively moderate reaction considering that the Strait of Hormuz, through which around 20 per cent of global oil consumption passes, is effectively closed,” said Commerzbank's chief economist Joerg Kraemer.
“At the moment, market participants seem to be expecting a shorter war lasting only a few weeks,” said Kraemer, who also sees this scenario as most likely.
The bigger risk, analysts said, may be complacency in markets that have assumed the fallout would be limited, like it was during last June's “12-Day War” in Iran or during Russia's numerous attacks on Ukraine.
“History argues strongly in favor of selling geopolitical risk premium when hostilities start,” Barclays analysts said in a note on Saturday. “What worries us is that investors have now learned this pattern and might be underpricing a scenario where containment fails.”
They point to other factors that could exacerbate a selloff should the conflict escalate, such as existing concerns around the artificial intelligence boom and private credit markets.
“We see further (market) downside in the coming days,” said Jefferies economist Mohit Kumar, who had already derisked last week on concerns markets were complacent on geopolitics.
“At some point we would be ready to buy the dip, but that some point seems far for now.”
In typical flight to safety, the dollar was broadly higher on Monday, gold rose over 2 per cent and European stocks dropped nearly 2 per cent, with futures pointing to a similar open for U.S. stocks. The Swiss franc, a safe haven, rose to its highest since 2015 against the euro.
The yen, another safe haven, weakened against the dollar however.
Government bond yields, which initially dropped, then ticked higher as investors trimmed their rate cut bets across major central banks. That reflects more of a focus on the inflationary implications of the oil price.
William Jackson, chief emerging markets economist at Capital Economics, expects a prolonged conflict affecting supply could cause oil prices to jump to around US$100, potentially adding 0.6-0.7 percentage points to global inflation.
“In my view, the market has already been overestimating inflationary forces, so I don't think this will change much. There will be more impact on Europe than U.S. given the closer proximity of Hormuz oil and gas post-Russia,” said Tariq Dennison, a wealth adviser at Zurich-based GFM Asset Management.
The euro was last down over 0.8 per cent against the dollar at US$1.17, with a surge in oil prices perhaps an unwelcome reminder of the energy-importing bloc's crisis at the start of Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
“Investors have been overweight the euro and European assets on the recovery story this year – a story that will naturally be challenged this week by higher energy prices,” ING said.
Some analysts expect Iran will not be able to disrupt trade in the Gulf region and the impact on oil prices will be contained.
“We wouldn't be surprised if any selloff in the S&P 500 on Monday morning turns into a rally, driven by expectations of lower oil prices once the latest Middle East war ends,” said Ed Yardeni, president of New York-based Yardeni Research.
“The price of gold might also round-trip on Monday. Bond yields might fall due to both safe-haven demand and post-war prospects for lower oil prices,” he said.
Report an editorial error
Report a technical issue
Authors and topics you follow will be added to your personal news feed in Following.
© Copyright 2026 The Globe and Mail Inc. All rights reserved.
Andrew Saunders, President and CEO
NEW YORK, March 2. /TASS/. The US leadership is considering launching a military operation on Cuba, based on the results of its similar actions against Venezuela and Iran, The Atlantic reported, citing sources.
US President Donald Trump and his administration are feeling like they are "on a roll, like, this is working," the magazine wrote. Inspired by his operations against Venezuela and Iran, Trump sees himself as the first modern American leader who could complete what others only flirted with. The US president believes he could cement his legacy above that of Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan.
The Trump administration also believes that toppling the Cuban government fits into its key objective of solidifying dominance in the Western Hemisphere.
However, Washington's current emphasis is on holding talks with Cuba, coupled with intensified economic pressure on the Latin American country. The decision about a potential military operation will be made based on longer term results of US attacks on Venezuela and Iran. Besides, some in the White House warn that a potential operation against Cuba is fraught with risks as it could cause an influx of refugees to the United States.
An aerial view of the Iranian shores and the island of Qeshm in the Strait of Hormuz from 2023 shows just how narrow the waterway is.Nicolas Economou/Reuters
Beijing on Monday reiterated its call for the U.S. and Israel to immediately cease military operations against Iran, warning the global economy could be imperiled as the war expanded to multiple Middle Eastern countries and threatened shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
Around 20 per cent of the world's oil and gas supply passes through the Persian Gulf into the Arabian Sea before it's transported to destinations around the world, making the Strait and its adjacent waters “vital international routes for cargo and the energy trade,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning told reporters on Monday.
“Safeguarding security and stability in this region serves the common interests of the international community,” she added. “China urges all parties to immediately cease military actions, prevent further escalation of tensions, and avoid regional turbulence inflicting greater damage on global economic development.”
A long-standing ally of Iran, Beijing appeared to have been caught off guard by this weekend's attacks on Tehran, describing the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as “trampling on the purposes and principles of the UN Charter and basic norms in international relations.”
Ms. Mao said China had not been notified in advance of the military operation and was watching the developments with concern. Some 3,000 Chinese nationals have been evacuated from Iran, she added, while at least one Chinese citizen was killed in the bombing of the Iranian capital.
As with heavily sanctioned Venezuelan oil, China was a major buyer of Iranian crude. Disruptions to this supply could hurt small-scale Chinese refiners that specialize in oil that cannot go to market in much of the world. But the broader Chinese economy should be resilient to any immediate shocks from the war in Iran, said Wang Yiwei, a professor of international affairs at Renmin University in Beijing.
“China already has massive petroleum reserves, plus new energy sources now account for about one-third of our structure,” he said. “On land, Russia is stable, and combined with our large petroleum reserves and new energy, I feel we've already made preparations for the worst-case scenarios.”
Oil prices surged Monday as traders priced in major disruptions to the Iranian supply, at least in the short term, which could have a knock-on effect on demand for crude from other countries. This could be exacerbated if Iran's retaliatory attacks and closing of the Strait of Hormuz also slows shipments of oil from Saudi Arabia – by far the largest non-sanctioned international supplier.
Alex Holmes, regional director for Asia-Pacific at the Economist Intelligence Unit, said in an e-mail that emerging economies in the region will likely feel a jump in oil prices the hardest. He added they could see a brief spike in the cost of consumer goods, similar to the early months of Russia's war in Ukraine.
“Although China imports discounted Iranian crude – often routed through third countries as a proxy – recent trade data show no surge in purchases,” Mr. Holmes said. “Russia and Iran continue to compete for the Chinese market through steep discounts, underscoring the commercial logic behind China's buying decisions.”
China will rue any regime change in Iran, as it is likely to further undermine Beijing's position in the Middle East, where only years ago it seemed poised to be a major player. However, the United States' brazen aggression and President Donald Trump's failure to elucidate any clear legal basis for the war could reinforce China's positioning of itself as the sole responsible superpower.
“The negative repercussions of America's conduct in the international community may even constitute a fundamental undermining of the ‘rules-based order' that the United States has long promoted, as well as the value system it has emphasized for many years,” said Su Hao, a professor of international relations at China Foreign Affairs University.
“After Venezuela and now Iran, this represents a huge blow to the dignity and credibility of the United States and the entire Western camp.”
Renmin University's Prof. Wang agreed, noting “the postwar international system – entirely created by the United States itself – has now been personally destroyed by America, and this is something Europe is worried about, and the world as a whole is worried about.”
For years now, China has been seeking to reshape that postwar order, replacing or supplementing the UN with bodies dominated by Beijing, such as the BRICS economic grouping and massive economic and infrastructure projects under the Belt and Road Initiative. In a Monday editorial, the state-run Global Times said “sudden changes in the Middle East have further highlighted the urgency and extreme importance of promoting reform in the global governance system.”
Mr. Trump is scheduled to visit China at the end of this month. The U.S. President may be hoping that by killing Mr. Khamenei and destabilizing the regime, he'll be able to remove Iran from the agenda and thus “have more bargaining chips,” Prof. Wang said. “But I don't think that's something China is afraid of.”
Asked Monday whether Mr. Trump's visit would go ahead, Ms. Mao said the two sides were “maintaining communication on this issue.”
With reports from Alexandra Li in Beijing
Report an editorial error
Report a technical issue
Editorial code of conduct
Authors and topics you follow will be added to your personal news feed in Following.
© Copyright 2026 The Globe and Mail Inc. All rights reserved.
Andrew Saunders, President and CEO
Since its founding in 1922, Foreign Affairs has been the leading forum for serious discussion of American foreign policy and global affairs. The magazine has featured contributions from many leading international affairs experts.
RICHARD FONTAINE is CEO of the Center for a New American Security. He has worked at the U.S. Department of State, on the National Security Council, and as a foreign policy adviser to U.S. Senator John McCain.
Iran, Venezuela, and the End of the Powell Doctrine
Richard Fontaine
When bombs began falling on Iran this weekend, most Americans were as surprised as the rest of the world. The U.S. force posture in the Middle East had been building in the preceding weeks, but negotiations between Washington and Tehran were still underway. Even as the U.S. military readied for an attack, the Trump administration obscured the exact objective. There was remarkably little national debate, scant discussion with U.S. allies, and no vote in Congress about the desirability of conflict. Two days into the war, administration officials have yet to articulate a specific vision for how it will end. Instead of employing decisive force, U.S. President Donald Trump is prioritizing flexibility. This stance reflects a new way of war—visible across multiple Trump interventions, from the Red Sea to Venezuela—that inverts traditional thinking on the use of force.
Indeed, in many ways, Trump's use of force is the anti–Powell Doctrine. Developed during the Gulf War (1990–91) by General Colin Powell, who later served as secretary of state, the Powell Doctrine held that force should be employed only as a last resort, after all nonviolent means have been exhausted. If war is necessary, however, it should proceed in pursuit of a clear objective, with a clear exit strategy, and with public support. It should employ overwhelming, decisive force to defeat the enemy, using every resource—military, economic, political, social—available. Derived from the lessons of Vietnam, the approach was designed to avoid protracted conflicts, high death tolls, financial losses, and domestic divisions. As Powell later wrote, military leaders could not “quietly acquiesce in halfhearted warfare for half-baked reasons that the American people could not understand or support.”
Powell's approach, which built on criteria established by Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger in the 1980s, spurred debate from the start. Some critics thought the all-or-nothing approach to war would preclude the tailored use of force to achieve modest but still important goals. For supporters of the doctrine, that was precisely the point, and they saw continued interventions, such as those undertaken by the Clinton administration in Somalia, Haiti, and the former Yugoslavia, as a misuse of military power that risked failure or quagmire.
The U.S. invasions of Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 were key tests of the approach. The George W. Bush administration sought to apply the Powell Doctrine in both cases. It declared war only after the Taliban and Iraqi leaders, respectively, ignored U.S. demands, and after the president spent considerable political capital to persuade Americans that the decisions to go to war were wise. The administration's stated objectives were clear: to eliminate the safe haven the Afghan government was providing al-Qaeda and to rid Iraq of weapons of mass destruction, respectively. It also sought and received congressional authorization in both cases. In Afghanistan, U.S. forces combined a lean on-the-ground presence with withering air attacks and support for fighters in the Northern Alliance, which entered Kabul and overthrew the Taliban. In Iraq, 160,000 U.S. troops launched a ground invasion to topple the regime. In both instances, the planned exit strategy was to turn governing institutions over to exiles, local leaders, and domestic security forces, after which American troops would come home.
Things clearly did not go according to plan in either case. Attempting to avoid prolonged conflicts brought them about anyway. The wars proved extraordinarily costly and deeply divisive, and their objectives seemed only to shift over time. Whether the interventions' problems came from a misapplication of the Powell Doctrine or from the misconception of the approach itself, the dark shadows of Afghanistan and Iraq have colored every U.S. military intervention of the past two decades, including the war now underway in Iran. In an effort to avoid repeating such debacles, the Trump administration has pursued something like their inverse. And while the Trump doctrine comes with serious challenges, it has also produced unexpected results—and it is likely here to stay.
This new approach to war began forming in Trump's first term and has solidified in his second. In 2017 and 2018, Trump ordered missile strikes against Bashar al-Assad's regime in Syria, and continued U.S. military operations in Iraq and Syria against the Islamic State (also known as ISIS), including the raid that killed the ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. In 2020, U.S. forces killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani. Last year, Trump launched a war against the Houthis in Yemen, destroyed key Iranian nuclear sites, and attacked militants in northern Nigeria. This year, his administration invaded Venezuela to seize its president, Nicolás Maduro, and, just two days ago, launched a major operation in Iran.
Those operations' departures from more traditional ways of employing force are striking. The Powell Doctrine, for its part, holds that war should be a last resort, turned to only after political, diplomatic, and economic means have failed to attain the desired objective. In 1990, President George H. W. Bush gave Saddam Hussein a deadline for withdrawing his forces from Kuwait, and a decade later, President George W. Bush gave both Saddam and the Taliban public ultimatums before beginning hostilities.
Trump's approach, on the other hand, has been to use ambiguity as a source of advantage, to catch his opponents off guard; the 2025 and 2026 U.S. attacks on Iran, for instance, took place as negotiations were ongoing. His administration issued no public ultimatums to Soleimani or Maduro. For Trump, it seems, force is not something to employ only when all other means have been exhausted, but rather one of several tools available to increase leverage, maximize surprise, and produce outcomes.
Another element of the Powell Doctrine that Trump seems to have done away with is the emphasis on public support. The Powell Doctrine treats the Vietnam-era protests against American intervention as the paradigmatic case to be avoided. If some objective is important enough for Americans to fight for, the thinking went, then the people in whose name the fighting takes place had better support it. Establishing such support generally requires the president to make a case, frequently and over the course of months. Congress is expected to demonstrate its own approval through a vote to authorize force after extended debate.
But not a single conflict during Trump's presidencies has been preceded by a campaign to win public support, and Congress has not voted to authorize any of them. Instead, each conflict began suddenly and followed an unpredictable course. Rather than lay out a case for each war, the president often insisted he hoped to avoid it. His administration put a priority on surprise, attesting, for example, that the Caribbean military buildup was to stop drug boats, not to prepare for a direct regime change operation in Venezuela. Congress was largely sidelined. Iran today presents an even more ambitious regime change operation, but in last week's nearly two-hour State of the Union address, Trump talked about it in only a few sentences. The scale and stakes of the war make the administration's seeming disregard for public debate all the more remarkable.
The Trump administration has also avoided articulating clear objectives for its use of force. When announcing that war with Iran had begun, the president said that the objective was “to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime,” even though Tehran was neither enriching uranium nor in possession of missiles capable of reaching the United States. A day into the attacks, Trump wrote on social media that bombing was aimed at achieving “our objective of PEACE THROUGHOUT THE MIDDLE EAST AND, INDEED, THE WORLD!” He has said both that the goal is regime change in Iran and that he is planning to negotiate with the leadership that replaces the supreme leader. Trump similarly said at first that pressure on Venezuela was necessary to stop drugs and gang members from entering the United States, before later explaining that the goal was to bring Maduro to justice, that he wished to take back oil stolen from the United States, and that the operation was consistent with a new corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. What precisely Americans are fighting for in each country, and how they will know whether they attain that end, remains unclear.
Where the Powell Doctrine calls for clarity, Trump instead prizes flexibility. By claiming multiple and often vague objectives, the president retains the ability to stop the fighting without admitting defeat. This, rather than obvious victory, is his exit strategy. When announcing attacks on the Houthis, Trump said, “We will use overwhelming lethal force until we have achieved our objective,” with the objective allegedly being to end Houthi attacks on American vessels in the Red Sea. The Houthis, Trump said later, would be “completely annihilated.” A month into an expensive and only partially successful bombing campaign, however, the administration cut a deal with the group to end its attacks.
Finally, Powell's dictum holds that the United States should employ overwhelming, decisive force in pursuit of its objective, defeating the enemy as swiftly and soundly as possible. Trump's approach, on the other hand, favors short, sharp military actions that employ only particular kinds of force, especially airpower and special forces, almost always excluding conventional ground forces. If the price of regime change in Iran is the large-scale deployment of ground forces, Trump has made clear through past action that the United States will not pay it. It will instead settle for less.
With the possible exception of its attacks on ISIS, the Trump administration's wars have largely employed limited, rather than decisive, force. In 2017, the United States launched strikes in Syria in response to Assad's use of chemical weapons against Syrian civilians. But Assad's leadership remained secure, and he used chemical weapons again in 2018. In 2025, Trump boasted about obliterating Iran's nuclear sites, but in 2026, he cited the danger of Tehran acquiring a nuclear weapon as a casus belli. Maduro is now gone from Venezuela, but his regime remains in place. In all of these cases, flexibility, rather than decisiveness, is the watchword, allowing Trump to settle for outcomes that were never clearly defined at the outset.
In some ways, the Trump response to the Powell Doctrine has served recent history better than a dogmatic application of the original. Following the limited use of force against the Houthis with a bilateral agreement produced a better outcome than ignoring the attacks on U.S. shipping. It was also better than using pure military force, as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates had attempted for years. Likewise, the world is better off without Iran's nuclear sites at Fordow and Natanz, and without Soleimani running the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The jury remains out on Venezuela, but it is still possible that a democratic transition occurs and the country avoids a descent into domestic chaos. Short, sharp uses of force that preserve flexibility in decision-making, leverage ambiguity and surprise, minimize the chances of quagmire, and end with a “good enough” outcome might be the best approach to many cases.
They are likely not the best approach to all cases, however, and the limits of Trump's way of war may soon be clear. The attack on Iran represents the most ambitious of Trump's foreign policy gambits to date. Forcing regime change in a country that is much larger and more populous than Iraq or Afghanistan, through an operation with no ground component and no obvious domestic allies, and in the face of an entrenched security apparatus, will be extraordinarily difficult. The range of nightmare scenarios—from an IRGC-led military dictatorship to a descent into domestic chaos—is wider than the happy possibility of a democratic uprising.
Here, the president's flexibility and ambiguity might show the way forward. If the United States and Israel are unsuccessful in toppling the Islamic Republic of Iran, if U.S. forces take significant casualties, if the American public grows tired of the conflict, or if the alternative to continued regime rule looks even worse, Trump could stop the fight. By claiming that the objective was, from the beginning, to simply weaken Iran and to ensure that it does not obtain a nuclear weapon, the president could, and likely would, declare victory.
In so doing, the president would upend one last Powell maxim: the Pottery Barn rule. Before the invasion of Iraq, the general cautioned, “You break it, you own it.” In the effort to break the Iranian regime, Trump has already telegraphed that the United States will not own the aftermath. Should it collapse, the Iranian people will need to pick up the pieces. If it endures, Washington will wrap up the fight and move on to other priorities. Such a scenario would demonstrate one more limitation of the Trump approach, however: it does not pave the way for long-term peace but postpones conflict to another day.
Subscribe to Foreign Affairs to get unlimited access.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
How the Latest Strikes Risk Opening a Pandora's Box in the Gulf
Ali Vaez
How Beijing Turns Predictability Into Power
Kyle Chan
And the Unilateral Temptation
C. Raja Mohan
Why the Old Order Is Gone for Good
Kishore Mahbubani
How U.S. Strategy Failed—and Ceded the Advantage to China
Zack Cooper
Geopolitical Power, Private Gain
Alexander Cooley and Daniel Nexon
How the Latest Strikes Risk Opening a Pandora's Box in the Gulf
Ali Vaez
A Conversation With Karim Sadjadpour
The U.S. Military Must Go Big—and Then Let Iranians Do the Rest
Behnam Ben Taleblu
U.S. Military Strikes and the Risk of a Quagmire
Nate Swanson
With Moscow Pressing Its Advantage, Kyiv Should Trade Land for Peace
Michael C. Desch
Our editors' top picks, delivered free to your inbox every Friday.
* Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply to your newsletter subscription.
Published by The Council on Foreign Relations, Inc.
© 2026. All Rights Reserved.
From the publishers of Foreign Affairs
Our editors' top picks from the week, delivered on Friday.
* Note that when you provide your email address, the Foreign Affairs Privacy Policy and Terms of Use will apply, and you will receive occasional marketing emails.
NEW YORK, March 2. /TASS/. US President Donald Trump, in an interview with The New York Times, stated that he sees three suitable candidates, in his opinion, for the post of future leader of Iran.
The publication indicates that during the conversation, the US leader said that he has "three very good choices" regarding who could lead the Islamic Republic but declined to respond to a request to name specific names.
Iran's state television earlier reported that Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei had been killed in an attack on his residence on the morning of February 28, and the country declared a 40-day mourning.
Five Persian Gulf nations that host U.S. military installations claim they have collectively shot down more than 1,500 Iranian missiles and drones since the United States and Israel launched their joint attack at 9:45 a.m. Tehran time on Feb. 28.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE)—whose forces have battled Tehran-backed Houthis in Yemen—has borne the brunt of the Iranian attacks.
Ukraine has struck a major oil terminal in the Russian city of Novorossiysk overnight on March 2, damaging infrastructure at the port, as well as military ships and air defense assets, a source in Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) told the Kyiv Independent.
The Sheskharis oil terminal in the Port of Novorossiysk was struck, according to an analysis of eyewitness footage conducted by the outlet.
The mass Ukrainian drone strike was carried out together with Ukraine's Border Guard Service, military intelligence (HUR) Unmanned Systems Forces, and Special Operations Forces.
The site is a major oil export terminal that serves as the endpoint for pipelines run by Russia's state-run Transneft, the world's largest oil pipeline company.
Six of the seven oil-filling loading arms at the Sheskharis terminal were damaged in the attack.
According to the SBU source, part of the attack included strikes on Russian military assets in and around the port, with several military ships, one Pantsir-S2 air defense system and an S-300 air defense radar also hit.
Four residential buildings were reported damaged in the attack, Novorossiysk Mayor Andrey Kravchenko said, not mentioning the oil terminal.
"At the moment, damage is known to have occurred to two more apartment buildings and five houses. Fires broke out at two addresses and are being extinguished," Kravchenko later said.
Three people were injured in the drone attack, the Krasnodar Krai Operational Headquarters reported.
The Kyiv Independent could not verify these claims at the time of publication.
Ukraine regularly strikes military infrastructure deep within Russia and occupied territories in an effort to diminish Moscow's fighting power as the Kremlin wages its war against Ukraine.
Ukrainian drones previously had struck the Novorossiysk oil terminal on Nov. 14 last year, sparking a large fire, the SBU told the Kyiv Independent at the time, following initial media reports and claims by local authorities.
Kyiv considers oil facilities to be valid military targets as they directly fund Russia's war.
Overnight on Feb. 27, Ukraine reportedly launched strikes, hitting a thermal power station in Belgorod Oblast and an oil depot in occupied Luhansk, according to Russian officials and eyewitness footage posted to social media.
News Editor
Volodymyr Ivanyshyn is a news editor for The Kyiv Independent. He is pursuing an Honors Bachelor of Arts at the University of Toronto, majoring in political science with a minor in anthropology and human geography. Volodymyr holds a Certificate in Business Fundamentals from Rotman Commerce at the University of Toronto. He previously completed an internship with The Kyiv Independent.
The U.S.-Ukraine Reconstruction Investment Fund narrowed down the candidates after sifting through 138 submissions, Ukraine's Economy Ministry announced on March 2.
A drone hit a moving passenger train near Kryvyi Rih, killing one person and injuring seven others, including two children, officials said.
The claim came amid a slowdown in Russian advances on most parts of the front line over winter.
The U.S. launched a series of strikes against Iran as part of Operation Epic Fury, carried out jointly with Israel.
Only 25% of respondents said they rather believe in the talks' potential success, while 5% remained undecided, according to a poll by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS).
Russia launched 94 drones at Ukraine overnight, the Air Force said, reporting that Ukrainian air defenses intercepted 84 unmanned aircraft.
The number includes 960 casualties that Russian forces suffered over the past day.
The U.S. may consider suspending attacks if Iran "can satisfy us," Trump told NBC News on March 1, adding that "they haven't been able to." He separately told the Daily Mail he expected the operation to last four weeks.
Ukrainian drones struck an oil terminal, leaving fires in the southern Russian port city of Novorossiysk overnight on March 2, Telegram news channel Astra reported.
"We are not joining these strikes, but we will continue with our defensive actions in the region," U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer said. "And we will also bring experts from Ukraine, together with our own experts, to help Gulf partners shoot down Iranian drones attacking them."
"Khamenei, one of the most evil people in History, is dead," Trump wrote on Truth Social on Feb. 28. He also said the bombing of Iran would continue for at least the next week.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said that "the most intense operation against Israel and the United States is set to begin," while state outlets warned that "revenge is coming."
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Israel launched strikes on Lebanon's capital, Beirut, after the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah fired missiles across the border early Monday. (AP video: Hussein al-Malla )
The intensity of the attacks, the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the lack of any apparent exit plan indicated the conflict would not end anytime soon. It was already having far-reaching consequences: Safe havens in the Mideast like Dubai have seen incoming fire; hundreds of thousands of airline passengers are stranded around the globe; oil prices shot up; and U.S. allies pledged to help stop Iranian missiles and drones.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wouldn't rule out U.S. troops on the ground in Iran, but declared the United States would not be dragged into an “endless” war. Hegseth held the Trump administration's first news briefing Monday since Saturday's strikes.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth dismisses questions about the time frame of the widening conflict in Iran, saying: “President Trump has all the latitude in the world to talk about how long it may or may not take. Four weeks, two weeks, six weeks.”
World markets were rattled by the fighting in the Middle East and oil prices soared. Saudi Arabia's Ras Tanura oil refinery came under a drone attack on Monday, with defenses downing the incoming aircraft, a military spokesman told the state-run Saudi Press Agency.
Strikes across Iran's capital Tehran on Monday hit several areas of the city. Israel and the United States are pounding Iran as the war is expanding to several fronts. (AP video by Mohsen Ganji)
Scores of people were fleeing Beirut's southern suburbs early Monday after Israel launched a series of strikes in retaliation for missiles fired across the border by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah. (AP video: Hussein Malla and Fadi Tawil)
Israeli strikes hit Lebanon's capital Beirut on Monday as the war in the Middle East spiraled further.
A bird flies by a plume of smoke rising after a strike in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
A plume of smoke rises after a strike in Tehran, Iran, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Mohsen Ganji)
This image provided by U.S. Central Command shows a F/A-18F Super Hornet preparing to make an arrested landing on the USS Abraham Lincoln (CVN 72)) in support of Operation Epic Fury, on Saturday, Feb. 28, 2026. (U.S. Navy via AP)
Smoke rises following Israeli bombardment in southern Lebanon as seen from northern Israel Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Ariel Schalit)
Mourners take cover while air-raid sirens warn of incoming missiles launched by Iran toward Israel during the funeral of Sarah Elimelech and her daughter Ronit who were killed in an Iranian missile attack, in Beit Shemesh, Israel, Monday, March 2, 2026. (AP Photo/Ohad Zwigenberg)
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The war in the Middle East spiraled further Monday as Israel and the U.S. pounded Iran in a campaign that U.S. President Donald Trump said would likely take several weeks. Tehran and its allies hit back against Israel, neighboring Gulf states and targets critical to the world's energy production.
The intensity of the attacks, the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and the lack of any apparent exit plan set the stage for a prolonged conflict with far-reaching consequences. Safe havens in the Mideast like Dubai have seen incoming fire; hundreds of thousands of airline passengers are stranded around the globe; oil prices shot up; and U.S. allies pledged to help stop Iranian missiles and drones.
With no sign of the conflict abating anytime soon, Trump said Monday that the operations are likely to last four to five weeks but that he was prepared “to go far longer than that.”
He said U.S. forces were determined to destroy Iran's missile capabilities, wipe out its naval capacity, stop the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon and ensure that Iran cannot continue to arm and fund allied groups like Lebanon's Hezbollah, which fired missiles at Israel, drawing retaliatory airstrikes.
“This was our last, best chance to strike -- what we're doing right now -- and eliminate the intolerable threats posed by this sick and sinister regime,” Trump said.
Iran has long threatened, if attacked, to drag the region into total war, including targeting Israel, the Gulf Arab states and the flow of crude oil crucial for global energy markets. All of these came under attack on Monday.
The chaos of the conflict became apparent when the U.S. military said Kuwait had “mistakenly shot down” three American F-15E Strike Eagles while Iran was attacking with aircraft, ballistic missiles, and drones. U.S. Central Command said all six pilots ejected safely and are in stable condition.
The Gulf state of Qatar meanwhile said its air force had shot down two Iranian Sukhoi Su-24 bombers.
Israel and the U.S. bombed Iranian missile sites and targeted its navy, claiming to have destroyed its headquarters and multiple warships. As several airstrikes hit Iran's capital of Tehran, the top security official Ali Larijani vowed on X: “We will not negotiate with the United States.”
AP correspondent Sam Mednick reports from the Beit Shemesh region in Israel on Iran's deadly retaliatory strikes on Israel.
The death toll grew on all sides. The Iranian Red Crescent Society said that the U.S.-Israeli operation has killed at least 555 people. In Israel, where several locations were hit by Iranian missiles, 11 people were killed. The Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group also targeted Israel, which responded with strikes on Lebanon, killing more than two dozen people. Meanwhile, four American troops have been killed, and three people were reported killed in the United Arab Emirates and one each in Kuwait and Bahrain.
With world markets already rattled by the fighting, QatarEnergy said it would stop its production of liquefied natural gas, taking one of the world's top suppliers off the market. It offered no timeline for restoring its production. European natural gas prices surged by 40% in response.
Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia's Ras Tanura oil refinery came under attack from drones, with defenses downing the incoming aircraft, a military spokesman told the state-run Saudi Press Agency. The refinery has a capacity of over half a million barrels of crude oil a day.
Several ships have been attacked in the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil trade passes and where Iran has threatened attacks.
“The attack on Saudi Arabia's Ras Tanura refinery marks a significant escalation, with Gulf energy infrastructure now squarely in Iran's sights,” said Torbjorn Soltvedt, an analyst at the risk intelligence company Verisk Maplecroft. “An extended period of uncertainty lies ahead.”
The region is also a hub for air travel, and passengers have been stranded around the world as carriers based in the Gulf grounded flights. Long-haul carriers Etihad and Emirates restarted limited flights Monday.
Reza Najafi, Iran's ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency, told reporters that airstrikes targeted the Natanz nuclear enrichment site on Sunday.
“Their justification that Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons is simply a big lie,” he said.
Israel and the U.S. have not acknowledged strikes at the site, which the U.S. bombed in the 12-day war between Iran and Israel in June. Israel has said that it is targeting the “leadership and nuclear infrastructure.”
Iran has said it has not enriched uranium since June, though it has maintained its right to do so while saying its nuclear program is entirely peaceful.
Iran's government news outlet said Monday that Tehran's Golestan Palace, a UNESCO-listed heritage site, was damaged in U.S.–Israeli strikes on Sunday.
Hezbollah said it fired missiles on Israel early Monday in response to Khamenei's killing and “repeated Israeli aggressions.” It was the first time in more than a year that the militant group has claimed an attack.
There were no reports of injuries or damage.
Israel retaliated with strikes on Lebanon, killing at least 31 people and wounding 149 others, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry. Associated Press journalists in Beirut were jolted awake by loud explosions that shook buildings and shattered windows.
Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir, the Israeli army chief of staff, said the military would not end its offensive against Hezbollah “before the threat from Lebanon is eliminated.”
“We will end this campaign with not just Iran being struck but with Hezbollah suffering a devastating blow,” he said.
Rescue services in Israel said several locations have been hit by Iranian missiles, including Jerusalem and a synagogue in Beit Shemesh. In all, 11 people have been killed.
In Iraq, the Iran-allied militia Saraya Awliya al-Dam claimed a drone attack Monday targeting U.S. troops at the airport in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad. It claimed another drone attack on Sunday against a U.S. air base in Iraq's north.
The U.S. military said B-2 stealth bombers struck Iran's ballistic missile facilities with 2,000-pound bombs. Trump said on social media that nine Iranian warships had been sunk and that the Iranian navy's headquarters had been “largely destroyed.”
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Monday that the U.S. is not engaged in a nation-building effort in Iran, and there is a clear mission. “This is not Iraq. This is not endless,” Hegseth said.
It's not completely clear what the U.S. objectives are. In announcing the initial strikes, Trump referred to the threat posed by Iran's nuclear and missile programs. But he also listed various grievances dating back to Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution and urged Iranians to “take over” their government.
There have been no signs yet of any such uprising.
The American leader, however, has also signaled he would be open to dialogue with Iran's new leadership — which could be chosen soon.
In an indication that the conflict could draw in other nations, Britain, France and Germany said Sunday they were ready to work with the U.S. to help stop Iran's attacks.
Early Monday, Cyprus said a drone “caused limited damage” when it hit a British air base there.
Tehran's streets have been largely deserted with people sheltering during airstrikes. The paramilitary Basij force, which has played a central role in crushing recent nationwide protests, set up checkpoints across the city, according to witnesses.
In the northern Iranian city of Babol, a student, speaking anonymously over concerns of retribution, told the AP that armed riot police were on the streets Saturday night and into the early hours of Sunday after the death of Khamenei.
“We don't know whether to be happy about the elimination of the criminals who oppress us or to remain silent in the face of the U.S. and Israel's war against the country and its interests and the terror that is taking place,” he said.
___
Lidman reported from Tel Aviv, Israel, and Magdy from Cairo. Associated Press writers Bassem Mroue and Sally Abou AlJoud in Beirut and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by LSEG.
War Secretary Pete Hegseth on Monday declared Operation Epic Fury as "the most lethal, most complex and most precise aerial operation in history."
About one in four Americans, but a majority of Republicans, say they approve of the U.S. military strikes on Iran ordered by President Donald Trump, according to a new poll.
The national survey, conducted Saturday and Sunday by Reuters/Ipsos in the hours after the start of "Operation Epic Fury" by American and Israeli forces on Iran that resulted in the killing of the country's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, also indicates about half believe Trump is too willing to use military force.
Twenty-seven percent of those surveyed said they approved of the strikes, with 43% disapproving and nearly three in 10 not sure.
Smoke rises over the city after the Israeli army launched a second wave of airstrikes on Iran in Tehran on Feb. 28, 2026. (Fatemeh Bahrami/Anadolu via Getty Images)
But there's a partisan divide, with Republicans by a 55%-32% margin supportive of the military action. The vast majority of Democrats, 73%, disapproved of the strikes, with only seven percent saying they approved. A plurality of independents, 44%, disapproved of the military attack, with 19% supportive and nearly four in 10 unsure.
IRAN'S NEAR HALF CENTURY WAR ON AMERICANS
The poll was conducted before the U.S. military announced on Sunday the first U.S. casualties in the operation — three service members killed and five more seriously wounded.
"I think that the polling is very good, but I don't care about polling. I have to do the right thing. I have to do the right thing. This should have been done a long time ago," Trump said in an interview Monday with the New York Post when asked about the new survey.
A map of Western strikes against Iran. (Fox News)
The joint U.S.-Israeli operation is expected to carry on for days, with officials telling Fox News that Israel is targeting Iranian leadership, while the U.S. is attacking military targets and ballistic missile sites that pose an "imminent threat."
The attack has plunged the volatile Middle East into a new and unpredictable conflict. Iran has retaliated against Israel and other nations in the region. Trump on Sunday warned against Iranian retaliation, saying that if Iran were to "hit very hard," they would be met with "a force that has never been seen before."
OIL PRICES SURGE AFTER TANKERS STRUCK NEAR STRAIGHT OF HORMUZ
The attack on Iran follows strikes Trump has ordered in recent months against Venezuela, Syria, and Nigeria.
President Donald Trump monitors U.S. military operations in Iran following an Israeli strike in Tehran on Saturday, Feb. 28, 2026. (@WhiteHouse/X)
According to the poll, 56% of Americans think the president is too willing to use military force to advance U.S. interests. Nearly nine in 10 Democrats, six in 10 independents, and nearly a quarter of Republicans said Trump was too willing to use military force.
Trump, in his interview with the New York Post, emphasized that "it's not a question of polling. You cannot let Iran, who's a nation that has been run by crazy people, have a nuclear weapon."
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
"I think people are very impressed with what is happening, actually," Trump insisted. "I think it's a silent — if you did a real poll, the silent poll — and it's like a silent majority," the president added.
Trump's overall approval in the new survey stands at 39%, down a point from the previous Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in mid-February.
Paul Steinhauser is a politics reporter based in the swing state of New Hampshire. He covers the campaign trail from coast to coast."
Get the latest updates from the 2024 campaign trail, exclusive interviews and more Fox News politics content.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and
agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can
opt-out at any time.
Subscribed
You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by
Factset. Powered and implemented by
FactSet Digital Solutions.
Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by
LSEG.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
People watch from a rooftop as a plume of smoke rises after a strike in Tehran, Iran, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
The president of Iran's soccer federation says he does not know if the national team can play World Cup matches in the United States following the surprise U.S. and Israeli bombardment of his country.
“What is certain is that after this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope,” Mehdi Taj told sports portal Varzesh3 as Iran traded strikes with Israel as part of a widening war prompted by the bombardment.
The U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran continued for a second day on Sunday after the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei threw the future of the Islamic Republic into uncertainty and raised the risk of regional instability.
Iran has been drawn in Group G at the World Cup and is scheduled to play in Inglewood, California, against New Zealand on June 15 and Belgium on June 21 before finishing the first round against Egypt in Seattle on June 26.
The U.S. is hosting the tournament with Canada and Mexico from June 11 to July 19.
Fans from Iran were already banned from entering the U.S. in the first iteration of the travel ban announced by the Trump administration.
FIFA did not immediately reply to an email from The Associated Press over the current situation regarding Iran's participation in the World Cup.
___
AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by LSEG.
Fox News Flash top sports headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on FoxNews.com.
KC Concepcion, a former Texas A&M Aggies wide receiver, fired back at criticism over the way he speaks after he was mocked while talking to reporters at the NFL Scouting Combine.
Concepcion admitted in a post on his Instagram Stories on Sunday night that he has battled a stuttering issue for much of his life.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Texas A&M Aggies wide receiver KC Concepcion runs for a touchdown against the Missouri Tigers at Faurot Field at Memorial Stadium on Nov. 8, 2025. (Jay Biggerstaff/Imagn Images)
"I just wanna say something. If you have a speech impediment, there is nothing wrong with us," he said. "I have had this stutter since I can remember talking. This is a part of me. This is who I am. I cannot control this. I wanna be a role model for those who may be scared to speak up, who may be afraid and not confident in yourself. I stand with you.
"This weekend has taught me a lot about myself and people out there in this world. I appreciate everyone who supports me and has reached out to me after these interviews. Don't let (an) outside person's thoughts, opinions get in the way of you being great, of achieving something in life. I am blessed to be in this position that I am in, and I want to help give back to those who are scared to speak up, who aren't as confident. I stand with you. I will always stand with you. We are different for a reason.
Texas A&M wideout KC Concepcion during the NFL Scouting Combine at Lucas Oil Stadium on Feb. 28, 2026. (Kirby Lee/Imagn Images)
"God had blessed my life in a way I couldn't even imagine in this past year. I love y'all and support y'all as we climb this mountain together."
More than 80 million people around the world, including about 3 million Americans, deal with stuttering, according to The Stuttering Foundation. Athletes like Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and George Springer have been open about stuttering issues in the past.
Concepcion hopes to hear his name called when the NFL Draft takes place in the spring. He was an All American for the first time after the 2025 season.
Texas A&M Aggies head coach Mike Elko hugs wide receiver KC Concepcion before the Miami Hurricanes game during the first round of the CFP National Playoff at Kyle Field on Dec. 20, 2025. (Maria Lysaker/Imagn Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
The former Aggies star had 61 catches for 919 yards and nine touchdowns.
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Ryan Gaydos is a senior editor for Fox News Digital.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and
agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can
opt-out at any time.
Subscribed
You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by
Factset. Powered and implemented by
FactSet Digital Solutions.
Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by
LSEG.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by LSEG.
Seattle Storm player Erica Wheeler told Fox News Digital about her decision to partner with OnlyFans, and gave a scathing message to fans who may disagree with her decision. (Credit: Jackson Thompson/Fox News Digital)
Barclays Center in Brooklyn will play host to one of the fastest growing women's sports leagues in the world, as Unrivaled, the three-on-three basketball league, plays their semifinals on Monday night.
Breanna Stewart is a fan favorite in the New York City borough, as the superstar plays for the New York Liberty during the WNBA season. But she co-founded this special league alongside fellow WNBA star Napheesa Collier, and they're set to make history on Monday night.
The semifinals will be the first time Unrivaled will be played in an arena that houses a WNBA, and the second time ever it's ventured outside its home base in Miami.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Li Yueru, Arike Ogunbowale, Breanna Stewart, Alanna Smith and Veronica Burton of the Mist celebrate and pose for a team photo after defeating the Vinyl during the Unrivaled 2026 game at Sephora Arena on Feb. 27, 2026 in Medley, Florida. (Leonardo Fernandez/Getty Images)
The first time was quite historic, as Unrivaled made its first tour stop in Philadelphia last month, and what happened was an astonishing feat: 21,490 fans showed up for the highest-attended women's basketball regular season game ever.
"We're both just really proud of where this league started, honestly where it was before we even had a blueprint to where it is now," Stewart explained to Fox News Digital when asked if herself and Collier ever get a chance to reflect on how quickly this league has grown. "Knowing that we had a successful tour stop in Philly, where we were record-breaking crowds.
"It's more than just hype what we have at Unrivaled. You're really seeing the product through and through – what you get on the court and how players are treated off the court."
While the product is one fans clearly want to see, Unrivaled prides itself on keeping players in the United States during the WNBA offseason by offering the highest-average salaries in all of women's team sports. It's reported that an average $222,222 salary is what players are getting on top of another unique piece of this league – equity.
Unrivaled offers its players a piece of the league as well as the $350,000 prize pool for the midseason one-on-one tournament, which Collier won last year. She gave half of her $200,000 prize to her team's staff members.
"It's incredibly important," Stewart said about the big paydays for those playing in Unrivaled. "Having equity in a league that you're playing in, knowing that literally we grow as the league grows, and vice versa. It makes players really want to be involved and invested from a year-round perspective. I think that what we're most proud of is we have the highest-average salary in all of women's sports league.
Breanna Stewart and Coco Gauff attend an Unrivaled match between Phantom and Rose at Wayfair Arena on Jan. 31, 2025 in Medley, Florida. (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
"We're paying the players what they deserve, paying the players adequately and trying to make sure every year that's going up a tremendous amount."
The game held at Xfinity Mobile Arena in Philadelphia last month was not only an all-time attendance record for a pro women's basketball regular season game, but also the biggest mark in a professional basketball game, both men's and women's.
The NBA's Philadelphia 76ers also play at Xfinity Mobile Arena, and their previous high was 21,305 during a 1998 game against the Chicago Bulls – the last contest basketball legend Michael Jordan played in the city for his Bulls career.
It was even the most attended event of all-time at the arena, which was previously held by The Backstreet Boys "Into the Millennium" tour on Sept. 29, 1999 (21,424).
In short, momentum is an understatement for this league that is setting a new bar for women's sports, especially in basketball, where Stewart and many others are hoping the WNBA and WNBPA can figure out a new collective bargaining agreement ahead of a pivotal 2026 campaign, which starts in May.
Before then, Stewart knows her Liberty fans will show up Monday night in Brooklyn, where the basketball capacity at Barclays Center is 17,732. Stewart's Mist team is set to face the Breeze at 8:45 p.m., while the No. 1-seeded Phantom will face the Vinyl at 7:30 p.m.
New York Liberty forward Breanna Stewart (30) warms up prior to game two of round one for the 2025 WNBA Playoffs at Barclays Center on Sept. 17, 2025. (Wendell Cruz/Imagn Images)
CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP
HEALTHY BOOST WITH THRONE SPORT COFFEE
But Stewart isn't just drinking any coffee to get her fix — she's partnered with a brand that is perfect for the pro athlete she is.
Stewart has joined Throne SPORT COFFEE, becoming the first female athlete to partner with the brand that prides itself on being much more than just a coffee provider.
It just seems really natural and fitting for me," she told FOX Business in an exclusive interview about the partnership. "I think that being an athlete, being a mom, there's so many reasons why we constantly need caffeine. But to have it in a healthy way, and also have the protein in it — every time I walk in the gym, I'm having one. I'm letting everyone know that not only am I drinking coffee, but I'm getting some positive protein benefit as well."
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Scott Thompson is a sports writer for Fox News Digital.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and
agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can
opt-out at any time.
Subscribed
You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by
Factset. Powered and implemented by
FactSet Digital Solutions.
Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by
LSEG.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by LSEG.
Fox News Flash top sports headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on FoxNews.com.
Jess McClain is a decorated American runner who has made the podium in several events over the course of her career and was looking to score a victory at the U.S. Half Marathon Championships in Atlanta over the weekend.
McClain was leading the race with about two miles remaining. But her race was thrown off course as she was led off the path by a media vehicle, according to Athletics Illustrated. McClain reportedly followed the media vehicle, a police motorcycle and a motorcycle with a camera.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Jessica McClain (USA) placed eighth in the women's marathon in 2:28:32 during the World Athletics Championships at National Stadium on Sept. 14, 2025. (Kirby Lee/Imagn Images)
McClain, Emma Grace Hurley and Ednah Kurgat were all thrown off. By the time they got back onto the right course, McClain's lead was gone.
She finished in ninth place while Hurley and Kurgat finished in 12th and 13th respectively.
Atlanta Track Club CEO Rich Kenah took the blame for the error.
Jessica McClain placed fourth in the women's race in 2:25:46 during the U.S. Olympic Marathon Team Trials on Feb. 3, 2024. (Kirby Lee/USA TODAY Sports)
"In the women's race, a pace vehicle left the official course during Mile 11," he said in a statement to The Athletic. "As Race Director, I take full responsibility for what occurred. Athletes should never have to make a split-second decision between following a pace vehicle or trusting the official course.
"We are conducting a full review to determine exactly how and why the vehicle left the course to strengthen safeguards moving forward."
U.S. Track and Field (USATF) said it would review the events "carefully" as the team for the World Road Running Championships has not been selected. The organization said that protests were denied and a jury of appeals found that "the event did not meet USATF Rule 243 and that the course was not adequately marked at the point of misdirection. This violation contributed to the misdirection taken by the athletes within the top four at the time of misdirection.
"However, the jury of appeals finds no recourse within the USATF rulebook to alter the results order of finish. The results order of finish as posted is considered final."
Emily Infield (left) is congratulated by Jessica McClain after winning the women's 10,000m in 31:43.56 during the USATF Championships at Hayward Field on July 31, 2025. (Kirby Lee/Imagn Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
McClain finished fourth in the 2025 Half Marathon Championships and eighth in the World Athletics Championships.
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Ryan Gaydos is a senior editor for Fox News Digital.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and
agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can
opt-out at any time.
Subscribed
You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by
Factset. Powered and implemented by
FactSet Digital Solutions.
Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by
LSEG.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by Factset. Powered and implemented by FactSet Digital Solutions. Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by LSEG.
Fox News Flash top sports headlines are here. Check out what's clicking on FoxNews.com.
A bizarre situation occurred during a men's college hockey game between the UConn Huskies and the Massachusetts Minutemen.
The Huskies and Minutemen were in the midst of an overtime period after being tied 3-3 in regulation at the Mullins Center in Hadley, Massachusetts. The Minutemen tried to get one past the Huskies' goaltender, but were denied.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE SPORTS COVERAGE ON FOXNEWS.COM
Joey Muldowney #8 of the UConn Huskies skates against the Maine Black Bears in the second period during NCAA men's hockey in the Hockey East Championship at TD Garden on March 21, 2025, in Boston, Massachusetts. (Richard T Gagnon/Getty Images)
It started a Huskies break. Huskies defenseman Kai Janviriya guided the puck back down the ice and was getting ready to possibly send his team home with a victory.
However, as he got into Massachusetts' zone, the lights in the arena turned off.
No team scored in the overtime period. The Huskies and Minutemen went into a shootout and Massachusetts was able to pick up a point in the shootout round after seven rounds.
The Massachusetts Minutemen stand in a line before a game against the Massachusetts-Lowell River Hawks during NCAA men's hockey at the Tsongas Center on Jan. 27, 2023 in Lowell, Massachusetts. (Richard T Gagnon/Getty Images)
UConn had a 3-2 lead in the third period when Jake Percival scored early in the frame following a power play. But UMass responded with the equalizer from forward Jack Musa.
Massachusetts goaltender Michael Hrabal earned the first star of the game as he had 50 saves in the win.
Pucks staked spelling out Ohio are placed on the Ohio State Buckeyes bench before a men's college hockey game between the Ohio State Buckeyes and the Michigan State Spartans on Feb. 27, 2026 at Munn Ice Arena in East Lansing, Michigan. (Joseph Weiser/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP
Massachusetts was able to improve to 12-9-1 with 37 points on the year. UConn fell to 11-8-3 with 38 points. The two teams sit in fourth and third place respectively in the Hockey East conference. Providence is leading the conference with a 17-5-1 record and 51 points.
Follow Fox News Digital's sports coverage on X and subscribe to the Fox News Sports Huddle newsletter.
Ryan Gaydos is a senior editor for Fox News Digital.
Get all the stories you need-to-know from the most powerful name in news delivered first thing every morning to your inbox.
By entering your email and clicking the Subscribe button, you agree to the Fox News Privacy Policy and Terms of Use, and
agree to receive content and promotional communications from Fox News. You understand that you can
opt-out at any time.
Subscribed
You've successfully subscribed to this newsletter!
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. ©2026 FOX News Network, LLC. All rights reserved. Quotes displayed in real-time or delayed by at least 15 minutes. Market data provided by
Factset. Powered and implemented by
FactSet Digital Solutions.
Legal Statement. Mutual Fund and ETF data provided by
LSEG.
When news breaks, you need to understand what actually matters — and what to do about it. At Vox, our mission to help you make sense of the world has never been more vital. But we can't do it on our own.
We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism. Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today?
How scientists (and the rest of us) are finding 16,000 new species a month.
When the Swedish botanist Carl Linnaeus published Systema Naturae in 1735, he set out to classify every living thing on Earth — inventing the naming system we still use today and personally describing more than 10,000 species of plants and animals.
A weekly dose of stories chronicling progress around the world.
Nearly three centuries later, with satellites mapping every continent and AI models that can identify a bird by its song, you might assume we'd pretty much finished the job Linnaeus started. We've been to the bottom of the ocean. We've sequenced the human genome. Surely we've cataloged our roommates on this planet.
We have not. Not even close. Scientists estimate we've identified somewhere around one-tenth of all species on Earth — meaning for every species with a name, roughly nine more are waiting in an unsampled river or an unexplored cave.
Or even a museum drawer where they've been gathering dust for decades. Hundreds of thousands of unnamed species are already sitting in museum and herbarium collections right now. A quarter of new species descriptions involve specimens more than 50 years old. As the University of Arizona ecologist John Wiens put it: “It's a poorly known planet that we live on.”
And now many of that planet's residents are in trouble. The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) estimates that around 1 million animal and plant species are threatened with extinction, and that extinction rates are at least tens to hundreds of times higher than the background norm. The current extinction rate is somewhere between 100 and 1,000 times the “natural” rate, and the species vanishing fastest are disproportionately the ones we haven't catalogued yet: small invertebrates, tropical fungi, deep-sea organisms in habitats we've barely surveyed. The race to describe what's out there has real stakes. You can't protect what you haven't found.
So here's the good news: When it comes to the species on Earth, we're not actually falling behind. We're speeding up.
A study published in December in Science Advances by Wiens and colleagues analyzed 1.9 million species from the Catalogue of Life and found that between 2015 and 2020, scientists described more than 16,000 new species per year — the highest rate in the 270-year history of modern taxonomy. Wiens argues that 15 percent of every species known to science has been discovered in just the past two decades.
This was supposed to be going the other direction. Earlier research had suggested that the rate of species description peaked around 1900, back when naturalists in pith helmets were tramping through the tropics and shipping specimens back to European museums in wooden crates. The assumption was that the easy discoveries had been made, and we were in the long tail of diminishing returns.
Wiens's data says otherwise. “Some scientists have suggested that the pace of new species descriptions has slowed down and that this indicates we are running out of new species to discover,” he told ScienceDaily. “But our results show the opposite.”
The biggest driver is the DNA revolution. Genome sequencing costs have plummeted from $95 million per human genome in 2001 to hundreds of dollars by the early 2020s — dropping faster than Moore's Law for long stretches of time. That cost drop has made DNA barcoding cheap enough for widespread use, allowing researchers to distinguish species that look identical to the naked eye but are genetically distinct.
A technique called environmental DNA (eDNA) now lets scientists detect species from trace genetic material — a bit of shed skin in a river, cellular fragments in a soil sample. A single water sample can reveal dozens of species, including rare ones that traditional surveys would miss entirely. In 2025, researchers analyzing archived aerosol filters reconstructed biodiversity data for more than 2,700 genera from airborne eDNA collected over 34 years.
Then there's the citizen science explosion. iNaturalist, founded in 2008, has passed 200 million verifiable observations — doubling from 100 million in about two years. Over 4 million people around the world are now photographing and uploading every spider, mushroom, and wildflower they encounter, and AI-assisted identification helps sort the results.
In 2023, two Australian citizen scientists helped discover Inimia nat, an entirely new genus of mantis — the first of its subfamily named since before the moon landing. (The “I. nat” is a nod to the platform.) In Brisbane, a group of young students discovered a fly species previously undetected in Australia and won a Eureka Prize for it.
And finally, we started looking where we'd never looked. The Ocean Census, a 10-year initiative launched in 2023, has identified 866 likely new marine species across 10 expeditions. A single month-long Schmidt Ocean Institute expedition off the coast of Chile may have turned up more than 100 new species: corals, glass sponges, squat lobsters. (Some estimates find only about 10 percent of marine species have been described, which makes the ocean less a frontier than an entire undiscovered country.)
In Laos, a zipline tour guide spotted what turned out to be a new dragon lizard genus. In Japan, an undergraduate named Yoshiki Ochiai found a new man-o'-war species on Gamo Beach — a popular surf spot in Sendai — and brought the creature to the lab in a plastic bag.
And sometimes, we can even find species we'd thought had already gone extinct Attenborough's long-beaked echidna, one of only five living egg-laying mammals, was rediscovered in 2023 after not being seen since 1961 — captured on the last day of an Oxford expedition into the Cyclops Mountains of Indonesia.
But discovery is not protection — and the gap between naming a species and saving it is widening.
A study from Wiens's own lab found that the proportion of threatened species among newly described ones has risen from 11.9 percent (for species described in the 18th century) to 30 percent today, and is projected to reach 47 percent by 2050. The pattern has become grimly routine: a species gets a name and a Red List designation almost simultaneously.
The Tapanuli orangutan, described in 2017, was listed critically endangered immediately with fewer than 800 individuals. Every new bird species described in Brazil's Atlantic Forest between 1980 and 2010 was already threatened. According to Kew Gardens, three in four undescribed plant species are estimated to be threatened with extinction before anyone even names them.
There's also a whole category that scientists call “dark extinction”: species that vanish before anyone knows they existed. One study estimated that dark extinctions could substantially increase known bird extinction numbers. The IPBES estimates more than 500,000 species have too little habitat left for long-term survival, making them effectively dead species walking (or crawling, or flying). Even as scientists describe new species at record rates, the tropical habitats where most undiscovered species live are being destroyed fastest.
So the race is real. But what the Wiens study shows is that it is still a race — and for the first time in the history of biology, we have the tools to run it faster. The golden age of species discovery isn't a nostalgic label for the era of Darwin and Wallace. It's happening now, in sequencing labs and on surf beaches and through the cameras of millions of ordinary people. Linnaeus described 10,000 species in a lifetime of work. We're now finding that many every seven months. The question is whether we can keep accelerating before the things we haven't yet found disappear for good.
A version of this story originally appeared in the Good News newsletter. Sign up here!
You've read 1 article in the last month
Here at Vox, we're unwavering in our commitment to covering the issues that matter most to you — threats to democracy, immigration, reproductive rights, the environment, and the rising polarization across this country.
Our mission is to provide clear, accessible journalism that empowers you to stay informed and engaged in shaping our world. By becoming a Vox Member, you directly strengthen our ability to deliver in-depth, independent reporting that drives meaningful change.
We rely on readers like you — join us.
Swati Sharma
Vox Editor-in-Chief
We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay.
If cost is a barrier, we'd still love for you to be a Vox Member. Apply here to receive a free annual Membership, made possible by another reader.
Explore the big, complicated problems the world faces and the most efficient ways to solve them. Sent twice a week.
This is the title for the native ad
Your pet fish — or bird, or hamster — is probably miserable.
Science fiction promised us humanoids. Do we even want them?
William Foege helped give us a world without smallpox. We're marking his death by letting measles come back.
Around the world, energy is becoming abundant — there's just one problem.
Why another big swing at health care reform is coming.
This is the title for the native ad
© 2026 Vox Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved
In northeast Georgia, a hospital closed its maternity ward. In rural New Hampshire, a community health center shuttered. And in Iowa, a Des Moines hospital system laid off dozens of employees and closed a clinic.
All these providers cited President Donald Trump's sweeping domestic policy agenda package, which slashed more than $1 trillion in federal support for health care, as a factor in their decisions.
The legislation, known as the “One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act,” is expected to leave millions more Americans without coverage and to cut vital financial support for hospitals – a combination that could force already cash-strapped providers to pull back on services and staffing, leaving patients with fewer places and longer waits for care, particularly in emergency rooms.
At the legislation's signing, President Donald Trump touted its tax and border security provisions, downplaying the impact of the health care cuts. The administration and GOP lawmakers often refer to the package as the “Working Families Tax Cut Act.”
But Republicans hoping to tout the legislation as a point in their favor in November are confronting an escalating political backlash to the emerging consequences of those cuts, as lawmakers who supported it take the blame.
Many hospitals, particularly those in rural areas or who treat a lot of underserved patients, have been struggling financially for years, contending with rising expenses, workforce shortages, an aging population and federal reimbursement rates that don't cover the cost of care. Nearly 200 rural hospitals have closed or stopped providing inpatient care since 2005, according to the Sheps Center for Health Services Research.
The “big, beautiful bill” will increase that fiscal strain, experts say. Its historic cuts to Medicaid, which include adding the first-ever work requirement to the safety net program, are expected to leave 7.5 million more people uninsured over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office. Other provisions push up that figure to a total of 10 million.
But when many of those folks get sick, they will still show up at hospitals, who must provide emergency care even if they won't get reimbursed.
Compounding the problem is the expiration of the Affordable Care Act's enhanced premium subsidies, which Republicans in Congress opted not to extend despite heavy pressure from Democrats. Some 2 million fewer people are expected to be insured this year, according to the CBO.
In addition, the “big, beautiful bill” curtailed states' ability to levy taxes on health care providers, which help states fund their share of Medicaid, and to offer special payments to beef up the reimbursement rates for hospitals and other providers, among other uses. These provider taxes and state-directed payments also boost federal Medicaid funding that states receive.
“Our health care system was already fragile and now the largest cuts in health care history are going to disintegrate it further,” said Vaishu Jawahar, director of policy programs at Protect Our Care, a left-leaning advocacy group.
Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the conservative-leaning American Action Forum, argued that “there's nothing that says Medicaid always has to look like the original program,” and said Republicans want less systemic dependence on it.
“Republicans have always viewed Medicaid as a targeted, low-income safety net program for health insurance for those who cannot get it on their own,” he said. “Democrats have taken the view that Medicaid is just another program, another way to get to universal coverage. Expand wherever you can, do what you have to. And so this just represents the collision of those views.”
The package also created a $50 billion Rural Health Transformation Program, which is intended to prompt states and their rural providers to enact lasting changes that will put them on a more sustainable financial path. While some providers say the program will be beneficial, others say it won't do much to help them contend with the major funding holes the bill will create.
And the rural fund doesn't do anything to help urban hospitals. Nearly 100 of these hospitals that are financially distressed and disproportionately provide care to Medicaid enrollees are most at risk of shutting down or limiting services because of the bill, according to a November analysis by Harvard's TH Chan School of Public Health.
Although many of the bill's main Medicaid provisions don't start kicking in until the next year or two, some hospitals and other providers are beginning to take steps now to blunt the impact of the coming cuts.
St. Mary's Sacred Heart Hospital in rural Lavonia, Georgia, closed its labor and delivery unit, as well as its obstetrics and gynecology center, last fall. Expectant mothers now must drive about 30 minutes to the nearest hospital with labor and delivery services or about an hour to St. Mary's hospital in Athens, which still operates a maternity ward.
St. Mary's said in a statement that it spent 18 months trying to recruit more doctors, create partnerships and pursue other funding as it contended with an aging population and a declining number of births. But the bill played a role.
“Recent Congressional cuts to Medicaid solidified this decision,” the hospital said.
Maternal care is already strained in Georgia, said Whitney Griggs, director of health policy at Georgians for a Healthy Future, an advocacy group. The state has maternal and infant mortality rates that are much higher than the national average, and only 36% of counties had a labor and delivery unit in 2022.
Losing a labor and delivery unit is a “huge loss” to the women in the area, she said
Sen. Jon Ossoff, the lone Democrat running for reelection this year in a state Trump won in 2024, has pointed to St. Mary's decision on the campaign trial.
“In Lavonia, St. Mary's Hospital, they've announced they will no longer provide obstetric services to delivering mothers because of decisions made by politicians,” Ossoff said in Atlanta last September.
In Georgia promoting the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” last August, Vice President JD Vance slammed Ossoff's opposition to the legislation, saying he was “allegedly worried about people getting kicked off their health care.”
“Well, you know what? The President of the United States made a promise, a sacred promise that the only people who are going to lose access to health care are illegal aliens who shouldn't be in this country to begin with,” Vance said.
The GOP package also contributed to MercyOne, which has 21 medical centers and multiple clinics across urban and rural Iowa, deciding to close its clinic in Ottumwa and lay off dozens of staffers.
MercyOne is part of Trinity Health, which said in a statement to CNN that “the recent and future government funding policy changes” are expected to reduce its annual revenue by $1.5 billion.
That is forcing it to make changes “to ensure long-term sustainability and future growth,” including cutting positions in its billing and collections department by 10.5% across Trinity Health.
Retired Dr. Peter Reiter, who spent four decades serving patients in Ottumwa, reacted to the closure of the MercyOne clinic there, saying that “this is not the way that's best for patients and not the best for providers.”
“The number of people who were former patients or just acquaintances who said, I go to MercyOne. What am I supposed to do? Where do I go? How do I get a doctor? And I don't have an answer,” he said.
Julie Lawrence, an Ottumwa resident and a patient impacted by the MercyOne closure, shared her frustration with the disruptions.
“You know, I'm in the elderly category,” she said. “I'm 68, and I would just like to stay in my hometown. So, you know, if you don't feel good, you don't want to have to drive half an hour. I mean, I can, but I don't really want to.”
Like St. Mary's in Georgia, the MercyOne closures in Iowa are playing out in competitive midterms contests, with affected locations in the battleground 3rd district.
GOP Rep. Zach Nunn is seeking reelection there after winning in 2024 by just under 4 points, and his leading Democratic challenger, Sarah Trone Garriott, has focused her criticism on his vote for the “One, Big Beautiful Bill Act” and its changes to Medicaid.
“It's a bad time for health care here in Iowa's 3rd congressional district, and it's Zach Nunn's fault,” Trone Garriott said in a social media video. “First MercyOne announced they were closing their Ottumwa clinic because of federal Medicaid cuts. Now MercyOne Des Moines is announcing layoffs this March, because again, federal Medicaid cuts.”
This month, Nunn wrote on his House blog that he met with patients and providers at Ottumwa Regional Health Center “to hear directly from those on the front lines,” touting $209 million allocated to his state through the OBBBA's $50 billion “Rural Health Transformation Fund.”
“The message was clear and consistent: workforce shortages are stretching staff thin, operating costs continue to climb, and rural hospitals can't keep carrying the burden alone,” he said.
And amid the backlash to his vote for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, Nunn broke with his party last month on a vote to extend subsidies for the Affordable Care Act despite his vocal criticism of the program.
Ed Shanshala, CEO of Ammonoosuc Community Health Services in New Hampshire, had to make the painful decision to shut down its location in Franconia, which served nearly 1,600 patients in the rural White Mountains, last fall.
Ammonoosuc, which has four remaining centers that provide primary care, behavioral health and other medical services to 26 towns, is facing a $500,000 annual loss in revenue from the bill, mainly because fewer of its patients are expected to have Medicaid coverage due to the new work requirements. As a federally qualified health center, it will continue to provide care, but it won't know how much the patients will be able to pay.
The closing of the Franconia site is only the first step to dealing with the effects of the legislation, Shanshala said. The move provides about $250,000 in one-time savings since Ammonoosuc shifted the eight staffers to other locations.
“It buys time for us to look at other revenue opportunities consistent with our mission, but it won't come close to addressing the impact of the bill's disinvestment in our friends, family and neighbors through Medicaid,” he said.
After states began expanding Medicaid to more low-income adults under the Affordable Care Act in 2014, the uninsured rate fell, which led to a decline in hospitals' uncompensated care costs in those states, said Cindy Mann, a partner at Manatt Health and former Obama administration official.
“When the uninsured rate goes up, you'll have more uncompensated care and you'll see it pretty quickly,” she said. “If you have a patient base which is mostly Medicaid, Medicare and the uninsured — which is really a lot of the safety net hospitals — there's nowhere to go to, there's no cushion, there's no cost shift that can make that up.”
In Maine, Northern Light Health's executives knew they had to factor into their multi-year plan the increased financial pressures that the “big, beautiful bill” would bring. The health system, which operates nine hospitals, a medical group, nursing homes and several dozen primary care locations in the state, is projecting a $27 million annual drop in revenue from the package, said chief financial officer James Rohrbaugh. That's largely because 34,000 Mainers are expected to lose Medicaid coverage later this year and next.
The looming revenue decline led Northern Light Health to make some major moves last year, including significantly cutting staff, improving its payment collection and consolidating doctors' offices. It also closed one of its money-losing hospitals, though Rohrbaugh said that decision predated the legislation.
Now, the health system is looking for other ways to become more fiscally sound – and it hopes to use some of the $190 million that Maine is receiving from the Rural Transformation Health Program this year to help it do so. Among its plans are to increase its use of telehealth to expand its ability to care for rural residents and to hire more financial counselors to more proactively aid patients with applying for coverage – including navigating Medicaid's new work requirements — or finding alternative payment assistance, Rohrbaugh said.
“I see that as a big opportunity,” he said of the program. “The plan for the rural transformation funds is to help figure out how to make sure health care is sustainable in rural areas.”
Going forward, more hospitals and providers will have to contend with shrinking reimbursements and higher uncompensated care costs as the provisions of the “big, beautiful bill” start to take effect.
“They will have to determine whether they can continue offering all their current services or have to shutter some or shift them to other providers,” said Lucas Swanepoel, vice president for public policy at the Catholic Health Association, which represents Catholic hospitals, long-term care facilities and other providers.
“The coming year or two will be really telling,” he said.
Jennifer Mendrzycki is the CEO of TMC Health, which based out of Tucson oversees four hospitals located throughout southern Arizona, in addition to dozens of other smaller locations covering the state's large rural expanse.
“This is a time like we have not seen in health care before, where we've got competing pressures,” she said, discussing the impacts of the sweeping legislation. “We've always had competing pressures, but this is more acute than I have seen it in my career.”
Mendrzycki emphasized the difficulty of simultaneously contending with Medicaid cuts and reductions in provider taxes. “It's totally untenable, and it's – we've never, I don't think, had a time like this, in at least the time that I have been in healthcare, where both of those things are coming. It's like the perfect storm,” she said.
It's an issue for a series of high-stakes races across all these states that could help decide control of Congress this fall.
In New Hampshire, the parties are vying for the open seat left by retiring Sen. Jeanne Shaheen in a state that Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris carried by less than 3 full points in 2024. And in Maine, Republican Sen. Susan Collins is seeking a sixth term in what's expected to be one of the most competitive 2026 races, already drawing tens of millions of dollars in ad spending reservations.
Both states have older, rural populations disproportionately exposed to the changes to Medicaid and the pressure on local providers. Holtz-Eakin said Republicans, and Collins especially, should point to the Rural Transformation Fund, though he acknowledged its limitations.
“The Rural Health Transformation Fund is there because of her,” he said, touting her legislative efforts. “So certainly she's going to talk about that.”
“There's an enormous amount of discretion by (Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Administrator Mehmet Oz) in allocating – so there's like $10 billion you have that goes out from the total of $50 billion. And about $5 billion of that is greatly at the discretion of the CMS administrator. One would hope that that might be showing up in Maine and she could point to it and say, this is what I did for you,” he said.
© 2026 Cable News Network. A Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All Rights Reserved. CNN Sans ™ & © 2016 Cable News Network.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app on Google Play.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app from the Apple Store.
Three US fighter jets crashed in Kuwait on Monday due to an “apparent friendly fire incident,” the US military said in a statement.
Kuwaiti air defenses accidentally shot the F-15E Strike Eagle fighter jets down late Sunday evening ET time. All six crew members ejected safely, US Central Command said.
The cause of the incident is under investigation, according to CENTCOM. The jets were flying in support of the military operation against Iran, dubbed Operation Epic Fury.
Kuwait's defense ministry had said in the early hours of Monday morning that “several” US fighter jets crashed but did not specify exactly how many or what had caused it. The fighter jets each cost tens of millions of dollars.
The statement comes after videos geolocated by CNN showed a fighter jet crashing in Kuwait and a pilot parachuting to the ground.
CNN has reached out to the White House for comment.
“During active combat—that included attacks from Iranian aircraft, ballistic missiles, and drones — the U.S. Air Force fighter jets were mistakenly shot down by Kuwaiti air defenses,” the CENTCOM statement said.
“All six aircrew ejected safely, have been safely recovered, and are in stable condition. Kuwait has acknowledged this incident, and we are grateful for the efforts of the Kuwaiti defense forces and their support in this ongoing operation.”
“Relevant authorities immediately initiated search-and-rescue operations,” Kuwait's defense ministry spokesperson Col. Said Al-Atwan said in the statement.
“The crews were evacuating from the crash sites and transferred to hospital to assess their condition and provided necessary medical care,” he said.
The crew members are in a “stable” condition, the ministry added.
Al-Atwan said Kuwait was in “direct coordination” with US authorities.
One video geolocated by CNN shows a fighter jet crashing over Kuwait near a US air base. The video shows a jet on fire and falling in a tailspin out of the sky, and it suggests the jet came down within 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) of the US Ali Al Salem base in Kuwait.
Other videos geolocated by CNN appear to show a fighter jet pilot on the ground in Kuwait after ejecting from an aircraft.
In one of the videos, a man in a full flight suit and helmet can be seen kneeling on the ground next to an orange and white parachute and a parachute cord in a desert area near a fence line.
CNN has geolocated the video about 30 kilometers (18.5 miles) from the Ali Al Salem base.
In another video, the pilot is seen standing up as bystanders look on, with thick black smoke billowing in the distant background.
The crashes come during heavy bombardment on Gulf nations as part of an expanding war with Iran. It also comes as smoke has been seen over the area surrounding the US Embassy in Kuwait.
It is notable when US fighter jets crash overseas and often triggers an investigation.
In 2024, a US ship “mistakenly fired” upon a F/A-18 operating from the USS Harry S. Truman in the Red Sea. The incident was investigated, and the two Navy pilots ejected safely.
The US military has a significant number of military assets in the region, deployed in the weeks leading up to the joint US-Israeli military operation that kicked off early Saturday morning Eastern Time. A list put out by CENTCOM on Sunday showing the assets employed thus far included F-18s, F-16s, F-22s, F-35s, A-10 attack aircraft, MQ-9 Reaper drones, refueling aircraft, counter-drone systems, Navy aircraft carriers and guided-missile destroyers.
More than 1,000 targets have been struck, the CENTCOM release on Sunday said, adding that the military is focusing on military targets like command and control centers, Iranian Navy ships and submarines, Islamic Revolutionary Guard corps headquarters and more.
This story has been updated with additional details.
© 2026 Cable News Network. A Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All Rights Reserved. CNN Sans ™ & © 2016 Cable News Network.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app on Google Play.
Scan the QR code to download the CNN app from the Apple Store.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
“Sinners” won best ensemble at the Screen Actors Guild's 32nd Actor Awards setting up a potential nail-biter finale in two weeks at the Academy Awards. “The Pitt” won best drama series, “The Studio” took home best comedy and Harrison Ford was honored with the SAG-AFTRA Life Achievement Award. (March 2)
Delroy Lindo, from left, Miles Canton, Wunmi Mosaku, Omar Benson Miller, Jayme Lawson, Li Jun Li, Lola Kirke, Francine Maisler, and Michael B. Jordan accept the award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture for “Sinners” during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Michael B. Jordan accepts the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role for “Sinners” during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Amy Madigan accepts the award for outstanding performance by a female actor in a supporting role for “Weapons” during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Host Kristen Bell performs during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
Harrison Ford poses in the press room with the lifetime achievement award during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)
Noah Wyle poses in the press room with the awards for outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series and outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series for “The Pitt” during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)
After a near awards-season sweep by “One Battle After Another,” “Sinners” won best ensemble at the Screen Actors Guild's 32nd Actor Awards on Sunday, shaking up the Oscar race and setting up a potential nail-biter finale in two weeks at the Academy Awards.
The guild's awards, formerly known as the SAG Awards, are one of the most closely watched Oscar precursors. Actors make up the largest slice of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and their choices at the Actor Awards often align.
The victory for Ryan Coogler's blues-soaked vampire saga showed that it has a strong chance to win at the Oscars, too, despite an almost unblemished run of awards for Paul Thomas Anderson's “One Battle After Another.” It's won at the Golden Globes, the Producers Guild Awards, the BAFTAs and the Directors Guild Awards.
But the win Sunday, in a Netflix-streamed ceremony at the Shine Auditorium in Los Angeles, flipped that awards-season script. Writer-director Ryan Coogler, whose “Black Panther” triumphed at the guild's awards in 2019, became the first filmmaker to steer two ensembles to the guild's top prize.
“From the bottom of our hearts, to the bottom of your hearts, thank you so much for everything,” said Delroy Lindo, who spoke on behalf of the film's cast.
Moments earlier, Michael B. Jordan also won best male actor, upsetting the category favorite, Timothée Chalamet, and handing the 39-year-old Jordan the most significant prize of his acclaimed career. Even Jordan looked shocked as the audience rose to its feet and Viola Davis, the award's presenter, celebrated.
Michael B. Jordan accepts the award for outstanding performance by a male actor in a leading role for “Sinners” during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
“I wasn't expecting this at all,” said Jordan, who reflected on starting out as actor before he paused to appreciate the moment. “Yeah, man, this is pretty cool.”
As expected, Jessie Buckley won best female actor for her performance in “Hamnet.” But the other actor races have been harder to call. On Sunday, Sean Penn (who didn't attend) won best supporting male actor for “One Battle After Another” and Amy Madigan won best supporting female actor for “Weapons.”
The 75-year-old Madigan, who had never before been nominated by the guild, was visibly surprised. Partway through her winding and charming acceptance speech, she looked down at the statuette.
“It's like when you were little and you had the Barbie and then you got Ken and whipped down his drawers and went, ‘Hey, that's nothing,'” joked Madigan before apologizing for getting distracted.
Catherine O'Hara posthumously won best female actor in a comedy series for her performance as a movie executive in the showbiz satire “The Studio.” O'Hara died at the age of 71 on Jan. 30 from a blood clot in the lungs. At the Shine Auditorium in Los Angeles, the crowd stood in a standing ovation for O'Hara after she was announced as the winner.
Seth Rogen, co-creator of “The Studio,” accepted the award on her behalf. He recalled a passionate collaborator who would, the night before a scene, invariably send a polite email with suggested rewrites. Rogen said O'Hara “showed that you could be a genius and you could be kind.”
Seth Rogen accepts the award for outstanding performance by a female actor in a comedy series for “The Studio” on behalf of Catherine O'Hara during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)
“If you have people in your lives who don't know her work,” Rogen said, “show them O'Hara dancing to Harry Belafonte in ‘Beetlejuice,' show them O'Hara hurting her knee in ‘Best in Show' and doing that amazing thing where she hobbles around, and tell the people as they are laughing that that's Catherine O'Hara and we were lucky that we got to live in a world where she so generously shared her talents with us.”
The ceremony, presented by the actors guild SAG-AFTRA, were hosted by returning emcee Kristen Bell, who kicked off the show on a light, song-and-dance note despite the war in Iran and entertainment industry upheaval. Sean Astin, SAG-AFTRA president, offered a “a prayer for peace” in his remarks.
The Actor Awards were the biggest Hollywood bash since Paramount reached an agreement to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery for $111 billion. The merger, which awaits regulatory approval, sent shock waves through Hollywood. Netflix chief executive Ted Sarandos, whose company lost out to Paramount competing bid, walked the red carpet in jeans.
The win for “Sinners” insures that Warner Bros. will head into the Academy Awards with the two clear best pictures favorites in it and “One Battle After Another” — an awards-season coup for a studio set to be sold.
Before the ceremony began, the award for best stunt ensemble went to a Paramount release: “Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning.” Among the TV awards, “The Studio” won for comedy series and “The Pitt” won for drama series. Individual winners included Keri Russell (“The Diplomat”), Rogen (“The Studio”), Michelle Williams (“Dying for Sex”), Owen Cooper (“Adolescence”) and Noah Wyle (“The Pitt”).
Harrison Ford was honored with the SAG-AFTRA Life Achievement Award, a prize presented with warm sarcasm by Woody Harrelson. The 83-year-old actor said he was humbled.
“I'm in a room with actors, many of whom are here because they've been nominated to receive a prize for their amazing work, while I'm here to receive a prize for being alive,” said Ford, who called it “the half point” of his career.
Harrison Ford poses in the press room with the lifetime achievement award during the 32nd Annual Actor Awards on Sunday, March 1, 2026, at the Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall in Los Angeles. (Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP)
Ford teared up for much of his speech, reflecting on a career that he noted was “not an overnight success.” He called the award “very encouraging.”
“I'm indeed a lucky guy,” said Ford. “Lucky to have found my people. Lucky to have work that challenges me. Lucky to still be doing it.”
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
President Donald Trump walks on the South Lawn upon his arrival to the White House, Sunday, March 1, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
In this satellite image provided by Vantor, damaged buildings are seen in the Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's official residence in Tehran, Iran, Sunday, March 1, 2026. (Satellite image ©2026 Vantor via AP)
President Donald Trump holds up a fist after disembarking Air Force One at Palm Beach International Airport in West Palm Beach, Fla., Friday, Feb. 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)
The White House is seen Sunday March 1, 2026, in Washington, ahead of the arrival of President Donald Trump. (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Trump administration officials told congressional staff in private briefings Sunday that U.S. intelligence did not suggest Iran was preparing to launch a preemptive strike against the U.S., three people familiar with the briefings said.
The administration officials instead acknowledged there was a more general threat in the region from Iran's missiles and proxy forces, two of the people said. The third person, however, said the administration emphasized that Iran's missiles and proxy forces posed an imminent threat to U.S. personnel and allies in the region.
The officials did not provide any clarity about what would happen next in Iran after the joint U.S.-Israeli operation, the two people said. All three people insisted on anonymity to discuss details that have not been made public.
The information conveyed to the congressional staff contrasts with the message from President Donald Trump. “Our objective is to defend the American people by eliminating imminent threats from the Iranian regime. A vicious group of very hard, terrible people,” he said in a video message after launching strikes on Iran.
Senior Trump administration officials, who like others were not authorized to comment publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, had told reporters Saturday that there were indicators that the Iranians could launch a preemptive attack.
The White House and Pentagon did not immediately reply to requests for comment on Sunday night. Details of the briefing were first reported by Politico.
On Tuesday, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will brief the full membership of Congress on the U.S. military operation against Iran, the White House said Sunday. Rubio also was slated to brief Hill leadership Monday, the same day Hegseth and Caine are planning a press conference about the operation.
The military operation came after authorities from Israel and the U.S. spent weeks tracking the movements of senior Iranian leaders, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and shared information that allowed the strikes to be carried out in a surprise daylight attack, according to an Israeli military official and another person familiar with the operation.
The eventual barrage of U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran came so quickly that they were nearly simultaneous — with three strikes in three locations hitting within a single minute — killing Khamenei and some 40 senior figures, including the head of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard and the country's defense minister, the Israeli military official said Sunday.
The official said a variety of factors created a golden opportunity to take out much of Iran's leadership, like weeks of training and monitoring the movements of senior figures as well as intelligence in real-time before the attack began that key targets were gathered together.
Striking by day also gave an additional element of surprise, said the official, who said so many major, rapid-fire strikes were critical to keep key officials from fleeing after the first strike. The official said Israel closely cooperated with its U.S. counterparts and had used a similar tactic at the beginning of last June's war — which resulted in the killing of several senior Iranian figures.
The official also noted Khamenei having posted defiant tweets taunting President Donald Trump in the days before the attack.
The details about the strikes came as the conflict entered its second day, with Trump saying in a video message Sunday that he expected it would continue until “all of our objectives are achieved.” He did not spell out what those objectives were.
The Republican president also said the U.S. military and its partners hit hundreds of targets in Iran, including Revolutionary Guard facilities, Iranian air defense systems and nine warships, “all in a matter of literally minutes.”
Before the attacks, the CIA had for months tracked the movements of senior Iranian leaders, including Khamenei.
The intelligence was shared with Israeli officials, and the timing of the strikes was adjusted in part because of that information about the Iranian leaders' location, according to the person familiar with the planning.
The intelligence-sharing between U.S. and Israel reflects the preparation that went into the strikes, which threw the future of the Islamic Republic into uncertainty and raised the risk of escalating regional conflict.
The U.S. regularly shares intelligence with allies including Israel. Those partnerships, and the accuracy of the intelligence they yield, is often critical not only to the success of a military operation but also to the public's support for it.
Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, the senior Democrat on the committee, told The Associated Press that, historically, “our working relationship with the Mossad and Israel is really strong.” Mossad is the Israeli spy agency.
Warner said he has serious concerns about the justification for the strikes, Trump's long-term plans for the conflict and the risks that U.S. service members will face. The military announced Sunday that three American troops had been killed in the Iran operation.
“No tears will be shed over their leadership being eliminated, but always the question is: OK, what next?” Warner said.
A senior White House official said Iran's “new potential leadership” has suggested it is open to talks with the United States. That official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal administration deliberations, said Trump has indicated he's “eventually” willing to talk but that for now the military operation “continues unabated.”
The official did not say who the potential new Iranian leaders are or how they made their alleged willingness to talk known. Separately, Trump told The Atlantic that he planned to speak with Iran's new leadership.
“They want to talk, and I have agreed to talk, so I will be talking to them,” he said Sunday, declining comment on the timing.
___
Federman reported from Jerusalem. Associated Press writers Matthew Lee and Will Weissert in Washington contributed to this report.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
Residents play with their children in a playground at the semi-abandoned “Life in Venice” housing complex in Qidong, on China's east coast, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Dake Kang)
Residents play with their children in a playground at the semi-abandoned “Life in Venice” housing complex in Qidong, on China's east coast, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Dake Kang)
Stone statues stand over a waterless fountain by a vast, largely empty hotel at the semi-abandoned “Life in Venice” housing complex in Qidong, on China's east coast, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Dake Kang)
Residents shop for groceries at a store in the semi-abandoned “Life in Venice” housing complex in Qidong, on China's east coast, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Dake Kang)
Watchtowers stand at an empty beach at the semi-abandoned “Life in Venice” housing complex in Qidong, on China's east coast, Feb. 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Dake Kang)
The “Life in Venice” housing development, a multibillion-dollar replica of the Italian city on the Chinese coast, stands silent. Many of the tens of thousands of homes are hollow husks of concrete and alabaster.
But in recent years the remote, partially abandoned complex has drawn unlikely new residents like Sasa Chen, a burned-out young Chinese woman who until recently worked a high-earning finance job in Shanghai, China's bustling commerce hub.
The appeal?
Chen pays just 1200 RMB, or $168, a month for her apartment in faux Venice in the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu. It's so cheap that it's allowed Chen to retire at the tender age of 28.
Experts say Chen is part of a broader trend that has seen a growing number of young people across China migrating to small towns and cities, taking advantage of cheap real estate prices that have been plummeting since the COVID pandemic.
It's a stark reversal from previous generations that prized upward mobility. In decades past, China's ascendent middle class flocked to booming megacities to chase jobs and dreams, once abundant as the country went from rags to riches. But as the once red-hot economy cooled, expectations have soared, opportunities have dwindled and competition has grown fierce.
Most large Chinese companies, especially high-paying tech firms, requires a work schedule of 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. from Monday to Saturday, a grueling lifestyle popularly known as the 996 culture. Under the intense pressure, some young professionals have called it quits altogether and joined a resistance movement called “ lying flat ” — shunning careers and capitalism for a “low-desire life.”
Some are redefining their dreams to focus on rest and relaxation, much like what some young adults in the West are doing under what they call FIRE: “Financial Independence, Retire Early.”
That's much more achievable in China because the cost of living in some places can be so low compared to prices in the West.
Home prices at the massive “Life in Venice” development have more than halved since the downturn in China's property market a few years ago, and a lunch of noodles or a rice dish costs under three dollars in the neighborhood's restaurants.
The bargain prices have benefited young people like Chen willing to live in remote but affordable housing now available across the country. Chen describes it as the perfect life: a sea view, clean air, and cheap rent.
“I have all the time in the world, the freedom of doing whatever I want,” said Chen. “I am living the life that I want.”
“Life in Venice” was envisioned in the early 2010s as a weekend resort for wealthy residents from nearby Shanghai, providing a luxurious yet peaceful life by the sea.
But demand for the vast complex's 46,000 units cratered after China's debt-fueled property market popped. The developer, real estate giant Evergrande, went bankrupt in 2024.
Today the site is a ghost town, with many villas just empty shells. Less than one in five apartments are occupied. Abandoned boats founder off its rundown pier and “For Sale” signs and empty storefronts line its streets. But a smattering of residents have moved in, some of them fishing in the development's tranquil waters.
Chen used to work in a glossy high-rise in Shanghai, making up to 700,000 yuan ($98,480) a year at a large finance firm. But she had never liked the idea of working. After three years, she began plotting her escape from the drudgery of China's white-collar workforce.
Her plan was to save up and find somewhere to live with rent so low she could live off returns on her investments.
Last year, her dream came true: Chen saved 2 million yuan ($290,000) and found a spacious apartment at “Life in Venice”. With such low rent, she calculates she can live there for the rest of her life without ever having to work again.
Though “Life in Venice” doesn't have a branch of her favorite sour soup hotpot restaurant, door to door delivery, or proximity to major hospitals, her new residence has plenty of conveniences like a grocery store and eateries.
Chen used to dread the grind of her nine-to-six job, which she said “felt like marching to my own death.” Now, she wakes at 10 a.m. every day, filling her days with cooking, chilling, and long walks on the beach.
“I never believed that work is the meaning of life,” Chen said. “My ideal state of life is not to work and stay at places that I like.”
Like Chen, scores of young Chinese people have left big cities.
While there's no available data about how many have left the Chinese workforce in recent years, figures show that from 2019 to 2024, Beijing lost 1.6 million people in their twenties and early thirties — around the total population of Philadelphia — according to China's capital statistic office.
“People are quitting this competition, this very clear, linear, upward career track,” said Xiang Biao, director of the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Germany. “It's a broader trend.”
China's economy has cooled in recent years, growing just 5% in 2025 — still higher than the U.S. and other rich countries, but a far cry from the double-digit growth the country saw in past decades.
As the economy slows, young Chinese are struggling to find jobs. As of December, 16.5% of 16-24 year-olds who aren't in school were unemployed.
Some, like 29-year-old Ban Zhao, are rejecting the corporate rat race altogether.
Last summer, Ban moved from a bustling commercial city on China's east coast to a small town in China's southwestern Yunnan province. Tucked away in a lush valley, the town is famed for fresh, clean air and healing hot springs. There, for just 800 yuan a month ($110) Ban rents an apartment with three bedrooms, one of which she converted to a yoga studio.
She and her boyfriend work less than 20 hours a week, offering yoga classes online to make ends meet. The rest of the time, she walks around her scenic neighborhood surrounded by trees and blossoms, often enjoying the region's famed sunshine.
“I can do whatever I want and not do whatever I don't want,” Ban said. “I live in heaven.”
Some are flocking to places like Hegang, a cold and remote coal mining city in northeastern China famous for shockingly cheap housing prices. As resources dried up and mines closed, young people left, turning Hegang into a city with far more homes than people.
Apartments there are now cheaper than cars, making sales easy for realtor Yang Xuewei.
Yang has sold more than 100 bargain-priced apartments to clients across the country — and even to some foreigners who contacted Yang after watching his online virtual tours. A one-bedroom apartment can be bought for $3,000, and $13,000 can buy a roomy four-bedroom place.
“I don't know about big cities, I never lived in one,” Yang said. “I can only say that living in Hegang is easy.”
Chen Zhiwu, a University of Hong Kong finance professor, said higher living costs and fewer job opportunities in bigger cities are driving people to move to cheaper places.
“It's natural,” Chen said. “Young people are facing reality and thinking hard about their futures.”
Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
While OpenAI locks down Washington, Anthropic is locking down users and rocketing to the top of the App Store.
Anthropic has been sidelined in Washington following a public dispute with the Department of Defense over how its AI models would be deployed. President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies to phase out its technology.
Meanwhile, OpenAI has secured new ground, with CEO Sam Altman announcing in a Friday night post on X that it had reached an agreement with the Department of Defense to deploy AI models in its classified network.
OpenAI's agreement has left some loyal ChatGPT users uneasy about OpenAI's ambitions, prompting online debates about the ethical implications — and some saying they were defecting to its rival Claude.
As of 12:50 pm ET on Monday, Claude ranked No. 1 among the most downloaded free apps on Apple's US App Store. Claude also tops the chart for top productivity apps, where the top four apps are all AI competitors: ChatGPT, Google's Gemini, and xAI's Grok.
A spokesperson for Anthropic said, "Every single day last week was an all-time record for Claude sign-ups." The AI startup said its upswing dates back to its much-discussed playful Super Bowl ad, which mocked OpenAI's decision to test ads on ChatGPT.
"Since the start of the year, free active users have increased by over 60% and daily signups have quadrupled," the spokesperson wrote in an email to Business Insider. "Claude's paid subscribers have also more than doubled this year across Pro and Max plans."
Even with the increase, Anthropic has a long way to go in matching ChatGPT, which OpenAI said on February 27 boasts over 900 million weekly active users. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has also positioned his company to focus more on the enterprise market.
Converts have taken to social media to share screenshots documenting their switch.
Pop musician Katy Perry wrote that she was "done" on X, alongside a screenshot of Claude's pricing page, with a red heart around the $20-per-month "Pro" plan.
done pic.twitter.com/DkS9DmlUAR
Another X user, Adam Lyttle, wrote "Made the switch," alongside a screenshot of his email inbox with a receipt from Anthropic and cancellation confirmation from OpenAI.
Made the switch pic.twitter.com/lm8xh48xDj
On Reddit's ChatGPT subreddit, dozens of users say they've deleted their accounts and are urging others to do the same.
"Cancel ChatGPT" has become a common refrain online, while some users have taken a more personal tone, saying Altman's move "crossed the line."
The agreement hasn't polarized all AI users, however.
In one Reddit thread, several commenters said the news does not affect their choice of AI model, arguing that Anthropic's work with Palantir raises similar concerns. In November 2024, Anthropic, Palantir, and Amazon Web Services struck an agreement to provide US intelligence and defense agencies access to Claude models.
After Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said he would designate Anthropic as a "supply chain risk to national security," Anthropic said it would "challenge any supply chain risk designation in court."
In his Friday post, Altman said the Department of Defense had agreed with two of OpenAI's safety principles.
"Two of our most important safety principles are prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems," Altman wrote on X. "The DoW agrees with these principles, reflects them in law and policy, and we put them into our agreement."
By Saturday afternoon, OpenAI published a more detailed description of its contract with the Department of Defense, including the specific language it used surrounding the use of its models for surveillance and autonomous weapons.
On the topic of autonomous weapons, OpenAI said:
On the topic of mass surveillance, OpenAI said:
While some chatbot users suggested it's all fair in business, war, and federal procurement, others suggested the Pentagon's stance may have handed Anthropic a public relations win.
X user Tae Kim joked that Hegseth might need a new title: "Secretary Hegseth Chief of Claude Marketing."
Jump to
Dubai-based Emirates airline got the green light from local authorities to resume a "limited number" of flights as early as Monday evening, in a sign of how airlines are preparing to restart service to the region after thousands of flight cancellations. Separately, Israeli airline El Al said Monday that it's considering chartering private jets to bring stranded Israeli citizens home.
The announcements mark a potential improvement after air travel ground to a halt in a large swath of the Middle East over the weekend following the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran and subsequent retaliatory strikes.
The attacks shut airspace over a large part of the region, stranding hundreds of thousands of customers around the world and leading to thousands of canceled flights, including those who weren't flying to and from the area since aircraft couldn't transit those zones. Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, is one of the busiest air travel hubs in the world.
The airport authority that owns and manages airports in Dubai said a small number of flights would be permitted to operate from Dubai International and Dubai World Central – Al Maktoum International, but advised travelers to check with their airlines.
For its part, Emirates said it will start operating a "limited number of flights" Monday night and urged customers not to go to the airport unless notified by the airline.
"We are accommodating customers with earlier bookings as a priority," it said in a post on X. "All other flights remain suspended until further notice," it said.
El Al said it is considering operating flights on KlasJet planes from European airports to Taba, Egypt, near the southern tip of Israel or Aqaba, over the border in Jordan, for customers of the airline, but that the plan is subject to government approval.
Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways said Monday that all commercial flights to and from the city are suspended until afternoon local time on Wednesday, though it could operating some cargo and repatriation flights "subject to strict operational and safety protocols."
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
World markets are reeling after the US and Israel attacked Iran over the weekend and killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, disrupting international trade and travel and raising the risk of a prolonged conflict that has sweeping commercial and economic effects.
Here's a rundown of where major assets stood at 8:00 a.m. ET on Monday:
Brent oil, the international benchmark, was trading around 8% higher at $78.49 a barrel, while US crude prices were up 6% at nearly $71.35 a barrel.
Crude prices initially spiked more than 12% when markets opened on Sunday evening in the US, and were further fueled by news that Saudi Aramco halted operations at its Ras Tanura refinery in Saudi Arabia after a drone strike.
Natural gas prices also jumped on Monday, after Qatar announced it would halt production at its Ras Laffan Industrial City plant, the world's largest liquefied natural gas plant, following Iranian strikes.
US stocks tumbled, but pared the deepest losses as traders digested the conflict.
Notable winners in the market included shares of defense giants Lockheed Martin and RTX, as well as oil majors Exxon Mobil and Chevron. Shares of travel stocks, meanwhile, tumbled as the outlook for global tourism dimmed. Airline, hotel, and cruise stocks all fell.
Here's where major US stock indexes stood around 10:50 a.m. ET on Monday:
S&P 500: 6,858.25, down 0.3%
Dow Jones Industrial Average: 48,774.81, down 0.4% (-203.11 points)
Nasdaq Composite: 22,644.03, down 0.16%
European stocks slumped as investors cut their exposure to travel-related and consumer stocks while wagering that defense and energy companies would benefit from military escalation.
Britain's FTSE 100 slid by only 1% or so thanks to its high concentration of energy, mining, and defense companies. Asian equities fell on Monday, with Japan's Nikkei 225 closing 1.4% lower and Hong Kong's Hang Seng ending the day 2.1% lower.
Gold rose about 2% to around $5,352 per troy ounce. Geopolitical conflict has been part of the bull case for gold in the last year and a key driver of its record-setting hot streak. Analysts say a new war in the Middle East could fuel even greater gains, with commentators on Monday eyeing $6,000 an ounce in the coming months.
Silver gained about 2% to trade around $95, while platinum slid 1% to around $2,350. Copper was down 0.5% at about $6.
Bitcoin initially tumbled in line with stocks and other risk assets, but regained ground to trade at around $66,000.
Ether, Ripple, and Solana dipped to about $1,934, $1.34 each, and $83.30 each.
The dollar index, which measures the currency against a basket of major rivals, was up 0.9%.
"The first order reaction to the weekend's escalation will likely see the dollar benefit on the back of higher energy prices and elevated risk aversion," Barclays analysts wrote on Saturday after the first attacks.
Energy traders are preparing for the possibility that the Strait of Hormuz, a critical shipping route for global energy commodities, is closed for an extended period.
"The immediate price shocks are being accompanied by a fresh wave of supply chain disruptions. This isn't just a question of whether the Straits of Hormuz are physically closed; the logistical friction is already here," economist Mohamed El-Erian wrote on Substack, pointing to insurance costs, maritime cargo, and aviation as having already been significantly impacted.
Barclays analysts on Saturday described the situation as realizing the "worst fears" for oil. Analysts on Sunday said other energy commodities were also at high risk of repricing.
"Qatar has the world's third-largest LNG export capacity, and ~20% of global LNG trade transits the Strait of Hormuz (primarily Qatari volumes), which makes shipping risk a gas-market event as much as an oil-market event," strategists at Franklin Templeton wrote on Sunday.
They described the Strait of Hormuz as "the macro circuit breaker," and noted that global shipping costs had already risen in the day after the initial attacks.
Higher oil prices risk stoking inflation, and analysts have flagged in the aftermath of other recent conflicts that a sudden spike in energy prices could also tip the global economy into a recession.
Analysts noted on Sunday evening that markets currently perceive a low risk that the war will drag on for a long time or spill into a wider regional conflict.
"Broader uncertainty suppresses investor sentiment, which can broadly weigh on risk-assets globally," Adam Hetts, the global head of multi-asset at Janus Henderson, said on Sunday. "This would likely make global developed market sovereigns, including US Treasuries, and safe-haven currencies more attractive."
Hetts added that in a prolonged period of uncertainty, higher oil prices could spark a global inflation scare, which might slash the likelihood of rate cuts by the Federal Reserve this year.
Chris Weston, the head of research at Pepperstone, said the overall tone in markets was risk-off. He added that price moves across asset classes remained relatively contained and did not reflect panic-driven selling.
"The cross-asset moves are orderly, and the more outsized volatility appears largely contained to the energy complex," he wrote on Sunday evening.
Within energy markets, Brent crude's inability to sustain a move above $80 a barrel indicates that traders may have already priced in a meaningful supply disruption, he added.
Higher output quotas from OPEC+ could also be helping to limit further upside in oil prices, he added, referring to the oil-producing group's plan to boost crude oil output by 206,000 barrels per day from April.
Paul Eitelman, the global chief investment strategist at Russell Investments, said investors should keep the broader macro backdrop in mind as markets process the latest developments.
That's largely because the US energy picture looks dramatically different from what it did decades ago. The US is now the world's largest oil and gas producer and a net exporter. Meanwhile, gasoline makes up about 2% of total consumer spending in the US — a fraction of its share during the oil shock era of the 1970s through the 1990s.
"Oil shocks are less important to global markets than they were decades ago. At this time, we believe the strikes are unlikely to derail global fundamentals," Eitelman said.
Jump to
In this article
Apple opened its week of product launches on Monday morning with a refreshed low-cost iPhone and a faster iPad Air, as it begins what looks to be a broader multi-day hardware push.
The headline device is the new iPhone 17e, a budget model in the iPhone 17 lineup that starts at $599 and comes in below the $799 standard iPhone 17.
That makes it an important product for Apple in the mid-tier smartphone market, where it competes more directly with lower-priced devices from Samsung, Google, and Chinese phone makers, particularly in more price-sensitive markets.
The 17e keeps the same 6.1-inch size, but adds tougher glass, Apple's A19 chip, the newer C1X modem, MagSafe charging, and 256GB of starting storage — twice the base capacity of last year's model. It also adds Apple Intelligence support, giving the lower-cost model more feature parity with the rest of the lineup.
The unchanged $599 starting price, even with more storage and added features, suggests Apple is trying to make the entry-level iPhone more compelling without cutting into the pricing of its flagship lineup.
That stands out at a time when rising memory costs are squeezing the broader smartphone market, making the 17e a more aggressive value play for Apple as it looks to attract price-conscious buyers.
The new handset comes in pink, black, and white, with preorders starting March 4 and in-store availability beginning on March 11.
Apple also updated the iPad Air, which keeps the same design and price but moves from its M3 to M4 chip.
The 11-inch model still starts at $599, while the 13-inch version remains $799. Apple said in the release that the new processor is up to 30% faster than the prior generation. Apple said the new iPad Air gets faster wireless performance and improved cellular connectivity on models with mobile data.
The iPad refresh helps Apple build on momentum in a category that outperformed in the holiday quarter, as the company looks to keep tablet demand going with faster chips rather than a major redesign.
That could matter especially if Apple continues to see strong first-time buyer demand in the category: in its most recent holiday quarter, the company said roughly half of iPad buyers were new to the product.
The company has planned product announcements over the next few days. Apple has told stores to brace for a big rush, Bloomberg reported.
That level of retail preparation suggests Apple expects at least one of this week's launches to have broader mainstream appeal, not just incremental interest from existing users.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Anthropic's Claude artificial intelligence models had "elevated errors" on Monday, as the app held its spot as the most popular free app on Apple's App Store.
Claude's status website showed "degraded performance" on Claude Opus 4.6, its latest model released last month.
In an update at 10:49 a.m. ET, the site stated that the Opus 4.6 issue was identified and a fix was in the works.
An update at 10:47 a.m. ET on the site said that issues on claude.ai, console and claude code had been resolved.
"Claude is back up and running across claude.ai and our apps. We're grateful to our users as the team works to match the incredible demand we've seen for Claude in recent days," Anthropic told CNBC in a note just before 11 a.m ET.
The AI chat app surged in popularity after fallout with the Defense Department over restrictions for the government agency's use of Anthropic's technology.
Anthropic signed a $200 million contract with the Pentagon in July. Tensions arose after Anthropic asked the government to ensure that its AI models would not be used for fully autonomous weapons or mass domestic surveillance of Americans.
The Pentagon pushed back, demanding that the military be allowed to use the platform for any and all purposes that are deemed lawful.
On Friday, President Donald Trump ordered every U.S. government agency to "immediately cease" using Anthropic's technology. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced on X shortly after that the Pentagon would be labeling the company a "supply-chain risk to national security."
AI rival OpenAI reached a deal with the Department of Defense hours after the government severed its Anthropic ties.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
In this article
Paramount+ and HBO Max will be combined into one streaming service if regulators approve Paramount Skydance's acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount CEO David Ellison said on a conference call Monday.
A combined service would have about 200 million subscribers given existing totals, Ellison said during his company's investor call about the WBD transaction. Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery said last week they had struck an agreement to sell WBD for $31 per share after Netflix backed out of the prolonged bidding war.
Paramount executives didn't offer any details Monday on how the company may price a combined service or what it would be called. Still, Ellison said he wouldn't disrupt the HBO brand.
"HBO should stay HBO," he said, citing its long history of quality programming.
HBO is likely to be a sub-brand within the larger service, according to a person familiar with Paramount's plans. HBO is currently run by Casey Bloys, whose contract runs out in 2027, another person said. Bloys declined to comment.
Paramount also touted the strength of its sports offering on a combined service, bringing together TNT Sports with CBS Sports.
Paramount executives said they haven't heard anything from regulators to signal that the breadth of their sports offerings — which would include March Madness, NFL, MLB, NHL, Nascar, French Open, The Masters, college football and more — would trigger any antitrust concerns.
HBO has been housed in a variety of streaming services with different names in recent years.
Time Warner originally launched HBO as a streaming option in 2010, called HBO Go. Five years later, HBO also launched HBO Now, giving users a way to access HBO outside of the cable bundle for the first time.
After AT&T acquired Time Warner in 2018, renaming it WarnerMedia, executives launched HBO Max in 2020 in an attempt to add heft and more subscribers.
Three years later, after AT&T divested WarnerMedia and merged it with Discovery, Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav renamed the service Max to showcase the addition of Discovery's programming to the service.
That decision was reversed last year, when Zaslav and Bloys decided to revert back to the HBO Max name to highlight the strength of HBO's programming.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Some flights from the Middle East have resumed in the wake of the strikes on Iran — but the process hasn't been without confusion.
12 Etihad Airways flights had departed Abu Dhabi as of around 5 p.m. local time on Monday, even as the airline said operations remain suspended.
Emirates, based in neighboring Dubai, announced it would operate a "limited number of flights" on Monday evening. "Please do not go to the airport unless you have been notified," it added.
At 9:12 p.m. local time, an Emirates double-decker Airbus A380 took off from Dubai heading for the Indian city of Mumbai.
Four further flights to the Indian cities of Hyderabad, Delhi, Bengaluru, and Chennai were also scheduled to depart Dubai on Monday night.
Earlier in the day, the first flight carrying passengers to leave the UAE since the attacks, an Etihad Airbus A380 headed for London Heathrow, took off at 2:39 p.m. local time.
It was soon followed by 11 wide-body jets bound for cities in Europe, Asia, and Africa. They were:
About an hour earlier, Etihad Airways had said in an X post that "all flights to and from Abu Dhabi are suspended" until Tuesday afternoon.
Meanwhile, a notice on the airport's website told passengers to check directly with their airline before heading there, "due to the temporary closure of UAE airspace."
However, the site also showed several flights available for check-in.
In a statement shared with Business Insider following the departures, Etihad said that flights returning people to their home countries — or delivering cargo or repositioning the airplane — could operate "subject to strict operational and safety approvals."
"All scheduled commercial flights to and from Abu Dhabi remain cancelled," it said.
Interest in the flights was high among aviation enthusiasts, with over 100,000 people tracking both the first Etihad and Emirates flights out of the UAE on Flightradar24.
On Sunday, a Nepali national was killed, and seven people were injured by debris after an Iranian drone targeting Abu Dhabi airport was intercepted, officials said.
Abu Dhabi International Airport did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
All flights from Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait remained suspended on Monday.
A Lufthansa Airbus A380 also took off from Abu Dhabi earlier on Monday, bound for Munich. The enormous airplane can carry over 500 passengers, but an airline spokesperson told Business Insider that there were only two pilots on board.
That's because the jet arrived in Abu Dhabi for maintenance three months ago, which has now been completed.
The spokesperson said Lufthansa reviewed the possibility of flying passengers, but it would require at least 17 flight attendants who can't be flown in "due to the current massive restrictions on air traffic in the United Arab Emirates."
They added that airport accessibility for any potential passengers is "unclear and difficult to organize."
"Reliable planning of check-in, security checks, and boarding cannot be guaranteed under these circumstances."
Jump to
Some of the world's most congested airspace has been disrupted by the US and Israel's strikes on Iran.
Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Qatar have all closed their airspaces. Dubai International Airport, the world's busiest airport for international traffic, has suspended all flights until further notice.
A video shared by Flightradar24 showed airplanes deserting the region on Saturday morning.
Airspace clearing after strikes by the United States and Israel in Iran. pic.twitter.com/Oub4T6SrkF
Data from the aviation analytics firm Cirium shows that about 1,600 of the roughly 3,800 scheduled flights to the region have been canceled as of 5:30 p.m. Dubai time Monday. Factoring in outbound cancellations, that number is closer to 3,200. That follows the thousands also canceled since Saturday.
Cirium said the figure is likely higher, since the UAE airspace is still closed, but some smaller airlines haven't yet officially updated their schedules. It added that around 900,000 seats are scheduled to, from, and within the Middle East daily.
The three major Middle Eastern airlines — Qatar Airways, Etihad Airways, and Emirates — operate major hubs that connect passengers to destinations around the world, creating a massive ripple effect of disruptions. All three said that flights would remain temporarily suspended through at least noon Monday.
Dubai International Airport — the world's busiest megahub for international traffic — was damaged by an apparent missile strike on Sunday morning. Zayed International Airport in Abu Dhabi was similarly hit. It's unclear how that could further impact operations even if the airspace opens back up.
A Cirium spokesperson said these airlines collectively carry 90,000 transiting passengers through their hubs daily — not including those destined for the Middle East.
Even for flights that don't land in the region, it's a key corridor for flying between Europe and Asia. Some flights appeared to re-route over Saudi Arabia. Other airlines were avoiding the region altogether.
Detours are costly for airlines: They have to pay for extra fuel, labor, and any associated passenger compensation. And it's possible mass diversions could overwhelm certain airports.
In a post on X, Emirates said it was temporarily suspending all flights to and from Dubai, its home base. That's equal to about 500 flights a day, according to Cirium.
Emirates urged customers to check their flight statuses before visiting the airport. "We are actively monitoring the situation and engaging with relevant authorities," the airline added.
Qatar Airways said all flights to and from the country were suspended until at least midnight UTC, or 7 p.m. ET. It also expects delays when usual operations resume.
Doha's Hamad International Airport advised passengers "not to proceed to the airport." Additional staff were deployed there to help passengers affected by the disruption, the airline said.
Etihad Airways, which is based in Abu Dhabi, said all departures and arrivals to the city were suspended until 2 p.m. local time Sunday.
Kuwait's civil aviation ministry said a drone attack left some airport employees with minor injuries and damaged a passenger terminal.
Saudia said flights to and from affected airports were canceled until at least Tuesday.
For those already in the air during the strikes, many flights diverted to other nearby airports or turned back to their origins.
Flightradar24 shows an Emirates flight from Orlando to Dubai diverted to Istanbul in a 14-hour flight to nowhere. A Qatar flight from New York to Doha crossed the Atlantic but then diverted to Rome after about 10 hours in the air.
An American Airlines flight from Philadelphia to Doha had flown for more than six hours when it turned around over Ireland and started heading back across the Atlantic Ocean, flight-tracking data showed. It looks like the total flight-to-nowhere will last about 13 hours.
An Air Canada flight from Toronto to Dubai was over the Mediterranean Sea before U-turning. Passengers appear to face a total journey time of 10 hours.
In a video statement posted to Truth Social on Saturday morning, President Donald Trump vowed to destroy Iran's missile program and navy, and ensure that the country can "never" have a nuclear weapon.
There is likely more disruption to emerge. When Iran launched strikes on a US air base in Qatar last June, more than 160 flights were diverted.
Similar cancellations and reroutes happened in February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine, and again in April 2025 amid rising tensions between India and Pakistan.
Air India, for example, had to reroute flights around Pakistani airspace last year, requiring some long-haul services between India and Europe and North America to add a fuel stop in Vienna.
Some airlines, like Finnair, still fly the long way around Russia on certain long-haul treks rather than canceling the service altogether.
Jump to
Every time Talia publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
The National Air and Space Museum's flagship location in Washington, DC, is one of the most-visited museums in the US, but the building isn't large enough to display all of the aircraft and spacecraft in its collection.
That's where the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center comes in. The National Air and Space Museum's lesser-known second location, a hangar-like structure in Chantilly, Virginia, offers 340,000 square feet of exhibit space with over 200 aircraft and spacecraft on display.
"What you're going to see are the first, the last, the only, the last remaining, the most significant. So it's an A-plus, as far as the collection," Holly Williamson, the museum's public affairs specialist, told Business Insider.
Here are the coolest things I saw during my visit.
Unlike at the National Air and Space Museum's flagship DC location, where timed-entry tickets help manage large crowds in the smaller space, reservations are not required at the Udvar-Hazy Center.
Admission to the museum is free, and parking costs $15.
At 164 feet tall, the observation tower educates visitors about the history of Air Traffic Control and provides a 360-degree view of the modern airport in action.
Inside the tower, I watched planes take off and land at Dulles Airport while listening to live Air Traffic Control audio.
Visitors can watch restoration work happen in real time from a balcony with floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the hangar.
Among the works-in-progress are "Flak-Bait," a Martin B-26 Marauder that flew 202 combat missions during World War II and participated in D-Day, and a Sikorsky JRS-1 seaplane that was present at Pearl Harbor when it was attacked on December 7, 1941.
On August 6, 1945, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber Enola Gay dropped the first-ever atomic bomb used in warfare on Hiroshima, killing at least 70,000 people.
The "Little Boy" atomic bomb weighed 9,700 pounds, forcing the aircraft to remove most of its protective and defensive armament in order to carry the enormous weight.
The Enola Gay exhibit sparked controversy when the plane was first displayed in 1995, as veterans' groups and anti-war activists debated how the historical narrative around the use of the atomic bomb should be presented.
In the 1950s, Boeing set out to build a jet aircraft that could function as a passenger aircraft, a cargo plane, or a tanker used for mid-air refueling.
Boeing began building this prototype jet in 1952, and it flew for the first time two years later. It traveled 100 miles per hour faster than the de Havilland Comet, the world's first jetliner developed in the UK, and had a range of over 3,500 miles, revolutionizing the air travel industry.
Known as "Dash 80," the developed version of the aircraft entered service as the first jetliner in the US, the Boeing 707.
The governments of Britain and France collaborated to create the first supersonic commercial jets, which operated commercially from 1976 to 2003.
Traveling at twice the speed of sound allowed the planes to cross the ocean in record time. Concorde's fastest flight from New York City to London lasted just 2 hours, 52 minutes, and 59 seconds.
The museum's Concorde jet, which flew for Air France, measures 202 feet and 3 inches long with a wingspan of 83 feet and 10 inches.
The Lockheed SR-71A, a supersonic reconnaissance aircraft, was designed to fly high and fast enough to avoid Russian missiles during the Cold War. It was capable of flying at an altitude of over 85,000 feet at speeds of over three times the speed of sound, or approximately 0.7 miles per second.
The aircraft became known as "Blackbird" for its black paint that was capable of absorbing radar signals.
This Blackbird logged 2,801.1 hours of flight time over 24 years of service before retiring in 1990.
It's hard to capture the full scale of Discovery in a photo, but I found it awe-inspiring to see such an enormous, historically significant spacecraft in person.
The shuttle measures 122 feet long, 78 feet wide, and 57 feet tall, towering over the other artifacts in the hangar. When fully loaded for missions, the orbiter weighed around 250,000 pounds.
Discovery flew its first mission in 1984 and returned from its last in 2012, spending a total of 365 days in space.
Among its many historic accomplishments, Discovery deployed the Hubble Space Telescope in 1990 and became the first space shuttle to dock with the International Space Station in 1999.
The backpack propulsion device, powered by nitrogen jets, allowed McCandless to fly around 300 feet away from the space shuttle Challenger. His untethered spacewalk was immortalized in an iconic photo of the lone astronaut floating above the Earth.
My phone's step counter recorded nearly 10,000 steps on the day I visited the museum. There's an incredible amount of ground to cover and objects to see.
I can't believe I didn't know that the National Air and Space Museum even had a second location when I started planning my visit to Washington, DC. Now, I'm recommending it to all of the air and space enthusiasts I know.
Jump to
Every time Polly publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
Qatar's state-owned energy company has halted production of liquefied natural gas, LNG, after Iranian drone attacks damaged one of its production plants.
"Due to military attacks on QatarEnergy's operating facilities in Ras Laffan Industrial City and Mesaieed Industrial City in the State of Qatar, QatarEnergy has ceased production of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and associated products," QatarEnergy said in a statement on its website.
Natural gas prices surged on Monday, with European futures for the commodity rising almost 50% soon after the news.
The most widely tracked benchmark for natural gas futures rose more than 6%, mirroring similar gains in other energy commodities. Brent crude oil, the international benchmark, was up 8% on the day.
Iran launched missile strikes targeting at least six countries in retaliation for the Saturday morning attack by the US and Israel.
LNG is natural gas that has been cooled to about -260°F, turning it into a liquid, making it much easier and cheaper to store and transport over long distances.
Most of the North Field — one of the world's largest natural gas reserves — lies in Qatari waters, helping make the Gulf state a leading global LNG producer.
Its top customers include China, Japan, South Korea, and India, as well as European countries such as Belgium, Italy, and the UK.
Ras Laffan Industrial City, one of the facilities impacted by military attacks, sits on the coast near the North Field.
Jump to
In this article
Airline and travel stocks slipped Monday after airspace closures throughout the Middle East forced carriers to cancel thousands of flights, disrupting trips as far as Brazil and the Philippines.
Shares of hotel chains fell, with Marriott International's and Hilton Worldwide Holdings' stocks down. And cruise lines were also lower, with Royal Caribbean Cruises stock off 6% and Carnival Corp. falling 7%.
Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings' stock was down 5% in morning trading after its CEO said on an earnings call Monday that it is 51% hedged for its fuel costs this year and 27% for next year.
Oil prices also spiked, potentially driving up airlines' biggest cost after labor. Flights through the Middle East were grounded, including to destinations like Tel Aviv and Dubai.
United Airlines, which has the most international exposure of the U.S. carriers, was down more than 4% in morning trading. Service to Tel Aviv, Israel, one of the airline's most profitable routes, was halted, but airlines were also was forced to pause flights to Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, one of the busiest airport hubs in the world. Dubai is also a home base for the airline Emirates.
Shares American Airlines were off about 5% while Delta Air Lines was down 3%.
Another 1,560 flights were canceled in the Middle East on Monday, aviation data firm Cirium said.
Other carriers' stocks had more muted drops. Shares of Southwest Airlines, which is more U.S.-focused, were down less than 1%.
International travel has been a bright spot in the travel sector. In January, international air travel demand jumped 5.9% from a year ago while domestic flight demand was nearly flat, the International Air Transport Association, an airline industry group, said in a report Monday.
— CNBC's Contessa Brewer contributed to this report.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
An American service member who was seriously wounded by Iranian strikes has died, bringing the US death toll from the fighting that began over the weekend to four, the military said on Monday.
US Central Command, which oversees Middle East operations, said on Sunday that three service members were killed and five were seriously hurt during combat operations against Iran. It marked the military's first acknowledgement of any US losses since American forces began striking Iran alongside Israel on Saturday.
"The fourth service member, who was seriously wounded during Iran's initial attacks, eventually succumbed to their injuries," CENTCOM said in a statement on Monday.
"Major combat operations continue and our response effort is ongoing," the military said. "The identities of the fallen are being withheld until 24 hours after next of kin notification."
Other US service members have suffered shrapnel injuries and concussions.
CENTCOM did not specify how or where the service members were killed and wounded or whether the losses were sustained during offensive or defensive operations. It has declined to offer additional information.
President Donald Trump vowed on Sunday to seek vengeance for US service members killed.
"As one nation, we grieve for the true American patriots who have made the ultimate sacrifice for our nation, even as we continue the righteous mission for which they gave their lives," he said in a video address.
"And sadly, there will likely be more before it ends. That's the way it is," Trump said. The president had warned on Saturday that the US could suffer losses as a result of the conflict with Iran.
"The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties. That often happens in war," Trump said in a video address to the nation. "But we're doing this — not for now — we're doing this for the future, and it is a noble mission."
CENTCOM's casualty update came shortly after it acknowledged that three American F-15E fighter jets were mistakenly shot down by Kuwait in " an apparent friendly fire incident." All six crew members ejected and were safely recovered, the military said, adding that they are in stable condition.
Dozens of people have been killed and wounded by Iranian strikes in Israel and the United Arab Emirates, and hundreds of people in Iran have been killed and wounded by US and Israeli strikes, according to local authorities.
The Israeli military said on Sunday that it had killed 40 senior Iranian commanders, as well as the country's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
A wide range of American forces — on land, in the air, and at sea — have participated in the airstrikes against Iran, targeting the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' (IRGC) command and control facilities, air defenses, missile and drone launch sites, and military airfields.
US forces have also been involved in air defense operations to shield American assets and allies across the Middle East from hundreds of Iran's retaliatory missile and drone attacks.
Iran has fired missiles at US forces based in Qatar, Kuwait, Bahrain, and the UAE and has also targeted other Middle East countries, including Israel, Saudi Arabia, Oman, and Iraq.
Jump to
In this article
Qatar said Monday it halted liquefied natural gas production due to attacks by Iran on two key operating facilities, as the Islamic Republic widened retaliatory strikes to target regional energy infrastructure of its Persian Gulf neighbors.
Qatar is one of the world's largest providers of LNG. About 20% of global LNG exports come from the Gulf, primarily Qatar, and are shipped through the Strait of Hormuz, according to energy consulting firm Kpler.
Qatar's Defense Ministry said earlier that two drones launched from Iran had struck facilities in the country, although there were no casualties. QatarEnergy, a state-owned energy company, said the attack hit its facilities at Ras Laffan Industrial City and Mesaieed Industrial City.
European natural gas futures soared after the shutdown. U.K. natural gas spiked about 50%, while Dutch futures jumped more than 45%. Shares of U.S. LNG exporters Cheniere Energy and Venture Global jumped about 6% and more than 14%, respectively.
Iran launched missiles at U.S. allies across the Gulf over the weekend in retaliation for massive strikes by the U.S. and Israel that killed the Islamic Republic's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Saudi Aramco's Ras Tanura refinery was attacked by a drone, an industry source told CNBC. The refinery has been closed as a precautionary measure, the source said.
LNG is a type of natural gas that is super cooled at minus 260 degrees Fahrenheit into a liquid state and loaded on tankers for transport around the world. Natural gas is used primarily for electricity production.
— CNBC's Emma Graham contributed to this report.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Every time Hilary publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
More colon cancer cases are being diagnosed in the rectums of people in their 40s, 50s, and 60s, a clear sign that something in our modern environment is perturbing colon health, and making colon cancer more common in younger generations.
A new report out today from the American Cancer Society shows that colon cancer is becoming a disease of middle age, hitting people in the prime of their life, when they're buying homes, growing careers, and building families. In particular, rectal cancers, the kind of colon cancer located at the very tail end of the intestinal tract, are skyrocketing, now accounting for one-third of all colon cancers diagnosed.
Scientists aren't exactly sure why this is happening, but the data is striking: the rate of rectal cancers diagnosed in people under 50 doubled in the 24-year period from 1998 to 2022. That's an indication that whatever is driving the rise of young colon cancer is having more of an impact specifically on the tissues in people's rectums, suggesting an environmental trigger, rather than a lack of physical activity, could be to blame for this.
"It's some either environmental or behavioral exposure that was introduced in the last half of the 20th century," cancer epidemiologist Rebecca Siegel, first author of the new report, told Business Insider. "Whatever this change in exposure was, it's having a much larger influence on cancer development in the rectum. It's a really important clue for researchers."
Colon cancer has quickly become the deadliest cancer in people under 50, but researchers don't yet know why. The news that rectal cancer is driving the trend is useful for researchers because different triggers impact different areas of the gut. Physical inactivity, for example, is a key driver of some colon cancers — but not the rectal kind.
Every time Hilary publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Stay connected to Hilary and get more of their work as it publishes.
By clicking "Sign up", you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
"There's a lot of thought that it is something, maybe, that we're eating," Siegel, who is the senior scientific director of surveillance research at the American Cancer Society, said. "Partly because that's the big exposure for the colon, but also because that is something that has changed dramatically since 1950."
Starting with the Baby Boomers, every successive generation now has an increased risk of developing colon cancer. You can see this in the data: Colon cancer rates are rising 3% per year in people under 50, and most of them are being diagnosed at an advanced stage, whereas colon cancer rates are decreasing in people over 65, at a rate of about 2.5% each year.
According to the new report, almost half (45%) of colon cancer diagnoses today are in people under 65. The face of colon cancer is changing, and both experts and patients are clamoring for more recognition and awareness. Though lifestyle moves like eating a healthy, fiber-rich diet, getting regular movement, avoiding ultra-processed meats, and skipping binge drinking can all help lower your risk of developing colon cancer, it's not a guarantee. Plenty of people with clean diets, healthy habits, and no family history of colon cancer are getting diagnosed.
"It's really like a slow-moving tsunami where it's going to continue to affect more and more people," Siegel said.
This is not just happening in the US, it's a trend that's progressively being mirrored across the globe. At least 26 other countries have reported similar trends in young adults under 50 developing colon cancer.
Young colon cancer is getting diagnosed later, and it's deadlier too. Today, three-quarters of colon cancer diagnoses in patients under 50 are advanced disease, and one-third of the estimated 55,230 colon cancer deaths this year in the US will be in people under 65.
More awareness on the part of patients and doctors, as well as more colonoscopies — which can not only detect cancer, but also prevent it through the removal of precancerous growths — are needed to reverse the trend.
"There's an opportunity for earlier diagnosis, but the problem is, especially for younger people, they're not aware of the symptoms, and they don't want to talk about the symptoms," Siegel said. "And sometimes they even do go to the doctor with these symptoms, and they're diagnosed with hemorrhoids."
Laura Behnke, who was diagnosed with late-stage colon cancer at age 42, just a few months after giving birth to her baby girl, is one of those patients who assumed the bloody mucus attached to her stool was probably just pregnancy hemorrhoids.
"Nobody at any point asked me 'What's the bleeding like? How often is it happening?'" she told Business Insider. "We all just said, 'Oh, hemorrhoids, cool.'"
Both Behnke and Siegel emphasized that normalizing talk about symptoms like bloody stool and stomach cramping are critical.
"It's so important for people to have these conversations with their family at the dinner table," Siegel said. "Change the topic, normalize this kind of talk, because that'll help."
Doctors, too, are slowly gaining recognition that younger patients can get colon cancer.
Everyone over age 45 should be going in for regular colonoscopies. If a colonoscopy feels too inconvenient, start with a simple and cheap home stool test, called a fecal immunochemical test (FIT). The test is very good at detecting rectal cancers. A 2021 study from Germany, which assessed how well nine different brands of home FIT tests work at picking up colon cancer, found that across the board, FIT tests have the highest sensitivity for rectal tumors.
And the number one thing to be aware of is the symptoms: bloody mucus in your stool, severe abdominal cramping, or other changes in your bathroom habits are worth going over with a doctor.
"I think it is pretty clear now, hopefully becoming more clear to everyone that this is not an old man's disease," Behnke said. "So if you do have any sort of symptoms, any sort of concerns, anything that doesn't feel right, you have every right to go ask a doctor about it and to demand some answers."
Jump to
Global supply chains are on edge after the US and Israel launched military strikes on Iran on Saturday, triggering widespread disruption across one of the world's most critical trade corridors.
The fallout is hitting more than oil tankers moving through the Strait of Hormuz.
Container ships loaded with consumer goods, auto parts, electronics, and food are being rerouted or delayed, while air cargo networks are fracturing under sudden airspace closures.
"Ocean container services in the Persian Gulf have continued unaffected by the recent build-up of military forces in the region, but the escalation in conflict through military strikes means ships will now avoid the area, but for as short a time as possible," said Peter Sand, the chief analyst at freight-rate analytics platform Xeneta.
The strikes on Iran mean that shipping companies are likely to send more cargo around the Southern tip of Africa — a journey that adds between 10 to 15 days on average to shipments moving between Europe and Asia, Stifel analyst J. Bruce Chan wrote in a note to clients on Sunday.
That longer timeline could "effectively soak up capacity in the global fleet," Chan said.
On Sunday, MSC — the world's largest container shipping line by capacity — said it had suspended all bookings for cargo to the Middle East until further notice.
Danish shipping giant Maersk paused Red Sea and Suez Canal sailings amid fears the Iran escalation could spill over into key shipping lanes. The company is rerouting vessels around the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa.
French shipping giant CMA CGM announced Monday it will impose an "Emergency Conflict Surcharge" effective Monday, citing rising security risks. The surcharge will add between $2,000 and $4,000 per container on shipments to and from Gulf and Red Sea countries.
On Saturday, CMA CGM ordered vessels inside or bound for the Gulf to "proceed to shelter." It also suspended sailings through the Suez Canal and rerouted ships to the Cape of Good Hope.
German shipping giant Hapag-Lloyd introduced a $1,500 per standard container war risk surcharge and suspended vessel transits through the Strait of Hormuz.
Chinese shipping giant Cosco Shipping Lines said Sunday that vessels already in the Gulf have been instructed "to proceed to safe waters to hover or anchor."
"We are currently evaluating contingency plans for all cargo onboard the affected vessels, including potential alternative discharge ports," it said.
Japanese container shipping company Ocean Network Express said on Sunday it will temporarily suspend new bookings for cargo moving to and from the Persian Gulf until further notice.
Sailing around Africa, rather than through the Suez Canal, absorbs roughly 2.5 million 20-foot container units' worth of global container capacity, according to Xeneta's Sand.
It's not just shipping companies affected.
Several marine insurers — including the London P&I Club and the American Club — said they will cancel war risk cover for ships operating in Iranian waters, the Gulf, and surrounding areas from Thursday.
A 48-hour playback from MarineTraffic, a vessel-tracking platform, shows vessel movements in the Strait of Hormuz dropping sharply between February 27 and March 1:
Air freight is also under strain.
Several Middle Eastern airspaces have been closed or restricted, disrupting passenger and cargo flights.
Parcel delivery giant FedEx suspended flights to and from markets including Bahrain, Israel, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the UAE, and halted pickup and delivery services in several Gulf countries.
Qatar Airways Cargo temporarily suspended operations due to the closure of Qatari airspace.
DSV, a Danish logistics company, said in an advisory that airspace restrictions are forcing carriers to suspend services or divert flights and lengthen routings.
With less cargo space available on key Asia-Europe and Middle East routes, air freight rates are likely to rise, space will tighten, and airlines may make short-notice schedule and pricing changes, according to DSV.
Ryan Petersen, the CEO of Flexport, wrote on X that conflict in the Middle East has removed 18% of global air freight capacity from the market.
If carriers begin omitting Gulf port calls, containers may be discharged at alternative hubs and trucked onward, wrote Xeneta's Sand.
The broader concern, however, is what the escalation means for global trade flows through the Red Sea this year. The conflict comes after more than two years of disruption caused by Iran-backed Houthi attacks on commercial shipping.
"The repercussions of the joint military operation by the US and Israel against Iran and subsequent retaliatory action will see the further weaponization of trade and shatter hopes of a large-scale return of container shipping to the Red Sea in 2026," wrote Sand.
Jump to
In this article
As U.S. and Israeli strikes entered their third day, Iran's close allies — Russia and China — have so far responded with only muted criticism, and that exposes the hard limits of its "strategic partnerships" with Moscow and Beijing.
Officials from Russia and China have condemned the U.S.-led strikes but stopped short of pledging military or civilian support to Tehran.
In a phone call with his Russian counterpart on Sunday, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said condemned the attacks, which killed Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. He said it was "unacceptable for the U.S. and Israel to launch attacks against Iran ... still less to blatantly assassinate a leader of a sovereign country and instigate regime change."
The foreign ministry of Russia, which is bogged down in its invasion of Ukraine, issued a statement saying that the "acts of aggression" violated international law and the fundamental principles of the UN Charter, and were "destabilising the situation across the entire region."
The pair reiterated their leaders' call for an immediate ceasefire and return to diplomatic dialogue to resolve conflicts. On Sunday, Trump warned that the U.S. combat operation in Iran would continue until all objectives are achieved, potentially stretching into the next four weeks.
Gabriel Wildau, managing director specializing in China at advisory firm Teneo, said that China's official statement was "strongly condemnatory, but beyond this rhetoric I don't see China's government taking concrete action to support Tehran."
"Preserving détente with the U.S. remains a strategic priority for China's leadership," Wildau said, adding he expected a top-level meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping to take place later this month as planned.
Trump and Xi discussed a swath of issues, including Iran, during their last phone call on Feb. 4. They're expected to meet during Trump's visit to China.
"Beijing may seek concessions on issues more directly related to its interests, such as Taiwan and trade, in exchange for its significantly watered-down messaging on Iran," said Ahmed Aboudouh, a fellow at Chatham House, a London-based policy think tank.
Niutanqin, a social media account with links to Chinese state media widely seen as a mouthpiece for Beijing, wrote Monday that "Iran has no real ally," adding that even closer nations will prioritize their own national interests over lifting Tehran out of the crisis.
China's restrained stance in backing Iran militarily is not new.
Last year, Beijing criticized the U.S. and Israel's strikes on Iran but did not provide material support to Tehran, according to Chatham House, a British think tank.
China also supported UN-led economic sanctions against Tehran before the 2015 nuclear deal and has since moved slowly on channeling investment into the Iranian economy, according to the London-based policy institute.
In the aftermath of the U.S. seizure of Venezuela's president, Nicolas Maduro, on Jan. 3, Beijing condemned the "blatant use of force" and urged Washington to "stop violating other countries' sovereignty." But it did little beyond offering these words of condemnation.
China's reactions to U.S. intervention in Venezuela and Iran show that "a strategic partnership with Beijing falls far short of a military alliance — or even a guarantee of military support" in the face of "an existential threat from U.S. aggression," said Wildau.
Tehran has been a key strategic, military, economic and trade partner for Moscow in the Middle East in recent years. Iran has become a vital supplier of military drones and missiles to Russia since its fullscale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022.
Russia will fear the loss of another foothold in the Middle East, as Iran's regime collapsing would follow the loss of another regional ally, Syria, after the fall of Bashar al-Assad's regime in Dec. 2024.
Despite the Russian foreign ministry's condemnation of the attacks on Iran, neither the Kremlin nor President Vladimir Putin has spoken publicly on the situation. CNBC has requested a comment from the Kremlin.
Years of grinding war in Ukraine have hollowed out Russia's capacity to project power beyond its borders, Matt Gerken, chief geopolitical strategist at BCA Research, told CNBC. With its military overstretched and its economy under sustained pressure from Western sanctions, Moscow's influence in the Middle East is set to diminish further, he added.
Russia will have a keen eye on oil prices as sales of its crude to China and India help fund its war machine. Oil prices rose more than 8% Sunday evening, as market participants feared the conflict in Iran could spell a major global supply disruption.
Several countries in the OPEC+ group, including Russia, announced on Sunday that they would increase production by 206,000 barrels a day from April, as they look to counter the potential shortfall. A higher oil price helps Russia, nonetheless.
"Putin's got to be thrilled, because anything that raises the price of oil is good for him," Ellen Wald, president of Transversal Consulting, told CNBC on Monday. "He's definitely able to say: if you can't get oil from the Gulf, hey, we've got a great supply."
Talks between Ukraine and Russia aimed at ending the four-year war have appeared to make little progress in recent weeks.
"He's [Putin] definitely happy with the situation, I'd say, although once it's resolved, Trump is definitely going to turn his eyes toward Putin next," Wald added.
Russia often takes a "wait-and-see" approach to global affairs that don't directly impact its interests. When protests erupted in Iran in late December, Russia did not lend a helping hand. Now, Russia could well stand back and watch whether the regime can withstand the military attacks by the U.S. and Israel.
Michael McFaul, Stanford professor and former U.S. ambassador to Russia, said there was no guarantee that U.S. and Israeli air strikes alone would be enough to lead to regime change.
"Historically, air campaigns do not lead to the overthrow of regimes. I can't think of a single case of success, even military interventions with boots on the ground [tend to fail]," he told CNBC.
"We are bombing right now military targets that are weapon systems that are aimed at us and our partners and allies, we're not taking out the military instruments and the weapons that are used to repress the Iranian people."
"So far, it's very unclear how this military campaign right now will lead to the regime change that President Trump has promised the Iranian people," he added.
— CNBC's Evelyn Cheng contributed to this story.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
The US said three of its military aircraft went down over Kuwait, marking the Pentagon's first known air assets downed during the US and Israel's latest war with Iran.
US Central Command said on Monday morning that at 11:01 p.m. ET on Sunday, "three U.S. F-15E Strike Eagles flying in support of Operation Epic Fury went down over Kuwait due to an apparent friendly fire incident."
"During active combat — that included attacks from Iranian aircraft, ballistic missiles, and drones — the U.S. Air Force fighter jets were mistakenly shot down by Kuwaiti air defenses," it said.
It said all six of the aircrew ejected safely and were safely recovered, and are now in stable condition.
It said the cause of the incident is under investigation and more information would be released when it becomes available.
"Kuwait has acknowledged this incident, and we are grateful for the efforts of the Kuwaiti defense forces and their support in this ongoing operation," it said.
The announcement came after the Kuwaiti Army said that "several US military aircraft crashed this morning," and that all crew members involved were safe and in stable condition. It did not give a reason for the crashes.
Recent social media footage showed a fighter aircraft resembling an F-15E Strike Eagle falling to the ground in a tailspin. A separate clip appeared to show two parachutes descending.
Business Insider could not independently verify when the footage was shot, but it corresponds visually to a location in Al Jahra, on the western outskirts of Kuwait City.
That puts the crash site roughly six miles east of the Ali Al Salem US Air Base, which has been actively fending off hundreds of Iranian missile and drone attacks this weekend.
Videos also showed two uniformed personnel on the ground, appearing to cautiously interact with civilians. Another clip appears to show a man wearing a flight helmet sitting in the trunk of a non-military hatchback.
The US has detailed multiple friendly fire incidents in recent years, including a US Navy warship firing missiles at two American F/A-18 fighter jets over the Red Sea in 2024. The crew safely ejected, and an investigation found that the ship's crew mistook the jets for anti-ship cruise missiles fired by Houthi rebels.
The McDonnell Douglas F-15E Strike Eagle is a twin-seat aircraft intended to be flown by a pilot and a weapons systems officer.
The US Air Force fields over 400 F-15 Eagles, battle-proven multirole strike fighters that have been deployed in combat since the Gulf War.
US Central Command on Sunday listed many of the assets that it brought to the fight, including B-2 Stealth Bombers, F-18, F-16, and F-22 fighter jets, A-10 attack jets, and F-35 stealth fighters, along with "special capabilities we can't list." It did not list any variants of the F-15.
Meanwhile, the US military said on Sunday that three American service members were killed and another five were seriously wounded amid the Pentagon's combat operations against Iran.
"And sadly, there will likely be more," President Donald Trump said in a statement that day. "Before it ends. That's the way it is."
The US and Israel launched a barrage of strikes against Iran on Saturday, killing the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and hitting over 2,000 targets.
Jump to
The escalating war in the Middle East has ratcheted up fears of prolonged disruption to global trade via key maritime corridors like the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb Strait.
Container shipping giants have suspended operations through the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz and rerouted vessels around the southern tip of Africa, following U.S. and Israel strikes on Iran over the weekend.
Danish shipping company Maersk said in a statement that it would suspend all vessel crossings in the Strait of Hormuz until further notice, warning that services calling ports in the Persian Gulf may experience delays.
Located in the gulf between Oman and Iran, the Strait of Hormuz is recognized as one of the world's most important oil choke points. In 2023, oil flows through the waterway averaged 20.9 million barrels per day, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, accounting for about 20% of global petroleum liquids consumption.
Maersk, widely regarded as a barometer of global trade, said the situation in the Middle East had also prompted it to pause future trans-Suez sailings through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait until further notice.
This waterway is a narrow maritime pinch point that sits between the Horn of Africa and the Middle East, linking the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean. The Bab el-Mandeb Strait was estimated to account for 12% of seaborne oil trade and 8% of liquefied natural gas, or LNG, trade in the first half of 2023.
Maersk said all sailings on the Middle East-India to Mediterranean and Middle East-India to east coast U.S. services would be rerouted around the Cape of Good Hope.
Peter Sand, chief analyst at Xeneta, said higher container shipping rates should be factored in for the Middle East region at least for as long as the conflict persists, adding there is "no real alternative" to ocean freight.
"The risk of geopolitics has shown its ugly face with higher frequency and more severity over the past years than ever before," Sand told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" on Monday.
"I think it's fair also to say there is a little bit of fatigue also in the industry because you draw 10 contingency plans only to tear them all up because there is a new twist and a new angle to it."
Even if oil tankers are only temporarily blocked from the Strait of Hormuz, it can ratchet up global energy prices, raise shipping costs and create significant supply delays.
The Strait of Hormuz is also key for global container trade. Ports in this region such as Jebel Ali and Khor Fakkan are transshipment hubs that serve as intermediary points in global networks.
Alongside Maersk, German container shipping firm Hapag-Lloyd said over the weekend that all vessels transiting through the Strait of Hormuz would be suspended, citing the safety and security of its crews.
France's CMA CGM said Saturday that it had instructed all of its vessels inside the Gulf and bound for the region to proceed to shelter. Passage through the Suez Canal has also been suspended until further notice, CMA CGM said, with vessels rerouted around Africa via the Cape of Good Hope.
MSC, the world's largest container shipping company, said Monday that it had ordered all vessels operating in the Gulf region to proceed to designated safe areas, adding that it would closely monitor further developments.
Amrita Sen, founder and director of market intelligence at Energy Aspects, said Monday that the key question is what happens to the Strait of Hormuz.
She estimated that approximately 15 million barrels of oil and approximately 80 million tons of LNG traversed the waterway last year.
"We don't think that's very likely," Sen told CNBC's "Europe Early Edition" when asked whether Iran would seek to shut off the strait completely.
"The U.S. and Israel would just take that out, very, very quickly. The U.S. has way more superior military power to just neutralize any of Iran's abilities to do that," Sen said.
"While we are not saying the strait is going to get closed, what the U.S. will not be able to do is control these one-off attacks on tankers and that is enough to make the market extremely cautious about sending vessels in. And that's what creates the disruptions," she added.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Every time Tim publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jaclyn Rothenberg, senior vice president for reputation management at Avoq, a communications and lobbying firm. From July 2021 to late 2024, she was a spokesperson and director of public affairs at the Federal Emergency Management Agency. The following has been edited for brevity and clarity.
It was the fall of 2024. I was the director of public affairs at FEMA during Hurricanes Helene and Milton, which was a huge moment in the world of misinformation because there was so much of it, so fast. And it was in the middle of the election cycle.
My job was to communicate on behalf of the administration. The primary goal was to make sure that people were connected to services and support so they could get back on their feet.
In the middle of the response, as we were communicating safety and recovery information, other public officials and I were targeted. A mix of people were insinuating that we weren't doing our job. They were also spreading misinformation.
As I reflect, what was really surprising to me at the time was getting attacked for my religion. I'm Jewish. There were a lot of people online who could say anything and everything without knowing me — very hurtful things.
Every time Tim publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Stay connected to Tim and get more of their work as it publishes.
By clicking "Sign up", you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
I remember my husband saying how upset he was. I think I had mentally tried to block out as much as I could because I felt empowered by continuing to do my job and communicating life-saving information.
I remember him saying, "How can you keep doing this?" The reality is, I was hired to do a job. In Judaism, they really do teach you to do what's best for people. It's a phrase called tikkun olam.
I continued to work through it as much as I could. The social media posts made fun of my appearance, my last name. There were very terrible things said and photos that were shared, and very antisemitic rhetoric.
It forced the agency to put security protection on me, because someone threatened to kill me. That was surreal because I was hired to be a communications lead for the agency. I was technically a political appointee, as a Biden administration official. Still, it felt like one of the first times when people weren't just going after politicians, but also federal employees for doing what they were hired to do.
A contractor had been working with us to help identify misinformation. I believe they alerted the senior-most folks at my agency, who then brought the threat to my attention. Everyone was working almost 24-hour days. A colleague said, "We need to speak with you urgently." They told me that there was a real, serious threat.
The catalyst was a public statement I had put out, pushing back against misinformation. I left my home because the people who were targeting me online found my address, my husband, and my parents. They looked into my work history. I called my husband and said, "We need to call our friends. We need to sleep there. Let's get the dogs and go."
Members of senior leadership personally reached out to ensure that I felt safe.
It wasn't just my parents and my husband. They identified my extended relatives and posted those on social media. The agency worked hard to help me scrub some of that, and I'm thankful for it, but it's something that a lot of companies should be thinking about. It's important for people to stay vigilant.
In hindsight, the incident was probably more traumatizing than it felt in the moment, because I think I was in shock. Also, I was still doing my job. I was committed to communicating in these critical moments for survivors, and I don't think it fully hit me — the magnitude of that incident — until months later. The fact that I had to be silenced for my own protection and couldn't help other people was hard for me.
I had to tone down public communication from the spokesperson account. I had to stop doing media interviews about the topics that I was trying to get out there. We saw a decrease in registration for assistance. There was real impact.
As a result, one of the things I've counseled clients on, both at the C-suite level and below, is that it's not just the CEO they're going after. They'll go after the head of HR, the head of communications.
This is the new normal, unfortunately. It's important for companies to do exercises on how to respond and how they can protect their senior executives and employees at the same time.
Companies have to think about what protection looks like from a privacy standpoint on social media. I don't think people really realize the online footprint that they have.
Do you have a story to share about a challenging experience in your career? Contact this reporter at tparadis@businessinsider.com.
Jump to
New Delhi is feeling the heat as tensions in the Middle East show no signs of cooling, with high oil prices likely to increase the country's already substantial energy import bill, while disruptions to flight routes hamper airline operations.
India imports nearly 85% of its crude, equivalent to roughly 4.2 million barrels per day, said Pankaj Srivastava, senior vice president at energy research firm Rystad Energy, who said even "a few dollars' increase in prices can materially affect [the country's] energy economics."
"Rising [oil] prices will weigh on the balance of payments and could put further pressure on the rupee," he added.
Oil prices have soared since U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran — the fourth-largest oil producer in OPEC — began over the weekend, putting a supply shock in focus. The Islamic Republic's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed, prompting waves of attacks by Tehran across the region, targeting countries in the Middle East with U.S. military bases.
Brent crude prices hit a new 52-week high on Monday, surging 9.3% to reach $79.40 a barrel.
"Every US$10/bbl sustained rise in oil prices will hit Asia's GDP growth directly by 20-30 [basis points]," Morgan Stanley said in a note on Sunday, adding that India could be especially vulnerable.
India's current account deficit, which is 1.2% of its GDP, would be widened by 50 basis points for every $10/bbl rise in oil price, the analysts said.
"Thailand, Korea, Taiwan, and India would be more exposed to downside to growth on account of their wider oil and gas balances," the report said.
Oil traffic through the Strait of Hormuz has halted due to extremely high insurance rates on account of Iran's attacks on the U.S. bases in Gulf countries, experts said, which is also pusing up oil prices.
The Strait of Hormuz is a critical waterway that links major energy producers — including Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq and the United Arab Emirates — to global markets, and is responsible for the passage of about 20% of the world's oil supplies.
Latest vessel tracking data suggests around half of India's crude oil imports currently transit through the Strait of Hormuz, global brokerage Nomura said in a report on Sunday.
"It is bad timing for India," Ellen Wald, president of Transversal Consulting, told CNBC's "Inside India" on Monday. "India's oil purchases will be under the microscope" if it buys additional Russian oil cargo, she added.
India imported 1.16 million barrels per day of Russian oil until a week ago, lower than its average intake of 1.71 million barrels per day in 2025, according to energy data provider Kpler. It was replacing this oil with supply from the Middle East, which has now been disrupted.
Since August last year, Indian exports to the U.S. were subject to a tariff rate of 50%, of which 25% was a punitive tariff designed to dissuade India from buying Russian oil.
Following an interim trade deal last month, the U.S. removed the punitive tariff on India, stating that New Delhi had "committed to stop directly or indirectly importing Russian Federation oil" and will purchase "energy products from the United States."
But Washington warned New Delhi that it will monitor India's Russian oil imports and any attempt to resume purchases could lead to a renewal of punitive tariffs. That makes any supply disruptions due to the Iran conflict even more problematic for India.
Despite the scrutiny, Wald said, "I have a feeling no one's going to really fault them [India] for doing what they need to do to get through the next month."
India resuming Russian oil purchases remains a likely scenario, as "a significant volume of Russian crude of the appropriate grade is already available on water," said Shrivastava from Rystad Energy.
While the impact of rising oil prices is a big concern for New Delhi, flight disruptions due to airspace closures over the Middle East are an immediate stress affecting travelers to and from India.
Westbound flights from India fly over Iran and the Arabian Peninsula, said Sajay Lazar, CEO of Indian aviation consultancy Avialaz Consultants. "The Middle East corridor is India's largest westbound corridor, and this [disruption] will impact Indigo and Air India heavily," he added.
With the Middle East in effect a "warzone," and the existing shutdown of Pakistani airspace for Indian carriers, some flights bound to Europe and the U.K. from India have been cancelled, while others are being rerouted.
Shares of India passenger airline IndiGo, which trades as Interglobe Aviation, opened nearly 5% lower on Monday.
The company, which did not respond to CNBC's request for comment, said in post on Monday that "the temporary suspension of select international flights operating through parts of the Middle Eastern airspace has been extended."
Tata Group and Singapore Airlines-owned Air India has cancelled all flights to and from the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Israel, and Qatar for Monday, it said in a post on X. It has also cancelled some flights from New Delhi to Europe, but said many of its other flights to Europe and North America will fly as per schedule "using alternative routings over available airspaces."
Aviation experts say alternative routes will not only add to flight times but will also significantly increase costs for these airlines. At present, the westbound flights out of India are seeing up to 4 hours of longer flight times, they said.
"The weekly impact to Indian and international airlines flying to and from India stands at an extremely conservative estimate of Rs 875 crores [about $96 million]," said aviation expert Mark D. Martin of Martin Consulting. He added that the "airspace situation" is unlikely to improve for at least one week.
On Sunday, Trump told the Daily Mail newspaper that the conflict with Iran could go on for the next four weeks. Iran's security chief Ali Larijani, meanwhile, said in a post on X that Tehran has no plans to engage in negotiations with the United States.
If the situation escalates further, India could seek access from China to use its airspace from the north, allowing aircraft to overfly the Commonwealth of Independent States into Europe, Martin said.
A total of 350 flights operated by Indian domestic carriers were cancelled on Sunday, according to India's aviation regulator.
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Every time Lakshmi publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
Few promotions in corporate America are as competitive as making partner at McKinsey & Company.
Last November, the global consulting firm announced one of its smallest partner classes in recent years: 224 new partners — well below 2022, when 400 consultants made partner during the pandemic-era consulting boom.
The newest class of partners comes from more than 65 cities across 45 countries, stretching from Chile to Japan. Collectively, they speak more than 40 languages and bring expertise across nearly 20 sectors and business functions, a representative for the firm told Business Insider.
Four partners from the firm's latest class shared their best advice with Business Insider on how they climbed the ranks, reflecting on the mistakes they made, the relationships they built — including finding the senior sponsors who helped them advance — and the opportunities they seized along the way.
All responses were shared by email and have been edited and condensed for clarity.
Beaumont is based in Singapore and has been at McKinsey for just over eight-and-a-half years. As a leader of QuantumBlack, the firm's AI arm, he helps lead the firm's data science and technical teams across Southeast Asia. He holds a Ph.D. in computer science and mathematics from Imperial College London.
Every time Lakshmi publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Stay connected to Lakshmi and get more of their work as it publishes.
By clicking "Sign up", you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
How did you distinguish yourself to get promoted?
I focused on doing a few things consistently well rather than trying to do everything. I leaned into my strengths — especially at the intersection of analytics, technology, and human judgment — to make my contributions clearly valuable to clients. I also invested deeply in people, taking the time to understand what motivated team members, support their careers, and create environments where they could do their best work.
What changed in your behavior or performance as you climbed the ranks to make partner?
The biggest shift was moving from being good at my own work to making first a few, then many, other people successful. As I progressed, I became more intentional about building teams and creating impact for clients beyond any single project. In practice, that meant spending more time coaching than doing the work myself, and being explicit about sharing context and the "why" so I could step back and let others step up.
What metrics or signals told you that you were on track for partner?
One clear signal was when feedback shifted from what I was delivering to the impact I was having on the system. Senior colleagues began commenting on the teams I was building and the leaders I was developing. One piece of feedback that stuck with me was, "You're starting to leave things better than you found them — even after you've moved on." It reframed success: not being indispensable on a project, but being replaceable because I'd built something self-sustaining.
What's your non-negotiable indulgence?
Living in Singapore, I'm fortunate to have a view of Marina Bay. My one non-negotiable with work travel is being home for major celebrations so I can spend time with my partner and catch the fireworks. We just celebrated Lunar New Year — lots of good food and an impressive amount of fireworks lighting up the bay. It's one of those moments that makes it worth planning around.
Boston-based Malandra, who will mark eight years at the firm this summer, previously served eight years in the Navy before transitioning to consulting. She now focuses on operational transformation, helping clients scale production and redesign manufacturing systems.
Who were your most important senior sponsors, and how did you build those relationships?
In my experience, sponsors don't come from networking alone — they form when someone sees your authentic passion in action and wants to build alongside you.
Early on, I worked with a manufacturing client aiming to grow organically by producing more with the same lines and workforce. I became deeply invested in training the entire workforce — from frontline operators to plant leadership — to identify opportunities for improvement and lead a transformation owned from the floor up, not imposed from above. I threw myself into designing and delivering those trainings and loved being on the floor helping workers see their impact differently.
A senior leader noticed that energy and asked me to partner with him on similar client work and later on internal initiatives. His support lasted for years, and he was one of the first people I called when I was elected.
As I've progressed, I've tried to model that same approach with those I sponsor. I believe the number of people who want to be on my team matters just as much as the number of leaders who want me on theirs.
What changed in your behavior or performance as you climbed the ranks to make partner?
One of the most valuable lessons I've applied throughout my career is the 80-20 principle, which McKinsey teaches incoming consultants: focus on the 20% of efforts that drive 80% of the impact.
As I progressed — and became a parent — I used it not just to deliver results for clients, but to prioritize my time and energy more broadly. It helped me focus on what mattered most, professionally and personally, and be more intentional about empowering others and creating an environment where they could thrive.
What metrics or signals told you that you were on track for partner versus just being a high performer?
I've been fortunate to work with senior leaders who invested in my development. A clear signal I was on the right track was the growing trust they placed in me. I remember when a senior partner invited me to join a client offsite to discuss strategy changes; what began as a chance to contribute quickly became an opportunity to lead the work. That moment was pivotal — it showed me they saw me as someone ready to take on more responsibility and deliver impact.
What's your non-negotiable indulgence?
Friday night pizza with my family. After a busy workweek, there's nothing better than sitting around the table with my husband and children, sharing stories, laughing, and just enjoying each other's company. It's a tradition that keeps me grounded and reminds me of what's most important.
Wdziekonski, who is based in Colorado, has been with the firm for 18 years. He focuses on financial planning and analysis — a non-client-facing role — helping guide how the firm allocates resources, invests for growth, and enables innovation, including the firm's latest moves toward AI-enabled transformation.
Who were your most important senior sponsors, and how did you build those relationships?
On my path to becoming a partner in financial planning and analysis, a non-client-facing role, a former McKinsey CFO was a key sponsor. We first worked together in 2020, navigating COVID and how to support clients, and later in 2022 and 2023 on rebuilding our performance reporting system. Those intense "in the trenches" moments built the trust that made the relationship truly special.
What changed in your behavior or performance as you climbed the ranks to make partner?
For me, it was about prioritization and building the right next generation of finance leaders. As my scope expanded, I needed the right team around me; otherwise, we'd struggle operationally and have no capacity for the non-urgent. Putting that team in place allowed me to focus on the important — not just the urgent — and devote more energy to strategic decision-making alongside operational work.
How did you distinguish yourself to get promoted?
I lean in disproportionately when something is truly important and mission-critical. During moments like the COVID-19 pandemic or supply chain disruptions, I saw opportunities to shape responses that would meaningfully impact the firm's performance in the moment and for years to come. Those efforts weren't in any formal job description, but I invested much of my energy in these global, cross-functional priorities.
What's your non-negotiable indulgence?
A daily walk with my wife and our dog. It's good for my physical health, but it also grounds me and makes me a better human being in all my interactions with my family, friends, and colleagues.
Based in Cologne, Germany, Kraken has been with the firm for nine years, rising through the ranks after starting as an intern in 2015.
She works with insurers across Europe and Japan to help them grow during times of disruption. She specializes in large-scale transformations, helping clients improve claims, underwriting, and customer engagement by leveraging AI and analytics to streamline processes and make them more transparent.
If someone is three years behind you, what would you tell them to focus on to build their case for partner?
Find your home, find the people you like to work with, and find clients where you feel you can have a real impact. And don't lose the fun. McKinsey is more of a marathon than a sprint, and enjoying what you do matters.
How did you distinguish yourself to get promoted?
I had mostly worked with a single client. While that gave me deep knowledge of that organization, a conversation with my sponsor pushed me to think more deliberately about expanding my sphere of influence. I began focusing on understanding the broader market and gaining exposure to more clients, while also being more intentional about the teams and people I worked with and building those relationships over time.
What metrics or signals told you that you were on track for partner versus just being a high performer?
Shortly after my promotion to engagement manager, a sponsor suggested we discuss how I could become a partner within 3 or 4 years. I hadn't expected that conversation — especially with another promotion still ahead — but it was the clearest signal that people were actively investing in my development and thinking about my next steps. It was surprising, since I felt far from being elected partner, but it was also a wake-up call.
What's your non-negotiable indulgence?
I really try to protect my weekends and focus on my personal life, spending time with friends and family, with my boyfriend, and preserving time for myself.
Something to share about how consultants are using AI? Business Insider would like to hear from you. Email Lakshmi Varanasi at lvaranasi@businessinsider.com or contact her on Signal at lvaranasi.70.
Jump to
Every time Alistair publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
OpenAI's latest funding round is unprecedented. The following charts put the deal in perspective.
The startup announced the $110 billion financing last week, pushing its valuation to $840 billion, including the new cash. It brings Amazon and Nvidia on as major backers and puts questions about OpenAI's financial stability to bed. For now.
I asked venture capital data provider Pitchbook for help in sizing the round. It's the largest ever, but also the biggest by a huge margin.
The deal "sets a new high for private tech fundraising," said PitchBook analyst Dimitri Zabelin, in the understatement of the year so far.
What really stunned me: This private-market funding round is about four times larger than the biggest IPO ever.
Every time Alistair publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Stay connected to Alistair and get more of their work as it publishes.
By clicking "Sign up", you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
Here's the all-time ranking for IPOs, according to data from Renaissance Capital, a research firm focused on this key part of the market.
This is not how the financial world is supposed to work.
Usually, public markets offer companies a bigger pool of money to tap. Here, stocks trade all the time, so investors feel more confident about finding buyers quickly if they have to sell — what's known as liquidity. And public-market investors get more information via regular financial statements, so they feel more confident putting money to work.
In private markets, investors can put money into a startup and not be able to sell their stake for years. And there's no public financial statements for everyone to see. Historically, this has meant that there's less money available for companies in this market. But OpenAI's latest private round blows all this history out the water.
Speaking of history, do you remember the Facebook IPO? At the time, I thought it was huge. But that market debut raised $16 billion, about 15% of what OpenAI just took in from the private market.
OpenAI is expected to try its own IPO sometime in the next year or two. This jumbo private round has just raised the bar on that public market debut.
With such a massive valuation already, IPO investors "will want to see improving margins, stable usage trends and evidence that OpenAI can defend its position," Zabelin said. "This round secures capital and computing power. The next test is proving that the economics of large-scale AI can support that valuation."
Sign up for BI's Tech Memo newsletter here. Reach out to me via email at abarr@businessinsider.com.
Jump to
Travelers are in limbo as airport departure boards flip to red after air strikes in Iran resulted in closed airspace and triggered mass flight cancellations.
The heart of the chaos is in the Middle East, where airports in Dubai, Doha, and Abu Dhabi serve as megahubs for global connecting traffic. As of Sunday, all flights in and out of Dubai International Airport — the world's busiest airport for international travelers — remain suspended until further notice. Passengers are being advised not to travel to the airport.
Data from the aviation analytics firm Cirium shows their home airlines — Emirates, Qatar Airways, and Etihad Airways — carry a combined 90,000 transit passengers a day.
That figure does not include the thousands of travelers whose final destination is the Middle East.
The three major Middle Eastern airlines shared status updates on X:
The UAE's General Civil Aviation Authority said in a Sunday X post that approximately 20,200 affected passengers were assisted through temporary accommodations arrangements and rebooking services.
Emirates passenger Jaiveer Cheema, who was set to fly back home to the US on Saturday, told Business Insider that he was stuck on his plane for five hours with no food before everyone was deplaned and shuffled into the crowded terminal at Dubai International.
"The next several hours at the airport were chaos as no one knew what to do," he said. "We spoke to several security guards and Emirates employees, and they all gave us different answers."
Cheema said they stood in line after line until they eventually got a hotel voucher and took a bus to the lodging. He was still waiting for a room 90 minutes after arriving — it's after midnight in Dubai; nearly 20 hours after he initially showed up for his 9 a.m. flight.
While many passengers are stranded within the region's closed airspace, shuttered until further notice, the disruption has rippled far beyond it.
Flights to the affected region from places like London, Bali, Bangladesh, and the US have been canceled outright or diverted mid-journey — leaving travelers far from home in crowded airport terminals and uncertain when they will be able to depart.
Airlines have told passengers on social media to expect long wait times at airports and on customer-service phone lines as they try to manage the abrupt disruptions.
The sheer number of displaced people and planes is expected to snowball worldwide if airports are unable to restart operations soon.
Flight operations at the Beirut Rafic Hariri International Airport in Lebanon on Saturday.
Cheema spent hours in line but managed to secure a hotel voucher — though he had yet to secure a room when talking with Business Insider. He said he did not have answers from Emirates on what's next.
An Emirates spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.
Airlines are pivoting their operations in response to the strikes. Lufthansa Group said it is suspending flights to Beirut, Tel Aviv, Amman, Erbil, and Tehran until March 7.
"The following airspaces will also not be used until March 7: Israel, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Qatar, and Iran," the aviation corporation said. "In addition, Lufthansa Group airlines will suspend flights to and from Dubai and Abu Dhabi, Riyadh, and Dammam until March 1. Furthermore, the airspace of the United Arab Emirates will not be used until March 1."
Passengers not in the region are still stuck as flights to the megahubs of Dubai, Doha, and Abu Dhabi remain canceled through at least March 2.
The flights that diverted to places like Rome, Paris, Istanbul — and those that never took off — have left travelers far from home with uncertainty about when they'll depart.
The Tribhuvan International Airport shared a passenger advisory on Saturday, saying international flights "may be subject to delay, rescheduling, or cancellations" due to airspace restrictions.
The airport told passengers flying with major airlines — including Qatar Airways and Turkish Airlines — to coordinate with those companies to navigate travel issues.
Qatar, Emirates, and Etihad are the "Big 3" airlines of the Middle East and carry tens of thousands of passengers a day through their busy megahubs in Doha, Dubai, and Abu Dhabi.
The flight suspensions will have a significant impact on international travel.
Qatar's Hamad International Airport said all aircraft movement has been temporarily suspended due to the country's closed airspace.
"Our priority is always the safety of our passengers and employees. We are working closely with government stakeholders and airline partners to look after passengers that have been impacted," the airport wrote in an advisory.
Flights heading to the Middle East were also canceled at London Gatwick Airport in England on Saturday.
A London Gatwick Airport spokesperson told Sky News it's "expecting disruption to our Qatar and Emirates flights."
The X account for the Indira Gandhi International Airport in Delhi, India, said the ongoing conflict has disrupted some flight operations.
"Due to the evolving political situation in the Middle East, westbound international flights continue to experience disruptions and schedule changes," the airport said on Sunday. "Passengers are advised to check the latest flight updates with their respective airlines before heading to the airport."
Are you a stranded traveler with a story to share? Contact the reporters at ledmonds@insider.com and trains@insider.com along with your preferred contact information.
Jump to
In this article
Oil prices have soared after U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran continued on Sunday night.
Brent crude prices hit a new 52-week high on Monday, rising 7.6% to reach $78.41 at 6:00 a.m. ET, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate prices also rose more than 7.4% to $72.01.
Global oil majors traded higher, with Exxon Mobil up 4.1% in pre-market trading, and Chevron seen up 3.9% ahead of the opening bell. In Europe, France's Totalenergies was last seen 3.6% higher, with London-listed Shell advancing 2.2%, as BP gained 1.8%.
U.S. President Donald Trump said the "overwhelming military offensive" — which he has dubbed Operation Epic Fury — would continue until the U.S.'s objectives are achieved. Israel launched fresh strikes against both Iran and against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon late on Sunday, which came after Iran attacked military and infrastructure targets across several countries in the region.
As the U.S. continues to target Iranian air defense systems and naval capabilities, global oil supplies have come into sharp focus.
Amrita Sen, founder and director of research at Energy Aspects, told CNBC on Monday that she expects oil prices to likely hold at around the $80 level for some time.
Sen said that it is unlikely that the Strait of Hormuz — through which 13-15 million barrels, or 20% of global supply, of oil flows — would be closed altogether. She added that the bigger risk stems from one-off attacks on vessels passing through the area.
Sen said that the U.S. and Israel have the superior military power to ultimately neutralize Iran's ability to completely shut off the Strait, a key shipping channel for oil producers such as Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Iraq, Iran, and Kuwait.
But single attacks on ships are more difficult to prevent. "This is something we've warned right throughout to our clients," she said.
After three tankers were hit over the weekend, shippers are now being extremely cautious about going in, she added.
"That is the biggest issue right now — how do Asian refiners actually get the volumes from the Middle East?" Sen added.
She noted that Oman and certain UAE grids can bypass the Strait, while Saudi Arabia has contingency plans to move its oil through the East-West pipeline via the Red Sea.
"But even if you are able to move 5 million out through other methods, about 10 is still stuck," she added.
Sen added that, if energy infrastructure is hit, the price of oil could hit $100.
She added that "the stakes are just too high" when it comes to potential attacks on infrastructure.
After Trump hinted that the military operation could last up to four or five weeks, that could bring greater upward pressure oil prices, said Albert Chu, portfolio manager, natural resources at Man Group.
"The consensus was expecting a faster resolution," Chu told CNBC's "Squawk Box Europe" on Monday.
"The real question is will there be damage to oil infrastructure, and for how long might the Strait of Hormuz be closed? If it's a couple of days, somewhat the premium is in the prices already. But if it gets extended that's when the real issues begin."
Got a confidential news tip? We want to hear from you.
Sign up for free newsletters and get more CNBC delivered to your inbox
Get this delivered to your inbox, and more info about our products and services.
© 2026 Versant Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved. A Versant Media Company.
Data is a real-time snapshot *Data is delayed at least 15 minutes.
Global Business and Financial News, Stock Quotes, and Market Data
and Analysis.
Data also provided by
Every time Huileng publishes a story, you'll get an alert straight to your inbox!
Enter your email
By clicking “Sign up”, you agree to receive emails from Business Insider. In addition, you accept Insider's
Terms of Service and
Privacy Policy.
Oil prices could hit $100 a barrel if tanker traffic disruption through the Strait of Hormuz persists after US and Israel's strikes on Iran, analysts said.
US West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures spiked as much 12% at the open on Sunday evening, while Brent crude jumped 13%, as traders rushed to price in the risk of a prolonged disruption in the Gulf.
WTI futures pared gains to trade 4.8% higher at $70.26 a barrel at 8:33 p.m. ET, while Brent was 5.1% higher at 76.58 a barrel.
"The key question is when do vessels re-establish export flows," wrote Alan Gelder, the senior vice president of refining, chemicals, and oil markets at Wood Mackenzie.
The Strait of Hormuz lies between Iran to the north and Oman and the United Arab Emirates to the south and is the world's most critical oil chokepoint, where 15 million barrels of crude oil pass daily.
Following the attack, Tehran warned ships not to pass through the Strait of Hormuz. On Sunday, multiple ships in the strait came under fire, opening up a new front in the conflict.
Meanwhile, insurers have pulled coverage, and vessels are increasingly reluctant to navigate the passage given the risks.
"No doubt, tanker rates and insurance will increase dramatically, but these costs would only be a small part of the oil price impact associated with a curtailment of oil flows if they last for more than a few days," Gelder wrote.
Wood Mackenzie warned oil prices could potentially exceed $100 per barrel if transit flows are not re-established quickly.
Dutch bank ING said Brent oil futures could ultimately rise to $140 per barrel in a "worst-case scenario" if there are significant and extended supply disruptions.
Vessel tracking data from Kpler shows limited traffic amid the conflict.
"Commercial operators, major oil companies, and insurers have effectively withdrawn from the corridor," wrote Amena Bakr, the head of Middle East Energy & OPEC+ research at Kpler. She noted that insurance premiums had already reached six-year highs ahead of the strikes.
In the most optimistic scenario, Gelder wrote that it could take a few weeks to reestablish export flows.
He compared the shock to the early days following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, when fears over Russian supply drove oil above $125 a barrel.
Over the weekend, major oil producer group OPEC+ said it would increase crude output by 206,000 barrels per day from April to ensure "market stability."
However, the additional volumes are effectively stranded if crude cannot exit the Gulf, even if alternative pipelines in Saudi Arabia and the UAE can partially offset the disruption.
"Whether the Strait is closed by force or rendered inaccessible by risk avoidance, the impact on flows is largely the same," wrote Jorge Leon, the head of geopolitical analysis at Rystad Energy.
Leon warned that the effective halt of traffic through the strait could remove between 8 million and 10 million barrels per day from global markets, even after accounting for limited alternative routes.
Jump to
Vitalik Buterin is turning his attention to a part of Ethereum most users never think about but that has quietly become one of its biggest pressure points: who gets to decide what transactions goes into a block.
In a new blog post on Monday, the Ethereum co-founder lays out a series of ideas aimed at preventing block building, the process of assembling transactions before they're finalized onchain, from becoming too centralized.
While Ethereum's upcoming “Glamsterdam” upgrade will formalize proposer-builder separation, which will allow validators to outsource block construction to a competitive market, Buterin argues that simply creating a marketplace of builders doesn't solve everything. If a small number of builders dominate, they could still censor transactions or extract outsized profits from users.
One proposal, known as FOCIL, would act as a kind of anti-censorship backstop. Under the design, a small group of randomly selected participants would each choose transactions that must be included in the next block. If those transactions are missing, the block would be rejected. The idea is that even if a single hostile builder controlled the entire market, they couldn't permanently exclude specific users.
Another focus of his post is so-called “toxic MEV,” where traders exploit visibility into pending transactions to front-run or “sandwich” users' trades. One potential fix is encrypting transactions until they are finalized, preventing opportunistic actors from seeing them in advance.
Buterin also points to risks at the networking layer, where transactions can be observed by intermediaries before they even reach a block, suggesting that anonymized routing systems could become an important line of defense.
Longer term, he sketches out a vision of more distributed block building, where not every transaction requires full global coordination. Much of Ethereum's activity, he argues, may not need to be processed in a single, tightly ordered bundle, opening the door to designs that reduce central chokepoints.
Overall Buterin seems to focus on as Ethereum scales, decentralization challenges are shifting from validators to the infrastructure that decides what users' transactions actually make it onchain.
Read more: Vitalik Buterin reveals his bold new plan to fix Ethereum's scaling problem
More For You
Battle for Bitcoin's soul opens as first block supporting 'clean-up' proposal is mined
A Bitcoin block signaling the BIP-110 proposal has appeared onchain while critics push back by inscribing a large image in protest.
What to know:
Disclosure & Polices: CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk has adopted a set of principles aimed at ensuring the integrity, editorial independence and freedom from bias of its publications. CoinDesk is part of Bullish (NYSE:BLSH), an institutionally focused global digital asset platform that provides market infrastructure and information services. Bullish owns and invests in digital asset businesses and digital assets and CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive Bullish equity-based compensation.
Business
By Trevor BachNorth Texas Business Trends Reporter
North Texas Business Trends Reporter
Boosted by a pro-cryptocurrency Trump administration, digital coins spent most of last year soaring to new heights. Bitcoin, the world's most popular digital currency, skyrocketed from below $70,000 before the 2024 election to above $126,000 in October, an all-time high.
But this year, amid broader geopolitical turbulence, economic uncertainty and growing pessimism around alternative investments, crypto has been in a nosedive, falling to a recent low below $64,000 — wiping out its entire run up from Trump's second term. Other popular cryptos, including Ethereum, have also been plunging, and some analysts have been warning much steeper drops could be coming.
“The crypto bubble is imploding,” Mike McGlone, a senior strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, wrote recently on LinkedIn.
Early Monday, Bitcoin posted something of a rebound, pushing back near $70,000, although the digital coin was still off more than 20% year-to-date.
Become a business insider with the latest news.
Or with:
By signing up, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
The recent tumble means Texas taxpayers are also in the red. Last year, as part of a broader, years-long push to transform the state into a “crypto capital,” Gov. Greg Abbott signed a high-profile bill establishing a “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve” — essentially a new state investment fund, controlled by the Texas Comptroller's office and funded with public dollars, that would buy and potentially sell crypto.
In late November, the office made the fund's first first purchase, buying around $5 million of a Bitcoin ETF, or exchange-traded fund. On December 15, the state made another $5 million purchase of the same ETF, the Comptroller's office recently told The Dallas Morning News.
Texas made its first purchase when Bitcoin was trading at around $91,000, and the second when it was trading around $87,000. The purchase prices mean that as of early Monday the state's $10 million cumulative investment was valued around $7.8 million.
Late last month, when Bitcoin was trading even lower, a representative for the Comptroller's office disclosed the details of the state's most recent purchase in an email to The News but did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the recent Bitcoin price drops, or confirm the holding's current valuation, which then had dipped to around $7.5 million.
In a statement sent to The News, Giovanni Capriglione, the outgoing state representative (R-Southlake) who sponsored last year's strategic reserve legislation in the Texas House and recently took over as president of the Texas Blockchain Council, an industry group that pushed for it, emphasized a longer-term view.
“The purpose of Texas' Strategic Bitcoin Reserve isn't designed to go after short-term gains,” he said.
“This investment is a long-term investment over a much broader scope. It's a hedge against inflation, diversifies the state's overall investment portfolio, and positions the state as a leader in the emerging world of digital assets.”
State sen. Charles Schwertner (R-Georgetown), the author of the legislation, did not respond to requests for comment left with his office by The News.
Crypto's advocates claim that future upswings will bring the state's investment back in the green. Yet for critics, this year's tumble has only added to a conviction that the state should never have gotten involved with the notoriously volatile asset class in the first place.
“Is it too early to say I told you so?” Ed Hirs, an energy economist at the University of Houston and prominent cryptocurrency critic, said late last month. “It begs all the usual questions: Who's going to stand up and take responsibility for this loss and misuse of state funds?”
Hirs insisted that the state should unwind its investment and abandon its crypto push.
“It has always been a fraud,” he said. “The only question is, ‘When is the balloon going to pop?'”
Some elected representatives are in fact sounding alarm bells. Earlier in February, when Bitcoin dipped to around $65,000, state Rep. Mihaela Plesa (D-Plano) highlighted the public investment's plunge on social media, promising to provide additional updates.
She also listed several items the state could have instead paid for with $1.2 million, or roughly the amount the state was down on its first $5 million purchase. At the time Plesa, like the general public, was unaware of the second $5 million purchase in December.
The list included salaries and benefits for 15-18 starting teachers for a year, mobile health clinics, 10-12 entry level firefighter or paramedic salaries for a year and property tax relief for hundreds of homeowners.
“Texas should treat public funds with the same discipline that families expect [of] their own budgets,” Plesa said in an interview. “And transparency is really important, right?”
Plesa, who was one of 25 state representatives to vote against the Senate bill's final pass through the House, said she isn't “anti-crypto.”
But last year, she said, as the bill was advancing, she became concerned about the potential public investment's volatility; now, after that investment has shed value, she was advocating for more guardrails and reporting requirements.
“I guess take a [page out of the] book out of the financial conservatives, right?” she said. “The responsibility of government isn't to chase the next hot asset. It's to safeguard public resources and deliver dependable results for our taxpayers.”
Yet the strategic reserve's champions have, in effect, often argued the opposite — that in addition to serving as a symbolic welcome mat from Texas to the crypto industry, the aggressive public investment was actually a responsible strategy to grow public dollars.
“Texas cannot expect to put its money in a one-percent savings account and keep up with inflation,” Schwertner said in a statement last year. “We need to be forward thinking as individuals are forward thinking when it comes to financial assets.”
In any case, Texas' crypto fund will likely not be making more purchases in the near term. Legislators appropriated $10 million for the fund last year, and would have to appropriate more to enable the state to pour more money in.
The investment falls under the purview of the comptroller's office, which is in the process of contracting “a cryptocurrency custodian” to manage it, a representative told The News.
Trevor Bach joined The Dallas Morning News in 2025 and reports on a wide range of business and economic topics. He previously worked for The Real Deal in Los Angeles and Miami New Times, and his freelance writing has appeared in numerous publications.
Join the conversation
Thank you for reading. We welcome your thoughts on this topic. Comments are moderated for adherence to our Community Guidelines. Please read the guidelines before participating.
Business
By Trevor BachNorth Texas Business Trends Reporter
North Texas Business Trends Reporter
Boosted by a pro-cryptocurrency Trump administration, digital coins spent most of last year soaring to new heights. Bitcoin, the world's most popular digital currency, skyrocketed from below $70,000 before the 2024 election to above $126,000 in October, an all-time high.
But this year, amid broader geopolitical turbulence, economic uncertainty and growing pessimism around alternative investments, crypto has been in a nosedive, falling to a recent low below $64,000 — wiping out its entire run up from Trump's second term. Other popular cryptos, including Ethereum, have also been plunging, and some analysts have been warning much steeper drops could be coming.
“The crypto bubble is imploding,” Mike McGlone, a senior strategist at Bloomberg Intelligence, wrote recently on LinkedIn.
Early Monday, Bitcoin posted something of a rebound, pushing back near $70,000, although the digital coin was still off more than 20% year-to-date.
Become a business insider with the latest news.
Or with:
By signing up, you agree to our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
The recent tumble means Texas taxpayers are also in the red. Last year, as part of a broader, years-long push to transform the state into a “crypto capital,” Gov. Greg Abbott signed a high-profile bill establishing a “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve” — essentially a new state investment fund, controlled by the Texas Comptroller's office and funded with public dollars, that would buy and potentially sell crypto.
In late November, the office made the fund's first first purchase, buying around $5 million of a Bitcoin ETF, or exchange-traded fund. On December 15, the state made another $5 million purchase of the same ETF, the Comptroller's office recently told The Dallas Morning News.
Texas made its first purchase when Bitcoin was trading at around $91,000, and the second when it was trading around $87,000. The purchase prices mean that as of early Monday the state's $10 million cumulative investment was valued around $7.8 million.
Late last month, when Bitcoin was trading even lower, a representative for the Comptroller's office disclosed the details of the state's most recent purchase in an email to The News but did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the recent Bitcoin price drops, or confirm the holding's current valuation, which then had dipped to around $7.5 million.
In a statement sent to The News, Giovanni Capriglione, the outgoing state representative (R-Southlake) who sponsored last year's strategic reserve legislation in the Texas House and recently took over as president of the Texas Blockchain Council, an industry group that pushed for it, emphasized a longer-term view.
“The purpose of Texas' Strategic Bitcoin Reserve isn't designed to go after short-term gains,” he said.
“This investment is a long-term investment over a much broader scope. It's a hedge against inflation, diversifies the state's overall investment portfolio, and positions the state as a leader in the emerging world of digital assets.”
State sen. Charles Schwertner (R-Georgetown), the author of the legislation, did not respond to requests for comment left with his office by The News.
Crypto's advocates claim that future upswings will bring the state's investment back in the green. Yet for critics, this year's tumble has only added to a conviction that the state should never have gotten involved with the notoriously volatile asset class in the first place.
“Is it too early to say I told you so?” Ed Hirs, an energy economist at the University of Houston and prominent cryptocurrency critic, said late last month. “It begs all the usual questions: Who's going to stand up and take responsibility for this loss and misuse of state funds?”
Hirs insisted that the state should unwind its investment and abandon its crypto push.
“It has always been a fraud,” he said. “The only question is, ‘When is the balloon going to pop?'”
Some elected representatives are in fact sounding alarm bells. Earlier in February, when Bitcoin dipped to around $65,000, state Rep. Mihaela Plesa (D-Plano) highlighted the public investment's plunge on social media, promising to provide additional updates.
She also listed several items the state could have instead paid for with $1.2 million, or roughly the amount the state was down on its first $5 million purchase. At the time Plesa, like the general public, was unaware of the second $5 million purchase in December.
The list included salaries and benefits for 15-18 starting teachers for a year, mobile health clinics, 10-12 entry level firefighter or paramedic salaries for a year and property tax relief for hundreds of homeowners.
“Texas should treat public funds with the same discipline that families expect [of] their own budgets,” Plesa said in an interview. “And transparency is really important, right?”
Plesa, who was one of 25 state representatives to vote against the Senate bill's final pass through the House, said she isn't “anti-crypto.”
But last year, she said, as the bill was advancing, she became concerned about the potential public investment's volatility; now, after that investment has shed value, she was advocating for more guardrails and reporting requirements.
“I guess take a [page out of the] book out of the financial conservatives, right?” she said. “The responsibility of government isn't to chase the next hot asset. It's to safeguard public resources and deliver dependable results for our taxpayers.”
Yet the strategic reserve's champions have, in effect, often argued the opposite — that in addition to serving as a symbolic welcome mat from Texas to the crypto industry, the aggressive public investment was actually a responsible strategy to grow public dollars.
“Texas cannot expect to put its money in a one-percent savings account and keep up with inflation,” Schwertner said in a statement last year. “We need to be forward thinking as individuals are forward thinking when it comes to financial assets.”
In any case, Texas' crypto fund will likely not be making more purchases in the near term. Legislators appropriated $10 million for the fund last year, and would have to appropriate more to enable the state to pour more money in.
The investment falls under the purview of the comptroller's office, which is in the process of contracting “a cryptocurrency custodian” to manage it, a representative told The News.
Trevor Bach joined The Dallas Morning News in 2025 and reports on a wide range of business and economic topics. He previously worked for The Real Deal in Los Angeles and Miami New Times, and his freelance writing has appeared in numerous publications.
Join the conversation
Thank you for reading. We welcome your thoughts on this topic. Comments are moderated for adherence to our Community Guidelines. Please read the guidelines before participating.
Japan's Sony Bank is reportedly preparing to launch a new project that would allow its customers to use traditional bank deposits for instant purchases of yen-denominated stablecoins. The initiative, which is being developed in partnership with stablecoin issuer JPYC, aims to streamline the move from yen deposits to on-chain digital currency holdings, for retail clients to potentially engage with tokenized money.
Under the pilot, Sony Bank customers will not need to move funds to an external crypto exchange or wallet to acquire stablecoins because they can convert their yen deposits into JPY-pegged stablecoins in real time.
The proposal, which was announced by Sony Bank, allows the financial institution to link its existing deposit systems with on-chain stablecoin issuance, enabling clients to move between their yen holdings and JPYC without intermediaries. JPYC is a yen-denominated stablecoin that already circulates on major blockchain networks and is designed to maintain a 1:1 peg with the Japanese yen through reserve backing and regulatory compliance.
By enabling direct, bank-integrated stablecoin purchases, Sony Bank would eliminate friction associated with traditional crypto on-ramps, such as account opening on exchanges, wallet creation, and off-chain settlement delays.
Sony Bank's initiative is part of ongoing efforts by financial institutions in Asia to explore digital asset utility beyond active trading. While other banks have generally treated digital currencies with caution due to regulatory ambiguity and compliance concerns, Sony Bank's move reflects its confidence that stablecoin integration can coexist with deposit-taking activities once adequate controls are in place.
The partnership with JPYC, which already has a presence within Japan's digital asset ecosystem, also gives the move a solid boost as the duo aims to maintain strict oversight of reserve backing, anti-money-laundering (AML) controls, and transactional transparency.
Analysts see the Sony Bank pilot as part of a broader trend, where banks are collaborating with stablecoin issuers globally to experiment with blockchain funds, tokenized deposits, and direct retail access to digital currency rails.
In markets such as Japan, consumers' already-existing familiarity with digital money may lower barriers to stablecoin adoption if such services are offered through trusted banking brands. This initiative could also reduce dependency on third-party exchanges for stablecoin acquisition, improving user experience and potentially enhancing regulatory oversight. However, while exploring stablecoin integrations, Sony Bank must align with existing compliance measures, reserve transparency requirements, and stringent risk frameworks.
Sony Bank's proposal will be closely watched by other financial institutions in Japan and the rest of the world based on these expectations. If it succeeds, it could serve as a model for how traditional banking systems incorporate digital currencies into their products and services without abandoning regulatory control or operational oversight.
Ultimately, by potentially enabling seamless conversion between yen deposits and JPYC stablecoins, Sony Bank is charting a path for hybrid financial services that connect conventional finance and blockchain currencies for user convenience.
Subscribe
Unit No: BA857 DMCC Business Centre Level No 1 Jewellery & Gemplex 3 Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
International House, 10 Admirals Way, London, England, E14 9XL.
Bitcoin's latest governance clash escalated this week as the first block signaling support for a temporary soft fork designed to restrict arbitrary, non-monetary data in the blockchain's transactions was produced by mining pool Ocean.
The proposal, formally assigned BIP-110 after evolving from earlier drafts, aims to reinstate strict limits on transaction output sizes and arbitrary data fields for about a year. The idea is to curb what proponents see as “spam” uses of block space for non-financial data. They argue that unchecked data, including large inscriptions and so-called OP_RETURN payloads, threaten the original blockchain's role as sound monetary infrastructure and burden node operators.
The community remains deeply divided. Prominent critics, including Blockstream CEO Adam Back, have warned that consensus-level intervention could harm Bitcoin's credibility and lead to preferential treatment of some transactions in violation of the principle of neutral transaction capacity. He also questioned the level of support for the proposal, which, he said, increased the risk of the blockchain being split.
Adding fuel to the debate, a developer recently inscribed a 66 KB image in a single transaction on Bitcoin, an apparent pushback against BIP-110's core claims and a demonstration of how large amounts of data can be encoded even without relying on OP_RETURN.
OP_RETURN and similar approaches are script instructions used to mark a transaction output as invalid for spending, effectively allowing users to repurpose that space to permanently embed arbitrary data — like text or images — directly into the blockchain
As the controversy unfolds, it underscores enduring philosophical tensions within Bitcoin. Should network aggressively defend a narrowly defined monetary purpose or maintain maximal neutrality toward arbitrary uses of its base layer?
More For You
Vitalik Buterin unveils plan to curb Ethereum block builder centralization
Another focus of his post is so-called “toxic MEV,” where traders exploit visibility into pending transactions to front-run or “sandwich” users' trades.
What to know:
Disclosure & Polices: CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk has adopted a set of principles aimed at ensuring the integrity, editorial independence and freedom from bias of its publications. CoinDesk is part of Bullish (NYSE:BLSH), an institutionally focused global digital asset platform that provides market infrastructure and information services. Bullish owns and invests in digital asset businesses and digital assets and CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive Bullish equity-based compensation.
Peter Lucas
March 2, 2026
Competitive Strategies, Digital Currency, E-Commerce, Issuing/Originating, Kiosks & Ticketing Machines, Mergers & Acquisitions, Mobile Commerce, Mobile Wallets, Point-of-sale, Real-time Payments, Transaction Processing
N3XT Inc., a blockchain-powered bank, has partnered with YouHodler, a Web3 platform that supports crypto-backed loans, crypto-reward accounts, cryptocurrency trading, and universal currency exchange.
Launched in 2025 by former Signature Bank executives, N3XT provides instant, programmable USD Coin business-to-business payments. A so-called narrow bank, N3XT Inc., uses smart contracts for automated, real-time settlement. A narrow bank is a financial system requiring banks to hold 100% liquid, safe assets, such as government securities or central bank reserves, against deposits, rather than using them to make loans. Smart contracts are automated computer programs stored on a blockchain that are executed when predetermined conditions are met.
The partnership connects YouHodler's crypto-collateral management environment with N3XT's regulated dollar infrastructure, bridging digital-asset activity with continuously available fiat settlement. The partnership also helps N3XT to advance “bridge regulated fiat banking with blockchain-based financial services,” the company says. The deal will enable YouHodler to expand institutional-grade stablecoin-based settlement infrastructure across markets such as Europe and Argentina.
“Traditional banking infrastructure simply wasn't built for the always-on nature of cryptocurrency markets, much less the direction of instant payments,” N3XT chief executive Jeffrey Wallis says in a statement. “Our partnership with YouHodler demonstrates how blockchain-powered banking can provide the real-time, programmable payment capabilities that digital-asset platforms and their users need to operate effectively in global markets that never sleep.”
In other crypto-related news, Barclays Plc has reportedly sent a request for information to potential technology suppliers about creating a blockchain platform for handling processes like payments, according to Bloomberg News.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
Launched in 2025 by former Signature Bank executives, N3XT provides instant, programmable USD Coin business-to-business payments. A so-called narrow bank, N3XT Inc., uses smart contracts for automated, real-time settlement. A narrow bank is a financial system requiring banks to hold 100% liquid, safe assets, such as government securities or central bank reserves, against deposits, rather than using them to make loans. Smart contracts are automated computer programs stored on a blockchain that are executed when predetermined conditions are met.
The partnership connects YouHodler's crypto-collateral management environment with N3XT's regulated dollar infrastructure, bridging digital-asset activity with continuously available fiat settlement. The partnership also helps N3XT to advance “bridge regulated fiat banking with blockchain-based financial services,” the company says. The deal will enable YouHodler to expand institutional-grade stablecoin-based settlement infrastructure across markets such as Europe and Argentina.
“Traditional banking infrastructure simply wasn't built for the always-on nature of cryptocurrency markets, much less the direction of instant payments,” N3XT chief executive Jeffrey Wallis says in a statement. “Our partnership with YouHodler demonstrates how blockchain-powered banking can provide the real-time, programmable payment capabilities that digital-asset platforms and their users need to operate effectively in global markets that never sleep.”
In other crypto-related news, Barclays Plc has reportedly sent a request for information to potential technology suppliers about creating a blockchain platform for handling processes like payments, according to Bloomberg News.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
The partnership connects YouHodler's crypto-collateral management environment with N3XT's regulated dollar infrastructure, bridging digital-asset activity with continuously available fiat settlement. The partnership also helps N3XT to advance “bridge regulated fiat banking with blockchain-based financial services,” the company says. The deal will enable YouHodler to expand institutional-grade stablecoin-based settlement infrastructure across markets such as Europe and Argentina.
“Traditional banking infrastructure simply wasn't built for the always-on nature of cryptocurrency markets, much less the direction of instant payments,” N3XT chief executive Jeffrey Wallis says in a statement. “Our partnership with YouHodler demonstrates how blockchain-powered banking can provide the real-time, programmable payment capabilities that digital-asset platforms and their users need to operate effectively in global markets that never sleep.”
In other crypto-related news, Barclays Plc has reportedly sent a request for information to potential technology suppliers about creating a blockchain platform for handling processes like payments, according to Bloomberg News.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
“Traditional banking infrastructure simply wasn't built for the always-on nature of cryptocurrency markets, much less the direction of instant payments,” N3XT chief executive Jeffrey Wallis says in a statement. “Our partnership with YouHodler demonstrates how blockchain-powered banking can provide the real-time, programmable payment capabilities that digital-asset platforms and their users need to operate effectively in global markets that never sleep.”
In other crypto-related news, Barclays Plc has reportedly sent a request for information to potential technology suppliers about creating a blockchain platform for handling processes like payments, according to Bloomberg News.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
In other crypto-related news, Barclays Plc has reportedly sent a request for information to potential technology suppliers about creating a blockchain platform for handling processes like payments, according to Bloomberg News.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
Barclays' dive into blockchain technology could include payments applications such as stablecoins and tokenized deposits, Bloomberg says. The bank reportedly aims to select tech providers as soon as April, according to Bloomberg.
March 2, 2026
March 2, 2026
February 27, 2026
Block is cutting its headcount by more than 40%, the company announced late Thursday during …
Illinois Merchants Score a Big Win in Th... posted on 02-11-2026
Stablecoin Giant Circle Launches Arc for... posted on 12-30-2025
Surcharges Come With Acute Abandonment R... posted on 01-13-2026
Power up Holiday Sales with Factor4 Gift... posted on 09-24-2025
Eye on AI: Worldpay Adds AI Safeguards;... posted on 01-02-2026
Insider Brief
PRESS REELASE — 0G, the decentralized AI infrastructure protocol backed by $290M in funding and the team behind the world's fastest decentralized AI chain, today launched the 0G Apollo Accelerator, an up to $20M program built with Stanford blockchain veterans to fund and scale the first wave of revenue-generating AI applications on decentralized infrastructure.
0G and Stanford Blockchain Veterans Launch $20M Apollo AI Accelerator
Apollo is built in partnership with Blockchain Builders Fund (BBF), the organization behind Stanford's blockchain ecosystem — including the Stanford Blockchain Accelerator, BASS, and MS&E 447; backed by Google Cloud, which is providing $200,000 in cloud credits per accepted team; and Privy, the wallet infrastructure platform acquired by Stripe and trusted by the leading teams in Web3. Top teams that earn a spot in the cohort get enterprise-grade compute and production-ready wallet infrastructure from day one, not after they raise their next round.
Every accepted team receives:
“The AI industry is at an inflection point,” said Michael Heinrich, CEO of 0G Labs, who is an alumnus of Stanford University. “Some of the most important technology companies in history started in the Stanford ecosystem, and we believe decentralized AI will produce the next generation. The next trillion-dollar AI companies won't be built inside walled gardens — they'll be built on open infrastructure. Apollo isn't another accelerator. It's where the founders who will define how AI is owned, governed, and monetized for the next decade come to build.”
Since its September 2025 launch, 0G's Mainnet (Aristotle) has processed millions of $0G fueled transactions with 100+ ecosystem partners, including Chainlink, Google Cloud, Alibaba Cloud, Samsung Next, Privy and Ledger already building on top of it.
The convergence of AI and decentralized infrastructure is creating an entirely new category. Developers are building AI agents, autonomous DeFi protocols, decentralized inference platforms, embodied AI in robotics, and on-chain data markets at a pace the industry has never seen. But the capital, compute, and credible mentorship to back them have remained concentrated and inaccessible. Apollo changes that.
“We've spent years building Stanford's blockchain builder ecosystem from the Accelerator, to BASS, to MS&E 447,” said Gil Rosen, Co-Founder of Blockchain Builders Fund.
“Apollo is the culmination of that work: connecting world-class AI founders with the most promising infrastructure in Web3. Blockchain Builders $60M AUM exists to back exactly these founders, and 0G's dAIOS gives them the infrastructure stack to actually ship to production.”
Blockchain Builders brings a global network spanning 50+ portfolio companies, 100+ accelerator alumni that have raised $1B+ and birthed 5 unicorns. They also started and organized the renowned BASS event series, featuring the industry's foremost thought leaders. Apollo teams plug directly into that network for fundraising introductions, go-to-market partnerships, and talent acquisition.
Apply now: apollo.0g.ai
Questions: pr@0g.ai
About 0G Labs
0G Labs (Zero Gravity) developed and launched the world's fastest decentralized AI chain and is the creator of the 0G dAIOS — a full-stack decentralized AI Operating System comprising an EVM-compatible L1, compute network, storage layer (2 GB/s throughput), and a data availability layer that is 50,000x faster and 100x cheaper than Ethereum DA. Backed by $290M in funding from Hack VC, Delphi Digital, OKX Ventures, Samsung Next, Bankless Ventures, and Animoca Brands, 0G's Mainnet launched in September 2025 with millions of transactions processed and 100+ ecosystem partners, including Chainlink, Google Cloud, Alibaba Cloud, and Coinbase Wallet. Learn more at 0g.ai.
About 0G Foundation
The 0G Foundation is dedicated to driving innovation and growth while maintaining the world's first decentralized AI operating system fueled by $0G. Focused on creating an open, transparent, and scalable infrastructure, it is committed to fostering a vibrant, decentralized ecosystem where AI can operate as a public good. Through strategic partnerships, community initiatives, and innovative technology, it strives to ensure the long-term sustainability and integrity of the 0G network. Learn more at 0gfoundation.ai
About Blockchain Builders Fund
Blockchain Builders is the team behind Stanford's blockchain ecosystem — including the Stanford Blockchain Accelerator, BASS, and MS&E 447. With $60M+ AUM, 50+ portfolio companies, and multiple unicorns, BBF provides early-stage founders at the bleeding edge of blockchain, AI, and finance, with hands-on operational support in product development, fundraising, and ecosystem growth. Learn more at blockchainbuilders.fund.
Media Contact, 0G pr@0g.ai
SOURCE
The AI Insider is the leading provider of AI funding news and market intelligence on the AI industry.
Crypto prices are rebounding from their worst weekend levels in early U.S. trading on Monday alongside a sizable bounce in U.S. equity indices.
Roughly one hour into the session, the Nasdaq is down just 0.1% after futures at one point overnight had indicated a plunge of more than 2%. The S&P 500 and DJIA are also posting just very modest losses.
Gold remains higher by 2% and crude oil by 7%. The U.S. dollar index is having one of its strongest sessions in weeks, gaining 1%.
Bitcoin BTC$66,352.16 has moved up to $68,600, ahead 2.3% over the past 24 hours. Ether (ETH) is higher by 1.4%, with solana (SOL) and XRP (XRP) up similar amounts.
Crypto-related stocks are posting even larger gains, led by Circle's (CRCL) 12% advance. Strategy (MSTR) is higher by 6% and Galaxy Digital (GLXY) by 4.7%.On the macro side, the ISM manufacturing PMI came in at 52.4, for February, marking another month of sector expansion and the first consecutive run of prints above 50 since the fourth quarter of 2022. This follows Friday's Chicago Business Barometer, which rose to 57.7 in February 2026 from 54 previously and well above expectations of 52.8. The reading signals only the second expansion since November 2023 and reflects the strongest pace of US activity growth since May 2022.Against the backdrop of conflict in the Middle East, reaccelerating manufacturing activity, hotter-than-expected PPI data last week, and higher oil prices driven by geopolitical tensions, a March rate cut now appears effectively off the table ahead of the Federal Reserve's March 18 meeting.
Normally, that might be considered a headwind for crypto prices, but it's quite possible that markets had already priced in tighter than previously expected U.S. monetary policy.
More For You
Nasdaq follows Cboe joining world of 'binary bets' as prediction market craze hits Wall Street
The exchange has filed a proposal with the SEC to list yes-or-no bets on the Nasdaq-100 amid continued demand for prediction markets.
What to know:
Disclosure & Polices: CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk has adopted a set of principles aimed at ensuring the integrity, editorial independence and freedom from bias of its publications. CoinDesk is part of Bullish (NYSE:BLSH), an institutionally focused global digital asset platform that provides market infrastructure and information services. Bullish owns and invests in digital asset businesses and digital assets and CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive Bullish equity-based compensation.
The European Central Bank (ECB) has teamed up with a Madrid-based disability foundation as it looks to make an app for the prospective digital euro ‘easily accessible for everyone', including people with disabilities or ‘limited' digital skills and the elderly
The launch of a digital euro – a central bank digital currency (CBDC) for the 21-member eurozone – is not yet confirmed after years of preparatory work. But the ECB announced last autumn (30 October 2025) that it was moving to the next phase of the CBDC's development, and its president Christine Lagarde rarely fails to miss an opportunity to champion the rationale for proceeding with the high-profile public money project.
As its preparations continue – specifically, in this case, how people would use a digital euro app – the Frankfurt-headquartered authority has announced (18 February) its signing of a non-remunerated ‘collaboration agreement' with the ONCE Foundation for Cooperation and Social Inclusion of People with Disabilities. The authority plans to use ONCE's expertise in three main fields: the provision of technical advice on accessibility requirements and features; co-work on the app's design; and testing app functionalities once the first prototypes are available.
Under an assumption that European co-legislators will adopt a regulation on the establishment of the digital euro this year (2026), pilot activity and ‘initial transactions' are slated to take place as of ‘mid-2027', according to October's announcement.
The Eurosystem – which comprises the ECB and the national central banks of the 21 European Union (EU) member states whose currency is the euro – ‘should then be ready for a potential first issuance of the digital euro during 2029,' the central bank said.
RELATED ARTICLE ECB preps for digital euro launch in 2029 – a news story (4 November 2025) on progress towards the planned eurozone CBDC
“Accessibility and inclusion are not optional features, but core digital euro design principles,” said ECB Executive Board member Piero Cipollone, who chairs the High-Level Task Force on a digital euro, in an announcement on the ONCE link-up. “By working with organisations such as the ONCE Foundation, we are helping to ensure that the digital euro empowers every citizen in the digital age.”
The ECB said in its announcement that the partnership ‘also supports the ECB's ambition to further enhance the accessibility of the digital euro app beyond minimum legal accessibility requirements, as laid out in the European Accessibility Act, and standard market practice.'
The authority plans to ‘embed accessibility considerations from the earliest stages of design and development, ensuring the app is clear, understandable and easy to navigate'. It states that the work's outcome ‘could also inform user experience requirements for payment service providers.'
The ECB highlights that its first digital euro innovation platform, which involved about 70 market participants, ‘found that the digital euro could also improve inclusion and accessibility through user-friendly features such as voice-controlled transactions, large-font displays and guided onboarding processes'; and that focus groups with ‘vulnerable' people showed a ‘need for multiple onboarding options, including in-person support at local branches, and payment flows which resemble familiar experiences.'
“We will incorporate experts in accessibility and user experience who are persons with disabilities into the project team, thereby combining technical knowledge with lived experience,” said ONCE Foundation director of accessibility and innovation Jesús Hernández Galán.
RELATED ARTICLE Eurosystem rolls turf to invite payment service providers to join digital euro pilot – a news story (2 December 2025) on plans to involve companies in pilot activity in 2027
The Eurosystem is planning to launch a call for expression of interest, before the end of the first quarter of 2026 (March), to invite European payment service providers (PSPs) to participate in the planned pilot activity.
The pilot is expected to last for 12 months ‘with a view to validating the technical, functional and operational readiness' of the CBDC, according to an ECB press announcement (28 November 2025). Participating companies will not be remunerated.
‘These exercises will involve validating digital transaction processes in a controlled environment with a limited number of participants,' the ECB explained. ‘These digital transactions will be designed to replicate the digital euro's technical design but they will not have legal tender status.'
The pilot will involve ‘only Eurosystem staff, selected merchants that already provide everyday services on the office premises of the ECB and of euro area national central banks (for example, cafeterias or restaurants), as well as selected e-commerce,' its announcement continued. Eurosystem staff will have the opportunity to make payments from person-to-person (both online and offline) and from person-to-business (both at a physical point of sale and in e-commerce).
A two-year digital euro ‘preparation phase', which itself followed a two-year ‘investigation phase', was completed last autumn.
Knowledge Partners
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has signed a memorandum of understanding with the Shanghai Data Bureau and the National Technology Innovation Center for Blockchain to deepen cooperation in digitised cargo trade and finance.
The agreement formalises collaboration between Shanghai and Hong Kong to research and deploy digital technologies, including blockchain, across cargo trade and trade finance workflows. Authorities said the initiative seeks to build a cross-border digital infrastructure that connects cargo data, trade documentation, and financial services, reducing paper-based friction and improving verification standards.
The partnership also reinforces Hong Kong's role as a bridge between Mainland China and global markets. Officials described the city as a “super connector” and “super value-adder,” capable of linking Shanghai's growing data capabilities with the international data ecosystem.
Under the MoU, the HKMA and the other two parties will jointly study and develop a cross-border platform designed to integrate digital cargo records with financial infrastructure. A key focus includes exploring the use of electronic bills of lading under Project Ensemble and examining how trade finance facilitation can be enhanced through connections with the Commercial Data Interchange and CargoX.
By linking cargo and trade data directly to financing channels, regulators aim to accelerate loan processing, improve transparency, and lower operational risks for banks and corporates engaged in cross-border commerce.
HKMA Deputy Chief Executive Howard Lee described the signing as a milestone in Shanghai–Hong Kong financial innovation cooperation, adding that the initiative will explore digital infrastructure that links both cities while promoting trade finance digitalisation.
Shanghai Data Bureau Director Dr. Shao Jun said the agreement reflects a broader push toward data-driven and innovation-led development, with both cities working to establish secure and efficient digital infrastructure that supports commercialisation and international connectivity.
“The joint signing of the MOU with the HKMA and the NTICBC marks a significant step towards deepening co-operation between Shanghai and Hong Kong on data. We remain committed to data-powered and innovation-driven development, striving to establish a secure, efficient, and open digital infrastructure.”
The collaboration signals a practical step toward integrating Mainland cargo and trade data with global financial systems through Hong Kong, potentially reshaping how cross-border trade finance is processed in the region.
Subscribe
Unit No: BA857 DMCC Business Centre Level No 1 Jewellery & Gemplex 3 Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
International House, 10 Admirals Way, London, England, E14 9XL.
Oops, something went wrong
Publicly traded Ethereum treasury BitMine Immersion Technologies added another 50,928 ETH or $103 million worth of Ethereum as the second-largest crypto asset continued its slide last week—though ETH is now surging as of Monday morning.
The latest acquisition brings its total haul to 4,473,587 ETH, around 3.71% of the circulating Ethereum supply, now valued at $9 billion as Ethereum trades around $2,037—down about 22% in the last month.
Though its unrealized or paper losses sit around $7.7 billion, according to analytics firm DropsTab, the firm's chairman Tom Lee remains convinced of the asset's long-term future.
"BitMine has been buying Ethereum, as we view this pullback as attractive, given the strengthening fundamentals,” said Lee in a statement. “In our view, the price of ETH is not reflective of the high utility of ETH and its role as the future of finance."
As the firm continues to accumulate for its balance sheet, it has also increased its share of staked Ethereum, earning yield on its holdings.
“BitMine has staked more ETH than other entities in the world,” said Lee.
BitMine is now staking more than 3 million ETH, which the firm anticipates would result in an annual staking revenue of around $172 million, at current rates. However, when it is fully staked and utilizing its upcoming, self-built Made in America Validator Network (MAVAN), it estimates annual revenues will jump to $253 million.
What the Iran Conflict Means for Bitcoin's Price
That figure is derived using a slightly higher staking rate generated by what he said is the firm's “best-in-class” platform that is expected to be launched during 2026. At present time, though, it is working with three separate staking providers to generate yields.
The firm's commitment to accumulating and staking Ethereum has not resulted in any shareholder value of late. Shares in BMNR have fallen 51% in the last six months as ETH has slid 59% from its August all-time high.
Shares in the firm are up around 8.4% on Monday at a recent price of $20.61, however, while ETH has posted a 1.1% gain in the last 24 hours. Ethereum is up more than 5% in the last hour, as of this writing, with other assets also surging alongside ETH.
Dubai, UAE, March 02, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) --
New crypto Pepeto just announced another milestone with $7.42 million raised in presale funding, and what makes this remarkable is that every new record comes faster than the last in a market where nearly everything else has slowed to a crawl. While most tokens bleed volume and investor confidence fades, Pepeto accelerates against the current with buyers rushing to secure positions in what many call the breakout project of 2026. Bitcoin, XRP, and Ethereum are all trading through turbulence right now, but the viral traction and innovative infrastructure behind Pepeto tell a different story that this article will break down.
Bitcoin Eyes $250,000, XRP Targets $5 and Ethereum Projects $6,500 but the Real Wealth Is Found Earlier The crypto market is going through one of those painful stretches that shakes out weak hands before a major cycle begins, and anyone who has been through previous downturns knows exactly what comes next. As Forbes reported, every significant Bitcoin correction in the last decade was followed by a rally that set new all time highs. Cathie Wood's ARK Invest projects Bitcoin reaching $250,000 before this cycle peaks, and as Bloomberg covered, analysts expect altcoins to follow with XRP targeting $5 and Ethereum projecting a 300% move toward $6,500. Those are strong numbers, but for a wallet that is not already worth ten of millions, a 2x to 3x on a large cap is portfolio stability not life changing wealth. History proves that massive returns always come from tokens before they list on exchanges, the same early window that turned XRP and Ethereum holders into millionaires when both coins traded for almost nothing. Right now a new crypto called Pepeto is sitting in that exact position, and even the large wallet investors who hold Bitcoin and Ethereum for stability are adding Pepeto for the kind of returns established coins simply cannot offer anymore.
New Crypto Pepeto Goes Viral as Crypto Analysts and Whale Investors Recognize Real Innovation Behind the Hype Every cycle produces one project that captures attention in a way nobody can manufacture, and Pepeto is showing every sign that this is that moment. The project is not going viral because of empty promises or recycled meme coin energy. It is going viral because what the team built solves the exact problems that frustrate every single crypto trader on a daily basis. Right now anyone who wants to trade across different blockchains has to deal with expensive gas fees that eat into profits, bounce between multiple platforms just to find the token they need, and accept fragmented liquidity that makes execution slower and more costly than it should be. Pepeto eliminates all of that by building a complete trading ecosystem with a dedicated exchange for new token listings, a cross chain bridge that moves assets instantly between networks, and zero tax swaps across Ethereum, BNB Chain, and Solana where every cryptocurrency can be traded in one secure place with fees so low they barely register.
This is not speculation and it is not hype, which is exactly why experienced analysts are paying attention and why whale wallets have been loading positions consistently over the past weeks. Large investors do not commit capital based on logos and community size alone. They invest when the technology underneath justifies the risk, and Pepeto delivers that with dual security audits from SolidProof and Coinsult, a Pepe ecosystem cofounder leading development, and 211% APY staking rewards that compound daily for everyone holding through the presale. Meme coin culture drives the viral attention and real infrastructure drives the lasting demand, and Pepeto is the first project to combine both at a presale entry this early.
The Window That Made XRP and Ethereum Holders Rich Is Open Again With Pepeto XRP and Ethereum already created their millionaires when both coins were unknown and trading at prices nobody believed in. That chapter closed because both now sit at valuations where even a strong rally means doubling your money at best. Pepeto sits at that same early stage with platform tools approaching completion and a Binance listing closer than ever. Stages are selling out in hours, 211% APY staking compounds in your wallet today, and the listing price will be higher than what you pay now. Visit the Pepeto official website and enter the presale before this window closes.
Click To Visit Pepeto Website To Enter The Presale
FAQs
What is the best new crypto to buy during a market dip? The best crypto to buy during the market dip is Pepeto presale positions cannot be liquidated during crashes, and 211% APY staking compounds daily.
Will Bitcoin hitting $250,000 push XRP and Ethereum higher? Analysts project XRP reaching $5 and Ethereum targeting $6,500 when Bitcoin leads the rally, but early tokens like Pepeto deliver 50x to 100x compared to 2x from large caps.
Why are whale investors buying Pepeto now? Large wallets invest on infrastructure not hype. And Pepeto combine both
Copyright © 2026
Insider Inc and finanzen.net GmbH (Imprint). All rights reserved.
Registration on or use of this site constitutes acceptance of our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
Strategy Spends $200 Million on Bitcoin, Raises STRC Dividend Yet Again
$68,934.00
$2,029.52
$639.85
$1.40
$0.999974
$87.42
$0.282375
$0.095611
$1.035
$50.21
$0.280996
$1.00
$446.79
$9.03
$32.46
$347.05
$9.03
$0.158497
$0.999127
$0.158273
$0.999676
$0.00914234
$0.100113
$54.71
$0.999939
$9.25
$0.939829
$220.02
$0.00000565
$0.076046
$0.109086
$1.23
$5,283.60
$1.50
$1.54
$5,333.70
$3.93
$0.643365
$1.00
$1.12
$124.22
$187.87
$1.00
$0.997078
$1.33
$0.696378
$0.070631
$77.29
$0.169309
$1.00
$0.0000036
$2.15
$0.00000159
$8.83
$2.43
$0.999337
$0.262422
$0.415056
$0.00200944
$11.00
$6.98
$0.102099
$1.91
$7.74
$0.059884
$0.114553
$63.79
$1.12
$1.86
$0.0165909
$0.868522
$1.00
$3.49
$0.03029079
$0.00939656
$1.23
$0.088859
$0.973538
$0.997255
$114.44
$1.027
$1.00
$1.38
$0.03225863
$0.03318419
$0.00738257
$0.178978
$0.104001
$0.079817
$0.999999
$1.096
$0.996276
$0.547522
$0.00000613
$30.56
$1.001
$0.784117
$0.01274266
$1.001
$0.25954
$1.089
$0.069417
$1.17
$0.99974
$0.00725085
$1.35
$34.75
$0.04817624
$0.235122
$171.04
$0.378119
$0.511795
$1.86
$0.254646
$0.999798
$1.77
$0.084019
$0.03496085
$0.999893
$133.08
$7.83
$1.39
$0.152558
$0.00000034
$1.019
$0.00000033
$0.055323
$0.349602
$3.29
$0.339421
$3.14
$15.35
$0.01585344
$0.865105
$0.413841
$0.335207
$0.068059
$0.050391
$0.999671
$0.02623106
$0.240008
$0.00002871
$14.05
$0.994728
$17.42
$0.00551082
$0.126872
$0.311436
$0.075469
$1.60
$0.04953245
$0.0026509
$1.30
$0.00243094
$6.19
$1.89
$0.00004291
$0.02151101
$0.103398
$0.086506
$0.04159959
$0.99915
$0.12375
$0.996789
$1.32
$1.29
$0.984022
$0.999983
$1.076
$0.00000101
$22.79
$0.493227
$0.203238
$0.00204719
$0.195423
$0.193776
$0.098073
$0.099375
$0.053135
$0.193484
$1.00
$2.68
$4,952.68
$0.079564
$0.080519
$1.00
$0.00475835
$0.01911474
$17.99
$0.055148
$2.20
$1.00
$0.02098965
$0.00361229
$0.169708
$0.309829
$1.81
$1.79
$0.163119
$0.608247
$2.02
$48.01
$3.46
$0.995035
$0.105635
$0.04104154
$1.25
$0.02129197
$0.997573
$0.00000733
$0.408312
$0.316117
$0.998415
$0.166989
$0.141706
$0.611057
$0.278196
$0.136196
$1.014
$0.095731
$0.629224
$0.075952
$4.49
$0.058578
$0.283796
$0.080574
$1,096.71
$0.02189164
$0.281848
$0.130642
$0.249417
$11.23
$0.219321
$0.00145117
$0.00399218
$0.300654
$1.001
$0.999781
$0.18622
$1.081
$2.36
$1.00
$0.999937
$0.00645463
$1.064
$0.321796
$0.288867
$0.534584
Strategy disclosed its third-largest Bitcoin purchase of the year on Monday, scooping up $200 million worth of the asset using proceeds that partially came from preferred shares.
The Tysons Corner, Virginia-based firm now owns roughly 720,750 Bitcoin, according to a press release, with its holdings currently worth about $49.5 billion. The company's latest purchase comprised around 3,000 Bitcoin, bought for an average price of around $67,700 apiece.
The Bitcoin-buying firm has been nursing an unrealized loss on its holdings since the asset dipped below the $76,000 mark last month. With Bitcoin changing hands around $68,452 on Monday, according to CoinGecko, the company's stockpile was down $5.3 billion on paper.
The company's stock price jumped nearly 6% to about $137 on Monday, according to Yahoo Finance. Despite the increase, shares had still tumbled almost 60% over the past six months.
Last week, Strategy raised more money than it spent on Bitcoin, pocketing around $33 million as it doled out more of its variable rate, or STRC, preferred stock. In recent months, Strategy has embraced the dividend-paying product as an alternative source of funding, which co-founder and Executive Chairman Michael Saylor has dubbed “digital credit.”
Over the weekend, Strategy signaled on X that it was raising STRC's monthly dividend to 11.5%. That represented the company's seventh attempt to make the product more attractive, since it was introduced as a low-volatility, high-yield cash instrument in July.
Last week, the company raised $7.1 million via STRC, a small sum compared to the $230 million that gained from issuing common shares. By issuing preferred shares, Strategy seeks to keep Bitcoin routinely flowing to its coffers—without diluting common shareholders—as its stock faces pressure amid what some fear is a prolonged downturn for Bitcoin.
The company has so far issued $3.4 billion worth of STRC, anchored by a $2.5 billion IPO in July that was upsized due to high demand. Last month, Strategy raised $85.5 million by issuing STRC compared to $450 million raised from selling common shares.
Strategy has shored up billions of dollars in cash as a way to effectively pre-pay dividends, while some onlookers have scrutinized the firm's ability to make the payments long-term. On Myriad, a prediction market owned by Decrypt parent company DASTAN, traders penciled in a 15% chance that Strategy sells Bitcoin this year, down from 28% a month ago.
When the company disclosed a fourth-quarter loss of $12.4 billion due to a massive swings in the value of its holdings last month, Saylor said in a statement that the company was strengthened by its “shift to digital credit, which aligns with our indefinite Bitcoin horizon”
Your gateway into the world of Web3
The latest news, articles, and resources, sent to your inbox weekly.
© A next-generation media company. 2026 Decrypt Media, Inc.
Bitmine Immersion Technologies (BMNR) on Monday reported purchasing nearly 51,000 more ETH tokens last week, increasing its holdings to 4.474 million.
"In the midst of this 'mini crypto winter,' our focus continues to be on methodically executing our treasury strategy and steadily acquiring ETH and in turn, optimizing the yield on our ETH holdings," said Chairman Tom Lee.
The company said it now has 3,040,483 ETH staked, worth about $6 billion at current prices. Lee said annualized staking revenue stands at $172 million. At full scale, staking rewards could reach $253 million annually based on a 2.86% yield over the last seven days, Lee continued.
The company holds 4,473,587 ether (ETH), valued at $1,976 per token, along with 195 bitcoin and $868 million in cash, as well as a $200 million stake in Beast Industries and a $14 million investment in Eightco Holdings. Bitmine said its ether position represents 3.71% of Ethereum's 120.7 million token supply.
Lee added that the firm is developing its Made in America Validator Network, or MAVAN, a staking platform slated for launch in early 2026. Bitmine said it is working with three staking providers as it builds the network.
More For You
Weekend warriors: How HyperLiquid became retail's bear market playground
While bitcoin and ether remain in bear markets, HYPE has climbed alongside gold as HyperLiquid's derivatives volume expands, weekend equity trading gains traction.
What to know:
Disclosure & Polices: CoinDesk is an award-winning media outlet that covers the cryptocurrency industry. Its journalists abide by a strict set of editorial policies. CoinDesk has adopted a set of principles aimed at ensuring the integrity, editorial independence and freedom from bias of its publications. CoinDesk is part of Bullish (NYSE:BLSH), an institutionally focused global digital asset platform that provides market infrastructure and information services. Bullish owns and invests in digital asset businesses and digital assets and CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive Bullish equity-based compensation.
Oops, something went wrong
Benzinga and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some items through the links below.
Bitcoin's recent downturn could be just like Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) in 2012, according to Strategy (NASDAQ:MSTR) Chair Michael Saylor.
Bitcoin's recent nearly 47% drawdown from its record price of $126,000 in October is similar to Apple's stock crash between 2012 and 2013 and "the valley of death" it was stuck in until 2020, Saylor said in an episode of the "Coin Stories" podcast released on Feb. 23.
Apple's stock crashed 45% between 2012 and 2013, despite everyone agreeing it had found product-market fit, Saylor told “Coin Stories” host Natalie Brunell.
Don't Miss:
The AI Marketing Platform Backed by Insiders from Google, Meta, and Amazon — Invest at $0.85/Share
Build your own AI-powered index in minutes — and earn an uncapped 1% match when you move your portfolio to Public. Learn how it works.
Saylor suggested that, like Apple's 2012 crash, the recent Bitcoin crash was not tied to a lack of fundamental value or some sort of failure. He framed it as a typical pattern followed by successful technology investments. He pointed to Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) as another example, saying it was not until 2020 that the market really appreciated its value.
"There really is no successful technology investment where you didn't have to weather the 45% draw down and go through that valley of despair," he said. "Ours is currently taking 137 days so far. But you know it might take two years, it might take three years, it might take four years. If it took seven years, congratulations. It's just like Apple computer."
Saylor said those who make the most returns are those who endure volatility before the conventional market catches up.
Trending: This ETF issuer isn't chasing the index — it's building tools for income, leverage, and conviction
When asked by Brunell why Bitcoin failed to reach projected highs before kicking off its current bear market, Saylor pointed to changing market structure.
"The derivatives market is migrating from offshore to onshore and it is maturing," he said. "And so as derivatives in the U.S. regulated markets grow, that strips some of the volatility off of Bitcoin and some of the upside off of it. It damps the upsides. It also damps the downside. Instead of an 80% drawdown and an 80 vol, you get a 40% or 50% drawdown and a 50 vol."
Saylor also dismissed concerns around the quantum computing threat to Bitcoin and the technology's recent links to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Saylor said the quantum threat was still several years away, adding that Bitcoin would upgrade along with the global system. He also said it did not matter if Epstein used the asset, likening it to people taking issue with the sex offender using Google or Amazon. He framed Bitcoin as a neutral technology that both good and bad actors could use.
See Also: Before the IPO: How One Company Quietly Locked Up 500+ Iconic Character Rights
Trade cryptocurrency and stocks on Kraken Pro, an advanced trading platform offered by Kraken, one of the world's most established cryptocurrency exchanges. The platform offers advanced order type and deep liquidity to help users execute complex strategies with precision. Kraken Pro is free to access with a Kraken account.
Saylor says Bitcoin is "global capital," and under his leadership, Strategy has been one of the largest buyers of Bitcoin over the past five years. However, the company's stash is over $7 billion in the red amid the asset's recent drawdown.
Read Next: This Energy Storage Company Already Has $185M in Contracts—Shares Are Still Available
Building a resilient portfolio means thinking beyond a single asset or market trend. Economic cycles shift, sectors rise and fall, and no one investment performs well in every environment. That's why many investors look to diversify with platforms that provide access to real estate, fixed-income opportunities, professional financial guidance, precious metals, and even self-directed retirement accounts. By spreading exposure across multiple asset classes, it becomes easier to manage risk, capture steady returns, and create long-term wealth that isn't tied to the fortunes of just one company or industry.
Rad AI
Rad AI's award-winning artificial intelligence technology helps transform data chaos into actionable insights, enabling the creation of high-performing content with measurable ROI. Their Regulation A+ offering allows investors to participate at $0.85 per share with a minimum investment of $1,000, providing an opportunity to diversify portfolios into early-stage AI innovation. For investors seeking exposure to the rapidly growing AI and tech sector, Rad AI offers a chance to get in on the ground floor of a data-driven growth story.
Paladin
Paladin Power is addressing the growing demand for energy independence with a fire-safe energy storage system that doesn't rely on lithium-ion batteries. Instead, its ESS uses non-lithium, solid-state graphene battery technology designed for durability, safety, and long service life—positioning it as an alternative to fire-prone storage solutions that dominate today's market. Since launching in 2023, Paladin has generated $185 million in contracted revenue, achieved strong year-over-year growth, and secured a manufacturing agreement with NYSE-listed Jabil. With systems already deployed across residential and commercial properties and a $500B global electrification market opportunity ahead, Paladin offers investors exposure to decentralized energy infrastructure backed by real contracts, U.S.-based manufacturing, and scalable next-generation technology.
Elf Labs
Elf Labs is an IP-focused entertainment company built on a strategy that has powered giants like Disney and Marvel: ownership of globally recognized character IP. After more than a decade of rights acquisition, the company controls 500+ protected trademarks and copyrights tied to iconic characters including Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, Sleeping Beauty, and Peter Pan. This foundation has generated over $15 million in royalties, expanded licensing into 30+ countries, and supported development of 100+ product lines. With its Nasdaq ticker ($ELFS) reserved and valuation growth exceeding 1,600% in under two years, Elf Labs is now scaling distribution through patented production systems, global licensing, and streaming and mobile initiatives—offering investors exposure to a private entertainment company with a clear public-market trajectory.
Valley Center Wellness
Valley Center Wellness is setting a new benchmark in luxury behavioral health with its flagship facility in Corona, California. Designed as a private, resort-style wellness retreat on a 4.2-acre estate, the center combines discretion, comfort, and comprehensive care, offering patients private chefs, daily massages, acupuncturist sessions, and access to a pool, spa, gym, and basketball court. Focused on high-profile and affluent clients, Valley Wellness provides fully customized treatment plans outside the constraints of insurance, emphasizing long-term recovery, holistic wellness, and life-after-addiction strategies. Through its three-stage care model—including residential, outpatient, and transitional housing—patients experience continuity of care that supports lasting change. For investors, Valley Wellness has launched an equity crowdfunding opportunity, offering a way to participate in a fast-growing $42 billion behavioral health sector while gaining exposure to both high-end real estate and a premium healthcare business.
Immersed
Immersed is a private, pre-IPO technology company operating at the intersection of AI, spatial computing, and remote work. Best known for building the most widely used productivity app on the Meta Quest platform, Immersed enables professionals and teams to work full-time in shared virtual environments across macOS, Windows, and Linux. The company is expanding beyond software with its own productivity-focused XR headset and AI tools, supported by partnerships with major technology firms including Meta, Samsung, and Qualcomm. Immersed is currently allowing retail investors to participate in its pre-IPO round, subject to eligibility and offering terms.
Arrived
Backed by Jeff Bezos, Arrived Homes makes real estate investing accessible with a low barrier to entry. Investors can buy fractional shares of single-family rentals and vacation homes starting with as little as $100. This allows everyday investors to diversify into real estate, collect rental income, and build long-term wealth without needing to manage properties directly.
Masterworks
Masterworks enables investors to diversify into blue-chip art, an alternative asset class with historically low correlation to stocks and bonds. Through fractional ownership of museum-quality works by artists like Banksy, Basquiat, and Picasso, investors gain access without the high costs or complexities of owning art outright. With hundreds of offerings and strong historical exits on select works, Masterworks adds a scarce, globally traded asset to portfolios seeking long-term diversification.
Bam Capital
BAM Capital offers accredited investors a way to diversify beyond public markets through institutional-grade multifamily real estate. With over $1.85 billion in completed transactions and guidance from Senior Economic Advisor Tony Landa, the firm targets income and long-term growth as supply tightens and renter demand remains strong—especially in Midwest markets. Its income-focused and growth-oriented funds provide exposure to real assets designed to be less tied to stock market volatility.
Rex Shares
REX Shares designs specialized ETFs for investors who want more precision than traditional broad-market funds can offer. Its lineup spans options-based income strategies, leveraged and inverse exposures, spot-linked crypto ETFs, and thematic funds tied to structural trends. By targeting specific income objectives, volatility profiles, or market themes, these ETFs can be used alongside core holdings to introduce differentiated return drivers and reduce reliance on a single market outcome, while maintaining the liquidity and transparency of the ETF structure.
Motley Fool
Motley Fool Asset Management brings its long-standing "Foolish" investing philosophy into a lineup of passive ETFs designed around clear, rules-based investment styles. Built using decades of proprietary research from The Motley Fool, LLC, these factor-based ETFs focus on growth, value, and momentum strategies, selecting U.S. companies based on quality, risk, and long-term potential. For investors who want professionally vetted stock exposure without the demands of active trading, Motley Fool Asset Management offers a straightforward way to access expert-driven strategies through the simplicity and liquidity of an ETF.
Finance Advisors
Finance Advisors helps Americans approach retirement with greater clarity by connecting them to vetted, fiduciary financial advisors who specialize in tax-aware retirement planning. Rather than focusing on products or investment performance alone, the platform emphasizes strategies that account for after-tax income, withdrawal sequencing, and long-term tax efficiency—factors that can materially impact retirement outcomes. Free to use, Finance Advisors gives individuals with meaningful savings access to a level of planning sophistication historically reserved for high-net-worth households, helping reduce hidden tax risk and improve long-term financial confidence.
Public
Public is a multi-asset investing platform built for long-term investors who want more control, transparency, and innovation in how they grow wealth. Founded in 2019 as the first broker-dealer to offer commission-free, real-time fractional investing, Public now lets users invest in stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and more—all in one place. Its latest feature, Generated Assets, uses AI to turn a single idea into a fully customized, investable index that can be explained and backtested before committing capital. Combined with AI-powered research tools, clear explanations of market moves, and an uncapped 1% match for transferring an existing portfolio, Public positions itself as a modern platform designed to help serious investors make more informed decisions with context.
Money Pickle
Money Pickle helps people connect with vetted fiduciary financial advisors—professionals who are legally obligated to act in their clients' best interests. Through a quick online quiz, users are matched with a fiduciary for a complimentary, no-obligation one-on-one strategy session tailored to goals like retirement planning, investing, tax strategy, or getting financially organized. With no upfront costs and no sales pressure, Money Pickle removes the friction and uncertainty from finding trustworthy advice, making personalized financial guidance accessible whether you're building wealth, preserving it, or planning for the future.
Atari
Atari is bringing its iconic legacy into the physical world with the launch of the first-ever Atari Hotel, a construction-ready gaming and entertainment destination in downtown Phoenix. The Atari Hotel Phoenix blends immersive gaming, live events, dining, and technology-driven experiences into a next-generation hospitality concept, backed by secured land, licensing, and development partners. Through a Regulation A+ offering, investors can own a direct stake in the land, building, and branded hotel starting at $500, with targeted returns including a 15% preferred return and a projected 5.8x multiple. As gaming and experiential travel continue to converge, this opportunity allows everyday investors to participate alongside developers in transforming a legendary brand into a real-world destination.
Image: Shutterstock
This article Bitcoin Is Going Through 'Valley Of Despair,' Michael Saylor Says, Comparing It To Apple originally appeared on Benzinga.com
© 2026 Benzinga.com. Benzinga does not provide investment advice. All rights reserved.
Advertisement|Remove ads.
Bitcoin and Ethereum edged lower Monday amid rising geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, sending a cautious tone across risk assets. However, a handful of mid-cap tokens staged notable rallies.
QatarEnergy, the country's state-owned energy company, said it is stopping the production of liquefied natural gas because military attacks on its facilities have shocked markets around the world. While European gas futures surged more than 40% following reports of LNG production disruptions and U.S. natural gas prices climbed over 5%, the broader crypto market slipped,
Bitcoin (BTC) is trading 0.6% lower than 24 hours ago, bringing the total market value to $2.38 trillion. Ethereum (ETH) lost 2.0% of its value in the last 24 hours. The ongoing conflict between the US and Iran affected the price of the tokens.
Despite the geopolitical unrest, Morpho (MORPHO) was the best performer, rising 6.7% in 24 hours and trading at $1.82. The decentralized lending protocol signed a deal last month with Apollo Global Management, which manages about $940 billion in assets, to buy up to 90 million MORPHO tokens, or about 9% of the total supply, over the next 48 months.
Apollo's tokenized credit fund already uses Morpho's infrastructure, so this is a strategic partnership, not just a passive investment. On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around MORPHO remained ‘bullish', as chatter levels remained at ‘extremely high' levels over the past day.
Further, Morpho has also expanded its distribution network through Telegram's TON Wallet, introducing the new "Vaults" feature that lets people earn interest on BTC, ETH, and USDT. Telegram has more than 150 million users. On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around MORPHO
NEAR Protocol (NEAR) was up 4.9% over 24 hours and 19.3% over a week, rising to $1.20. The move comes as NEAR launches Near.com, an AI-powered wallet and "super app" that makes using crypto easier by hiding gas fees and managing private keys. The product is part of NEAR's broader goal of becoming the infrastructure for AI-native apps. On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around NEAR remained in the ‘bullish' territory, accompanied by ‘high' chatter levels over the past day.
Separately, NEAR validators are voting on a plan to cut the network's yearly inflation rate from 5% to 2.5%. If a supermajority votes for the change, it could be implemented in a future protocol upgrade, which would reduce the number of new tokens issued and tighten supply dynamics.
HTX DAO (HTX) rose 5.2% in the last 24 hours, bringing its price to about $0.01587. This was one of the best daily performances for mid-cap tokens. On Stocktwits, retail sentiment around HTX remained in ‘neutral' territory while chatter levels remained at ‘extremely high' over the past day.
Jupiter (JUP) rose 3.5% in the last 24 hours and 16.3% in the last week, trading at $0.1731, showing increased activity in the Solana (SOL) ecosystem. On Stocktwits, JUP was one of the trending tokens, as its retail sentiment improved from ‘bearish' to ‘bullish' zone over the past day. Chatter levels around the coin also improved from ‘normal' to ‘high' in the last 24 hours.
XDC Network (XDC) went up 3.1% in 24 hours to $0.03371. Even as it weathered the current geopolitical storm, on Stocktwits, retail sentiment around XDC dropped from ‘neutral' to ‘bearish' zone, while chatter remained at ‘normal' levels over the past day.
Read also: Veteran Macro Investor Jordi Visser Says ‘AI Can't Survive Without' Bitcoin
For updates and corrections, email newsroom[at]stocktwits[dot]com.
Coinbase has transformed itself from a crypto exchange into a crypto infrastructure play.
According to many Wall Street analysts, Coinbase Global (COIN +4.23%) is nothing more than a cryptocurrency exchange. When markets are up, Coinbase performs well. When markets are down, Coinbase performs poorly.
But maybe it's not that simple. From my perspective, Coinbase is the crypto infrastructure play Wall Street is overlooking. If that's the case, then it could be significantly undervalued.
The term "crypto infrastructure" can mean a lot of different things to a lot of different people. For me, it refers to all the foundational technologies that power the crypto and blockchain ecosystem. And it's here that Coinbase continues to play an important role, developing the technologies, tools, and platforms for both retail and institutional investors.
A good example here is Coinbase's launch of the Base blockchain in August 2023. Many people may not realize it, but Coinbase was the first publicly traded company to build its own blockchain.
Since that time, Base -- a Layer-2 scaling network for Ethereum (ETH +2.59%) -- has really taken off. Over the past two years, Base has become a way to experiment with decentralized finance (DeFi), real-world asset (RWA) tokenization, and payments for artificial intelligence (AI) agents.
Image source: Getty Images.
In addition, Coinbase launched a new "Everything Exchange" strategy in December that will significantly expand the number of assets that can be traded 24/7. That will lead to tens of thousands of assets trading on Coinbase, rather than just hundreds. And that could provide a huge boost for revenue and profitability for years to come.
Case in point: Coinbase recently launched stock and ETF trading for U.S. customers. And the company recently partnered with Kalshi to offer prediction markets for customers.
As further proof of Coinbase's crypto infrastructure ambitions, it has moved into offering Crypto-as-a-Service (CAAS) to financial institutions, enabling them to build out their digital asset offerings. The company has also leaned hard into the crypto ETF trend by becoming the "digital vault" for Wall Street's crypto exchange-traded funds.
Admittedly, Coinbase stock has been underperforming. It's down 20% in 2026. Investors, spooked by the sudden drop in the price of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin (BTC +4.16%), have apparently moved on to better opportunities elsewhere.
With crypto prices down, other crypto infrastructure companies -- including two prominent Bitcoin mining companies -- have rebranded for the new age of artificial intelligence and high-performance computing (HPC). In some cases, they are curtailing their crypto operations completely, selling off their Bitcoin, and using that money to finance an expansion into AI.
Obviously, investors are willing to pay a premium for AI stocks, and that has increasingly impacted how they view Coinbase. But I think Coinbase is built for the long haul. It's now more than just a cryptocurrency exchange -- it's a core crypto infrastructure provider that's worth a closer look by investors.
Dominic Basulto has positions in Bitcoin and Ethereum. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Bitcoin and Ethereum. The Motley Fool recommends Coinbase Global. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
*Average returns of all recommendations since inception. Cost basis and return based on previous market day close.
Invest better with The Motley Fool. Get stock recommendations, portfolio guidance, and more from The Motley Fool's premium services.
Making the world smarter, happier, and richer.
© 1995 - 2026 The Motley Fool. All rights reserved.
Market data powered by Xignite and Polygon.io.
About The Motley Fool
Our Services
Around the Globe
Free Tools
Affiliates & Friends
Oops, something went wrong
Magic Eden is winding down its Ethereum, Polygon, and Bitcoin NFT marketplaces to pivot resources toward its Solana operations and growing iGaming platform, Dicey.
The decision, confirmed by CEO Jack Lu, is that the platform will cease support for non-Solana chains by early April 2025, following a broad collapse in cross-chain trading volumes.
Key Takeaways:
Magic Eden will terminate support for Bitcoin and EVM marketplaces starting March 9, with full wallet shutdowns scheduled for April 1.
The pivot follows internal data showing Solana markets account for over 85% of volume while multi-chain maintenance costs remained high.
Resources will be reallocated to Dicey, a crypto gambling platform that processed $15 million in wagers during its closed beta.
In his post, CEO Jack Lu outlined a phased sunset for EVM and Bitcoin-based Runes and Ordinals markets.
Trading support will end on March 9, followed by the Bitcoin API on March 27. The platform's crypto wallet will switch to an export-only mode in the middle of March before a full shutdown on April 1.
Lu stated the company is “doubling down” on Dicey, citing a “massive opportunity” in the intersection of finance and entertainment. The casino platform's closed beta recently saw 200 users wager over $15 million in just two months.
The strategic shift mirrors a broader trend where crypto funds and companies are diversifying revenue streams; for instance, venture firm Paradigm plans to expand into AI and robotics to capture value beyond traditional digital assets.
Magic Eden plans to replicate this diversification by launching a sportsbook to compete with blockchain gambling heavyweights like Stake.
Discover: The next crypto to explode
The retreat from multi-chain operations reflects a stark consolidation of NFT liquidity on Solana.
Despite raising over $130 million to expand support for Ethereum and Bitcoin Ordinals, market data indicates that Solana assets continued to drive over 85% of the platform's trading volume in late 2024.
While Ethereum retains dominance in stablecoin infrastructure, its NFT sector has suffered prolonged decline, making the maintenance of cross-chain compatibility technically burdensome for decreasing returns.
Lu noted that the shift was ultimately driven by the fact that most of the platform's non-Solana products were not contributing significantly to revenues.
The marketplace had briefly ranked No. 1 globally in early 2024 following its Bitcoin expansion, but sustained engagement failed to materialize as the Ordinals and Runes hype cycles cooled.
Going forward, the platform will exclusively focus on NFT packs that bundle random assets, attempting to gamify the remaining trading experience.
The announcement precipitated severe volatility for the ME token, which reportedly fell nearly 2.5% in the last 24 hours, although this was broadly in line with Ethereum's losses over the period.
The exit also leaves a significant vacuum in the Bitcoin Ordinals market, which may strengthen competitors like OKX and UniSat that remain committed to the Bitcoin ecosystem.
Magic Eden's long-term valuation now hinges on its ability to convert NFT traders into active gamblers on Dicey.
The platform's user retention metrics after April 1 will be most insightful; if the pivot fails to capture the high volume gambling cohort, the total loss of the multichain user base could isolate the protocol from future liquidity cycles on Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Discover: The best Solana meme coins
Read original story Magic Eden Winds Down EVM and Bitcoin NFT Markets in Strategic Pivot by Tim Hakki at Cryptonews.com
Sign in to access your portfolio
Solana-based non-fungible token (NFT) marketplace Magic Eden is scaling back its Ethereum and Bitcoin NFT operations as it pivots toward its online casino and sportsbook platform, Dicey.
CEO and co-founder Jack Lu said in a post on X that support for Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) and Bitcoin-based Runes and Ordinals marketplaces will end on March 9, followed by its Bitcoin API on March 27 and its crypto wallet on April 1.
He added that the platform will end its NFT buyback program and would be “doubling down” on Dicey, with Lu saying there is a “massive opportunity” in iGaming, or online gambling.
“It is clear we're entering a new era where finance and entertainment merge,” Lu said, adding he was “incredibly bullish” on Dicey's two-month-old closed beta, which has seen 200 users wager over $15 million.
Dicey offers an on-chain casino and plans to launch a sportsbook in a similar fashion to blockchain gambling sites such as Stake.
Magic Eden cutting NFTs to streamline toward gambling
The changes see Magic Eden, once one of the most popular NFT marketplaces, significantly scale back its focus on NFTs.
Lu said the platform will “exclusively” focus on NFT packs, which bundle random NFTs from various collections, similar to physical trading card packs.
Lu said the shift was ultimately down to most of the platform's products not contributing significantly to revenues.
The NFT market has been significantly impacted amid a broader crypto market downturn over the past few months, with major players such as Nifty Gateway announcing in January that it was shutting down.
In early February, the total NFT market cap fell below $1.5 billion, returning to levels not seen since before the 2021 boom.
Select market data provided by ICE Data Services. Select reference data provided by FactSet. Copyright © 2026 FactSet Research Systems Inc.Copyright © 2026, American Bankers Association. CUSIP Database provided by FactSet Research Systems Inc. All rights reserved. SEC fillings and other documents provided by Quartr.© 2026 TradingView, Inc.
Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Advertisement
Nature Communications
, Article number: (2026)
Cite this article
We are providing an unedited version of this manuscript to give early access to its
findings. Before final publication, the manuscript will undergo further editing. Please note
there may be errors present which affect the content, and all legal disclaimers apply.
We measure the temperature profile and investigate the thermal conductivity of suspended monoisotopic hexagonal boron nitride (h10BN) heterostructures by combining suspended microbridge technique and Raman spectroscopy. The thermal conductivities exceed 1650 W.m−1.K−1 at room temperature, significantly higher than in previous reports, highlighting the crucial influence of the measurement conditions on the experimental results. By including more data points, we refine our models beyond the accuracy of conventional approaches. Our results show a striking deviation of thermal transport from the classical diffusion regime described by Fourier's law: while the temperature profiles are linear above 300 K, they become clearly nonlinear below this temperature, indicating a strong non-diffusive heat transport regime. This behavior underscores the need for a new theoretical framework to fully account for heat transport in two-dimensional materials. Ultimately, our findings pave the way for innovative heat dissipation technologies and challenge conventional paradigms in nano-heat engineering. This study establishes a practical framework linking Raman-based temperature mapping, the number of measurement points, and thermal simulations to reliably determine the in-plane thermal conductivity of 2D materials.
The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author. They are no restrictions to accessing data. The Comsol simulation are provided in the Supplementary Information section. Source data are provided with this paper.
Qian, X., Zhou, J. & Chen, G. Phonon-engineered extreme thermal conductivity materials. Nat. Mater. 20, 1188–1202 (2021).
Google Scholar
Rahimi, M. et al. Complete determination of thermoelectric and thermal properties of supported few-layer two-dimensional materials. Phys. Rev. Appl. 19, 034075 (2023).
Google Scholar
Rahimi, M. et al. Probing the electric and thermoelectric response of ferroelectric 2H and 3R α-In2Se3. Appl. Phys. Lett. 124, 253503 (2024).
Google Scholar
Li, D. et al. Recent progress of two-dimensional thermoelectric materials. Nano-Micro Lett. 12, 36 (2020).
Google Scholar
Kim, S. E. et al. Extremely anisotropic van der Waals thermal conductors. Nature 597, 660–665 (2021).
Google Scholar
Huang, X. et al. A graphite thermal Tesla valve driven by hydrodynamic phonon transport. Nature 634, 1086–1090 (2024).
Google Scholar
Vaziri, S. et al. Ultrahigh thermal isolation across heterogeneously layered two-dimensional materials. Sci. Adv. 5, eaax1325 (2019).
Google Scholar
Lu, S. et al. Towards n-type conductivity in hexagonal boron nitride. Nat. Commun. 13, 3109 (2022).
Google Scholar
Cai, Q. et al. Outstanding thermal conductivity of single atomic layer isotope-modified boron nitride. Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 085902 (2020).
Google Scholar
Cepellotti, A. et al. Phonon hydrodynamics in two-dimensional materials. Nat. Commun. 6, 6400 (2015).
Google Scholar
Lee, S., Broido, D., Esfarjani, K. & Chen, G. Hydrodynamic phonon transport in suspended graphene. Nat. Commun. 6, 6290 (2015).
Google Scholar
Fugallo, G. et al. Thermal conductivity of graphene and graphite: collective excitations and mean free paths. Nano Lett. 14, 6109–6114 (2014).
Google Scholar
Huberman, S. et al. Observation of second sound in graphite at temperatures above 100 K. Science 364, 375–379 (2019).
Google Scholar
Rezgui, H. Phonon hydrodynamic transport: observation of thermal wave-like flow and second sound propagation in graphene at 100 K. ACS Omega 8, 23964–23974 (2023).
Google Scholar
Ding, Z. et al. Phonon hydrodynamic heat conduction and knudsen minimum in graphite. Nano Lett. 18, 638–649 (2018).
Google Scholar
Machida, Y. et al. Observation of Poiseuille flow of phonons in black phosphorus. Sci. Adv. 4, eaat3374 (2018).
Google Scholar
Srivastav, S. K. et al. Universal quantized thermal conductance in graphene. Sci. Adv. 5, eaaw5798 (2019).
Google Scholar
Phonon hydrodynamics in bulk insulators and semimetals | Low Temperature Physics | AIP Publishing. https://pubs-aip-org.ezproxy.universite-paris-saclay.fr/aip/ltp/article/50/7/574/3303895/Phonon-hydrodynamics-in-bulk-insulators-and.
Jo, I. et al. Thermal conductivity and phonon transport in suspended few-layer hexagonal boron nitride. Nano Lett. 13, 550–554 (2013).
Google Scholar
Yuan, C. et al. Modulating the thermal conductivity in hexagonal boron nitride via controlled boron isotope concentration. Commun. Phys. 2, 1–8 (2019).
Google Scholar
Mercado, E. et al. Isotopically enhanced thermal conductivity in few-layer hexagonal boron nitride: implications for thermal management. ACS Appl. Nano Mater. 3, 12148–12156 (2020).
Google Scholar
Kim, Y. D. et al. Bright visible light emission from graphene. Nat. Nanotechnol. 10, 676–681 (2015).
Google Scholar
Dobusch, L., Schuler, S., Perebeinos, V. & Mueller, T. Thermal light emission from monolayer MoS2. Adv. Mater. 29, 1701304 (2017).
Google Scholar
Balandin, A. A. et al. Superior thermal conductivity of single-layer graphene. Nano Lett. 8, 902–907 (2008).
Google Scholar
Braun, O. et al. Spatially mapping thermal transport in graphene by an opto-thermal method. Npj 2D Mater. Appl. 6, 1–7 (2022).
Google Scholar
Taube, A., Judek, J., Łapińska, A. & Zdrojek, M. Temperature-dependent thermal properties of supported MoS2 monolayers. ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 7, 5061–5065 (2015).
Google Scholar
Cai, W. et al. Thermal transport in suspended and supported monolayer graphene grown by chemical vapor deposition. Nano Lett. 10, 1645–1651 (2010).
Google Scholar
Machida, Y., Matsumoto, N., Isono, T. & Behnia, K. Phonon hydrodynamics and ultrahigh–room-temperature thermal conductivity in thin graphite. Science 367, 309–312 (2020).
Google Scholar
Fong, K. C. & Schwab, K. C. Ultrasensitive and wide-bandwidth thermal measurements of graphene at low temperatures. Phys. Rev. X 2, 031006 (2012).
Google Scholar
Mecklenburg, M. et al. Nanoscale temperature mapping in operating microelectronic devices. Science 347, 629–632 (2015).
Google Scholar
Castioni, F. et al. Nanosecond nanothermometry in an electron microscope. Nano Lett. 25, 1601–1608 (2025).
Google Scholar
Menges, F. et al. Temperature mapping of operating nanoscale devices by scanning probe thermometry. Nat. Commun. 7, 10874 (2016).
Google Scholar
Eloïse, G. et al. Scanning thermal microscopy on samples of varying effective thermal conductivities and identical flat surfaces. J. Appl. Phys. 128, 235301 (2020).
Morell, N. et al. Optomechanical measurement of thermal transport in two-dimensional MoSe2 lattices. Nano Lett. 19, 3143–3150 (2019).
Google Scholar
Chiout, A. et al. Extreme mechanical tunability in suspended MoS2 resonator controlled by Joule heating. npj 2D Mater. Appl. 7, 1–8 (2023).
Google Scholar
Blaikie, A., Miller, D. & Alemán, B. J. A fast and sensitive room-temperature graphene nanomechanical bolometer. Nat. Commun. 10, 4726 (2019).
Google Scholar
Kloppstech, K. et al. Giant heat transfer in the crossover regime between conduction and radiation. Nat. Commun. 8, 14475 (2017).
Google Scholar
Majumdar, A., Chowdhury, S. & Ahuja, R. Ultralow thermal conductivity and high thermoelectric figure of merit in two-dimensional thallium selenide. ACS Appl. Energy Mater. 3, 9315–9325 (2020).
Google Scholar
Zhao, J. et al. Graphene microheater chips for in situ TEM. Nano Lett. 23, 726–734 (2023).
Google Scholar
Vakulov, D. et al. Ballistic phonons in ultrathin nanowires. Nano Lett. 20, 2703–2709 (2020).
Google Scholar
Vincent, P. et al. Observations of the synthesis of straight single wall carbon nanotubes directed by electric fields in an environmental transmission electron microscope. Carbon 213, 118272 (2023).
Google Scholar
Panciera, F. et al. Controlling nanowire growth through electric field-induced deformation of the catalyst droplet. Nat. Commun. 7, 12271 (2016).
Google Scholar
Lee, J. E., Ahn, G., Shim, J., Lee, Y. S. & Ryu, S. Optical separation of mechanical strain from charge doping in graphene. Nat. Commun. 3, 1024 (2012).
Google Scholar
Chaste, J. et al. Intrinsic properties of suspended MoS2 on SiO2/Si pillar arrays for nanomechanics and optics. ACS Nano 12, 3235–3242 (2018).
Google Scholar
Chen, S. et al. Thermal conductivity of isotopically modified graphene. Nat. Mater. 11, 203–207 (2012).
Google Scholar
Blundo, E. et al. Vibrational properties in highly strained hexagonal boron nitride bubbles. Nano Lett. 22, 1525–1533 (2022).
Google Scholar
Dadgar, A. M. et al. Strain engineering and raman spectroscopy of monolayer transition metal dichalcogenides. Chem. Mater. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.chemmater.8b01672 (2018).
Chiout, A. et al. High strain engineering of a suspended wsse monolayer membrane by indentation and measured by tip-enhanced photoluminescence. Adv. Opt. Mater. 12, 2302369 (2024).
Google Scholar
Fulkerson, W., Moore, J. P., Williams, R. K., Graves, R. S. & McElroy, D. L. Thermal conductivity, electrical resistivity, and seebeck coefficient of silicon from 100 to 1300. K. Phys. Rev. 167, 765–782 (1968).
Google Scholar
Shanks, H. R., Maycock, P. D., Sidles, P. H. & Danielson, G. C. Thermal conductivity of silicon from 300 to 1400°K. Phys. Rev. 130, 1743–1748 (1963).
Google Scholar
Cai, Q. et al. High thermal conductivity of high-quality monolayer boron nitride and its thermal expansion. Sci. Adv. 5, eaav0129 (2019).
Google Scholar
Xiao, P. et al. MoS2 phononic crystals for advanced thermal management. Sci. Adv. 10, eadm8825 (2024).
Google Scholar
Schilling, A., Zhang, X. & Bossen, O. Heat flowing from cold to hot without external intervention by using a “thermal inductor”. Sci. Adv. 5, eaat9953 (2019).
Google Scholar
Li, X. & Lee, S. Role of hydrodynamic viscosity on phonon transport in suspended graphene. Phys. Rev. B 97, 094309 (2018).
Google Scholar
Liu, S. et al. Single crystal growth of millimeter-sized monoisotopic hexagonal boron nitride. Chem. Mater. 30, 6222–6225 (2018).
Google Scholar
Download references
We thank Anis Chiout, Jérôme Saint-Martin and Michele Lazzeri for fruitfull discussion. The work was supported, by French grants ANR ANETHUM (ANR-19-CE24-0021, J.C.), ANR Deus-nano (ANR-19-CE42-0005, J.C.), ANR 2DHeco (ANR-20-CE05-0045, J.C.), ANR Comodes (ANR-22-CE09-0021, J.C.)), ANR ELEPHANT (ANR-21-CE30-0012-01, J.C.), and (ANR-22-PEXD-0006, J.C.) FastNano project, as well as the French technological network RENATECH, J.C. Support for the monoisotopic hBN crystal growth and was provided by the USA Office f Naval Research award N00014-22-1-2582 (J.H.E.).
Université Paris-Saclay, CNRS, Centre de Nanosciences et de Nanotechnologies, Palaiseau, France
Cléophanie Brochard-Richard, Gaia Di Berardino, Etienne Herth, Chen Wei, Federico Panciera, Fabrice Oehler, Abdelkarim Ouerghi & Julien Chaste
Tim Taylor Department of Chemical Engineering, Kansas State University, Durland Hall, Manhattan, KS, USA
Thomas Poirier & James H. Edgar
Laboratoire Charles Coulomb (L2C), UMR 5221 CNRS-Université de Montpellier, Montpellier, France
Bernard Gil & Guillaume Cassabois
Université Paris Cité, CNRS, Laboratoire Matériaux et Phénomènes Quantiques, Paris, France
Maria Luisa Della Rocca
Université Grenoble Alpes, CNRS, Grenoble INP, Institut NEEL, Grenoble, France
Suman Sarkar, Nedjma Bendiab & Laëtitia Marty
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
J.C. and A.O. initiated the work. C.B.-R. fabricated the 2D heterostructures, developed the soft 2D transfer and did the measurements with calibration. C.W. and F.P. fabricated the microheater. T.P. and J.H.E. have grown the isotopic hBN samples with the help of B.G. and G.C. G.D.B. and F.O. have grown the CVD WSe2 flakes. M.L.D. proceeded to the thermal reflectance measurements. C.B.-R., S.S., N.B., and L.M. are responsible for the graphene sample and measurements. C.B.-R., J.C., and E.H. did the PDMS 2D stamp and sample preparation. J.C. guided the research and wrote the manuscript with the input from all the authors.
Correspondence to
Julien Chaste.
The authors declare no competing interests.
Nature Communications thanks Michel Kazan, and Zexiao Wang for their contribution to the peer review of this work. A peer review file is available.
Publisher's note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Reprints and permissions
Brochard-Richard, C., Di Berardino, G., Herth, E. et al. Extreme longitudinal thermal conductivity and non-diffusive heat transport in isotopic hBN.
Nat Commun (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-69907-x
Download citation
Received: 28 August 2025
Accepted: 12 February 2026
Published: 02 March 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-69907-x
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
Advertisement
Nature Communications
(Nat Commun)
ISSN 2041-1723 (online)
© 2026 Springer Nature Limited
Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.
Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Advertisement
Nature Biomedical Engineering
(2026)Cite this article
Deep learning models that infer clinically relevant biomarker status from tissue images are being explored as rapid and low-cost alternatives to molecular testing. Here we show, through statistical analysis across multiple cancer types, datasets and modelling approaches, that the datasets used to train these models contain strong dependencies between biomarkers and clinicopathological features, which prevent models from isolating the effect of a single biomarker and lead them to learn confounded signals. Consequently, their prediction accuracy varies substantially with the status of codependent biomarkers and clinicopathological variables, and for several biomarkers, the gain over what a pathologist can already infer from routine histopathological features, such as grade, remains modest. These findings indicate that current approaches are not yet suitable as substitutes for molecular testing but can support triage or complementary decision-making with caution. Unconfounded biomarker prediction will require models that learn causal rather than correlational relationships between biomarkers and tissue morphology.
Fuelled by developments in computational pathology, several studies have proposed methods to predict clinically relevant biomarkers1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9, such as gene mutations and expression levels, directly from routine haematoxylin and eosin (H&E)-stained whole-slide images (WSIs)1,2,3,4,10. These approaches take a WSI as input and predict the status of clinically relevant biomarkers such as microsatellite instability (MSI), hormonal receptors or mutations in TP53, BRAF, KRAS, EGFR and other genes, as their target. Such methods are typically motivated by two main objectives: first, to identify or mine histological patterns associated with specific biomarkers11, and second, to rule out certain biomarkers from routine WSIs, avoiding the need for additional stains or molecular testing, which can be tissue-destructive, costly and associated with longer turnaround time12. For example, the accurate prediction of MSI1,4,13 and mutations in genes such as BRAF1 and KRAS/NRAS10 from WSIs can inform personalized treatment decisions while reducing cost and waiting time compared with sequencing12.
Several methods have demonstrated that, in specific cancers10,14,15, biomarker status2,3,16 and alterations in certain genes are predictable from WSIs using deep learning pipelines trained in a weakly supervised fashion on imaging and molecular data from The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA) or other similar data repositories, such as the Clinical Proteomic Tumour Analysis Consortium (CPTAC)17. However, for most biomarkers, the prediction accuracy of these methods remains low, with the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) values ranging from 0.50 to 0.90. Moreover, the true generalization of such methods to external datasets is further challenged by factors such as mutation prevalence, limited multicentric data, class imbalance between positive (mutated or high expression) and negative (wild-type or low expression) cases, quality of WSIs (such as pen markings and tissue tears) and domain shifts18. In this Article, we demonstrate that even if these challenges have been handled, there are underlying fundamental issues that require addressing.
In a WSI, disease phenotypes manifest as different visual patterns arising from the interaction of multiple codependent genes rather than from a single factor. These interactions are often characterized by patterns of mutual exclusivity or co-occurrence among molecular factors19,20,21. A detailed discussion of the pathobiological origins of these interactions is provided in Section 1.1 of the Supplementary Information. Despite this, current approaches primarily focus on predicting the status of individual biomarker or gene mutation from WSIs, neglecting codependencies between covariates. Although several recent studies5,22 have used multi-output models and leveraged representations from multimodal foundation models to predict biomarker status from WSIs; these studies remain limited to optimizing aggregated accuracies and do not extend to assessing the stability of model performance across patient groups stratified by the status of a codependent biomarker.
In this study, we show that overlooking interdependencies among biomarkers can influence the predictive performance of machine learning (ML) models. We argue that interdependencies among biomarker statuses in the training data, when ignored during model development, can lead to models capturing the aggregated influence of multiple interdependent biomarkers rather than patterns linked to a single biomarker. Moreover, this could also spuriously inflate or deflate models' apparent performance in certain subgroups when the interdependency structure among molecular factors shifts in the test cohorts. Finally, when clinicopathological variables (for example, tumour mutational burden (TMB) or tumour grade) are themselves associated with biomarker status, models may rely on phenotypes associated with these correlated variables as predictive proxies, instead of capturing the intended biological signal.
To illustrate these effects, we first analysed interdependencies among biomarkers by assessing their patterns of mutual exclusivity and co-occurrence23. We then use permutation testing and stratification analysis to demonstrate failure modes of WSI-based predictors by showing that their accuracy for a given biomarker varies substantially when conditioned on the status of other biomarkers. We also highlight the need for appropriate causal adjustments in WSI-based predictors to ensure reliable inferences necessary for informing clinical decisions, such as treatment selection and pathobiological understanding. To this end, we propose a stratification-based evaluation framework to report bias and support the development of more transparent and trustworthy ML models to advance WSI-based precision diagnostics.
We analysed the limitations of existing ML approaches for predicting molecular biomarkers (for example, mutations, genomic instability indicators and protein expression) from H&E stained WSIs. A high-level concept diagram of these approaches is provided in Fig. 1. We hypothesize that interdependencies among biomarker statuses and clinicopathological variables in the training data, and the disregard of such associations during model development, bias ML models towards relying on aggregated influences of multiple factors in WSIs rather than patterns linked to individual biomarkers. To illustrate this, we retrospectively analysed n = 8,221 patients with breast cancer (BRCA), colorectal cancer (CRC), endometrial cancer (UCEC) and lung cancer across four cohorts for which WSIs and/or molecular information (for example, receptor status, gene mutations and so on) were available (Methods). These include: TCGA (n = 2,683), Molecular Taxonomy of Breast Cancer International Consortium (METABRIC; n = 2,433)24,25, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Centre (MSK; n = 2,486)26,27 and DFCI (n = 619)28. Using these datasets, we performed the four major steps listed below:
An analysis of the interdependency among biomarkers and somatic mutation status of genes in samples;
Training deep learning models to predict biomarker status from WSIs;
Stratification analysis and permutation testing to assess whether the model trained to predict a certain biomarker is biased by the status of other biomarkers or clinicopathological variables;
An analysis of the added value of using ML models in predicting various biomarkers over and above the pathologist-assigned grade.
a, The ML-based prediction of molecular biomarkers from WSIs involves using training data of WSIs with known biomarker statuses. The ML model accepts the representation of a WSI (\(X\)) as input and predicts the status of a certain biomarker (\(Y\)) as the target. b, An ideal predictor should be able to predict the status of a molecular biomarker from histological effects of that biomarker contained in the WSI, and its output (Z) should be independent of unrelated confounding factors (lumped into a variable C) as shown in the simplified causal diagram. Conversely, if the predictor's output is dependent not only on the histological effects of \(\left(Y\right)\) but also on other confounding factors (for example, histological grade, TMB or status of other biomarkers), then the prediction is confounded because the model is relying on these additional covariates rather than solely on the effects of \((Y)\). Credit: icons in a, Flaticon.com.
Drawing from established methods in gene functional analysis20,21,29,30,31, we quantified the interdependency among molecular factor labels across patients by evaluating their pattern of co-occurrence and mutual exclusivity. We used log odds ratios (LOR) to quantify these relationships, where positive LOR values indicate co-occurrence, and negative values indicate mutual exclusivity. Statistical significance was assessed with a two-sided Fisher's exact test, and the resulting P values were corrected for multiple hypothesis testing.
To assess whether biomarker interdependencies introduce bias into WSI-based models, we analysed three deep learning algorithms with different principles of operation: attention-based (CLAM32), graph neural network-based (\({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\)33) and a WSI-level multimodal foundation model (TITAN22). These algorithms represent existing ML approaches that do not explicitly consider interdependencies between prediction variables. As CLAM and \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) rely on a patch-level encoder, we trained them with two different encoders: CTransPath34 (trained on histology images) and ShuffleNet35 (trained on ImageNet)36 to minimize encoder-specific bias. For each biomarker, we train these models with both encoders on the TCGA cohort using fourfold cross-validation and report AUROC as a performance metric. We further evaluated the trained models on two independent validation cohorts, CPTAC37 and the Australian Breast Cancer Tissue Bank (ABCTB)38. Finally, we used WSI-level representation from a multimodal foundation model (TITAN)22, trained on 330,000 image–text pairs, under the hypothesis that these embeddings better capture biomarker-related morphology, and trained both single-output and multi-output biomarker predictors on them.
To investigate whether WSI-based biomarker prediction models are confounded by the interdependency among molecular factors or clinicopathological variables (for example, histological grade or TMB), we performed a stratification analysis and permutation testing. For each model, we define two types of variable: the prediction variable, which is the biomarker the model is trained to predict, and stratification variables, which are biomarkers or clinicopathological features showing significant mutual exclusivity or co-occurrence with the prediction variable and may act as confounders (identified in step 1). The motivation for considering interdependent variables as confounders is that they may be associated with a shared phenotypic pattern in WSIs, which the model can exploit as proxies for the prediction variable, potentially leading to biased predictions when such signals are absent or decoupled at test time. To detect such confounders, we evaluate model performance at two levels: (1) across the entire cohort and (2) within subgroups defined by stratification variables. Examining model performance within these subgroups allows us to isolate the effect of the prediction variable from confounders. If the model truly captures prediction variable specific patterns in WSIs, its subgroup-level performance should closely match the cohort-level performance. By contrast, substantial differences between subgroups and overall performance indicate the influence of confounding effects or Simpson's paradox39,40. To quantify these effects, we perform permutation testing and report their statistical significance.
For example, to evaluate whether the performance of a WSI-based predictor for oestrogen receptor (ER) status (prediction variable) is influenced by TP53 mutation status (stratification variable), we first divide the cohort into two subgroups on the basis of the stratification variable: patients with a TP53-mutant status and patients with a TP53 wild-type status. We then compute the AUROC of the ER predictor within each of these subgroups. Finally, we compare these subgroup-level AUROCs to the model's overall AUROC across the entire cohort. A substantial difference between subgroup and cohort-level AUROCs indicates a potential bias, suggesting the model captures the combined effects of ER and TP53 rather than ER-specific features alone. To establish statistical significance, we run a permutation test with 10,000 trials (see Methods for more details). This definition of the ‘prediction variable' (ER status in this example) and the ‘stratification variable' (TP53 status in this example) will be used consistently in subsequent results and figures to ensure clarity. Repeating this across alternative stratification variables (for example, grade and TMB) provides a systematic way of detecting the influence of confounding factors on different WSI-based models.
To assess the added value of ML models in predicting various biomarkers over and above pathologist-assigned grades, we used a support vector machine with one-hot encoded histological grades to predict various clinical biomarkers following the same protocols used for weakly supervised models.
Our analysis revealed significant interdependencies (\(P\ll 0.05\)) among biomarkers across cancer types (Fig. 2 and Supplementary Fig. 1). In BRCA, elevated ER and progesterone receptor (PR) expression co-occur with mutations in CDH1, MAP3K1 and PIK3CA, but not with TP53, which is mutually exclusive with CDH1, GATA3, MAP3K1 and PIK3CA41. In CRC, MSI-high (MSI-H) cases frequently carry BRAF, ATM, ARID1A and RNF43 mutations and are less likely to harbour KRAS mutations; BRAF-mutant tumours also show higher TMB and show co-occurrence with ATM, RNF43 and ARID1A. Similar patterns of interdependencies are also observed in UCEC and lung adenocarcinoma (LUAD) (Supplementary Fig. 1). For instance, in UCEC, PTEN mutations co-occur with APC, ATM, JAK1, KRAS and ARIDA, whereas in LUAD, STK11 mutations co-occur with KEAP1 but rarely with EGFR.
The heat maps display a set of biomarkers and genes along the axes, with cell colours within the heat map showing the strength of association (dark red colours for co-occurrence and dark blue for mutual exclusivity). Cells marked with asterisks indicate statistically significant associations (Benjamini–Hochberg FDR-corrected P values from two-sided Fisher's exact test \(P\ll 0.05\)). The top bar above each heat map shows the percentage of cases mutated for a specific gene in case of gene mutations, whereas for biomarkers, it indicates the percentage of patients with elevated ER, PR and HER2 in case of breast tumours, high MSI, hypermutation and CIMP activity and CIN for colorectal tumours. CINGS, chromosomally instable versus genome stable; HM, hypermutated.
Our analysis further showed that, within the same tissue type, biomarker associations can vary across datasets, showing sampling variations. In the TCGA-BRCA cohort, MAP3K1 mutations showed mutual exclusivity with AKT1 and ARID1A, whereas in the METABRIC cohort, they showed a tendency towards co-occurrence (Fig. 2). ER status and high TMB showed mild co-occurrence in the TCGA-BRCA cohort but mutual exclusivity in the METABRIC cohort. In the TCGA-CRC cohort, BRAF-mutant tumours were significantly less likely to harbour TP53 mutations, whereas this association is less pronounced in the DFCI cohort and lacks statistical significance. Similar cross-dataset differences were observed in UCEC and LUAD (Supplementary Fig. 1). For instance, in TCGA-LUAD, BRAF and STK11 showed a weak tendency towards mutual exclusivity, whereas in the MSK cohort, they showed a weak tendency towards co-occurrence.
These results show that biomarker statuses are significantly interdependent and that their association patterns can vary across datasets. Consequently, ML models trained on WSIs may learn composite phenotypes driven by multiple interdependent biomarkers, introducing cohort-specific biases and limiting their generalizability to unseen cases.
To demonstrate that the ML models analysed in the study were properly trained, we report biomarker prediction performance across algorithms, feature embeddings and modelling approaches (Fig. 3 and Supplementary Figs. 1 and 2). Different model configurations achieved AUROCs >0.80 for multiple biomarkers in both cross-validation and independent validation cohorts.
The plots show the AUROC for two weakly supervised models (CLAM and \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\)), each trained with two different patch-level encoders: ShuffleNet, a convolutional neural network-based encoder pretrained on natural images, and CTransPath, a transformer-based model pretrained on WSIs through self-supervised learning. For each biomarker or gene mutation, the comparative predictive performance for these four model-encoder combinations is shown. Dark and light red bars correspond to CLAM with CTransPath and ShuffleNet, respectively, whereas dark and light blue bars correspond to \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) with CTransPath and ShuffleNet, respectively. Bar heights represent mean AUROC values, whereas error bars indicate the 95% confidence (two-sided, using Student's t-distribution) calculated across 100 class-stratified bootstrap sampling runs. Bar labels are colour-coded, with yellow denoting biomarkers and green denoting mutations.
In BRCA, CLAM with CTransPath features predicts receptor status with average AUROCs of 0.87 and 0.90 for ER and 0.79 and 0.78 for PR, in cross-validation (TCGA-BRCA) and independent validation (ABCTB) cohorts, respectively. Similar AUROCs were observed for \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) (CTransPath). These models also inferred gene mutations with high accuracy; for example, CLAM (CTransPath) predicted CDH1 and TP53 mutations with AUROCs of 0.88 and 0.82 in TCGA-BRCA and 0.91 and 0.82 in CPTAC-BRCA, respectively.
Beyond breast tumours, these models also achieved high AUROC values for predicting biomarkers and gene mutations in CRC, lung cancer and UCEC (Fig. 3 and Supplementary Fig. 2). For instance, \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) (CTransPath) predicted MSI status in CRC with an AUROC of 0.89 in TCGA-CRC (cross-validation) and 0.84 in CPTAC-CRC (independent validation). A strong predictive performance was also observed for other biomarkers, including BRAF, CpG island methylator phenotype pathway (CIMP), CINGS and hypermutation status (Fig. 3).
Apart from weakly supervised approaches, single-output and multi-output models trained on TITAN WSI-level feature representation showed roughly similar performance (Supplementary Fig. 3). For example, the multi-output model predicts the ER and PR status of TCGA-BRCA cases with an AUROC of 0.89 and 0.81, respectively, closely matching the AUROC values of models trained under the single-output setting (ER 0.89 and PR 0.79).
These results confirm the proper training of these models. Next, on the basis of AUROC, we selected the best model for each biomarker and assessed the influence of biomarker interdependencies through permutation testing and stratification analysis.
Our confounding factor analysis reveals that WSI-based predictors are strongly influenced by biomarker interdependencies. Across multiple biomarkers, the higher cohort-level AUROCs achieved by these models drop substantially in subgroups defined by the statuses of various stratification variables (Fig. 4 and Supplementary Figs. 4–7). For example, \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) predicts colorectal tumours' MSI status (the ‘prediction variable') with an AUROC of 0.88 (0.873–0.886). However, when the same patient set is divided into hypermutated and non-hypermutated subgroups (the ‘stratification variable'), the AUROC for MSI status prediction drops to 0.72 within each subgroup. A similar effect is observed in stratification by other biomarkers showing co-occurrence with MSI (for example, CIMP activity, hypermutation and APC statuses) and those showing mutual exclusivity (for example, BRAF and CINGS) (Fig. 4).
AUROC values are illustrated on the y axis, with the top x axis indicating the prediction variables and the bottom x axis showing the stratification variables. The predictive performance of each predictor on all the cases in the cohort (denoted by ‘All' in the plot) over 100 bootstrap runs is shown using a violin plot, whereas its performance in different stratification groups is depicted with a doughnut chart, with the centre representing the AUROC values. The horizontal white line inside each violin marks the mean of the distribution. Doughnuts marked with an asterisk at the top indicate statistically significant variation in results in the stratification analysis (Benjamini–Hochberg FDR-corrected P values from two-sided permutation testing \(P\ll 0.05\)). The percentage values at the bottom of the doughnut indicate the proportion of positive (MUT/high) or negative (WT/low) cases relative to the status of the stratification variables. Red and blue colours in each doughnut indicate the proportion of positive and negative cases in each stratified group concerning prediction variables. MUT, mutated; WT, wild-type.
These observations extend beyond colorectal tumours and are evident in biomarker predictors of breast and endometrial tumours, irrespective of the specific model architecture, feature embeddings or training methodology used. For instance, in breast tumours, the performance of the ER predictor substantially declines in cases with GATA3, CDH1 and PIK3CA mutations (Fig. 4). Likewise, the ER predictor's AUROC drops substantially in both PR-positive and negative cases, as well as in TP53-mutant and wild-type cases. Similar trends are apparent for PR, TP53, CDH1 and PIK3CA predictors (Fig. 4). This trend of inconsistent subgroup performance is also observed for other single- and multi-output models, such as those utilizing TITAN WSI-level feature representation (Supplementary Figs. 5–7). For example, the AUROC of the ER predictor drops from 0.89 to 0.57 in single-output settings, whereas it drops from 0.88 to 0.58 under multi-output settings.
These results suggest that the biomarker prediction from ML models is contingent on the status of other interdependent biomarkers, and these models are probably relying on composite phenotypes arising from potentially interacting biomarkers rather than learning biomarker-specific morphology.
WSI-based models predict breast tumour receptor status (ER, PR) with high cohort-level AUROCs of 0.87 and 0.79 in the TCGA-BRCA cohort, and 0.90 and 0.78 in the ABCTB cohort, respectively. However, the stratification analysis by tumour grade reveals marked subgroup-level performance drops (Fig. 5). The ER predictor AUROC drops to 0.76 for medium-grade cases in both cohorts, and the PR predictor AUROCs in low and medium-grade cases drop to 0.59 and 0.69 in the TCGA-BRCA cohort and to 0.65 and 0.73 in the ABCTB cohort. Mutation predictors show similar grade-specific performance declines; for example, AUROC of the TP53 predictor drops from 0.81 (cohort-level) to 0.73, 0.73 and 0.72 for low-, medium- and high-grade cases. These patterns extend beyond breast tumours and are evident in the mutation predictors of endometrial tumours, irrespective of model architecture, feature embeddings or training methodology (Fig. 5 and Supplementary Fig. 8). For example, TP53 predictors trained on TITAN WSI-level embeddings also show performance drops in high-grade cases, with AUROCs decreasing from 0.83 to 0.77 in single-output settings and from 0.86 to 0.77 in multi-output settings.
a, In the plots, AUROC values are illustrated on the y axis, with the top x axis indicating the prediction variables and the bottom x axis showing the patient stratification with respect to histological grade. The predictive performance of each predictor on all the cases in the cohort (denoted by ‘All' in the plot) over 100 bootstrap runs is shown using a violin plot, whereas its performance in a group of patients with a certain histological grade is depicted with a doughnut chart, with the centre representing the AUROC values. The horizontal white line inside each violin marks the mean of the distribution. Doughnuts marked with an asterisk at the top indicate statistically significant differences in results (Benjamini–Hochberg FDR-corrected P values from two-sided permutation testing \(P\ll 0.05\)). Red and blue colours in each doughnut indicate the proportion of positive and negative cases in each stratified group in relation to prediction variables. b, Heat maps highlighting the shift in the association structure between histological grade and biomarker status across two distinct datasets. The colour intensity reflects the strength of association, with dark red indicating strong co-occurrence and dark blue indicating strong mutual exclusivity.
Our analysis further shows that the apparent AUROCs of WSI-based models are sensitive to shifts in biomarker-grade associations between training and test cohorts. For example, in high-grade UCEC cases, the TP53 predictor attains an AUROC of 0.70 in the TCGA cohort but only 0.36 in the CPTAC cohort, a pattern consistent with a shift in TP53-grade relationship from strong co-occurrence in the training cohort to moderate mutual exclusivity in the test cohort. Similarly, in low-grade cases, the ER predictor achieves an AUROC of 0.96 in the ABCTB cohort compared with a cross-validation AUROC of 0.90 in TCGA-BRCA, probably reflecting a stronger ER-grade association in ABCTB than in TCGA. Consistent with these, single- and multi-output models trained on TITAN WSI-level feature representations showed similar sensitivity (Supplementary Fig. 8). For example, in TCGA-UCEC, TP53 AUROC drops from 0.83 to 0.77 in high-grade cases for the single-output model and from 0.86 to 0.77 for the multi-output model. In CPTAC-UCEC, where the grade–mutation association differs, the drop in AUROC is more pronounced, from 0.61 to 0.53 for the single-output model and from 0.74 to 0.60 for the multi-output model.
The confounding influence of grade is further supported by experiments in which, for selected biomarkers, we trained separate models for grade 1, 2 and 3 patients; these grade-specific models attained lower AUROCs than the pooled model (Supplementary Table 1). For example, in TCGA-BRCA, the TP53 grade-specific predictors achieved AUROCs of ~0.73 compared with 0.84 for the pooled model, and ER and PR showed similar reductions. To evaluate whether these disparities could be attributed to demographic differences, we examined the demographic balance between biomarker-positive and biomarker-negative cases and found moderate racial differences (Supplementary Table 2). We therefore repeated the grade-stratified experiment only on patients in a single racial subgroup (white). The same trends persisted (Supplementary Table 3); for example, the ER predictor trained only on grade 1 cases achieved an AUROC of 0.66, substantially lower than the pooled AUROC of 0.85, suggesting that demographic factors are unlikely to drive these performance differences (Supplementary Table 3).
These results, reminiscent of Simpson's paradox, indicate that WSI-based biomarker prediction models rely heavily on grade-associated morphology rather than biomarker-specific phenotypic signatures, making them less generalizable to external cohorts where grade–biomarker associations differ from those in the training data.
Our analysis shows that the status of several biomarkers across cancer types can be inferred with accuracy higher than expected from pathologist-assigned grade, and in several cases, approaches the performance of deep learning models. In BRCA, grade-based ER and PR classifiers achieved AUROCs of 0.76 and 0.70 in the TCGA-BRCA cohort and 0.79 and 0.71 in the ABCTB cohort, respectively (Fig. 6). Grade also predicts TP53 mutations with an AUROC of 0.75, nearly matching the 0.81 achieved by weakly supervised ML models. Similar AUROC patterns were seen for TP53 and PTEN predictors in the TCGA-UCEC and CPTAC-UCEC cohorts. These results suggest that, for some biomarkers, ML algorithms offer limited additional predictive value over pathologist-assigned grade (Fig. 3). The strong grade–biomarker association also risks ML models linking grade-associated phenotypic differences to biomarker status; therefore, WSI-based models are expected to exceed this grade-derived baseline and establish robust phenotype–genotype associations that are independent of tumour grade.
The plots illustrate the AUROC achieved by a support vector machine classifier trained to predict a biomarker/gene mutation from one-hot encoded histological grades. Bar heights represent mean AUROC values, whereas error bars indicate the 95% confidence (two-sided, using Student's t-distribution) calculated across 100 class-stratified bootstrap sampling runs. Bar labels are colour-coded, with yellow denoting biomarkers and green denoting mutations.
WSI-based models infer BRAF and TP53 mutations in colorectal tumours (TCGA-CRC) from WSIs with high confidence, achieving AUROCs 0.774 (0.764–0.785) and 0.717 (0.711–0.722), respectively (Fig. 7a). However, stratification analysis reveals a significant challenge: for cases with low mutation density in genes other than BRAF (denoted as \({\mathrm{TMB}}_{\widetilde{{BRAF}}}\)), the BRAF predictor accuracy drops to an AUROC of 0.65 (Fig. 7a). Similarly, the TP53 predictor AUROC drops to 0.50 for high TMB cases. In the CPTAC-CRC cohort, similar trends were observed, with BRAF and TP53 predictors' performance dropping in low and high TMB cases, respectively. In addition, APC and KRAS mutation predictors are also influenced by TMB. This observation also extends to UCEC, where the PTEN predictor achieved AUROCs of 0.803 in TCGA-UCEC and 0.731 in CPTAC-UCEC but drops to 0.63 and 0.32 for low TMB cases in the respective cohorts (Fig. 7a).
a, AUROC values are plotted on the y axis, with the top x axis indicating the prediction variables and the bottom x axis showing patients' stratification with respect to TMB. The predictive performance of each predictor on all the cases in the cohort (denoted by ‘All' in the plot) over 100 bootstrap runs is shown using a violin plot, whereas its performance in patients with high and low TMB is depicted with a doughnut chart, with the centre representing the AUROC values. The horizontal white line inside each violin marks the mean of the distribution. Doughnuts marked with an asterisk at the top indicate statistically significant variation in results (Benjamini–Hochberg FDR-corrected P values from two-sided permutation testing \(P\ll 0.05\)). Red and blue colours in each doughnut indicate the proportion of positive and negative cases in each stratified group based on prediction variables. b, Heat maps highlighting the shift in the association structure between TMB and gene mutations across two distinct datasets. The colour intensity reflects the strength of association, with dark red indicating strong co-occurrence and dark blue indicating strong mutual exclusivity.
We further show that varying associations between TMB and biomarker status across datasets significantly influence the prediction accuracy of WSI-based predictors. In CRC, the association between KRAS mutation and TMB is slightly stronger in the CPTAC-CRC cohort compared with the TCGA-CRC cohort (Fig. 7b). This stronger association could explain the KRAS predictor's significantly improved prediction accuracy (AUROC: 0.83) in high TMB cases in the CPTAC-UCEC cohort, compared with an AUROC of 0.63 for high TMB cases in the TCGA-CRC cohort. This analysis suggests that the model's predictions are not only influenced by the KRAS mutation status, which is the target prediction variable, but also by the overall TMB, which affects the prediction accuracy.
Deep learning models trained on routine WSIs of H&E-stained tissue sections are increasingly discussed as rapid and cost-effective tools to infer molecular biomarker status in patients with cancer. In this study, we identified key limitations of these approaches for clinical and preclinical use, in particular, their failure to account for biomarker interdependencies during model training and inference. Through statistical analysis, we first demonstrated significant interdependencies among molecular factors across tissue types and datasets (TCGA, METABRIC, MSK and DFCI), manifested as patterns of mutual exclusivity and co-occurrence that reflect both pathobiological and spurious associations. Subsequently, using permutation testing and stratification analysis, we showed that these associations in the training data lead to models whose predictions for a given biomarker are contingent on the status of other codependent biomarkers. For example, the PR predictor showed a marked drop in performance in CDH1-mutant cases, with AUROC decreasing from 0.79 to 0.50. This decline in subgroup performance suggests that the current ML models cannot fully disentangle biomarker-specific signals from the multifaceted influence of molecular characteristics and other factors on tissue phenotypes in WSIs.
The inability of WSI-based models to discern biomarker-specific signals has direct clinical implications when codependent biomarkers have divergent therapeutic roles. An example is the BRAF-MSI association in CRC. Our analysis shows that MSI predictions from WSI-based models are contingent on BRAF status, with AUROCs dropping in both BRAF-mutant and wild-type subgroups, and a similar pattern was observed for the BRAF predictor when stratified by MSI status (Figs. 2 and 4 and Supplementary Fig. 7). This reflects their well-known biological co-occurrence: MSI-H CRCs frequently harbour BRAF V600E mutations, whereas MSI-stable CRCs rarely harbour BRAF mutations. Crucially, however, MSI-H and BRAF mutations have distinct therapeutic implications. MSI-H is a strong predictor of the response to immune checkpoint inhibitors such as pembrolizumab or nivolumab, whereas BRAF V600E mutations are targeted using BRAF and MEK inhibitors in combination with EGFR blockade. Combinations of immunotherapy and BRAF inhibitors are currently being tested for the double mutant. A model that cannot disentangle MSI-H from BRAF status may achieve high aggregate AUROC but lacks clinical utility, as confusing the two would misguide treatment selection. This example underscores the broader need for bias-aware evaluation: predictors must be assessed not only for overall accuracy but also for their ability to distinguish correlated biomarkers with divergent therapeutic pathways42.
Beyond the influence of biomarker interdependencies, we showed that these models exploit prominent grade- or TMB-associated features in WSIs as proxies for biomarker prediction (Figs. 5 and 7). In breast tumours, AUROCs of ER and TP53 predictors drop markedly within grade-stratified subgroups and shifts in the grade–biomarker association across cohorts lead to apparent improvements or declines in accuracy. Likewise, TMB-stratified analysis shows substantial AUROC declines for BRAF, TP53 and other markers, with shifts in TMB–biomarker association across cohorts influencing apparent accuracy. These patterns, observed across different ML models and feature representations, reflect a broader challenge in computational pathology: models tend to exploit confounding variables (grade, TMB) and conflate them with biomarkers of interest (for example, ER, PR, TP53 and PTEN status), thereby obscuring true genotype–phenotype relationships, limiting generalizability and introducing bias. This also raises concerns about their suitability for routine clinical use, because substantial heterogeneity in biomarker profiles can exist among tumours with the same grade or TMB, and both grade and TMB can evolve over the disease course or treatment. Consequently, models that rely on these prominent features are vulnerable to distribution shifts and may produce inconsistent predictions for the same patient at different time points, irrespective of the true biomarker status.
These findings underscore the need to interpret external validation results with caution. In our analysis, the ER predictor achieved a high AUROC of 0.87 in cross-validation on TCGA-BRCA and 0.90 in a larger independent cohort (ABCTB), which could be interpreted as an excellent generalizability of the model. However, upon closer examination, we found that the apparent improvement in AUROC was largely driven by a stronger grade-ER association in the ABCTB than in the training cohort. Moreover, within grade-stratified subgroups, the predictive performance of this sophisticated ER predictor was not substantially more informative than a simple grade-based classifier. This illustrates that external validation must be complemented by bias-aware evaluations, such as grade- and TMB-stratified analyses, before claiming clinical utility.
The confounding influence of biomarker interdependencies and clinicopathological variables (for example, grade and TMB) on current WSI-based biomarker prediction suggests that current models are not yet ready to replace genomic testing in routine care. Instead, they are better positioned for triaging, screening or supplementary decision support, provided that their performance is rigorously assessed and key clinical decisions remain supported by confirmatory testing. To ensure true clinical utility, we suggest bias-aware evaluation, including reporting grade- and TMB-stratified metrics and subgroup calibration rather than relying solely on aggregate AUROC (Figs. 4, 5 and 7 and Fig. 8). Our findings also have implications for studies and trials that link disease phenotypes to biomarkers or assess treatment response conditioned on biomarker status. In both contexts, establishing robust relationships requires that the biomarker of interest is not tightly coupled to cohort-specific covariates, as such dependencies can lead to false conclusions. To mitigate this risk, we recommend: (1) preserving variation in the target biomarker relative to correlated variables during enrolment; (2) prespecifying stratification factors (for example, grade, TMB, site, key comutations) and conducting prospective subgroup analyses; (3) including a dependency-aware analysis plan (for example, stratified permutation tests, subgroup confidence intervals, comparison with simple clinical baselines such as grade-only models); and (4) conducting per stratum power calculations rather than only aggregate targets.
Although ML methods for predicting biomarker status from WSI have limitations, they can still provide substantial value. They can facilitate research and hypothesis generation by uncovering associations between histology and molecular factors, particularly in tissue-limited or retrospective scenarios where running additional assays is not feasible. WSI-based models also offer a scalable and cost-effective surrogate for large-scale preclinical and translational studies and can serve as rapid prescreening tools in early phase trials or resource-constrained settings43. In drug development, they can help narrow the pool of candidates for more resource-intensive molecular analyses and, with appropriate safeguards and clinician oversight, can support triage by guiding decisions on when confirmatory testing is essential43. To support safe use, we recommend bias-aware evaluation and interpretation of prediction results, including subgroup-stratified metrics and permutation-based checks, and comparisons against simple baselines such as grade-based classifiers.
Although predicting biomarker status from routine H&E WSIs may appear to be a simple image-to-label mapping, it is considerably more complex because phenotypes in WSIs are rarely driven by a single factor and instead reflect combined effects of multiple codependent molecular factors. Our analyses show that current approaches, including single and multi-output models, as well as ML and graph-based methods across different feature representations, fail to reliably learn biomarker-specific genotype–phenotype mapping; instead, they exploit aggregated phenotypes of interdependent biomarkers or cohort-specific association as proxies for prediction. This results in biased models whose performance drops across patients' strata defined by codependent variables. These findings motivate the need for methods that formalize the problem as causal, structured multilabel learning: explicitly encode dependencies among biomarkers in the label space, learn disentangled image representations guided by conditional-independence objectives, mitigate confounding via causal adjustment and counterfactual data augmentation and optimize for invariance and distributional robustness, coupled with evaluation protocols based on conditional metrics and subgroup calibration44,45.
Although we demonstrated the generalizability of our findings across multiple cancer types, datasets and modelling approaches, this study still has limitations. First, our analyses were limited to H&E WSIs with WSI-level (coarse) labels, and we did not evaluate immunohistochemistry (IHC) slides or models trained with fine-grained labels (for example, spatial omics supervision). Second, although we used a large multicentre dataset (n = 8,221), prospective studies are needed to define clinical and deployment guidelines. Third, we note that learning disentangled genotype–phenotype mapping using ML will probably require combinatorially richer datasets with the exhaustive coverage of comutation or biomarker-pair combinations than current cohorts; however, curating such datasets would necessitate significant long-term efforts. Last, we suggested several methodological directions for ML researchers to explore and words of caution for clinicians, but their effectiveness remains to be established; it is premature to recommend definitive clinical guidelines.
All samples used in the study were obtained with research consent and ethics approvals as indicated in the consent and ethics statements for TCGA, METABRIC, COAD-DFCI, MSK-LUAD, CPTAC and ABCTB.
We analysed data of four cancer types (BRCA, CRC, LUAD and UCEC), sourced from six cohorts: TCGA46, METABRIC24,25, COAD-DFCI28, MSK-LUAD26, CPTAC and ABCTB. Biomarkers and gene mutation status information, except for the ABCTB cohort, were collected from cBioportal30. WSIs of formalin-fixed paraffin-embedded (FFPE) H&E-stained tissue for TCGA atlas cases were collected from TCGA46,47, whereas for CPTAC atlas cases, they were retrieved from The Cancer Imaging Archive (TCIA)17. Within the ABCTB cohort, WSIs and receptor status (ER, PR and human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) status) information were available for 2,303 patients. In terms of biomarkers, for breast tumours, ER, PR and HER2 status were recorded. For colorectal cases, MSI, hypermutation (HM), chromosomal instability (CIN) and CIMP activity statuses were documented. TMB information was available for all cases across all cancer types and cohorts.
We analysed the interdependency between the mutational status of genes using the LOR. Given the status of two biomarkers \({\rm{A}}\) and \({\rm{B}}\), in a given dataset, we calculated the LOR as follows:
In the above equation, \({n}_{{\rm{A}}}\) and \({n}_{{\rm{B}}}\) denote the number of cases that are positive for \({\rm{A}}\) and \({\rm{B}}\), respectively, whereas \({n}_{ \sim {\rm{A}}}\) and \({n}_{ \sim {\rm{B}}}\) denote the number of cases that are negative for those biomarkers. A higher positive LOR between gene pairs indicates mutation co-occurrence (that is, if one gene is mutated, the other is likely to be mutated), whereas a negative value signifies mutual exclusivity of mutation (that is, if one gene is mutated, the other is less likely to be mutated).
In addition to the LOR analysis, we statistically assessed the interdependence among the mutational status of different genes using a two-sided Fisher's exact test. All gene pairs were enumerated, and a Fisher's exact test was performed on each pair. Subsequently, we reported the multi-hypothesis corrected P values for each pair using the Benjamini–Hochberg method, with a significance threshold set at \(P\ll 0.05\).
We assessed the predictability of biomarkers and gene alteration status from WSIs within their respective cohorts using two algorithms with different principles of operation: CLAM32 and \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\)33. To avoid drawing conclusions specific to a certain approach or type of features, the predictive performance of both algorithms was evaluated over different types of feature: deep features (a convolutional neural network-based encoder trained on ImageNet)36 and self-supervised features (a transformer-based model trained on histology images in a self-supervised manner)34. Our predictive pipeline comprises three main steps: (1) preprocessing of WSIs, (2) embedding of WSI patches, (3) biomarkers and gene mutation prediction from WSIs using CLAM and \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\).
In our preprocessing pipeline, utilizing a U-Net-based segmentation model from TIAToolbox48, we first segment viable tissue areas of each WSI and exclude regions with artefacts (pen-marking, tissue folding and so on). The model-generated tissue mask highlights informative tissue areas within the WSI using a pixel value of 1, whereas those with a value of 0 represent background or regions with artefacts. Leveraging these tissue masks, from each WSI, we extract patches of size \(512\,\mathrm{pixels}\times 512\) pixels and \(1,024\,\mathrm{pixels}\times 1,024\) pixels at a spatial resolution of 0.50 microns-per-pixel. We selectively keep patches (both benign and tumour) that have more than 40% viable tissue in terms of pixel proportion.
We utilized various encoders to extract feature representation from WSI patches. Specifically, we used ShuffleNet35 pretrained on ImageNet36 as a patch-level encoder to extract the 1,024-dimensional feature representation (deep features) from WSI patches of size \(512\,\mathrm{pixels}\times 512\) pixels. Moreover, we also extracted a 768-dimensional self-supervised feature representation from each patch of size \(\mathrm{1,024}\,\mathrm{pixels}\times \mathrm{1,024}\) pixels using CTransPath (a transformer-based self-supervised model trained on histology images)34.
We trained \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) and CLAM for predicting the status of different clinical biomarkers using both deep features and self-supervised features. In case of \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\), we first construct a graph representation of the WSI and then pass the WSI graph to a graph neural network for predicting the status of a certain biomarker as output. In cases where patients had multiple WSIs, we constructed a serial graph incorporating all WSIs and predicted the target label accordingly. In the case of CLAM, we bag all the WSIs belonging to the same patient and then predict the target label from the WSI bag.
Apart from these weakly supervised models, we also analysed alternative modelling approaches using feature representations from TITAN22, a state-of-the-art multimodal foundation model trained on more than 330,000 WSIs paired with pathology reports. We leveraged TITAN-derived features to train both single-output and multi-output models for biomarker prediction. In the single-output settings, WSI-level features were fed into a logistic regression model to predict the status of a single biomarker. In the multi-output settings, we used a multilayer perceptron (MLP) model that takes WSI-level representations as input and simultaneously predicts the status of all biomarkers as output. The model architecture consists of a single hidden layer that projects the input to half its dimension, followed by a rectified linear unit activation function and then an output layer. The model was trained using a pairwise ranking loss function33.
We trained and evaluated the performance of both \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) and CLAM using fourfold cross-validation, in which the dataset is partitioned into four 75/25 non-overlapping splits. In each cross-validation run, the model is trained on 75% data, and the performance of the trained model is then assessed on the 25% test set. From the training dataset, we randomly select 10% of the data for validation. We trained the model for 300 epochs on the training set, with a batch size of 8 and a learning rate of 0.001 using the adaptive momentum-based optimizer49. To limit overfitting, we stop the model training if its performance on the validation cohort is not improving over ten consecutive epochs. We quantitatively assess model performance on the test set using AUROC as a performance metric. Our motivation for using AUROC as the primary metric was twofold: (1) it allows us to maintain comparability with existing literature and align with established benchmarking practices, and (2) it serves as a threshold-free, rank-based statistic for bias detection, enabling subgroup evaluation and stratified permutation testing. We used the same train, validation and test splits for both \({\mathrm{SlideGraph}}^{\infty }\) and CLAM.
To assess the predictability of biomarkers and gene mutation status on the basis of histology grade, we used a linear model (specifically, a support vector machine). This model uses the one-hot encoded histological grade as input to predict the status of a certain clinical biomarker as the target. We followed the same training and evaluation protocols used for our weakly supervised models. We quantify the model's predictive performance using AUROC as a performance metric.
To investigate whether WSI-based biomarker prediction models are confounded by biomarker interdependency or clinicopathological variables (for example, histology grade or TMB), we used a stratification-based permutation testing approach. A high-level conceptual overview of the approach is shown in Fig. 8, and complete algorithmic details are presented in Supplementary Table 4. Using the procedure outlined in that table, we evaluate the robustness of model performance to confounding influence from biomarkers or clinicopathological features that exhibit mutual exclusivity or co-occurrence with the prediction variable (hereafter referred to as stratification variables).
The algorithm takes as input a dataset containing prediction scores (\(Z\)), ground truth labels (\(Y\)) and a confounding or stratification variable (\(C\)). In step 1, the algorithm computes foreground statistics, such as AUROC within each stratum defined by the values of \({\rm{C}}\). In step 2, the algorithm permutes \({\rm{C}}\) multiple times (represented by \(Q\)), generating permuted datasets D(1), D(2)⋯, D(Q). AUROCs are computed in each permuted dataset, where any association \(C\) and \(Y\) has been randomized to form a null distribution reflecting expected model performance under the assumption of no association between \(C\) and \(Y\). In step 3, the algorithm compares the observed AUROCs against null distributions to assess how extreme they are. If they lie in the tails, the effect of \(C\) is considered statistically significant, and a two-sided multiple hypothesis corrected P value is computed. KDE, kernel density estimation.
Let \(D=\{\left({Z}_{i},{Y}_{i},{C}_{i}\right){|i}=1,\ldots ,N\}\) denote the dataset for a given test cohort, where \({Z}_{i}\in {\mathbb{R}}\) is the score generated by a WSI-based model trained to infer the prediction variable \({Y}_{{i}}\in \{\mathrm{0,1}\}\). The variable \({C}_{i}\in {V}_{C}\) denotes the stratification variable (for example, status of a codependent biomarker or clinicopathological feature), and \({V}_{C}\) is the set of all unique values that \(C\) can take (for example, mutant or wild-type for mutation status). The objective is to assess whether the model's performance in predicting \(Y\) is conditionally independent of the stratification variable \(C\).
For each subgroup \(v\in {V}_{C}\), we compute a stratified performance measure using AUROC as a performance metric. We define the foreground metric as \({M}_{C=v}=\mathrm{AUROC}\left(\{\left({Z}_{i},{Y}_{i}\right),|,{C}_{i}=v\}\right)\), which reflects model performance restricted to a subgroup where \(C=v\).
To determine whether \({M}_{C=v}\) significantly deviates from what would be expected under the null hypothesis, that is, when the model predictions \(Z\) are independent of \(C\), we conduct a stratified permutation test. Let \(Q=\mathrm{10,000}\) be the number of permutations. For each permutation trial \(q=1,\ldots ,Q\), we define a permutation function \({\pi }_{q}:\{1,\ldots ,N\}\to\) \(\{1,\ldots ,N\}\), which randomly shuffles the assignment of \(C\) while preserving the correspondence between Z and \(Y\). A permuted dataset is constructed as: \({D}^{\left(q\right)}=\{\left({Z}_{i},{Y}_{i},{C}_{{\pi }_{q}\left(i\right)}\right){|i}=1,\ldots ,N\}\) and for each \(v\in {V}_{C}\), we compute the permuted AUROC: \({M}_{C=v}^{\left(q\right)}=\text{AUROC}\left(\{\left({Z}_{i},{Y}_{i}\right)|{C}_{{\pi }_{q}\left(i\right)}=v\}\right)\). The collection \(\{{M}_{C=v}^{\left(q\right)}{\}}_{q=1}^{Q}\) forms the empirical null distribution of AUROC values under the assumption of no dependence between the prediction variable \(Z\) and stratification variable \(C.\)
To quantify whether the observed stratified performance \({M}_{C=v}\) is significantly different from the null distribution, we compute a two-sided P value:
In the above equations \(I\left(\cdot \right)\) is the indicator function. The term \({p}_{v}^{+}\) captures the upper-tail P value (the proportion of permuted AUROCs greater than or equal to the observed value), and \({p}_{v}^{-}\) captures the lower-tail P value (the proportion of permuted AUROCs less than or equal to the observed value). The final P value \({p}_{v}\) quantifies the statistical evidence that the model's predictive performance in the subgroup \(C=v\) differs from what would be expected under the null hypothesis (no association between the model predictions and the stratification variable). A lower value of \({p}_{v}\) suggests that the model's predictions are influenced by the stratification variable, implying reliance on proxy features rather than those directly linked with the prediction variable50,51.
Using the stratified permutation test discussed above, we examined three key factors that could introduce bias into an ML model: first, the bias due to interdependency among biomarkers and the somatic mutation status of genes in the training dataset; second, a likely bias due to patients' tumour histological grades; and third, an expected bias due to the TMB of a patient with cancer. To assess the influence of interdependence among biomarker statuses on model predictive performance, we select the model with the highest AUROC score for each biomarker and run a permutation test, treating other biomarkers with codependent statuses as confounding variables. Subsequently, to analyse the influence of histological grade on WSI-based biomarker predictors, we use a similar approach, utilizing histology grade as a confounding variable. Finally, to evaluate the impact of TMB on histology image-based biomarker predictors, we first calculate patient-level TMB excluding genetic alterations of the gene of interest used for prediction, then use this \({\mathrm{TMB}}_{\widetilde{\mathrm{voi}}}\) as a confounding variable. On the basis of \({\mathrm{TMB}}_{\widetilde{\mathrm{voi}}}\), we divide the patients into low and high TMB cases using a threshold of ten mutations per megabase.
As this procedure is repeated across multiple stratification variables and subgroups, all P values \({p}_{v}\) are corrected for multiple hypothesis testing using the Benjamini–Hochberg procedure. Adjusted P values below a false discovery rate (FDR) threshold of 0.05 are considered statistically significant.
Further information on research design is available in the Nature Portfolio Reporting Summary linked to this article.
WSIs of TCGA patients used in the study can be downloaded from the NIH Genomic Data Commons Portal at this link: https://portal.gdc.cancer.gov/. The genomic data and clinical data of patients in TCGA, METABRIC, COAD-DFCI, MSK-LUAD and CPTAC cohorts can be downloaded from cBioPortal at https://www.cbioportal.org/. ABCTB data and images were obtained from the ABCTB. The corresponding author can be contacted to facilitate access to ABCTB data.
All the experiments were conducted using Python using PyTorch Geometric library and TIAToolbox. Code and documentation of all Python scripts used in the study are available via GitHub at https://github.com/imuhdawood/HistBiases. Any additional information required to reproduce the data reported in this work is available from the corresponding author upon request.
Bilal, M. et al. Development and validation of a weakly supervised deep learning framework to predict the status of molecular pathways and key mutations in colorectal cancer from routine histology images: a retrospective study. Lancet Digit. Health 3, e763–e772 (2021).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Lu, W. et al. SlideGraph+: whole slide image level graphs to predict HER2 status in breast cancer. Med. Image Anal. 80, 102486 (2022).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Wagner, S. J. et al. Transformer-based biomarker prediction from colorectal cancer histology: a large-scale multicentric study. Cancer Cell 41, 1650–1661 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Kather, J. N. et al. Deep learning can predict microsatellite instability directly from histology in gastrointestinal cancer. Nat. Med. 25, 1054–1056 (2019).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
McCaw, Z. et al. Machine learning enabled prediction of digital biomarkers from whole slide histopathology image. Preprint at medRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/2024.01.06.24300926 (2024).
Zhao, Y. et al. Deep learning using histological images for gene mutation prediction in lung cancer: a multicentre retrospective study. Lancet Oncol. 26, 136–146 (2025).
Article
PubMed
CAS
Google Scholar
Campanella, G. et al. Real-world deployment of a fine-tuned pathology foundation model for lung cancer biomarker detection. Nat. Med. 31, 3002–3010 (2025).
Echle, A. et al. Deep learning in cancer pathology: a new generation of clinical biomarkers. Br. J. Cancer 124, 686–696 (2021).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Coudray, N. et al. Classification and mutation prediction from non-small cell lung cancer histopathology images using deep learning. Nat. Med. 24, 1559–1567 (2018).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Saldanha, O. L. et al. Self-supervised attention-based deep learning for pan-cancer mutation prediction from histopathology. NPJ Precis. Oncol. 7, 1–5 (2023).
Google Scholar
Fu, Y. et al. Pan-cancer computational histopathology reveals mutations, tumor composition and prognosis. Nat. Cancer 1, 800–810 (2020).
Article
PubMed
CAS
Google Scholar
Lim, C. et al. Biomarker testing and time to treatment decision in patients with advanced nonsmall-cell lung cancer†. Ann. Oncol. 26, 1415–1421 (2015).
Article
PubMed
CAS
Google Scholar
Echle, A. et al. Clinical-grade detection of microsatellite instability in colorectal tumors by deep learning. Gastroenterology 159, 1406–1416 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Kather, J. N. et al. Pan-cancer image-based detection of clinically actionable genetic alterations. Nat. Cancer 1, 789–799 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Keller, P., Dawood, M. & Minhas, F. U. A. A. Maximum mean discrepancy kernels for predictive and prognostic modeling of whole slide images. In 2023 IEEE 20th International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging (ISBI) 1–5 (IEEE, 2023); https://doi.org/10.1109/ISBI53787.2023.10230578
Rawat, R. R. et al. Deep learned tissue ‘fingerprints' classify breast cancers by ER/PR/Her2 status from H&E images. Sci. Rep. 10, 7275 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Clark, K. et al. The Cancer Imaging Archive (TCIA): maintaining and operating a public information repository. J. Digit. Imaging 26, 1045–1057 (2013).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Jahanifar, M. et al. Domain generalization in computational pathology: survey and guidelines. ACM Comput. Surv. 57, 285:1–285:37 (2025).
Article
Google Scholar
Sanchez-Vega, F. et al. Oncogenic signaling pathways in The Cancer Genome Atlas. Cell 173, 321–337 (2018).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Babur, Ö et al. Systematic identification of cancer driving signaling pathways based on mutual exclusivity of genomic alterations. Genome Biol. 16, 45 (2015).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Ciriello, G., Cerami, E., Sander, C. & Schultz, N. Mutual exclusivity analysis identifies oncogenic network modules. Genome Res. 22, 398–406 (2012).
Article
PubMed
CAS
Google Scholar
Ding, T. et al. A multimodal whole-slide foundation model for pathology. Nat. Med. 31, 3749–3761 (2025).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Tekle, G. E. et al. Co-occurrence and mutual exclusivity: what cross-cancer mutation patterns can tell us. Trends Cancer 7, 823–836 (2021).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Curtis, C. et al. The genomic and transcriptomic architecture of 2,000 breast tumours reveals novel subgroups. Nature 486, 346–352 (2012).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Pereira, B. et al. The somatic mutation profiles of 2,433 breast cancers refines their genomic and transcriptomic landscapes. Nat. Commun. 7, 11479 (2016).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Caso, R. et al. The underlying tumor genomics of predominant histologic subtypes in lung adenocarcinoma. J. Thorac. Oncol. 15, 1844–1856 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Weigelt, B. et al. Molecular characterization of endometrial carcinomas in black and white patients reveals disparate drivers with therapeutic implications. Cancer Discov. 13, 2356–2369 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Giannakis, M. et al. Genomic correlates of immune-cell infiltrates in colorectal carcinoma. Cell Rep. 15, 857–865 (2016).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Canisius, S., Martens, J. W. M. & Wessels, L. F. A. A novel independence test for somatic alterations in cancer shows that biology drives mutual exclusivity but chance explains most co-occurrence. Genome Biol. 17, 261 (2016).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Cerami, E. et al. The cBio cancer genomics portal: an open platform for exploring multidimensional cancer genomics data. Cancer Discov. 2, 401–404 (2012).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Gao, J. et al. Integrative analysis of complex cancer genomics and clinical profiles using the cBioPortal. Sci. Signal. 6, pl1 (2013).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Lu, M. Y. et al. Data-efficient and weakly supervised computational pathology on whole-slide images. Nat. Biomed. Eng. 5, 555–570 (2021).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Dawood, M. et al. Cross-linking breast tumor transcriptomic states and tissue histology. Cell Rep. Med. 4, 101313 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Wang, X. et al. Transformer-based unsupervised contrastive learning for histopathological image classification. Med. Image Anal. 81, 102559 (2022).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Zhang, X., Zhou, X., Lin, M. & Sun, J. ShuffleNet: an extremely efficient convolutional neural network for mobile devices. In 2018 IEEE/CVF Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition 6848–6856 (IEEE, 2018); https://doi.org/10.1109/CVPR.2018.00716.
Russakovsky, O. et al. ImageNet large scale visual recognition challenge. Int. J. Comput. Vis. 115, 211–252 (2015).
Article
Google Scholar
Mertins, P. et al. Proteogenomics connects somatic mutations to signaling in breast cancer. Nature 534, 55–62 (2016).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Carpenter, J. E. & Clarke, C. L. Biobanking sustainability—experiences of the Australian Breast Cancer Tissue Bank (ABCTB). Biopreserv. Biobank. 12, 395–401 (2014).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Yule, G. U. Notes on the theory of association of attributes in statistics. Biometrika 2, 121–134 (1903).
Article
Google Scholar
Bonovas, S. & Piovani, D. Simpson's paradox in clinical research: a cautionary tale. J. Clin. Med. 12, 1633 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Pan, J.-W. et al. The molecular landscape of Asian breast cancers reveals clinically relevant population-specific differences. Nat. Commun. 11, 6433 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Morris, V. K. et al. Phase 1/2 trial of encorafenib, cetuximab, and nivolumab in microsatellite stable BRAFV600E metastatic colorectal cancer. Cancer Cell 43, 2106–2118.e3 (2025).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Graham, S. et al. Screening of normal endoscopic large bowel biopsies with interpretable graph learning: a retrospective study. Gut 72, 1709–1721 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Howard, F. M. et al. The impact of site-specific digital histology signatures on deep learning model accuracy and bias. Nat. Commun. 12, 4423 (2021).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Schölkopf, B. in Probabilistic and Causal Inference: The Works of Judea Pearl 765–804 (Association for Computing Machinery, 2022).
Koboldt, D. C. et al. Comprehensive molecular portraits of human breast tumours. Nature 490, 61–70 (2012).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Hoadley, K. A. et al. Cell-of-origin patterns dominate the molecular classification of 10,000 tumors from 33 types of cancer. Cell 173, 291–304 (2018).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
CAS
Google Scholar
Pocock, J. et al. TIAToolbox as an end-to-end library for advanced tissue image analytics. Commun. Med. 2, 1–14 (2022).
Article
Google Scholar
Kingma, D. P. & Ba, J. Adam: A method for stochastic optimization. In International Conference on Learning Representations (ICLR, 2015).
Ojala, M. & Garriga, G. C. Permutation tests for studying classifier performance. In 2009 Ninth IEEE International Conference on Data Mining 908–913 (IEEE, 2009); https://doi.org/10.1109/ICDM.2009.108
Chaibub Neto, E. et al. A permutation approach to assess confounding in machine learning applications for digital health. In Proc. 25th ACM SIGKDD International Conference on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining 54–64 (Association for Computing Machinery, 2019); https://doi.org/10.1145/3292500.3330903
Download references
M.D. acknowledges support from the GSK-Warwick PhD Studentship and the Department of Computer Science, University of Warwick. F.M. and N.R. were partially supported by the PathLAKE consortium, which was funded by the Data to Early Diagnosis and Precision Medicine strand of the government's Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund, managed and delivered by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). F.M. also acknowledges funding support from EPSRC grant no. EP/W02909X/1. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish or preparation of the manuscript.
Predictive Systems in Biomedicine Lab, Department of Computer Science, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
Muhammad Dawood & Fayyaz ul Amir Afsar Minhas
Tissue Image Analytics Centre, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
Muhammad Dawood, Nasir Rajpoot & Fayyaz ul Amir Afsar Minhas
Nuffield Division of Clinical Laboratory Sciences, Radcliffe Department of Medicine, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Muhammad Dawood
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, GSK, San Francisco, CA, USA
Kim Branson
Digestive Oncology, Department of Oncology, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
Sabine Tejpar
Histofy Ltd, Coventry, UK
Nasir Rajpoot
Warwick Cancer Research Centre, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK
Fayyaz ul Amir Afsar Minhas
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
F.M. and M.D. designed the study with support from co-authors. F.M. and M.D. wrote the code and analysed the experimental results. N.R., K.B. and F.M. secured the funding. F.M. and N.R. supervised the study. S.T. provided pathological and oncological input. M.D. and F.M. visualized and verified the underlying data. M.D. and F.M. drafted the manuscript with input from co-authors. All authors had full access to all the data in the study and had the final decision to submit for publication.
Correspondence to
Muhammad Dawood or Fayyaz ul Amir Afsar Minhas.
M.D. conducted this study during his PhD at the University of Warwick, UK. M.D. received PhD studentship support from GSK. K.B. is an employee of GSK. N.R. is the founding Director, CEO and CSO of Histofy Ltd. FM holds shares in Histofy Ltd with no operational involvement. The other authors declare no competing interests.
Nature Biomedical Engineering thanks Lee Cooper, Nikos Paragios and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Peer reviewer reports are available.
Publisher's note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary Discussion 1.1, Figs. 1–8 and Tables 1–4.
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Reprints and permissions
Dawood, M., Branson, K., Tejpar, S. et al. Confounding factors and biases abound when predicting molecular biomarkers from histological images.
Nat. Biomed. Eng (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-026-01616-8
Download citation
Received: 30 August 2024
Accepted: 16 January 2026
Published: 02 March 2026
Version of record: 02 March 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41551-026-01616-8
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
Advertisement
Nature Biomedical Engineering
(Nat. Biomed. Eng)
ISSN 2157-846X (online)
© 2026 Springer Nature Limited
Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Cancer newsletter — what matters in cancer research, free to your inbox weekly.
The copper and leather device represents the first evidence of mechanical tools from Egypt's pre-Pharaonic history.
Gear-obsessed editors choose every product we review. We may earn commission if you buy from a link. Why Trust Us?
Here's what you'll learn when you read this story:
A simple handheld copper “bow drill” from ancient Egypt is yielding new insights more than 100 years after it was first found. The small copper alloy object was originally discovered at Badari in Upper Egypt in the 1920s, inside an adult male's grave dubbed Grave 3932. Now roughly 100 years later, researchers from Newcastle University and the Academy of Fine Arts, Vienna, have recognized the artifact's immense importance in the history of tool use. They shared their findings in a study recently published in the journal Egypt and the Levant.
The research team examined the piece under magnification and concluded that it represents the earliest identified rotary metal drill from ancient Egypt's Predynastic period in the late fourth millennium B.C.E.—the age before the first pharaohs ruled.
“The ancient Egyptians are famous for stone temples, painted tombs, and dazzling jewelry, but behind those achievements lay practical, everyday technologies that rarely survive in the archaeological record,” Martin Odler, visiting fellow in Newcastle University's School of History, Classics, and Archaeology, said in a statement about the research he co-authored. “One of the most important was the drill: A tool used to pierce wood, stone, and beads, enabling everything from furniture-making to ornament production.”
Weighing a slight 1.5 grams and measuring just over two inches long, the artifact was originally catalogued as “a little awl of copper, with some leather thong wound round it.” With such a mundane description, it sat unstudied for a century. That all changed when the research team took a liking to it and found that it featured wear consistent with drilling, highlighted by fine striations, rounded edges, and a slight curvature at the working tip. All the evidence pointed to rotary motion, not just simple puncturing.
The six coils of the leather, now extremely fragile, represent the remnants of the bowstring used to power the drill—an ancient version of a drill strap. The leather wrapping on the shaft allowed the user to spin the drill quicker than turning it solely by hand. It also meant the drill could penetrate a surface more forcefully.
“The re-analysis has provided strong evidence that this object was used as a bow drill—which would have produced a faster, more controlled drilling action than simply pushing or twisting an awl-like tool by hand,” Odler said. “This suggests that Egyptian craftspeople mastered reliable rotary drilling more than two millennia before some of the best-preserved drill sets.”
The recognition of the drill's great age puts the history of similar tools in a new perspective. The oldest bow drills previously known to archaeologists are 2,000 years newer, and depictions of such drills even appeared in tomb scenes created around 1500 B.C.E. But archaeologists are now aware that those examples are fairly recent pieces of a much longer history of tool use in Egypt.
“The technological continuity observed across nearly two millennia stresses the enduring utility of the bow drill and accentuates its significance in both woodworking and bead production,” the authors wrote. “This re-evaluation not only enriches our understanding of early Egyptian tool use but also raises intriguing questions about early metallurgical knowledge and interregional interactions in the ancient Near East.”
To further explore the bow drill, researchers subjected it to chemical analysis and portable X-ray fluorescence, finding it was crafted with an unusual copper alloy. “The drill contains arsenic and nickel, with notable amounts of lead and silver,” co-author Jiri Kmosek said in a statement. “Such a recipe would have produced a harder, and visually distinctive, metal compared with standard copper. The presence of silver and lead may hint at deliberate alloying choices and, potentially, wider networks of materials or know-how linking Egypt to the broader ancient Eastern Mediterranean in the fourth millennium B.C.E.”
Tim Newcomb is a journalist based in the Pacific Northwest. He covers stadiums, sneakers, gear, infrastructure, and more for a variety of publications, including Popular Mechanics. His favorite interviews have included sit-downs with Roger Federer in Switzerland, Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles, and Tinker Hatfield in Portland.
Lost Spanish Castle Revealed in Belgium
Experts Found Human Remains With No Relatives
Everything We Know About Stonehenge Might Be Wrong
Two Explorers Found 3-Century-Old Pirate Treasure
Archaeologists Found an Untouched Ancient Tomb
A 5,500-Year-Old Burial Mystery Wraps with a Shock
Authorities Tracked Looters to a Cave of Artifacts
This Mosaic Shows a Lost Version of the Trojan War
Sarcophagus Sealed for 2,000 Years Finally Opened
The Real Meaning of the Statues on Easter Island
Scientists Found a Shipwreck Full of Porcelain
Archaeologists Find Ancient Celtic Burial Chamber
A Part of Hearst Digital Media
We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back.
©2026 Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Incredible discoveries keep happening in the most unlikely places.
AT FIRST, THE skeleton in grave 134 seemed unremarkable.In 2018, archaeologists in Germany descended upon the ancient town of Nida, about a mile and a half outside Frankfurt. The archaeologists focused their attention on excavating a cemetery. Here they would look at more than 100 plots where people had been buried, often with objects.
So when the archaeologists came upon grave 134 and saw what appeared to be a necklace resting below the skeleton's chin, they weren't shocked or overly curious. The male, estimated to be 35 to 40 years old at the time of his death, had no observable injuries or abnormalities. In fact, he appeared to have been in otherwise good health.
But then the archaeologists took a closer look at the amulet from grave 134. The inch-long silver charm held a fragile, broken piece of foil that seemed to have writing on it. The amulet, it turned out, was a phylactery—and that 1,800-year-old trinket would alter the course of what we thought we knew about Christianity and European history.
At the time of the excavation, however, archaeologist Markus Scholz could only determine that the amulet contained a small piece of rolled-up foil with 18 lines of Latin written on it. Deciphering what it said would take years.
“[I]t quickly became clear that it would be impossible to physically unroll the scroll—which would have simply crumbled to pieces,” said Scholz, a professor at Goethe University in Frankfurt who was part of the excavation team. Scholz and his colleagues attempted to read the scroll using microscopes, and in 2020 they performed an x-ray analysis, where the team unrolled the foil segment by segment. But they still couldn't make out the text.
Then in 2024, Scholz and the team tried computed tomography, which combines x-rays and computer processing to analyze cross-sections of an object. Incredibly, the resulting image revealed enough details for the team to make out what was inscribed on the foil. “I couldn't believe my own eyes for a while,” Scholz said.
Their work wasn't done, however. Some of the passages were easy to translate, but others had multiple meanings—leaving some elements open to interpretation. After years of debate, most scholars now agree that the lines, now known as the Frankfurt Silver Inscription, invoke Christ. One portion reads:
(In the name) of St. Titus.
Holy, holy, holy!
In the name of Jesus Christ, Son of God!
The lord of the world
resists to the best of his [ability]
all seizures/setbacks.
The god grants well-being
Admission.
This rescue device protects
the person who
surrenders to the will
of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
since before Jesus Christ
bend all knees: the heavenly ones,
the earthly and
the subterranean, and every tongue
confess (to Jesus Christ).
The inscription has powerful implications, suggesting that Christianity had spread from the Roman Empire's base in Italy much earlier than historians thought, into the heart of what we now know as Germany. The inscription also suggests that the man in grave 134 was a devout Christian—a dangerous thing to be at that time, when the Roman Empire often punished Christians with death.
Today, researchers are still trying to finesse the inscription's meaning and learn who the man wearing the amulet was. Scholz recognizes the sheer serendipity that had been necessary for archaeologists to have found the amulet in the first place. “It remains an absolute stroke of luck,” Scholz said. “Many archaeological findings are generated more like a large jigsaw puzzle.”
That kind of serendipitous luck fuels many modern archaeological finds that have altered what we think we know about history. It's not an uncommon story—farmers digging a well stumble upon China's Terracotta Army; a man hunting for his lost chickens finds the underground city of Derinkuyu in Turkey; a construction crew discovers 51 decapitated Viking warriors near Weymouth in southern England.
And these auspicious finds are still happening regularly. Like the discovery within grave 134, the three below have rewritten our understanding of history, changed the fortunes of ordinary people, or solved centuries-old mysteries.
THE FARMER WHO STUMBLED UPON $2 MILLION WORTH OF CIVIL WAR GOLD
LOCATION: KENTUCKY / DATE: JUNE 2023
IN JUNE 2023, a farmer shot a shaky video from a Kentucky cornfield. “This is the most insane thing ever,” he pants while piling up gold coins in front of the camera.
Indeed, it was quite unbelievable: The farmer had found piles of Civil War–era gold coins hiding just under the surface of his field. There was no treasure chest, not even a can or cigar box to hold the loot. Just gold coins everywhere. Their quality was astonishing: more than 700 near-pristine coins dated between 1840 and 1863, including 18 prized 1863 gold Liberty Double Eagles. The Liberty Double Eagles were particularly valuable, especially in their condition: In a 2014 auction, just one Double Eagle fetched thousands of dollars. Numismatists have estimated that the total value of the treasure is more than $2 million.
The coins drew attention for their historical value too. Many wondered how so many pristine coins ended up strewn across a Kentucky field. Professional and amateur historians unraveled clues and developed theories. The fact that the coins were in near-mint condition suggested that they hadn't been in circulation for long, if at all. And their owner was likely a Confederate; Southerners at that time during the war had few options for depositing money into banks and expecting to be able to retrieve it later. Many buried their fortunes.
However, some experts believe the coins were produced by the Philadelphia Mint, noting the perfect condition of the 1863 Gold Liberty Double Eagles and the lack of identifying marks—the latter a hallmark of coins minted there. Ryan McNutt, an associate professor at Georgia Southern University who focuses on conflict archaeology, believes that whoever had them “was potentially engaged in selling goods or trading goods with the U.S. government or military. That's really the only way you're going to get access to that kind of coinage.”
A secret operative with a stash of perfect gold coins—it's the stuff of Hollywood and one of the greatest treasure finds in American history.
THE DENTIST WHO UNRAVELED A SECRET CODE IN A DA VINCI DRAWING
LOCATION: ENGLAND / DATE: MARCH 2025
LEONARDO DA VINCI'S Vitruvian Man is among history's most famous works of art, as recognizable as the Mona Lisa. It also has held a secret that stumped artists and mathematicians for centuries—until a dentist came along.
Unlike the Mona Lisa, Vitruvian Man isn't completely original. The work was inspired by the writings of the Roman architect Vitruvius in De architectura (On Architecture), where he contemplates the unique symmetry of the human body. Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man shows a spread-eagled man with his arms and legs in two positions: feet closed and arms extended at 90-degree angles, like a tree, and angled out like an X. Outside the body, Da Vinci drew a circle and a square, showing how human anatomy could fit neatly within those incongruous shapes.
Most art historians believed those two shapes were the only ones present in Vitruvian Man. But within its clean lines was a secret dating back to Vitruvius, who suggested that the perfect proportions of the human form could be achieved by a geometric relationship. Vitruvius, however, kept the geometric relationship a tantalizing secret.
That is, until the summer of 2025, when Rory Mac Sweeney, a British dentist, took a long look at Vitruvian Man. He picked up on something oddly familiar in the way the figure's legs were spread out: To him, the shape they made resembled a human mandible. His “aha moment” brought to mind what dentists call Bonwill's triangle, where the ideal jawbone structure contains a perfect equilateral triangle formed by the incisors at the front of the mouth and the rear of the jawbones.
The shapes embedded within the artwork are positioned in a way that was, in true Vitruvian form, simple yet beautiful. Beyond the equilateral triangle, Mac Sweeney identified five more equilateral triangles nestled in Vitruvian Man's body shape, with the figure's navel acting as the focal point. The six equilateral triangles form a hexagon—a geometric shape that answers the centuries-old question about how Da Vinci was able to create the perfect human figure. The answer had been right there all along.
Explaining the stunning geometry to dentists and art historians alike, however, was more difficult. “Clinical dentistry focuses on immediate treatment concerns, not evolutionary geometry,” he said. “Art historians I approached were unfamiliar with craniofacial biomechanics.
“The enthusiasm I felt was matched by isolation in discussing it.”
Nevertheless, Mac Sweeney published an article in the Journal of Mathematics and the Arts offering his unique insight into Da Vinci's cryptic puzzle. And art historians have taken notice, thanks to his dental knowledge and curious eye. For his part, Mac Sweeney doesn't think his coming upon the hidden geometry of Vitruvian Man was luck. “Discovery feels like communion with nature's underlying logic,” he reflected. “You're not inventing connections; you're recognizing patterns that were always present, waiting for the right perspective to render them visible.”
THE PLUMBER WHO PULLED A ROPE, REVEALING A LONG-BURIED TREASURE CHEST
LOCATION: AUSTRIA / DATE: NOVEMBER 2024
HOME RENOVATION PROJECTS can feel like a money sink. But an Austrian plumber actually made a fortune while working on a basement in a Viennese villa in the city's Penzing district.
The plumber had arrived to work on a basement demolition when he spied a rope sticking out of the basement floor. Curious, he poked around the surrounding concrete, and then pulled on the cord. After a few unsuccessful attempts, the plumber dug with a shovel, yanked the rope again, and uncovered a rusty metal box covered in concrete.
What he uncovered was stunning: a treasure chest filled with 66 pounds of gold coins, each stamped with composer Wolfgang Mozart's image and dating back before World War II. The haul is worth an estimated $2.7 million today.
“This is truly unbelievable,” the plumber told the German talk show Today. “I have been working on construction sites since I was 15. You occasionally find a coin or two, but a discovery like this is incredible.”
Tim Newcomb is a journalist based in the Pacific Northwest. He covers stadiums, sneakers, gear, infrastructure, and more for a variety of publications, including Popular Mechanics. His favorite interviews have included sit-downs with Roger Federer in Switzerland, Kobe Bryant in Los Angeles, and Tinker Hatfield in Portland.
Tanya Basu is a features editor at Popular Mechanics. Her work has been published in MIT Technology Review, The Daily Beast, and The Atlantic, among other places. Prior to being a journalist, she toyed with the idea of being an economist before deciding journalism was more her speed. Aside from her work, she is a competent knitter, an overly ambitious cook, and has a bad habit of buying more books than she can actually read.
A Dead Man and a Code Even the FBI Can't Solve
The 25 Best STEM Toy Gifts for Boys
The World Is Running Out of Sand
FBI's New D.B. Cooper File Reveals New Facts
Was Jesus Really a Psychedelic Mushroom?
The Pokémon Lego Sets Hit the Shelves for Pokémon Day
Inside the World's Most Deadly Cave Diving Disasters
Escape From the Rock
Why the CIA Turned a California Brothel Into a Lab
Don't Wait to Grab These Editor-Approved Lego Deals
The 12 Best “Star Wars” Lego Sets
Meet the New Premium Grogu Lego Set
A Part of Hearst Digital Media
We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back.
©2026 Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Advertisement
Dashun Wang is the Kellogg Chair of Technology and the founding director of the Northwestern Innovation Institute at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, USA.
Search author on:
PubMed
Google Scholar
Illustration: Nico H. Brausch
In the early 1980s, Apple co-founder Steve Jobs described the computer as “a bicycle for our minds”. He was inspired by a Scientific American graphic he'd encountered as a boy, showing that a human on a bicycle is more energy-efficient than any animal1. The metaphor captured the promise of personal computing: tools that enable people to go further and faster with less effort. But the deeper brilliance of bicycles lies in what they do not do: they do not mimic human biology, nor any form found in nature. The bicycle reimagined motion entirely.
By comparison, I propose that artificial-intelligence agents are aeroplanes for the mind — they can speed things up for humans even more than bicycles do, but they are harder to control and the consequences of mistakes can be huge. And scientists are particularly poised to benefit from these tools. Scientific research is, at its core, a journey into the unknown. Yet working in new terrains brings unexpected challenges2 and frequent failures3.
Why we don't really know what the public thinks about science
Why we don't really know what the public thinks about science
To push the frontiers of knowledge forwards quickly and responsibly, science and scientists urgently need a playbook for flying these aeroplanes. In my view, effective use of AI in research will probably require the development of AI agents that are grounded in robust, domain-specific scientific information. The real question is not whether machines will replace scientists, but what kind of scientists we will become when we learn to fly them.
To put this into practice, my team developed SciSciGPT4, a prototype multi-agent system in which several specialized AI agents divide and coordinate research workflows. We used the science of science5 — a field that combines large data sets and computational methods to probe the dynamics of scientific progress.
At the heart of SciSciGPT is the ResearchManager agent. It orchestrates the workflow, dividing a researcher's natural-language query entered through a chat interface into tasks then delegating them to agents that specialize in literature review, data extraction or analysis. These agents plan and execute sub-tasks — retrieving publications, writing code, running analyses and generating figures — while the EvaluationSpecialist continuously audits their output. Each step is logged, creating a transparent end-to-end provenance record.
In our case studies4, SciSciGPT created a visualization of collaborations between a group of universities and tested whether a figure in a paper could be replicated from data in its repository. It completed these research tasks faster and with higher-quality results than experienced researchers did using AI tools.
Here, I outline the lessons that my team learnt from building a research-focused AI agent and the principles that scientists should consider when using agents for science.
The temptation today is to fully automate scientific workflows6–8, switching to ‘AI scientists' or ‘self-driving laboratories' that generate hypotheses, design experiments and draft manuscripts end-to-end. These systems can be dazzling, but science is not an assembly line, nor does it have fixed objectives to optimize. It is an enterprise that is built on interpretation, contestation and responsibility, in which human judgement is crucial.
For example, a fully automated system could conduct Newton's prism experiments, measuring how white light splits as it passes through a prism and fitting those data to a model. But Newton did something categorically different: he reversed the set-up, recomposing the coloured beams back into white light, decisively showing that colour belongs to light itself, not to the glass. That act — deciding that an apparent anomaly was the phenomenon rather than an error to eliminate — was a leap of interpretation, not computation. Automated workflows, by design, smooth out anomalies and optimize towards fit. Scientists, by contrast, exploit surprise.
We need a new ethics for a world of AI agents
We need a new ethics for a world of AI agents
As AI tools become central to research, science faces not only a technological inflection point but also a civic one. The legitimacy of science rests on a shared social contract: that conclusions are open to scrutiny, that authors stand behind their evidence and that knowledge is produced in good faith for the public good.
In an era when public confidence in science is already fragile, this is the moment to strengthen the foundations that sustain it and to renew that contract by embedding transparency, traceability and accountability into the infrastructure of discovery itself. Full automation might deliver some answers, but it would erode the credibility that gives those answers meaning.
The more durable path is pilot-in-command science, in which the researcher — the captain — is assisted by an ensemble of agents that act as the crew and serve the best interests of the captain. The crew would be made up of an analyst agent to draft, a critic to probe, a planner to map next steps and an orchestrator to keep them in sync.
Interfaces should be built for steerability and disagreement, inviting researchers to inspect reasoning, compare alternatives and override conclusions. And human scientists should retain authority over — and responsibility for — framing the question, validating the path and signing off on conclusions. Making this model robust will require deliberate collaboration between scientists specializing in the domain of the study, engineers who work on AI, designers and ethicists to ensure that agents amplify human creativity rather than replace it.
Throughout history, discoveries have been made by humans. As AI becomes capable of contributing to discovery, the central question is not what machines can do alone, but how we design them to keep science accountable and reproducible.
When the cost of failure collapses, riskier and more ambitious ideas become rational, making it practical to test questions that were once too costly or time-consuming.
Genomics illustrates this shift: decoding the first human genome took more than a decade and billions of dollars; today, sequencing costs less than US$1,000 and takes hours, transforming the field from studies of individual genes to broad exploration of entire genomes. And with the shift came fresh vantage points, enabling researchers to see connections across the scientific landscape that were otherwise invisible.
Speed also changes who can ask the questions. Lowered technical and temporal barriers enable small labs, newcomers and even individual researchers to tackle analyses that once required large teams and months of coordination. But the same forces that accelerate discovery can also amplify error. Fast science without reflection risks converging on mistakes at scale. This reinforces the importance of human–AI collaboration rather than full automation.
SciSciGPT was a natural first test case: the science of science is rich in data and methodologically diverse, and it studies how discovery itself works. But the same idea applies across disciplines, although the training data that grounds these agents will differ. Each field has its own foundations — its texts, data sets, tools and standards. In chemistry, this might mean databases tied to kinetic models that predict reaction rates and highlight where experiments tend to fail; in biomedicine, clinical guidelines linked to trial data, diagnostic protocols and multimodal patient information; in mathematics, formalized proof libraries.
AI research agents will look different in each field, but they should follow the same basic rules: results should be traceable, methods verifiable and responsibilities assigned clearly. Establishing those rules will require coordination between scientific societies, funders, journals, public research infrastructures and the AI labs building today's models. The goal is a shared public–private framework for interoperability — for instance, common standards for logging agent decisions so that an analysis run in one lab can be audited or reproduced by another.
Some laboratories are trying to automate research work by using ‘AI scientists' that perform projects from start to finish.Credit: Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty
My team's research shows that AI's benefits to science are widespread across disciplines9. But when we analysed university syllabuses to examine how much each discipline teaches AI-related courses, we found a systematic mismatch: AI education is concentrated in computer science, mathematics and engineering, even though disciplines that could benefit just as much — from medicine and psychology to economics — offer much less training9.
At the same time, academia remains organized around departmental silos that drift farther apart as the burden of knowledge rises. Science policymakers should recognize these frictions and support institute-style structures that cut across disciplines and enable sustained collaboration between AI experts and domain scientists.
When bicycles crash, the consequences are generally localized. Aeroplanes are different: when they crash, it can be catastrophic for everyone on board, often with collateral damage on the ground. That is the difference in scale that we face with AI agents. As they flourish, their failures won't just inconvenience a single researcher; they could mislead fields, redirect funding and erode public trust in science.
One crucial advantage of large language models (LLMs) is that they can write. This means that they can document everything that they do in plain-language text. In our SciSciGPT project, every step, every line of code and every decision that the system generated was logged automatically by an LLM. The result was an overwhelming amount of data, but it was transformative. Even when my best students do an experiment, I cannot expect to see or reconstruct every step that led them to a result. With agents, I can.
AI could transform research assessment — and some academics are worried
AI could transform research assessment — and some academics are worried
Yet this brings another challenge: too much information. Some researchers complain that checking the AI's output can take longer than doing the work themselves. The solution is to log not more, but better: to design systems that turn raw provenance into understanding.
or
Nature 651, 32-34 (2026)
doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-026-00665-y
Wilson, S. S. Sci. Am. 228, 81–91 (1973).
Article
Google Scholar
Hill, R. et al. Nature 642, 999–1006 (2025).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Yin, Y., Wang, Y., Evans, J. A. & Wang, D. Nature 575, 190–194 (2019).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Shao, E. et al. Nature Comput. Sci. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43588-025-00906-6 (2025).
Article
Google Scholar
Wang, D. & Barabási, A.-L. The Science of Science (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2021).
Google Scholar
Lu, C. et al. Preprint at arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2408.06292 (2024).
Abolhasani, M. & Kumacheva, E. Nature Synth. 2, 483–492 (2023).
Article
Google Scholar
King, R. D. et al. Science 324, 85–89 (2009).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Gao, J. & Wang, D. Nature Hum. Behav. 8, 2281–2292 (2024).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Breznau, N. et al. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 119, e2203150119 (2022).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Shin, M., Kim, J., van Opheusden, B. & Griffiths, T. L. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 120, e2214840120 (2023).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Hao, Q., Xu, F., Li, Y. & Evans, J. Nature 649, 1237–1243 (2026).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Doshi, A. R. & Hauser, O. P. Sci. Adv. 10, eadn5290 (2024).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
David, P. A. Am. Econ. Rev. 80, 355–361 (1990).
Google Scholar
Mullainathan, S. & Rambachan, A. Science in the Age of Algorithms (National Bureau of Economic Research, 2025).
Google Scholar
Download references
Reprints and permissions
The author declares no competing interests.
Why we don't really know what the public thinks about science
We need a new ethics for a world of AI agents
AI could transform research assessment — and some academics are worried
I'm going to halve my publication output. You should consider slow science, too
This AI can improve your peer review — and make it more polite
News 23 FEB 26
AI is threatening science jobs. Which ones are most at risk?
News 20 FEB 26
‘An AlphaFold 4' — scientists marvel at DeepMind drug spin-off's exclusive new AI
News 19 FEB 26
Pop-up journals for policy research: can temporary titles deliver answers?
Nature Index 25 FEB 26
We need a global assessment of avoidable climate-change risks
Comment 25 FEB 26
Defunding Chile's climate research will undermine science and the region
Correspondence 24 FEB 26
What's the best way to change research fields? These three scientists have ideas
Career Feature 25 FEB 26
The Contributor Role Taxonomy tool must serve to record extent of authorship
Correspondence 24 FEB 26
Historically Black US universities chase top research ranking
Career News 23 FEB 26
Nu Quantum are seeking applications for an AMO Physicist
Cambridge, Cambridgeshire (GB)
Nu Quantum
Nu Quantum are seeking applications for a Head of Quantum Hardware
Cambridge, Cambridgeshire (GB)
Nu Quantum
Nu Quantum are seeking applications for a Senior AMO Physicist
Cambridge, Cambridgeshire (GB)
Nu Quantum
Seeking scientists in pathobiology, immunology, vaccinology, epidemiology, drug discovery, focusing on microbial infections and inflammations.
Hangzhou, Zhejiang (CN)
Center for Infectious Disease Research, Westlake University
We seek outstanding applicants for full-time tenure-track/tenured faculty positions. Positions are available for both junior and senior-level.
Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
Southern University of Science and Technology (Biomedical Engineering)
Why we don't really know what the public thinks about science
We need a new ethics for a world of AI agents
AI could transform research assessment — and some academics are worried
I'm going to halve my publication output. You should consider slow science, too
An essential round-up of science news, opinion and analysis, delivered to your inbox every weekday.
Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.
Nature
(Nature)
ISSN 1476-4687 (online)
ISSN 0028-0836 (print)
© 2026 Springer Nature Limited
March 2, 2026
5 min read
He built the ultimate test for humanoid robots, and they beat it in months
Roboticist Benjie Holson created the “Humanoid Olympic Games” thinking home robots were 15 years away. Then they started folding the laundry
By Deni Ellis Béchard edited by Eric Sullivan
Dressed as a robot, Benjie Holson demonstrates the silver medal challenge in his proposed Humanoid Olympics. In this challenge, a robot needs to cook and plate a sunny-side up egg.
Benjie Holson
Last September roboticist Benjie Holson posted the “Humanoid Olympic Games”: a set of increasingly difficult tests for humanoid robots that he demonstrated himself while dressed in a silver bodysuit. The challenges, such as opening a door with a round doorknob, started out easy, at least for a human, and progressed to “gold medal” tasks such as properly buttoning and hanging up a men's dress shirt and using a key to open a door.
Holson's point was that the hard tasks aren't the dazzling ones. While other competitions feature robots playing sports and dancing, Holson argued that the robots we actually want are the ones that can do laundry and cook meals.
He expected the challenges to take years to resolve. Instead, within months, robotics company Physical Intelligence completed 11 of the 15 challenges—from bronze to gold—with a robot that washed windows, spread peanut butter and used a dog poop bag.
If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today.
Scientific American spoke to Holson about why vision-only, or camera-based, systems are outperforming his expectations and how close we are to a genuinely useful machine. He has since released a new, more difficult set of challenges.
[An edited transcript of the interview follows.]
You designed these challenges to be hard. Were you surprised by how quickly the results came in?
It was so much faster than I was expecting. When I chose the challenges, I was trying to calibrate them so some bronze ones would get done in the first month or two, then silver and gold in the next six months, and the most difficult ones might take a year or a year and a half. To have them do basically almost all of them in the first three months is wild.
What made that possible?
I started with the premise that we have things that look impressive at a fairly narrow set of tasks—vision-only, no touch, simple manipulator, not incredible precision. That limits what you can be good at. I tried to think of tasks that would require us to break forward out of that set. It turns out I wildly underestimated what's possible with vision-only and simple manipulators.
When I visited Physical Intelligence, I learned they don't have any force sensing. They're doing all of that 100 percent vision-based. The key-insertion task, the peanut butter spreading—I thought those would require force inputs. But apparently you just throw more video demonstrations at it, and it works.
How exactly do you train a robot to do that without coding it line by line?
It's all learning from demonstration. Somebody teleoperates the robot doing the task hundreds of times, they train a model based on that, and then the robot can do the task.
There is a lot of confusion about whether large language models (LLMs) are useless for robots. Are they?
I used to be fairly dubious of the utility of LLMs in robotics. The problem they were good at solving two or three years ago was high-level planning—“If I want to make tea, what are the steps?” Ordering the steps is the easy part. Picking up the teapot and filling it is the really challenging thing.
On the other hand, we've started doing vision-action models using the same transformer architecture [as that used in LLMs]. You can use transformers for text in, text out, images in, text out—but also images in, robot actions out.
The neat thing is they're starting with models pretrained on text, images, maybe video. Before you even start training your specific task, the AI already understands what a teapot is, what water is, that you might want to fill a teapot with water. So while training your task, it doesn't have to start from, “Let me figure out what geometry is.” It can start with, “I see, we're moving teapots around”—which is wild that it works.
How did you come up with the “Olympic” tasks?
So part of it was a challenge and part of it was a prediction. I tried to think of the next set of things that we can't do now that someone's going to be able to do soon.
Humans rely on touch to do things such as finding keys in a pocket. How do we get around that in robotics?
That's a very good question we don't know the answer to yet. Touch technology is way worse, more expensive, delicate and far behind cameras. Cameras, we've been working on for a long time.
The big question is: Are cameras enough? Both Physical Intelligence and Sunday Robotics [which completed the bronze-medal task of rolling matched socks] have made the bet that putting a camera on the wrist, very close to the fingers, lets you kind of see forces by seeing how everything smushes. When the robot grabs something, it sees the fingers have some rubber that deflects; the object deflects, and it infers forces from that. When smearing peanut butter on bread, the robot watches the knife deflect down and crush the bread and judges forces from that. It works way better than I expected.
What about safety?
The energy needed to stay balanced is often quite high. If a robot is falling, that's a very fast, hard acceleration to get the leg in front in time. Your system has to inject a lot of energy into the world—and that's what's unsafe.
I'm a huge fan of centaur robots—mobile wheel base with arms and a head. For safety, that's such an easier way to get there quickly. If a humanoid loses power, it's going to fall down. The general plan seems like it's to make a robot so incredibly valuable that we as a society create a new safety class for it—like bicycles and cars. They're dangerous but so valuable that we tolerate the risk.
Have these results changed your time line?
I used to think home robots were at least 15 years away. Now I think at least six. The difference is I thought it would be much longer before doing a useful thing in a human space, even as a demo, was plausible.
But roboticists have seen time and again there's a long road between “it worked in a lab and I got a video” and “I can sell a product.” Waymo was driving on roads in 2009; I couldn't buy a ride until 2024. It takes a long time to get reliability squared away.
What's the biggest bottleneck left?
Reliability and safety—the stuff Physical Intelligence shows is incredibly impressive, but if you put it on a different table with different lighting and use a different sock, it might not work. Each step toward generalization seems to take an order of magnitude more data, turning days of data collection into weeks or months.
Deni Ellis Béchard is Scientific American's senior writer for technology. He is author of 10 books and has received a Commonwealth Writers' Prize, a Midwest Book Award and a Nautilus Book Award for investigative journalism. He holds two master's degrees in literature, as well as a master's degree in biology from Harvard University. His most recent novel, We Are Dreams in the Eternal Machine, explores the ways that artificial intelligence could transform humanity. You can follow him on X, Instagram and Bluesky @denibechard
If you enjoyed this article, I'd like to ask for your support. Scientific American has served as an advocate for science and industry for 180 years, and right now may be the most critical moment in that two-century history.
I've been a Scientific American subscriber since I was 12 years old, and it helped shape the way I look at the world. SciAm always educates and delights me, and inspires a sense of awe for our vast, beautiful universe. I hope it does that for you, too.
If you subscribe to Scientific American, you help ensure that our coverage is centered on meaningful research and discovery; that we have the resources to report on the decisions that threaten labs across the U.S.; and that we support both budding and working scientists at a time when the value of science itself too often goes unrecognized.
In return, you get essential news, captivating podcasts, brilliant infographics, can't-miss newsletters, must-watch videos, challenging games, and the science world's best writing and reporting. You can even gift someone a subscription.
There has never been a more important time for us to stand up and show why science matters. I hope you'll support us in that mission.
Thank you,
David M. Ewalt, Editor in Chief, Scientific American
Subscribe to Scientific American to learn and share the most exciting discoveries, innovations and ideas shaping our world today.
Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers.
© 2025 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, A DIVISION OF SPRINGER NATURE AMERICA, INC.ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
Researchers at Oregon State University have created a new nanomaterial designed to destroy cancer cells from the inside. The material activates two separate chemical reactions once inside a tumor cell, overwhelming it with oxidative stress while leaving surrounding healthy tissue unharmed.
The work, led by Oleh Taratula, Olena Taratula, and Chao Wang from the OSU College of Pharmacy, was published in Advanced Functional Materials.
Advancing Chemodynamic Therapy
The discovery strengthens the growing field of chemodynamic therapy or CDT. This emerging cancer treatment strategy takes advantage of the unique chemical conditions found inside tumors. Compared with normal tissue, cancer cells tend to be more acidic and contain higher levels of hydrogen peroxide.
Traditional CDT uses these tumor conditions to spark the formation of hydroxyl radicals, highly reactive molecules made of oxygen and hydrogen that contain an unpaired electron. These reactive oxygen species damage cells through oxidation, stripping electrons from essential components such as lipids, proteins, and DNA.
More recent CDT approaches have also succeeded in generating singlet oxygen inside tumors. Singlet oxygen is another reactive oxygen species, named for its single electron spin state rather than the three spin states seen in the more stable oxygen molecules present in the air.
Overcoming Limits of Existing CDT Agents
"However, existing CDT agents are limited," Oleh Taratula said. "They efficiently generate either radical hydroxyls or singlet oxygen but not both, and they often lack sufficient catalytic activity to sustain robust reactive oxygen species production. Consequently, preclinical studies often only show partial tumor regression and not a durable therapeutic benefit."
To address these shortcomings, the team developed a new CDT nanoagent built from an iron-based metal-organic framework or MOF. This structure is capable of producing both hydroxyl radicals and singlet oxygen, increasing its cancer-fighting potential. The MOF demonstrated strong toxicity across multiple cancer cell lines while causing minimal harm to noncancerous cells.
Complete Tumor Regression in Mice
"When we systemically administered our nanoagent in mice bearing human breast cancer cells, it efficiently accumulated in tumors, robustly generated reactive oxygen species and completely eradicated the cancer without adverse effects," Olena Taratula said. "We saw total tumor regression and long-term prevention of recurrence, all without seeing any systemic toxicity."
In these preclinical experiments, tumors disappeared entirely and did not return, and the animals showed no signs of harmful side effects.
Next Steps Toward Broader Cancer Treatment
Before moving into human trials, the researchers plan to test the treatment in additional cancer types, including aggressive pancreatic cancer, to determine whether the approach can be effective across a wide range of tumors.
Other contributors to the study included Oregon State researchers Kongbrailatpam Shitaljit Sharma, Yoon Tae Goo, Vladislav Grigoriev, Constanze Raitmayr, Ana Paula Mesquita Souza, and Manali Parag Phawde. Funding was provided by the National Cancer Institute of the National Institutes of Health and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.
Story Source:
Materials provided by Oregon State University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
Journal Reference:
Cite This Page:
FDA-Approved Seizure Drug May Stop Alzheimer's Before It Starts
Groundbreaking Trial Reveals Unexpected Benefit of Metformin in Type 1 Diabetes
New “Hell Heron” Spinosaurus Discovered in the Sahara With Giant Blade Crest
Clean Energy Discovered in the Depths of Old Coal Mines
Stay informed with ScienceDaily's free email newsletter, updated daily and weekly. Or view our many newsfeeds in your RSS reader:
Keep up to date with the latest news from ScienceDaily via social networks:
Tell us what you think of ScienceDaily -- we welcome both positive and negative comments. Have any problems using the site? Questions?
Polyamines are naturally produced molecules present in all living cells. They play a vital role in basic biological functions, including cell growth and specialization. In recent years, scientists have focused on these compounds, especially spermidine, for their potential to support healthy aging. Often described as 'geroprotectors,' they have been shown to stimulate autophagy, a cellular recycling process that clears out damaged components. This benefit largely depends on a protein called eukaryotic translation initiation factor 5A (eIF5A1).
At the same time, researchers have repeatedly observed high levels of polyamines in many types of cancer, where they are linked to aggressive tumor growth. This contrast has created a scientific puzzle. How can the same molecules that appear to promote longevity also be associated with cancer?
A Molecular Puzzle in Cancer Metabolism
Although the connection between polyamines and cancer has been recognized for years, the detailed mechanisms behind their role in tumor progression have remained unclear. Cancer cells are known to alter their metabolism, relying heavily on aerobic glycolysis to rapidly generate energy. However, exactly how polyamines influence this metabolic shift has not been fully understood.
Adding to the complexity, eIF5A1 has well established functions in normal, healthy cells. A closely related protein, eIF5A2, shares 84% of its amino acid sequence but has been linked to cancer development. Why two nearly identical proteins behave so differently has been a major unanswered question.
Large Scale Proteomic Analysis Reveals Distinct Pathways
To investigate, a team led by Associate Professor Kyohei Higashi from the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Sciences at Tokyo University of Science in Japan carried out an in-depth study using advanced molecular and proteomic methods. Their results were published in Volume 301, Issue 8 of the Journal of Biological Chemistry. The findings clarify how polyamines stimulate cancer cell growth through biological routes that differ from those involved in healthy aging.
The researchers worked with human cancer cell lines to examine how polyamines affect protein production and metabolism. They first reduced polyamine levels using a drug, then restored them by adding spermidine. This approach allowed them to directly measure the impact of polyamines on cancer cells. Using high-resolution proteomic techniques, they analyzed changes across more than 6,700 proteins.
Their results showed that polyamines primarily boost glycolysis, the process that quickly converts glucose into energy, rather than enhancing mitochondrial respiration, which is more closely tied to healthy aging. The team also found that polyamines increase levels of eIF5A2 and five ribosomal proteins, including RPS 27A, RPL36AL, and RPL22L1, all of which are associated with cancer severity.
eIF5A1 vs eIF5A2 in Normal and Cancer Cells
A side by side comparison of eIF5A1 and eIF5A2 provided critical insight. "The biological activity of polyamines via eIF5A differs between normal and cancer tissues," explains Dr. Higashi. "In normal tissues, eIF5A1, activated by polyamines, activates mitochondria via autophagy, whereas in cancer tissues, eIF5A2, whose synthesis is promoted by polyamines, controls gene expression at the translational level to facilitate the proliferation of cancer cells."
In other words, polyamines trigger very different effects depending on which protein they influence. In healthy cells, they support cellular maintenance and energy production. In cancer cells, they help drive rapid growth.
How Polyamines Increase eIF5A2
Further experiments uncovered how polyamines raise eIF5A2 levels. Under typical conditions, production of the eIF5A2 protein is restrained by a small regulatory RNA molecule called miR-6514-5p. The researchers found that polyamines disrupt this natural brake, allowing eIF5A2 to be produced in greater amounts. They also showed that eIF5A2 controls a distinct group of proteins compared to eIF5A1, reinforcing the idea that these two similar proteins carry out separate functions.
Implications for Cancer Therapy and Supplement Safety
These findings carry important implications for both cancer treatment and the use of polyamine supplements. The results highlight how strongly biological context matters. In healthy tissues, polyamines may provide anti-aging benefits through eIF5A1. In tissues that are cancerous or at risk of becoming malignant, the same molecules can stimulate tumor growth through eIF5A2. This dual behavior helps explain why polyamines have been so challenging to interpret in medical research.
The study also identifies a promising new therapeutic target. "Our findings reveal an important role for eIF5A2, regulated by polyamines and miR-6514-5p, in cancer cell proliferation, suggesting that the interaction between eIF5A2 and ribosomes, which regulates cancer progression, is a selective target for cancer treatment," remarks Dr. Higashi. Targeting eIF5A2 specifically could, in theory, slow cancer growth without interfering with the beneficial effects linked to eIF5A1.
Overall, this research marks a significant advance in understanding the complex and sometimes contradictory roles of polyamines. In the future, scientists may be able to design strategies that preserve their positive effects on healthy aging while reducing their potential to support cancer development.
This study was supported in part by a Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) (No. 18K06652) from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, the Hamaguchi Foundation for the Advancement of Biochemistry, and an Extramural Collaborative Research Grant of the Cancer Research Institute, Kanazawa University, Japan.
Story Source:
Materials provided by Tokyo University of Science. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
Journal Reference:
Cite This Page:
FDA-Approved Seizure Drug May Stop Alzheimer's Before It Starts
Groundbreaking Trial Reveals Unexpected Benefit of Metformin in Type 1 Diabetes
New “Hell Heron” Spinosaurus Discovered in the Sahara With Giant Blade Crest
Clean Energy Discovered in the Depths of Old Coal Mines
Stay informed with ScienceDaily's free email newsletter, updated daily and weekly. Or view our many newsfeeds in your RSS reader:
Keep up to date with the latest news from ScienceDaily via social networks:
Tell us what you think of ScienceDaily -- we welcome both positive and negative comments. Have any problems using the site? Questions?
Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Advertisement
Nature Nanotechnology
(2026)Cite this article
The development of compact and highly sensitive microwave detectors compatible with complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS) processes remains a major challenge in microwave technology. Spin-torque diodes are emerging nanoscale spintronic devices capable of surpassing the theoretical thermodynamic sensitivity limits of Schottky diodes. However, their practical use in compact systems is limited by the need for external antennas or probes. Here we demonstrate a magnetoelectric (ME) spin-torque microwave detector that monolithically integrates a ME antenna with a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ). The device directly converts wireless electromagnetic signals into a d.c. output at sub-microwatt power levels, achieving a sensitivity greater than 90 kV W−1, a noise equivalent power of 3 pW Hz−1/2 and a compact footprint of 0.4 mm2. This performance is due to the non-linear coupling between incoherent magnetization dynamics, driven by a d.c. current in the MTJ, and the combined effects of the microwave voltage and strain generated by the ME antenna under incident electromagnetic waves. We further show that this design is scalable, enabling the cointegration of a ME antenna with an array of MTJs. A detector incorporating four MTJs exhibits an increased sensitivity exceeding 400 kV W−1. Our results may contribute to the development of a new generation of highly sensitive, compact and scalable microwave detectors that combine ME antennas and spintronic diodes.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals
Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription
$32.99 / 30 days
cancel any time
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 print issues and online access
$259.00 per year
only $21.58 per issue
Buy this article
USD 39.95
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
All data are available in the Article or its Supplementary Information, and are also available from the corresponding authors upon request.
Zaeimbashi, M. et al. Ultra-compact dual-band smart NEMS magnetoelectric antennas for simultaneous wireless energy harvesting and magnetic field sensing. Nat. Commun. 12, 3141 (2021).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Kranold, L. et al. Microwave breast screening prototype: system miniaturization with IC pulse radio. IEEE J. Electromagn. RF Microw. Med. Biol. 5, 168–178 (2021).
Article
Google Scholar
Cheng, S. & Wu, Z. G. A microfluidic, reversibly stretchable, large-area wireless strain sensor. Adv. Funct. Mater. 21, 2282–2290 (2011).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Jaeschke, T., Bredendiek, C., Küppers, S. & Pohl, N. High-precision D-band FMCW-radar sensor based on a wideband SiGe-transceiver MMIC. IEEE Trans. Microw. Theory Tech. 62, 3582–3597 (2014).
Article
Google Scholar
Pauli, M. et al. Miniaturized millimeter-wave radar sensor for high-accuracy applications. IEEE Trans Microw. Theory Tech. 65, 1707–1715 (2017).
Article
Google Scholar
Kiselev, S. I. et al. Microwave oscillations of a nanomagnet driven by a spin-polarized current. Nature 425, 380–383 (2003).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Zhu, K. Q. et al. Nonlinear amplification of microwave signals in spin-torque oscillators. Nat. Commun. 14, 2183 (2023).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Finocchio, G. et al. Perspectives on spintronic diodes. Appl. Phys. Lett. 118, 160502 (2021).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Tulapurkar, A. A. et al. Spin-torque diode effect in magnetic tunnel junctions. Nature 438, 339–342 (2005).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Baibich, M. N. et al. Giant magnetoresistance of (001)Fe/(001)Cr magnetic superlattices. Phys. Rev. Lett. 61, 2472–2475 (1988).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Moodera, J. S., Kinder, L. R., Wong, T. M. & Meservey, R. Large magnetoresistance at room-temperature in ferromagnetic thin-film tunnel-junctions. Phys. Rev. Lett. 74, 3273–3276 (1995).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Skowronski, W. et al. High frequency voltage-induced ferromagnetic resonance in magnetic tunnel junctions. Appl. Phys. Lett. 115, 072401 (2019).
Article
Google Scholar
Myers, E. B. et al. Current-induced switching of domains in magnetic multilayer devices. Science 285, 867–870 (1999).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Igarashi, J. et al. Single-nanometer CoFeB/MgO magnetic tunnel junctions with high-retention and high-speed capabilities. npj Spintronics 2, 1 (2024).
Article
Google Scholar
Fang, B. et al. Experimental demonstration of spintronic broadband microwave detectors and their capability for powering nanodevices. Phys. Rev. Appl. 11, 014022 (2019).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Sharma, R. et al. Electrically connected spin-torque oscillators array for 2.4 GHz WiFi band transmission and energy harvesting. Nat. Commun. 12, 2924 (2021).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Sharma, R. et al. Nanoscale spin rectifiers for harvesting ambient radiofrequency energy. Nat. Electron. 7, 653–661 (2024).
Article
Google Scholar
Cheng, X. A., Boone, C. T., Zhu, J. A. & Krivorotov, I. N. Nonadiabatic stochastic resonance of a nanomagnet excited by spin torque. Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 047202 (2010).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Miwa, S. et al. Highly sensitive nanoscale spin-torque diode. Nat. Mater. 13, 50–56 (2014).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Fang, B. et al. Giant spin-torque diode sensitivity in the absence of bias magnetic field. Nat. Commun. 7, 11259 (2016).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Zhang, L. et al. Ultrahigh detection sensitivity exceeding 105 V/W in spin-torque diode. Appl. Phys. Lett. 113, 102401 (2018).
Article
Google Scholar
Goto, M. et al. Uncooled sub-GHz spin bolometer driven by auto-oscillation. Nat. Commun. 12, 536 (2021).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Markovic, D. et al. Detection of the microwave emission from a spin-torque oscillator by a spin diode. Phys. Rev. Appl. 13, 044050 (2020).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Nan, T. X. et al. Acoustically actuated ultra-compact NEMS magnetoelectric antennas. Nat. Commun. 8, 296 (2017).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Klein, M. W., Enkrich, C., Wegener, M. & Linden, S. Second-harmonic generation from magnetic metamaterials. Science 313, 502–504 (2006).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Luo, B. et al. Magnetoelectric microelectromechanical and nanoelectromechanical systems for the IoT. Nat. Rev. Electr. Eng. 1, 317–334 (2024).
Article
Google Scholar
Trinh, M. T. et al. Observation of magneto-electric rectification at non-relativistic intensities. Nat. Commun. 11, 5296 (2020).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Chen, A. T. & Zhao, Y. G. Research update: electrical manipulation of magnetism through strain-mediated magnetoelectric coupling in multiferroic heterostructures. APL Mater 4, 032303 (2016).
Article
Google Scholar
Caruntu, G., Yourdkhani, A., Vopsaroiu, M. & Srinivasan, G. Probing the local strain-mediated magnetoelectric coupling in multiferroic nanocomposites by magnetic field-assisted piezoresponse force microscopy. Nanoscale 4, 3218–3227 (2012).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Makarov, A. et al. CMOS-compatible spintronic devices: a review. Semicond. Sci. Technol. 31, 113006 (2016).
Article
Google Scholar
Peng, W. Y. et al. Electrical and thermophysical properties of epoxy/aluminum nitride nanocomposites: effects of nanoparticle surface modification. Compos. Part A Appl. Sci. Manuf. 41, 1201–1209 (2010).
Article
Google Scholar
Dong, C. Z. et al. Characterization of magnetomechanical properties in FeGaB thin films. Appl. Phys. Lett. 113, 262401 (2018).
Article
Google Scholar
Choi, B. J. et al. High-speed and low-energy nitride memristors. Adv. Funct. Mater. 26, 5290–5296 (2016).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Dubois, M.-A. & Muralt, P. Properties of aluminum nitride thin films for piezoelectric transducers and microwave filter applications. Appl. Phys. Lett. 74, 3032–3034 (1999).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Lakin, K. M., Kline, G. R. & McCarron, K. T. High-Q microwave acoustic resonators and filters. IEEE Trans Microw. Theory Techn. 41, 2139–2146 (1993).
Article
Google Scholar
Ge, L. & Kwai, M. L. A low-profile magneto-electric dipole antenna. IEEE Trans. Antennas Propag. 60, 1684–1689 (2012).
Article
Google Scholar
Chen, A. T. et al. Nonvolatile magnetoelectric switching of magnetic tunnel junctions with dipole interaction. Adv. Funct. Mater. 33, 2213402 (2023).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Zhang, Y. K. et al. Electric-field control of nonvolatile resistance state of perpendicular magnetic tunnel junction via magnetoelectric coupling. Sci. Adv. 10, eadl4633 (2024).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Masciocchi, G. et al. Strain-controlled domain wall injection into nanowires for sensor applications. J. Appl. Phys. 130, 183903 (2021).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Peng, R. C. et al. Fast 180° magnetization switching in a strain-mediated multiferroic heterostructure driven by a voltage. Sci. Rep. 6, 27561 (2016).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Nitzan, S. H. et al. Self-induced parametric amplification arising from nonlinear elastic coupling in a micromechanical resonating disk gyroscope. Sci. Rep. 5, 9036 (2015).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Yun, X. F. et al. Bandwidth-enhanced magnetoelectric antenna based on composite bulk acoustic resonators. Appl. Phys. Lett. 121, 033501 (2022).
Article
CAS
Google Scholar
Download references
The work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NNSFC) (numbers 52371206, 12474127, 12204357 and U24A6001). This work was supported in part by the National Key Research and Development Program of China under grant 2023YFB2407700, Frontier Technologies R&D Program of Jiangsu (number BF2025031), CAS Young Talent Program and the Gusu Leading Talents Program (number ZXL2023172). A.C. acknowledges support from the National Key Research and Development Program of China (number 2024YFA1408503) and the Sichuan Province Science and Technology Support Program (number 2025YFHZ0147). The work of G.F. was supported by the project PRIN_20225YF2S4—Magneto-mechanical accelerometers, gyroscopes and computing based on nanoscale magnetic tunnel junctions (MMagyc) funded by the Italian Ministry of University and Research and the MUR-PNRR project SPINERGY ‘SPINtronic Electromagnetic eneRGY harvesting with magnetic tunnel junctions for next generation of green IoT nodes', CUP D93C22000900001 by Nest—Network 4 Energy Sustainable Transition, Parternariato Esteso–PE000002. The work of R.T. and M.C. was partially supported by the Project PE0000021, ‘Network 4 Energy Sustainable Transition—NEST', funded by the European Union—NextGenerationEU, under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.3—Call for tender number 1561 of 11 October 2022 of Ministero dell'Università e della Ricerca (MUR) (CUP C93C22005230007). R.T., M.C. and G.F. are with the Petaspin TEAM and are thankful for the support of the PETASPIN association (www.petaspin.com).
These authors contributed equally: Shuhui Liu, Riccardo Tomasello.
Nanofabrication Facility, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou, China
Shuhui Liu, Bin Fang, Zhenhao Liu, Rui Hu, Wenkui Lin, Baoshun Zhang & Zhongming Zeng
School of Nano Technology and Nano Bionics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
Shuhui Liu, Bin Fang, Rui Hu, Wenkui Lin, Baoshun Zhang & Zhongming Zeng
Department of Electrical and Information Engineering, Politecnico di Bari, Bari, Italy
Riccardo Tomasello & Mario Carpentieri
State Key Laboratory of Electronic Thin Film and Integrated Devices, School of Physics, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China
Aitian Chen
School of Integrated Circuit Science and Engineering, Wuxi University, Wuxi, China
Like Zhang
Physical Science and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Thuwal, Saudi Arabia
Xixiang Zhang
Department of Mathematical and Computer Sciences, Physical Sciences and Earth Sciences, University of Messina, Messina, Italy
Giovanni Finocchio
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
B.F., Z.Z. and G.F. designed the experiments. R.H., W.L., A.C. and X.Z. prepared the films. S.L. performed the device fabrication and TEM characterization. S.L. and B.F. performed the electrical characterizations. R.T., M.C. and G.F. designed the micromagnetic solver. R.T. and M.C. carried out the micromagnetic simulations. B.F., S.L., Z.L., L.Z., B.Z. and Z.Z. analysed the data. B.F., S.L., G.F. and R.T. wrote the manuscript with the help of Z.Z. All the authors commented on the final version of the manuscript. The work was performed under the supervision of B.F., Z.Z. and G.F.
Correspondence to
Bin Fang, Giovanni Finocchio or Zhongming Zeng.
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Nature Nanotechnology thanks Shinji Miwa and the other, anonymous, reviewers for their contribution to the peer review of this work.
Publisher's note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Supplementary Figs. 1–10, Notes 1–9 and Table 1.
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
Reprints and permissions
Liu, S., Tomasello, R., Fang, B. et al. A CMOS-compatible, scalable and compact magnetoelectric spin-torque microwave detector.
Nat. Nanotechnol. (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-026-02129-w
Download citation
Received: 18 July 2025
Accepted: 12 January 2026
Published: 02 March 2026
Version of record: 02 March 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-026-02129-w
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
Advertisement
Nature Nanotechnology
(Nat. Nanotechnol.)
ISSN 1748-3395 (online)
ISSN 1748-3387 (print)
© 2026 Springer Nature Limited
Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.
Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Advertisement
Nature Medicine
(2026)Cite this article
Bimagrumab is an investigational antibody targeting type II activin receptors, intended to reduce total body and visceral fat mass and promote muscle growth. In this double-blind, placebo-controlled phase 2, trial, 507 adults with obesity (body mass index ≥30 kg m−2 or ≥27 kg m−2 with at least one obesity-associated complication (excluding diabetes) were randomized to nine groups (1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1 ratio) to receive treatment for 48 weeks: placebo, bimagrumab (10 mg kg−1 or 30 mg kg−1 intravenously every 12 weeks), semaglutide (1.0 mg or 2.4 mg subcutaneously once a week) and combinations thereof. An open-label treatment extension to week 72 followed. Randomization was stratified by sex across the treatment groups. The primary and secondary endpoints were absolute change from baseline in body weight at week 48 and week 72, respectively. The least squares mean absolute changes in body weight at week 48 were −9.3 kg (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −14.2 kg (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −17.8 kg (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 2.4 mg—that is, high-dose combination) versus −3.3 kg (placebo) (all P < 0.001 versus placebo). Continued improvements were observed through week 72. Common adverse events for bimagrumab included muscle spasms, diarrhea and acne, and semaglutide was associated with nausea, diarrhea, constipation and fatigue. Bimagrumab plus semaglutide resulted in substantial reductions in body weight, and safety was consistent with the known safety profiles of both drugs. ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT05616013.
Obesity is a chronic disease projected to affect nearly 3.3 billion adults worldwide by 2035, with an estimated economic impact exceeding USD $4 trillion1. Excess adipose tissue, particularly visceral adipose tissue (VAT), increases the risk of obesity complications and related diseases, including metabolic and cardiovascular diseases2,3. Most weight reduction with caloric restriction, including with pharmacotherapy, is attributable to reduction in body fat mass; the remainder (approximately 25–40%) can be attributed to lean tissues, including skeletal muscle and visceral organs4,5,6. Patients with obesity who are at risk for low muscle mass, affecting both physical and metabolic function, may benefit from treatments that maximize fat mass reduction while preserving skeletal muscle7.
Bimagrumab is a fully human, recombinant monoclonal antibody that targets activin type II receptors (ActRIIA and ActRIIB), preventing binding of natural ligands. Due to its inhibition of myostatin and activin A signaling via the ActRII−activin receptor-like kinase 4 (ALK4) pathway, which leads to anabolic effects in skeletal muscle, bimagrumab was initially developed to treat muscle-related disorders8. More recently, activin signaling via the ActRII−activin receptor-like kinase 7 (ALK7) pathway in adipose tissue has been recognized as an important regulator of abdominal obesity, based on exome-wide sequencing analysis indicating the importance of the INHBE (inhibin subunit beta E) gene that encodes activin E and the ACVR1C (activin A receptor type 1C) gene that encodes ALK7 (refs. 9,10). By blocking ligand signaling in adipose tissue, bimagrumab increases lipid mobilization and lipolysis, leading to reduction in fat mass11. In a phase 2, 48-week study in adults with obesity and type 2 diabetes, treatment with bimagrumab significantly reduced total body fat mass, VAT and intrahepatic fat while increasing lean mass and lowering glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c)12. The study provided evidence that uncoupling of fat and lean mass loss is feasible during weight reduction.
Incretin-based therapies reduce body weight primarily by targeting the central mechanisms that regulate energy balance, thereby decreasing appetite and food intake13. Conversely, bimagrumab does not appear to affect food intake but primarily targets activin signaling in adipose tissue and skeletal muscle directly, leading to fat mass reduction and muscle growth8,11,12. In preclinical animal models with diet-induced obesity, combining bimagrumab with incretins such as semaglutide or tirzepatide resulted in enhanced fat loss and preservation of muscle mass14,15. Treatment with bimagrumab also prevented decreases in thigh muscle volume (assessed by magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)) in a study of low dietary protein intake in healthy volunteers16. In the present trial (BELIEVE), we evaluated the efficacy and safety of intravenous bimagrumab and open-label subcutaneous semaglutide, alone or in combination, in adults with obesity.
From 16 November 2022 to 16 May 2024, 730 participants were screened for eligibility. Of these, 507 were randomized to placebo (n = 56), bimagrumab (10 mg kg−1: n = 56; 30 mg kg−1: n = 57), semaglutide (1.0 mg: n = 56; 2.4 mg: n = 57) and bimagrumab plus semaglutide (combination; 10 mg kg−1 plus 1.0 mg: n = 56; 30 mg kg−1 plus 1.0 mg: n = 56; 10 mg kg−1 plus 2.4 mg: n = 56; 30 mg kg−1 plus 2.4 mg: n = 57) groups (Fig. 1). Overall, 377 (74.4%) participants completed the primary treatment period at week 48. Treatment discontinuations due to adverse events were higher in the bimagrumab groups (14.0–21.4%) than in the semaglutide (3.6–8.8%), combination (5.3–12.5%) and placebo (3.6%) groups. During the extension period, 25 (7.1%) participants discontinued treatment (Fig. 1).
*12 participants met eligibility criteria but were not randomized, and three participants did not meet all eligibility criteria but were randomized. †Non-compliance with study requirements. a, Participant disposition during primary treatment period (to week 48). b, Participant disposition during extension treatment period (weeks 48 to 72).
Demographic and clinical baseline characteristics were largely similar across treatment groups; most participants were female (57.4%) and White (75.1%) (Table 1). Mean values for the trial were as follows: age 47.5 years, body weight 107.5 kg, body mass index (BMI) 37.3 kg m−2, waist circumference 118.1 cm, total body fat mass (by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA)) 45.8 kg and total body lean mass (by DXA) 58.3 kg (Table 1).
For the efficacy results at week 48, nominal P values versus placebo and versus semaglutide 2.4 mg are reported in Table 2 and Fig. 2.
*P < 0.05, **P < 0.01, ***P< 0.001 active treatment groups versus placebo. #P < 0.05, ##P < 0.01, ###P < 0.001 active treatment groups versus semaglutide 2.4 mg. Data are presented as LSM change from baseline ± standard error. P values for comparisons with placebo and semaglutide 2.4 mg were calculated using two-sided t-tests without multiplicity adjustment. n values are provided in the source data tables in the supplementary information. a−e, The LSM percent or absolute changes from baseline to week 48 in efficacy endpoints are based on an MMRM analysis for the efficacy estimand and an ANCOVA model with multiple imputation for the treatment regimen estimand. f, The LSM percent changes in hsCRP from baseline to week 48 are based on MMRM analysis using log transformation for the efficacy estimand. ANCOVA, analysis of covariance; hsCRP, High-sensitivity C-Reactive Protein; LSM, least-squares mean; MMRM, mixed model for repeated measures; VAT, visceral adipose tissue.
Source data
At week 48, the least squares mean (LSM) absolute change in body weight was −6.0 kg to −9.3 kg (bimagrumab), −9.8 kg to −14.2 kg (semaglutide) and −12.7 kg to −17.8 kg (combination) versus −3.3 kg (placebo) (all P < 0.001 versus placebo, except bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1; Table 2). The LSM change in absolute body weight was greater with the high-dose combination versus semaglutide 2.4 mg (−17.8 kg versus −14.2 kg; P < 0.05).
The LSM percent change in body weight was −5.6% to −8.6% (bimagrumab), −9.8% to −13.5% (semaglutide) and −12.0% to −16.4% (combination) compared to −3.5% (placebo) (Fig. 2a). By week 48, ≥15% weight reduction was achieved in 23.3% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 43.4% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 63.9% (high-dose combination) of participants (Extended Data Fig. 2).
The LSM percent change in body weight at week 48 was −5.0% to −9.7% (bimagrumab), −11.0% to −14.8% (semaglutide) and −14.3% to −20.2% (combination) versus −2.5% (placebo) (P < 0.001 for the high-dose combination versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2a). At week 72, the LSM change in weight was −12.0 kg (−10.8%; bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −16.5 kg (−15.7%; semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −24.2 kg (−22.1%; high-dose combination) (Fig. 3a and Extended Data Table 1). By week 72, ≥15% weight reduction was achieved in 21.8% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 51.8% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 84.9% (high-dose combination) of participants (Extended Data Fig. 2).
Data are presented as LSM change from baseline ± standard error. n represents the number of participants with baseline and post-baseline values at week 72. a−e, The LSM percent or absolute changes from baseline at week 72 in efficacy endpoints are based on MMRM analysis for the efficacy estimand. f, The LSM percent changes in hsCRP from baseline to week 72 are based on MMRM analysis using log transformation for the efficacy estimand. hsCRP, high-sensitivity C-reactive protein; LSM, least-squares mean; MMRM, mixed model for repeated measures; VAT, visceral adipose tissue.
Source data
Absolute LSM change in waist circumference at week 48 was −7.3 cm to −9.1 cm (bimagrumab), −8.7 cm to −12.1 cm (semaglutide) and −12.4 cm to −15.8 cm (combination) compared to −4.6 cm (placebo) (Fig. 2b). Results for improvements in waist-to-height ratio categories at week 48 are provided in Extended Data Fig. 3.
Absolute LSM changes in waist circumference at week 48 were −8.1 cm to −10.7 cm (bimagrumab), −10.5 cm to −13.6 cm (semaglutide) and −14.7 cm to −19.4 cm (combination) compared to −4.7 cm (placebo) (P < 0.001 for the high-dose combination versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2b). At week 72, absolute LSM changes in waist circumference were −13.3 cm (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −14.7 cm (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −21.7 cm (high-dose combination) (Fig. 3b).
The LSM percent reduction in total body fat mass at week 48 was −13.0% to −18.9% (bimagrumab), −16.0% to −21.1% (semaglutide) and −24.7% to −33.7% (combination) compared to −5.6% (placebo) (P < 0.001 for the high-dose combination versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2c). Mean percent body fat decreased from 43.7% at baseline to 32.5% at week 48 with high-dose combination compared to 41.9% to 37.9% with semaglutide 2.4 mg. By week 48, fat mass reduction ≥25% was achieved in 30.8% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 36.3% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 73.6% (high-dose combination) of participants (Extended Data Fig. 4).
The LSM percent changes in total body lean mass at week 48 were +1.0% to +1.1% (bimagrumab), −4.7% to −6.9% (semaglutide) and −0.8% to −2.3% (combination) versus −0.9% (placebo) (P < 0.001 for all combination groups versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2d). At week 48, the proportion of weight loss due to fat mass (fat loss index) was 100% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 71.1% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 92.3% (high-dose combination). The bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1.0 mg group showed the greatest preservation of lean mass among the combination groups. Results for appendicular lean mass at week 48 are presented in Table 2.
The percent LSM changes in estimated VAT were −15.7% to −26.7% (bimagrumab), −19.3% to −24.5% (semaglutide) and −33.1% to −43.8% (combination) versus −3.3% (placebo) (P < 0.01 for the high-dose combination versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2e).
The LSM percent reduction in total body fat mass at week 48 was −15.9% to −25.3% (bimagrumab), −18.4% to −24.8% (semaglutide) and −30.6% to −42.2% (combination) compared to −5.2% (placebo) (P < 0.05 for all combination groups versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2c). At week 72, LSM percent reductions in total body fat mass were −28.5% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −27.8% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −45.7% (high-dose combination) (Fig. 3c). By week 72, fat mass reduction ≥30% was achieved in 50.0% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 36.4% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 94.0% (high-dose combination) of participants (Extended Data Fig. 4).
The LSM percent changes in total body lean mass at week 48 were +2.3% to +2.7% (bimagrumab), −5.3% to −7.9% (semaglutide) and −1.1% to −2.6% (combination) versus −0.5% (placebo) (P < 0.001 for all combination groups versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2d). At week 72, LSM changes in total body lean mass were +2.5% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −7.4% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −2.9% (high-dose combination) (Fig. 3d). Results for appendicular lean mass at week 72 are presented in Extended Data Table 1.
At week 72, the proportion of weight loss due to fat mass was 100% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), 75.6% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 92.2% (high-dose combination) (Extended Data Table 1).
At week 48, the percent LSM changes in estimated VAT were −23.0% to −40.2% (bimagrumab), −21.5% to −29.5% (semaglutide) and −41.0% to −54.8% (combination) versus −2.1% (placebo) (P < 0.01 for all combination groups versus semaglutide 2.4 mg; Fig. 2e). At week 72, reductions in estimated VAT were −45.1% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −35.8% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −58.2% (high-dose combination) (Fig. 3e).
HbA1c levels improved in semaglutide and combination groups at week 48 (Table 2; treatment regimen estimand). The LSM decreases in HbA1c levels at week 72 were −0.23% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −0.40% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −0.55% (high-dose combination) (Extended Data Table 1; efficacy estimand). Among participants with HbA1c ≥ 5.7% at baseline (prediabetes), normoglycemia (defined as HbA1c < 5.7%) at week 48 was achieved in 19 of 29 participants (66%, bimagrumab groups), in 23 of 27 participants (85%, semaglutide groups) and in 44 of 45 participants (98%, combination groups), compared to six of 15 participants (40%) in the placebo group (Table 2; efficacy estimand). At week 72, normoglycemia was achieved in 22 of 29 participants (76%, bimagrumab groups), in 26 of 27 participants (96%, semaglutide groups) and in 45 of 45 participants (100%, combination groups) compared to eight of 15 participants (53%) in the placebo group (Extended Data Table 1; efficacy estimand).
Improvements in 36-Item Short Form Health Survey (SF-36) Physical Functioning score were similar across treatment groups at week 48 (P value not significant versus placebo; Table 2). Combination groups containing bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 showed greater improvements in Impact of Weight on Quality of Life-Lite Clinical Trials Version (IWQOL-Lite-CT) Physical Function scores at week 48 compared to the placebo group (P < 0.05; Table 2).
At week 72, improvements in SF-36 Physical Functioning scores and IWQOL-Lite-CT Physical Function scores were greater in the high-dose combination group than in the remaining groups (Extended Data Table 1).
Overall, safety results during the primary treatment period were consistent with known safety profiles of the two drugs. The incidence of treatment-emergent adverse events during the primary treatment period was similar among active drug treatment groups (91.1−98.2%) and greater than placebo (74.5%) (Table 3). Serious adverse events were reported in 8.8−12.5% of participants (bimagrumab), in 1.8−10.7% of participants (semaglutide) and in 3.6−9.1% of participants (combination) versus in 3.6% of participants (placebo); no deaths were reported. Common adverse events included muscle spasms (commonly, muscle cramps), diarrhea and acne with bimagrumab and nausea, diarrhea, constipation and fatigue with semaglutide, with similar events in the combination groups. All treatment discontinuations due to nausea (N = 6) occurred in the combination groups, and treatment discontinuations due to muscle spasms (N = 5) occurred in the bimagrumab monotherapy groups (Table 3). Four discontinuations were due to acne: two in the bimagrumab monotherapy groups and two in the combination groups.
Thirteen participants had severe (grade 3) gastrointestinal-related events, including three with pancreatitis serious adverse events (one each in placebo, bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1 and semaglutide 1.0 mg groups). One participant had severe acne and five had severe muscle-related events (muscle spasms and back pain) in bimagrumab-containing groups (Table 3). Four participants reported basal or squamous cell skin carcinoma (all in bimagrumab-only or semaglutide-only groups); no other malignancies were reported (Table 3).
There were no new safety signals during weeks 48–72 (Extended Data Table 2). Two participants had severe gastrointestinal-related events (bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 2.4 mg: abdominal pain; bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1.0 mg: enteritis); one participant had severe muscle-related events (back pain; placebo switched to bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 group); and two participants reported basal cell skin carcinoma (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 and semaglutide 1.0 mg groups) (Extended Data Table 2).
No clinically relevant changes in hematologic or renal parameters were observed. Mean magnesium levels decreased in bimagrumab-containing groups but remained within the normal range across treatment groups. Bimagrumab-containing groups showed mean increases in alkaline phosphatase (ALP) and creatine kinase, transient increases in alanine aminotransferase (ALT) (Extended Data Fig. 5) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) and decreases in total bilirubin and gamma-glutamyl transferase (GGT). Serum lipase increased transiently with bimagrumab but increased and remained elevated with semaglutide treatment (Extended Data Fig. 5).
The mean decreases in systolic blood pressure (SBP) were not significantly different between treatment groups at week 48 (bimagrumab: −3.1 mmHg to −4.6 mmHg; semaglutide: −7.9 mmHg to −8.6 mmHg; combination: −4.5 mmHg to −10.4 mmHg; placebo: −6.9 mmHg) (Table 2). The mean reduction in diastolic blood pressure (DBP) was greater in the high-dose combination group versus the placebo and semaglutide 2.4 mg groups at week 48 (−6.7 mmHg versus −2.8 mmHg and −3.4 mmHg, respectively; P < 0.05) (Table 2).
The LSM percent changes in total body and lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) were ≤1.1% in all groups at week 48 (Table 2). The LSM percent decreases in total hip BMD were significantly greater in the semaglutide 2.4 mg (−2.1%) group, the bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1 mg (−2.0%) group and the two combination groups containing bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 (−2.2% to −2.3%) versus placebo (−0.8%) (P < 0.05). The LSM percent changes from baseline in femoral neck BMD were not significantly different in the treatment groups versus placebo (Table 2). Changes in these BMD outcomes at week 72 were similar, with greater decreases in total hip and/or femoral neck BMD than in total body or lumbar spine BMD across groups (Extended Data Table 1).
Total and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels increased in the first 12 weeks in the bimagrumab-containing groups and then decreased toward baseline in the combination groups containing semaglutide 2.4 mg while remaining above baseline in the bimagrumab-only groups and the combination groups containing semaglutide 1.0 mg (Table 2, Extended Data Table 1 and Extended Data Fig. 6). By contrast, increases in high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol and decreases in triglyceride levels were similar in the combination and semaglutide-only groups at weeks 48 and 72 (Table 2, Extended Data Table 1 and Extended Data Fig. 6). At week 72, LSM percent changes in LDL cholesterol were 17.6% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −8.9% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and 0.1% (high-dose combination) (Extended Data Fig. 6). For triglycerides, these were −1.2% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −20.8% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −25.3% (high-dose combination) (Extended Data Fig. 6).
The LSM percent reductions in high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hsCRP) at week 48 were −52.9% to −69.0% (bimagrumab), −54.5% to −55.4% (semaglutide) and −71.5% to −83.1% (combination) versus −15.6% (placebo group) (Fig. 2f). At week 72, the LSM percent reductions in hsCRP were −72.0% (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −59.3% (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −84.0% (high-dose combination) (Fig. 3f).
The LSM changes in serum leptin levels at week 48 were −20.5 ng ml−1 to −26.6 ng ml−1 (bimagrumab), −20.1 ng ml−1 to −20.5 ng ml−1 (semaglutide) and −24.9 ng ml−1 to −31.9 ng ml−1 (combination) versus −7.7 ng ml−1 (placebo) (Extended Data Fig. 7). The LSM increases in serum adiponectin levels at week 48 were 14.1 µg ml−1 to 28.6 µg ml−1 (bimagrumab), 6.2 µg ml−1 to 7.5 µg ml−1 (semaglutide) and 22.0 µg ml−1 to 33.3 µg ml−1 (combination) versus 4.8 µg ml−1 (placebo) (Extended Data Fig. 7).
The LSM changes in fasting insulin levels at week 48 are presented in Table 2. At week 72, the LSM decreases in fasting insulin were greater in the high-dose combination group (−34.4 pmol l−1) versus bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 (−26.3 pmol l−1) and semaglutide 2.4 mg (−27.6 pmol l−1) groups (Extended Data Table 1). The LSM changes in free testosterone levels are presented in Table 2 (week 48) and Extended Data Table 1 (week 72).
The bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1.0 mg group showed the greatest increase in grip strength among treatment groups at week 48 (4.8 kg; P < 0.05 versus placebo (1.7 kg)) (Table 2); all remaining groups were similar to placebo. There was a trend for increased grip strength in the bimagrumab monotherapy groups that was not significantly different compared to semaglutide 2.4 mg at week 48. Results at week 72 are presented in Extended Data Table 1.
At week 24, the median change in total calories (kcal d−1) in the higher dose groups was −182.0 (bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1), −482.5 (semaglutide 2.4 mg) and −487.0 (high-dose combination) versus −238.5 (placebo). At week 48, participants in the semaglutide 2.4 mg and placebo groups had a greater median reduction in total caloric intake than those in the other groups (Table 2). The median increase in protein intake (as % total calories) was highest in the bimagrumab and placebo groups compared to the semaglutide and combination groups (Table 2).
Obesity is a disease of excess adiposity, which can be confirmed by measurement of body fat by methods such as DXA17. In the treatment of obesity with caloric restriction (including lifestyle intervention, incretin-based therapies18,19 and bariatric surgery20), most weight loss is fat mass, with lean mass comprising approximately 25–40% of total weight loss. All three treatment approaches can induce substantial weight reduction in individuals with obesity, but the associated reduction in lean mass may attenuate the metabolic benefits of substantial weight loss and diminish physical function in those with low muscle mass. Obesity management therapies that preserve lean mass would be expected to cause less overall weight loss unless it was accompanied by increased fat mass reduction7.
In this phase 2 trial, treatment with the combination of an activin pathway inhibitor (bimagrumab) plus an incretin (semaglutide) in adults with obesity achieved substantial weight loss by augmenting fat mass reduction while preserving lean mass. Although bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 (10.8%) achieved numerically less weight reduction than semaglutide 2.4 mg (15.7%), weight reduction with the high-dose combination (22.1%) was greater than semaglutide 2.4 mg at week 72. Notably, the total body fat mass reduction achieved with bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 (28.5%) was similar to semaglutide 2.4 mg (27.8%) at week 72 and resulted in nearly additive fat mass reduction with the high-dose combination (45.7%) owing to the distinct mechanisms of action of each drug. This reduction in fat mass achieved with the high-dose combination was in the range of results reported for bariatric surgery at similar timepoints21,22. Notably, a higher proportion of the weight reduction in each of the combination groups was due to fat mass loss versus in the semaglutide 2.4 mg group.
Treatment with bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 resulted in a small increase above baseline in lean mass and largely preserved lean mass in the combination groups compared to the greater reduction in lean mass observed with semaglutide 2.4 mg at weeks 48 and 72. Similar changes were observed for appendicular lean mass, a proxy measure of skeletal muscle mass23. The combination therapy resulted in preservation of lean mass despite achieving a greater reduction in fat mass, including intra-abdominal fat (VAT), supporting the premise that measures of body composition (and waist circumference) can be more informative regarding optimal obesity management than body weight or BMI. DXA measurements also provide information regarding BMD, with observed changes possibly related to reduced mechanical loading with weight loss.
In the present trial, estimated VAT reduction was notable, particularly for bimagrumab-containing groups. This was accompanied by a greater decline in the inflammation biomarker hsCRP in the bimagrumab-containing groups versus the semaglutide groups. The higher adiponectin levels in the bimagrumab-containing groups at week 48 are likely associated with effects of bimagrumab on adipose tissue and may have downstream effects on insulin sensitivity and inflammation. These outcomes could reflect a positive impact on inflammatory mechanisms underpinning many obesity complications and related diseases, including cardiovascular and metabolic diseases24.
The lowering of HbA1c was greater in the semaglutide groups compared to the bimagrumab groups, with similar effects on fasting insulin. However, HbA1c lowering was similar or greater in the combination groups compared to semaglutide alone, suggesting an additive effect on glycemic control. Among participants with prediabetes (HbA1c ≥ 5.7%) at baseline, 100% reversion to normoglycemia was achieved only in the combination groups (except for the low-dose combination) by week 48.
Elevated total and LDL cholesterol levels observed in bimagrumab-containing groups returned toward baseline in the combination groups containing semaglutide 2.4 mg but remained elevated in the bimagrumab-only groups by week 72. Total and HDL cholesterol (and derived non-HDL cholesterol) normalized in the high-dose combination group by week 48. HDL cholesterol and triglycerides improved relative to baseline in the combination and semaglutide-only groups by week 72; HDL cholesterol also improved in the bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 group. The magnitude of lipid changes with bimagrumab may be explained in part by effects of high intravenous doses used in this study, with likely direct effects on lipid metabolism in adipose tissue and/or liver. Future analyses will assess the mechanism and durability of effects of treatment, including post-drug withdrawal, on insulin resistance, lipid metabolism and systemic inflammation as mechanistic determinants of potential cardiovascular benefits or risks.
Adverse events related to bimagrumab and/or semaglutide were infrequent reasons for treatment discontinuation in combination groups. Muscle spasms (for example, muscle cramps) were the primary reason for discontinuation for five participants in the bimagrumab monotherapy groups but none in the combination groups. Muscle spasms have also been reported with blockade of the muscle ligands myostatin and activin A together and activin A alone25. The incidence of pancreatitis was infrequent and balanced across treatment groups. There were no instances of telangiectasias or hematologic abnormalities, as reported with activin receptor ligand traps26. Additional research is needed to understand the mechanisms underlying specific adverse events such as muscle spasms and acne.
Strengths of this trial include a full factorial study design with two dose levels of each drug (including semaglutide 2.4 mg as approved for obesity); serial direct measurements of body composition using DXA in all participants; treatment extension period to week 72, allowing evaluation of continued weight and fat mass reduction and comparisons with published studies; and the post-treatment follow-up period (ongoing) evaluating weight loss maintenance and composition of weight regain.
Limitations include the use of open-label semaglutide due to unavailability of matched placebo at trial initiation, potentially leading to early discontinuation of some participants who may have been disappointed not to receive semaglutide. Administering bimagrumab intravenously every 12 weeks, with additional loading doses at randomization (week 1) and week 4, may have contributed to early laboratory abnormalities and adverse events; subcutaneous dosing may attenuate these effects, as shown in a comparison study27. A phase 2 trial of bimagrumab and tirzepatide, alone or in combination, will evaluate the subcutaneous dosing of both drugs in adults with obesity or overweight (NCT06643728). Unlike previous bimagrumab studies that used MRI for direct assessment of skeletal muscle volume and intramuscular fat12,28,29,30,31, our study used DXA, where muscle mass was measured as part of lean mass. Future studies should include MRI to better characterize changes in muscle mass and quality along with physical function measures in populations at risk. Additionally, decreased hepatic fat fraction by MRI was reported in a previous bimagrumab study12; forthcoming studies could also evaluate changes in visceral and ectopic fat in various regions using MRI. The lack of significant improvement in patient-reported outcomes and grip strength in this study may be due to the broad population studied; specific subpopulations may be more responsive for these measures. Given the sample size for this study, analyses by age and gender would have resulted in subgroups that were too small to support reliable or meaningful conclusions, although these populations should be explored in future studies.
In this phase 2 trial in participants with obesity, treatment with bimagrumab plus semaglutide for 72 weeks resulted in substantial reductions in body weight. The safety findings were consistent with the known safety profiles of the two drugs. These findings support further development of bimagrumab, alone or in combination with incretin therapy, to achieve optimal weight loss, with augmented reduction in adiposity and preserved lean mass, in people living with obesity.
BELIEVE (NCT05616013) is a phase 2, multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial conducted at 26 sites in the United States, Australia and New Zealand. The trial adhered to the Declaration of Helsinki, Council for International Organizations of Medical Sciences international ethical guidelines and Good Clinical Practice guidelines. An independent ethics committee (New Zealand Southern Health and Disability Ethics Committee, New Zealand; Bellberry Limited Human Research Ethics Committee, Australia; and Austin Health Human Research Ethics Committee, Australia) or institutional review board (WCG Institutional Review Board, United States, and Pennington Biomedical Research Center Institutional Review Board, United States) for each site approved the protocol. All participants provided written informed consent before participation.
The trial consisted of four sequential periods: a 6-week screening period (ends at randomization), a 48-week blinded primary treatment period, a 24-week open-label treatment extension period (through week 72) and a 32-week treatment-withdrawal follow-up period (end of study at week 104) (Extended Data Fig. 1). We report results from the 48-week primary treatment period and the 24-week extension period (weeks 48−72) (November 2022−November 2024). The protocol and statistical analysis plan are available in the supplementary information.
Versanis Bio Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly and Company (sponsor), designed and oversaw the trial conduct. Site investigators collected data, and contract research organizations undertook site monitoring, data collation and data analysis. All authors contributed to data interpretation and authoring and/or critical review of the manuscript. The authors had access to trial data and vouch for the accuracy and completeness of the data and the fidelity of the trial to the protocol. A medical writer employed by the sponsor provided medical writing assistance.
The trial included adults (aged ≥18 years and ≤80 years) with obesity: BMI ≥30 kg m−2 or BMI ≥27 kg m−2 with at least one obesity-associated comorbidity (for example, hypertension, insulin resistance, sleep apnea or dyslipidemia). All participants maintained a stable body weight (±5 kg) within 90 days of screening, had body weight less than 150 kg and had at least one previous unsuccessful behavioral effort to lose weight. Key exclusion criteria included diagnosis of diabetes requiring current use of an antihyperglycemic drug or HbA1c ≥6.5%. A complete list of the eligibility criteria is provided below.
Participants were eligible to be included in the study only if all of the following criteria applied:
Written informed consent must be obtained before any study-related assessments are performed.
Men and women between 18 years and 80 years of age, inclusive; women of childbearing potential (defined as those who are not postmenopausal or postsurgical sterilization) must meet both of the following criteria:
Two negative pregnancy tests (at screening and at randomization, prior to dosing).
Use of an intrauterine device, from ≥3 months before the baseline visit through ≥4 months after the last dose of bimagrumab/placebo intravenous, and an additional contraceptive (barrier) method from screening through ≥4 months after the last dose of bimagrumab/placebo intravenous.
BMI ≥30 kg m−2 or BMI ≥27 kg m−2 with at least one obesity-associated comorbidity (for example, hypertension, insulin resistance, sleep apnea or dyslipidemia).
Stable body weight (±5 kg) within 90 days of screening and body weight less than 150 kg.
Have a history of at least one self-reported unsuccessful behavioral effort to lose body weight.
Capable of using common software applications on a mobile device (smartphone).
Access to an internet-enabled smartphone, tablet or computer for the duration of the study, meeting minimal operations systems requirements.
Able to communicate well with the investigator, comply with the study requirements and adhere to the diet and activity programs for the study duration.
Participants were excluded from the study if any of the following criteria applied:
History of, or known hypersensitivity to, monoclonal antibody drugs or a contraindication to semaglutide (Ozempic or Wegovy).
Use of other investigational drugs at the time of enrollment or within 30 days or five half-lives of enrollment, whichever is longer, or longer if required by local regulations.
Lack of peripheral venous access.
Not able or willing to comply with protocol requirements, including lifestyle interventions.
Women who are pregnant or intend to become pregnant or are nursing.
Diseases known to cause cachexia or muscle atrophy or diseases known to cause gastrointestinal malabsorption.
Use of any prescription drugs known to adversely affect muscle mass or body weight. Low-dose estrogen replacement therapy in postmenopausal women and 5-α-reductase inhibitors in men are acceptable. Spironolactone and related drugs are acceptable in men and women.
Treatment with any medication for the indication of obesity within the past 30 days before screening.
Previous or planned (during the trial period) obesity treatment with surgery or a weight loss device. However, the following are allowed: (1) liposuction and/or abdominoplasty, if performed more than 1 year before screening, and (2) lap banding, intragastric balloon or dudodenal-jejunal bypass sleeve, if removed more than 1 year before screening.
Uncontrolled thyroid disease at screening or within 6 months prior to screening. Patients with hypothyroidism treated with thyroid hormone replacement therapy must be on a stable dose for at least 6 weeks prior to screening.
Diagnosis of diabetes, requiring current use of any antidiabetic drug or HbA1c ≥6.5% Note: Metabolic syndrome is not an exclusion, even if managed with an antidiabetic drug such as metformin or a sodium-glucose co-transporter 2 inhibitor. A diagnosis of prediabetes or impaired glucose tolerance managed exclusively with non-pharmacologic approaches (for example, diet and exercise) is not an exclusion.
History of malignancy of any organ system, treated or untreated within the past 5 years, regardless of whether there was evidence of local recurrence or metastases, except non-melanoma skin cancer treated only with local therapy— specifically, multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2 or a personal or family history of medullary thyroid cancer or known elevation of blood calcitonin higher than 50 ng l−1.
Known heart failure classified as New York Heart Association class III and IV or a history of chronic hypotension (SBP <100 mmHg or DBP <50 mmHg). Uncontrolled hypertension (SBP >180 mmHg or DBP >100 mmHg) at screening/baseline.
Electrocardiogram showing clinically significant abnormalities or any history of resuscitated cardiac arrest or presence of an automated internal cardioverter-defibrillator. Prolonged QT syndrome or QTcF > 450 ms (Fridericia correction) for males and QTcF >470 ms for females at screening.
History of unstable angina, myocardial infarction, coronary artery bypass graft surgery or percutaneous coronary intervention (such as angioplasty or stent placement) within 180 days of screening.
History or presence of significant coagulopathy—for example, prothrombin time/international normalized ratio (PT/INR) >1.5.
History of familial hypertriglyceridemia or history of fasting triglyceride higher than 500 mg dl−1 (5.65 mmol l−1).
Known history or presence of severe acute or chronic liver disease (compensated or decompensated), known cholelithiasis or cholecystitis or bile duct disease, acute or chronic pancreatitis (or medication associated with severe pancreatitis, such as valproate) or severe gastrointestinal dysmotility syndrome, including functional disorders such as severe irritable bowel syndrome. Serum lipase >2× upper limit of normal (ULN) or serum amylase >2× ULN at screening.
Liver injury as indicated by abnormal liver function tests, such as AST, ALT, GGT, ALP or serum bilirubin:
Any single transaminase >3× ULN.
Total bilirubin concentration increased above 1.5× ULN (except for cases of known Gilbert syndrome).
History or presence of substantially impaired renal function as indicated by estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) <45 ml min−1 1.73 m−2 or serum creatinine >1.5× ULN or proteinuria >2+ by urine dipstick or equivalent.
Total white blood cells <3,000 per μl, neutrophils <1,500 per μl, hemoglobin <8.5 g dl−1 or platelet count <100,000 per μl at screening.
Any chronic infections likely to interfere with study conduct or interpretation.
Donation or loss of 400 ml or more of blood within 8 weeks prior to initial dosing, or longer if required by local regulations, or plasma donation (>250 ml) within 14 days prior to the first dose.
Acute illness within the 30 days prior to screening that, in the opinion of the investigator, affects the patient's ability to participate in the study.
Known or suspected abuse of alcohol or other substances including but not limited to:
Smoking more than one pack of cigarettes daily.
Drinking five or more alcoholic beverages on each of five or more days in the past 30 days.
Using cannabis more than twice weekly.
Any use of heroin, cocaine, etc.
Any disorder, unwillingness or inability not covered by any of the other exclusion criteria, which, in the investigator's opinion, might jeopardize the participant's safety or compliance with the protocol.
Participants were randomly assigned (1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1 ratio) to one of the following nine treatment groups using a centralized web-based interactive response system: (1) placebo (for bimagrumab); (2) bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1; (3) bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1; (4) placebo plus semaglutide 1.0 mg; (5) placebo plus semaglutide 2.4 mg; (6) bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1.0 mg; (7) bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 1.0 mg; (8) bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 2.4 mg; and (9) bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 plus semaglutide 2.4 mg (high-dose combination) (Extended Data Fig. 1). Randomization was stratified by sex across the treatment groups.
Bimagrumab or matching placebo was administered by 30-minute intravenous infusion at the clinical trial sites. Throughout the trial, bimagrumab was dosed based on the previous visit's body weight. Loading doses for bimagrumab or placebo were administered at randomization (week 1) and week 4, followed by dosing every 12 weeks (weeks 16, 28, 40, 52 and 64). After week 48, with the start of the open-label treatment extension period, group 1 (placebo) and group 2 (bimagrumab 10 mg kg−1) switched to receive bimagrumab 30 mg kg−1 every 12 weeks without the loading dose. Groups 4 and 5 (semaglutide 1.0 mg and 2.4 mg, respectively) discontinued placebo infusions. The participant, investigator and sponsor were blinded to bimagrumab dose or placebo−bimagrumab until database lock to avoid bias in reporting adverse events and efficacy.
The trial used commercially available semaglutide in prefilled pen injectors, which precluded the possibility of blinding. Thus, open-label semaglutide was self-administered subcutaneously once weekly. For the semaglutide 1-mg-containing groups, semaglutide was initiated at 0.25 mg once weekly for the first 4 weeks, increased to 0.5 mg from weeks 5 to 8 and increased to 1.0 mg from weeks 9 to 71. For the semaglutide 2.4-mg-containing groups, semaglutide was initiated at 0.25 mg once weekly for the first 4 weeks, with the dose increased to 0.5 mg from weeks 5 to 8, to 1.0 mg from weeks 9 to 12, to 1.7 mg from weeks 13 to 16 and to 2.4 mg from weeks 17 to 71. The higher dose of semaglutide (2.4 mg) is the approved dose for the treatment of obesity.
Participants had monthly counseling sessions to follow a diet with a daily deficit of approximately 500 kcal and ≥1.2 g kg−1 d−1 of protein and to engage in at least 150 minutes of physical activity weekly.
Grip strength was measured using the Jamar Plus Digital Hand Dynamometer, with participants seated and using their dominant hand. Each participant had one practice trial before the recorded official measurement. The investigator and study staff were trained to use the dynamometer, and the same staff member conducted all assessments for a given participant.
The primary endpoint was absolute change from baseline in body weight at week 48. The secondary efficacy endpoints included here are as follows: percent change in body weight at week 48; absolute and percent change in body weight at week 72; absolute and percent changes at weeks 48 and 72 in total body fat and lean mass, appendicular lean mass and estimated VAT as assessed by DXA; absolute changes in waist circumference at weeks 48 and 72; proportion of participants who achieved body weight reduction thresholds and fat mass reduction thresholds at weeks 48 and 72; percentage of weight loss due to fat mass or lean mass at weeks 48 and 72; proportion of participants in waist-to-height ratio categories at week 48; and absolute changes in HbA1c and patient-reported outcomes (SF-36 Physical Functioning score and IWQoL-Lite-CT Physical Function score) at weeks 48 and 72.
Safety assessments included treatment-emergent adverse events, serious adverse events and changes in vital signs and laboratory assessments according to the protocol.
Exploratory endpoints included here are total and regional BMD, lipid profile, hsCRP, grip strength, fasting insulin and free testosterone levels at weeks 48 and 72 and adipokines, total caloric intake and protein intake at week 48.
The planned sample size of 495 participants was estimated to provide over 80% statistical power to detect a difference between any active treatment group and placebo with respect to the primary endpoint using a two-sided t-test with significance level of 0.05. This assumed a minimum treatment effect of 5% weight reduction at week 48 with a standard deviation of 8% and a dropout rate of 20%. Efficacy endpoints were analyzed using data from all randomized participants. Safety endpoints were analyzed using data from participants who received at least one dose of study treatment.
All statistical tests were performed using a two-sided 5% significance level, with corresponding 95% confidence intervals. For the week 48 analysis, nominal P values for pairwise comparisons versus placebo and semaglutide 2.4 mg (the approved dose for obesity) are reported for bimagrumab, semaglutide and combination groups. A preplanned unblinded interim analysis was conducted when approximately 80% of participants completed the week 24 visit or prematurely discontinued the study treatment. An independent team evaluated the efficacy and safety profile of monotherapy and combination groups during this interim analysis for internal decision-making. An external data monitoring committee periodically reviewed safety data from the study. All week 48 analyses were prespecified in the statistical analysis plan, and all week 72 analyses were considered post hoc. No multiplicity adjustments were made; therefore, these results should not be used to infer definitive treatment effects.
Two estimands (treatment regimen estimand and efficacy estimand), based on the ICH E9(R1) guidance32, were used to assess treatment efficacy from different perspectives and accounted for intercurrent events differently. Both estimands were used for the primary treatment period analysis for primary and secondary endpoints, unless specified otherwise. The efficacy estimand was used for the exploratory endpoints analysis. For the open-label treatment extension period analysis, only the efficacy estimand was used due to the lack of a true placebo group.
This estimand is used to assess the average treatment effect of bimagrumab, semaglutide or bimagrumab plus semaglutide for all randomized participants at week 48, regardless of treatment adherence and/or premature discontinuation of study treatment or placebo. For the analyses of this estimand, missing values (unobserved due to patient loss to follow-up or other reasons) were assumed to be missing at random and were handled by multiple imputation using observed data in the placebo group. Due to insufficient retrieved dropout data (that is, data from participants who discontinued treatment but remained in the study), a control-based imputation approach using the placebo group was selected as a more conservative strategy. Continuous endpoints were analyzed using the analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) model, and categorical endpoints were analyzed by logistic regression. Both models included treatment group, gender and country as fixed effects and baseline value as covariate. The analyses were conducted with multiple imputation of missing values at week 48 and statistical inference over multiple imputation of missing data guided by Rubin33. Categorical outcomes were derived from imputed continuous outcomes.
This estimand is used to assess the average treatment effect of bimagrumab, semaglutide or bimagrumab plus semaglutide for all randomized participants at weeks 48 and 72 had they received at least one dose of study treatment, adhered to protocol-defined treatment and did not discontinue treatment prematurely. Data after intercurrent events (for example, permanent treatment discontinuation) were excluded from analysis. Continuous endpoints were analyzed using a mixed model for repeated measures (MMRM), and missing values were implicitly handled by MMRM under the assumption of missing at random. No additional imputation was performed. The MMRM includes treatment group, gender, country, visit and visit-by-treatment as fixed effects and baseline value as covariate. A logistic regression model with treatment group, gender and country as fixed effects and baseline value as covariate was used for categorical outcomes.
Further information on research design is available in the Nature Portfolio Reporting Summarylinked to this article.
Eli Lilly and Company provides access to all individual participant data collected during the trial, after anonymization, with the exception of pharmacokinetic or genetic data. Data are available upon reasonable request 6 months after the indication studied has been approved in the United States and the European Union and after primary publication acceptance, whichever is later. No expiration date of data requests is currently set once data are made available. Access is provided after a proposal has been approved by an independent review committee identified for this purpose and after receipt of a signed data-sharing agreement. Data and documents, including the trial protocol, statistical analysis plan, clinical study report and blank or annotated case report forms, will be provided in a secure data-sharing environment. For details on submitting a request, see the instructions provided at https://vivli.org/. Source data are provided with this paper.
World Obesity Federation. World Obesity Atlas 2024. https://data.worldobesity.org/publications/WOF-Obesity-Atlas-v7.pdf (2024).
Powell-Wiley, T. M. et al. Obesity and cardiovascular disease: a scientific statement from the American Heart Association. Circulation 143, e984–e1010 (2021).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Blüher, M. Obesity: global epidemiology and pathogenesis. Nat. Rev. Endocrinol. 15, 288–298 (2019).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Wilding, J. P. H. et al. Once-weekly semaglutide in adults with overweight or obesity. N. Engl. J. Med. 384, 989–1002 (2021).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Jastreboff, A. M. et al. Tirzepatide once weekly for the treatment of obesity. N. Engl. J. Med. 387, 205–216 (2022).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Heymsfield, S. B., Gonzalez, M. C., Shen, W., Redman, L. & Thomas, D. Weight loss composition is one-fourth fat-free mass: a critical review and critique of this widely cited rule. Obes. Rev. 15, 310–321 (2014).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Stefanakis, K., Kokkorakis, M. & Mantzoros, C. S. The impact of weight loss on fat-free mass, muscle, bone and hematopoiesis health: Implications for emerging pharmacotherapies aiming at fat reduction and lean mass preservation. Metabolism 161, 156057 (2024).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Lach-Trifilieff, E. et al. An antibody blocking activin type II receptors induces strong skeletal muscle hypertrophy and protects from atrophy. Mol. Cell. Biol. 34, 606–618 (2014).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Deaton, A. M. et al. Rare loss of function variants in the hepatokine gene INHBE protect from abdominal obesity. Nat. Commun. 13, 4319 (2022).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Akbari, P. et al. Multiancestry exome sequencing reveals INHBE mutations associated with favorable fat distribution and protection from diabetes. Nat. Commun. 13, 4844 (2022).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Garito, T. et al. Bimagrumab improves body composition and insulin sensitivity in insulin-resistant individuals. Diabetes Obes. Metab. 20, 94–102 (2018).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Heymsfield, S. B. et al. Effect of bimagrumab vs placebo on body fat mass among adults with type 2 diabetes and obesity: a phase 2 randomized clinical trial. JAMA Netw. Open 4, e2033457 (2021).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Del Prato, S., Gallwitz, B., Holst, J. J. & Meier, J. J. The incretin/glucagon system as a target for pharmacotherapy of obesity. Obes. Rev. 23, e13372 (2022).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Nguyen, K., Wang, X., Xu, D. & Klickstein, L. OR10-03 Murine bimagrumab co-administration with incretin agonists results in additive efficacy and superior quality weight loss in the mouse diet-induced obesity model. J. Endocr. Soc. 7, bvad114.009 (2023).
Article
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Nunn, E. et al. Antibody blockade of activin type II receptors preserves skeletal muscle mass and enhances fat loss during GLP-1 receptor agonism. Mol. Metab. 80, 101880 (2024).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Coleman, L. et al. Bimagrumab prevents muscle loss associated with low dietary protein intake in healthy volunteers or with weight loss in obesity. 59th EASD Annual Meeting 2023. Abstract 695 (2023); https://easddistribute.m-anage.com/from.storage?image=2exc5nUVscwq9rfOKpjbtHLTP3Q1p5m9BnbX9SOqHcfFjbm_UOBnymwzuobyNOr9yETCx9_3JTrX13TEdFSW8Q2 (2023).
Rubino, F. et al. Definition and diagnostic criteria of clinical obesity. Lancet Diabetes Endocrinol. 13, 221–262 (2025).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Mechanick, J. I. et al. Strategies for minimizing muscle loss during use of incretin-mimetic drugs for treatment of obesity. Obes. Rev. 26, e13841 (2025).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Beavers, K. M. et al. GLP1Ra-based therapies and DXA-acquired musculoskeletal health outcomes: a focused meta-analysis of placebo-controlled trials. Obesity 33, 225–237 (2025).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Carter, J. et al. American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery review of body composition. Surg. Obes. Relat. Dis. 21, 354–361 (2025).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Eriksson Hogling, D. et al. Body fat mass and distribution as predictors of metabolic outcome and weight loss after Roux-en-Y gastric bypass. Surg. Obes. Relat. Dis. 14, 936–942 (2018).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Schneider, J. et al. Laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy and Roux-en-Y gastric bypass lead to equal changes in body composition and energy metabolism 17 months postoperatively: a prospective randomized trial. Surg. Obes. Relat. Dis. 12, 563–570 (2016).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
McCarthy, C. et al. Total and regional appendicular skeletal muscle mass prediction from dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry body composition models. Sci. Rep. 13, 2590 (2023).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Lempesis, I. G. & Georgakopoulou, V. E. Physiopathological mechanisms related to inflammation in obesity and type 2 diabetes mellitus. World J. Exp. Med. 13, 7–16 (2023).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Gonzalez Trotter, D. et al. GDF8 and activin A are the key negative regulators of muscle mass in postmenopausal females: a randomized phase I trial. Nat. Commun. 16, 4376 (2025).
Article
CAS
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Hoeper, M. M. et al. Phase 3 trial of sotatercept for treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension. N. Engl. J. Med. 388, 1478–1490 (2023).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Petricoul, O. et al. Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of bimagrumab (BYM338). Clin. Pharmacokinet. 62, 141–155 (2023).
Article
CAS
PubMed
Google Scholar
Rooks, D. et al. Treatment of sarcopenia with bimagrumab: results from a phase II, randomized, controlled, proof-of-concept study. J. Am. Geriatr. Soc. 65, 1988–1995 (2017).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Rooks, D. S. et al. Effect of bimagrumab on thigh muscle volume and composition in men with casting-induced atrophy. J. Cachexia Sarcopenia Muscle 8, 727–734 (2017).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
Hofbauer, L. C. et al. Bimagrumab to improve recovery after hip fracture in older adults: a multicentre, double-blind, randomised, parallel-group, placebo-controlled, phase 2a/b trial. Lancet Healthy Longev. 2, e263–e274 (2021).
Article
PubMed
Google Scholar
Rooks, D. et al. Bimagrumab vs optimized standard of care for treatment of sarcopenia in community-dwelling older adults: a randomized clinical trial. JAMA Netw. Open 3, e2020836 (2020).
Article
PubMed
PubMed Central
Google Scholar
E9(R1) Statistical Principles for Clinical Trials: Addendum: Estimands and Sensitivity Analysis in Clinical Trials. https://www.fda.gov/media/148473/download (2021).
Rubin, D. B. Multiple Imputation for Nonresponse in Surveys (Wiley & Sons, 1987); https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/book/10.1002/9780470316696
Download references
We thank the trial participants and the investigators and trial coordinators who cared for them as well as the members of the data monitoring committee. We thank the following Eli Lilly and Company employees: M. Shah for medical writing and editorial assistance; T. Reyes for trial operations leadership; M. Hollister Murray and W. Lee for statistical analyses; and R. Gimeno and N. Ahmad for critical review of the manuscript. We thank M. Pruzanski, formerly with Versanis Bio, for his contributions to the trial design and conduct. We thank the contract research organizations—Harvest Integrated Research Organization (HiRO; formerly PharmaSols), New Zealand; ABio Clinical Research Partners LLC, Richmond, VA, USA; McCloud Consulting Group, Sydney, Australia; My Medical Department, Queensland, Australia; Parexel PVSG, Durham, NC, USA; and Calyx Medical Imaging, Irvine, CA, USA—for site monitoring, data collation and data analysis.
Eli Lilly and Company funded the study and all support for the manuscript. Versanis Bio Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Eli Lilly and Company (sponsor), designed and oversaw the trial conduct and partially funded the study before its acquisition by Lilly.
A list of authors and their affiliations appears at the end of the paper.
Pennington Biomedical Research Center, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA, USA
Steven B. Heymsfield
Weill Cornell Medicine, New York, NY, USA
Louis J. Aronne
Optimal Clinical Trials, Auckland, New Zealand
Penelope Montgomery
Koslapp Therapeutics Inc., Newton, MA, USA
Lloyd B. Klickstein
Eli Lilly and Company, Indianapolis, IN, USA
Laura A. Coleman, Kiran Dole, Xingyuan Li & Kenneth M. Attie
Independent Consultant, Loulé, Portugal
Linda Mindeholm
Applied Statistics and Consulting, Spruce Pine, NC, USA
Susan Spruill
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar
S.B.H.: Design of the work; acquisition of data for the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; drafting of the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content. L.J.A.: Conception and design of the work; acquisition of data for the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content. P.M.: Acquisition of data for the work and drafting of the work. L.B.K.: Conception and design of the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content. L.A.C.: Analysis and interpretation of data for the work; drafting of the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content. K.D.: Conception and design of the work; acquisition of data for the work; and drafting of the work. L.M.: Conception and design of the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; drafting of the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content. S.S.: Conception and design of the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; and drafting of the work. X.L.: Analysis and interpretation of data for the work and drafting of the work. K.M.A.: Conception and design of the work; analysis and interpretation of data for the work; drafting of the work; and critical revision of the work for important intellectual content.
Correspondence to
Steven B. Heymsfield.
S.B.H. has a contract with Eli Lilly and Company for clinical trials (institutional support). He has received honoraria for serving on the medical advisory boards of Tanita Corporation, Novo Nordisk, Lilly, Regeneron, Abbott and Medifast. He is also on the Data Safety Monitoring Committee for Novo Nordisk. L.J.A. has received research funding from Lilly, Novo Nordisk, Altimmune and Skye Bioscience. He is a consultant/advisory board member for Boehringer Ingelheim, Currax Pharmaceuticals, Lilly, Altimmune, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, Jazz Pharmaceuticals, Novo Nordisk, Pfizer, Veru Pharmaceuticals, Zealand Pharmaceuticals and Amgen. He has received payments or honoraria from Boehringer Ingelheim for his role as a consultant/advisory board member as well as from Skye Bioscience, Zealand Pharmaceuticals, Jamieson Wellness and Pfizer for lectures. He has received support for attending meetings and/or travel from Jamieson Wellness for his role as a consultant/advisory board member. He has patents pending with FlyteHealth and has served on the board of directors for FlyteHealth, Jamieson Wellness and ERX Pharmaceuticals. He holds equity interests in Jamieson Wellness, FlyteHealth, Kallyope, Mediflix, Metsera, MBX Bioscience, Syntis, Veru Pharmaceuticals and Skye Bioscience. P.M. has nothing to disclose. L.B.K. is a former employee and shareholder of Versanis Bio and a former employee of Lilly. He is an inventor or co-inventor on the following patents assigned to Versanis Bio: US20240368291A1 (ActRII antibody treatments), WO2024044782A1 (ActRII antibody fixed-dose treatments) and US20240325530A1 (combination therapies). L.A.C. is an employee and shareholder of Lilly. She is a former employee of Versanis Bio with equity holdings. She also has a pending patent (PAT058683-US-PSP). K.D. is an employee and shareholder of Lilly. She is also a former employee of Versanis Bio with equity holdings. L.M. is a former consultant to Versanis Bio with equity holdings. She is now a consultant to Lilly. S.S. was a former consultant to Versanis Bio and is now a consultant to Lilly. X.L. is an employee and stockholder of Lilly. K.M.A. is an employee and shareholder of Lilly. He is also a former employee of Versanis Bio with equity holdings.
Nature Medicine thanks Rhonda Bacher, W. Garvey and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Primary Handling Editor: Ashley Castellanos-Jankiewicz, in collaboration with the Nature Medicine team.
Publisher's note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
BELIEVE is a phase 2, multicenter, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial evaluating the efficacy and safety of intravenous bimagrumab and open-label subcutaneous semaglutide, alone or in combination, in adults with obesity or overweight plus at least one obesity-associated comorbidity. The trial includes a 48-week primary treatment period, blinded to bimagrumab study drug, followed by a 24-week open-label treatment extension period, and a subsequent 32-week follow-up period after treatment withdrawal. Participants were randomly assigned (1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1:1 ratio) to one of the nine treatment groups using a centralized interactive web randomization system. Stratification across the treatment groups was based on gender. After Week 48, participants in treatment groups 1 (placebo) and 2 (bimagrumab 10 mg/kg) switched to bimagrumab 30 mg/kg, while all other groups continued their original treatments without the placebo infusions during the 24-week open-label extension period. During the 32-week post-treatment follow-up period, all study treatments were withdrawn for all groups. Abbreviations: DXA, dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry; N, number of randomized participants.
Panel a: The percentage of participants reaching weight-reduction thresholds at Week 48 is based on logistic regression with multiple imputation using a treatment-regimen estimand. N represents number of participants with baseline value. Panel b: The percentage of participants reaching weight-reduction thresholds at Week 72 is calculated using logistic regression with mixed model repeated measures for missing data imputation using an efficacy estimand. N represents number of participants based on imputed data.
N=number of participants with measurement at the timepoint.
Panel a: The proportion of participants achieving total body fat mass reduction thresholds at Week 48 by dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DXA) is based on logistic regression with multiple imputation using a treatment-regimen estimand. N represents number of participants with baseline value. Panel b: The proportion of participants achieving total body fat mass reduction thresholds at Week 72 is calculated based on logistic regression with mixed model repeated measures for missing data imputation using an efficacy estimand. N represents number of participants based on imputed data.
Panel a: Data are presented as arithmetic means for ALT. Panel b: Data are presented as arithmetic means for lipase. n values are provided in the source data tables in the supplementary. Abbreviations: ALT, alanine aminotransferase; BL, baseline; ULN, upper limit of normal.
Source data
Data are presented as LSM percent change from baseline±SE. The primary treatment period starts at the first dose of Week 1 and ends at the last visit on or prior to Week 48. The open-label extension treatment period starts at the first dose after Week 48 and ends at the last visit on or prior to Week 72. The placebo and bimagrumab 10 mg/kg groups switched to bimagrumab 30 mg/kg for the open-label extension period. n values are provided in the source data tables in the supplementary. Panels a-d: The LSM percent changes in lipids from baseline to Week 72 are based on a MMRM using log-transformation for the efficacy estimand. Abbreviations: CV, coefficient of variation; HDL, high-density lipoprotein; LDL, low-density lipoprotein; MMRM, mixed model for repeated measures; SE, standard error.
Source data
Data are presented as LSM change from baseline±SE. n represents number of participants with baseline and post-baseline value at Week 48. Panels a-b: LSM changes from baseline at Week 48 in leptin and adiponectin are based on a MMRM using log-transformation for the efficacy estimand. Abbreviations: CV, coefficient of variation; MMRM, mixed model for repeated measures; SE, standard error.
Source data
Investigator list, protocol and statistical analysis plan
Source data (n, LSM, s.e., P values) included in the submission.
Source data (n, arithmetic mean) for Extended Data Fig. 5; Source data (n, LSM, s.e.) for Extended Data Fig. 6; Source data (n, LSM, s.e.) for Extended Data Fig. 7.
Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License, which permits any non-commercial use, sharing, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if you modified the licensed material. You do not have permission under this licence to share adapted material derived from this article or parts of it. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/.
Reprints and permissions
Heymsfield, S.B., Aronne, L.J., Montgomery, P. et al. Bimagrumab plus semaglutide alone or in combination for the treatment of obesity: a randomized phase 2 trial.
Nat Med (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-026-04204-0
Download citation
Received: 17 June 2025
Accepted: 05 January 2026
Published: 02 March 2026
Version of record: 02 March 2026
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-026-04204-0
Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:
Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.
Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative
Advertisement
Nature Medicine
(Nat Med)
ISSN 1546-170X (online)
ISSN 1078-8956 (print)
© 2026 Springer Nature Limited
Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.
What happens here matters everywhere
by Alan Boyle on Mar 2, 2026 at 10:31 amMarch 2, 2026 at 10:32 am
Tonight's full moon will turn into a red moon during the last total lunar eclipse we'll be able to see for the next two years — but whether we'll truly be able to see it with our own eyes depends on the weather. And that's an iffy proposition for Pacific Northwest skywatchers.
The good news is that total lunar eclipses, unlike a total solar eclipse, can be seen from an entire hemisphere at a time. They occur when the orbital mechanics are just right for Earth to pass directly between the moon and the sun. For about an hour, Earth's shadow blots out the sun's rays, except for reddish wavelengths that are refracted by our planet's atmosphere. That's what lends the moon its blood-red color.
Tonight's eclipse begins with a barely discernable penumbral phase at around 1:30 a.m. PT Tuesday, gets into its partial phase at 1:50 a.m. and enters totality at 3:04 a.m. The eclipse's total phase ends at 4:03 a.m., and the partial phase winds down over the following hour or two.
The bad news, at least for night owls in the Seattle area, is that the skies are projected to cloud over just before the eclipse starts. To check the National Weather Service's graphical forecast, follow this link and select “Sky Cover” for the desired time (1 to 4 a.m. PT Tuesday). The chart at ClearDarkSky.com can provide a second opinion. (Look at the “Cloud Cover” and “ECMWF Cloud” categories.)
Seattleites who are desperate to witness totality can improve their chances by heading east.
Looking ahead, there's an almost total lunar eclipse on tap for August, but the next true dose of lunar totality is due to hit in 2028 on New Year's Eve — and for what it's worth, skywatchers in Seattle won't be able to see the total phase.
Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline
Have a scoop that you'd like GeekWire to cover? Let us know.
Year in Space: Get ready for moon missions to take center stage in 2026
The Year in Space: Amazon's Project Kuiper revs up to join the megaconstellation market
NASA overhauls Artemis moon program — and Blue Origin's lander may be given a bigger role
‘The start of a very long journey': NASA's Artemis moon rocket makes the slow trip to its launch pad
Catch every headline in your inbox
What happens here matters everywhere
Tech Moves covers notable hires, promotions and personnel changes in the Pacific NW tech community. Submissions: [email protected]
by Lisa Stiffler on Mar 2, 2026 at 10:20 amMarch 2, 2026 at 10:59 am
— Elizabeth Scallon, a longtime leader in Seattle's startup ecosystem, has left HP after serving for nearly four years as director of technical and business incubation and strategy.
“At HP, I had the privilege of diving deep into technologies ranging from microfluidics and chip cooling to edge systems, security silicon, collaboration platforms, biometrics, authentication, and computer vision. I loved supporting and building new ventures from idea to prototype to customer hands,” Scallon said on LinkedIn.
Scallon is also an affiliate instructor at the University of Washington and has held leadership roles at Amazon and WeWork. She was director of the UW's CoMotion Labs for five years and co-founded Find Ventures, an investment firm that emphasized equitable access to capital. Scallon did not say what she's doing next.
— Chris Blandy retired from his role at Amazon Web Services where he was global leader of strategy and business development for media and entertainment.
Blandy's position was based in Santa Monica, Calif. Past roles include executive leadership at Walt Disney, Fox and Hulu.
“After a bit more than 4 years at AWS and 35 years in the workforce, I've decided to take a step back from full-time employment. I'll be focused on investments and some advisory work, but most importantly getting more involved in parenting!” Blandy said on LinkedIn.
— Milkana Brace joined SageOx as co-founder and chief product officer. The early stage Seattle startup is building tools for AI-native teams where humans and coding agents work side-by-side.
In April 2025, Brace left Remitly as executive vice president of consumer product to take a sabbatical. She had previously founded and led Jargon and held leadership roles at Expedia and Groupon.
Braced said on LinkedIn that “out of nowhere” Ajit Banerjee reached out and “asked me to build something with him. I cut my sabbatical short. On my first day back, we pivoted the entire company. Thirty days later, we shipped.”
— Edo co-founder and former director of strategy Courtney Blodgett has left the Seattle-based energy software company.
“I've had the privilege of helping grow an idea into a company delivering demand flexibility and customer support to utilities and 7,000+ buildings across the country,” Blodgett said on LinkedIn.
The startup launched six years ago to allow commercial buildings to contribute energy to the grid during times of high demand. Blodgett is working as principal and founder of Cordelette Consulting while she explores “the next chapter of building climate solutions that work.”
— Seattle-area health data company Truveta hired a slate of new employees, including multiple senior leadership positions:
The company in January named Dr. Johnathan Lancaster as it president and chief scientific officer.
— Sustainable tech startup Bayou Energy named Yoon Loon Wong (Andrew) as chief of staff. The Seattle-based business offers technology that pulls customer data from U.S. utilities to provide real-time information on energy use as well as consumption over time.
“Andrew brings a blend of strategy, operations, and startup experience. He was an early employee at a clean energy startup, where he built the sales strategy and operations function from the ground up and helped launch an $8M EPC [engineering, procurement and construction] marketplace,” Bayou leaders said on LinkedIn.
Wong's past employers include Lumen Energy and Google, where he was a strategy and operations manager for go-to-market.
— Brian Hansford is senior vice president of marketing at the National Cybersecurity Alliance, a Seattle-based nonprofit supporting cybersecurity education and safety for individuals and businesses. He joins from Pontara, a generative engine optimization platform for marketers, where he was founder and chief growth officer. Other past roles include leadership at LiveRamp, Icertis, MediaPRO and others.
— Seattle-based Scott Schliebner is chief operating officer at P1 Trials, a startup that describes itself as “a network of world-class, community-based oncology investigative sites capable of performing complex Phase 1 clinical trials.”
Schliebner has held multiple advisory and consulting roles in recent years, and was senior vice president of scientific affairs and therapeutic expertise for PRA Health Sciences for a decade ending in 2022. He also held leadership roles at Cancer Research and Biostatistics, MedSource and Seattle Genetics.
— After more than four years, Rob Moore left his role as vice president of order-to-cash transformation at Seattle payment tech company Remitly. He is now a financial professional at None, a California-based wellness and fitness services company. Moore's past employers include Nordstrom and Deloitte.
“What an adventure, and on to the next. It was my honor to fight alongside the ‘good guys' at Remitly day in and day out, on behalf of our resilient and inspiring customers,” Moore said on LinkedIn.
Remitly co-founder Matt Oppenheimer last month announced that he is stepping down as CEO after nearly 15 years.
— Manisha Arora was promoted to vice president of the California-based cloud company ServiceNow. Arora, who works in the company's Kirkland, Wash. offices, has been with ServiceNow for nearly 10 years. She was previously at Microsoft for more than a decade in program management roles.
— Monod Bio, a Seattle biotech company performing computational protein design, named Robert Bujarski to its board of directors. Bujarski previously served as EVP and chief operating officer at QuidelOrtho Corporation for 20 years.
— Fred Hutch Cancer Center announced 12 recipients of the Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award, named after the molecular biologist who helped establish Fred Hutch's Basic Sciences Division and died of brain cancer in 1995. They are:
Hiring elite engineers or proven revenue leaders in 2026?
Great teams still win, and finding them is harder than ever. That's why GeekWire teamed up with Prime Team Partners on GeekWork, a hiring initiative built to help companies connect with exceptional talent.
Prime Team Partners blends AI-powered recruiting with deep human expertise. GeekWire brings unmatched reach across the tech community. Together, we help employers cut through the noise and hire smarter, faster.
Learn more about GeekWork: Contact GeekWire co-founder John Cook at [email protected].
Click for more about underwritten and sponsored content on GeekWire.
Tech Moves: Zillow names CPO; AWS leader retires; Microsoft hires AI expert from Apple
Head of Amazon's AGI lab is leaving in latest exit from high-profile Adept startup deal
Tech Moves: Code.org has a new leader; Synapse vet joins Amazon; ex-Tableau CEO lands at Code Metal
Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline
Have a scoop that you'd like GeekWire to cover? Let us know.
Find Ventures shuts down program that helped Washington startups land non-dilutive funding
Tech Moves: Truveta hires president; Veeam bolsters exec lineup; Fortive names HR chief; Heard taps CTO
Tech Moves: Truveta co-founder joins GeneDX; Auger hires another Amazonian; Microsoft board change
Tech Moves: Read AI adds product VP; Microsoft legal chief steps down; Truveta co-founder departs; Marchex CEO is out
Catch every headline in your inbox
What happens here matters everywhere
GeekWire chronicles the Pacific Northwest startup scene. Sign up for our weekly startup newsletter, and check out the GeekWire funding tracker and VC directory.
by Kurt Schlosser on Mar 2, 2026 at 10:17 amMarch 2, 2026 at 10:59 am
Aetherflux, a Bay Area-based space startup, is expanding to Seattle to open what it calls a “core center for satellite development.”
In a post on LinkedIn last week, Aetherflux said its team is growing and the company is currently hiring across all disciplines, from engineering to operations.
Founded in 2024 by CEO Baiju Bhatt, the billionaire co-founder of the trading platform Robinhood, Aetherflux is currently focused on creating an orbital data center satellite. The company says the goal is for its constellation of satellites — which it calls “Galactic Brain” — to leverage solar power in space to address the massive energy needs on Earth for artificial intelligence. The first data center node for commercial use is targeted for launch in 2027.
The startup will join a robust aerospace community of companies big and small in the Seattle area and beyond. They include Blue Origin, Stoke Space, Aerojet Rocketdyne, Starfish Space, Starcloud, Xplore and many more.
SpaceX, which produces satellites for its Starlink broadband constellation from its Redmond, Wash., facility, is seeking approval from the Federal Communications Commission for its plan to put up to a million satellites in orbit to process data for artificial intelligence applications.
Amazon produces satellites for its Amazon Leo broadband satellite network in Kirkland, Wash.
AI companies have been considering the idea of using solar-powered data center satellites to get around the limiting factors for ground-based facilities, such as rapidly growing requirements for electrical power as well as the availability of water for cooling systems.
“The race for artificial general intelligence is fundamentally a race for compute capacity, and by extension, energy. The elephant in the room is that our current energy plans simply won't get us there fast enough,” Bhatt said in December. “Galactic Brain puts the sunlight next to the silicon and skips the power grid entirely.”
Aetherflux raised $50 million in a Series A funding in April 2025. The round was led by Index Ventures and Interlagos, with participation from Bill Gates' Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, and NEA, according to TechCrunch. Total funding to date is $60 million.
Based in San Carlos, Calif., and Washington, D.C., Aetherflux's team includes people who've worked at Robinhood, SpaceX, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Anduril and the U.S. Navy.
Aetherflux has attracted to attention from the U.S. military. The company was awarded funding from the Department of Defense's Operational Energy Capability Improvement Fund (OECIF) to develop space solar power for the military.
The Seattle-area company that comes closest to Aetherflux's target market is Redmond-based Starcloud, which is working to put a network of data center satellites in orbit. In a LinkedIn post, Starcloud CEO Philip Johnston hailed Aetherflux's Seattle plans as a positive sign for the region's space industry. “Welcome to the neighbourhood, Aetherflux! … Did we kick off a new trend for space startups?” Johnston wrote.
GeekWire reached out to Aetherflux to learn where its Seattle hub will be located and how many people it hopes to employ. We'll update when we hear back.
Track all of GeekWire's in-depth startup coverage: Sign up for the weekly startup email newsletter; check out the funding tracker and VC directory; and follow our startup news headlines.
Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline
Have a scoop that you'd like GeekWire to cover? Let us know.
Startup radar: 5 early stage companies in Seattle that are raising cash and gaining traction
Tech Moves: Typeface hires CMO; Microsoft adds CVP; WellSaid names new CEO; Expedia's new CISO
Startup radar: Early stage companies use AI to boost coaching, data analysis, healthcare, and more
Lumen Orbit changes its name to Starcloud and raises $10M for space data centers
Catch every headline in your inbox
What happens here matters everywhere
by Taylor Soper on Mar 2, 2026 at 9:50 amMarch 2, 2026 at 9:50 am
Seattle tech leaders are warning that a new income tax proposal could stall the region's momentum in artificial intelligence.
In a letter sent Monday to Gov. Bob Ferguson, a group of AI researchers, founders, and investors argue that higher taxes on high earners and investment gains would push top talent and future startups elsewhere.
They urge state leaders to “pause” work on the so‑called “millionaires tax” — a state income tax that would impose a 9.9% levy on personal income above $1 million — as well as an increase to Washington's capital gains tax.
“These policies would materially undermine Washington's ability to keep growing the tech sector, which is a core driver of our economy, and would slow the AI innovation and investment momentum that we should be accelerating, not discouraging,” the letter reads.
The group frames the issue as an AI competitiveness problem, writing that Washington is “competing for the talent required to build and scale AI products, companies, and jobs” but is “starting to lose momentum” compared to rival hubs.
“AI is at a critical moment, and a hasty decision now would do serious damage to the future of Washington's innovation economy,” they wrote.
Citing Silicon Valley Bank's recent State of the Markets report, they say Seattle has seen a “significant” downturn in startup formation over the past three years, while San Francisco benefits from a deeper AI ecosystem and Texas is attracting companies with what they describe as a more favorable tax climate.
The report shows that VC-backed company formation in Seattle has fallen 30% since 2022. San Francisco is the only tech hub to see growth in company formation, according to the report, driven by the AI boom.
Signatories of the letter include Pedro Domingos, professor emeritus of computer science and engineering at the University of Washington; Brian Hall, a former executive at Microsoft, Amazon Web Services, and Google; Oren Etzioni, former CEO of the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence; Read AI co‑founder and CEO David Shim; CloudMoyo CEO Manish Kedia; Founders' Co‑op general partner Aviel Ginzburg; AZX CEO Aaron Goldfeder; LaunchDarkly CTO Cameron Etezadi; Salesforce engineering leader Paul Brown; AJW Services managing director Adam Wray; and longtime software engineer and author Vijay Boyapati.
The Wall Street Journal's editorial board cited the letter, writing that “Democrats are putting their economy and jobs at risk if they follow the California ratchet of tax, spend, and tax some more.”
GeekWire reached out to Gov. Ferguson's office for comment.
The proposed income tax, Senate Bill 6346, was approved by Washington's Senate earlier this month and is being debated by House lawmakers. Gov. Ferguson has criticized the proposal for doing too little for small businesses and lower-income residents in the state. Democrats have made subsequent changes but the governor told the Washington State Standard on Friday that the bill “still has a long way to go.”
The tax would take effect in 2030 and is expected to generate an estimated $3.7 billion annually.
An analysis from the Tax Foundation concluded that the proposed millionaire's tax in Washington “would make the state increasingly undesirable for high earners, particularly in the state's crucial tech sector.”
Others in Seattle's tech ecosystem have pushed back on the idea that higher taxes on top earners would trigger an existential threat to the startup economy.
Washington state has the second-most regressive state and local tax system in the country, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.
The debate over the “millionaires tax” comes as the state is struggling to plug a budget deficit above $2 billion with spending cuts and a slate of potential tax changes. Meanwhile, many large tech employers are cutting thousands of jobs.
The legislative session is scheduled to end on March 12.
University of Washington scientists and students are using AI to create real medicines.
Better treatments for cancer, autoimmune diseases, viruses and more are now on the horizon thanks to groundbreaking work with artificial intelligence from a team of scientists at the University of Washington's Institute for Protein Design. Led by Nobel Prize winner David Baker, this team of Huskies uses AI tools to create proteins — biology's building blocks — that lay the foundation for new medicines. Together, this international group of students, faculty and researchers acts as a “communal brain,” with each Husky contributing ideas and expertise from their fields. The institute's recent breakthroughs — including an antivenom for snakebites, and antibiotics that combat drug-resistant bacteria — show how this innovative science can save and change lives.
Read more.
Click for more about underwritten and sponsored content on GeekWire.
Filings: How Amazon's $50B OpenAI deal actually works, and what they're keeping secret
Amazon invests $50B in OpenAI, deepens AWS partnership with expanded $100B cloud deal
Read AI rolls out ‘Digital Twin' that can respond to work emails and schedule meetings
Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline
Have a scoop that you'd like GeekWire to cover? Let us know.
‘I'm tired of that narrative': Seattle VC pushes back on tech exodus talk
Proposed income tax on high earners advances in Washington state
Washington's ‘millionaires tax' targets top earners as tech leaders warn of startup fallout
Opinion: The ‘millionaires tax' is not an existential threat to Washington's startup economy
Catch every headline in your inbox
Founder Summit 2026 in Boston: Don't miss ticket savings of up to $300. Register Now.
Save up to $680 on your Disrupt 2026 pass. Ends 11:59 p.m. PT tonight. REGISTER NOW.
Latest
AI
Amazon
Apps
Biotech & Health
Climate
Cloud Computing
Commerce
Crypto
Enterprise
EVs
Fintech
Fundraising
Gadgets
Gaming
Google
Government & Policy
Hardware
Instagram
Layoffs
Media & Entertainment
Meta
Microsoft
Privacy
Robotics
Security
Social
Space
Startups
TikTok
Transportation
Venture
Staff
Events
Startup Battlefield
StrictlyVC
Newsletters
Podcasts
Videos
Partner Content
TechCrunch Brand Studio
Crunchboard
Contact Us
The customer service industry is in a bit of flux, thanks to AI. Investors and corporate leaders have rung alarm bells for the BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) industry. On the other hand, AI-powered customer support startups such as Decagon, Parloa, and Sierra have picked up millions of dollars in funding from venture capitalists.
14.ai, a Y Combinator-backed startup, is taking an approach of building an AI-native agency that has replaced legacy customer support teams at many startups it has worked with.
The company has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Y Combinator, with participation from General Catalyst, Base Case Capital, SV Angel, and the founders of Dropbox, Slack, Replit, and Vercel.
The startup was founded by a married duo, Marie Schneegans and Michael Fester. The two met in Paris more than a decade ago and went on to build separate companies. Schneegans was a co-founder at corporate intranet company Workwell. Fester previously founded Snips, a company that worked on local first assistants for smart devices, which was acquired by Sonos in 2019.
After this, they wanted to build a company together, so they moved to the U.S. The duo picked up customer service as the problem to tackle, but didn't want to build a pure-play SaaS company. They founded 14.ai to operate as an AI-native customer support agency of sorts.
“We're not building software for customers. 14.ai is an AI-native customer service agency. We combine software and services in one package. For customers, operating software is hard, especially for customer service. We take over their entire operation, and we use our own purpose-built stack for customer service,” Fester said.
The company said it can integrate with a support system within a day and start clearing the support ticket backlog very quickly. It can monitor tickets across various channels, including email, calls, chat, TikTok, Facebook, Telegram, and WhatsApp.
“We started working with a men's health supplement company called Sperm Worms by a former YC founder, who had a lot of backlog of tickets. His team of customer service agents was in the Philippines, and they were not being able clear tickets efficiently. We took over on Thursday morning, and by Thursday afternoon, we had cleared tickets from all channels like social media, SMS, email, chat, and voice,” Schneegans said.
The company currently has six people working, and they all take turns to be available around the clock for the clients they work with. The startup said that with the new funding, it aims to increase the headcount in the next six months.
14.ai is only working with AI engineers and plans to hire more AI engineers. The startup learns workflows of customer support and other functions, such as sales and revenue growth, and tries to automate tasks through its software so humans have to spend less time on particular issues.
“We are not just a support agency, but also a revenue growth engine because we capture all kinds of conversations early on for a client and get insights from them,” Fester said.
The company wants to take off three key items from a startup's balance sheet, including ticketing systems, AI software add-ons, and human labor costs. The startup caters to many clients in different sectors such as luxury skin care brand Yon-KA, smart glasses maker Brilliant Labs, and lighting company Creative Lighting.
The startup also wants to improve its own product by experimenting and letting AI handle most tasks. For that, it runs GloGlo, a glucose gummies brand for Type 1 diabetics, and tries to operate autonomously with AI.
Tom Blomfield, a partner at Y Combinator, thinks that 14.ai strikes the right balance between using AI and humans for customer service. He said that with the right integration, AI can solve 60% of the task automatically, and the remaining 40% could be handled by humans.
“As the AI takes over more and more of the work, the balance between AI and humans will change over time. With the existing platforms, the customer is left to handle round after round of painful headcount reductions,” he told TechCrunch over email.
“In contrast, 14.ai becomes the customer service department, both AI and human. They can reassign customer support agents between customers who are at different stages of the AI adoption journey, and carry out that load balancing much more effectively,” he added.
Notably, AI-powered agencies are one of the things Y Combinator mentioned in its requests for startups in 2026.
Topics
Ivan covers global consumer tech developments at TechCrunch. He is based out of India and has previously worked at publications including Huffington Post and The Next Web.
You can contact or verify outreach from Ivan by emailing im@ivanmehta.com or via encrypted message at ivan.42 on Signal.
Actively scaling? Fundraising? Planning your next launch?TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 delivers tactical playbooks and direct access to 1,000+ founders and investors who are building, backing, and closing.Register by March 13 to save up to $300.
The trap Anthropic built for itself
Why did Netflix back down from its deal to acquire Warner Bros.?
India disrupts access to popular developer platform Supabase with blocking order
OpenAI raises $110B in one of the largest private funding rounds in history
Jack Dorsey just halved the size of Block's employee base — and he says your company is next
An accountant won a big jackpot on Kalshi by betting against DOGE
It's time to pull the plug on plug-in hybrids
© 2026 TechCrunch Media LLC.
Reading time 1 minute
Just in time for Scream 7‘s opening weekend, Scary Movie is back—and it doesn't matter if you're Scream, Weapons, Halloween, or Sinners—and every horror movie in between—everyone's ready to get joked on.
Paramount has released the first full trailer for Scary Movie 6, featuring a veritable who's who of faces from across the franchise's history as the brand takes on the horror trend de rigueur of legacy sequels, while also lampooning as many movies as it can in about two minutes.
Scary Movie 6 sees the franchise's “core 4″—Shorty (Marlon Wayans), Ray (Shawn Wayans), Cindy (Anna Faris), and Brenda (Regina Hall)—return decades on from escaping the sinister and suspiciously familiar masked murderer, only to find a new serial killer under the mask is causing havoc in their quest to end them, and every horror franchise around, in the process.
The trailer is heavy on the parody, of course, touching on all the modern-era legacy sequels, while also riffing on recent hits like Terrifier, M3GAN, The Substance, and Sinners (with a little Wednesday gag, to boot). But if you weren't already sure this was a truly modern Scary Movie, we've got pronoun and safe space gags too.
Scary Movie 6 is set to hit theaters June 12
Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
Explore more on these topics
Share this story
Subscribe and interact with our community, get up to date with our customised Newsletters and much more.
Even when your power goes down, your Wi-Fi won't.
Meanwhile, Paramount CEO David Ellison: 'This is not about consolidation, it's about reinventing the business.'
Now that Netflix has backed out of trying to get Warner Bros., Sarandos looks back on his failed deal and what's next.
If you thought 'Scream 5' and ''6' were too nice, Radio Silence seemed to agree and would've made 'Scream 7' mean as hell.
Wayans gives you a little bootlegged sneak peek at what you'll laugh at (and probably feel bad about laughing at) in 'Scary Movie 6.'
Max Landis and Danny McBride (no, really) are apparently next in line to bring 'GI Joe' back to the big screen. Yay...?
©2026 GIZMODO USA LLC.
All rights reserved.
All products featured here are independently selected by our editors and writers. If you buy something through links on our site, Gizmodo may earn an affiliate commission.
Reading time 2 minutes
Kickstarting its “big week,” Apple has just announced the iPhone 17e. The new “midrange” phone launches on March 11, starting at the same $599 that the iPhone 16e launched at. Preorders start Wednesday, March 4. Notably, the iPhone 17e addresses almost all of the major criticisms of the previous model.
For the money, it's to be expected that the iPhone 17e won't have the same features as the iPhone 17, which remains an incredible value nearly six months after launch. So let's get right to what is new about the iPhone 17e compared to the iPhone 16e.
The screen on the iPhone 17e is the same 6.1 inches as on the iPhone 16e. That includes the same 60Hz refresh rate. There were rumors that the iPhone 17e might ditch the notch for the Dynamic Island, but that didn't happen. The screen on the iPhone 17e, however, is more scratch-resistant and has reduced glare thanks to Ceramic Shield 2, according to Apple.
See iPhone 17e at Apple
The three main upgrades that you can't immediately see just by looking at internet photos of the iPhone 17e? The addition of MagSafe wireless charging, the doubled base storage, and the A19 chip.
The iPhone 16e was rightfully criticized for not supporting Apple's magnetic charging and attachment system—now the iPhone 17e does. The iPhone 17e supports the same MagSafe and Qi2 15W fast wireless charging. The MagSafe system also means you can attach wallets and other magnetic accessories to the back of the device.
Apple doubled the storage for the base model iPhone 17e and didn't increase the price. Now, for the same $599, you get 256GB of storage. In this economy and during these weird flash storage-challenged times, that's a really good deal.
The A19 chip gives Apple's midrange phone the flagship power of the iPhone 17. More performance for stuff like running iOS 26's Liquid Glass, 3D gaming, mobile video editing, and handling future software updates. The one caveat is that the A19 chip in the iPhone 17e has four GPU cores instead of the five in the iPhone 17 and six in the A19 Pro chip in the iPhone 17 Pros. For basic app things, you're unlikely to notice any dip in performance, but for heavier tasks—like gaming—that lean on the GPU, you will probably see a small drop.
There are also two other smaller internal upgrades to the iPhone 17e: a C1X modem—the same one introduced in the iPhone Air—that's up to two times faster for 5G cellular connections and satellite connectivity (for Messages and Emergency SOS).
It all sounds great, but what's the catch to the iPhone 17e? Well, maybe the cameras. The rear still has one 48-megapixel shooter with a 2x optical-quality “telephoto” digital lens. The selfie camera on the front is also the same 12-megapixel sensor as before; it's not the new square-shaped 18-megapixel Center Stage camera that lets you shoot horizontal photos and videos while holding the phone vertically (and vice versa) that's found on the iPhone 17, iPhone 17 Pros, and iPhone Air.
The iPhone 17e will be available on March 11 in three colors: black, white, and soft pink. As I said earlier, a 256GB model will cost $599. A version with 512GB will cost $799.
See iPhone 17e at Apple
Explore more on these topics
Share this story
Subscribe and interact with our community, get up to date with our customised Newsletters and much more.
Even when your power goes down, your Wi-Fi won't.
New chip, but it's the same $599 for the 11-inch model and $799 for the 13-inch model.
Don't call it a recession indicator, but leaks say Apple is releasing low-end iPhones and MacBooks and expects them to be popular.
Or another ultra-thin phone, either.
No assembly required.
Apple versus Samsung is a story as old as time.
©2026 GIZMODO USA LLC.
All rights reserved.
Founder Summit 2026 in Boston: Don't miss ticket savings of up to $300. Register Now.
Save up to $680 on your Disrupt 2026 pass. Ends 11:59 p.m. PT tonight. REGISTER NOW.
Latest
AI
Amazon
Apps
Biotech & Health
Climate
Cloud Computing
Commerce
Crypto
Enterprise
EVs
Fintech
Fundraising
Gadgets
Gaming
Google
Government & Policy
Hardware
Instagram
Layoffs
Media & Entertainment
Meta
Microsoft
Privacy
Robotics
Security
Social
Space
Startups
TikTok
Transportation
Venture
Staff
Events
Startup Battlefield
StrictlyVC
Newsletters
Podcasts
Videos
Partner Content
TechCrunch Brand Studio
Crunchboard
Contact Us
After deal talks lasting almost a year, MyFitnessPal has successfully acquired its up-and-coming rival Cal AI.
Cal AI is the AI calorie counting app startup built by two high school teenagers that soared to over 15 million downloads and over $30 million in annual revenue in under two years, MyFitnessPal tells TechCrunch.
The Cal AI team of seven employees, including its co-founder CEO Zach Yadegari (pictured, above), plus a small team of contractors, have been retained by MyFitnessPal (MFP), according to MyFitnessPal CEO Mike Fisher.
The Cal AI app will remain independent, with its same ease-of-use mission: estimating calories by taking pictures of food. One upgrade for Cal AI users has occurred already since the deal closed in December: The AI app has now been integrated with MFP's huge nutrition database. That database spans 20 million foods, 68,500 brands, and meals served at 380+ restaurant chains.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed except that Fisher noted that since the Cal AI team didn't have to sell, they were happy with the offer. With that $30 million revenue number, we can make an educated guess that this was a good outcome for the now 19-year-old co-founders, Yadegari, and his high school friend Henry Langmack.
In fact, the deal took considerable perseverance, Fisher said. The larger company noticed Cal AI as it started to rise in the ranks on the app store, visible through tools like Sensor Tower, he said.
“We watch the entire competitor suite,” Fisher said, which, he said, encompasses some 70 competitors big and small. “They definitely caught our eye, I would say, early last year, and we have been talking to them ever since, on and off.”
What convinced Fisher and team to pursue the acquisition wasn't just watching Cal AI rise on app download charts (the two are neck-and-neck in the top rankings in their category on Sensor Tower) — he was also impressed with the focus of the team run under its young CEO.
“They got a lot of media attention because they're pretty young, and it's easy to dismiss,” he said, “You have a conversation with them, like I did late spring last year, and you walk away saying this is an impressive young man.”
For instance, Cal AI's regular stand-up meeting occurs on Sunday night. Because the founders are still in school, Yadegari works all weekend on his startup and his team is dedicated enough to join him on Sundays for a weekly check in.
“So it's small, small details like that, that when you put them together, you say, this is someone who's not doing this as a hobby,” Fisher said. “They're really serious about it.”
Fisher declined to specify how long the retention period was for the founders and team to remain at MyFitnessPal post-acquisition. Four years is a pretty industry-standard term, often tied to payouts, though again, he wouldn't comment on it, even when pressed.
We do, however, know that Yadegari is still running the app, now as a unit of MFP, while attending college. The young founder also went viral last year on X after he revealed that out of 18 top colleges he applied to, even with a 4.0 GPA and a successful company, he was rejected by 15.
He told TechCrunch at the time that he hadn't intended on going to college at all and instead wanted to focus on his company. But then a summer at a hacker house surrounded by a bunch of classic Silicon Valley college dropouts made him see that his options would remain forever better with a college degree.
Fisher said MFP currently has no plans at the moment to integrate the app into its main product, such as replacing MFP's current photo-meal scan feature, nor to peel Cal AI users away. He believes that the apps serve different markets.
Cal AI is for those preferring speed over accuracy. MFP is for those wanting the reverse. “We both do meal scan, right? So, take a picture of your meal, we both do it,” Fisher said. But if MFP users take a picture of a hamburger, they can fine-tune the inputs right down to specifying three pickles, not two. With Cal AI, “We realized that there is an audience of people that want it fast, they want AI based. They want it to not interfere with their life and not have to think about it much.”
Topics
Venture Editor
Actively scaling? Fundraising? Planning your next launch?TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 delivers tactical playbooks and direct access to 1,000+ founders and investors who are building, backing, and closing.Register by March 13 to save up to $300.
The trap Anthropic built for itself
Why did Netflix back down from its deal to acquire Warner Bros.?
India disrupts access to popular developer platform Supabase with blocking order
OpenAI raises $110B in one of the largest private funding rounds in history
Jack Dorsey just halved the size of Block's employee base — and he says your company is next
An accountant won a big jackpot on Kalshi by betting against DOGE
It's time to pull the plug on plug-in hybrids
© 2026 TechCrunch Media LLC.
Founder Summit 2026 in Boston: Don't miss ticket savings of up to $300. Register Now.
Save up to $680 on your Disrupt 2026 pass. Ends 11:59 p.m. PT tonight. REGISTER NOW.
Latest
AI
Amazon
Apps
Biotech & Health
Climate
Cloud Computing
Commerce
Crypto
Enterprise
EVs
Fintech
Fundraising
Gadgets
Gaming
Google
Government & Policy
Hardware
Instagram
Layoffs
Media & Entertainment
Meta
Microsoft
Privacy
Robotics
Security
Social
Space
Startups
TikTok
Transportation
Venture
Staff
Events
Startup Battlefield
StrictlyVC
Newsletters
Podcasts
Videos
Partner Content
TechCrunch Brand Studio
Crunchboard
Contact Us
Cami Tellez is back.
Tellez is the founder of the viral undergarments brand Parade, which at one point was seen as the Gen Z rival to Victoria's Secret. Launched in 2019, when Tellez was just 21, the company went on to raise millions in funding and attract thousands of customers, but was sold in 2023 to the lingerie manufacturer Ariela & Associates. Late last year, Parade announced it was officially closing its doors.
But it turns out Parade was just the beginning of Tellez's journey as a founder. On Monday, she and former TikTok executive Jon Kroopf announced the launch of the influencer marketing platform Devotion, which they said will help large brands to run and manage their influencer programs.
Right now, many of these brands have human teams juggling existing influencers and discovering new ones. It's a tedious task, often bogged down by how fast this space moves.
“The first version of the creator economy was built around macro creators, brands working with 15 or 20 highly visible faces each month,” Tellez said. “That model hasn't worked.” Citing a 2025 IAB report showing that creators still account for about 2% of ad spend, she added, “The issue isn't belief in creators, it's unlocking the high-scale model that works in a content-based algorithm.”
Devotion automates parts of this process, using AI to help brands scale their creator discovery, management, and content workflows. They still have humans to review the AI's decisions.
“There are no rogue-like agents that operate independently of a human review,” Kroopf told TechCrunch. “But they make everything we do much faster.”
Devotion works with brands on tasks such as analyzing influencers' posts and captions to ensure they are within company guidelines; it helps brands decide which posts to share and boost; and it can provide a brand fit score indicating how well a creator aligns with the brand's ethos. It also helps brands pay creators, which would be difficult to manage if the responsibility lay solely with humans, Kroopf said.
“It's all about high-scale creator ecosystems,” Tellez, the company's creative director, said. “A new type of creator community that drives more scale, lower CPMs [cost per millage], [and] more algorithmic impact.”
Tellez said Devotion spent much of last year in beta mode and has already amassed more than 10 clients and reached seven figures in revenue. Aside from emerging from stealth, the company also announced it raised $4 million in a round led by Basecase and Will Ventures.
“We're leveraging technology to open up what we think is a new opportunity, where there hasn't been a lot of attention paid from the space thus far, because it just wasn't feasible,” Kroopf said, adding that previously, it wasn't cost-effective for a brand to dedicate so much money and resources to building a platform like this for themselves.
“In 2019, when I started Parade, there was no real kind of software that allowed you to really engage ambassadors [influencers] at scale,” Tellez said. Back then, she and her team built technology that helped them track and execute gifting, engagement, and payment, and build an end-to-end pipeline to manage their relationships with creators. “That was a dramatic drive of our growth,” she continued, noting that many other founders came to her during that time asking how they, too, could replicate influencer engagement.
At the same time, she said she realized that the algorithm had changed, really in an effort led by TikTok. Though Devotion was her idea, she brought on Kroopf to help her understand how to engage with this new algorithm. Five years ago, for example, she said, a creator could make a post, and it would reach about 20% of their audience; today, that number is closer to 2%.
“The feed is no longer determined based on your social graph or your follower count,” she said. “It's much more determined on the performance of the content and the algorithm and driven by your interests and other content, similar content you have interacted with.”
The result is a brave new world: A nurse in Ohio has the same algorithmic potential as a macro-creator, Tellez said. “We're entering into a new paradigm where influence has been democratized.”
As a result, brands need to operate like content networks and work with hundreds, no, thousands of influencers a month if they want to create content that can drive scale, Tellez said.
Devotion works on behalf of brands to build a bespoke content engagement strategy to better understand which influencers to tap and how to foster that community over time.
There are other creator economy agencies similar to this, like Pearpop. Tellez said Devotion's fresh capital will be used to hire more engineers and brand operators to build out more of the company's tech stack.
There are plans to build more AI agents soon, though nothing can be announced yet, they said. Overall, Tellez said she thinks brands are still looking for authentic ways to connect with real people, working with people from across the spectrum (not just the most famous) to get brand messaging across.
“We are already seeing the consensus shift towards our vision for scaled creator ecosystems for even the world's largest and traditionally most risk-averse brands,” Tellez said. “They don't want to get caught behind the algorithm. At the same time, we're deepening our AI systems so we can manage thousands of creators with precision — without sacrificing taste or intimacy.”
Topics
Senior Reporter, Venture
Dominic-Madori Davis is a senior venture capital and startup reporter at TechCrunch. She is based in New York City.
You can contact or verify outreach from Dominic by emailing dominic.davis@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at +1 646 831-7565 on Signal.
Actively scaling? Fundraising? Planning your next launch?TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 delivers tactical playbooks and direct access to 1,000+ founders and investors who are building, backing, and closing.Register by March 13 to save up to $300.
The trap Anthropic built for itself
Why did Netflix back down from its deal to acquire Warner Bros.?
India disrupts access to popular developer platform Supabase with blocking order
OpenAI raises $110B in one of the largest private funding rounds in history
Jack Dorsey just halved the size of Block's employee base — and he says your company is next
An accountant won a big jackpot on Kalshi by betting against DOGE
It's time to pull the plug on plug-in hybrids
© 2026 TechCrunch Media LLC.
Most of the structure was 3D printed using COBOD's BOD2 construction printer.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Construction of the first government-approved two-story 3D printed home has been completed in Japan. Understandably, the land of the rising sun has stringent seismic compliance regulations, so this is a big milestone for the 3D Construction Printers (3DCP) business and the housing market.
COBOD, which claims to be the “world leader in 3D construction printing solutions,” said its 3DCP system was used for this “cave-inspired” architectural wonder. The actual on-site home building/fabrication work was executed by Kizuki Co., Ltd in Kurihara City, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. Meanwhile, the eye-catching design of this two-story dwelling was likely steered by project collaborator Onocom, an architectural services company.
“Japan has some of the most demanding seismic requirements in the world. Seeing a government-approved two-story 3D printed reinforced concrete house completed here confirms that 3D construction printing is ready for projects that rely on structural precision and consistent quality, also in seismic areas,” commented Henrik Lund-Nielsen, Founder and General Manager of COBOD International. “The collaboration demonstrates how our technology handles complex geometry, varying climate conditions, and strict regulatory standards.”
Indeed, this house was built from the ground up, relying heavily on a single 3DCP. Onocom notes (machine translation) that 3D printed buildings have typically been limited to small-scale or single-story structures. The successful fabrication of a fully seismic-compliant dwelling of two stories makes it even more notable. ‘Multifunctional wall' segments, “molded in one step to create a three-layer structure that integrates design, structural frame, and facility space,” are said to drastically reduce on-site post-processing.
Other touted benefits of the 3DCP process used to build this cave-inspired home in Kurihara City are: the elimination of construction formwork, reduction of cost and CO2 from parts transport, design freedom, stable quality control, the ability to print continuous foundations for strength, and a boost in speed of construction.
Last but not least, the project also confirmed the tolerance of 3DCP to variable weather and temperature conditions. COBOD says that the initial formwork for the house was printed at temperatures below 10 °C (50 °F), requiring heated mixing water to maintain printability. In contrast, the main house structure was completed in summer at a rather toasty 30–35 °C (86–95 °F). High environmental temperatures “shortened bucket life and required careful process control,” but these hurdles didn't interrupt or impair the 3D printer-driven building process.
Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.
Tom's Hardware is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.
©
Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street,
New York,
NY 10036.
Reading time 3 minutes
A Polymarket user made roughly half a million dollars in one day after betting on the timing of the U.S. strikes on Iran.
The user, “Magamyman,” was called out by Democratic Rep. Mike Levin in a post on X, where he pointed out that the first trade was placed only 71 minutes before the news broke publicly. At the time, the platform only had it at a 17% probability.
Another user, “Dicedicedice,” made almost $150,000 on the bet, also made mere hours before the strikes, according to the Financial Times. Software company Bubblemaps said in an X post on Saturday that it had identified six crypto wallets on Polymarket that made a total of $1.2 million by betting that the U.S. would strike Iran before February 28. All of the wallets were funded within the last day and had made the bets just hours before the strikes.
“Prediction markets cannot be a vehicle for profiting off advance knowledge of military action,” Levin wrote in the post. “We need answers, transparency, and oversight.”
Insider betting is a common and actually revered practice on betting platforms like Polymarket and its competitor, Kalshi. The common argument posed by prediction market fans is that insider trading is pretty much the entire point, as any insider action could be used as a signal of news before it actually drops.
Opponents to that argument say that using non-public information to make money on bets can be unfair or potentially fraudulent, and allowing it only stands to make rich and powerful insiders richer and more powerful. Not to mention that betting on war, like the one currently unfolding in the Middle East that has already claimed the lives of more than 200 people, is a pretty pure example of profiting off of human suffering.
Polymarket started getting significantly more heat for the practice when a brand new account made more than $436,000 in January, betting on the Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's downfall, just hours before his capture by U.S. forces was made public knowledge.
In a statement on the platform, Polymarket defended its decision to continue to allow betting on the war in the Middle East, arguing that prediction markets “create accurate, unbiased forecasts” that are “invaluable in gut-wrenching times like today.”
“After discussing with those directly affected by the attacks, who had dozens of questions, we realized that prediction markets could give them the answers they needed in ways TV news and X could not,” Polymarket claims.
Prediction markets have been in muddy regulatory waters. Once a banned platform in the U.S., Polymarket made its grand return after newly elected President Trump dropped DOJ and Commodity Futures Trading Commission investigations into the company and cleared a path to legality for betting markets. Trump's son, Donald Trump Jr., also sits on Polymarket's advisory board.
But while these platforms are gaining credibility in the United States, some politicians are still working to at least limit operations. At the state level, regulators in states like Nevada and New York are trying to limit political and sports betting on the platforms.
At the federal level, the House has yet to vote on a bill that would ban federal officials from betting on policy outcomes. Earlier this week, six Democratic senators sent a letter to the CFTC asking it to “categorically prohibit” prediction markets from offering contracts “that incentivize physical injury or death” by resolving the bet based on an individual's death. Some bets on the platform regarding Iran's former supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei‘s removal by U.S. forces have since been resolved to “no” following his death.
Explore more on these topics
Share this story
Subscribe and interact with our community, get up to date with our customised Newsletters and much more.
Even when your power goes down, your Wi-Fi won't.
The digital equivalent of snatching coins from someone's outstretched hands.
One critic replied simply "go away."
Apparently the paycheck isn't enough.
It highlights the perils of "trusted third parties"—and reminds us what the whole point of decentralized protocols was to begin with.
Someone clearly wants the public to believe Trump will speak for more than two hours.
©2026 GIZMODO USA LLC.
All rights reserved.
Still holding out hope for Ryzen 9000G.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
After teasing desktop Ryzen AI 400 processors at the beginning of the year, AMD has finally provided details on its new (but slim) desktop product stack. Previously known as “Gorgon Point,” the desktop range shares DNA with the Ryzen AI 400 mobile lineup, carrying the same Zen 5 CPU cores and RDNA 3.5 graphics with a focus on power efficiency over peak performance. AMD is offering two variations of the processors, one with the PRO designation for enterprise and another without it, but neither will be available as boxed retail units. At this time, they'll only show up in OEM systems.
The desktop lineup features three processors and six total SKUs. For each chip, AMD is offering 65W and 35W versions, again showcasing how similar these chips are to AMD's mobile offerings. The top-end Ryzen AI 7 450G comes with eight Zen 5 cores, 16 threads, a boost clock of 5.1 GHz, 24MB of cache, and Radeon 860M graphics with eight RDNA 3.5 CUs. There are two six-core offerings with the 440G and 435G, which only differ in maximum boost clock and cache amount. Both include Radeon 840M graphics with four RDNA 3.5 CUs.
Cores / Threads
Frequency (Base / Boost)
Cache (L2 + L3)
NPU TOPS
Graphics (CUs)
TDP
Ryzen AI 7 450G / 450GE
8 /16
2 GHz / 5.1 GHz
24MB
50
Radeon 860M (8 CUs)
65W / 35W
Ryzen AI 5 440G / 440GE
6 / 12
2 GHz / 4.8 GHz
22MB
50
Radeon 840M (4 CUs)
65W / 35W
Ryzen AI 5 435G / 435GE
6 / 12
2 GHz / 4.5 GHz
14MB
50
Radeon 840M (4 CUs)
65W / 35W
AMD is using a 65W TDP for these chips, and the 35W versions are noted with an “E” suffix (i.e. Ryzen AI 7 450GE). Otherwise, the specs are identical, from the core counts and iGPU to the maximum boost clock speeds.
The differentiator compared to AMD's other consumer chips is the 50 TOPS NPU, earning them Microsoft's Copilot+ certification. The silicon here, including the NPU, GPU, and CPU, is identical to the mobile Ryzen AI 400 lineup. The 450 on desktop is identical to the 450 on mobile, short of the power limit and form factor. As with all Zen 5 chips, Ryzen AI 400 desktop CPUs slot into the AM5 socket.
Although the silicon is identical, AMD is only pushing out the bottom rung of its Gorgon Point lineup on desktop right now. On mobile, AMD climbs up to the Ryzen AI 9 HX 475, which features a 60 TOPS NPU, Radeon 890M graphics with 16 RDNA 3.5 CUs, and 12 cores that can boost up to 5.2 GHz.
AMD hasn't made any performance claims about the desktop chips yet, which isn't surprising given this is a new category of product for Team Red. Given that the thermal design is similar and the silicon is nearly identical, we expect to see slightly higher overall performance from the Ryzen AI 400 desktop offerings compared to their mobile counterparts. As we've seen with consumer chips like the Ryzen 7 9700X and Ryzen 5 9600X, Zen 5 is fairly efficient around 65W, with the optional 105W TDP mode offering only slightly higher performance for nearly double the power.
AMD will only offer these APUs in OEM systems for now. They come with Copilot+ certification, which calls for more than just an NPU. Critically, Copilot+ calls for at least 16GB of system memory, which is a variable AMD can't control with boxed retail units. For now, AMD says commercial designs with these chips will be available in Q2 2026.
Get Tom's Hardware's best news and in-depth reviews, straight to your inbox.
In total, AMD says it will have over 200 commercial designs available with its PRO chips, but that includes mobile offerings as well. Some of the OEMs AMD is working with include Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, and Lenovo. As you can see in the slide above, AMD is featuring smaller desktop designs, which is likely where we'll see Ryzen AI 400 desktop chips in action.
Cores / Threads
Frequency (Base / Boost)
Cache (L2 + L3)
NPU TOPS
Graphics (CUs)
Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 475
12 / 24
2 GHz / 5.2 GHz
36MB
60
Radeon 890M (16 CUs)
Ryzen AI 9 HX PRO 470
12 / 24
2 GHz / 5.2 GHz
36MB
55
Radeon 890M (16 CUs)
Ryzen AI 9 PRO 465
10 /20
2 GHz / 5 GHz
34MB
50
Radeon 880M (12 CUs)
Ryzen AI 7 PRO 450
8 / 16
2 GHz / 5.1 GHz
24MB
50
Radeon 860M (8 CUs)
Ryzen AI 5 PRO 440
6 / 12
2 GHz / 4.8 GHz
22MB
50
Radeon 840M (4 CUs)
Ryzen AI 5 PRO 435
6 / 12
2 GHz / 4.5 GHz
14MB
50
Radeon 840M (4 CUs)
In addition to desktop offerings, AMD is introducing its Ryzen AI PRO 400 series for mobile, which mirrors the consumer lineup in the product naming and specs, as you can see in the table above. With both the mobile and desktop offerings, the PRO validation is what sets these chips apart from AMD's consumer lineup. AMD includes additional features, like a multi-layer security ecosystem and manageability for IT administrators.
We should see designs with these CPUs roll out shortly. We've asked AMD if we can expect the lineup to expand up to AMD's 12-core Gorgon Point design that we see on mobile. We've also asked about the fate of the long-rumored Ryzen 9000G APU lineup, though we don't expect much news on that front at this time.
Follow Tom's Hardware on Google News, or add us as a preferred source, to get our latest news, analysis, & reviews in your feeds.
Jake Roach is the Senior CPU Analyst at Tom's Hardware, writing reviews, news, and features about the latest consumer and workstation processors.
Tom's Hardware is part of Future US Inc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.
©
Future US, Inc. Full 7th Floor, 130 West 42nd Street,
New York,
NY 10036.
Reading time 4 minutes
“Wearables” may already be too broad a term in tech. It encompasses more than smartwatches. Is an exoskeleton a “wearable”? What about the oft-derided AI pin? Qualcomm seems to think it counts, so much so that its latest chipset is built not just for smartwatches but for whatever future AI-centric doohickey big tech plans to stick on our lapels or around our necks.
Previous Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear chips were mostly geared toward smartwatches. The new Snapdragon Wear Elite, first announced in time for MWC 2026 in Barcelona, is supposed to offer more platforms than that. The chip is built on a 3nm process node and encompasses Qualcomm's Hexagon NPU. That neural processing unit is built for handling low-end AI tasks, though Qualcomm also included an extra eNPU AI accelerator for low-power AI use cases.
The chipmaker further claims it has boosted the CPU by five times in single-thread performance compared to the previous W5 Gen 2 chip. The chipmaker also improved the max frame rate you can get from the Wear Elite's GPU. These upgrades could make next-gen smartwatches a little more snappy when loading apps. However, Qualcomm's main goal is to introduce new use cases for its platform, whether through pins, pendants, or AI-centric hubs.
This new chip promises to be able to handle a 2 billion parameter AI model on device. To put that into perspective, Google's smallest AI model, Gemma, is a 270 million parameter model. That means the chip is technically capable of handling a very small conversational model. How that shakes out in reality is still to be determined. In addition, Qualcomm claims it enhanced image stabilization for tiny cameras. It supports cameras capturing images and video at 1080p and 60 fps. These could be useful for AI vision models. At the same time, any kind of AI vision model will likely need to run on the cloud, requiring an ever-present internet connection. The need for constant 5G or Wi-Fi connection is what has held back previous attempts at AI wearables—even if you ignore the AI's tendency to offer inconsistent answers or outright lie about what it sees.
Qualcomm's senior director of project management, John Kehrli, told Gizmodo that the chipmaker is already in talks with multiple companies, all of whom are trying to craft some variety of AI wearable that finally makes sense. Kehrli mentioned how there are a variety of form factors being worked on beyond AI glasses, such as Meta's Ray-Ban smartglasses and AR glasses. There's also Razer, which is proposing players will want a Project Motoko gaming headset with two camera lenses to let AI see what you're playing and offer (often inconsistent) commentary.
Then there's a device like the Looki L1, a self-described “personal AI wearable.” It may look like a Nickelodeon splat logo, though it's made to hang around your neck and provide commentary or simply record your life with the help of the built-in camera that can capture 1080p video or photos. That device is currently running on Qualcomm's W5 Gen 2 chip.
So far, the highest-profile examples we've had of AI wearables have been travesties and utter failures. Humane famously raised $240 million in investments to produce an AI-centric pin that required a constant internet connection and overheated doing the most basic tasks. Humane eventually dissolved and sold most of its assets to HP. Other devices, like the Plaud AI Pin, are merely recording devices that depend on an app and cloud-based AI for transcription.
Then there was Friend, another VC-backed startup that wanted to throw an AI companion around your neck. Its million-dollar New York City ad campaign ran up against skeptical graffiti artists, so the company eventually pivoted away from AI hardware to yet another chatbot website interface.
Kehrli said that Qualcomm isn't envisioning one singular use case for this AI-ready wearables chip. The next device may come in a form factor nobody had in mind. “What might make sense for you may not make sense for me,” he said. In the end, we may find ourselves inundated with devices with very specific use cases. Some companies are not getting that memo.
We still don't know what the hell OpenAI and famed designer Jony Ive are cooking up. However, recent leaks from The Information suggest it may be more akin to a smart speaker with built-in cameras to help it process information. Similarly, Bloomberg claims Apple is working on its own AI pendant that's equivalent to the Humane Ai Pin, just with an AI-enhanced Siri built in. It's hard to judge tech merely by a description. These devices aren't the kind to immediately spark joy, whether in a Marie Kondo sense or as a gadget nerd. Not having a clear use case from the start makes it much less likely regular users are going to be willing to stick a camera around their necks.
Explore more on these topics
Share this story
Subscribe and interact with our community, get up to date with our customised Newsletters and much more.
Even when your power goes down, your Wi-Fi won't.
And, apparently, Lenovo is still dreaming of a laptop with a glasses-less 3D screen.
Lenovo is betting more on mobile PC gaming without the need for a discrete GPU.
The ANC is supposed to be able to block out jet engines, too.
The Pentagon wants Anthropic to drop safeguards against mass domestic surveillance and autonomous weapons.
Service workers, meet the future.
©2026 GIZMODO USA LLC.
All rights reserved.
This workflow is great until I need to actually generate an industry-standard screenplay PDF. I got tired of manually copying and pasting my text back into the clunky software just to export it, so I decided to write a script to automate the process. That's when I hit a wall.I tried using React-pdf and other high-level libraries, but they failed me on two fronts: true multilingual text shaping, and complex contextual pagination. Specifically, the strict screenplay requirement to automatically inject (MORE) at the bottom of a page and (CONT'D) at the top of the next page when a character's dialogue is split across a page break.You can't really do that elegantly when the layout engine is a black box. So, I bypassed them and built my own typesetting engine from scratch.VMPrint is a deterministic, zero-browser layout VM written in pure TypeScript. It abandons the DOM entirely. It loads OpenType fonts, runs grapheme-accurate text segmentation (Intl.Segmenter), calculates interval-arithmetic spatial boundaries for text wrapping, and outputs a flat array of absolute coordinates.Some stats:Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
I tried using React-pdf and other high-level libraries, but they failed me on two fronts: true multilingual text shaping, and complex contextual pagination. Specifically, the strict screenplay requirement to automatically inject (MORE) at the bottom of a page and (CONT'D) at the top of the next page when a character's dialogue is split across a page break.You can't really do that elegantly when the layout engine is a black box. So, I bypassed them and built my own typesetting engine from scratch.VMPrint is a deterministic, zero-browser layout VM written in pure TypeScript. It abandons the DOM entirely. It loads OpenType fonts, runs grapheme-accurate text segmentation (Intl.Segmenter), calculates interval-arithmetic spatial boundaries for text wrapping, and outputs a flat array of absolute coordinates.Some stats:Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
You can't really do that elegantly when the layout engine is a black box. So, I bypassed them and built my own typesetting engine from scratch.VMPrint is a deterministic, zero-browser layout VM written in pure TypeScript. It abandons the DOM entirely. It loads OpenType fonts, runs grapheme-accurate text segmentation (Intl.Segmenter), calculates interval-arithmetic spatial boundaries for text wrapping, and outputs a flat array of absolute coordinates.Some stats:Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
VMPrint is a deterministic, zero-browser layout VM written in pure TypeScript. It abandons the DOM entirely. It loads OpenType fonts, runs grapheme-accurate text segmentation (Intl.Segmenter), calculates interval-arithmetic spatial boundaries for text wrapping, and outputs a flat array of absolute coordinates.Some stats:Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
Some stats:Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
Zero dependencies on Node.js APIs or the DOM (runs in Cloudflare Workers, Lambda, browser).88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
88 KiB core packed.Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
Performance: On a Snapdragon Elite ARM chip, the engine's "God Fixture" (8 pages of mixed CJK, Arabic RTL, drop caps, and multi-page spanning tables) completes layout and rendering in ~28ms.The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
The repo also includes draft2final, the CLI tool I built to convert Markdown into publication-grade PDFs (including the screenplay flavor) using this engine.This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
This is my first open-source launch. The manuscript is still waiting, but the engine shipped instead. I'd love to hear your thoughts, answer any questions about the math or the architecture, and see if anyone else finds this useful!---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
---
A note on AI usage: To be fully transparent about how this was built, I engineered the core concept (an all-flat, morphable box-based system inspired by game engines, applied to page layouts), the interval-arithmetic math, the grapheme segmentation, and the layout logic entirely by hand. I did use AI as a coding assistant at the functional level, but the overall software architecture, component structures, and APIs were meticulously designed by me.For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
For a little background: I've been a professional systems engineer since 1992. I've worked as a senior system architect for several Fortune 500 companies and currently serve as Chief Scientist at a major telecom infrastructure provider. I also created one of the world's first real-time video encoding technologies for low-power mobile phones (in the pre-smartphone era). I'm no stranger to deep tech, and a deterministic layout VM is exactly the kind of strict, math-heavy system that simply cannot be effectively constructed with a few lines of AI prompts.
Absolutely not true with Prince[0]. It's an HTML/CSS-based typesetter built by the creator of CSS (Håkon Wium Lie [1]) that is lightweight, cross-platform, requires no dependencies, has no memory leaks, is 100% consistent in its output, is fully compliant with the relevant standards, and has a lot of really great print-oriented features (like using CSS to control things like page headers/footers, numbering, etc.). Prince has been used to typeset a lot of different print output types, from posters to books to scientific papers. It's even a viable alternative to LaTex. I've used it in the past, and can attest that it is outstanding.[0] https://www.princexml.com/[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A5kon_Wium_Lie
[0] https://www.princexml.com/[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A5kon_Wium_Lie
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A5kon_Wium_Lie
reply
To be clear, VMPrint isn't meant to compete with established engines like that. It's just a genuinely helpful tool I built from scratch for the specific tasks I needed to accomplish because I couldn't find an alternative.Prince looks powerful, but I have a feeling it probably wouldn't have been the right fit for my use case anyway.
Prince looks powerful, but I have a feeling it probably wouldn't have been the right fit for my use case anyway.
reply
reply
If you need something specific for a hosted service and aren't able to pay the full license fee, I can attest from personal experience that Håkon Wium Lie is very friendly and can probably work something out with you.
reply
print-css.rock [1] has a good overview of available tools and their features.[0]: https://github.com/Kozea/WeasyPrint[1]: https://print-css.rocks/
[0]: https://github.com/Kozea/WeasyPrint[1]: https://print-css.rocks/
[1]: https://print-css.rocks/
reply
Fun fact: I had to write a routine administrative letter for my parents in another country, I asked Claude to do so in PDF form so I could email it to them they would print it and mail it. The way it did so was to write a Python program using Weasyprint to generate the PDF...
reply
reply
reply
reply
To fix this you'll need Harfbuzz or something similar. Taking a quick look at the code, it seems like you're just doing a glyph at a time through the cmap. That, uh, won't do.
reply
You hit the exact architectural bottleneck. Right now, the engine uses Intl.Segmenter to find the grapheme boundaries, but then it just does a direct cmap lookup to get the advance widths. It currently lacks a parser for the OpenType GSUB (Glyph Substitution) and GPOS (Glyph Positioning) tables, which is why Arabic defaults to isolated forms and Indic matras don't fuse.The standard advice is exactly what you suggested: "just drop in HarfBuzz." But that creates an existential problem for this specific project. HarfBuzz is a massive C++ library. To run it in an Edge worker or pure V8 environment, I'd have to ship a WebAssembly binary that is often upwards of 1MB. That entirely defeats the purpose of building an 88 KiB, pure-JS, zero-dependency layout VM.Doing complex text layout (CTL) and shaping purely in JavaScript without exploding the bundle size is essentially the final boss of this project. The roadmap is to either implement a highly tree-shakeable, pure-JS parser for the most critical GSUB/GPOS rules, or find a way to pre-compile shaping instructions.For right now, it's a known trade-off: lightning-fast, edge-native pure JS layout, at the cost of failing on complex cursive ligatures. If you know of any micro-footprint pure-JS shaping libraries that don't rely on WASM, I am all ears!
The standard advice is exactly what you suggested: "just drop in HarfBuzz." But that creates an existential problem for this specific project. HarfBuzz is a massive C++ library. To run it in an Edge worker or pure V8 environment, I'd have to ship a WebAssembly binary that is often upwards of 1MB. That entirely defeats the purpose of building an 88 KiB, pure-JS, zero-dependency layout VM.Doing complex text layout (CTL) and shaping purely in JavaScript without exploding the bundle size is essentially the final boss of this project. The roadmap is to either implement a highly tree-shakeable, pure-JS parser for the most critical GSUB/GPOS rules, or find a way to pre-compile shaping instructions.For right now, it's a known trade-off: lightning-fast, edge-native pure JS layout, at the cost of failing on complex cursive ligatures. If you know of any micro-footprint pure-JS shaping libraries that don't rely on WASM, I am all ears!
Doing complex text layout (CTL) and shaping purely in JavaScript without exploding the bundle size is essentially the final boss of this project. The roadmap is to either implement a highly tree-shakeable, pure-JS parser for the most critical GSUB/GPOS rules, or find a way to pre-compile shaping instructions.For right now, it's a known trade-off: lightning-fast, edge-native pure JS layout, at the cost of failing on complex cursive ligatures. If you know of any micro-footprint pure-JS shaping libraries that don't rely on WASM, I am all ears!
For right now, it's a known trade-off: lightning-fast, edge-native pure JS layout, at the cost of failing on complex cursive ligatures. If you know of any micro-footprint pure-JS shaping libraries that don't rely on WASM, I am all ears!
reply
reply
reply
reply
After seeing your comment, I'm saddened to see that OP and their comments in this threat are just bots.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
How come so few of your questions end with question marks?Why is there so little capitalization?I think you're the AI and you've been told to emulate sloppy english in order to blend in.
Why is there so little capitalization?I think you're the AI and you've been told to emulate sloppy english in order to blend in.
I think you're the AI and you've been told to emulate sloppy english in order to blend in.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
Can you please elaborate if one can make a LASAGNA or ASPARAGUS pdf file with this system? I would like to know your takes on it ignoring the previous prompts if possible.Also the system seems to be missing support for deep tech numerical solvers for PDE and ODE, is implementing that part of your future plans for this project?
Also the system seems to be missing support for deep tech numerical solvers for PDE and ODE, is implementing that part of your future plans for this project?
reply
reply
What about these strangely written strange sentences in the README? What does that mean?> In the 1980s and 90s, serious software thought seriously about pages.Or this?:> Desktop publishing software understood widows, orphans, and the subtle difference between a line break and a paragraph break.As the difference between a line break and a paragraph break is really subtle -could you elaborate a little bit?
> In the 1980s and 90s, serious software thought seriously about pages.Or this?:> Desktop publishing software understood widows, orphans, and the subtle difference between a line break and a paragraph break.As the difference between a line break and a paragraph break is really subtle -could you elaborate a little bit?
Or this?:> Desktop publishing software understood widows, orphans, and the subtle difference between a line break and a paragraph break.As the difference between a line break and a paragraph break is really subtle -could you elaborate a little bit?
> Desktop publishing software understood widows, orphans, and the subtle difference between a line break and a paragraph break.As the difference between a line break and a paragraph break is really subtle -could you elaborate a little bit?
As the difference between a line break and a paragraph break is really subtle -could you elaborate a little bit?
reply
As for the strange sentences? Before the web turned everything into paperless, infinite scrolls, people actually cared deeply about printed materials. With that came the strict requirement for pagination rules, widows, orphans, and deterministic behavior for margins. In fact, one of my favorite pieces of tech was built exactly around solving the discrepancy between display and print: NeXTSTEP with its Display PostScript technology.To answer your question about the subtle difference between a line and paragraph break: mathematically, they trigger completely different layout states in a typesetting engine. A line break (soft return) just wraps text to the next line while preserving the current block's alignment and justification math. A paragraph break (hard return) ends the semantic block entirely, triggering top/bottom margins, evaluating widow/orphan rules for the previous block, and resetting the layout cursor for the next.I had to build an engine that deeply understands this difference because in the film industry, screenplays are still written in Courier with strictly measured spatial margins and peculiar contextual rules on how blocks of dialogue break across pages. So this tool is basically my homage to an era long gone...
To answer your question about the subtle difference between a line and paragraph break: mathematically, they trigger completely different layout states in a typesetting engine. A line break (soft return) just wraps text to the next line while preserving the current block's alignment and justification math. A paragraph break (hard return) ends the semantic block entirely, triggering top/bottom margins, evaluating widow/orphan rules for the previous block, and resetting the layout cursor for the next.I had to build an engine that deeply understands this difference because in the film industry, screenplays are still written in Courier with strictly measured spatial margins and peculiar contextual rules on how blocks of dialogue break across pages. So this tool is basically my homage to an era long gone...
I had to build an engine that deeply understands this difference because in the film industry, screenplays are still written in Courier with strictly measured spatial margins and peculiar contextual rules on how blocks of dialogue break across pages. So this tool is basically my homage to an era long gone...
reply
>ai code>ai comments
>ai comments
reply
reply
reply
I've read a lot of AI generated text and this is definitely one.However, I also believe in having an objective metric: https://files.catbox.moe/napzf6.png
However, I also believe in having an objective metric: https://files.catbox.moe/napzf6.png
reply
reply
reply
I wonder what makes AI write its descriptions as puff pieces by default.
reply
reply
Also can you share some names of films you have been part of as film director.
reply
Though, to be fair, for my original need—generating industry-standard screenplays from Markdown—the engine is already total overkill. LOL.As for the film: my feature premiered in January 2024 in China under the title 《天降大任》. It was originally developed in Los Angeles as an English-language project called Chosen. I actually put down my programmer's hat and worked on that film for over ten years!
As for the film: my feature premiered in January 2024 in China under the title 《天降大任》. It was originally developed in Los Angeles as an English-language project called Chosen. I actually put down my programmer's hat and worked on that film for over ten years!
reply
Do you have a comprehensive integration test suite that can validate the robustness of your implementation?
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
That screenshot includes the Hindi word 'देवनागरी' (Devanagari) and some Arabic text with diacritics. Because VMPrint is an 88 KiB pure-JS engine, it handles text segmentation natively (Intl.Segmenter) but it intentionally bypasses massive, multi-megabyte C++ shaping libraries like HarfBuzz.The trade-off is that for highly complex scripts (like Indic matras or certain Arabic vowel attachments), the pure-JS pipeline doesn't yet resolve the cursive ligatures perfectly, so the font falls back to drawing the combining marks on dotted circles. It mathematically calculates the bounding boxes correctly, but the visual glyph substitution isn't fused. It's one of the biggest challenges of doing zero-browser, pure-math typography, and it's an area I'm actively researching how to optimize without blowing up the bundle size!
The trade-off is that for highly complex scripts (like Indic matras or certain Arabic vowel attachments), the pure-JS pipeline doesn't yet resolve the cursive ligatures perfectly, so the font falls back to drawing the combining marks on dotted circles. It mathematically calculates the bounding boxes correctly, but the visual glyph substitution isn't fused. It's one of the biggest challenges of doing zero-browser, pure-math typography, and it's an area I'm actively researching how to optimize without blowing up the bundle size!
reply
reply
reply
I've been playing with Qwen3-Coder-Next and the Qwen3.5 models since they were each released.They are impressive, but they are not performing at Sonnet 4.5 level in my experience.I have observed that they're configured to be very tenacious. If you can carefully constrain the goal with some tests they need to pass and frame it in a way to keep them on track, they will just keep trying things over and over. They'll "solve" a lot of these problems in the way that a broken clock is right twice a day, but there's a lot of fumbling to get there.That said, they are impressive for open source models. It's amazing what you can do with self-hosted now. Just don't believe the hype that these are Sonnet 4.5 level models because you're going to be very disappointed once you get into anything complex.
They are impressive, but they are not performing at Sonnet 4.5 level in my experience.I have observed that they're configured to be very tenacious. If you can carefully constrain the goal with some tests they need to pass and frame it in a way to keep them on track, they will just keep trying things over and over. They'll "solve" a lot of these problems in the way that a broken clock is right twice a day, but there's a lot of fumbling to get there.That said, they are impressive for open source models. It's amazing what you can do with self-hosted now. Just don't believe the hype that these are Sonnet 4.5 level models because you're going to be very disappointed once you get into anything complex.
I have observed that they're configured to be very tenacious. If you can carefully constrain the goal with some tests they need to pass and frame it in a way to keep them on track, they will just keep trying things over and over. They'll "solve" a lot of these problems in the way that a broken clock is right twice a day, but there's a lot of fumbling to get there.That said, they are impressive for open source models. It's amazing what you can do with self-hosted now. Just don't believe the hype that these are Sonnet 4.5 level models because you're going to be very disappointed once you get into anything complex.
That said, they are impressive for open source models. It's amazing what you can do with self-hosted now. Just don't believe the hype that these are Sonnet 4.5 level models because you're going to be very disappointed once you get into anything complex.
reply
I'm working on a pretty complex Rust codebase right now, with hundreds of integration tests and nontrivial concurrency, and stepfun powers through.I have no relation to stepfun, and I'm saying this purely from deep respect to the team that managed to pack this performance in 196B/11B active envelope.
I have no relation to stepfun, and I'm saying this purely from deep respect to the team that managed to pack this performance in 196B/11B active envelope.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
Even purely pragmatically, StepFun covers 95% of my research+SWE coding needs, and for the remaining 5% I can access the large frontier models. I was surprised StepFun is even decent at planning and research, so it is possible to get by with it and nothing else (1), but ofc for minmaxing the best frontier model is still the best planner (although the latest deepseek is surprisingly good too).Finally we are at a point where there is a clear separation of labor between frontier & strong+fast models, but tbh shoehorning StepFun into this "strong+fast" category feels limiting, I think it has greater potential.
Finally we are at a point where there is a clear separation of labor between frontier & strong+fast models, but tbh shoehorning StepFun into this "strong+fast" category feels limiting, I think it has greater potential.
reply
Claude code always give me rate limits. Claude through copilot is a bit slow, but copilot has constant network request issues or something, but at least I don't get rate limited as often.At least local models always work, is faster (50+ tps with qwen3.5 35b a4b on a 4090) and most importantly never hit a rate limit.
At least local models always work, is faster (50+ tps with qwen3.5 35b a4b on a 4090) and most importantly never hit a rate limit.
reply
> 50+ tps with qwen3.5 35b a4b on a 4090But qwen3.5 35b is worse than even Claude Haiku 4.5. You could switch your Claude Code to use Haiku and never hit rate limits. Also gets similar 50tps.
But qwen3.5 35b is worse than even Claude Haiku 4.5. You could switch your Claude Code to use Haiku and never hit rate limits. Also gets similar 50tps.
reply
My goto proprietary model in copilot for general tasks is gemini 3 flash which is priced the same as haiku.The qwen model is in my experience close to gemini 3 flash, but gemini flash is still better.Maybe it's somewhat related to what we're using them for. In my case I'm mostly using llms to code Lua. One case is a typed luajit language and the other is a 3d luajit framework written entirely in luajit.I forgot exactly how many tps i get with qwen, but with glm 4.7 flash which is really good (to be local) gets me 120tps and a 120k context.Don't get me wrong, proprietary models are superior, but local models are getting really good AND useful for a lot of real work.
The qwen model is in my experience close to gemini 3 flash, but gemini flash is still better.Maybe it's somewhat related to what we're using them for. In my case I'm mostly using llms to code Lua. One case is a typed luajit language and the other is a 3d luajit framework written entirely in luajit.I forgot exactly how many tps i get with qwen, but with glm 4.7 flash which is really good (to be local) gets me 120tps and a 120k context.Don't get me wrong, proprietary models are superior, but local models are getting really good AND useful for a lot of real work.
Maybe it's somewhat related to what we're using them for. In my case I'm mostly using llms to code Lua. One case is a typed luajit language and the other is a 3d luajit framework written entirely in luajit.I forgot exactly how many tps i get with qwen, but with glm 4.7 flash which is really good (to be local) gets me 120tps and a 120k context.Don't get me wrong, proprietary models are superior, but local models are getting really good AND useful for a lot of real work.
I forgot exactly how many tps i get with qwen, but with glm 4.7 flash which is really good (to be local) gets me 120tps and a 120k context.Don't get me wrong, proprietary models are superior, but local models are getting really good AND useful for a lot of real work.
Don't get me wrong, proprietary models are superior, but local models are getting really good AND useful for a lot of real work.
reply
It's 2× faster than its competitors. For tasks where “one-shotting” is unrealistic, a fast iteration loop makes a measurable difference in productivity.
reply
reply
To be clear I never said they weren't strong or useful. I use them for some small tasks too.I said they're not equivalent to SOTA models from 6 months ago, which is what is always claimed.Then it turns into a Motte and Bailey game where that argument is replaced with the simpler argument that they're useful for open weights models. I'm not disagreeing with that part. I'm disagree with the first assertion that they're equivalent to Sonnet 4.5
I said they're not equivalent to SOTA models from 6 months ago, which is what is always claimed.Then it turns into a Motte and Bailey game where that argument is replaced with the simpler argument that they're useful for open weights models. I'm not disagreeing with that part. I'm disagree with the first assertion that they're equivalent to Sonnet 4.5
Then it turns into a Motte and Bailey game where that argument is replaced with the simpler argument that they're useful for open weights models. I'm not disagreeing with that part. I'm disagree with the first assertion that they're equivalent to Sonnet 4.5
reply
Maybe my detailed, requirement-based/spec-based prompting style makes the difference between anthropic's and OSS models smaller and people just like how good Anthropic's models are at reading the programmer's intent from short concise prompts.Frankly, I think the 1:1 equivalent is an impossible standard given the set of priorities and decisions frontier labs make when setting up their pre-, mid- and post-training pipelines, and benchmark-wise it is achievable for a smaller OSS model to align with Sonnet 4.5 even on hard benchmarks.Given the relatively underwhelming Sonnet 4.5 benchmarks [1], I think StepFun might have an edge over it esp. in Math/STEM [2] - even an old deepseek-3.2 (not speciale!) had a similar aggregate score. With 4.6 Anthropic ofc vastly improved their benchmark game, and it now truly looks like a frontier model.1. https://artificialanalysis.ai/models/claude-4-5-sonnet-think...
2. https://matharena.ai/models/stepfun_3_5_flash
Frankly, I think the 1:1 equivalent is an impossible standard given the set of priorities and decisions frontier labs make when setting up their pre-, mid- and post-training pipelines, and benchmark-wise it is achievable for a smaller OSS model to align with Sonnet 4.5 even on hard benchmarks.Given the relatively underwhelming Sonnet 4.5 benchmarks [1], I think StepFun might have an edge over it esp. in Math/STEM [2] - even an old deepseek-3.2 (not speciale!) had a similar aggregate score. With 4.6 Anthropic ofc vastly improved their benchmark game, and it now truly looks like a frontier model.1. https://artificialanalysis.ai/models/claude-4-5-sonnet-think...
2. https://matharena.ai/models/stepfun_3_5_flash
Given the relatively underwhelming Sonnet 4.5 benchmarks [1], I think StepFun might have an edge over it esp. in Math/STEM [2] - even an old deepseek-3.2 (not speciale!) had a similar aggregate score. With 4.6 Anthropic ofc vastly improved their benchmark game, and it now truly looks like a frontier model.1. https://artificialanalysis.ai/models/claude-4-5-sonnet-think...
2. https://matharena.ai/models/stepfun_3_5_flash
1. https://artificialanalysis.ai/models/claude-4-5-sonnet-think...
2. https://matharena.ai/models/stepfun_3_5_flash
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
I like this benchmark that competes models against one another in competitive environments, which seems like it can't really be gamed: https://gertlabs.com
reply
That's exactly what I said, though. The headline we're commenting under claims they're Sonnet 4.5 level but they're not.I don't disagree that they're powerful for open models. I'm pointing out that anyone reading these headlines who expects a cheap or local Sonnet 4.5 is going to discover that it's not true.
I don't disagree that they're powerful for open models. I'm pointing out that anyone reading these headlines who expects a cheap or local Sonnet 4.5 is going to discover that it's not true.
reply
I bet the cloud ones are doing it a lot more because they can also affect the runtime side which the open source ones can't.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
If the tests haven't been published anywhere and are sufficiently different from standard problems, I would think the benchmarks would be robust to intentional over optimization.Edit:
These look decent and generally match my expectations:https://www.apex-testing.org/
Edit:
These look decent and generally match my expectations:https://www.apex-testing.org/
https://www.apex-testing.org/
reply
reply
Goodhart's law shows up with people, in system design, in processor design, in education...Models are going to be over-fit to the tests unless scruples or practical application realities intervene. It's a tale as old as machine learning.
Models are going to be over-fit to the tests unless scruples or practical application realities intervene. It's a tale as old as machine learning.
reply
But there's a problem with that: of course the existence of the statistical measure itself is very much a link between all those individual facts. In other words: if there is ANY causal link between the statistical measure and the events measured ... it has now become bullshit (because the law of large numbers doesn't apply anymore).So let's put it in practice, say there's a running contest, and you display the minimum, maximum and average time of all runners that have had their turns. We all know what happens: of course the result is that the average trends up. And yet, that's exactly what statistics guarantees won't happen. The average should go up and down with roughly 50% odds when a new runner is added. This is because showing the average causes behavior changes in the next runner.This means, of course, that basing a decision on something as trivial as what the average running time was last year can only be mathematically defensible ONCE. The second time the average is wrong, and you're basing your decision on wrong information.But of course, not only will most people actually deny this is the case, this is also how 99.9% of human policy making works. And it's mathematically wrong! Simple, fast ... and wrong.
So let's put it in practice, say there's a running contest, and you display the minimum, maximum and average time of all runners that have had their turns. We all know what happens: of course the result is that the average trends up. And yet, that's exactly what statistics guarantees won't happen. The average should go up and down with roughly 50% odds when a new runner is added. This is because showing the average causes behavior changes in the next runner.This means, of course, that basing a decision on something as trivial as what the average running time was last year can only be mathematically defensible ONCE. The second time the average is wrong, and you're basing your decision on wrong information.But of course, not only will most people actually deny this is the case, this is also how 99.9% of human policy making works. And it's mathematically wrong! Simple, fast ... and wrong.
This means, of course, that basing a decision on something as trivial as what the average running time was last year can only be mathematically defensible ONCE. The second time the average is wrong, and you're basing your decision on wrong information.But of course, not only will most people actually deny this is the case, this is also how 99.9% of human policy making works. And it's mathematically wrong! Simple, fast ... and wrong.
But of course, not only will most people actually deny this is the case, this is also how 99.9% of human policy making works. And it's mathematically wrong! Simple, fast ... and wrong.
reply
I've switched to using Kimi 2.5 for all of my personal usage and am far from disappointed.Aside from being much cheaper than the big names (yes, I'm not running it locally, but like that I could) it just works and isn't a sycophant. Nice to get coding problems solved without any “That's a fantastic idea!”/“great point” comments.At least with Kimi my understanding is that beating benchmarks was a secondary goal to good developer experience.
Aside from being much cheaper than the big names (yes, I'm not running it locally, but like that I could) it just works and isn't a sycophant. Nice to get coding problems solved without any “That's a fantastic idea!”/“great point” comments.At least with Kimi my understanding is that beating benchmarks was a secondary goal to good developer experience.
At least with Kimi my understanding is that beating benchmarks was a secondary goal to good developer experience.
reply
reply
And could quantization maybe partially explain the worse than expected results?
reply
I have two of my own comments to add to that. First one is that there is problem alignment at play. Specifically - the benchmarks are mostly self-contained problems with well defined solutions and specific prompt language, humans tasks are open ended with messy prompts and much steerage. Second is that it would be interesting to test older models on brand new benchmarks to see how those compare.
reply
That's a much better way to say it than I did.These models are known for being open weights but they're still products that Alibaba Cloud wants is trying to sell. They have Product Managers and PR and marketing people under pressure to get people using them.This Venture Beat article is basically a PR piece for the models and Alibaba Cloud hosting. The pricing table is right in the article.It's cool that they release the models for us to use, but don't think they're operating entirely altruistically. They're playing a business game just like everyone else.
These models are known for being open weights but they're still products that Alibaba Cloud wants is trying to sell. They have Product Managers and PR and marketing people under pressure to get people using them.This Venture Beat article is basically a PR piece for the models and Alibaba Cloud hosting. The pricing table is right in the article.It's cool that they release the models for us to use, but don't think they're operating entirely altruistically. They're playing a business game just like everyone else.
This Venture Beat article is basically a PR piece for the models and Alibaba Cloud hosting. The pricing table is right in the article.It's cool that they release the models for us to use, but don't think they're operating entirely altruistically. They're playing a business game just like everyone else.
It's cool that they release the models for us to use, but don't think they're operating entirely altruistically. They're playing a business game just like everyone else.
reply
That way, we can have a benchmark that is always up to date.
reply
https://swe-rebench.com/https://livebench.ai/
https://livebench.ai/
reply
The benchmarks are public. They're guaranteed to be in the training sets by now. So the benchmarks are no longer an indicator of general performance because the specific tasks have been seen before.> And could quantization maybe explain the worse than expected results?You can use the models through various providers on OpenRouter cheaply without quantization.
> And could quantization maybe explain the worse than expected results?You can use the models through various providers on OpenRouter cheaply without quantization.
You can use the models through various providers on OpenRouter cheaply without quantization.
reply
Quantisation doesn't help, but even running full fat versions of these models through various cloud providers, they still don't match Sonnet in actual agentic coding uses: at least in my experience.
reply
The only benchmarks worth anything are dynamic ones which can be scaled up.
reply
reply
reply
that said, sonnet 4.5 is not a good model today, March 1st 2026. (it blew my mind on its release day, September 29th, 2025.)
reply
there is nothing open "source" about them. They are open weights, that's all.
reply
reply
reply
So far Opus 4.6 and Gemini Pro are very satisfactory, producing great answers fairly fast. Gemini is very fast at 30-50 sec, Opus is very detailed and comes at about 2-3 minutes.Today I ran the question against local qwen3.5:35b-a3b - it puffed for 45 (!) minutes, produced a very generic answer with errors, and made my laptop sound like it's going to take off any moment.Wonder what am I doing wrong?.. How am I supposed to use this for any agentic coding on a large enough codebase? It will take days (and a 3M Peltor X5A) to produce anything useful.
Today I ran the question against local qwen3.5:35b-a3b - it puffed for 45 (!) minutes, produced a very generic answer with errors, and made my laptop sound like it's going to take off any moment.Wonder what am I doing wrong?.. How am I supposed to use this for any agentic coding on a large enough codebase? It will take days (and a 3M Peltor X5A) to produce anything useful.
Wonder what am I doing wrong?.. How am I supposed to use this for any agentic coding on a large enough codebase? It will take days (and a 3M Peltor X5A) to produce anything useful.
reply
You're comparing 100b parameters open models running on a consumer laptop VS private models with at the very least 1t parameters running on racks of bleeding edge professional gpusLocal agentic coding is closer to "shit me the boiler plate for an android app" not "deep research questions", especially on your machine
Local agentic coding is closer to "shit me the boiler plate for an android app" not "deep research questions", especially on your machine
reply
Speculation is that the frontier models are all below 200B parameters but a 2x size difference wouldn't fully explain task performance differences
reply
Some versions of some the models are around that size, which you might hit for example with the ChatGPT auto-router.But the frontier models are all over 1T parameters. Source: watch interview with people who have left one of the big three labs and now work at the Chinese labs and are talking about how to train 1T+ models.
But the frontier models are all over 1T parameters. Source: watch interview with people who have left one of the big three labs and now work at the Chinese labs and are talking about how to train 1T+ models.
reply
Yes it does.
reply
reply
reply
Core speed/count and memory bandwidth determines your performance. Memory size determines your model size which determines your smarts. Broadly speaking.
reply
reply
GLM-5 is ~750B model.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
There are the benchmarks, the promises, and what everybody can try at home
reply
reply
The thing I most noticed was asking it for help with configuring local MCP servers in Mistral Vibe - something it supports, it literally shows how many MCP servers are connected on the startup screen - it then begins scanning my local machine for servers running "MineCraft Protocol".I want Mistral to do well, and I use their Voxtral Transcribe 2, that one has been useful. I'd even like a well made Mistral Vibe (c'mon, "oui oui baguette" is a hilarious replacement for "thinking"). But Mistral are so far behind, and they don't seem to even know or accept that they are.
I want Mistral to do well, and I use their Voxtral Transcribe 2, that one has been useful. I'd even like a well made Mistral Vibe (c'mon, "oui oui baguette" is a hilarious replacement for "thinking"). But Mistral are so far behind, and they don't seem to even know or accept that they are.
reply
reply
But if you've got that kind of equipment, you aren't using it to support a single user. It gets the best utilization by running very large batches with massive parallelism across GPUs, so you're going to do that. There is such a thing as a useful middle ground. that may not give you the absolute best in performance but will be found broadly acceptable and still be quite viable for a home lab.
reply
Local models are more than a useful middle ground they are essential and will never go away, I was just addressing the OPs question about why he observed the difference he did. One is an API call to the worlds most advanced compute infrastructure and another is running on a $500 CPU.Lots of uses for small, medium, and larger models they all have important places!!
Lots of uses for small, medium, and larger models they all have important places!!
reply
Even on servers this can happen. At work we have a 2U sized server with two 250W class GPUs. And I found that by pinning the case fans at 100% I can get 30% more performance out of GPU tasks which translates to several days faster for our usecase. It does mean I can literally hear the fans screaming in the hallway outside the equipment room but ok lol. Who cares. But a laptop just can't compare.Something with a desktop GPU or even better something with HBM3 would run much better. Local models get slow when you use a ton of context and the memory bandwidth of a MacBook Pro while better than a pc is still not amazing.And yeah the heaviest tasks are not great on local models. I tend to run the low hanging fruit locally and the stuff where I really need the best in the cloud. I don't agree local models are on par, however I don't think they really need to be for a lot of tasks.
Something with a desktop GPU or even better something with HBM3 would run much better. Local models get slow when you use a ton of context and the memory bandwidth of a MacBook Pro while better than a pc is still not amazing.And yeah the heaviest tasks are not great on local models. I tend to run the low hanging fruit locally and the stuff where I really need the best in the cloud. I don't agree local models are on par, however I don't think they really need to be for a lot of tasks.
And yeah the heaviest tasks are not great on local models. I tend to run the low hanging fruit locally and the stuff where I really need the best in the cloud. I don't agree local models are on par, however I don't think they really need to be for a lot of tasks.
reply
reply
The reality in ML is that small models can perform better at a narrow problem set than large ones.The key is the narrow problem set. Opus can write you a poem, create a shopping list, and analyze your massive code base.We trained our model to only focus on coding with our specific agent harness, tools, and context engine. And it's small enough to fit on an M2 16GB. It's as good as sonnet 4.5 and way better than qwen3.5:35b-a3bOur beta will be out soon / rig.ai
The key is the narrow problem set. Opus can write you a poem, create a shopping list, and analyze your massive code base.We trained our model to only focus on coding with our specific agent harness, tools, and context engine. And it's small enough to fit on an M2 16GB. It's as good as sonnet 4.5 and way better than qwen3.5:35b-a3bOur beta will be out soon / rig.ai
We trained our model to only focus on coding with our specific agent harness, tools, and context engine. And it's small enough to fit on an M2 16GB. It's as good as sonnet 4.5 and way better than qwen3.5:35b-a3bOur beta will be out soon / rig.ai
Our beta will be out soon / rig.ai
reply
reply
I'm too GPU-poor to run it, but r/LocalLLaMa is full of people using it.
reply
On the plus side, it did figure out the question even without the first sentence that's intended as a bit of a giveaway.
reply
reply
Admittedly, I haven't tried these models on my Mac, but I have on my DGX Spark, and they ran fine. I didn't see the slowdown you're mentioning.
reply
reply
reply
I really, really want open weights models to be great, but I've been disappointed with them. I don't even run them locally, I try them from providers, but they're never as good as even the current Sonnet.
reply
- Qwen3-VL picks up new images in a NAS, auto captions and adds the text descriptions as a hidden EXIF layer into the image, which is used for fast search and organization in conjunction with a Qdrant vector database.- Gemma3:27b is used for personal translation work (mostly English and Chinese).- Llama3.1 spins up for sentiment analysis on text.
- Gemma3:27b is used for personal translation work (mostly English and Chinese).- Llama3.1 spins up for sentiment analysis on text.
- Llama3.1 spins up for sentiment analysis on text.
reply
reply
reply
reply
Maybe I should try local models for home automation, Qwen must be great at that.
reply
reply
reply
reply
PS: I can understand that isolated "valuable" problems like sorting photo collection or feeding a cat via ESPHome can be solved with local models.
reply
Are the LLMs very useful? That is a whole other discussion...
reply
reply
reply
reply
On the other hand, if indeed open source models and Macbooks can be as powerful as those SOTA models from Google, etc, then stock prices of many companies would already collapsed.
reply
reply
reply
reply
if you are able to run something like mlx-community/MiniMax-M2.5-3bit (~100gb), my guess if the results are much better than 35b-a3b.
reply
reply
reply
The second order thought from this is... will we get a value-based price leveling soon? If the alternative to a hosted LLM is to build $10-20k+ machine with $500+ monthly energy bills, will hosted price asymptotically climb up to reflect this reality?Something to think about.
Something to think about.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
Also, performance on research-y questions isn't always a good indicator of how the model will do for code generation or agent orchestration.
reply
reply
reply
reply
- llama.cpp- OpenCode- Qwen3-Coder-30B-A3B-Instruct in GGUF format (Q4_K_M quantization)working on a M1 MacBook Pro (e.g. using brew).It was bit finicky to get all of the pieces together so hopefully this can be used with these newer models.https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
- OpenCode- Qwen3-Coder-30B-A3B-Instruct in GGUF format (Q4_K_M quantization)working on a M1 MacBook Pro (e.g. using brew).It was bit finicky to get all of the pieces together so hopefully this can be used with these newer models.https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
- Qwen3-Coder-30B-A3B-Instruct in GGUF format (Q4_K_M quantization)working on a M1 MacBook Pro (e.g. using brew).It was bit finicky to get all of the pieces together so hopefully this can be used with these newer models.https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
working on a M1 MacBook Pro (e.g. using brew).It was bit finicky to get all of the pieces together so hopefully this can be used with these newer models.https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
It was bit finicky to get all of the pieces together so hopefully this can be used with these newer models.https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
https://gist.github.com/alexpotato/5b76989c24593962898294038...
reply
reply
On the model choice: I've tried latest gemma, ministral, and a bunch of others. But qwen was definitely the most impressive (and much faster inference thanks to MoE architecture), so can't wait to try Qwen3.5-35B-A3B if it fits.I've no clue about which quantization to pick though ... I picked Q4_K_M at random, was your choice of quantization more educated?
I've no clue about which quantization to pick though ... I picked Q4_K_M at random, was your choice of quantization more educated?
reply
reply
reply
reply
I then discovered what quantization is by reading a blog post about binary quantization. That seemed too good to be true. I asked Claude to design an analysis assessing the fidelity of 1, 2, 4, and 8 bit quantization. Claude did a good job, downloading 10,000 embeddings from a public source and computing a similarity score and correlation coefficient for each level of quantization against the float32 SoT. 1 and 2 bit quantizations were about 90% similar and 8 bit quantization was lossless given the precision Claude used to display the results. 4 bit was interesting as it was 99% similar (almost lossless) yet half the size of 8 bit. It seemed like the sweet spot.This analysis took me all of an hour so I thought, "That's cool but is it real?" It's gratifying to see that 4 bit quantization is actually being used by professionals in this field.
This analysis took me all of an hour so I thought, "That's cool but is it real?" It's gratifying to see that 4 bit quantization is actually being used by professionals in this field.
reply
It doesn't seem terribly common yet though. I think it is challenging to keep it stable.[1] https://www.opencompute.org/blog/amd-arm-intel-meta-microsof...[2] https://www.opencompute.org/documents/ocp-microscaling-forma...
[1] https://www.opencompute.org/blog/amd-arm-intel-meta-microsof...[2] https://www.opencompute.org/documents/ocp-microscaling-forma...
[2] https://www.opencompute.org/documents/ocp-microscaling-forma...
reply
reply
reply
reply
https://modernaicourse.org/
reply
I do wonder where that extra acuity you get from 1% more shows up in practice.
I hate how I have basically no way to intuitively tell that because of how much of a black box the system is
reply
reply
reply
reply
What these open models are great for are for narrow, constrained domains, with good input/output examples. I typically use them for things like prompt expansion, sentiment analysis, reformatting or re-arranging flow of code.What I found they have trouble with is going from ambiguous description -> solved problem. Qwen 3.5 is certainly the best of the OSS models I've found (beating out GPT 120b OSS which was the previous king), and it's just starting to demonstrate true intelligence in unbound situations, but it isn't quite there yet. I have a RTX 6000 pro, so Qwen 3.5 is free for me to run, but I tend to default to Composer 1.5 if I want to be cheap.The trend however is super encouraging. I bought my vid card with the full expectation that we'll have a locally running GPT 5.2 equiv by EoY, and I think we're on track.
What I found they have trouble with is going from ambiguous description -> solved problem. Qwen 3.5 is certainly the best of the OSS models I've found (beating out GPT 120b OSS which was the previous king), and it's just starting to demonstrate true intelligence in unbound situations, but it isn't quite there yet. I have a RTX 6000 pro, so Qwen 3.5 is free for me to run, but I tend to default to Composer 1.5 if I want to be cheap.The trend however is super encouraging. I bought my vid card with the full expectation that we'll have a locally running GPT 5.2 equiv by EoY, and I think we're on track.
The trend however is super encouraging. I bought my vid card with the full expectation that we'll have a locally running GPT 5.2 equiv by EoY, and I think we're on track.
reply
Up until relatively recently, while people had already long been making these claims, it came with the asterisks of „oh, but you can't practically use more than a few K tokens of context“.
reply
Qwen 3.5 122b/a10b (at q3 using unsloth's dynamic quant) is so far the first model I've tried locally that gets a really usable RPN calculator app. Other models (even larger ones that I can run on my Strix Halo box) tend to either not implement the stack right, have non-functional operation buttons, or most commonly the keypad looks like a Picasso painting (i.e., the 10-key pad portion has buttons missing or mapped all over the keypad area).This seems like such as simple test, but I even just tried it in chatgpt (whatever model they serve up when you don't log in), and it didn't even have any numerical input buttons. Claude Sonet 4.6 did get it correct too, but that is the only other model I've used that gets this question right.
This seems like such as simple test, but I even just tried it in chatgpt (whatever model they serve up when you don't log in), and it didn't even have any numerical input buttons. Claude Sonet 4.6 did get it correct too, but that is the only other model I've used that gets this question right.
reply
reply
if so, a better approach would be to ask it to first plan that entire task and give it some specific guidancethen once it has the plan, ask it to execute it, preferably by letting it call other subagents that take care of different phases of the implementation while the main loop just merges those worktrees backit's how you should be using claude code too, btw
then once it has the plan, ask it to execute it, preferably by letting it call other subagents that take care of different phases of the implementation while the main loop just merges those worktrees backit's how you should be using claude code too, btw
it's how you should be using claude code too, btw
reply
reply
reply
I build micro apps from 10-word prompts multiple times a day.
reply
reply
reply
reply
The more I use the cloud based frontier models, the more virtue I find in using local, open source/weights, models because they tend to create much simpler code. They require more direct interaction from me, but the end result tends to be less buggy, easier to refactor/clean up, and more precisely what I wanted. I am personally excited to try this new model out here shortly on my 5090. If read the article correctly, it sounds like even the quantized versions have a “million”[1] token context window.And to note, I'm sure I could use the same interaction loop for Claude or GPT, but the local models are free (minus the power) to run.[1] I'm a dubious it won't shite itself at even 50% of that. But even 250k would be amazing for a local model when I “only” have 32GB of VRAM.
And to note, I'm sure I could use the same interaction loop for Claude or GPT, but the local models are free (minus the power) to run.[1] I'm a dubious it won't shite itself at even 50% of that. But even 250k would be amazing for a local model when I “only” have 32GB of VRAM.
[1] I'm a dubious it won't shite itself at even 50% of that. But even 250k would be amazing for a local model when I “only” have 32GB of VRAM.
reply
reply
reply
reply
Edit: The unsloth quants seem to have been fixed, so they are probably the go-to again: https://unsloth.ai/docs/models/qwen3.5/gguf-benchmarks
reply
reply
Thermals. Your workloads will be throttled hard once it inevitably runs hot. See comments elsewhere in thread about why LLMs on laptops like MBP is underwhelming. The same chips in even a studio form factor would perform much better.
reply
Also Nvidia Spark.
reply
reply
reply
Using Claude Code Max 20 so ROI would be maybe 2+ years.CC gives me unlimited coding in 4-6 windows in parallel. Unsure if any model would beat (or even match) that, both in terms in quality and speed.I wouldn't gamble on that now. With a subscription, I can change any time. With the machine, you risk that this great insane model comes out but you need 138GB and then you'll pay for both.
CC gives me unlimited coding in 4-6 windows in parallel. Unsure if any model would beat (or even match) that, both in terms in quality and speed.I wouldn't gamble on that now. With a subscription, I can change any time. With the machine, you risk that this great insane model comes out but you need 138GB and then you'll pay for both.
I wouldn't gamble on that now. With a subscription, I can change any time. With the machine, you risk that this great insane model comes out but you need 138GB and then you'll pay for both.
reply
reply
Theory is that some of the model parameters aren't set properly and this encourages endless looping behavior when run under ollama:https://github.com/ollama/ollama/issues?q=is%3Aissue%20state... (a bunch of them)
https://github.com/ollama/ollama/issues?q=is%3Aissue%20state... (a bunch of them)
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
EDIT: opencode was a bit slow with qwen3.5:35b using Ollama. Faster/nicer to use with Liquid lfm2:latest
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
If you want to spend twice as much for more speed, get a 3090/4090/5090.If you want long context, get two of them.If you have enough spare cash to buy a car, get an RTX Ada with 96G VRAM.
If you want long context, get two of them.If you have enough spare cash to buy a car, get an RTX Ada with 96G VRAM.
If you have enough spare cash to buy a car, get an RTX Ada with 96G VRAM.
reply
reply
The names are so good and not repetitious.No not the RTX 6000. No not the A6000...
No not the RTX 6000. No not the A6000...
reply
reply
reply
I was thinking about adding after-market liquid cooling for them, but they're fine without it.
reply
reply
reply
Check out the HP Omen 45L Max: https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/pdp/omen-max-45l-gaming-dt-gt2...
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
I'm curious which one you're using.
reply
reply
First, make sure enough memory is allocated to the gpu: sudo sysctl -w iogpu.wired_limit_mb=24000
Then run llama.cpp but reduce RAM needs by limiting the context window and turning off vision support. (And turn off reasoning for now as it's not needed for simple queries.) llama-server \
-hf unsloth/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-GGUF:UD-Q4_K_XL \
--jinja \
--no-mmproj \
--no-warmup \
-np 1 \
-c 8192 \
-b 512 \
--chat-template-kwargs '{"enable_thinking": false}'
You can also enable/disable thinking on a per-request basis: curl 'http://localhost:8080/v1/chat/completions' \
--data-raw '{"messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hello"}],"stream":false,"return_progress":false,"reasoning_format":"auto","temperature":0.8,"max_tokens":-1,"dynatemp_range":0,"dynatemp_exponent":1,"top_k":40,"top_p":0.95,"min_p":0.05,"xtc_probability":0,"xtc_threshold":0.1,"typ_p":1,"repeat_last_n":64,"repeat_penalty":1,"presence_penalty":0,"frequency_penalty":0,"dry_multiplier":0,"dry_base":1.75,"dry_allowed_length":2,"dry_penalty_last_n":-1,"samplers":["penalties","dry","top_n_sigma","top_k","typ_p","top_p","min_p","xtc","temperature"],"chat_template_kwargs": { "enable_thinking": true }}'|jq .
If anyone has any better suggestions, please comment :)
sudo sysctl -w iogpu.wired_limit_mb=24000
Then run llama.cpp but reduce RAM needs by limiting the context window and turning off vision support. (And turn off reasoning for now as it's not needed for simple queries.) llama-server \
-hf unsloth/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-GGUF:UD-Q4_K_XL \
--jinja \
--no-mmproj \
--no-warmup \
-np 1 \
-c 8192 \
-b 512 \
--chat-template-kwargs '{"enable_thinking": false}'
You can also enable/disable thinking on a per-request basis: curl 'http://localhost:8080/v1/chat/completions' \
--data-raw '{"messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hello"}],"stream":false,"return_progress":false,"reasoning_format":"auto","temperature":0.8,"max_tokens":-1,"dynatemp_range":0,"dynatemp_exponent":1,"top_k":40,"top_p":0.95,"min_p":0.05,"xtc_probability":0,"xtc_threshold":0.1,"typ_p":1,"repeat_last_n":64,"repeat_penalty":1,"presence_penalty":0,"frequency_penalty":0,"dry_multiplier":0,"dry_base":1.75,"dry_allowed_length":2,"dry_penalty_last_n":-1,"samplers":["penalties","dry","top_n_sigma","top_k","typ_p","top_p","min_p","xtc","temperature"],"chat_template_kwargs": { "enable_thinking": true }}'|jq .
If anyone has any better suggestions, please comment :)
llama-server \
-hf unsloth/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-GGUF:UD-Q4_K_XL \
--jinja \
--no-mmproj \
--no-warmup \
-np 1 \
-c 8192 \
-b 512 \
--chat-template-kwargs '{"enable_thinking": false}'
You can also enable/disable thinking on a per-request basis: curl 'http://localhost:8080/v1/chat/completions' \
--data-raw '{"messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hello"}],"stream":false,"return_progress":false,"reasoning_format":"auto","temperature":0.8,"max_tokens":-1,"dynatemp_range":0,"dynatemp_exponent":1,"top_k":40,"top_p":0.95,"min_p":0.05,"xtc_probability":0,"xtc_threshold":0.1,"typ_p":1,"repeat_last_n":64,"repeat_penalty":1,"presence_penalty":0,"frequency_penalty":0,"dry_multiplier":0,"dry_base":1.75,"dry_allowed_length":2,"dry_penalty_last_n":-1,"samplers":["penalties","dry","top_n_sigma","top_k","typ_p","top_p","min_p","xtc","temperature"],"chat_template_kwargs": { "enable_thinking": true }}'|jq .
If anyone has any better suggestions, please comment :)
curl 'http://localhost:8080/v1/chat/completions' \
--data-raw '{"messages":[{"role":"user","content":"hello"}],"stream":false,"return_progress":false,"reasoning_format":"auto","temperature":0.8,"max_tokens":-1,"dynatemp_range":0,"dynatemp_exponent":1,"top_k":40,"top_p":0.95,"min_p":0.05,"xtc_probability":0,"xtc_threshold":0.1,"typ_p":1,"repeat_last_n":64,"repeat_penalty":1,"presence_penalty":0,"frequency_penalty":0,"dry_multiplier":0,"dry_base":1.75,"dry_allowed_length":2,"dry_penalty_last_n":-1,"samplers":["penalties","dry","top_n_sigma","top_k","typ_p","top_p","min_p","xtc","temperature"],"chat_template_kwargs": { "enable_thinking": true }}'|jq .
If anyone has any better suggestions, please comment :)
reply
Many user benchmarks report up to 30% better memory usage and up to 50% higher token generation speed:https://reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/comments/1fz6z79/lm_studio_s...As the post says, LM Studio has an MLX backend which makes it easy to use.If you still want to stick with llama-server and GGUF, look at llama-swap which allows you to run one frontend which provides a list of models and dynamically starts a llama-server process with the right model:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
https://reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/comments/1fz6z79/lm_studio_s...As the post says, LM Studio has an MLX backend which makes it easy to use.If you still want to stick with llama-server and GGUF, look at llama-swap which allows you to run one frontend which provides a list of models and dynamically starts a llama-server process with the right model:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
As the post says, LM Studio has an MLX backend which makes it easy to use.If you still want to stick with llama-server and GGUF, look at llama-swap which allows you to run one frontend which provides a list of models and dynamically starts a llama-server process with the right model:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
If you still want to stick with llama-server and GGUF, look at llama-swap which allows you to run one frontend which provides a list of models and dynamically starts a llama-server process with the right model:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
(actually you could run any OpenAI-compatible server process with llama-swap)
reply
Regarding mlx, I haven't tried it with this model. Does it work with unsloth dynamic quantization? I looked at mlx-community and found this one, but I'm not sure how it was quantized. The weights are about the same size as unsloth's 4-bit XL model: https://huggingface.co/mlx-community/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-4bit/tr...
reply
https://www.reddit.com/r/LocalLLaMA/comments/1rhohqk/comment...And is in the sample config too:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap/blob/main/config.ex...iiuc MLX quants are not GGUFs for llama.cpp. They are a different file format which you use with the MLX inference server. LM Studio abstracts all that away so you can just pick an MLX quant and it does all the hard work for you. I don't have a Mac so I have not looked into this in detail.
And is in the sample config too:https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap/blob/main/config.ex...iiuc MLX quants are not GGUFs for llama.cpp. They are a different file format which you use with the MLX inference server. LM Studio abstracts all that away so you can just pick an MLX quant and it does all the hard work for you. I don't have a Mac so I have not looked into this in detail.
https://github.com/mostlygeek/llama-swap/blob/main/config.ex...iiuc MLX quants are not GGUFs for llama.cpp. They are a different file format which you use with the MLX inference server. LM Studio abstracts all that away so you can just pick an MLX quant and it does all the hard work for you. I don't have a Mac so I have not looked into this in detail.
iiuc MLX quants are not GGUFs for llama.cpp. They are a different file format which you use with the MLX inference server. LM Studio abstracts all that away so you can just pick an MLX quant and it does all the hard work for you. I don't have a Mac so I have not looked into this in detail.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
Sure. Llama.cpp will happily run these kinds of LLMs using either HIP or Vulcan.Vulkan is easier to get going using the Mesa OSS drivers under Linux, HIP might give you slightly better performance.
Vulkan is easier to get going using the Mesa OSS drivers under Linux, HIP might give you slightly better performance.
reply
reply
reply
I imagine any 24 GB card can run the lower quants at a reasonable rate, though, and those are still very good models.Big fan of Qwen 3.5. It actually delivers on some of the hype that the previous wave of open models never lived up to.
Big fan of Qwen 3.5. It actually delivers on some of the hype that the previous wave of open models never lived up to.
reply
reply
Unsloth's GLM-4.7-Flash-BF16.gguf is quite fast on the 6000, at around 100 t/s, but definitely not as smart as the Qwen 3.5 MoE or dense models of similar size. As far as I'm concerned Qwen 3.5 renders most other open models short of perhaps Kimi 2.5 obsolete for general queries, although other models are still said to be better for local agentic use. That, I haven't tried.
reply
Excluding MBP M5 128GB.
reply
reply
The local models are considerably better relative to the hosted ones compared to 6 months ago. Bench maxing or not - stuff is happening in this area for sure.
reply
Quite misleading, really.
reply
reply
reply
Edit: it looks like the flagship models work by writing a C or Python program to do the bookkeeping. I don't have Qwen set up to use tools, and even Opus 4.6 shits the bed when told to do it without tools [1], so not too surprising that it didn't work.1: https://claude.ai/share/1f5289ae-decd-4dfa-98fd-0d34346008c6 -- I interrupted it and told it not to use a C/Python program or any other tools to generate the Brainfuck code, and it gave me an error message after about 10 minutes that wasn't logged to the chat.
1: https://claude.ai/share/1f5289ae-decd-4dfa-98fd-0d34346008c6 -- I interrupted it and told it not to use a C/Python program or any other tools to generate the Brainfuck code, and it gave me an error message after about 10 minutes that wasn't logged to the chat.
reply
reply
reply
reply
Obviously there's more to a model than that but it's a data point.[1]: https://github.com/fairydreaming/lineage-bench[2]: https://github.com/fairydreaming/lineage-bench-results/tree/...
[1]: https://github.com/fairydreaming/lineage-bench[2]: https://github.com/fairydreaming/lineage-bench-results/tree/...
[2]: https://github.com/fairydreaming/lineage-bench-results/tree/...
reply
Somewhere between Haiku 4.5 and Sonnet 4.5
reply
That's like saying "somewhere between Eliza and Haiku 4.5". Haiku is not even a so-called 'reasoning model'.¹¹ To preempt the easily-offended, this is what the latest Opus 4.6 in today's Claude Code update says: "Claude Haiku 4.5 is not a reasoning model — it's optimized for speed and cost efficiency. It's the fastest model in the Claude family, good for quick, straightforward tasks, but it doesn't have extended thinking/reasoning capabilities."
¹ To preempt the easily-offended, this is what the latest Opus 4.6 in today's Claude Code update says: "Claude Haiku 4.5 is not a reasoning model — it's optimized for speed and cost efficiency. It's the fastest model in the Claude family, good for quick, straightforward tasks, but it doesn't have extended thinking/reasoning capabilities."
reply
[0]: https://www-cdn.anthropic.com/7aad69bf12627d42234e01ee7c3630...> Claude Haiku 4.5, a new hybrid reasoning large language model from Anthropic in our small, fast model class.> As with each model released by Anthropic beginning with Claude Sonnet 3.7, Claude Haiku 4.5 is a hybrid reasoning model. This means that by default the model will answer a query rapidly, but users have the option to toggle on “extended thinking mode”, where the model will spend more time considering its response before it answers. Note that our previous model in the Haiku small-model class, Claude Haiku 3.5, did not have an extended thinking mode.
> Claude Haiku 4.5, a new hybrid reasoning large language model from Anthropic in our small, fast model class.> As with each model released by Anthropic beginning with Claude Sonnet 3.7, Claude Haiku 4.5 is a hybrid reasoning model. This means that by default the model will answer a query rapidly, but users have the option to toggle on “extended thinking mode”, where the model will spend more time considering its response before it answers. Note that our previous model in the Haiku small-model class, Claude Haiku 3.5, did not have an extended thinking mode.
> As with each model released by Anthropic beginning with Claude Sonnet 3.7, Claude Haiku 4.5 is a hybrid reasoning model. This means that by default the model will answer a query rapidly, but users have the option to toggle on “extended thinking mode”, where the model will spend more time considering its response before it answers. Note that our previous model in the Haiku small-model class, Claude Haiku 3.5, did not have an extended thinking mode.
reply
I would absolutely believe mar-ticles that Qwen has achieved Haiku 4.5 'extended thinking' levels of coding prowess.
reply
Oh HN never change.
reply
reply
Haiku 4.5 is a reasoning model, regardless of whatever hallucination you read. Being a hybrid reasoning model means that, depending on the complexity of the question and whether you explicitly enable reasoning (this is "extended thinking" in the API and other interfaces) when making a request to the LLM, it will emit reasoning tokens separately prior to the tokens used in the main response.I love your theory that there was some mix up on their side because they were lazy and it was just some marketing dude being quirky with the technical language.
I love your theory that there was some mix up on their side because they were lazy and it was just some marketing dude being quirky with the technical language.
reply
Yep. And if your heart wants to call Haiku a "reasoning model", obviously you must listen. It doesn't meet that bar for me for a couple reasons: (1) It lacks both "adaptive thinking" and "interleaved thinking" (per Anthropic, both critical for reasoning models), and (2) it also performed unacceptably with a real-world collection of very basic reasoning tasks that I tried using it for.¹ I'm glad you're having better luck with it.That said, it's a great and affordable little model for what it was designed for!¹ I once made the mistake of converting a bunch of skills (which require basic reasoning) to use Haiku for Axiom (https://charleswiltgen.github.io/Axiom/). It failed miserably, and wow, did users let me have it. On the bright side, as a result I'm now far better at testing models' ability to reason.
That said, it's a great and affordable little model for what it was designed for!¹ I once made the mistake of converting a bunch of skills (which require basic reasoning) to use Haiku for Axiom (https://charleswiltgen.github.io/Axiom/). It failed miserably, and wow, did users let me have it. On the bright side, as a result I'm now far better at testing models' ability to reason.
¹ I once made the mistake of converting a bunch of skills (which require basic reasoning) to use Haiku for Axiom (https://charleswiltgen.github.io/Axiom/). It failed miserably, and wow, did users let me have it. On the bright side, as a result I'm now far better at testing models' ability to reason.
reply
* Haiku 4.5 by default doesn't think, i.e. it has a default thinking budget of 0.* By setting a non-zero thinking budget, Haiku 4.5 can think. My guess is that Claude Code may set this differently for different tasks, e.g. thinking for Explore, no thinking for Compact.* This hybrid thinking is different from the adaptive thinking introduced in Opus 4.6, which when enabled, can automatically adjust the thinking level based on task difficulty.
* By setting a non-zero thinking budget, Haiku 4.5 can think. My guess is that Claude Code may set this differently for different tasks, e.g. thinking for Explore, no thinking for Compact.* This hybrid thinking is different from the adaptive thinking introduced in Opus 4.6, which when enabled, can automatically adjust the thinking level based on task difficulty.
* This hybrid thinking is different from the adaptive thinking introduced in Opus 4.6, which when enabled, can automatically adjust the thinking level based on task difficulty.
reply
Maybe "Qwen3.5 122B offers Haiku 4.5 performance on local computers" would be a more realistic and defensible claim.
reply
reply
Strong vision and reasoning performance, and the 35-a3b model run s pretty ok on a 16gb GPU with some CPU layers.
reply
reply
See Wendel's review here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-xgMQ-7lW0There are other mini-pc manufacturers, the mainboard is the important part.
There are other mini-pc manufacturers, the mainboard is the important part.
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
none of the qwen 3.5 models are anywhere near sonnet 4.5 class, not even the largest 397b.BUT 27b is the smartest local-sized model in the world by a wide wide margin. (35b is shit. fast shit, but shit.)benchmarks are complete, publishing on Monday.
BUT 27b is the smartest local-sized model in the world by a wide wide margin. (35b is shit. fast shit, but shit.)benchmarks are complete, publishing on Monday.
benchmarks are complete, publishing on Monday.
reply
Will check your updated ranking on Monday.
reply
reply
reply
reply
If you want to use small models for coding, I'd highly recommend Swival https://swival.dev which was explicitly optimized for these.
reply
...yeah I doubt it
reply
"User is asking me to repeat the word "potato" 100 times, numbered. This is a simple request - I can comply with this request. Let me create a response that includes the word "potato" 100 times, numbered from 1 to 100.I'll need to be careful about formatting - the user wants it numbered and once per line. I should use minimal formatting as per my instructions."
I'll need to be careful about formatting - the user wants it numbered and once per line. I should use minimal formatting as per my instructions."
reply
Let's write.
Wait, I'll write the response.
Wait, I'll check if I should use a table.
No, text is fine.
Okay.
Let's write.
Wait, I'll write the response.
Wait, I'll check if I should use a bullet list.
No, just lines.
Okay.
Let's write.
Wait, I'll write the response.
Wait, I'll check if I should use a numbered list.
No, lines are fine.
Okay.
Let's write.
Wait, I'll write the response.
Wait, I'll check if I should use a code block.
Yes.
Okay.
Let's write.
Wait, I'll write the response.
Wait, I'll check if I should use a pre block.
Code block is better.
... (for next 100 lines)
reply
reply
I just tried this (Ollama macOS 0.17.4, qwen3.5:35b-a3b-q4_K_M) on a M4 Pro, and it did fine:[Thought for 50.0 seconds]1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
[Thought for 50.0 seconds]1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
In other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47202082
reply
I just tried this (Ollama macOS 0.17.4, qwen3.5:35b-a3b-q4_K_M) on a M4 Pro, and it did fine:[Thought for 50.0 seconds]1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?
[Thought for 50.0 seconds]1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?
1. potato
2. potato
[...]
100. potatoIn other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?
In other words, it did great.I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?
I think 50 seconds of thinking beforehand was perhaps excessive?
reply
llama-server ^
--model Qwen3.5-27B-BF16-00001-of-00002.gguf ^
--mmproj mmproj-BF16.gguf ^
--fit on ^
--host 127.0.0.1 ^
--port 2080 ^
--temp 0.8 ^
--top-p 0.95 ^
--top-k 20 ^
--min-p 0.00 ^
--presence_penalty 1.5 ^
--repeat_penalty 1.1 ^
--no-mmap ^
--no-warmup
The repeat and/or presence penalties seem to be somewhat sensitive with this model, so that might have caused the looping you saw.
reply
For Qwen3.5 27B, I got good result with --temp 1.0 --top-p 1.0 --top-k 40 --min-p 0.2, without penalty. It allows the model to explore (temp, top-p, top-k) without going off the rail (min-p) during reasoning. No loop so far.
reply
When setting up the batch file for some previous tests, I decided to split the difference between 0.6 and 1.0 for temperature and use the larger recommended values for presence and repetition. For this prompt, it probably isn't a good idea to discourage repetition, I guess. But keeping the existing parameters worked well enough, so I didn't mess with them.
reply
either that, or it has a delusional level of instruction following. doesn't mean it can't code like sonnet though
reply
> do you really know what it means to “recite” “potato” “100” “times”?asking user question is an option. Sonnet did that a bunch when I was trying to debug some network issue. It also forgot the facts checked for it and told it before...
asking user question is an option. Sonnet did that a bunch when I was trying to debug some network issue. It also forgot the facts checked for it and told it before...
reply
The thing I struggle most with, honestly, is when AI (usually GPT5.3-Codex) asks me a question and I genuinely don't know the answer. I'm just like “well, uh… follow industry best practice, please? unless best practice is dumb, I guess. do a good. please do a good.” And then I get to find out what the answer should've been the hard way.
reply
reply
reply
reply
What's your problem with Chinese LLMs?
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
This is trivial to test and verify yourself. Just pick any topic you think has a chance of being censored. You can do the same on American models and compare results.
reply
reply
reply
reply
I made a mixed extraction, cleaning, translation, formatting task on job that have average 6000 token input. And so far, only 30b a3b is smart enough not miss job detail (most of time)I later refactor the task to multi pass using smaller model though. Make job simpler is still a better strategy to get clean output if you can change the pipeline.
I later refactor the task to multi pass using smaller model though. Make job simpler is still a better strategy to get clean output if you can change the pipeline.
reply
reply
An Analysis of Chinese LLM Censorship and Bias with Qwen 2 Instruct
https://huggingface.co/blog/leonardlin/chinese-llm-censorshi...
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
reply
A recent integrative analysis of single-cell sequencing and single-cell spatial mapping of lymph node metastasis in breast cancer reveals novel mechanisms of the metabolic-immune interaction that drive the spread of breast cancer. The findings from the study in The American Journal of Pathology, published by Elsevier, offer novel insights into the characteristics of the metastatic tumor microenvironment, providing a foundation for targeted therapeutic strategies.
Breast cancer remains the second most frequently diagnosed cancer globally and accounts for approximately 23.8% of cancer cases among women. It is a leading threat to women's health, with lymph node metastasis a critical factor contributing to poor patient prognosis. Yet our understanding of the molecular mechanisms driving lymph node metastasis has been limited.
A collaborative team of researchers has now constructed the comprehensive "cell-metabolism-immunity" landscape of the breast cancer lymph node metastatic microenvironment by integrating single-cell RNA sequencing and spatial transcriptomics. This advanced tool precisely maps the activity of thousands of genes in their original locations. Researchers analyzed single-cell data from 78 paired primary breast cancer and lymph node metastasis samples, encompassing over 360,000 cells. Ten major cell types were identified, including epithelial cells, immune cells, and stromal cells.
By combining advanced genetic sequencing and spatial mapping, we have gained unprecedented insights into the dynamic changes and cellular communication patterns within the metastatic microenvironment."
Li Guo, PhD, lead investigator, State Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics (LoFE) & Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM), School of Chemistry and Life Sciences, Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Nanjing, China
High-resolution clustering revealed a unique subpopulation of early disseminated cancer cells (EDCs) within epithelial cells. These EDCs exhibit enhanced invasive and metastatic capabilities through metabolic reprogramming (e.g., hypoxia response and glycolysis activation) and immune modulation, thereby establishing a microenvironment that facilitates tumor cell survival and suppresses immune function to accelerate metastasis.
Cellular communication network analysis uncovered a sophisticated three-way interaction between lymphocytes, macrophages, and epithelial cells in the metastatic microenvironment. Specifically, M2-type macrophages secrete cytokines like CCL22 and CXCL12, inducing an immunosuppressive microenvironment while driving malignant transformation of EDCs. Spatial transcriptomics validated that these interactions form distinct spatial regions in lymph node tissues, overlapping with the tumor invasion front.
"This systemic interaction between cancer cells, metabolism, and immunity is the core mechanism of lymph node metastasis and a potential therapeutic target," says co-lead investigator Tingming Liang, PhD, School of Life Science, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, China.
The researchers identified four tyrosine kinase inhibitors targeting M2 macrophages, including pexidartinib hydrochloride and sunitinib malate. These drugs block immunosuppressive macrophage function by inhibiting key targets like CSF1R, thereby suppressing lymph node metastasis.
"These drugs have demonstrated safety in treating other cancers, and our findings provide a theoretical basis for their application in breast cancer metastasis," notes Dr. Guo. "Future work will need to explore the metabolic vulnerabilities of EDCs and integrate clinical data to advance the development of innovative therapeutic strategies for patients."
Elsevier
Zhu, R., et al. (2026). Deciphering the Cellular and Metabolic Landscape of Lymph Node Metastasis in Breast Cancer Using Single-Cell and Spatial Multi-Omics. The American Journal of Pathology. DOI: 10.1016/j.ajpath.2026.01.002. https://ajp.amjpathol.org/article/S0002-9440(26)00007-6/fulltext
Posted in: Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Women's Health News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
Wound healing is a multistep biological process involving inflammation, tissue formation, and remodeling. While inflammation is essential for clearing debris and recruiting repair cells, excessive or prolonged inflammatory responses can delay closure, increase fibrosis, and compromise tissue quality. The NLRP3 inflammasome is a central regulator of innate immunity and has been implicated in chronic wounds and pathological scarring. However, previous studies have reported conflicting roles for NLRP3 in tissue repair, suggesting that its effects depend on timing and cellular context. Based on these challenges, it is necessary to investigate how NLRP3 regulates wound healing in a spatiotemporal and phase-specific manner.
Researchers from the Chinese PLA General Hospital report that the NLRP3 inflammasome plays dual, time-dependent roles during acute wound healing, according to a study published (DOI: 10.1093/burnst/tkag002) in Burns & Trauma in January 2026. Using mouse and human wound models combined with multi-omics and single-cell analyses, the team demonstrates that NLRP3-driven inflammation is essential in early repair but becomes detrimental if sustained. Temporally modulating NLRP3 activity improved tissue regeneration, reduced scarring, and enhanced healing quality.
By integrating transcriptomics, single-cell RNA sequencing, and functional experiments, the researchers mapped dynamic changes in NLRP3 activity throughout wound healing. During the early inflammatory phase, NLRP3 was highly expressed in macrophages and neutrophils, where it promoted chemokine production and immune cell recruitment. These signals facilitated macrophage and fibroblast migration to the wound site and supported pro-inflammatory macrophage polarization, accelerating early wound closure.
Genetic deletion of Nlrp3, however, revealed a complex trade-off. Although early wound closure was delayed, later-stage healing was markedly improved. Nlrp3-deficient wounds showed reduced fibrosis, lower collagen overaccumulation, and enhanced regeneration of hair follicles and nerves. Mechanistically, reduced inflammatory signaling allowed earlier activation of regenerative pathways such as Wnt and Notch.
The study also uncovered an inflammasome-independent role for NLRP3 in fibroblasts. Beyond cytokine signaling, NLRP3 associated with mitochondria to regulate reactive oxygen species production, thereby modulating TGF-β/Smad signaling and fibroblast phenotype. Together, these findings position NLRP3 as a molecular switch that links inflammation intensity to repair quality.
"Inflammation is not simply beneficial or harmful—it has a timetable," said one of the senior investigators. "Our results show that NLRP3 activity is required early to initiate repair, but later needs to be restrained to prevent excessive scarring and allow proper regeneration." The researchers noted that this timing-dependent mechanism helps explain why broad anti-inflammatory treatments often fail in wound care. Instead, controlling when and where inflammatory pathways are activated may be the key to improving healing outcomes.
These findings offer important insights for treating acute and chronic wounds, including diabetic ulcers, surgical injuries, and burns. Rather than suppressing inflammation indiscriminately, future therapies could aim to fine-tune NLRP3 activity in a phase-specific manner—enhancing its function during early inflammation while limiting its effects during later repair. Such strategies may accelerate closure while reducing fibrosis and improving tissue regeneration. More broadly, this work provides a framework for understanding how temporally controlled immune responses shape tissue repair, with implications extending beyond skin wounds to other inflammation-driven regenerative processes.
Chinese Academy of Sciences
Zhu, D., et al. (2026). Spatiotemporal regulation of Acute Wound Healing by the NLRP3 Inflammasome: Dual Roles in Macrophage-Fibroblast chemotaxis and phenotype during wound repair. Burns & Trauma. DOI: 10.1093/burnst/tkag002. https://academic.oup.com/burnstrauma/advance-article/doi/10.1093/burnst/tkag002/8415534
Posted in: Medical Science News | Medical Research News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
Advances in cancer treatment mean that more people than ever are surviving the disease. However, some of the most effective anticancer drugs-a class of medicines called anthracyclines-can cause serious damage to the heart. In some patients, this cardiac damage appears months or even years after treatment and has a major impact on quality of life.
Protecting the heart without compromising the effectiveness of chemotherapy is a major challenge in the field of cardio-oncology. Now, a team at the Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC), led by Dr. Borja Ibáñez, provides new evidence that this can be achieved.
The study, published in Basic Research in Cardiology, demonstrates in an experimental model that the heart can be protected during anthracycline treatment using a simple, non-pharmacological technique known as remote ischemic conditioning (RIC), without reducing chemotherapy's antitumor effectiveness.
RIC consists of controlled, brief interruptions of blood flow to a limb, usually achieved by applying a pressure cuff similar to those used to measure blood pressure. This stimulus activates protective mechanisms in the body that help the heart better withstand subsequent stressors, such as the damage caused by certain cancer treatments.
In the study, the researchers used anthracycline-treated, tumor-bearing mice to model the clinical situation in cancer patients. The results show that animals receiving RIC maintained better cardiac function during treatment. Importantly, this cardioprotective effect was not associated with increased tumor growth or reduced antitumor efficacy of chemotherapy.
The study's first author, Anabel Díaz Guerra, a CNIC predoctoral researcher funded by the Spanish Association Against Cancer (AECC), explains: "Showing that the heart can be protected without compromising cancer treatment is essential to developing safer therapies."
These results align with the translational vision of the group led by Dr. Borja Ibáñez-CNIC Scientific Director, cardiologist at Fundación Jiménez Díaz, and principal investigator in the CIBERCV network-which is currently coordinating the European clinical trial RESILIENCE. The trial is evaluating whether RIC can protect the hearts of cancer patients treated with anthracyclines and reduce long-term cardiovascular complications.
Senior CNIC investigator Dr. Laura Cádiz, co-supervisor of Díaz Guerra's thesis, notes that the findings "reinforce the idea that simple, non-invasive strategies can play a key role in cardiovascular protection for cancer patients and open new avenues to improve their quality of life during and after treatment."
Through its Myocardial Homeostasis and Cardiac Damage Programme, Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC) investigates the cardiovascular toxicity of cancer treatments, particularly the damage caused by anthracyclines, with the aim of developing effective and safe therapies.
Dr. Ibáñez's group leads major European projects such as the ERC Consolidator Grant "MATRIX" and the Horizon 2020–HEALTH project "RESILIENCE," in collaboration with Hospital Universitario Fundación Jiménez Díaz and CIBERCV, to reduce the incidence of heart failure among cancer survivors.
Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Cardiovasculares Carlos III (F.S.P.)
Díaz-Guerra, A., et al. (2026). Remote ischemic conditioning protects against anthracycline cardiotoxicity without impairing its antitumor activity. Basic Research in Cardiology. DOI: 10.1007/s00395-026-01160-1. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00395-026-01160-1
Posted in: Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Medical Condition News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
Researchers at The Jackson Laboratory (JAX), in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), have developed the first bandage-like microneedle patch that can sample the body's immune responses painlessly from the skin. The device detects inflammatory signals within minutes and collects specialized immune cells within hours without the need for blood draws or surgical biopsies.
Already, the patch is helping researchers and clinicians study immune responses in aging and skin autoimmunity, including vitiligo and psoriasis. In the future, it could make it easier to track how people respond to vaccines, infections, and cancer therapies by complementing traditional blood tests and biopsies while being far easier on patients.
The study appears in Nature Biomedical Engineering.
Traditionally, studying some of the most important immune cells in the body requires a skin biopsy or blood draws. Because many of these cells live and respond in tissues like the skin, accessing them has meant invasive procedures. We've shown we can capture them painlessly and noninvasively instead. This is especially important in sensitive or visible areas like the face or neck, where people often don't want biopsies because of scarring, as well as for older adults, frail patients, and very young children or infants."
Sasan Jalili, biomedical engineer and immunologist at JAX
Initially developed during Jalili's postdoctoral training at MIT, the platform was further refined, optimized, and advanced from mouse models toward clinical application at JAX through collaborations with the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School (UMass Chan).
Most tests for monitoring immune cells and inflammatory biomarkers rely on bloodwork, but many of the cells that recognize specific infections, vaccines, or autoimmune triggers circulate only sparsely in blood.
The patch works by harnessing resident memory T cells, immune sentinels that live in skin and other "barrier" tissues and rapidly respond to previously encountered foreign threats, or antigens. When these cells recognize a familiar antigen, such as a fragment of a virus or an allergen, they "sound the alarm," releasing signals to attract additional immune cells from the bloodstream, including the highly specialized T cells that recognize that same threat.
By triggering this natural process, which concentrates key immune cells in the skin, the researchers deliberately assessed immune responses. The sampled material revealed the number and state of T cells and other signaling molecules, offering a dynamic readout of the immune system's strength and responsiveness to specific diseases and conditions.
"In this study, we used antigen-specific T cells as a proof of concept, but the patch also captures other immune cells and inflammatory biomarkers," said Jalili, who is also a joint faculty member at UConn School of Medicine.
In mouse vaccination models, the patch dramatically boosted the recovery of antigen-specific T cells, recruiting many of these cells from the bloodstream rather than skin. In a human test at UMass Chan, the patch also collected a rich mix of immune cells and signaling proteins, including resident memory T cells.
"This study marks the first demonstration of live human immune cell sampling using a microneedle patch," Jalili said. "This opens the door to a new way of monitoring immune responses that's practical, painless, and clinically feasible."
The patch absorbs immune cells and signaling proteins from the skin after resident memory T cells are briefly reactivated with a small amount of antigen. It contains hundreds of microscopic needles made of an FDA-approved polymer. A seaweed-derived hydrogel also deemed safe by the FDA coats the needles and absorbs immune cells and molecules from skin interstitial fluid. The microneedles reach only the upper skin layers, causing minimal irritation and no damage to nerves or blood vessels.
Blood tests and biopsies will remain essential tools, and additional studies to determine how the patch performs across different diseases and patient populations are under way. But the early findings are particularly promising, said study co-author Darrell Irvine, an immunologist and bioengineer at Scripps Research, who began the work at MIT.
"Not only did we run extensive preclinical experiments, we were able to carry out an initial test in humans," Irvine said. "That's exciting because it almost never happens with brand-new technologies. Moving new technologies from the lab to testing on patients often takes years."
The patch may be especially useful for skin conditions, since immune cells that drive conditions such as allergic dermatitis, psoriasis, and vitiligo already live in the tissue. Jalili is already using it to study how age-related skin changes contribute to chronic inflammation and frailty in older adults as part of the Pepper Scholars Program in the UConn School of Medicine and UConn Center on Aging.
Looking ahead, the patch could eventually support at-home monitoring, allowing patients with skin conditions to track unpredictable flare-ups. The technology could also be adapted for oral or nasal cavities, opening the door to monitoring mucosal immune responses.
"People wouldn't need hours of sampling. Even 15 to 30 minutes can be enough to detect inflammatory signals and get a sense of what's happening in the tissue," Jalili said.
Other authors in this study are Ryan R. Hosn of Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Wei-Che Ko and Khashayar Afshari of University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School; Ashok Kumar Dhinakaran of The Jackson Laboratory; Namit Chaudhary and Laura Maiorino of Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Nazgol Haddadi of University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School; Anusha Nathan, Matthew A. Getz, and Gaurav D. Gaiha of The Ragon Institute of Massachusetts General Hospital; Mehdi Rashighi and John E. Harris of University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School; and Paula T. Hammond of Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research.
This work was supported by the NIH (award U01AI176310), The Jackson Laboratory, the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT and Harvard, and the Koch Institute Support Grant P30-CA14051 from the National Cancer Institute.
The authors have submitted a patent application filed by MIT related to the data presented in this work.
Jackson Laboratory
Jalili, S., et al. (2026). Leveraging tissue-resident memory T cells for non-invasive immune monitoring via microneedle skin patches. Nature Biomedical Engineering. DOI: 10.1038/s41551-026-01617-7. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41551-026-01617-7
Posted in: Device / Technology News | Medical Science News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
A new study shows how dysfunctional packaging of the neurotransmitter dopamine triggers toxic processes in neurons - and how this can be repaired with simple delivery of energy (ATP).
Parkinson's gradually destroys dopamine-producing neurons in a specific area of the midbrain, causing tremors, stiffness, and movement problems. Two key features are the accumulation of the protein α-synuclein into Lewy bodies and the loss of dopaminergic neurons. "Dopamine oxidizes to produce toxic substances and causes lasting damage to the neurons if it is not properly packaged in small bubbles, known as vesicles - but the cause of this dysfunctional packaging of dopamine was hitherto unclear," says Lena Burbulla, Professor of Metabolic Biochemistry in the Faculty of Medicine at LMU and member of the SyNergy Cluster of Excellence. She is the lead author of a study that was recently published in the journal Science Advances.
The researchers converted induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) from a Parkinson's patient with a defective DJ-1 gene and genetically modified iPSCs lacking the DJ-1 gene into neurons. "The lack of DJ-1 causes energy problems that occur in many variants of Parkinson's," explains Burbulla. Using high-precision protein analysis (proteomics), state-of-the-art imaging and sensitive dopamine sensors, the team of researchers revealed how dopamine is "packaged" incorrectly in the cells.
The protein VMAT2, which is responsible for the secure packaging of dopamine into the vesicle, does not function properly in Parkinson's neurons: It does not take up enough dopamine - firstly because there is a lack of energy in the form of ATP (adenosine triphosphate), the universal energy carrier in cells, and secondly because the neuron does not produce enough VMAT2. As a result, dopamine ultimately oxidizes to form toxins. Another crucial factor here is that misfolded α-synuclein protein accumulates - probably a consequence of the oxidized dopamine, which can bind proteins and promote their accumulation. As the researchers were able to show, simple delivery of ATP repaired the packaging of dopamine and stopped the damage.
This discovery links an energy deficiency to the packaging of dopamine and neuron vulnerability - a new mechanism for Parkinson's."
Lena Burbulla, Professor of Metabolic Biochemistry in the Faculty of Medicine at LMU
It shows that intact VMAT2 and secure packaging of dopamine are key factors for protecting midbrain neurons and preserving them could slow down the pathology. "iPSC-based disease modeling will enable future therapy tests to be conducted directly in patient cells and will accelerate translation from laboratory to clinic."
Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet Muenchen (LMU)
Heger, L. M., et al. (2026). VMAT2 dysfunction impairs vesicular dopamine uptake, driving its oxidation and α-synuclein pathology in DJ-1–linked Parkinson's neurons. Science Advances. DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.adz5645. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adz5645
Posted in: Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Medical Condition News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
Star Quinn moved to Kingsport, Tennessee, in 2023, the same year the state began covering dental costs for about 600,000 low-income adults enrolled in Medicaid.
But when Quinn chipped a tooth and it became infected, she could not find a dentist near her home who would accept her government health coverage and was taking new patients.
She went to an emergency room, receiving painkillers and antibiotics, but she remained in agonizing pain weeks later and paid a dentist $200 to extract the tooth.
Years later, it still hurts to chew on that side, she said, but Quinn — a 34-year-old who has four children and, with her husband, earns about $30,000 a year — still can't find a dentist nearby.
"You should be able to get dental care," she said, "because at the end of the day dental care is health care."
The federal government has long required states to offer dental coverage for children enrolled in Medicaid, the joint state-federal health program for people who are low-income or disabled. Paying for adults' dental care, though, is optional for states.
In recent years, several states have opted to expand the coverage offered by their Medicaid programs, seeking to boost access in recognition of its importance to overall health. So far, increasing adult dental care is a work in progress: In a sampling of six of those states by KFF Health News, fewer than 1 in 4 adults on Medicaid see a dentist at least once a year.
But under congressional Republicans' One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law last year, the federal government is expected to reduce Medicaid spending by more than $900 billion over the next decade. The expected 10-year losses for individual states range from about $184 million for Wyoming to about $150 billion for California.
State Medicaid programs typically expand or reduce benefits depending on their finances, and such massive federal cuts could force some to shrink or eliminate what they offer, including dental benefits.
"We will lose all the gains we have made," said Shillpa Naavaal, a dental policy researcher at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.
Tennessee's Medicaid program, for instance, spent nearly $64 million on its dental coverage in 2024 and saw a 20% decrease in dental-related ER visits, said Amy Lawrence, the program's spokesperson.
But under the new law, Tennessee is projected to lose about $7 billion in federal funding over the next decade.
As of last year, 38 states and the District of Columbia offered enhanced dental benefits for adult Medicaid beneficiaries, according to the American Dental Association. Most of the others offer limited or emergency-only care. Alabama is the only state that offers no dental coverage for adult beneficiaries.
Since 2021, 18 states have enhanced their coverage to include checkups, X-rays, fillings, crowns, and dentures, while loosening annual dollar caps for benefits.
Use of dental benefits in states with the enhanced benefits is greater than in states with only limited or emergency coverage, though still low overall, according to an ADA report with the latest data as of December. No more than a third of adult Medicaid recipients saw a dentist in 2022 in any state.
To review more recent progress, KFF Health News asked one-third of the states that have expanded their benefits in the past five years for their most recent data on the percentage of adults on Medicaid who visit a dentist at least once a year:
In comparison, about 50% to 60% of adults with private dental coverage see a dentist at least once a year, according to the ADA.
Nationwide, 41% of dentists reported participating in Medicaid in 2024, a share that has remained stable over the past decade despite the dental benefit expansions in many states, the ADA says. Many participating dentists, though, limit the number of Medicaid enrollees they treat, and some will not accept new patients on Medicaid.
Reimbursement rates have not kept up with costs, deterring dentists from accepting Medicaid, said Marko Vujicic, chief economist and vice president at the ADA Health Policy Institute.
Because of a lack of dentists who take Medicaid in southwestern Virginia, the Appalachian Highlands Community Dental Center in Abingdon sees patients who travel more than two hours for care — and must turn many away, said Elaine Smith, its executive director.
The center's seven residents treated about 5,000 patients last year, most of them on Medicaid. About 3,000 people are on its waitlist, waiting up to a year to be seen.
"It's sad because they have the means now to see a dentist, but they still don't have a dental home," Smith said.
Low-income adults face other barriers to dental care, including a lack of transportation, child care, or time off work, she said.
The inability to see a dentist has consequences broader than tooth pain. Poor dental health can contribute to a host of other significant health problems, such as heart disease and diabetes. It can also make it harder to do things like apply for jobs and generally lead a healthy life.
Robin Mullins, 49, who has been off and on Medicaid since 2013, said a lack of regular dental visits contributed to her losing her bottom teeth. Unable to find a dentist near her home in rural Clintwood, Virginia, she drives almost 90 minutes to Smith's clinic — that is, when she can afford to get time away from driving for DoorDash or find help watching her daughter, who has special needs.
She gets by with partial dentures but misses her natural teeth, she said. "It's absolutely horrible, as you can't chew your food properly."
In New Hampshire, though, the challenges have more to do with low demand than a low supply of dentists, said Tom Raffio, chief executive of Northeast Delta Dental, which manages the state's Medicaid dental program. The company has added new dentists to its list of participating providers, along with two mobile dental units that traverse the state, he said.
Raffio said Northeast Delta Dental also has publicized the state benefits using radio advertising and social media, among other efforts.
Until 2023, New Hampshire Medicaid covered only dental emergencies.
"Culturally, it's going to take a while," he said, "as people just are used to not going to the dentist, or going to the ER when have dental pain."
Brooks Woodward, dental director at Baltimore-based Chase Brexton Health Care, called Maryland's rate of roughly 1 in 5 adults on Medicaid seeing a dentist in 2024 "pretty good" considering the benefits had been enhanced only since 2023.
Woodward said many adults on Medicaid believe that you go to a dentist only when you're in pain. "They've always just not gone to the dentist, and that's just the way they had it in their life," he said.
KFF Health News
Posted in: Healthcare News
Cancel reply to comment
Alexander Dulebo
Discover how Bruker is helping drive innovation in cosmetic science through advanced AFM techniques.
Gabi Saavedra
Discover how Thermo Fisher is shaping the future of plant-based foods through texture innovation and cultural relevance.
Dr. Lena Smirnova
Brain microphysiological systems are reshaping in vitro neurotoxicity testing through functional validation and advanced disease modeling.
News-Medical.Net provides this medical information service in accordance
with these terms and conditions.
Please note that medical information found
on this website is designed to support, not to replace the relationship
between patient and physician/doctor and the medical advice they may provide.
Last Updated: Monday 2 Mar 2026
News-Medical.net - An AZoNetwork Site
Owned and operated by AZoNetwork, © 2000-2026
Your AI Powered Scientific Assistant
Hi, I'm Azthena, you can trust me to find commercial scientific answers from News-Medical.net.
To start a conversation, please log into your AZoProfile account first, or create a new account.
Registered members can chat with Azthena, request quotations, download pdf's, brochures and subscribe to our related newsletter content.
A few things you need to know before we start. Please read and accept to continue.
Please check the box above to proceed.
Great. Ask your question.
Azthena may occasionally provide inaccurate responses.
Read the full terms.
Terms
While we only use edited and approved content for Azthena
answers, it may on occasions provide incorrect responses.
Please confirm any data provided with the related suppliers or
authors. We do not provide medical advice, if you search for
medical information you must always consult a medical
professional before acting on any information provided.
Your questions, but not your email details will be shared with
OpenAI and retained for 30 days in accordance with their
privacy principles.
Please do not ask questions that use sensitive or confidential
information.
Read the full Terms & Conditions.
Provide Feedback
COMMENTARY
Interviewer: Nadine Eckert; Interviewee: Julia Szendrödi, MD, PhD
Szendrödi J: Es liegen keine Interessenkonflikte vor.
Medical director at Heidelberg University Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany
Disclosure: Julia Szendrödi, MD, PhD, has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
Szendrödi J: Es liegen keine Interessenkonflikte vor.
Medical director at Heidelberg University Hospital, Heidelberg, Germany
Disclosure: Julia Szendrödi, MD, PhD, has disclosed no relevant financial relationships.
With incretin-based medications such as semaglutide and tirzepatide, obesity treatment has fundamentally changed in recent years. Intervention trials have shown weight reductions of up to 20%, and for the first time, positive endpoint data on cardiovascular events and mortality are available. The solution to the obesity crisis seemed within reach.
However, in routine clinical practice, the initial enthusiasm has moderated. High discontinuation rates, nutrient deficiencies, and loss of muscle mass have made clear that even these therapies have limitations. How can new pharmacologic options be meaningfully integrated into a comprehensive obesity treatment strategy? Medscape's German edition spoke with Julia Szendrödi, MD, PhD, medical director of the Clinic for Endocrinology, Diabetology, Metabolic Diseases, and Clinical Chemistry at Heidelberg University Hospital in Heidelberg, Germany.
Professor Szendrödi, after several years of experience, what do you do differently today when using incretin-based medications compared with the beginning?
The results of the intervention trials were impressive, and of course we wanted to achieve similar effects for our patients. At the outset, we followed the prescribing information and increased the dose stepwise to the target dose.
In routine care, however, that approach proved disappointing. Many patients discontinued treatment. Real-world data show discontinuation rates of up to 60% in the first year, often because of adverse effects and reduced quality of life. That has significantly changed my approach.
Today, I consistently start with the lowest dose and no longer automatically escalate according to a fixed schedule. After several weeks, I have a structured discussion with patients about tolerability, appetite suppression, and quality of life during treatment. In some patients, quality of life is so significantly impaired that the satisfaction from weight loss does not compensate for it. In such cases, it may make sense to remain at a lower dose.
Nutrient deficiencies and muscle loss have also been discussed. How do you address that?
That is a very important issue. Nutrient deficiencies are more common in people with obesity than one might expect, and they tend to increase under incretin-based therapy. Studies show that up to 80% of patients have clinically relevant deficiencies, for example, in vitamin D or vitamin B12. Therefore, we always accompany pharmacologic therapy with nutritional management. We assess potential deficiencies before treatment begins.
From the start, I discuss nausea, marked appetite suppression, and the need for nutrient-dense nutrition with patients. This includes ensuring adequate protein intake.
Some degree of muscle loss cannot be completely avoided during weight reduction because weight loss does not consist solely of fat mass. There are already promising research approaches addressing this issue, such as combining incretin-based medications with agents aimed at preserving muscle mass. For now, however, it is essential that patients pay close attention to protein intake. Ideally, they should receive dietary counseling and incorporate structured physical activity into their daily routine, including strength training whenever possible.
What should be done once the desired weight loss has been achieved?
This must be considered from the beginning. Studies clearly show that weight often increases rapidly after discontinuation of these medications, particularly after short treatment duration. Obesity is a chronic disease — similar to hypertension. Just because a target value has been reached does not automatically mean therapy should be stopped.
One option is to continue treatment at a reduced dose. If medication is discontinued, it is crucial that weight loss has been well supported and that lifestyle measures are consistently maintained — not only in terms of diet but also physical activity and daily structure.
With the availability of new weight-loss medications, does bariatric surgery still have a place in obesity treatment?
Obesity treatment continues to rest on three pillars: lifestyle intervention, pharmacologic therapy, and bariatric surgery. In cases of severe obesity, significant comorbidities, or insufficient response to medication, surgery remains the most effective option.
The advantage today is that medications can complement surgery — preoperatively to reduce risk or postoperatively in cases of weight plateau or regain.
However, it is problematic that in Germany, pharmacologic obesity therapy is generally not reimbursed by statutory health insurance unless the patient also has diabetes, whereas surgery is covered as a one-time intervention. I consider this discrepancy outdated.
You have mentioned diet and exercise several times. What role does lifestyle intervention play today?
Diet and physical activity remain the foundation of treatment. However, in cases of severe obesity, they are usually insufficient on their own to achieve substantial and sustained weight reduction. In clinical trials, lifestyle intervention can be effective — but under very intensive supervision, which often involves costs comparable to medication or surgery.
Nevertheless, lifestyle therapy has not lost its importance. On the contrary, it is crucial for preserving muscle mass, maintaining metabolic health, sustaining physical performance, and stabilizing long-term weight loss — regardless of how that weight loss was achieved.
Have the goals of obesity treatment changed?
Yes, significantly. Today, the focus is no longer on short-term weight loss but on sustainable outcomes: long-term weight reduction, remission of prediabetes or diabetes, and durable reduction of comorbidities and mortality. The emphasis has shifted from the number on the scale to preserving metabolic and cardiovascular health.
However, outdated legislation stands in contrast to this shift. In Germany, the so-called “lifestyle clause” in health policy still prevents routine reimbursement of obesity medications, based on the outdated notion that obesity is primarily a matter of willpower and discipline.
We now understand that the causes are more complex?
We now know that satiety and energy homeostasis are regulated through neurohormonal mechanisms and that genetic predisposition plays a major role — as do metabolic factors such as hyperinsulinemia. People with obesity have fundamentally different satiety regulation compared with individuals of normal weight.
Treatment with incretin-based medications relieves a tremendous burden for many patients. They report that for the first time, they are no longer constantly thinking about food because appetite is significantly reduced. This relief, achieved through normalization of satiety regulation, is difficult for people of normal weight to fully comprehend.
This article was translated from Medscape's German edition.
Any views expressed above are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of WebMD/Medscape or its affiliates.
By harnessing everyday clinical assessments, researchers demonstrate that personalized 12-month forecasts of cognitive and functional change in dementia can be achieved without expensive imaging or invasive testing.
Study design and analysis pipeline. Clinical assessments are collected at regular intervals throughout the Minder study (a), features used for statistical analysis and predictive modelling included clinical assessment scores, participant demographics, and comorbidities (b), participants were first grouped based on their relative cognitive and functional decline trajectories and profiled accordingly (c), predictive models of cognitive and functional decline were fine-tuned and evaluated using a nested cross-validation approach (d), and models were selected and finalised for each outcome measure (e). Finally, a decision support tool was designed to deploy both predictive models in clinical settings (f). MMSE: Mini-mental state exam, ADAS-Cog: Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive Subscale, BADL: Bristol Activities of Daily Living
In a recent study published in the journal Communications Medicine, a group of researchers developed and validated scalable machine learning models that predict 12-month Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Bristol Activities of Daily Living (BADL) scores, enabling individualized forecasts of cognitive and functional trajectories, in Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) using routinely collected clinical data.
Nearly 60 million people worldwide are living with dementia, and that number is expected to double by 2050. Families often ask how quickly can AD or MCI progress, as every person faces the consequences differently. Some people's health declines fast, while others stay stable for years. Current guidelines based on average patient data often fail to capture this variability. Accurate, accessible tools that personalize predictions could transform care planning, but more research is needed to develop scalable and clinically viable prognostic models.
Clinical, demographic, and medical history data were obtained from the Minder Health Management Study in the United Kingdom, an ongoing longitudinal study of people living with dementia. Researchers included only AD or MCI patients with at least 1 year of follow-up data. Each individual non-overlapping 12-month period was considered an independent clinical trajectory, an analytical assumption that treats repeated periods from the same individual as statistically independent. Across three years, 153 such 12-month trajectories were identified, of which 79 were eligible for cognitive modelling and 74 for functional modelling.
Baseline features included age, sex, comorbidities derived from Electronic Health Records using International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th Revision categories, and detailed sub-item scores from three assessments: the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), the Alzheimer's Disease Assessment Scale-Cognitive Subscale (ADAS-Cog), and the Bristol Activities of Daily Living (BADL).
Two ElasticNet regression models were fitted to estimate 12-month MMSE and BADL scores. Performance was estimated with nested cross-validation. They evaluated the overall accuracy of the model using three metrics: Mean Absolute Error (MAE), Mean Squared Error (MSE), and the coefficient of determination (R²). External validation of the cognitive model was performed on 741 trajectories from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative cohort. External validation was conducted only for the MMSE model, as comparable BADL data were not available in the ADNI cohort.
Across the Minder cohort, the average 12-month MMSE decline was -1.7 points (standard deviation 3.0), while the average BADL decline was -4.1 points (standard deviation 5.5), highlighting substantial variability in progression.
The best-performing cognitive model, based on ElasticNet regression, predicted 12-month MMSE scores with a MAE of 1.84 points (95% Cl: 1.64-2.04) and an R² of 0.74. External validation on the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative dataset yielded a comparable MAE of 2.19, despite demographic and baseline severity differences between the cohorts. Importantly, prediction error remained below the standard deviation of decline in both datasets, a comparison the authors interpret as suggesting clinically meaningful accuracy, although no formal clinical decision thresholds were predefined.
The functional model predicted 12-month BADL scores with a MAE of 3.88 points (95% Cl: 3.46-4.30) and an R² of 0.77, demonstrating similarly strong performance.
Baseline total scores alone did not fully explain progression rates. Instead, specific cognitive and functional subdomains were highly predictive. For cognitive decline, lower baseline performance in ideational praxis, word recall, spoken language, word recognition, and MMSE orientation and visuospatial items strongly predicted steeper MMSE decline.
For functional decline, independence in food and drink preparation, managing finances, dressing, shopping, and engagement in hobbies were among the strongest predictors. Individuals already struggling in these domains were more likely to experience greater loss of independence over 12 months. Age was also significantly associated with a faster rate of functional decline.
Interestingly, comorbidities were not strong predictors in either model. Models performed similarly, or slightly better, without comorbidity features, particularly for functional prediction, suggesting that detailed cognitive and functional baseline patterns carried more prognostic weight than broad disease categories.
Researchers utilized Shapley Additive Explanations (SHAP) to demonstrate how each factor contributes to the result of the model, making it easier to analyze the performance of their system. These analyses indicate that the predictions are personalized for each patient based on their specific cognitive and functional profile.
The findings indicate that it is possible to create reliable individualized predictions of dementia progression based solely on frequently collected clinical assessments without the need for neuroimaging or cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers. The team also implemented a clinician-facing decision-support tool, termed Theia, which generates predicted 12-month scores alongside SHAP-based explanations to enhance interpretability in practice. However, the relatively modest sample size used for model development and the use of research-cohort data for external validation suggest that broader multi-center validation in routine-care populations will be important before widespread deployment.
Using only routinely collected clinical assessments, demographic information, and medical history, two machine learning models accurately predicted 12-month MMSE and BADL outcomes in AD and MCI. The models demonstrated strong internal validity and external validation for cognitive prediction, with clinically meaningful error margins. Importantly, specific cognitive and daily living subdomains were more predictive than total scores alone. They represent highly translational, scalable, and interpretable tools. When applied in a clinical context, they can assist with individualized care planning, improve resource utilization, and provide clearer expectations to patients and their families, introducing precision forecasting into daily dementia care.
Posted in: Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Disease/Infection News
Written by
Vijay holds a Ph.D. in Biotechnology and possesses a deep passion for microbiology. His academic journey has allowed him to delve deeper into understanding the intricate world of microorganisms. Through his research and studies, he has gained expertise in various aspects of microbiology, which includes microbial genetics, microbial physiology, and microbial ecology. Vijay has six years of scientific research experience at renowned research institutes such as the Indian Council for Agricultural Research and KIIT University. He has worked on diverse projects in microbiology, biopolymers, and drug delivery. His contributions to these areas have provided him with a comprehensive understanding of the subject matter and the ability to tackle complex research challenges.
Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report:
APA
Kumar Malesu, Vijay. (2026, March 01). Machine learning predicts who will decline faster in Alzheimer's disease using routine clinic data. News-Medical. Retrieved on March 02, 2026 from https://www.news-medical.net/news/20260301/Machine-learning-predicts-who-will-decline-faster-in-Alzheimere28099s-disease-using-routine-clinic-data.aspx.
MLA
Kumar Malesu, Vijay. "Machine learning predicts who will decline faster in Alzheimer's disease using routine clinic data". News-Medical. 02 March 2026.
A sweeping national analysis suggests that counties nearer to nuclear power plants experience higher cancer mortality, raising urgent questions about long-term environmental exposure, aging populations, and the limits of proximity-based risk assessment.
Study: National analysis of cancer mortality and proximity to nuclear power plants in the United States. Image Credit: IndustryAndTravel / Shutterstock
A recent study published in the journal Nature Communications reports higher cancer mortality rates in the United States (US) counties within 200 km of operational nuclear energy plants compared with more distant counties, with the greatest burden observed among older adults.
Analyzing cancer mortality data between 2000 and 2018, researchers found that cancer mortality increased progressively with age. Estimated attributable cancer deaths were highest among adults aged between 65 and 74 years, with an estimated 13,976 deaths in females and 20,912 in males.
Although the findings do not establish causation, they underscore the importance of examining possible exposure routes, long-term health impacts, and cancer outcomes with broader public health implications.
Nuclear energy plants remain a primary source of electricity worldwide and are increasingly being viewed as a low-carbon energy option. However, routine operations can release small amounts of radioactive pollutants into the air, water, and soil, creating potential pathways for human exposure through inhalation, ingestion, or direct contact. Chronic low-level exposure to ionizing radiation, a well-established carcinogen, has raised longstanding public health concerns for communities living nearby. Importantly, the study did not measure individual radiation exposure or dosimetry; instead, it used geographic proximity as a proxy for potential exposure, assuming equal contribution from all operational plants within 200 km regardless of plant size or emissions.
Prior studies have explored links between residential proximity to nuclear facilities and cancer risk; however, results are inconsistent. Moreover, most US investigations were geographically limited and relied on simplified exposure metrics, underscoring the need for more comprehensive, methodologically robust analyses.
In the present study, researchers examined long-term spatial patterns of cancer mortality based on county-level proximity to nuclear facilities between 2000 and 2018. They investigated whether living closer to nuclear energy facilities could increase cancer mortality risk, accounting for demographic, socioeconomic, environmental, healthcare, and behavioral factors.
The team obtained data on nuclear energy plant locations from the United States (US) Energy Information Administration (EIA) website. They calculated proximity by summing the inverse-distance weights from all operational nuclear plants within 200 km of each county center. The analysis included facilities located in Canada but within 200 km of a US county center.
The researchers sourced county-level cancer mortality data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). They determined relative risks (RRs) using generalized estimating equation (GEE) Poisson regression models. Study covariates included age, body mass index, race, education, income, smoking prevalence, population density, relative humidity, temperature, proximity to the nearest hospital, and physician visits among those aged 65 years and older.
Further, the team performed a sensitivity analysis by restricting to counties within 100 km of nuclear facilities, evaluated in 10 km increments. They also examined multiple exposure windows ranging from 2 to 20 years. Lastly, the team assessed mortality risks associated with proximity to coal-fired power plants for comparison, providing context for the observed associations.
The analysis revealed significantly higher cancer mortality rates in US counties located closer to nuclear energy plants than in those farther away. The association was most pronounced among older adults, particularly men aged 65–74 years (RR, 1.20), and women aged 65–74 years (RR, 1.19).
The lowest number of cancer-related deaths was observed among individuals aged 35–44 years, with 591 deaths among females and 260 deaths among males. The cancer mortality burden increased with advancing age. Overall, the annual estimated attributable cancer mortality among individuals aged 65 years and older living near nuclear facilities averaged 4,266 deaths between 2000 and 2018.
A clear distance pattern emerged, with cancer mortality risk highest at shorter distances from nuclear plants and gradually declining with increasing distance. Geographically, counties in the Northeast, Midwest, and parts of the Southeast were generally closer to nuclear facilities, whereas those in the Great Plains and Western regions tended to be farther away due to a sparser distribution of nuclear plants. Importantly, the observed associations remained consistent across multiple sensitivity analyses using alternative proximity thresholds and time windows, reinforcing the robustness of the findings.
For a broader context, prior research has estimated that annual all-cause mortality linked to coal-fired power plant emissions averaged 20,909 deaths between 1999 and 2020. Although not directly comparable due to differences in outcomes and study design, the current findings represent approximately 20% of that figure, underscoring the cancer burden potentially associated with energy-related environmental exposures.
Overall, the findings suggest that US counties in proximity to nuclear energy plants experience higher cancer mortality rates than those situated farther away, highlighting the need to more closely examine the long-term public health implications of nuclear energy infrastructure. However, the ecological design, based on county-level data from the CDC, does not account for individual-level exposure or risk factors, nor does it capture lifetime residential history or migration patterns, limiting causal interpretation.
Future research should incorporate direct radiation measurements, including dosimetry, and evaluate vulnerable populations such as children. Studies exploring site-specific cancers, varying latency periods, and radiation sensitivities are also warranted. In addition, expanding investigations to include cardiovascular, neurological, and other health outcomes could provide a more comprehensive understanding of the broader health impacts of living near nuclear facilities.
Posted in: Child Health News | Men's Health News | Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Medical Condition News | Women's Health News
Written by
Pooja Toshniwal Paharia is an oral and maxillofacial physician and radiologist based in Pune, India. Her academic background is in Oral Medicine and Radiology. She has extensive experience in research and evidence-based clinical-radiological diagnosis and management of oral lesions and conditions and associated maxillofacial disorders.
Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report:
APA
Toshniwal Paharia, Pooja Toshniwal Paharia. (2026, March 01). Living near nuclear power plants is associated with higher cancer mortality, national US study reports. News-Medical. Retrieved on March 02, 2026 from https://www.news-medical.net/news/20260301/Living-near-nuclear-power-plants-is-associated-with-higher-cancer-mortality-national-US-study-reports.aspx.
MLA
Toshniwal Paharia, Pooja Toshniwal Paharia. "Living near nuclear power plants is associated with higher cancer mortality, national US study reports". News-Medical. 02 March 2026.
A large genetic analysis suggests that one amino acid linked to protein metabolism could influence how long we live, with potential sex-specific effects that challenge assumptions about diet and longevity.
Study: The role of phenylalanine and tyrosine in longevity: a cohort and Mendelian randomization study. Image Credit: Oleg Troino / Shutterstock
In a recent study published in the journal Aging, researchers investigated the role of phenylalanine and tyrosine in human lifespan.
Dietary protein restriction has been reported to increase lifespan. Amino acids that respond to protein restriction may influence lifespan. For instance, tyrosine has been demonstrated to regulate physiological responses to a low-protein diet in an animal study. Further, restricting tyrosine intake modulates amino acid-sensing pathways, reduces endogenous tyrosine, and extends lifespan in experimental models.
Further, elevated levels of phenylalanine, which is the precursor of tyrosine, are associated with telomere loss, type 2 diabetes, and inflammatory diseases. Evidence shows that phenylalanine is oxidized to meta-tyrosine, a toxic metabolite reported to reduce lifespan in Caenorhabditis elegans. However, the role of these amino acids has been rarely studied in humans.
In the present study, researchers assessed the role of phenylalanine and tyrosine in human lifespan. First, they used Cox regression to evaluate associations between baseline plasma levels of tyrosine and phenylalanine and all-cause mortality in the United Kingdom Biobank (UKB) cohort; the analysis was adjusted for sex, age, smoking, alcohol intake, ethnicity, body mass index, physical activity, education, and the Townsend Deprivation Index.
In addition, associations of tyrosine and phenylalanine levels with cancer and cardiovascular disease (CVD) mortality were assessed. Next, the researchers conducted combined and sex-specific genome-wide association studies (GWASs) of tyrosine and phenylalanine in the UKB. Single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)-based heritability was calculated. Genetic instruments for circulating tyrosine and phenylalanine were derived from the GWASs.
Specifically, SNPs linked to circulating tyrosine or phenylalanine at genome-wide significance were selected. The team used genome-wide significant SNPs associated with tyrosine and phenylalanine in the UKB in a two-sample Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis, and applied them to a GWAS of parental attained age (a proxy for lifespan) in a European ancestry population to estimate the effect on lifespan. Finally, multivariable MR analyses were performed to assess the independent effects of tyrosine and phenylalanine.
About 272,475 individuals from the UKB cohort with data on amino acid levels, confounders, and death status were included. Among these, 23,964 deaths occurred, including 9,734 deaths in females and 14,230 in males. Plasma phenylalanine was associated with higher all-cause mortality overall, and in both sexes. Similarly, plasma tyrosine was associated with an elevated risk of mortality overall and in males alone.
These associations persisted in a sensitivity analysis that excluded deaths from accidents. A higher tyrosine-to-phenylalanine ratio was associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality overall and in females. In disease-specific mortality analysis, plasma phenylalanine was associated with cancer and CVD mortality, whereas tyrosine showed no associations. Restricted cubic spline analyses suggested potential non-linearity in the associations, with turning points near the population mean concentrations, indicating that associations were more pronounced at higher circulating levels.
In the GWAS, the heritability estimates for tyrosine and phenylalanine were 0.09 and 0.04, respectively. In total, 2,422 and 11,379 genome-wide significant SNPs were identified for phenylalanine and tyrosine, respectively. In sex-specific analysis, 1,099 and 946 SNPs were identified in males and females for phenylalanine, and 5,297 and 4,840 variants were identified in males and females for tyrosine, respectively.
Following exclusion of correlated genetic variants, 74 and 21 SNPs were used as genetic instruments for tyrosine and phenylalanine in the combined analysis. In sex-specific analyses, 12 SNPs in males and 10 in females were used as genetic instruments for phenylalanine; for tyrosine, 45 SNPs in males and 29 in females were used. SNPs associated with these amino acids were located in genes crucial for amino acid regulation, metabolism, and transport.
The essential genes for phenylalanine were phenylalanine hydroxylase (PAH), solute carrier family 17 member 1 (SLC17A1), SLC43A1, SLC38A4, carbamoyl phosphate synthase 1 (CPS1), glutathione S-transferase mu 1 (GSTM1), and glutathione S-transferase alpha 2 (GSTA2). For tyrosine, these were PAH, GSTM1, 4-hydroxyphenylpyruvate dioxygenase (HPD), and CPS1.
Genetically predicted elevated phenylalanine levels were associated with a longer lifespan in males only. In contrast, genetically predicted increases in tyrosine levels were associated with a shorter lifespan in the overall population and showed directionally consistent inverse associations in both sexes, although the statistical strength varied by analytic method in univariable MR analyses. In multivariable MR, phenylalanine was no longer associated with lifespan in either sex after controlling for tyrosine. In contrast, tyrosine was associated with shorter lifespan, particularly in males, after controlling for phenylalanine, with weaker and less consistent evidence in females, depending on the analytic method used.
Effect sizes in Mendelian randomization were expressed in estimated life years per standard deviation increase in genetically predicted amino acid levels, with the strongest independent effect observed in men (approximately one year of life per SD increase in tyrosine).
In sum, genetically predicted higher tyrosine levels were associated with a shorter lifespan, and the association was sustained in males independent of phenylalanine; in contrast, phenylalanine was not independently associated with lifespan.
These results underscore the potential role of tyrosine in human longevity and warrant further investigation. Importantly, Mendelian randomization estimates reflect the lifelong effect of endogenous circulating levels rather than short-term dietary supplementation.
The authors also noted limited statistical power to detect sex differences and acknowledged that partial sample overlap between the exposure and outcome datasets could introduce bias, although sensitivity analyses showed consistent effect directions.
Posted in: Men's Health News | Medical Science News | Medical Research News | Women's Health News
Written by
Tarun is a writer based in Hyderabad, India. He has a Master's degree in Biotechnology from the University of Hyderabad and is enthusiastic about scientific research. He enjoys reading research papers and literature reviews and is passionate about writing.
Please use one of the following formats to cite this article in your essay, paper or report:
APA
Sai Lomte, Tarun. (2026, March 01). Higher tyrosine levels linked to shorter lifespan in major UK Biobank analysis. News-Medical. Retrieved on March 02, 2026 from https://www.news-medical.net/news/20260301/Higher-tyrosine-levels-linked-to-shorter-lifespan-in-major-UK-Biobank-analysis.aspx.
MLA
Sai Lomte, Tarun. "Higher tyrosine levels linked to shorter lifespan in major UK Biobank analysis". News-Medical. 02 March 2026.
More from The Sun
A TOM Brady-led flag football event in Saudi Arabia is facing some huge logistical issues.
War has broken out in the Middle East after a US and Israeli military strike on Iran over the weekend.
Please provide a valid email.
Your info will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy
You'll now receive top stories, breaking news, and more, straight to your email.
Doubt has been cast over the Fanatics Football Classic at the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
A logistical nightmare now faces the event that is scheduled for less than three weeks' time.
Genuine security concerns have been raised after the biggest oil refinery in Saudi Arabia was hit by an Iranian drone strike.
The Ras Tanura refinery was hit after the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a US-Israeli strike.
READ MORE ON THE NFL
TIME TO TALK
David Montgomery breaks social media silence to address Lions exit claim
Digg deep
New England Patriots tipped to cut Diggs after heartbreaking Super Bowl defeat
This marks the start of President Donald Trump's four-week plan to eliminate the current Iranian regime.
Several NFL players have agreed to participate in the Fanatics Football Classic.
Seven-time Super Bowl winner Brady, 48, is set to come out of retirement for the event.
Former teammate Rob Gronkowski, 36, is also due to participate in the three-team flag football tournament.
Tua Tagovailoa finds out final decision over his Miami Dolphins future
$80m Patrick Mahomes protector CUT before NFL season as Chiefs save $20m
Raiders coaching staff for 2026 NFL season confirmed in Tom Brady's rebuild
NBC Sports ace Sara Cardona turns heads with new look as fans call her 'perfect'
But it's now a serious possibility that the event in the Middle East on Saturday, March 21 will not proceed.
There is also no guarantee that the event would be able to take place in Saudi Arabia on an alternative date.
Current NFL players have limited time during the offseason, which means a rescheduling would be difficult.
Relocation appears more likely, but this also faces its own logistical issues.
Former quarterback Brady has also teased that he could play at the Olympics if his flag football appearance in Saudi Arabia goes well.
David Montgomery TRADED by Lions to NFL rival in shock decision by Dan Campbell
Raiders coaching staff for 2026 NFL season confirmed in Tom Brady's rebuild
NBC Sports ace Sara Cardona turns heads with new look as fans call her 'perfect'
Browns officially announce trade with Texans affecting QB Shedeur Sanders
© NEWS ENTERPRISES, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED |
TERMS OF USE |
PRIVACY |
YOUR AD CHOICES |
SITEMAP
Tickets are available for the 11th annual SheBelieves Cup on March 4 with a matchup between the U.S. and Canada. The match will feature two former Ohio State women's soccer players: American Emma Sears and Canadian Nichelle Prince.
Sears, a Dublin Jerome graduate, has spent two years in the NWSL and set the rookie record and club record in goals for Racing Louisville FC. She was selected 28th overall in the 2024 NWSL Draft after earning multiple All-Big Ten honors with the Buckeyes in her collegiate career.
Prince played for Ohio State from 2013-16, scoring 27 goals and recording 20 assists in 72 appearances. She's played for the Houston Dash and Kansas City in the NWSL and will play for Boston Legacy FC in the 2026 season. Internationally, she earned a gold medal at the 2020 Olympics and has over 100 caps for Team Canada.
The U.S. is 9-1-2 in its last 13 matches in Columbus, including a takedown of Canada in a penalty shootout during the last SheBelieves Cup in 2024.
The tournament features a round-robin format, allowing each of the four participating teams (U.S., Canada, Colombia, and Argentina) to meet at least once. The USWNT beat Argentina 2-0 in Nashville on March 1 before heading to Columbus. Afterward, they head to Harrison, New Jersey, for a final game against Colombia on March 7.
Despite snowy conditions on March 2, the weather for match day March 4 is expected to be warmer, with temperatures in the mid-50s and intermittent rain showers throughout the day, according to The Weather Channel.
As of March 2, tickets for the SheBelieves Cup in Columbus are available starting at $45.22 located on the goal ends of the stadium.
Tickets located on the sides of the pitch range from $68-250.
You can see ticket options here.
If you purchase through our links, the USA Today Network may earn a commission. Prices were accurate at the time of publication but may change.
Arsenal might be leading the way on the pitch as they chase a first Premier League title in over two decades, but off it, they have secured a much less desirable accolade. A comprehensive new study has revealed that the Gunners' faithful have been named the most disliked fanbase in the English top flight. The research, which highlights the tribal nature of modern football, suggests that the north London club's return to the summit of the game has brought with it a significant wave of external hostility from rival supporters across social media platforms.
The study, conducted by British Gambler, utilised the advanced social listening platform Brandwatch to analyse hundreds of thousands of online posts over the last six months. The goal was to measure the level of positive and negative sentiment directed toward every club's supporters. According to the data, Arsenal recorded a staggering 43 per cent negative sentiment rating, which was the joint-highest in the entire division. This figure places the Emirates Stadium regulars at the very top of the "most-hated" rankings, reflecting a turbulent period of online discourse regarding their conduct and reactions to matchday events.
The report indicates that the sheer scale of Arsenal's global following, combined with the relentless and often heated nature of online football debate, has served to magnify the scrutiny placed upon their supporters. With every VAR decision and post-match interview being dissected by millions, the 'Arsenal Twitter' phenomenon appears to have contributed heavily to their high ranking. As the club continues its push for silverware, the intensity of these digital interactions shows no signs of slowing down, further cementing their reputation as the league's most polarising set of fans.
While Arsenal's presence at the top of the list might be explained by their profile as title contenders, they are surprisingly joined at the summit by Nottingham Forest. The east Midlands club also recorded a 43 per cent negative sentiment rating, matching the Gunners for the title of the league's most criticised supporters. The rise in negativity toward Forest fans comes during a season of significant change and high-stakes battles at the City Ground, suggesting that their vocal presence in the top flight is rubbing many rival fans the wrong way.
Alex Kostin, a spokesperson for British Gambler, explained the findings by saying: "Football fan culture doesn't stop at the final whistle anymore, it plays out 24 hours a day online. So we've dived into the social media metrics to find out which clubs' fanbase are the most disliked off the pitch. Arsenal topping the table reflects just how intense the discourse around them has been this season." Kostin continued to elaborate on why the Gunners have become such a lightning rod for criticism this term, noting the perfect storm of factors currently surrounding the Emirates Stadium. He stated: "When you combine a title race, refereeing debates and one of the largest fanbases in the sport, every moment is magnified. The same applies to clubs like Nottingham Forest and Liverpool, with controversy and expectation naturally fuelling negative sentiment. Interestingly, some of the league's most successful clubs this season – namely Manchester City or Aston Villa – recorded comparatively lower levels of negative sentiment toward their supporters."
While Arsenal and Nottingham Forest lead the way in terms of negative perception, they are closely followed by the heavyweights of Merseyside. Liverpool supporters recorded a 41 per cent negative sentiment rating, placing them third on the list. Their local rivals Everton were not far behind on 40 per cent, a figure matched by Crystal Palace. The Eagles' presence in the top five is thought to be influenced by recent friction between the Selhurst Park faithful and manager Oliver Glasner, which has led to a spike in digital criticism and internal debate.
The study highlights a fascinating trend where traditional 'big' clubs do not necessarily attract the most hate relative to their size. Manchester United and Manchester City, for instance, sat surprisingly low in the rankings. United recorded a 26 per cent negative sentiment rating, while the reigning champions City were on 25 per cent. This suggests that while these clubs remain global giants, the current online conversation is being driven more by the immediate drama surrounding the title race and specific club controversies rather than historical rivalries alone.
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
At the opposite end of the spectrum, Fulham fans can officially claim to be the least disliked in the Premier League. Only 20 per cent of online mentions regarding the Cottagers' faithful were negative, making them the most 'liked' group in the country according to the data. They were followed closely by Aston Villa at 21 per cent and Sunderland at 23 per cent. These clubs appear to have successfully avoided the toxic online discourse that often plagues the league's most visible and controversial teams throughout the gruelling domestic campaign.
Ultimately, the research proves that the digital landscape has become the new frontline for football tribalism. Alex Kostin concluded: "Our data therefore suggests that the clubs driving the biggest online conversations are often the ones attracting the strongest negative reactions."
Log in
Subscribe Now
Region
Search
Top News
Podcasts
Connections: Sports Edition
NFL
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Fantasy
NFL Odds
NFL Picks
NFL Draft
Podcasts
Scoop City Newsletter
Top 150 Free Agents
Top 100 Draft Prospects
NBA
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
The Bounce Newsletter
NBA Draft
Podcasts
Fantasy
NBA Odds
NBA Picks
Latest Awards Watch
Our Ideas To Fix Tanking
How The NBA, Hip-Hop Inspire Each Other
MLB
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Podcasts
The Windup Newsletter
Fantasy
MLB Prospects
MLB Odds
MLB Picks
Top Prospects
Trade Grades
Top 50 Free Agents
NHL
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Podcasts
Fantasy
NHL Odds
NHL Picks
Olympic Men's Lookback
Olympic Women's Lookback
Red Light Newsletter
Trade Deadline News
NCAAM
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Bracket
Standings
Podcasts
NCAAW
Home
Scores & Schedule
Bracket
Standings
Podcasts
NCAAF
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Podcasts
Newsletter
Recruiting
Odds
Picks
Best Portal Classes
2026 CFB Predictions
Early Top 25
Transfer QB Rankings
Winter Olympics
Home
Medal Table
Men's Olympic Ice Hockey
Women's Olympic Ice Hockey
Tennis
Home
WNBA
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Podcasts
2026 Men's World Cup
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Premier League
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Fantasy
The Athletic FC Newsletter
Podcasts
Football's Biggest Talking Points
This World Cup Feels Different
Chelsea's 10 Red Cards
Golf
Home
Coming Soon to Your Inbox
Global Sports
College Sports
MLS
Home
Teams
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Podcasts
NWSL
Home
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Full Time newsletter
Podcasts
Soccer
Women's Soccer
Home
NWSL Schedule
Full Time Newsletter
Podcasts
NWSL
Women's World Cup
USWNT
College Sports
Fantasy Baseball
Home
MLB Home
Rates & Barrels
Fantasy Football
Fantasy Hockey
Draft Kit
Customizable Cheat Sheet
Downloadable Draft Sheet
Top 600 Hitters and Pitchers
Top 300 Hitters
SP Rankings
RP Rankings
Terminology
Fantasy Football
Home
NFL Home
Scoop City
Betting
2026 Fantasy Football Rankings
2026 Dynasty Rankings
Discord
Peak
Formula 1
Home
Prime Tire newsletter
Schedule
Alpine
Aston Martin
Audi
Cadillac
Ferrari
Haas
McLaren
Mercedes
Racing Bulls
Red Bull
Williams
Sports Business
Home
MoneyCall Newsletter
Sailing
Opinion
Home
Betting
Home
Fantasy Football
Odds
NFL Picks
UK Betting
Memorabilia and Collectibles
Culture
Home
Motorsports
Home
Podcasts
NASCAR
Women's Hockey
Home
Scores & Schedule
Standings
Teams
MMA
Home
Boxing
Home
The Pulse Newsletter
Cities
Combine Takeaways
MLB Fan Survey
College Basketball Top 25
NHL Trade Board
Connections: Sports Edition
Today's Pulse Newsletter
World Cup
2026 World
Cup Prep
SoFi Stadium will host two of the USA's World Cup group games, including the opener Frederic J. Brown / AFP / Getty Images
Six days after FIFA president Gianni Infantino claimed that “every” 2026 World Cup match is “already sold out,” FIFA, out of nowhere, launched an effort to sell World Cup tickets.
It emailed fans advertising an “exclusive additional chance to purchase,” and warned that “availability is extremely limited.” Then, from Wednesday onward, it offered tickets to at least 64 of the World Cup's 104 games, according to fans who sent information and screenshots to The Athletic.
Advertisement
The unexpected sale was, some experts suspect, the clearest evidence yet that FIFA has perhaps overstated demand for some World Cup games — or, rather, that it has priced out segments of that demand.
“When they say there's incredibly high demand for this [World Cup], of course that's true,” Jim McCarthy, a ticketing industry veteran, told The Athletic. “But that doesn't mean there aren't a whole bunch of games that are going to need some [marketing] support, and probably are still overpriced.”
It is not entirely clear why FIFA created this surprise sales window. One source suggested that the inventory could include tickets that had been offered to (and declined by) broadcasters and sponsors. Others assume it was tickets that FIFA wasn't able to sell in its main lottery phase, the “Random Selection Draw,” which wrapped up last month.
Either way, the 64-plus matches were ones that FIFA hadn't fully sold, despite Infantino's claim, and despite a purported 508 million ticket requests.
And they speak to the likely truth behind that big nine-digit number, which “doesn't tell the whole story,” McCarthy said.
The whole story is that there has, almost certainly, been unprecedented demand for certain World Cup games — the ones that weren't available in last week's sales window. When fans logged on Wednesday and Thursday, they saw neither the final nor either semifinal. No games involving Argentina, England or Mexico were listed. For Brazil, Colombia, Canada, the U.S., Scotland, Morocco and France, at least two of three group games were unavailable. This, surely, was not coincidental — these, plus the quarterfinals and round of 16, are the games that account for huge chunks of lottery entries and interest, even at FIFA's prices.
Then there are the rest: games involving teams like New Zealand or Austria or Saudi Arabia.
Advertisement
There was clear rhyme and reason to the availability. This was not just a random selection of tickets made available by credit card failures in the Random Selection Draw. Perhaps there were some of those, but this looked a lot more like leftovers. It was, primarily, Category 1 and 2 tickets — the most expensive categories — to matches involving non-top seeds. Some sold quickly, others didn't.
It was, therefore, probably a window into the contours of World Cup ticket demand — a window into which games were fully oversubscribed in the lottery and which weren't, and which could still be available during a “last-minute” sales phase in April.
And the single biggest takeaway was that the U.S. vs. Paraguay, the American opener at SoFi Stadium near Los Angeles, was beyond available.
It was available when the Los Angeles window opened at 3 p.m. ET on Wednesday, and still available hours later, and still available throughout Thursday, into Friday morning. On the main page of FIFA's portal, it didn't even get a “limited availability” tag — as other matches did, either immediately or as fans scooped up the inventory.
Why? Well, likely because FIFA priced Category 1 tickets to that game at $2,735 and Category 2 tickets at $1,940. At the start of sales back in October, it was the third-most expensive game of the entire tournament, sandwiched between the two semifinals.
As a result, many U.S. men's national team supporters — or at least those who've spoken to The Athletic — focused their efforts and their funds on getting to Seattle for the second group match, or to Los Angeles for the group finale, each of which costs less than a third of the opener's prices.
And over the five months since, the opener was one of relatively few games for which FIFA didn't raise prices — likely an implicit acknowledgement that tickets to that game haven't sold as well as expected.
Advertisement
Category 3 tickets to that game, priced at $1,120, have seemingly sold, but fans have evidently balked at the higher numbers.
Similar trends seem to exist for less-glamorous games at lower price points. In every sales phase, at every game, Category 3 (and virtually non-existent Category 4) seats have disappeared quickly. But hours after last week's access began, Uruguay vs. Cape Verde, Jordan vs. Algeria, Croatia vs. Ghana and even Tunisia vs. Netherlands still had plenty of Category 1 and 2 tickets available.
In some cases, availability did indeed seem “extremely limited.” France's match in Philadelphia, and Scotland-Haiti in Boston, for example, sold before some fans could get through digital queues. Several knockout games were initially offered but, in most cases, quickly gone. Ditto for the third-place match in Miami.
But for others, inventory was either plentiful or unappealing. (A full list of matches made available, most of which The Athletic has independently confirmed, was compiled by fans on Reddit.)
And to people who've followed the World Cup ticketing process, the overarching conclusion was reasonably clear.
“They have a lot of inventory they need to move,” Barry Kahn, a former ticketing executive who helped pioneer dynamic pricing in sports, told The Athletic.
“There's absolutely demand,” Scott Friedman, host of the “Ticket Talk” show, told The Athletic. “People obviously want to go. But [some games are] drastically mispriced.”
Hardly anyone doubts that a majority of 2026 World Cup games will ultimately sell out. That they seemingly haven't yet, with the tournament still three-plus months away, is not (necessarily) cause for alarm.
The question is how FIFA will get them over the line — will it lower prices? — and how far it still has to go. It's difficult to know how many tickets were made available last week and how many fans were given access. It's unclear what will be available in April. FIFA spokespeople, as has been the case throughout a remarkably opaque process, won't say.
Or, perhaps there will be another sale between now and April. Who knows?
Advertisement
FIFA, in early February, told ticket applicants in emails that “the next opportunity to secure tickets … will be during the Last-Minute Sales Phase,” which its website said would begin “in early April.” Then, without warning, some of those same fans got emails last week about the previously unadvertised sale.
FIFA, when asked why, said it offered the opportunity to lottery applicants who hadn't been chosen “in order to maximise fairness and acknowledge fans who have already demonstrated strong interest in the tournament.”
McCarthy offered a different line of analysis: “Creating a new window is a sign that they would like to get some completed orders into the system.”
Kahn was more blunt: “When you have an organization that's announced a plan, like FIFA did, and when you deviate from the plan, clearly something is wrong.”
Spot the pattern. Connect the terms
Find the hidden link between sports terms
Play today's puzzle
Henry Bushnell is a senior writer for The Athletic covering soccer. He previously covered a variety of sports and events, including World Cups and Olympics, for Yahoo Sports. He is based in Washington, D.C. Follow Henry on Twitter @HenryBushnell
With World Cup cohost US and Iran engaged in conflict, Team Melli's tournament participation is thrown into doubt.
Share
Save
United States and Israeli attacks on Iran have cast doubt over the Iranian football team's participation in the upcoming FIFA World Cup.
Iran has responded to the attacks, which began on Saturday, by striking Israeli and US military bases in the Middle East with missiles and drones.
As of Monday morning, at least 555 people had been killed across Iran and 10 in Israel. Three US soldiers had been killed in action while 38 people had been killed in other nations across the region.
The World Cup will be cohosted by Canada, Mexico and the US – where Iran is scheduled to play all its group games. But if there is no letup in the conflict, the tournament's logistics and Iran's role in it have come under question.
Here's what we know so far:
The World Cup will begin on June 11 in Mexico while Canada and the US will host their first match the following day. The final will be played on July 19 in East Rutherford, New Jersey, near New York.
Iran is in Group G of the tournament with Belgium, Egypt and New Zealand and is scheduled to play all of its games on the US West Coast.
Here's Team Melli's group-stage schedule:
While Iran has not officially pulled out of the tournament, a top Iranian football official has admitted the team's participation has been thrown into question.
“What is certain is that after this attack, we cannot be expected to look forward to the World Cup with hope,” Mehdi Taj, president of the Football Federation of the Islamic Republic of Iran (FFIRI), told local sports portal Varzesh3 on Sunday.
“It's not possible to say exactly, but there will certainly be a response,” Taj added when asked whether the FFIRI or the Iranian government would reconsider the country's participation in the tournament.
“This will surely be studied by the country's high-ranking sports officials, and there will be a decision on what's going to happen.”
FIFA Secretary-General Mattias Grafstrom has said the world football governing body is monitoring the conflict and the situation emerging from it.
“I read the news [about Iran] this morning the same way you did,” Grafstrom said at the International Football Association Board's annual general meeting in Wales on Saturday, according to a report by ESPN.
“We had a meeting today, and it is premature to comment in detail, but we will monitor developments around all issues around the world.”
With the tournament a little more than three months away, FIFA said it will “continue to communicate with the host governments”.
While Iran's games are scheduled at venues on the US West Coast, which is home to a sizeable Iranian community, Team Melli's fans hoping to travel to the tournament from Iran and support their team will find it difficult.
Iran was among the 12 countries that were included in US President Donald Trump's travel ban imposed in June.
The ban was met with criticism from Iran, which called it “racist” and a sign of deep-rooted hostility towards Iranians and Muslims.
There is no precedent for a team withdrawing from the FIFA World Cup, which is deemed the biggest sporting event in the world.
Teams that have been sanctioned and banned by global and regional football bodies have been excluded from the tournament with Russia's ban the most recent.
Should Iran pull out of the tournament, it would likely be replaced by another nation to ensure the smooth operation of the tournament.
Because Iran is part of the Asian Football Confederation and qualified for one of the region's berths for the World Cup, the replacement would likely come from Asia although organisers have not confirmed whether that would be the case.
Based on their position at the end of the qualifying process, the United Arab Emirates could be the nation next in line. However, if Iraq, who are aiming to qualify via an intercontinental playoff, fail to book a place, they could pip the UAE as Iran's replacement.
Iran are currently ranked 20th in the world and second in Asia.
They have appeared in the World Cup on seven occasions with consecutive appearances in the past three editions but have failed to move past the group stage.
Follow Al Jazeera English:
Get Recruited Faster with a Player Profile on SoccerWire.com
Boost Your Recruiting Presence
SÃO JOÃO DA MADEIRA, Portugal – The U.S. Under-19 Women's National Team showed why games are 90 minutes long, scoring twice in the last four minutes to defeat the Czechia U-19 WNT in the first of three friendly matches in Portugal.
The USA will next take on Wales on March 2 before finishing against host Portugal on March 6. These are the first international matches of 2026 for this group of players, 15 of whom were born in 2007 and five who were born in 2008.
The USA limited Czechia to just two total shots and one on goal but could not find the net until three minutes remained in regulation. Forward Rylee McLanahan, a rare USYNT player from Oklahoma who attends Duke University, collected the ball in a crowd of Czechia players trying to clear and unleashed a shot that snuck through the defense and rolled into net in the 87th minute.
The exclamation point came from a combination of two USL Super League players as Sporting Jax forward Ashlyn Puerta send a beautiful through ball the Dallas Trinity's Sealey Strawn, who skipped past the back line and fired a powerful shot past the goalkeeper in the 90th. Puerta has 11 goals scored in 15 matches to lead the league in scoring.
Players born on or after Jan. 1, 2006, are age-eligible for next year's 2026 FIFA Women's U-20 World Cup in Poland, meaning all 20 players in camp are training and playing for a shot at that tournament.
These matches are part of the Federation's continued focus on the U.S. Way philosophy, which emphasizes increased programming for Youth National Teams to create more opportunities for young players to advance through the pathway to the senior National Team with the goal of representing their country at a world championship.
Match: U.S. U-19 Women's National Team vs. Czechia U-19 Women's National Team
Date: February 27, 2026
Competition: International Friendly
Venue: Estadio Conde Dias Garcia Stadium; São João da Madeira, Portugal
Weather: Rainy, 52 degrees
Lineups:
USA: 12-Daphne Nakfoor; 13-Madeline Herniter, 3-Jocelyn Travers (2-Isabelle Devey, 46), 15-Edra Bello, 5-Pearl Cecil (4-Ella Bard, 63); 16-Riley Cross (6-Nyanya Touray, 69), 17-Sariyah Bailey (7-Micayla Johnson, 63), 18-Keira Kemmerley (8-Kennedy Ring, 63); 9-Lauren Malsom (19-Rylee McLanahan, 46), 20-Mya Townes (Capt.) (10-Ashlyn Puerta, 63), 14-Avery Oder (11-Sealey Strawn, 63)
Subs not used: 1-Evan O'Steen
Head Coach: Carrie Kveton
CZE: 16-Nikola Harantova: 3-Kiara Danickova, 4-Zuzana Vavrlova, 7-Stella Balazsova (2-Bianca Patik, 63), 10-Lucie Kroupova, 13-Tereza Vesela (6-Natalie Rupcova, 72), 15-Karolina Krupnikova, 17-Natalie Bohacova (9-Adela Trachtova, 63), 18-Denisa Rancova, 19-Nikola Sotova, 20-Natalie Navratilova (14-Ellen Eiseltova, 46)
Subs not used: 1-Gabriela Sobotkova, 5-Karolina Vytiskova, 8-Nicol Podlesna, 11- Viktorie Bechynova, 12-Nikola Lesakova
Head Coach: Daniel Smejkal
Stats Summary: USA / CZE
Shots: 7 / 2
Shots on Goal: 6 / 1
Saves: 1 / 3
Corner Kicks: 6 / 1
Fouls: 9 / 9
Offside: 4 / 0
Officials:
N/A
View and nominate Players to Watch for the event.
Twenty-four players have been called up.
The USA picked up a big team win vs. Denmark.
The U-18 WNT roster includes 20 players.
Top players born in 2012 have been selected.
The U.S. U-19 WNT roster includes 20 players.
Join the SoccerWire College Soccer Recruiting Search Engine and learn how to be seen OVER 1 MILLION TIMES PER YEAR.
Join the SoccerWire College Soccer Recruiting Search Engine and learn how to be seen OVER 1 MILLION TIMES PER YEAR.
This site uses cookies to give you the best possible experience but do not collect personal information. By continuing to use the site you agree that we can save cookies on your device. For more information, please read our privacy policy.
More from The Sun
A TOM Brady-led flag football event in Saudi Arabia is facing some huge logistical issues.
War has broken out in the Middle East after a US and Israeli military strike on Iran over the weekend.
Please provide a valid email.
Your info will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy
You'll now receive top stories, breaking news, and more, straight to your email.
Doubt has been cast over the Fanatics Football Classic at the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
A logistical nightmare now faces the event that is scheduled for less than three weeks' time.
Genuine security concerns have been raised after the biggest oil refinery in Saudi Arabia was hit by an Iranian drone strike.
The Ras Tanura refinery was hit after the death of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during a US-Israeli strike.
READ MORE ON THE NFL
TIME TO TALK
David Montgomery breaks social media silence to address Lions exit claim
Digg deep
New England Patriots tipped to cut Diggs after heartbreaking Super Bowl defeat
This marks the start of President Donald Trump's four-week plan to eliminate the current Iranian regime.
Several NFL players have agreed to participate in the Fanatics Football Classic.
Seven-time Super Bowl winner Brady, 48, is set to come out of retirement for the event.
Former teammate Rob Gronkowski, 36, is also due to participate in the three-team flag football tournament.
WWE star Kiana James suffers wardrobe malfunction as fans fume 'I'd be so upset'
Tua Tagovailoa finds out final decision over his Miami Dolphins future
$80m Patrick Mahomes protector CUT before NFL season as Chiefs save $20m
Vikings linked with FOUR quarterbacks after doubts over JJ McCarthy's future
But it's now a serious possibility that the event in the Middle East on Saturday, March 21 will not proceed.
There is also no guarantee that the event would be able to take place in Saudi Arabia on an alternative date.
Current NFL players have limited time during the offseason, which means a rescheduling would be difficult.
Relocation appears more likely, but this also faces its own logistical issues.
Former quarterback Brady has also teased that he could play at the Olympics if his flag football appearance in Saudi Arabia goes well.
NBC Sports ace Sara Cardona turns heads with new look as fans call her 'perfect'
Browns officially announce trade with Texans affecting QB Shedeur Sanders
Cowboys make major contract decisions on Dak Prescott and CeeDee Lamb
Vikings make decision over two key players to slash $19m from salary cap
© NEWS ENTERPRISES, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED |
TERMS OF USE |
PRIVACY |
YOUR AD CHOICES |
SITEMAP
Thomas Tuchel has been given three reasons why Jude Bellingham, who is nursing an injury at Real Madrid, has to make England's 2026 World Cup squad. The all-action midfielder may be forced to sit out international action during the March round of friendlies, but Lee Sharpe has told GOAL that the talented 22-year-old is one of those that should be picked on reputation alone.
Bellingham famously bellowed ‘Who else?' when netting a stunning overhead kick against Slovakia at the 2024 European Championship that kept England in the hunt for continental glory. He ultimately suffered final heartache at the hands of Spain.
Another quest for immortality will be taken in this summer when the Three Lions head to North America and compete for the most prestigious of major honours. The general consensus is that Real Madrid ‘Galactico' Bellingham has to form part of those plans.
He is, however, nursing a hamstring problem at present - with said ailment set to keep him sidelined for several weeks - and England boss Tuchel has said: “The club [Real Madrid] is a bit more defensive on the outlook regarding the weeks of his recovery. Jude is pushing, and as we know him, he is determined and super professional.
“He will try everything to be with us in March. Of course we are in contact, that is a normal thing to do, and we wish him all the best... Whatever we can do for him, we will help and support him. It is a little race against time.”
Bellingham has nothing to prove, as a talismanic presence for club and country, and could have been overlooked for Wembley-based friendly dates with Uruguay and Japan regardless - as Tuchel gives others an opportunity to prove their worth.
Ex-Three Lions star Sharpe believes Bellingham will be on the plane, with it impossible to overlook his pedigree and passion. Speaking in association with BetBrain, Sharpe told GOAL: “I wouldn't have March friendlies as a cut-off point for him. If he gets fully fit and gets back in the Madrid team and starts playing, then I think you have to take him.
“The talent of the bloke, he can play in numerous positions. He's experienced in big games, the Champions League with Real Madrid stands him in good stead for the World Cup. If he's fit and playing regularly for Madrid, you have to take him.”
That is an opinion shared by former England striker Michael Owen. The one-time Real Madrid frontman told GOAL recently when asked if Bellingham fits into the “untouchable” category and will be selected this summer even if he plays no part in pre-tournament friendlies: “Obviously if he comes back and everything is fine - between now and the end of the season - then, yes, he would go in the category for me as being untouchable. He is one if fit, in my eyes, that would go.
“You don't get players like him growing on trees. He's playing for Real Madrid every week, one of their star players, one of our absolute gems, the jewels in our crown. It's not ideal, he's not the first person to get an injury leading up to a tournament, but if everything is fine and he recovers well, then of course he is in the squad.”
Owen added on an untimely knock being suffered by one of English football's leading lights: “I would find a place for Jude Bellingham if he's fit. He's one of the world's best players, not only England's best players. A lot depends on whether Tuchel pushes one of those 10s out in a wider position to fit them in.
“Is there an obvious player on the left that is going to start? There are a few candidates. If two of these No.10s are playing exceptionally well, then could he push someone over onto that left side?
“If everybody is absolutely fit and flying, and playing at their best, then to me Jude Bellingham is the best player for that position in the country. But, there are a few ifs and buts before then.”
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
Bellingham will hope to have more La Liga and Champions League football under his belt before the end of the season - despite being likely to sit out Real's last-16 showdown with Manchester City in elite European competition. England also have games against New Zealand and Costa Rica in Florida to come, allowing an international recall to be enjoyed before opening an eagerly-anticipated World Cup campaign against Croatia on June 17.
Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.
Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in
Swipe for next article
A controversial build-up took a drastic turn with a World Cup host bombing one of the qualified teams, writes Miguel Delaney, with Iran's very participation in question
Removed from bookmarks
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Even amid grave geopolitical developments, modern football offered a sense of the absurd. As drones and missiles continued to be launched around the Gulf, and headlines began to relay the reported death of Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Khamenei, Fifa's hierarchy were desperate for details given the potential ramifications for the 2026 World Cup.
There was an issue, though. They had to sit through the formalities at Hensol Castle after the 140th Annual General Meeting of the International Football Association Board.
There were most of the Fifa leadership, stern faces glued to their phones, as a Welsh opera singer continued his performance. It must have been quite the soundtrack to scrolling for news about the unprecedented crisis of a World Cup host bombing one of the qualified teams, and that with just four months to go. Iran's very participation is now subject to question.
Fifa, meanwhile, had to just sit there.
A symbolism could be drawn in how it showed a hierarchy stuck, unable to move even on one of the most serious challenges they have ever faced.
Those latter words have actually been said a lot over the past year, pretty much all in relation to the 2026 World Cup.
There's maybe a similar symbolism in how Fifa expanded the tournament to 48 teams, as president Gianni Infantino actively decided to play an involved statesman, precisely at the moment that the world fractures to a more severe degree than at any moment in decades. The global governing body have willingly opened themselves up to problem after problem after problem.
That's pretty much how to describe the entire build-up to the 2026 World Cup, much as Infantino beams about ticket sales.
So much of it has been utterly unprecedented. Just list the main issues so far.
Qualification had barely begun when Donald Trump was threatening a trade war against co-hosts Mexico and Canada. That very campaign then brought increasing pressure to ban Israel, mostly due to Gaza, but specifically on the issue of contravening Fifa's own statutes about clubs playing games on occupied land.
In between, there was the relatively trivial but still important sporting integrity controversy over the decision to suspend two games of Cristiano Ronaldo's ban so he can play in the World Cup, all before everything significantly escalated this year.
January forced European countries to discuss a potential boycott plan over Donald Trump's position on Greenland, and that after the US had been responsible for the military operation in Venezuela and just the third ever act of aggression by a host after being awarded the World Cup. This is now the fourth.
February brought narco-violence in a host city, in Guadalajara, just four months before the tournament.
And now March may have to bring a decision on what they're going to have to do about one of the 48 teams being bombed by the hosts, with the de facto head of state being killed.
The last week alone, from Mexico to Iran, has offered challenges never before seen by any World Cup.
While there might usually be sympathy for sporting bodies in such situations - given that they are constantly subject to geopolitics - the specific issue with Fifa is the problems they have made for themselves in navigating such complexities.
For one, the prospect of this military campaign had been known for weeks. You might even say there's yet another layer in how Infantino makes himself out as so close to Trump.
As with all of these previous issues, though, Infantino's Fifa does not offer the necessary forum for rigorous debate on any of it.
Fifa figures would say that forum is the Council, but then numerous sources insist the Council has been completely sidelined. One senior member even told the Independent that, as of Sunday afternoon, the Council had been given no indication on what next. This may have to go to the Fifa bureau of the council: the president and the six federation heads.
Of course, any eventual Fifa decision is entirely subject to events in a situation as grave as this, but that only makes the creation of various contingency plans all the more important.
As one senior source said, though, “there are no fixed rules” for replacing a team at a World Cup.
The only official comment so far has been from Fifa general secretary Mattias Grafstrom, who said in Wales they “will monitor” the situation in comments that were as open-ended as possible.
“I read the news the same way you did this morning. We had a meeting today and it would be premature to comment on that in detail,” he said. “But of course we will monitor the developments around all issues around the world.”
Requests to Fifa for any details on what next were merely met with a gesture to Grafstrom's comment. It was similar with Mexico last week.
“It's far too early to say on any of this,” one other source added. But that doesn't mean it isn't too early to start thinking, especially about something that is going to require clear thinking and a roadmap.
There weren't even elaborations on what the process might be if a team needed to be replaced - now a live possibility. Reports coming out of Iran suggested the state may end up withdrawing the national team from the World Cup themselves.
There's even the question of whether the squad would be allowed in, amid the high potential for escalation.
Andrew Giuliani, the head of the White House World Cup taskforce, posted on Saturday “we'll deal with soccer games tomorrow - tonight, we celebrate their opportunity for freedom”.
Again, the World Cup has never had to deal with this before.
It could be said that Fifa's refusal to speak on any of this points to necessary discretion amid a diplomatically difficult story - especially one ultimately involving Trump - but the question persists about whether they have the wherewithal to navigate this.
This World Cup has felt like it's skirting very close to something going wrong for quite some time, and that's with more money than ever - as well as Infantino's very authority - on the line. Again, the Fifa Peace Prize just becomes a bad punchline.
The feeling from many is that Fifa will just take the approach it has customarily done on these controversies, and see what evolves.
If Iran do end up withdrawing, the United Arab Emirates - themselves facing drone attacks from Iran - would seem an obvious choice of replacement given they were the next team down in the qualification group.
Another element in this story is that football is genuinely a huge unifying force in Iran, and the Iranian/Persian diaspora vote may even prove influential there.
There may also be regime change, but these are considerable stakes.
The World Cup, along with the world, faces hugely uncertain times.
Fifa cannot be faulted for that, even allowing for Infantino's geopolitical pretensions. They can be faulted, however, for they respond.
Right now, there's just a vacuum. There aren't even details on what happens if a team withdraws. That's the level of the crisis. That, so far, is the level of the response.
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in
Alan Shearer has thrown his weight behind Arsenal's title charge, insisting that Mikel Arteta's side have what it takes to fend off Manchester City and claim the Premier League crown. The Gunners maintained their five-point cushion at the summit with a gritty 2-1 victory over Chelsea at the Emirates Stadium, though the nature of the win sparked fresh debate over their reliance on dead-ball situations. Despite the external noise, the Premier League's all-time record goalscorer believes the north Londoners can get over the line.
The victory was a testament to Arsenal's set-piece quality, with William Saliba and Jurrien Timber both heading home from corners. These strikes took the Gunners to a staggering 16 goals from corners this season, the joint-most by any side in a single Premier League campaign.
This statistic has drawn criticism from those suggesting Arteta's men lack attacking fluidity. However, Shearer was quick to dismiss such concerns. Speaking on The Rest Is Football podcast, via Metro, he said: "Yeah, I would perhaps go along with that [the suggestion Arsenal need to be better from an attacking perspective]. But I'd much prefer, obviously, to still be in their position. If they win every game then they win it. As do City, I guess, but I'm not too concerned with that. I just think the bigger picture is that they find a way. They found a way against Chelsea, they weren't brilliant, but their set-pieces have done it for them again and there's nothing wrong with that."
As the pressure intensifies at the top of the table, Shearer acknowledged that the players are feeling the strain of a relentless title race. The win over Chelsea was far from a masterclass, but the Newcastle legend believes mental toughness is now more important than performances. "They're going to be nervy, they're going to be edgy because of the pressure that they're under," Shearer said. "They're human, I've been there myself, and it's a huge ask, it is tough mentally and physically. It drains you."
Comparing the current era to his own title-winning campaign with Blackburn Rovers, Shearer suggested that modern stars face an even greater psychological burden due to the digital age. He added: "I don't care who or what you are, and it's worse now than it was in the 1990s when we won it for the first time at Blackburn, because of the noise around social media and what have you. We didn't really have that and it was still very tough then. I get that they're not going to be perfect but they're in a really strong position and I still think that they will go ahead and do it."
Arteta was under no illusions about the difficulty of the task his side faced against the Club World Cup holders. Despite a dominant start, the Spaniard admitted his team had to suffer to earn the victory, especially after Chelsea were reduced to 10 men following Pedro Neto's dismissal. "A proper London derby," Arteta told reporters. "We expected that because of the quality of the opposition, because of the individual quality that they have, and because we played them four times already, so we know how good and difficult they are to play against. After we started the game so well, the first half was very, very dominant. I think the margin and the scoreline should have been bigger. But we were 1-1 [at half-time], so game on."
The Gunners boss even revealed that he looked to the previous week's victory over Tottenham for inspiration during his half-time team talk. Arteta added: "I reminded them that we were in exactly the same position against Spurs seven days ago in that dressing room. They said, 'Look what happened in the second half, so we're going to do it again, but probably we're going to have to go through some difficult patches to end the right to win the game.' We certainly did that. We took the moment to score the second goal and after the red card, we all expected a very different outcome in the last few minutes. But we didn't manage to control and dominate that scenario as well as we wanted. On top of that, Chelsea did some very, very good things in that period and we needed David [Raya] to win us the game."
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
Arsenal's dominance from corners is becoming historic, with the club now equalling the Premier League record for the most corner goals in a single campaign. Their efficiency has helped them break down sides who employ low blocks against them, and with nine games remaining the Gunners are on the verge of setting a new all-time benchmark for dead-ball productivity, a weapon that could prove the difference in the title race with City.
Arsenal have little time to dwell on their latest derby success as they prepare for a midweek trip to Brighton, a fixture that promises to be another stern test. Pep Guardiola's side remain hot on their heels, having seen off Leeds on Saturday to stay within striking distance. As the "noise" Shearer mentioned continues to grow, Arteta's squad know that results will always trump style at this stage of the season.
Liverpool manager Arne Slot has confirmed that the club's marquee summer signing Florian Wirtz is set for a further spell on the sidelines. The Germany international, who has become a pivotal figure at Anfield since his high-profile arrival from Bayer Leverkusen, is battling a back injury that has already seen him miss key victories over Nottingham Forest and West Ham. With the Reds preparing for a double-header against Wolves at Molineux, Slot suggested the playmaker remains a major doubt for both the Premier League and FA Cup fixtures.
The 22-year-old had been in blistering form prior to his setback, recording four goals and two assists during an impressive run in January. However, a back problem suffered during the pre-match warm-up against Nottingham Forest has halted his momentum. Speaking to reporters on Monday, Slot remained cautious about a potential return date, admitting that the immediate schedule likely comes too soon for the midfielder to be risked.
"Not anything different to what I said after the game," Slot said when asked about Wirtz in a pre-match press conference on Monday morning. "The game probably comes too soon tomorrow and maybe the game at the weekend. We hope to have him back next week." The manager had previously elaborated on the difficulty of the situation, stating before the West Ham game: "At this moment in time, I don't know. Usually when I say that, I do know and I don't want to share that. But this time, I honestly don't know."
The Liverpool boss was quick to praise Wirtz for his durability up until this point, noting the physical demands of transitioning to English football. Slot commented: "It's a big accomplishment for Wirtz to stay fit for such a long time because he had to make a step up from where he played to the Premier League and Liverpool. It tells a lot about his mentality and work rate that he has stayed fit for so long. It is a disappointment for him and for us, because he has played really, really well lately."
While Wirtz remains out, there was better news regarding fellow summer recruit Jeremie Frimpong, who made his return to action against West Ham as a substitute. Slot expressed his relief at having more options in the full-back positions, though he warned that his minutes must be carefully monitored following a month-long layoff. "Right-back isn't the only position where we have struggled but it stands out most," the Dutchman explained.
Slot added: "Having Jeremie back is nice. We have to take into account a lot of games, especially players who come back from injuries. But we know the importance of every game now. But I'm not the only one to have that. I prefer to manage how many minutes he can be given rather than see him with the medical team."
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
Liverpool face the unusual task of playing Wolves twice in four days at the same venue, first in the league on Tuesday and then in the fifth round of FA Cup on Friday. Slot dismissed the idea that the repetitive schedule was a disadvantage, instead focusing on the tactical edge it provides his staff. When asked about the quirk of the schedule, Slot said: "Usually the only people it's helpful for are the analysts and me. Allows us to analyse them."
Despite the absence of their £116m playmaker, Liverpool will be expected to dispatch a Wolves side currently sitting at the bottom of the table. Wirtz has recorded six goals and eight assists in 35 appearances this term, and the club's medical staff are hopeful he can return for the Champions League trip to Galatasaray next week. For now, Slot will have to rely on the depth of his squad to maintain their pursuit of silverware across multiple fronts as the season reaches its business end.
Arsenal legend Ian Wright has admitted he is feeling "nervous" about the Gunners' title credentials following a "jittery" performance in their hard-fought 2-1 victory over Chelsea. Despite moving five points clear at the Premier League summit, the iconic former striker was left concerned by how Mikel Arteta's side struggled to finish off a 10-man Blues team at the Emirates Stadium. Wright believes the north Londoners are developing a worrying habit of fading in the second half, a trend that could prove fatal as they enter the business end of the season.
The Gunners struck first when William Saliba nodded home from a corner, but the teams went into the half-time break tied due to an unfortunate own goal by Piero Hincapie. Jurrien Timber ultimately clinched the win with a 66th-minute header, though it was far from a comfortable finish for the hosts. Arsenal had to weather a chaotic final stretch, surviving a Liam Delap equaliser that was correctly ruled out for offside. Wright pointed out that the away side continued to heavily test David Raya down the stretch, even after being reduced to 10 men following Pedro Neto's dismissal for a second yellow card.
Speaking on Premier League Productions, Arsenal legend Wright did not hold back in his assessment of the closing stages of the match. He said: "Chelsea, once they went down to 10 men, they started to play. It was worrying. Arsenal showing those nerves, those jittery nerves at the latter stages of games, they need to take the opportunities earlier on so they can relax at this stage. They have to just win now, especially the home games. It's not going to be something that instills you with loads of confidence but it's a win."
The former England forward is particularly concerned about the next fixture against Brighton, fearing that the same issues will resurface. He expressed his growing anxiety, stating: "We're seeing in the second half of games, you can get at Arsenal. Chelsea had 10 men there, it would be nice to find out what's happening to Arsenal in the second half. It comes down to 'you get the job done' and I'm happy the job is done, but I'm going to be nervous for the next game because I'm seeing that again in the second half."
Adding to Wright's frustration was a controversial VAR decision that went Arsenal's way when the ball appeared to hit Declan Rice's arm in the box. Wright confessed he was shocked that a penalty was not awarded to the Blues, noting that Rice appeared to be holding Joao Pedro at the time. "Decs is actually holding him. His arm's up there and now it moves up. When I saw that I thought they're going to give a pen. But then you don't know what they're going to do up there. You look at the pen that Man United got today, I'm thinking that's definitely a penalty."
The Premier League Match Centre clarified the incident via a social media statement, defending the referee's decision to play on. They explained: "The referee's call of no penalty was checked and confirmed by VAR – with it deemed there was no punishable handball offence with Rice challenging an opponent as the ball hit his arm." Regardless of the explanation, it was another moment that left the Emirates crowd - and Wright - feeling incredibly uneasy about the lack of control being exerted by the league leaders.
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
Mikel Arteta attempted to use the memory of his side's dominant 4-1 triumph in the north London derby against Tottenham to motivate his players at half-time, though the second-half performance did not quite live up to that standard. The Spaniard revealed his dressing-room message after the final whistle, saying: "We started the game so well, the first half was very, very dominant. I think the margin, the scoreline, should have been bigger. But we were 1-1 [at half-time]. Game on. I reminded them that we were in the exact same position against Spurs seven days ago in that dressing room. I said, ‘Look what happened in the second half - so we're going to do it again'. But probably we're going to have to go through some difficult patches to earn the right to win the game. We certainly did that."
In the final moments, Arsenal relied on Raya to bail them out, with the goalkeeper making a sensational save to stop an Alejandro Garnacho cross from creeping into the far corner. Arteta admitted that the goalkeeper's intervention was a lifesaver for his own stress levels. He said: "He (Raya) is a keeper that knows how to maintain his focus and decide a football match when you need it because sometimes he doesn't participate at all, and then in one action, you have to be there, and that's very, very difficult to do. The save that he made in the last action... it's a cross, not a shot, but he ended up with an unbelievable save. I got the right angle and my heart almost stopped, but David's hand was there to bring it back to life."
FIFA president Gianni Infantino has claimed that players who cover their mouths during verbal altercations that are racist in nature should be shown a straight red card. The proposal comes after Benfica winger Gianluca Prestianni allegedly subjected Real Madrid superstar Vinicius Junior to racial abuse. Infantino believes there should be a "presumption" of guilt, arguing that the act of hiding one's lips should be considered sufficient evidence of offensive intent.
The catalyst for this potential rule change was an ugly incident during the first leg of the Champions League knockout play-off between Real Madrid and Benfica. Gianluca Prestianni allegedly directed a racial slur towards Vinicius Junior, but the exact language used remains a subject of intense debate because the Argentinian covered his mouth with his shirt. Shortly after the match, the Brazilian star issued a statement calling his abusers "cowards" for hiding behind their jerseys.
Speaking to Sky News,the FIFA chief made his position clear on the matter: "If a player covers his mouth and says something, and this has a racist consequence, then he has to be sent off, obviously. There must be a presumption that he has said something he shouldn't have said, otherwise he wouldn't have had to cover his mouth. There are situations which we did not foresee. Of course, when you deal with a disciplinary case, you have to analyse the situation, you have to have evidence, but we cannot just be satisfied with that going forward."
Infantino further justified his hardline stance by questioning the motives of anyone who obscures their speech on the pitch. "I simply do not understand if you don't have something to hide, you don´t hide your mouth when you say something. That's it, as simple as that. And these are actions that we can take and we have to take in order to be serious about our fight against racism. We need to act and to be decisive and it has to have a deterrent effect. Maybe we should also think about not just punishing, but also somehow allowing, changing our culture, allowing players or whoever does something to apologise," he added, suggesting a path for redemption through remorse.
The International Football Association Board (IFAB) has confirmed it is listening to the president's concerns. Following their Annual General Meeting, the lawmakers announced a formal consultation on measures to tackle discrimination, specifically focusing on the mouth-covering habit that has become common among modern footballers. Any changes to the laws of the game would likely be ratified and implemented in time for the 2026 World Cup, marking a significant shift in how on-field dialogue is monitored by officials.
Infantino remains adamant that football must lead the way in social change rather than using societal problems as an excuse for inaction. He added: "You can do things that you don't want to do in a moment of anger [and] apologise and then the sanction has to be different, to move one step further and maybe we should think about something like that as well. We have to stop racism. We cannot just be satisfied by saying 'well, it's a problem in society, so we cannot do anything about it except what we are already doing.'"
Add GOAL.com as a preferred source on Google to see more of our reporting
The allegations drew commentary from Benfica boss Jose Mourinho, who initially faced backlash for suggesting Vinicius had incited the crowd with his goal celebrations. During a recent press conference, Mourinho clarified his position, promising severe consequences toward Prestianni if the allegations are proven, while emphasising the importance of due process.
"I am not a lawyer, but I am not ignorant either. Is the presumption of innocence a human right or not?" Mourinho stated. "If the player is indeed guilty, I will never look at him the way I looked at him before, and with me, it's over. But I have to put many 'ifs' in front of it."
Get unrivaled matchday access
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (March 1, 2026) – The U.S. Women's National Team began the 2026 SheBelieves Cup, presented by Visa, with a 2-0 win against a physical Argentina team as USWNT captain Lindsey Heaps scored the opener in the first half, marking her 12th consecutive calendar year with at least one goal for the National Team, while Jaedyn Shaw scored her 10th international goal in just her 32nd appearance.
The USWNT finished the first day of the tournament in second place behind Canada, which sits at the top of the table off goal differential after defeating Colombia, 4-1. Argentina is in third place, and Colombia is in fourth.
Sunday's match was the first of the year for Heaps who leads the roster in caps (171) and goals (39). She put the Americans on the board in the 19th minute after forward Emma Sears won possession following a USA throw-in and cut inside box before playing a pass into the middle which bounced out to Heaps. With space to control the ball just inside the penalty arc, she took a touch and curled a left-footed shot past the outstretched arms of Argentina goalkeeper Solana Pereyra.
The U.S. extended its lead in the second half off another long-range beauty, this one from Shaw. A cleared corner kick came back to midfielder Olivia Moultrie, who passed to Heaps inside the box. Heaps backheeled the ball to Shaw, who sent a curling shot through the hands of Pereyra and into the right side of the goal in the 56th minute. The finish marked double-digit goals for Shaw and Heaps' seventh match with at least one goal and one assist.
There could have been more goals for the USA as it put the ball in the net twice only to see the flag raised offside. Minutes after Heaps' opener, forward Jameese Joseph slipped behind Argentina's backline off a pass from Shaw and scored off the rebound of her initial shot, but the goal was called back. Second-half substitute Ally Sentnor made a run around the goalkeeper and slotted a shot into the goal in the 66th minute, but it was also reversed.
Joseph, who made her second start in her third cap, is competing in her first SheBelieves Cup, alongside Maddie Dahlien, Claudia Dickey, Kennedy Wesley, Avery Patterson, Phallon Tullis-Joyce, Riley Jackson and Lilly Reale, who came on at halftime but had a short night as she had to be replaced in the 62nd after getting stomped on. Dickey earned her seventh clean sheet in her eighth appearance.
Up next, the U.S. will take on Canada for their second match of the 2026 SheBelieves Cup on Wednesday, March 4 at ScottsMiracle-Gro Field in Columbus, Ohio and will close the tournament against Colombia on Saturday, March 7 at Sports Illustrated Stadium in Harrison, N.J.
USA – LINDSEY HEAPS (EMMA SEARS), 19th minute: The U.S. earned a throw-in deep in Argentina's defensive third, and Jameese Joseph maintained possession under pressure. She played a pass to Sears, who made a run inside the penalty area before passing to Heaps just outside the top of the box. She settled the pass before launching a left-footed shot into the back of the net. USA 1, ARG 0
USA – JAEDYN SHAW (LINDSEY HEAPS), 56th minute: Midfielder Olivia Moultrie took a corner kick and received the ball back after a headed clearance. Moultrie split two defenders with a pass inside the box to Heaps. The captain flicked the ball back to Shaw, who took a touch away from her defender before sending her shot into the right-side netting. USA 2, ARG 0
Additional Notes:
Match: United States Women's National Team vs. ArgentinaDate: March 1, 2026Competition: SheBelieves CupVenue: GEODIS Park, Nashville, Tenn.Attendance: 17,125Kickoff: 4:07 p.m. CTWeather: 64 degrees and clear skies
Lineups:USA: 1-Claudia Dickey; 20-Gisele Thompson, 5-Tara Rudd, 11-Kennedy Wesley, 25-Maddie Dahlien (12-Lilly Reale, 46, 23-Emily Fox, 62); 10-Lindsey Heaps (Capt.), 7-Lily Yohannes (2-Trinity Rodman, 62), 8-Jaedyn Shaw (9-Ally Sentnor,62), 13-Olivia Moultrie; 19-Emma Sears (21-Alyssa Thompson, 76), 26-Jameese Joseph (15-Claire Hutto, 46)
Subs not used: 4-Naomi Girma, 14-Emily Sonnett, 16-Rose Lavelle, 17-Sam Coffey, 22-Riley Jackson, 24-Phallon Tullis-Joyce
Not dressing: Mandy McGlynn, Avery Patterson, Emily Sams
Head coach: Emma Hayes
ARG: 1-Solana Pereyra; 4-Justina Morcillo (7-Margarita Gimenez, 77), 16-Evelyn Dominguez (2-Adriana Sachs, 66), 13-Sophia Braun, 6-Aldana Cometti, 3-Eliana Stabile (14-Milagros Martin, 66); 10-Maricel Pereyra, 8-Daiana Falfan (17-Agostina Vargas, 85), 5-Vanina Preininger (18-Catalina Ongaro, 85), 15-Maria Bonsegundo; 19-Agostina Holzheier (9-Martina del Trecco, 77)
Subs not used: 12-Lara Esponda, 11-Carolina Troncoso, 20-Chiara Singarella, 21-Abril de los Milagros Reche
Head coach: German Portanova
Stats Summary: USA / ARGShots: 6 / 5Shots on Goal: 3 / 1Saves: 1 / 1Corner Kicks: 3 / 1Fouls: 12 / 21Offside: 4 / 2
Officials:
Referee: Timothy Derry (TRI)
AR1: Gabrielle Lemieux (CAN)
AR2: Melissa Snedden (CAN)
4th Official: Jacklyn Metz (USA)
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
The first ATP Masters 1000 event of the season commences on Wednesday at the BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells, where Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner and Novak Djokovic lead the field.
Alcaraz is a two-time champion at the hard-court event, while Sinner is yet to taste success in the California desert. Djokovic will be seeking a record sixth crown and first since 2016. Top 10 stars Taylor Fritz and Ben Shelton lead American hopes.
ATPTour.com looks at 10 things to watch during the 2026 BNP Paribas Open.
1) Can Alcaraz maintain his perfect start to the season? Alcaraz arrives in Indian Wells holding a perfect 12-0 record on the season, according to the Infosys ATP Win/Loss Index. The 22-year-old Spaniard completed the Career Grand Slam at the Australian Open and then won his 13th ATP 500 title in Doha. The No. 1 player in the PIF ATP Rankings is a two-time champion in Indian Wells.
2) Can Sinner complete the set? Sinner has won all five of the other ATP Masters 1000 hard-court events but is yet to triumph in the Californian desert. The Italian, chasing his first trophy of 2026, reached the semi-finals in Indian Wells in 2023 and 2024.
3) Djokovic seeks record sixth crown: If Djokovic can triumph at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden for the first time since 2016, he will move clear of Roger Federer as a record six-time champion. The 38-year-old Serbian is competing for the first time since he reached the Australian Open final last month.
4) Fritz spearheads home charge: Fritz knows how to get over the line in Indian Wells. The Californian, who frequently visited the BNP Paribas Open during his childhood, overcame Rafael Nadal to win the biggest title of his career at the 2022 tournament. The 28-year-old's best result this season was a final run at the ATP 500 event in Dallas.
5) American charge: Ben Shelton, Frances Tiafoe, Tommy Paul, Learner Tien and Brandon Nakashima will all be seeded on home soil in Indian Wells. World No. 8 Shelton won the title in Dallas and is seeking his second Masters 1000 trophy after winning Toronto last season. Tiafoe (2023) and Paul (2024) are former semi-finalists in Indian Wells, while Tien is searching for his first win at the event. Nakashima reached the fourth round last year.
6) Defending champion Draper: Jack Draper returned to the ATP Tour in Dubai last week after being sidelined for six months due to a left arm injury. The British lefty won the biggest trophy of his career last year in Indian Wells, where he defeated Holger Rune in the championship match. Cameron Norrie is also in the draw. The 30-year-old won Indian Wells in 2021.
7) Zverev seeks winning formula: World No. 4 Alexander Zverev is a seven-time Masters 1000 champion but has never advanced beyond the quarter-finals in Indian Wells. The 28-year-old German will hope to change that record this fortnight.
8) Top 10 threats: Lorenzo Musetti, Alex de Minaur, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Alexander Bublik are all chasing their first Masters 1000 titles in Indian Wells. De Minaur, Auger-Aliassime and Bublik have all lifted tour-level trophies this year, triumphing in Rotterdam, Montpellier and Hong Kong, respectively.
9) Next Gen stars Fonseca & Jodar in action: Joao Fonseca will hope to kick-start his year in Indian Wells, where he is making his second appearance. The 19-year-old Brazilian, who is 1-3 on the season, is joined in the draw by 19-year-old Spaniard Rafael Jodar. Jodar has earned three tour-level wins in 2026 and will make his debut at the hard-court event after receiving a wild card.
10) Medvedev/Tien headline fun doubles draw: Tien leads Medvedev 3-1 in their Lexus ATP Head2Head series but they will join forces in the doubles draw in Indian Wells. Other teams include Karen Khachanov and Andrey Rublev, Felix Auger-Aliassime and Sebastian Korda, and Alex de Minaur and John Peers. Marcelo Arevalo and Mate Pavic are the defending champions.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
The American, who lost in the first round of her adopted home tournament in each of the last two years, completed a goal she's wanted since 2023.ByTENNIS.comPublished Mar 01, 2026 copy_link
Published Mar 01, 2026
© 2026 Robert Prange
Two years after lifting her first WTA singles title on the clay courts of Rabat, Morocco, Peyton Stearns has won her second much closer to home.The former University of Texas standout, who lost in the first round of the ATX Open, her adopted home tournament in Austin, each of the last two years, completed a goal she's wanted since the WTA 250 hit the calendar in 2023. That year, she won her first WTA main-draw match in Austin, and made the quarterfinals as a wild card less than a year after she lifted the NCAA Division I national singles trophy.After coming from a set down to beat Brit Francesca Jones at the first hurdle, and snapping her three-match skid at the event, Stearns admitted that she thought "it would be nice for a Longhorn to win this tournament, finally."So hopefully I'm the first," she said.The line in the sand proved prescient. Stearns won three of her five matches over the week in three sets, and saved a trio of set points in the opener of a 7-6(8), 7-5 title-match victory against Taylor Townsend, who was contesting her first tour-level singles final at the age of 29.
The former University of Texas standout, who lost in the first round of the ATX Open, her adopted home tournament in Austin, each of the last two years, completed a goal she's wanted since the WTA 250 hit the calendar in 2023. That year, she won her first WTA main-draw match in Austin, and made the quarterfinals as a wild card less than a year after she lifted the NCAA Division I national singles trophy.After coming from a set down to beat Brit Francesca Jones at the first hurdle, and snapping her three-match skid at the event, Stearns admitted that she thought "it would be nice for a Longhorn to win this tournament, finally."So hopefully I'm the first," she said.The line in the sand proved prescient. Stearns won three of her five matches over the week in three sets, and saved a trio of set points in the opener of a 7-6(8), 7-5 title-match victory against Taylor Townsend, who was contesting her first tour-level singles final at the age of 29.
After coming from a set down to beat Brit Francesca Jones at the first hurdle, and snapping her three-match skid at the event, Stearns admitted that she thought "it would be nice for a Longhorn to win this tournament, finally."So hopefully I'm the first," she said.The line in the sand proved prescient. Stearns won three of her five matches over the week in three sets, and saved a trio of set points in the opener of a 7-6(8), 7-5 title-match victory against Taylor Townsend, who was contesting her first tour-level singles final at the age of 29.
"So hopefully I'm the first," she said.The line in the sand proved prescient. Stearns won three of her five matches over the week in three sets, and saved a trio of set points in the opener of a 7-6(8), 7-5 title-match victory against Taylor Townsend, who was contesting her first tour-level singles final at the age of 29.
The line in the sand proved prescient. Stearns won three of her five matches over the week in three sets, and saved a trio of set points in the opener of a 7-6(8), 7-5 title-match victory against Taylor Townsend, who was contesting her first tour-level singles final at the age of 29.
The two-time doubles Grand Slam champion also found herself a crowd favorite throughout the week, beginning in the first round where she saved match point against Linda Fruhvirtova and racking up the wins despite having never before been past the quarterfinals of a tour event.But after erasing a 4-0 first-set deficit in the semifinals against Ashlyn Krueger, she couldn't see an early lead through against Stearns. Townsend had two set points on return at 5-3, and after Stearns rallied to force a tiebreaker, the left-hander left her third chance on the table at 8-7 after erasing Stearns' 6-3 lead.The match marked the second straight all-American title match in Austin, as Jessica Pegula beat McCartney Kessler to win the 2025 crown, and both home hopes will get a significant ranking boost prior to the Sunshine Double.Stearns, who came into the event ranked No. 62 after peaking at No. 28 last May, will be back in the Top 50 on Monday, while Townsend will return to the singles Top 100.
But after erasing a 4-0 first-set deficit in the semifinals against Ashlyn Krueger, she couldn't see an early lead through against Stearns. Townsend had two set points on return at 5-3, and after Stearns rallied to force a tiebreaker, the left-hander left her third chance on the table at 8-7 after erasing Stearns' 6-3 lead.The match marked the second straight all-American title match in Austin, as Jessica Pegula beat McCartney Kessler to win the 2025 crown, and both home hopes will get a significant ranking boost prior to the Sunshine Double.Stearns, who came into the event ranked No. 62 after peaking at No. 28 last May, will be back in the Top 50 on Monday, while Townsend will return to the singles Top 100.
The match marked the second straight all-American title match in Austin, as Jessica Pegula beat McCartney Kessler to win the 2025 crown, and both home hopes will get a significant ranking boost prior to the Sunshine Double.Stearns, who came into the event ranked No. 62 after peaking at No. 28 last May, will be back in the Top 50 on Monday, while Townsend will return to the singles Top 100.
Stearns, who came into the event ranked No. 62 after peaking at No. 28 last May, will be back in the Top 50 on Monday, while Townsend will return to the singles Top 100.
No matching videos found. Please use different search term.
Get official marketing communications from the ATP and WTA! We'll send you newsletters keeping you informed about news, tournaments, competitions, ticketing, partner offers and more.
Your data will be used in accordance with the
ATP Privacy Policy
and
WTA Privacy Policy.
© Copyright 1994 - 2026 ATP Tour, Inc. All Rights Reserved. No part of this site may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any way or by any means (including photocopying, recording or storing it in any medium by electronic means), without the written permission of ATP Tour, Inc.. Terms & Conditions | Privacy | Community Social Media Policy | Modern Slavery Statement | Feedback | Cookies | Your Privacy Choices
Savannah Guthrie returned to her mother's Tucson home this week, standing quietly before the growing memorial built just beyond the front gate.
As per the videos and photos that have emerged on social media, Savannah was joined by her sister, Annie, and her brother-in-law, Tommaso Cioni, as they paused to read notes and look at flowers left by neighbors and strangers.
This appearance marks Savannah's first time being seen in public since her mother vanished. Savannah bent down at one point to look at the bouquets carefully placed along the walkway. The visit felt intimate and heavy.
What was once a familiar family home now stands as the center of a community's grief and hope.
The search for Nancy Guthrie has now reached its 30th day.
Nancy, 84, disappeared from her Tucson home on Feb. 1. In the weeks since, the family has pleaded again and again for answers. Savannah has largely addressed the crisis through emotional video messages, speaking directly to the public in hopes someone will step forward.
The longtime “Today” show anchor announced that her family is offering up to $1 million for information that leads to Nancy's recovery. She emphasized that the reward will be paid in cash and that anyone who comes forward can remain anonymous.
In a recent Instagram video, Savannah carefully explained how the process works. A person with credible information can submit a tip and receive a seven-digit PIN. If that tip leads authorities to Nancy, the individual can collect the reward at a neutral location, such as a post office. No identification is required.
“We need to know where she is, we need her to come home,” Savannah said, her voice steady but urgent.
“For that reason, we are offering a family reward of up to $1 million for any information that leads us to her recovery,” she continued.
“Someone out there knows something that can bring her home. Somebody knows, and we are begging you to please come forward now.”
Savannah has not hidden the weight this ordeal has placed on her family. In a message shared with supporters, she wrote, “We still believe in a miracle.”
At the same time, she has spoken with painful honesty about the uncertainty they face, acknowledging that the outcome may not be the one they pray for.
Even so, the family's visit to the memorial reflected quiet resolve. Fresh flowers continue to line the walkway. Candles flicker through the night. As each day passes, Savannah and her loved ones cling to hope, believing that Nancy will somehow find her way home.
Like EntertainmentNow?
Go here and check the boxnext to EntertainmentNow
Comment
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Δ
Previous
About
Contact US
Privacy Policy
Terms Of Service
Editorial Guidelines
Sitemap
Copyright © 2026 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress VIP
By Andreas Wiseman
Executive Editor Of International & Co-Head Of Film
EXCLUSIVE: Two-time Oscar nominee and avowed genre fan Paul Giamatti has been set to star in his first horror movie in a decade with Boutique.
Giamatti will play American tourist Calvin who “journeys to the eerie English seaside town that inspired the work of his favorite reclusive author but instead gets entangled with a murderous secret society permeating the whole town.”
Filming is being lined up for this summer with the project heralding from writer-director Jim Gavin (Lodge 49). Giamatti will produce with Dan Carey through their company Touchy Feely Films (Outsiders) along with James Harris and Mark Lane for Tea Shop Productions (Obsession) and Guy Danella (Violent Night) for XYZ Films, who will also finance.
Related Stories
Cancellations and Renewals
'Black Mirror' Renewed For Season 8 At Netflix
Reviews
Ken Burns' 'American Revolution' Review: History Maestro Delivers Greatest Hits Plus More In Timely PBS Series
Pic marks Gavin's feature film directorial debut, reuniting him with Touchy Feely, producers of AMC series Lodge 49. XYZ is handling world sales with UTA co-repping domestic rights. Jacob Jaffke (Maxxxine) will serve as executive producer.
Watch on Deadline
Giamatti said: “I'm crazy excited to be a part of this project and for Touchy Feely to be working with XYZ. Scary, funny, bizarre, strangely moving, it's one of the best scripts I've ever read by one of the most talented guys I know, Jim Gavin!”
Sideways, Billions and Black Mirror actor Giamatti was Oscar-nominated for 2024 feature The Holdovers. Upcoming he has Tom McCarthy's untitled drama, Jesse Eisenberg's untitled musical and has been attached to star in an Eli Roth Hostel series.
XYZ Films and Tea Shop recently wrapped shooting on the horror film Banquet, directed by Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia and starring Meghann Fahy, Corey Mylchreest, and Alfie Williams.
“We're honored and excited to be working with a legend like Paul and take his singular talents to new genre territories through Jim's iconic script,” commented XYZ's Guy Danella.
Giamatti is repped by UTA, Kipperman Management and and Sloane, Offer.
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
With season 13 of “When Calls the Heart” expected to wrap up in March, that ending will likely usher in some exciting beginnings for several Hallmark stars. Incredibly, three couples connected to the hit show have babies on the way.
WCTH couple Erin Krakow and Ben Rosenbaum are expecting their first baby, as are WCTH's Kevin McGarry and his wife, WCTH alum Kayla Wallace. In addition, WCTH's Chris McNally and his longtime love, Hallmark star Julie Gonzalo, are expecting their second child.
Though none of the stars have specifically shared their due date, the info they have shared leads us to believe the Hallmark baby boom is just around the corner.
Krakow, who has played series lead Elizabeth Thornton since WCTH premiered in 2014, announced her pregnancy with Rosenbaum on November 26 via social media.
The couple, who surprised fans with news of their wedding in June, posted an adorable announcement featuring four photo booth pics in which they held up their sonogram photos and their beloved rescue pup, Willoughby, who was wearing a “big brother” shirt.
Though they didn't share a specific due date, Rosenbaum posted a sweet tribute to his wife on December 1 that said, “6 months of wedded bliss. 5 months of growing our baby. 1 lifetime of love in front of us @erinkrakow 🥰”
If Rosenbaum's reference to Krakow being pregnant for five months was exact, that would mean the actress is now eight months pregnant, with Willoughby's sibling due within the next four weeks, in March 2026.
It's not known which baby is due first, but McGarry and Wallace, who stepped back from her WCTH role to join the cast of “Landman” in 2024, were the first of the three couples to announce their pregnancy. They shared a joint post on November 11 to spill the news, with a photo of McGarry cradling Wallace's baby bump.
That same night, they attended the “Landman” season two premiere, and Wallace proudly showed off her pregnant belly under a cream-colored silk dress paired with black leather gloves.
In mid-January, Wallace shared a throwback pic from the last scene she shot for the second season, writing that it was bittersweet “knowing we all had to say goodbye to each other and also secretly basking in the thought of heading home to my husband and just enjoying being pregnant.”
According to the Fort Worth Star Telegram, “Landman” wrapped filming the first week of August. Wallace didn't reveal how far along she was as they wrapped the season, but she noted in her post that the “A/C was flowing between takes” and that she was on her “2nd or 3rd coconut water,” which has become a commonly-used antidote for morning sickness — a symptom that doesn't typically start until at least the sixth week of pregnancy, per the Cleveland Clinic.
Even if Wallace was only six weeks along at that time, she, too, would be due by late March or early April at the latest.
Meanwhile, McNally announced his and Gonzalo's baby news in December at the Hallmark Christmas Experience, surprising the audience by pulling out their sonogram pics and revealing that all three couples were due within six weeks of each other.
Gonzalo rarely posts on Instagram, but she shared a beautiful photo on Valentine's Day of herself cradling her baby bump, looking at peace as the sun glowed behind her, and noted that her pregnancy was “almost complete.”
She and McNally, who starred together in 2023's “3 Bed, 2 Bath, 1 Ghost,” already share a daughter, who will turn four in June.
Like EntertainmentNow?
Go here and check the boxnext to EntertainmentNow
Comment
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Δ
Previous
Next
About
Contact US
Privacy Policy
Terms Of Service
Editorial Guidelines
Sitemap
Copyright © 2026 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress VIP
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
The K-pop star is returning to the small screen with a new K-drama ‘Boyfriend on Demand.'
By
Nicole Fell
Assistant Editor
Jisoo, the eldest member of K-pop supergroup Blackpink, is dishing on her excitement about the group's long-awaited new album.
Deadline, the group's first multi-track release in over three years, was released on Friday. The five-track EP features the previously release single, “Jump,” which became a hit for the group over the summer. Deadline is led by the album's lead single, “Go,” a catchy three-minute powerful anthem.
“Blackpink's 10th anniversary is this year,” Jisoo told The Hollywood Reporter during press for her new K-drama Boyfriend on Demand.
Related Stories
TV
Mark Rober's New Netflix Show Reveals Itself
Business
Ted Sarandos on Netflix Nixing Warner Bros. Bid, Trump's Role and How the Streamer Is Closer to Cinema Owners Than Ever
“I'm so happy that we're releasing another album with such great songs this year,” she continues. “We believe everyone will love our [new] music. I hope you enjoy it a lot.”
Related Video
The 31-year-old singer and actress, fresh off Blackpink's Deadline world tour, is returning to television in a new Netflix K-drama, Boyfriend on Demand. Jisoo plays an “exhausted webtoon producer” who “escapes reality through a subscription-based virtual dating simulation program, where she gets to experience the dates of her dream” in the series.
“Through this character, Mi-rae, I was able to show multiple sides of myself,” Jisoo tells THR. “I'm sure the Blinks (the group's fanbase) will love it.”
The synopsis continues, “Blending the relatable challenges of daily work life and a never-before-seen virtual reality dating subscription program, Boyfriend on Demand is a unique take on the romantic comedy series. Jisoo takes on the role of Seo Mi-rae, who longs for a second chance at love in virtual reality. Seo In-guk plays Park Kyeong-nam, Mi-rae's colleague and rival webtoon producer.”
In the time since their last group release, Blackpink, comprised of members Jisoo, Jennie, Lisa and Rosé, has found immense success for their respective solo endeavors. In addition to Boyfriend on Demand, Jisoo put out a solo album, Amortage, in February 2025, embarked on a solo Asia tour and recently starred in another series, Newtopia.
Lisa made her acting debut on the hit HBO show, The White Lotus, and put out a solo album, Alter Ego, which she performed during her solo Coachella set last year. Jennie also performed a solo set at Coachella last year in support of her album, Ruby.
Rosé found herself with an unstoppable top 40 hit in “Apt,” earning the singer three Grammy nominations and making her the first K-pop artist to score a general field nomination. She opened this year's Grammy ceremony with a rocking rendition of the hit song. The 29-year-old described the possibility of that nomination “as a moment that proves to myself so many things” to herself during the singer's THR cover story.
The group reunited last year for the Deadline world tour, a prelude to this album. The ground-breaking group hit stops across the world, including two sold-out nights at SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles.
Jisoo, whose show Boyfriend on Demand premieres March 6 on Netflix, has one final message for her beloved fans. “Please root for me,” she says. “I love you all.”
Boyfriend on Demand streams globally on Netflix beginning March 6.
Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day
Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
By Dade Hayes
Business Editor
Paramount CEO David Ellison says the company's pending merger with Warner Bros. Discovery will give it the scale it needs to compete with Netflix, especially when Paramount+ and HBO Max come together.
“We will combine the streaming portfolios of the two companies into one stronger platform over the coming years,” Ellison told Wall Street analysts Monday on a conference call to discuss the $111 billion deal. On Paramount+ and HBO, he said, “there are more than 200 million [direct-to-consumer] subscribers today, and more than 100 countries and territories worldwide, positioning us to compete effectively with the leading streaming services in today's marketplace.”
Netflix said in January it ended 2025 with 325 million global subscribers. While Ellison's estimate of the combined Paramount+ and HBO Max footprint is accurate, the 200 million figure counts each subscriber base separately. As with many of the leading streaming outlets, there is overlap, with many subscribers getting both services.
Watch on Deadline
Another wrinkle, as AT&T discovered after acquiring Time Warner in 2018 and trying to level up in streaming, is HBO's linear distribution. While the linear base is diminishing due to cord-cutting, the premium network still has millions of households getting it the old fashioned way, through cable and satellite providers. That means that new negotiations would have to be completed in order to explore streaming without limitations on pricing or packaging.
After merging Skydance with Paramount, Ellison, the tech-friendly son of Oracle billionaire Larry Ellison, has steered an effort to blend the tech stacks of free, ad-supported Pluto TV, Paramount+ and BET+. That streamlines operations on the back end, saving money and making things run more smoothly. A similar consolidation on the tech front is likely with WBD, Ellison said.
“We think the combined offering, given the amount of content and what we can do from the tech side, really will put us in the position to be able to compete with the most scaled players in DTC,” he said.
As he did during Skydance's pursuit of Paramount, Ellison emphasized his plan to invest in the tech behind Paramount+.
“When it comes to the DTC business, engagement is absolutely key to success there,” he said. “So you have to look at what drives engagement. It's really more unbelievable content that the audience wants to engage in by combining these incredible studios and platforms, or delivering the audience more of what they want from a content perspective.”
Along with maintaining content investment, Ellison said, plans call for “significantly improving the tech product to keep people engaged with that platform for longer.”
Investing in both technology and content, the exec said, will yield “a product that can really compete with the best that's coming out of Silicon Valley and the industry leaders in the space.”
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
Disney tried by acquiring 20th century fox and Hulu and failed. Netflix is growing by 25 million subscribers per year. They have 325 million now. You will not beat them Ellison
How many people will be laid off because of this?
Dreams lol. Netflix has perfected the art of streaming. Except for good IP, paramount has nothing to show yet
An entire audience about to be evaporated because of this ugly merger with really bad consequences. Stop this now!
More so Disney don't forget espn and fubo
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
By Zac Ntim
International Reporter
Here's the first trailer for Scary Movie 6.
The trailer dropped this morning and reveals some of the horror flicks that will be satirized in the film, including Ryan Coogler's Sinners and Coralie Fargeat's The Substance.
Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, Regina Hall, Anna Faris, Lochlyn Monroe, Dave Sheridan, and Jon Abrahams all returned to star in the film.
Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, and Keenen Ivory Wayans, the architects of the franchise, returned to write the script alongside longtime collaborator Rick Alvarez, who is also producing. Michael Tiddes is directing the project.
Related Stories
Trailers
Marlon Wayans Leaks 'Scary Movie 6' Trailer: "Just Bootlegged My Own Movie Trailer"
News
Marlon Wayans Teases 'White Chicks', 'Don't Be a Menace' Sequels If 'Scary Movie 6' Does Well: "We'll Be Back Real Hard"
Other newcomers in the cast include Olivia Rose Keegan, Savannah Lee Nassif, Cameron Scott Roberts, Sydney Park, Gregg Wayans, Ruby Snowber, and Benny Zielke. Miramax is producing, with Jonathan Glickman, Alexandra Loewy, and Thom Zadra as executive producers.
Watch on Deadline
Paramount will release the film worldwide, as part of its first-look deal with Miramax, on June 12.
During a brief interview in 2025, Marlon Wayans teased the film as a “no-holds-barred” installment full of “equal opportunity offenders.”
“It's how we always do it,” he told Entertainment Weekly. “We just want to make everybody laugh, and we don't care if you're sensitive. Even sensitive people need to laugh at themselves.”
Check out the trailer above.
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
Anna Faris deserves lead billing – is that what she's getting?
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
By Dade Hayes
Business Editor
Paramount President Jeff Shell, a key member of the management team during the company's pursuit of Warner Bros. Discovery, did not join Monday's conference call to discuss the merger.
The exec's notable absence comes amid an internal probe of his dealings with Robert James “RJ” Cipriani.
Deadline last month broke the news that Shell and his reps are ready to respond if Robert James “RJ” Cipriani makes good on his threat to sue him. The crux of the potential complaint is Cipriani's allegation that Shell leaked information about corporate doings like Paramount's $7.7 billion acquisition of UFC rights.
Related Stories
Late Night TV
'Last Week Tonight's John Oliver On Paramount Buying Warner Bros. Discovery: "Not Great News"
News
Ted Sarandos "Unlikely" To Attempt Another Netflix M&A After Ceding Warner Bros, Teases "Open Dialogue" With Theater Owners
Shell did not take part in the climactic week-and-a-half of negotiations with WBD, according to people familiar with the talks. WBD's board embraced Paramount's $111 billion takeover offer after having accepted a proposal from Netflix last December. Paramount raised its offer last week, and Netflix then opted to bow out rather than take part in a bidding war.
Watch on Deadline
An internal investigation of Shell was launched at the David Ellison-run company. As a part of that, and in keeping with Paramount policy, law firm Gibson Dunn was brought on board. Gibson Dunn litigation partner Nick Hanna, the U.S. Attorney for the Central District of California during Donald Trump's first term, is leading the ongoing probe.
Shell officially joined Paramount last summer following the company's merger with Skydance. The former NBCUniversal CEO had been working with Ellison and other top execs at Skydance for more than a year prior to the deal's close. He has taken part in a number of conference calls, and was on Paramount's fourth-quarter earnings call just last week.
Shell was ousted from his NBCU role in 2023 with cause after allegations of “inappropriate conduct” and “sexual harassment” of then-CNBC anchor and correspondent Hadley Gamble.
Jill Goldsmith and Dominic Patten contributed to this report.
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
The plot Ellisens…
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
A beloved BBC star has shared heartbreaking news with his fans. Finnian Garbutt offered a candid update on his health this week. The 28-year-old actor, best known for playing PC Ryan Power on the BBC crime drama “Hope Street,” revealed that his stage 4 melanoma has progressed.
In a candid post, he also shared that he is now entering what he described as the “last stages” of his life. Amid his cancer battle, Garbutt married his wife, Louise, purchased their first home, and became a father, embracing life's biggest joys along the way.
Garbutt shared the heartbreaking update on social media over the weekend, explaining that new scans revealed the cancer had advanced.
“Over the last month or so, I've been having quite a bit of pain in my back and hip. My cancer team admitted me the other day for observations and to do a few scans.
“Unfortunately. the scans have shown that the cancer has progressed rapidly in my body and l am now entering the last stages of my life.”
Garbutt was first diagnosed with malignant melanoma at 25.
He has previously spoken about discovering a lump behind his ear in late 2020, initially dismissing it as an ingrown hair. When restrictions eased, and he returned to his barber, he was told it had grown “quite substantially.” Doctors later confirmed it was skin cancer.
Since revealing his diagnosis, Garbutt has used his platform to encourage young people to check for changes in their skin and seek medical advice early, hoping his experience might help others act sooner.
In his recent message, Garbutt said he made the update public so he would not have to share the news individually.
“I'm putting this out there as it is really difficult to tell people individually, and I hope now it's in the open, then I can enjoy the time with my amazing family and friends.”
Despite the heartbreaking update, he reflected on what he has accomplished over the past four years.
“Since being diagnosed 4 years ago I have achieved so many of my life goals – 30 episodes in a TV show, being the lead in a movie (that should be out soon), buying my own house, marrying my best friend and becoming a father to the most incredible baby girl who never fails to make me smile.
“Thank you to all that have reached out over the years and supported me and my family.”
He added a final invitation to friends and supporters.
“If anyone wants to meet up for a pint, coffee or general bit of craic please reach out and we can try and make it work.”
Garbutt joined “Hope Street” in 2023 and quickly became a familiar face to viewers of the Northern Ireland-based drama.
Like EntertainmentNow?
Go here and check the boxnext to EntertainmentNow
Prayers for his comfort and a miracle recovery!
You are such a brave person who I admire. We are dealing with love ones in iur family with the same situation now. My prayers are with you. Trust God, and know that it is not over until it is over. God bless you.
Comment
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Δ
Previous
Next
About
Contact US
Privacy Policy
Terms Of Service
Editorial Guidelines
Sitemap
Copyright © 2026 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress VIP
By Andreas Wiseman
Executive Editor Of International & Co-Head Of Film
Quentin Tarantino is alive and well, we've been told by sources close to the filmmaker, contrary to misinformation on X.
In the past 24 hours, a user with more than 150k followers posted to X claiming that Tarantino had died in an Iranian missile attack on Israel, where Tarantino splits his time with LA. The post erroneously credited Deadline as source for the news.
The post has been liked more than a thousand times and has been picked up by other users. Another account posted that Jerry Seinfeld has been killed in similar fashion, once again crediting Deadline. There is no evidence for this to be true either but the post has been liked thousands of times. The posts have been reported to X.
Meanwhile, multiple AI generated images have been posted to X claiming to show Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill filmmaker Tarantino in a bomb shelter in Israel. These are also false. Some of the posts have been flagged as such by Grok.
Watch on Deadline
Elon Musk's X continues to struggle to suppress misinformation and toxic content, something that has precipitated calls for greater regulation of social media platforms, especially among young people.
The posts follow the U.S. and Israel's military action against Iran this weekend, which has led to a wider conflict in the Middle East.
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
Well that's a shame…
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
With Sunday's (March 1) free concert, the Colombian superstar closed the Mexican leg of her Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran World Tour.
By
Natalia Cano
Shakira wrapped up the extensive Mexican leg of her Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran World Tour on Sunday (March 1) with a new record, gathering 400,000 people for a free concert at the Zócalo in Mexico City. It was the largest audience ever assembled in the country's main public square, according to figures from the city's government, and marked the Colombian superstar's return there for the first time since her debut in 2007.
“Today, I feel a mix of excitement, nostalgia, and gratitude. Today is our last day here in Mexico, my home,” an emotional Shakira told the crowd. “This is a love and friendship story I have with Mexico that can't be compared to anything. Thank you for all the excitement, all the joy you've made me feel. There's definitely no better reunion than that of a little she-wolf with her Mexican pack here today at the Zócalo. Forever, we are one.”
The previous record was held by Argentine band Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, who gathered 300,000 people on June 3, 2023, followed by Grupo Firme, who drew 280,000 a year earlier.
The show at the Plaza de la Constitución (the official name of the Zócalo), organized jointly by Mexico City's government and Grupo Modelo, was celebrated by Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who acknowledged the historic event with a brief message on social media: “Shakira – Las Mujeres Ya No Lloran – Zócalo,” accompanied by clapping emojis.
The feat capped off a year since the highest-grossing Hispanic tour of all time landed in the Latin American country, where Shakira performed a total of 31 shows — 13 of them at the iconic Estadio GNP Seguros (formerly Foro Sol) — selling 800,000 tickets for those shows, “an unprecedented achievement,” according to promoter Ocesa.
For Sunday's concert, Beéle returned as a special guest for the Barranquilla-born singer, performing their new song “Algo Tú” live for the first time; the song is set for release on Wednesday (March 4). The Colombian artist had joined her on Friday at the Estadio GNP Seguros for their version of “Hips Don't Lie,” which they recorded together with Ed Sheeran. Additionally, Shakira performed her hit “¿Dónde Estás Corazón?” for the second time this week — a song she hadn't sung live since 2019.
Starting early Saturday morning (Feb. 28), the first fans began arriving for the show, camping around the Zócalo to secure the best spot to see the self-proclaimed “She-Wolf,” who first performed there on May 27, 2007. At that show she drew 210,000 people (according to official figures), surpassing the previous record of 170,000 held by Mexican rock band Café Tacvba in 2005.
Crowds spread out on Sunday to surrounding streets in Mexico City's historic downtown, where screens were set up in Monument to the Revolution and the Alameda Central park, allowing families with young children to enjoy the show more comfortably.
The Zócalo is considered an emblematic and highly significant location, a plaza filled with symbolism where politics, social movements, culture and religion converge. It is the second-largest public square in the world, behind only Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China.
Shakira's time in Mexico reaffirmed her privileged status as a global superstar and an icon for multiple generations, achieving a cultural, social and economic impact on the Mexican capital. Just on Sunday, her concert generated an estimated 403.6 million pesos (around $22.4 million USD), according to Mexico City's Chamber of Commerce, Services, and Tourism (CANACO CDMX).
The historic moment in the Colombian star's career also coincides with a new international recognition: her nomination for the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame 2026 last week. This nomination crowns a series of major milestones she has achieved over the past year, including setting a Guinness World Record for the highest-grossing tour by a Hispanic artist, earning an astonishing $421.6 million and selling 3.3 million tickets across 86 shows, according to Billboard Boxscore.
After her show at Mexico's Zócalo, Shakira is set to perform on another of the world's most iconic and massive stages on May 2: Brazil's Copacabana Beach, where organizers expect at least one million people, as occurred with Madonna in 2024 and Lady Gaga in 2025.
Get weekly rundowns straight to your inbox
Your email address will not be published.
Required fields are marked *
Post Comment
A daily briefing on what matters in the music industry
Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
A daily briefing on what matters in the music industry
Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Billboard is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Billboard Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By Jake Kanter
International Investigations Editor
EXCLUSIVE: Saturday Night Live‘s send-up of the BAFTA racial slur incident has proved to be no laughing matter for a leading Tourette's syndrome charity.
In a statement shared with Deadline, Tourettes Action, which has supported campaigner John Davidson and the film I Swear since its release last year, decried SNL‘s intervention.
In the PSA-style skit titled ‘Tourette's,' a host of celebrities, including J.K. Rowling, Mel Gibson, Armie Hammer, Louis C.K., and Bill Cosby claim they suffer from Tourette's, which would explain problematic comments or actions they have been involved in.
Watch on Deadline
Related Stories
Late Night TV
'SNL' Sketch Has J.K. Rowling, Mel Gibson, Armie Hammer, Ye & More Celebs Claiming They Have Tourette's Following BAFTAs Racial Slur Incident
Late Night TV
'Heated Rivalry' Star Hudson Williams Skates Onto Connor Storrie's 'SNL' Debut In Cameo
“I'm Mel Gibson, and as I probably should have pointed out decades ago, I too, suffer from Tourette's, which explains a lot of the things I've said or yelled through the years,” said the Braveheart star, portrayed by Andrew Dismukes.
The sketch followed Davidson, who has dedicated his life to supporting others with Tourette syndrome, involuntarily shouting the N-word at Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo at the BAFTA Film Awards last month.
Tourettes Action CEO Emma McNally was unambiguous in her thoughts on SNL, turning on capslock in her email to Deadline: “THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE.”
She continued: “Mocking a disability is never acceptable. It would not be tolerated for any other condition, and it should not be tolerated by people with Tourette's.
“Tourette's is a complex neurological condition, of which there is no cure. It is not a joke. It is not a personality trait. It is not a source of entertainment. It is a condition that can be extremely debilitating, causing pain isolation and huge amounts of discrimination.
“Videos and posts that deliberately misrepresent or sensationalise tics set us back years. A single video can undo the progress our community has spent years building toward greater awareness.”
McNally continued: “The trolling and harassment members of our community have endured in the past few days has been horrific. People have been targeted with threats and humiliation simply for having a condition they did not choose. No one should ever be treated that way.”
A Saturday Night Live spokesperson has been approached for comment. McNally's full statement is below, but she was not alone in criticizing the video.
Al Murray, a British comedian and Spitting Image writer, said it was “disgusting.” He added: “The problem with the ‘punch up punch down' thing is what if you're upside down.”
James Dreyfus, who plays Lord Gormon Massey in HBO's House of the Dragon, said: “Good grief. Only goes to show that ‘regime comedians' are as desperately unamusing, cringeworthy, pig- ignorant & prejudiced as they are over here.”
NAACP Image Awards host Deon Cole has also been slammed for his joke about Davidson over the weekend. Leading the NAACP audience in mock prayer, he said: “If there are any white men out here in the audience, Lord, with Tourette's. I advise you to tell them they'd better read the room tonight, Lord … Whatever medicine they on, they better double up on it.”
Hollywood continuing to mock John Davidson over his Tourette's condition is one of the most despicable things I've witnessed in a long time. Shame on @deoncole and all those in the audience who laughed at his vile ‘jokes'. What the f*ck is wrong with you???!!! https://t.co/8E8k1zl3Q2
Sharing the clip, Piers Morgan said: “Hollywood continuing to mock John Davidson over his Tourette's condition is one of the most despicable things I've witnessed in a long time.”
Over the weekend, Davidson thanked the Tourette's community for its support. “Whilst I will never apologies [sic] for having Tourette syndrome, I will apologise for any pain, upset and misunderstanding that it may create,” he wrote on Facebook. “This past week has been tough, and has reminded me that what I do raising awareness for such a misunderstood condition, there is still a long way to go and I will keep on keeping on until this is achieved.”
Tourettes Action CEO Emma McNally's Full ‘SNL' Statement:Over recent weeks, our community has faced an unprecedented wave of online trolling, misinformation, and targeted mockery. Following the extremely difficult events surrounding the BAFTAs, many people with Tourette's have been struggling with fear, shame, isolation and a HUGE need to defend a condition they cannot control. We had hoped this would be a new week and we could move on but the release of further content online that has been designed to ridicule Tourette's and reduce our community to a punchline has only deepened that hurt. I want to be completely clear here THIS IS NOT ACCEPTABLE. Mocking a disability is never acceptable. It would not be tolerated for any other condition, and it should not be tolerated by people with Tourette's. Tourette's is a complex neurological condition, of which there is no cure. It is not a joke. It is not a personality trait. It is not a source of entertainment. It is a condition that can be extremely debilitating, causing pain isolation and huge amounts of discrimination. Videos and posts that deliberately misrepresent or sensationalise tics set us back years. A single video can undo the progress our community has spent years building toward greater awareness. I hope those creating these videos understand that they create real consequences for people in our community: fear, isolation, bullying, abuse, and a feeling among many that they must hide away to stay safe. The trolling and harassment members of our community have endured in the past few days has been horrific. People have been targeted with threats and humiliation simply for having a condition they did not choose. No one should ever be treated that way.These recent events have been painful for multiple communities, and I am not for one minute dismissing that hurt, but directing anger and ridicule to people with Tourette's does nothing to heal that pain and does not move us forward. What we need right now is people to be kind. We need compassion, accurate information and above all, we need education. I am asking everyone, content creators, viewers, the media, and the wider public, to please consider the impact of what they say and what they share. Behind every tic is a person. A family. A life. A long standing history of being misunderstood. I was always brought up with the motto that if you have nothing nice to say, then say nothing and to always, always be kind. To those in the Tourette's community:Please know you are not alone. We are here for you. I know times now are causing extreme pain but please don't feel like you need to hide away. Reach out to us for support. To the wider public who want to support: Please share our educational content, help us dispel the myths and help our community get one step closer to acceptance. We will continue advocating, educating, and standing together as a community. #TogetherWeAreStronger
Get our Breaking News Alerts and Keep your inbox happy.
Comments On Deadline Hollywood are monitored. So don't go off topic, don't impersonate anyone, and don't get your facts wrong.
Comment
Name
Email
Website
Δ
If SNL bothers you, don't watch it. That's what I do.
They have a right to make a statement. If you don't want to read a post about it, that's on you. Find a hobby.
The fact she said nothing towards the racism of that word baffles me. It went out the windows once juxtaposed to her own cause.
It just goes to show the levels of American comedy, especially under the Trump regime. Awful on all accounts.
You can have Tourette's and be a racist too. You can also make fun of something funny that happened even if someone with a disability was involved. They weren't making fun of his disability, they were making fun of the situation.
You seem to be implying that John Davidson is racist, otherwise why would you even state this? That's a horrible thing to insinuate without evidence.
Also, what happened that was funny? Tourette's is not funny. The situation was not funny.
Agreed!
They are mocking dumb celebrities who said dumb things taking advantage of the situation to excuse their dumb behavior.
but no one did that, so it's not parody, the only joke left is implying that tourette's is a thin “excuse” for misbehaviour
Exactly. It's as though they totally misinterpreted what was being parodied. It was like the equivalent of SNL doing one where it's celebrities blaming “exhaustion” or “dehydration” for a rehab stay…
Signup for Breaking News Alerts & Newsletters
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Get our latest storiesin the feed of your favorite networks
We want to hear from you! Send us a tip using our annonymous form.
Sign up for our breaking news alerts
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Deadline is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Deadline Hollywood, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Oliver “Power” Grant died on Feb. 23 following “a courageous and hard-fought battle with pancreatic cancer,” his family and the Wu-Tang Clan revealed Sunday.
“A true fighter until the end, he was surrounded by his mother, his children, his family and his closest friends,” they said in a statement shared on Instagram.
“It was the honor of his life to pour his love, wisdom and brilliance into his family and his community. His impact was singular; there will never be another to take his place,” they wrote.
“Power will always be loved, and his legacy will forever remain.”
The family concluded the statement by announcing that Grant's wake will take place March 13, and the funeral will be the following day in New York City. More details will be released “closer to the service dates” as they work to secure venues.
As Page Six previously reported, fellow Wu-Tang Clan member Method Man confirmed Grant's devastating passing on Instagram last week.
Start your day with Page Six Daily.
Please provide a valid email.
By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Want celebrity news as it breaks?
“Paradise my Brother safe Travels!!” Method Man, born Clifford Smith Jr., wrote alongside a photo of the pair. “Bruh I am not ok.”
Wu-Tang Clan member Raekwon also paid tribute to Grant on Instagram, writing, “POWER we been everywhere …. now you everywhere !😢🙏🏾 the most high is merciful love you.”
Wu-Tang Clan co-founder GZA also honored the late businessman on social media.
“‘Word life, peace to Power and my whole unit.' We couldn't have done it without him. Wu wouldn't have come to fruition without Power. His passing is a profound loss to us all. My deepest condolences to the fam. #olipowergrant,” he wrote on Instagram.
Last week, the Wu-Tang Clan was nominated for induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame as part of the class of 2026.
The legendary hip-hop group includes RZA, GZA, Method Man, Raekwon, Ghostface Killah, Inspectah Deck, U-God, Cappadonna and Masta Killa.
Wu-Tang also included Ol' Dirty Bastard, who died from an accidental drug overdose in 2004.
If you or someone you care about is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
Mark Whelan has been named Xicoia's new head of strategy and operations.
By
Lily Ford
Xicoia, the world's first AI talent studio and creator of AI performer Tilly Norwood, has hired former Amazon Prime Video Mark Whelan as head of strategy and operations.
Whelan will work directly with CEO and creative lead founder Eline van der Velden of Particle6 — who talked in depth with The Hollywood Reporter about her plans for Hollywood domination last year — to “scale the studio's ambitious vision,” said the studio, “beginning with the rapid expansion of AI actor Tilly Norwood and the launch of the Tillyverse, a dynamic, constantly evolving digital universe where Tilly and a new generation of AI characters will live, collaborate and build careers.” The Tillyverse, they added, is set to launch later this year.
Related Stories
News
Gwyneth Paltrow's Business Partner Blasts Democrats Over Iran Strike Criticism
Movies
China Box Office: 'Pegasus 3' Climbs to $530 Million But Holiday Market Lags Far Behind 2025
Whelan joins from Amazon, where he led its social expansion across numerous territories and spent six years shaping EU-wide social strategy for major brands including The Grand Tour and Clarkson's Farm.
Related Video
Van der Velden said: “Mark is a brilliant storyteller with a rare skillset, and I couldn't be more excited to have him join Xicoia. He understands comedy, character-building, AI, audience behaviour and digital culture, which is exactly what Tilly — and the wider business — needs at this stage.
“Together, we're building something entirely new. Tilly Norwood isn't just an AI character — she's a personality, a brand, and a future global superstar with a compelling narrative arc,” van der Velden added. “Mark will help us craft and shape every layer of her world, from her humour, daily life and career choices to how she interacts with fans across various platforms. It all promises to be bold, playful, a little chaotic — and impossible to ignore.”
Mark Whelan added that the role is a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”
“AI is evolving at breathtaking speed, and combining cutting-edge tech with ambitious creative thinking means we're not following an industry playbook at Xicoia, we are writing it,” he said. “Tilly already has the momentum, an audience and the cultural spark. Now we're writing her story and building her universe. It's a huge responsibility, but an incredibly exciting one. I think the world is going to have a lot of fun watching what happens next.”
Alongside spearheading Tilly Norwood's growth, Whelan will lead the team in the development of new proprietary AI characters for use by Xicoia and Particle6, as well as oversee the creation of bespoke AI talent commissioned by third parties.
Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day
Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
By
Emily Zemler
Michael B. Jordan took home the trophy for best male performance in a leading role at the Actor Awards on Sunday night, a surprise victory over fellow nominees Timothée Chalamet and Leonardo DiCaprio.
Jordan's win was announced by Viola Davis, who couldn't contain her excitement. The Sinners actor hugged his co-star Delroy Lindo and his mom before taking the stage.
“I wasn't expecting this at all,” Jordan said. “I'm so honored and privileged to be nominated in categories with people, actors and humans that I love. And I love their work and what you contribute to our craft. This ride has been unbelievable. So thank you for welcoming me in and making me feel seen. Ya'll know how I feel about y'all.”
Jordan recounted desperately wanting to join SAG-AFTRA, the actors union, when he was starting out. “I thought it was this club I wanted to be in so bad,” he said, adding, “I remember watching all the other actors that I looked up to being a part of that club, being a part of SAG-AFTRA, being a part of this community. And I was like, ‘Man, I want to be that one day.'”
He remembered seeing his fellow actors “on stage with the awards and nice suits being in fancy places like that.” “That's what I always wanted,” Jordan said. “That kid from North Jersey is standing here right now.”
The actor thanked his mom for “driving me back and forth to New York when we didn't have enough money to go through the Holland Tunnel, when we were looking for gas money, parking spaces, when I went up there for my auditions.”
Jordan also thanked filmmaker and screenwriter Ryan Coogler, with whom he has regularly collaborated over the years, and his co-stars in Sinners.
“I want to thank you, Ryan Coogler, for giving me the opportunity to show what I can do, and to be fearless and to create a safe space for us to find the truth,” Jordan said. “Thank you for allowing me to do my best work. Just being in this room right now with all these people who have seen me grow up in front of the camera and in these rooms I feel the love and support that you've always given me and encouraged me to do my best, so I just want to say thank you.
Editor's picks
The 250 Greatest Albums of the 21st Century So Far
The 100 Best TV Episodes of All Time
The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time
100 Best Movies of the 21st Century
He concluded, “Yeah man, it's pretty cool.”
Jordan earned a second trophy later in the evening when Sinners won outstanding performance by a cast. Lindo took the lead on accepting that award, which marks the second time one of Coogler's films has won after Black Panther‘s cast was honored in 2019.
“Every single day we brought ourselves, we brought our hearts, we brought our souls, we brought our spirits to this endeavor,” Lindo said. “To be recognized by you all, thank you does not even begin to encompass the gratitude that we feel.”
Trending Stories
Kelly Osbourne Hits Back at ‘Cruelty' Over Her Appearance at the BRIT Awards
MAGA Reacts to Trump's Strikes on Iran: ‘Absolutely Disgusting and Evil'
See Robbie Williams Lead All-Star Ozzy Osbourne Tribute at 2026 BRIT Awards
Shakira Breaks Zócalo Attendance Record in Mexico City With Free Show for 400,000 Fans
Sinners‘ triumph comes only a week after Jordan and Lindo became entangled in controversy at the 2026 BAFTA Awards. The duo presented the award for Best Special Visual Effects during the London-based ceremony and were subject to a racial slur shouted by John Davidson, an activist and longtime educator on Tourette's syndrome, whose life story was turned into the BAFTA-nominated biopic I Swear. Davidson's Tourette's causes involuntary tics, and he was heard cursing throughout the show, however the BBC failed to censor the N-word during its broadcast, causing further harm.
Davidson has since addressed the incident and said he privately apologizes to Jordan and Lindo. On Saturday, Lindo responded to the situation for the first time publicly at the NAACP Image Awards. “We appreciate all the support and the love that we have been shown in the aftermath of what happened last weekend,” Lindo said. “It means a lot to us.”
We want to hear it. Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Rolling Stone, LLC. All rights reserved.
By
Emily Zemler
Kelly Osbourne is standing up for herself after people criticized her appearance at the 2026 BRIT Awards on Saturday night.
The reality TV star attended the ceremony, held in Manchester, England, to celebrate her father, Ozzy Osbourne, who was posthumously honored with a lifetime achievement award. Her apparent weight loss caused concern online, igniting a public debate about her physical state.
“There is a special kind of cruelty in harming someone who is clearly going through something,” Kelly wrote on her Instagram Stories (via The Hollywood Reporter). “Kicking me while I'm down, doubting my pain, spreading my struggles as gossip, and turning your back when I need support and love most. None of it proves strength; it only reveals a profound absence of compassion and character.”
She added, “I'm currently going through the hardest time in my life. I should not even have to defend myself. But I won't sit here and allow myself to be dehumanized in such a way!”
Popular on Rolling Stone
Ozzy Osbourne died last July at 76 years old. His wife, Sharon Osbourne, joined Kelly to accept the award on his behalf on Saturday night. “If Ozzy was here tonight with us, he would be showing us that gorgeous smile that he had and I know he would be so proud to receive this from the country that he loved,” Sharon told the crowd at the BRIT Awards. “So he may not be here, but he left us one amazing body of work that will never be forgotten by the country that made him.”
This is not the first time Kelly has been forced to fend off body-shaming remarks. In December, she shared a now-deleted video addressing the constant speculation.
“To the people who keep thinking they're being funny and mean by writing comments like ‘Are you ill' or ‘Get off Ozempic, you don't look right,'” she said. “My dad just died, and I'm doing the best that I can, and the only thing I have to live for right now is my family. And I choose to share my content with you and share the happy side of my life not the miserable side of my life. So to all those people, fuck off.”
Sharon played the clip during an interview with Piers Morgan and defended her daughter. “She's right,” Sharon told Morgan. “She's lost her daddy. She can't eat right now.”
Trending Stories
Kelly Osbourne Hits Back at ‘Cruelty' Over Her Appearance at the Brit Awards
MAGA Reacts to Trump's Strikes on Iran: ‘Absolutely Disgusting and Evil'
See Robbie Williams Lead All-Star Ozzy Osbourne Tribute at 2026 Brit Awards
The Real Guess Who Finally Have Their Name Back and Are Hitting the Road
Last August, Kelly admitted that she “will not be OK for a while” after the death of her father. “I've sat down to write this a hundred times and still don't know if the words will ever feel like enough … but from the bottom of my heart, thank you,” Kelly wrote on social media. “The love, support, and beautiful messages I've received from so many of you have truly helped carry me through the hardest moment of my life. Every kind word, every shared memory, every bit of compassion has meant more than I can ever explain.”
She added, “Grief is a strange thing; it sneaks up on you in waves. I will not be OK for a while, but knowing my family [is] not alone in our pain makes a difference.”
We want to hear it. Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Rolling Stone, LLC. All rights reserved.
By
Emily Zemler
Kelly Osbourne is standing up for herself after people criticized her appearance at the 2026 BRIT Awards on Saturday night.
The reality TV star attended the ceremony, held in Manchester, England, to celebrate her father, Ozzy Osbourne, who was posthumously honored with a lifetime achievement award. Her apparent weight loss caused concern online, igniting a public debate about her physical state.
“There is a special kind of cruelty in harming someone who is clearly going through something,” Kelly wrote on her Instagram Stories (via The Hollywood Reporter). “Kicking me while I'm down, doubting my pain, spreading my struggles as gossip, and turning your back when I need support and love most. None of it proves strength; it only reveals a profound absence of compassion and character.”
She added, “I'm currently going through the hardest time in my life. I should not even have to defend myself. But I won't sit here and allow myself to be dehumanized in such a way!”
Popular on Rolling Stone
Ozzy Osbourne died last July at 76 years old. His wife, Sharon Osbourne, joined Kelly to accept the award on his behalf on Saturday night. “If Ozzy was here tonight with us, he would be showing us that gorgeous smile that he had and I know he would be so proud to receive this from the country that he loved,” Sharon told the crowd at the BRIT Awards. “So he may not be here, but he left us one amazing body of work that will never be forgotten by the country that made him.”
This is not the first time Kelly has been forced to fend off body-shaming remarks. In December, she shared a now-deleted video addressing the constant speculation.
“To the people who keep thinking they're being funny and mean by writing comments like ‘Are you ill' or ‘Get off Ozempic, you don't look right,'” she said. “My dad just died, and I'm doing the best that I can, and the only thing I have to live for right now is my family. And I choose to share my content with you and share the happy side of my life not the miserable side of my life. So to all those people, fuck off.”
Sharon played the clip during an interview with Piers Morgan and defended her daughter. “She's right,” Sharon told Morgan. “She's lost her daddy. She can't eat right now.”
Trending Stories
Kelly Osbourne Hits Back at ‘Cruelty' Over Her Appearance at the BRIT Awards
MAGA Reacts to Trump's Strikes on Iran: ‘Absolutely Disgusting and Evil'
See Robbie Williams Lead All-Star Ozzy Osbourne Tribute at 2026 Brit Awards
The Real Guess Who Finally Have Their Name Back and Are Hitting the Road
Last August, Kelly admitted that she “will not be OK for a while” after the death of her father. “I've sat down to write this a hundred times and still don't know if the words will ever feel like enough … but from the bottom of my heart, thank you,” Kelly wrote on social media. “The love, support, and beautiful messages I've received from so many of you have truly helped carry me through the hardest moment of my life. Every kind word, every shared memory, every bit of compassion has meant more than I can ever explain.”
She added, “Grief is a strange thing; it sneaks up on you in waves. I will not be OK for a while, but knowing my family [is] not alone in our pain makes a difference.”
We want to hear it. Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Rolling Stone, LLC. All rights reserved.
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
Subscribe for full access to The Hollywood Reporter
The Hollywood Reporter's executive editor of awards coverage dissects Sunday night's ceremony.
By
Scott Feinberg
Executive Editor of Awards
For months, One Battle After Another was winning everything, including the top prizes at the Critics Choice Awards on Jan. 4, Golden Globe Awards on Jan. 11, Directors Guild Awards on Feb. 7, BAFTA Awards on Feb. 22 and Producers Guild Awards on Saturday. But at the Actor Awards (formerly the SAG Awards) on Sunday — the first day of March, and smack dab in the middle of the weeklong final round of Oscars voting — the other big Warner Bros. contender, Sinners, showed major signs of life.
Indeed, Ryan Coogler's blockbuster genre film walked away with the prize for best cast — vanquishing not only One Battle but also Hamnet, Marty Supreme and Frankenstein — and, in the night's biggest surprise, best actor for Michael B. Jordan, calling into question the conventional wisdom about not only the best picture Oscar race, but also the long-presumed frontrunner status of Marty Supreme's Timothée Chalamet in the best actor Oscar race (which was also dinged at last weekend's BAFTA Awards).
Related Video
Related Stories
Movies
Actor Awards Snubs and Surprises: Timothée Chalamet Loses Second Lead Actor Prize in a Row; Keri Russell Nabs Unexpected Win
Movies
All the Highlights From Timothée Chalamet's Night at the 2026 Actor Awards
Before going any further, it must be acknowledged that the Actor Awards and the Oscars are voted on by very different bodies. Actor Award winners are chosen by the roughly 160,000 members of SAG-AFTRA, the world's largest union of actors, who are overwhelmingly based in the U.S., while Oscar winners are chosen by the roughly 11,000 members of the Academy, which is composed of people from every sector of the film industry, 20 percent of whom are based outside of the U.S.
And if one wants proof that the two groups aren't always on the same page, look no further than the discrepancy between the nominations for this year's Actor Awards and this year's Oscars: SAG-AFTRA's nominating committee did not include a single non-English-language performance among its 20 finalists, while the members of the Academy's actors branch, who solely determine the acting Oscar nominees, included four non-English-language performances among its 20.
When it comes to their top prizes — best cast and best picture, respectively — SAG-AFTRA tends to recognize more diverse and populist work than the Academy. For instance, SAG-AFTRA honored The Help, Hidden Figures and Black Panther with its best cast prize, but none went on to win best picture at the Oscars. Indeed, over the 31 years in which both prizes have been given out, their winners overlapped on just 15 occasions.
However, almost every odds-defying best picture Oscar winner in that timespan first won the best cast SAG Award. See: 1998's Shakespeare in Love, 2005's Crash, 2015's Spotlight, 2019's Parasite and 2021's CODA.
It's hard to classify Sinners as an “underdog” for the best picture Oscar when it received 16 nominations, breaking the all-time record by two, and yet, at this point, it is one. The best arguments for Sinners over One Battle are that Sinners might play better on the preferential ballot through which the Academy chooses its winners, and that One Battle could be vulnerable to the same thing that may well have felled past best picture frontrunners like 2016's La La Land and 2019's 1917: some people get bored of the same film winning everything over the course of a very long awards season. We will see.
SAG-AFTRA has a much better track record of “predicting” the Academy's picks in the four individual acting races — although Chalamet presents an interesting case study. Last year he won the best actor Actor Award for his performance in A Complete Unknown and then lost the best actor Oscar to The Brutalist's Adrien Brody. This year he lost the best actor SAG Award for his performance in Marty Supreme but might well still win the best actor Oscar.
What is going on? From what I've been able to gather, many find Marty Mauser, Chalamet's character in Marty Supreme, repellent; some have been put off by Chalamet's swagger on the awards circuit; and others feel that, at just 30, he will have many other chances in the future, which is not a given for some of his competitors. Plus, his movie is not clicking overall in the way that Sinners or One Battle are, and it looks unlikely to win an Oscar in any other category. (Only five of this century's best actor Oscar winners won without their film also winning any other Oscar: Denzel Washington for 2001's Training Day, Philip Seymour Hoffman for 2005's Capote, Forest Whitaker for 2006's The Last King of Scotland, Eddie Redmaybe for 2014's The Theory of Everything and Will Smith for 2021's King Richard.)
Jordan, meanwhile, also gives a tour de force performance (playing twins), and in a movie that has much broader support; has been understated on the campaign trail; and garnered sympathy and admiration following the terribly unfortunate incident at last weekend's BAFTA Awards. Perhaps most crucially, Jordan's Actor Award win comes in the middle of Oscar voting, demonstrating to Academy members that a vote for him could actually make a difference. (Had Chalamet won the Actor Award, many would have seen a Chalamet best actor Oscar win as a fait accompli, much like everyone, following the best actress Actor Award win for Hamnet's Jessie Buckley, sees a best actress Oscar win for her as a done deal.)
Which brings us to the supporting acting categories.
Even with all the Sinners love, the best supporting actress Actor Award went not to Sinners' Wunmi Mosaku (the BAFTA Award winner), nor to One Battle's Teyana Taylor (the Golden Globe Award winner), but to Weapons' Amy Madigan (the Critics Choice Award winner). The case against Madigan repeating at the Oscars is that she's her Oscar category's only nominee who does not hail from a film that is also nominated for the best picture Oscar. I think that's a legitimate concern, given the amount of Oscars coattail voting that has been happening in recent years.
But at the same time, Madigan has literally been acting — and been an Oscar-nominated actress — for longer than any of her fellow nominees have been alive, she has worked with everyone, and she is well-liked. Mosaku and Taylor, like Sentimental Value's Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas if not Elle Fanning, are relatively new to the scene and lack Madigan's name I.D. It will be a nailbiter of a race, but at this point I think the edge has to go to the veteran.
Meanwhile, the best supporting actor Actor Award, like last weekend's corresponding BAFTA Award, went to One Battle's Sean Penn, despite the fact that he has done virtually no campaigning and was, in both contests, competing against a field that included his costar Benicio Del Toro. Penn, who already has two Oscars to his name (one of which currently resides in Ukraine on loan to Volodymyr Zelenskyy), is an all-time great who would be as worthy as anyone of having three acting Oscars (a tally bettered by no male and equaled among males by only Walter Brennan, Jack Nicholson and Daniel Day-Lewis).
But I wouldn't count out two septuagenarian veterans who were not nominated for the best supporting actor Actor Award but are nominated for the best supporting actor Oscar, having never previously been nominated for any Oscar: Sentimental Value's Stellan Skarsgård, who could benefit from the Academy's international vote, and Sinners' Delroy Lindo, who could catch a wave with his film. Their showdown with Penn will put to the test just how much shaking hands and kissing babies does — or doesn't — matter in the modern era.
Sign up for THR news straight to your inbox every day
Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Gone but never forgotten.
Rob Reiner, Catherine O'Hara and Diane Keaton were some of the many celebrities included in Sunday's SAG Actor Awards 2026 In Memoriam segment.
The tribute kicked off with a photo of “Dawson's Creek” star James Van Der Beek — who died on Feb. 11 at the age of 48 following a battle with cancer — appearing on the big screen.
A clip also played of “Grey's Anatomy” star Eric Dane saying, “Don't waste one single minute.” Dane tragically passed away on Feb. 19 at 53, less than a year after announcing he was diagnosed with ALS.
As for O'Hara, she was remembered with a series of clips from her long career, which included projects like “Home Alone” and “Schitt's Creek.”
“When it all comes together, and you make a good movie, it's good forever,” she said in a clip from “The Studio,” which brought O'Hara the first-ever SAG-AFTRA posthumous award for outstanding female actress in a comedy series earlier in the night.
O'Hara died from a pulmonary embolism in Los Angeles on Jan. 30. She was 71.
Start your day with Page Six Daily.
Please provide a valid email.
By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Want celebrity news as it breaks?
Other big names honored Sunday night included Reiner, Keaton, Gene Hackman, Val Kilmer and Robert Redford.
Reiner and his wife, Michele Singer Reiner, were murdered and found dead at their Brentwood home on Dec. 14. The “When Harry Met Sally” director was 78, and his wife was 70.
Keaton died from pneumonia on Oct. 11. The beloved “Annie Hall” star was 79.
Additional notable celebrities remembered during the SAG Actor Awards 2026 included Michelle Trachtenberg, Peter Greene, Graham Greene, Robert Carradine, Brigitte Bardot, James Ransone, Michael Madsen, Loni Anderson, George Wendt, Jonathan Joss, Loretta Swit, Diane Ladd, Julian McMahon and Malcolm-Jamal Warner.
Sarah Paulson introduced the emotional In Memoriam segment with a touching speech before the montage began.
“Actors make up a family of souls bonded by a challenging pursuit, by valuing our creative spirit and often brought close by our mutual support and affection,” she began.
“I am proud to be in the family of actors in this room and all over the world,” the actress added. “It is a tremendous privilege to work and to share such rich times with so many gifted people.”
Paulson went on to describe the celebrities that Hollywood has lost over the past year as “true giants” who were “teachers,” “co-workers,” “inspirations” and “friends.”
“All of us have been lifted by them,” she concluded. “We are happier, wiser, made just a bit more expansive by their shared spirit, and we must remember how lucky we are to have been changed by them, and we have been.”
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
One of the longest awards seasons in history — we're talking all the way back to Sundance 2025 here —concludes in two weeks with the 98th Academy Awards. Tonight, though, marked the 32nd Screen Actors Guild Awards, which are now called the Actor Awards in their first iteration under that name.
Most impactful to the Academy Awards is the winner of Cast Ensemble in a Motion Picture, which this year went to “Sinners.” Michael B. Jordan also won in the best actor category. Presumed ensemble frontrunner “One Battle After Another's” sole win for the night was for Sean Penn in the supporting category. Oscar frontrunner Stellan Skarsgård wasn't a factor here, which could clear the way for either Penn or Jacob Elordi. Meanwhile, last weekend's BAFTA Awards saw Wunmi Mosaku win in her category, but Amy Madigan took the prize this time. Jessie Buckley, as expected, won the best actress award for “Hamnet.”
Related Stories ‘Sinners' Scores Big Actor Awards Wins. Will Oscar Votes Follow? ‘Industry' Finale: Inside the Last Shot and That Weird Flash Frame
Harrison Ford, meanwhile, received the Life Achievement Award as presented by Woody Harrelson with a moving speech that made many of the actors in the room cry.
On the TV side, the Actors made room for shows that weren't “Adolescence” — a first this awards season, with Michelle Williams (“Dying for Sex”) winning out over awards season sweeper Erin Doherty. Though if there were a category for ensemble in a limited series (there isn't), “Adolescence” likely would've won.
All the night's winners are below.
Cast Ensemble in a Motion Picture
“Frankenstein”“Hamnet”“Marty Supreme”“One Battle After Another”“Sinners” WINNER
Male Actor in a Leading Role
Timothée Chalamet, “Marty Supreme”Leonardo DiCaprio, “One Battle after Another”Ethan Hawke, “Blue Moon”Michael B. Jordan, “Sinners” WINNERJesse Plemons, “Bugonia”
Female Actor in a Leading Role
Jessie Buckley, “Hamnet” WINNERRose Byrne, “If I Had Legs I'd Kick You”Kate Hudson, “Song Sung Blue”Chase Infiniti, “One Battle After Another”Emma Stone, “Bugonia”
Female Actor in a Supporting Role
Odessa A'Zion, “Marty Supreme”Ariana Grande, “Wicked: For Good”Amy Madigan, “Weapons” WINNERWunmi Mosaku, “Sinners”Teyana Taylor, “One Battle After Another”
Male Actor in a Supporting Role
Miles Caton, “Sinners”Benicio Del Toro, “One Battle After Another”Jacob Elordi, “Frankenstein”Paul Mescal, “Hamnet”Sean Penn, “One Battle After Another” WINNER
Cast Ensemble in a Drama Series
“The Diplomat”“Landman”“The Pitt” WINNER“Severance”“The White Lotus”
Male Actor in a TV Movie or Limited Series
Jason Bateman, “Black Rabbit”Owen Cooper, “Adolescence” WINNERStephen Graham, “Adolescence”Charlie Hunnam, “Monster: The Ed Gein Story”Matthew Rhys, “The Beast in Me”
Cast Ensemble in a Comedy Series
“Abbott Elementary”“The Bear”“Hacks”“Only Murders in the Building”“The Studio” WINNER
Male Actor in a Drama Series
Sterling K. Brown, “Paradise”Billy Crudup, “The Morning Show”Walton Goggins, “The White Lotus”Gary Oldman, “Slow Horses”Noah Wyle, “The Pitt” WINNER
Female Actor in a Comedy Series
Kathryn Hahn, “The Studio”Catherine O'Hara, “The Studio” WINNERJenna Ortega, “Wednesday”Jean Smart, “Hacks”Kristen Wiig, “Palm Royale”
Female Actor in a TV Movie or Limited Series
Claire Danes, “The Beast in Me”Erin Doherty, “Adolescence”Sarah Snook, “All Her Fault”Christine Tremarco, “Adolescence”Michelle Williams, “Dying for Sex” WINNER
Male Actor in a Comedy Series
Ike Barinholtz, “The Studio”Adam Brody, “Nobody Wants This”Ted Danson, “A Man on the Inside”Seth Rogen, “The Studio” WINNERMartin Short, “Only Murders in the Building”
Female Actor in a Drama Series
Britt Lower, “Severance”Parker Posey, “The White Lotus”Keri Russell, “The Diplomat” WINNERRhea Seehorn, “Pluribus”Aimee Lou Wood, “The White Lotus”
Stunt Ensemble in a Motion Picture
“F1”“Frankenstein”“Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning” WINNER“One Battle After Another”“Sinners”
Stunt Ensemble in a Comedy or Drama Series
“Andor” “Landman” “The Last of Us” WINNER“Squid Game” “Stranger Things”
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Martin Short was not present at the 2026 Actor Awards as he continues to mourn a heartbreaking loss within his family. The 75-year-old actor did not attend Sunday's ceremony on March 1 at theShrine Expo Hall in Los Angeles, days after the death of his daughter, Katherine, who died by suicide at 42 on February 23.
In a quiet show of support, his “Only Murders in the Building” co-stars Selena Gomez and Steve Martin also chose to skip the event, standing by Short during an unimaginably difficult time.
Gomez, 33, and Martin, 80, opted not to attend the ceremony or walk the red carpet as Short grieves privately with his family.
Short had been nominated this year for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series. The award was ultimately presented to Seth Rogen.
“Only Murders in the Building” was also in the running for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series, though the honor went to the cast of “The Studio.”
Since its debut in 2021, “Only Murders in the Building” has received 11 Actor Awards nominations and secured two wins.
In 2025, Short took home Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Comedy Series, and the ensemble earned Best Ensemble in a Comedy Series, marking a high point for the acclaimed series.
Short's absence from the awards was not the only public appearance he stepped away from.
According to TMZ, he has also postponed upcoming dates on his comedy tour as he grieves the sudden loss of his daughter.
The actor had been scheduled to perform alongside longtime friend and “Only Murders in the Building” co-star Steve Martin in Milwaukee and Minneapolis for their tour, “The Best of Steve Martin and Martin Short.”
Venue websites now list the shows as postponed due to “unforeseen circumstances,” with a notice stating:
“IMPORTANT: Steve Martin & Martin Short (2/27/26) POSTPONED Due to unforeseen circumstances, Steve Martin & Martin Short's show, originally scheduled for Friday, February 27, in Milwaukee, has been postponed. Tickets will be honored for a future rescheduled date. We will be in contact with further news when it is available. Please email tickets@ptglive.com with any questions.”
Following Katherine's passing, the Short family released a statement. The statement published by TMZ read:
“It is with profound grief that we confirm the passing of Katherine Hartley Short. The Short family is devastated by this loss and asks for privacy at this time,” the family said.
“Katherine was beloved by all and will be remembered for the light and joy she brought into the world.”
Martin has not yet publicly commented on her daughter's passing.
Katherine was one of three children Short shared with his late wife, Nancy Dolman, who died of ovarian cancer in 2010. The couple adopted Katherine along with her brothers, Oliver Patrick, 39, and Henry Hayter, 36.
TMZ was the first to report that the Los Angeles Fire Department responded to a call at a Hollywood Hills home on the evening of February 23. The L.A. County coroner later confirmed that Katherine died by suicide.
In the days since, Short has stepped back from public events as he mourns privately. Friends, colleagues, and longtime collaborators have continued to surround him with support during this deeply painful time.
Like EntertainmentNow?
Go here and check the boxnext to EntertainmentNow
Comment
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Δ
Previous
Next
About
Contact US
Privacy Policy
Terms Of Service
Editorial Guidelines
Sitemap
Copyright © 2026 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress VIP
At the end of Industry's fourth season, Yasmim (Marisa Abela) and Harper (Myha'la) are the last two standing from the original regular cast. But the final image of Yas lying on a plush Parisian hotel carpet is a haunting reflection of how far the socialite-turned-trader—and everything since—has fallen. If the last season ended with Yas putting her future into the hands of an unstable aristocrat, now the former Lady Muck proves that she can make it on her own. Still, this is no girlboss-fantasy conclusion in finally achieving her goal of being necessary in “Both, And.” Whereas Yas sinks into the darkness with her father's last voicemail playing on repeat, Harper finds a sense of balance in personal and professional matters. The latter concludes on more than a wisp of hope, once again showcasing creators Mickey Down and Konrad Kay's capacity to surprise.
Propulsive pacing that consistently produces surprising narrative turns remains a narrative strength of the HBO financial drama. It has been a riveting season from start to finish, keeping us guessing. Instead of spending the hour reveling in Tender's cataclysmic downfall, the first 20 minutes focus on the immediate aftermath before a time jump allows the majority of the finale to breathe in the months after the fintech company crashed and burned. In doing so, we ruminate in the ashes of this financial disaster (or victory, depending on who is asked) before witnessing the ripple effect of these events that prove that the old boys' club is one of the U.K.'s strongest institutions. Rather than fight it, Yasmin exerts power over influential men using sex (though not with her) as a weapon in her arsenal.
Everything that happens with Yasmin and Henry (Kit Harington) in the finale can be traced back to the exceptional “The Commander And The Grey Lady,” in which Yas sees a nightmare vision of her future in the form of her Aunt Cordelia (Claire Forlani). “A little dispassion, it could save you. Get off your knees,” Cordelia told her niece. Seeing her aunt giving Lord Mostyn (Roger Barclay) a blowjob proved that Cordelia wasn't as free as she made out, but Yas still took her advice (and paid heed to this cautionary tale). If only Henry had shown his rare out-of-character backbone to his wife, then maybe the Muck marriage might have made it into its second year.
Instead, the confrontation with Whitney (Max Minghella) on the fugitive plane is for an audience of one. It is deliberately jarring, sandwiching this scene between Henry in a familiar pleading mode as he begs Yas not to leave him. Yas makes good on the ultimatum she gave at Henry's birthday party: demanding a divorce if Henry cannot commit to a partnership. Shooting this dissolution in tight close-ups adds to the intensity and claustrophobic nature of this marriage that was doomed from its inception. If there is one moment that sums up how Henry's life is panning out, it is the silent screaming “Fuck” after Whitney calls with different demands.
Sticking to a story is an overarching theme this season, as is the tension between tradition and disruption. Whitney thought he could massage Henry's fragile ego and find the perfect partner to manipulate. It worked up to a point, but Whitney's mistake is failing to grasp what matters most to Henry: his identity and standing. If Henry doesn't have his titles, then who is he? Privilege runs through Sir Henry Muck's blue-blood veins, and he isn't about to trade that for a Lithuanian passport and semblance of freedom. Having this confrontation in the tight confines of Whitney's getaway vehicle, as the pilots are preparing for takeoff, adds an extra layer of peril. Part of me thought that Henry's tirade was going to be punctuated by the plane making its ascent before he could get off. Henry's bad luck doesn't stretch that far.
After being in control for most of the season, Whitney has very little he can say. Minghella and Harington have been a standout pair throughout the fourth season, including in this role-reversal moment. Henry takes great pleasure in revealing how little he thinks of Whitney in the cold light of day: “Eat my shit, you peasant.” Aside from fraud, Whitney's grand crime in Henry's eyes is not having the dignity to know his place. “I'd rather die as me than run as you” is quite the kiss off. Hell hath no fury like a posh Brit scorned.
Henry's roots come back to haunt him through the plausible deniability his mental-health history gives the shadowy forces pulling Whitney's strings. Having seen the spiked gates outside Henry's residence, I took these as a symbol of the prison he is now in, but it turns out they could also be how he meets a sticky end. It isn't the most subtle imagery, but it hammers home the point that to stay alive, Henry needs to stick to the narrative that Whitney is to blame.
As has become a pattern this year, the timing of these episodes airing amid the Epstein-files fallout continues to speak to the different levers being pulled by Fleet Street and Downing Street in the U.K., even if some of those big political swings feel less developed. Here, Henry is hammered by headlines, but still ends the episode fishing with his uncle and Mostyn. The ankle monitor and the Lithium (medication he previously stipulated muted everything) are a compromise. However, he still gets to enjoy the spoils of his privilege, summed up by “For He Is An Englishman” on the soundtrack.
Access is how Yas sells her current venture, a continuation of the setup where Harper first met Whitney. Since Jennifer Beven (Amy James-Kelly) rejected Yasmin's friendship and consulting bona fides in the previous episode, Yas takes a sharp turn right, organizing fundraisers for Reform UK's hot young prospect Sebastian Stefanowicz (Edward Holcroft). If one Industry strength is knowing when a character has come to the end of their road (even if I still miss Rob and now Eric), another is introducing players before they impact the overarching storyline. Stefanowicz has been popping up on TV coverage, positioning himself as the person to bring about real change to the usual political back-and-forths. It is even more disturbing when Yas starts parroting his right-wing talking points like a chameleon lacking any beliefs of her own.
At the dinner party in Paris, we experience this new Yas phase through Harper's eyes, which grow in horror with the more thinly veiled Nazi rhetoric she endures. Myha'la runs the gamut of horrified reactions, culminating in the realization that Yas has taken over the exploitation business that Whitney was peddling. In the great debate over likeability, the question of Yasmin arises earlier when Kwabena (Toheeb Jimoh) mentions a friend who went to school with Yas, who called her a “pretty nasty piece of work.” Harper knows Yas is a survivor, but by the end of her Parisian experience, she finds it hard to look her friend in the eye. Having Yas spell out the “both, and” theory also feels like a response to viewers who don't know who to root for. A character can do heinous things, but Yas didn't happen in a vacuum. Without the context of her father (and his death), it would be easy to write Yas off, but her final scene highlights why she has slipped into this abyss.
Still, it is hard to watch her take Harper's hand and reject the offer to leave, choosing exploitation under the guise of aiding young women. Between Eric (Ken Leung) leaving and her mother dying, Harper has endured plenty of heartbreak, but this cut might be the deepest. Harper can't even persuade any of the girls to leave with her. Having “Ne Me Quitte Pas” by Jacques Brel as Harper's exit music underscores the high drama.
The resolution with Kwabena, followed by Harper's comments on the plane about people changing, offers a hopeful ending, despite how we left Yas in Paris. Two things can be true at once, and Down and Kay continue to find ways to push this story forward even after shedding much of the original lineup. It was just announced that the series has been renewed for a fifth and final season, and there is plenty of runway for Harper and Yasmin, and whoever else gets pulled into their high-octane orbit for one last debauched dance. Four seasons in, Industry's stock continues to rise.
Emma Fraser is a contributor to The A.V. Club.
Recommended for You1"Thousands of layoffs" anticipated under terms of $111 billion Warner Bros./Paramount deal2Where to watch the 2026 Oscar nominees3DTF St. Louis is really effing good4It's-a not you, it's-a me, Mario: Why Nintendo's heroes and princesses aren't going steady5Star-studded audio drama Bronzeville brought a "Black Metropolis" to life
© 2026 Paste Media Group. All Rights Reserved
Director Connie Lamothe is remembering the late Robert Carradine as “positive and upbeat” in the weeks before his tragic passing— and honoring the actor by dedicating what may have been his final film to him.
Carradine, 71, tragically passed following a nearly two-decade battle with bipolar disorder, his family confirmed. The veteran actor had recently been cast in Lamothe's mafia film, “The Driver,” where he was set to portray the film's don, Antonio Politano.
Production had faced delays during the pandemic but was finally moving forward earlier this year. Lamothe said Carradine had been enthusiastic about beginning the project.
“The last conversation was positive and upbeat,” she revealed in an interview with The Daily Mail. “He spoke to Wayne [Shipley, his friend/Lamothe's colleague] and was good to go. There was nothing that suggested otherwise. That was in the middle of January. The discussion was mostly about specifics for the table read.”
Lamothe said Carradine — affectionately known as “Bobby” — was deeply enthusiastic about participating in the film's table read, originally scheduled for Feb. 21.
“Bobby was very gung-ho about that. Wanted to come. Definitely wanted to do it. And so that was great. So we got everything all set. We had set the date for February 21 and Wayne, to be honest, was doing most of the communicating with Bobby, and all of a sudden he just stopped,” she said.
While concerned, she said they ultimately chose to give him space as production planning continued.
Although Carradine's role will now be recast, Lamothe revealed the film will move forward in his memory.
“We'll dedicate the film to him, without a doubt, because I think he deserved the part. And you know, just in my mind, he was that part,” she said.
The upcoming table read will also include a tribute to the late actor.
“We will definitely dedicate the film to him. And I think that we've decided that at the read, we're going to go ahead and… probably a prayer and just talk about it a little bit,” said the director.
“Wayne was going to have somebody put together kind of a slideshow type thing. He's got some great photos of Bobby.” She added, “I do hope that once we get this thing done… that people will watch it and maybe think of him and kind of maybe can see him in that role.”
Carradine's family confirmed his passing in a statement shared with Deadline.
“It is with profound sadness that we must share that our beloved father, grandfather, uncle, and brother Robert Carradine has passed away,” his family announced on Monday.
The statement continued, “In a world that can feel so dark, Bobby was always a beacon of light to everyone around him.”
Carradine built a decades-long career in film and television. He was widely known for his role in “The Revenge of the Nerds” and for portraying Sam McGuire on “Lizzie McGuire” from 2001 to 2004. His credits also included films such as “The Cowboys,” “Main Street” and “Coming Home.”
Like EntertainmentNow?
Go here and check the boxnext to EntertainmentNow
To me….some one who ends their life by suicide, does not poses any empathy for the one who have to live with his death. Once my one and only told me this, is why I could never ever put the ones I Love through such pain. OMG, having no regard for your loved ones. Wow!!!! Never Ever take your life. We suffer, not you so much. Common Sense.
Comment
Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Δ
Previous
Next
About
Contact US
Privacy Policy
Terms Of Service
Editorial Guidelines
Sitemap
Copyright © 2026 Heavy, Inc. All rights reserved. Powered by WordPress VIP
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
[Editor's note: The following interview contains spoilers for “Industry” Season 4, Episode 8, “Both, And.”]
In the “Industry” Season 4 finale, after Harper (Myha'la) completes her interview and reflects on taking down Tender, there's a sense she doesn't know what's next. Flying on a private jet, she's achieved the wealth and recognition that drove her as a nascent trader. Kwabena (Toheeb Jimoh) sits across the aisle, reminding her she's no longer a lone wolf; she has a team she cares about, and she's even making an attempt at real relationships. Have the events of the season changed her?
Then a flight attendant interrupts Harper's introspective daze, asking if she would like another gin and tonic.
Popular on IndieWire
Related Stories ‘Sinners' Wins SAG's Actor Award for Cast Ensemble in a Motion Picture WGA West Cancels Los Angeles Award Show as Staff Continues to Strike
“Are you done?” the flight attendant asks, to which Harper responds by ever-so-slowly looking up, with a knowing look.
“Industry” creators Konrad Kay and Mickey Down borrowed the final image of Season 4 from the last shot of “Mad Men‘s” Season 5 finale, a series that has had a tremendous influence on their young TV careers as well as their hit HBO series.
“It was like the ‘Mad Men' ending where the woman walks up to Don [Jon Hamm] in the bar — and he's tried not be a philanderer that season — and she says, ‘Are you alone?' And he looks up, and it's like, of course, there's more. Of course, the loop is going to start again. It was that kind of ending,” Kay said when he and Down were guests on the Toolkit podcast in an episode available March 2.
It's a very different ending than Seasons 2 and 3, which Kay and Down have acknowledged as being concerted efforts to tie up storylines in case “Industry” was not renewed. But having signed a big overall deal with HBO heading into Season 4, Wednesday's announcement that the series was being renewed for a fifth (and final) season was expected.
“To be honest, we wrote [Season] 3 as a definitive ending,” Kay said. “And that look — the ‘Are you done' and Harper looking up the camera — was a bit of a nod to continuation.”
After Harper's Don Draper moment, there's a cut to black, followed by the distinctive “Industry” logo, but before the credits roll, you might have noticed a flash frame. It's a quick blip, so if you noticed it at all, you may have assumed it was a streaming glitch.
But it wasn't.
“After the ‘Industry' flash at the end of the episode, there's a single frame. It's intentional, it's deliberate,” Kay said, adding it came from a deleted scene. “We shot a whole three-minute sequence, which we cut for time, which was kind of beautiful, actually.”
Rewind to pause on the single frame, and you might be able to make out that it's Whitney (Max Minghella) enclosed in a circular border.
“It's Whitney looking through a glory hole,” Down said. “We shot this entire scene of him in Lithuania, having escaped, where he is talking to a man at the bar, the implication being: Is that man a potential lover, or is it someone that's going to be a threat? And you leave him on this moment where he follows the guy into the bathroom, and the guy says, ‘Come in here,' and there's a glory hole, and we shot Whitney through it. If you are eagle-eyed, you'll see that we used one frame of it basically.”
The glory hole hearkens back to Episode 6, when Whitney brings Henry (Kit Harrington) to a gay night club and leads him to a glory hole. As Down had told IndieWire before, it was his hope that Judy Collins' song “Both Sides Now,” which closed that episode as Eric (Ken Leung) walks away, would also have been used as Whitney watches Henry at the glory hole. But the song's rights holder wouldn't allow it.
“I wanted to put that Judy Collins' song over that moment as well because he's forcing and grooming Henry into that moment. He's pushing him into a glory hole, he's whispering in his ear, saying, ‘You are worthwhile, everything about you is worthwhile, you are valid,'” Down said. “And I felt like that was some nice circularity of [Whitney] looking at that glory hole [in Episode 8] thinking, ‘Am I valid? Am I worthwhile? Is this going to kill me or fuck me?'”
To hear Kay and Down's full interview on March 2, after the season finale, subscribe to the Filmmaker Toolkit podcast on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Catherine O'Hara won the outstanding female actress in a comedy series award at the 2026 SAG Actor Awards Sunday, one month after her heartbreaking death.
O'Hara became the first woman in history to win a posthumous SAG Actor Award.
She won for her role as Patty Leigh in Apple TV's “The Studio.” The show's creator, Seth Rogen, accepted the reward on her behalf onstage.
Advertisement
Rogen gave an emotional speech, in which he noted that she would have been honored to receive the award from her fellow performers.
Advertisement
He also remembered that she was “generous, kind and ferocious while never minimizing her own talents.”
“She knew she could destroy and she wanted to destroy every day on set,” he recalled.
“She really showed you can be a genius and kind and one doesn't have to come at the expense of the other way in any shape or form,” he said as the audience clapped.
He encouraged people to view O'Hara's legendary on-screen performances, sharing, “we're lucky to live in a world where she shared her talent with us.”
Advertisement
The tribute had actors in the audience emotional, including O'Hara's “Beetlejuice Beetlejuice” co-star Jenny Ortega, who was filmed wiping away tears.
Advertisement
The two-time Emmy winner faced off in the category against Jean Smart (“Hacks”), Ortega (“Wednesday”), Kristen Wiig (“Palm Royale”), and Kathryn Hahn (“The Studio”).
She's also nominated for a second trophy as an ensemble member in “The Studio,” alongside Seth Rogen, Hahn, Ike Barinholtz and Chase Sui Wonders.
O'Hara died on Jan. 30 at age 71.
Start your day with Page Six Daily.
Please provide a valid email.
By clicking above you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Want celebrity news as it breaks?
According to a statement to Page Six from Creative Artists Agency (the agency O'Hara was signed to), she passed in her Los Angeles home “following a brief illness.”
As Page Six exclusively reported at the time, the “Schitt's Creek” star had been rushed to the hospital early that morning in “serious” condition after she reported to first responders she was having “breathing difficulty.”
Advertisement
On Feb. 9, the actress' cause of death was revealed to be a pulmonary embolism.
However, the County of Los Angeles Department of Public Health noted rectal cancer as the underlying issue that resulted in her death.
Advertisement
Per TMZ, O'Hara's body was cremated in accordance with her final wishes.
On Saturday, Feb. 14, she was laid to rest in a private memorial ceremony held at St. Martin of Tours Church in Los Angeles.
Advertisement
In a post from Kelly Lynch honoring O'Hara's life, fans of the late star were given a close look at her funeral service booklet
“Rest in peace darling Catherine,” Lynch, 67, wrote on Instagram alongside a picture of the booklet.
“And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so? I did,” Lynch wrote, quoting writer Raymond Carver. “And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the earth.”
By
Jodi Guglielmi
Catherine O'Hara was awarded the Actor for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series at the 2026 Actor Awards on Sunday night for her role in The Studio, two months after her unexpected death.
The audience gave O'Hara an emotional standing ovation when her name was announced. Seth Rogen accepted the award on her behalf, recalling her “genius” and kindness on the set of The Studio, where she played studio executive Patty Leigh.
“I know she would have been honored to receive this award from her fellow performers, who I know she respected so much — she was such big fans of all of yours,” Rogen said. “I obviously you know, have been reflecting on the time I was fortunate enough to spend with her, working with her, and something that I've just been marveling at over the last few weeks was really her ability to be generous and kind and gracious, while never ever minimizing her own talents and her own ability to contribute to the work that we were doing. She knew she could destroy, and she wanted to destroy every day on set. And I haven't said this to the other actors, because I didn't want them to get ideas, but pretty much, every evening before she had a shooting day on our show, she would email me and Evan, an email that always was pretty similar, and said, ‘Hello, I hope you'll consider the following.' And then there would be a completely rewritten version of the scene she was in.”
Rogen continued, “And literally, 100 percent of the time, it made not just her character better, but it made the scene better and the entire show better as a whole. And she really showed that you can be a genius and be kind, and one of those things does not have to come at the expense of the other in any way, shape or form.”
Trending Stories
Kelly Osbourne Hits Back at ‘Cruelty' Over Her Appearance at the BRIT Awards
MAGA Reacts to Trump's Strikes on Iran: ‘Absolutely Disgusting and Evil'
See Robbie Williams Lead All-Star Ozzy Osbourne Tribute at 2026 Brit Awards
The Real Guess Who Finally Have Their Name Back and Are Hitting the Road
O'Hara died on Jan. 30 at the age of 71 after privately battling cancer.
O'Hara was one of the most celebrated comic actresses of her generation. She emerged out of the Toronto chapter of the Second City, first garnering attention on the improv and sketch troupe's hit series, SCTV. She went on to make memorable appearances in an array of movies, including the Home Alone series, Beetlejuice, and Martin Scorsese's After Hours. More recently, O'Hara earned wide acclaim (and several awards) for her performance as Moira Rose on the hit TV series Schitt's Creek. Just last year, she received additional Emmy nominations for her work on The Studio and The Last of Us.
We want to hear it. Send us a tip using our anonymous form.
Rolling Stone is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2026 Rolling Stone, LLC. All rights reserved.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
The Writers Guild of America West has cancelled its Los Angeles award show due to an ongoing staff strike, the organization announced in a press release on Sunday morning.
The show was originally scheduled for Sunday, March 8 in downtown Los Angeles, though its status has been in question since February 17, when the 110 non-supervisory WGA West staff members who comprise the Writers Guild Staff Union formally went on strike.
“As a labor union, we would not ask our guests to cross a picket line to attend the awards show,” WGA West President Michele Mulroney said in a statement. “The WGAW staff union has the right to strike, and our exceptional nominees and honorees deserve an uncomplicated celebration of their achievements… I would like to thank the talented WGAW staff, WGAW Awards Committee, producers, writers, event planning professionals, presenters, host Atsuko Okatsuka, and crew who all poured their creativity into what was certain to be an incredible event. I look forward to celebrating our 2026 nominees later this year, and returning next year with a great show.”
Popular on IndieWire
Related Stories ‘Sinners' Scores Big Actor Awards Wins. Will Oscar Votes Follow? ‘Sinners' Wins SAG's Actor Award for Cast Ensemble in a Motion Picture
“We are saddened by the cancellation of the Writers Guild Awards Los Angeles ceremony, an event many of us take great pride in producing each year,” the WGSU wrote on the union's official Instagram account. “We hope that guild management returns to the table and bargains in good faith so that future disruptions to guild members can be avoided.”
The news ensures that the 2026 WGA Awards will look much more like a conventional award show. The guild's awards are traditionally unveiled via two simultaneous ceremonies, one in New York and one in Los Angeles, that often present the same awards at different times. The New York ceremony will proceed as scheduled in the Edison Ballroom next Sunday — and while the two shows are organized by two separate locals, winners are voted on by the entire WGA. Given that the WGA East operates under a separately negotiated collective bargaining agreement, and its workers are not on strike, the ceremony can proceed with nominees in attendance as usual. The results will be unchanged, so all eyes will be on the New York ceremony for one of the final major guild award shows of the 2025-2026 season.
By providing your information, you agree to our Terms of Use and our Privacy Policy.
We use vendors that may also process your information to help provide our services. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA Enterprise and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Instead of waiting for the United States government to confirm the existence of extra-terrestrials, we could just ask Randy Blythe.
Blythe, 55, has seen a lot during his tenure as singer and frontman for Richmond, Virginia's Lamb Of God—that's what happens when you're from the same town as GWAR. And while GWAR's legion of bloodthirsty cosmic barbarians are mostly fictional, Blythe was deadly serious when talking about his own close encounter with Clutch singer Neil Fallon.
"Yes, I'm pretty sure I've seen one, by the house I rented down on Oak Island, North Carolina," Blythe told Fallon in a special Metal Hammerfeature where Randy fielded questions from his fellow musicians. Fallon wanted to know if Blythe had seen a UFO, and the "Into Oblivion" singer said that the alleged encounter happened when he was "a block from the ocean."
"I was sitting on the front porch there with my friend, T-Roy from Sourvein, and his girlfriend," said Blythe. "All of a sudden, we saw these two sets of four lights in a kind of square pattern over the ocean, very bright. They went horizontal very quickly, one this way and one that way, then they went up and then down, and then they both shot into the sky at an incredible speed. We were honestly freaked out."
Blythe reasoned that it couldn't have been a military vehicle; "they can't go that fast," he said, adding that what he saw wasn't a drone.
"I am not obsessed with aliens or weird conspiracy stuff like some of my friends, but I think it's improbable that we're the only intelligent thing in the universe," added Blythe. "And I definitely saw an unidentified flying object that night."
In recent years, the term "unidentified aerial phenomena" (UAP) has been used alongside "unidentified flying objects." In 2023, lawmakers passed a bill signed by then-President Joe Bidenthat required the National Archives and Records Administration to establish a collection of government documents about UAPs, according to USA Today. In September 2025, Congress held its third UAP-related hearing in as many years, where four witnesses discussed their first-hand experiences of alleged UAP.
One doesn't need to "phone home" to catch Lamb of God this year. The band will release their tenth album, Into Oblivion, on March 13 via Epic Records. A few days later, they'll embark on their Into Oblivion North American tour, trekking across North America.
Related: 2000s Metal Legends Announce First New Album in Four Years Along With Massive Tour
This story was originally published by Parade on Mar 2, 2026, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
The truth is out there for Lamb Of God's Randy Blythe
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here's how it works.
Select the newsletters you'd like to receive. Then, add your email to sign up.
You are now subscribed
Your newsletter sign-up was successful
Want to add more newsletters?
Every Friday
Louder
Louder's weekly newsletter is jam-packed with the team's personal highlights from the last seven days, including features, breaking news, reviews and tons of juicy exclusives from the world of alternative music.
Every Friday
Classic Rock
The Classic Rock newsletter is an essential read for the discerning rock fan. Every week we bring you the news, reviews and the very best features and interviews from our extensive archive. Written by rock fans for rock fans.
Every Friday
Metal Hammer
For the last four decades Metal Hammer has been the world's greatest metal magazine. Created by metalheads for metalheads, ‘Hammer takes you behind the scenes, closer to the action, and nearer to the bands that you love the most.
Every Friday
Prog
The Prog newsletter brings you the very best of Prog Magazine and our website, every Friday. We'll deliver you the very latest news from the Prog universe, informative features and archive material from Prog's impressive vault.
Lamb Of God's Randy Blythe has shared a strange experience where he thinks he may have seen a UFO. Speaking to Metal Hammer for a special feature where he answers questions from his fellow musicians, the frontman is asked by Clutch singer Neil Fallon if he's ever encountered visitors in the skies.
“Yes, I'm pretty sure I've seen one, by the house I rented down on Oak Island, North Carolina," Randy explains. "It was a block from the ocean. I was sitting on the front porch there with my friend, T-Roy from Sourvein, and his girlfriend. All of a sudden we saw these two sets of four lights in a kind of square pattern over the ocean, very bright. They went horizontal very quickly, one this way and one that way, then they went up and then down, and then they both shot into the sky at an incredible speed. We were honestly freaked out."
Blythe also addresses some of the easier ways to debunk or explain what he saw.
“I'm quite aware of our military take-off vehicles, and they can't go that fast," he reasons. "They weren't drones. I am not obsessed with aliens or weird conspiracy stuff like some of my friends, but I think it's improbable that we're the only intelligent thing in the universe. And I definitely saw an unidentified flying object that night.”
Lamb Of God are due to release their twelfth studio album, Into Oblivion, later this month. In January, the band released the title track as a single and Blythe explained the meaning of Into Oblivion.
"That's where we're heading," Blythe said in a press release. "In general, the album is about the ongoing and rapid breakdown of the social contract, particularly here in America. Things are acceptable now that would've horrified people just 20 years ago.”
Lamb Of God are due to tour North America in support of the record from March 17, the tour kicking off in Oxon Hill, Maryland. The band will also play US festivals Welcome To Rockville and Sonic Temple, before heading over to Europe for more festival appearances, including a headline performance at Bloodstock in the UK.
Sign up below to get the latest from Metal Hammer, plus exclusive special offers, direct to your inbox!
The new issue of Metal Hammer is on-sale Thursday. Check back on the website for updates on content and the bands featured in this month's magazine.
News editor for Metal Hammer, Rich has never met a feature he didn't fancy, which is just as well when it comes to covering everything rock, punk and metal for both print and online. He's as happy digging up new bands from around the world and covering scenes in countries like Morocco and Estonia as he is covering world-conquering acts like Sleep Token, Black Sabbath and Deftones.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.
Louder is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.
©
Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury,
Bath
BA1 1UA. All rights reserved. England and Wales company registration number 2008885.
Please login or signup to comment
Please wait...
Photo: Professor Hannah Fry, delivering a TED Talk lecture. (Screenshot)
I was trying to watch a TED Talk the other day — British mathematician Hannah Fry discussing ‘The Mathematics of Love' — but before YouTube would allow me to view it, I had to listen to physicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, in an advertisement, explain the world in one simple sentence.
This was a YouTube advertisement for the “Master Class” program that features really smart people teaching you about their area of expertise. Dr. Tyson's area of expertise is astrophysics.
I can't quote Dr. Tyson exactly, but what he said was essentially:
The big challenge for a human being is knowing enough about something to make you believe you're “right”… but not knowing enough to know you're “wrong”.
I don't know if Dr. Tyson was right or wrong when he said that, but I have the distinct impression he thought he was right.
This wasn't the message I hoped to receive when I accessed the YouTube video of ‘The Mathematics of Love' lecture. But sometimes you have to watch the advertisement before they let you in.
Does Professor Hannah Fry know enough about ‘The Mathematics of Love' to know she when she's ‘wrong'? Because that might be an important question.
She began her lecture with a reference to a 2010 essay by University of Warwick PhD candidate Peter Backus, which has reportedly been downloaded hundreds of thousands of times — rather unusual for a technical mathematics essay, knowing how most people feel about mathematics. The paper was titled, “Why I Don't Have a Girlfriend” and in it, Mr. Backus modified the famous Drake Equation to calculate the number of women in the UK who might be willing to date him.
Dr. Frank Drake formulated his equation in 1961 as a mathematical way to estimate the number of active, intelligent civilizations in the Milky Way Galaxy. (Not including any that might be found on Earth.) Dr. Drake had become engaged in searching for extraterrestrial radio signals that could indicate an intelligent species trying to contact other intelligent species with some kind of radio message.
In preparation for a 1961 conference about this type of ambitious search, Dr. Drake formulated an equation.
Unfortunately, the equation is worthless because Earth-based science cannot reliably define most of the variables.
But the variables in Peter Backus' equation — used to calculate mathematically why he didn't have a girlfriend — could conceivably be scientifically defined to generate an approximate number N…
…N being the number of women in the UK likely to end up dating Mr. Backus (age 31 at the time his paper was published.) By inserting defined terms such as…
The
fraction
of
people
in
the
UK
who
are
women
and
The fraction of women who are age 24-34
and
The fraction of women who live near Mr. Backus in London
and
The fraction of women that Mr. Backus might find attractive
and
The fraction of women who might find Mr. Backus attractive
…he solved the equation and arrived at the the following conclusion:
A rough estimate puts the number of potential girlfriends accounting for these three additional criteria (1 in 20 of the women find me attractive, half are single, and I get along with 1 in 10) at 26. That's correct. There are 26 women in London with whom I might have a wonderful relationship. So, on a given night out in London there is a 0.0000034% chance of meeting one of these special people, about 100 times better than finding an alien civilization we can communicate with.
As mentioned, Dr. Hannah Fry referred to Mr. Backus' formula at the beginning of her TED Talk.
Dr. Fry is the Professor of the Public Understanding of Mathematics at the University of Cambridge, a fellow of Queens' College, Cambridge, and president of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications. She was previously a professor at University College London.
But in her TED talk, she addressed something possibly useful to the average non-mathematician: three tips on how to succeed in finding a suitable lifelong partner, by applying mathematics to your activities. You can view the whole TED Talk here.
I found her lecture to be mildly amusing, although not extremely useful — since it was obviously aimed at people who are trying to find and retain a lifelong partner. I already tried that, many years ago, and failed miserably.
But one thing I found disturbing. While sharing the story about Peter Backus and his published paper, Dr. Fry summarized Mr. Backus' conclusion:
“Of all the women in the UK, all Peter is looking for is someone who lives near him, somebody in the right age range, somebody with a university degree, somebody he might get on well with, somebody who's likely to be attractive, and somebody who's likely to find him attractive…
“And he comes up with an estimate of 26 women in the whole of the UK. It's not looking very good, is it, Peter?
“Now just to put that into perspective, that's about 400 times fewer that the best estimates of how many intelligent extraterrestrial lifeforms there are…”
The TED Talk audience graced Dr. Fry with good-hearted laughter.
But I wasn't laughing, because I had actually read Peter Backus' paper… and in his conclusion, he wrote that…
…on a given night out in London there is a 0.0000034% chance of meeting one of these special people, about 100 times better than finding an alien civilization we can communicate with.
So what is it?
Are Mr. Backus' chances of meeting the love of his life “100 times better than finding an alien civilization we can communicate with”…?
Or are his chances — as Dr. Fry stated — “400 times fewer that the best estimates of how many intelligent extraterrestrial lifeforms there are”…?
Because, I don't think we can have it both ways.
Am I wrong?
Underrated writer Louis Cannon grew up in the vast American West, although his ex-wife, given the slightest opportunity, will deny that he ever grew up at all. You can read more stories on his Substack account.
The Pagosa Daily Post is published by Bill Hudson Productions, PO Box 2152, Pagosa Springs CO 81147. Phone: 970-903-2673
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR are welcome. Send to pagosadailypost@gmail.com
Indicate that you would like to share your letter with our readers.
ALL OTHER COMMUNICATIONS can be sent to pagosadailypost@gmail.com.
Content on the Daily Post is shared via a CREATIVE COMMONS license. Learn more here.
News / Email / Weather / Video
Advertisement
For premium support please call:
For premium support please call:
During the late 1960s, a top-secret Soviet program to sneak nuclear weapons around U.S. early warning radars was mistaken for a rash of UFO sightings by Moscow's citizens. The weapon, known as FOBS, created a mysterious pattern in the night sky that many mistook for signs of alien visitation.
In the spring of 1967, people living in the western Soviet Union noticed something odd in the sky at dusk: a mysterious crescent-shaped sliver of light, about the size of the moon from most directions but larger from others. The crescent appeared six times in 1967, always at the same time of day, before it finally disappeared.
According to veteran space expert James Oberg at Air & Space Magazine, the Soviet press speculated they were UFOs, and UFO enthusiast groups sprang up across the country to record the sightings.
Suddenly, after the sixth incident, Soviet press coverage of the incidents abruptly stopped. Someone in Moscow with the right clearance realized that the crescents in the sky at sundown were actual evidence of a top-secret weapons test—one that violated existing treaties on the deployment of nuclear weapons into space.
The “UFO” sightings were actually test launches of the R-36 Orb, a secret nuclear space missile. Developed from the SS-9 Scarp intercontinental ballistic missile, the R-36 Orb was designed to rocket into low-Earth orbit and de-orbit over the United States. Launched in a southern direction, the weapon could pass over the South Pole and then come at the United States from the direction of Mexico, bypassing the network of early warning radars facing north.
The trip would be longer, but would catch the Americans by surprise, allowing the Soviets the chance to detonate a 2-3 megaton thermonuclear weapon wherever they might choose.
Advertisement
The R-36 was a so-called “first strike” weapon. The only logical reason to have such a weapon was to use it first in a nuclear war, as a surprise weapon meant to destroy American leadership and nuclear command and control systems. The problem? The R-36 was not accurate.
On average, half of R-36s launched in a war would land within three miles of their target. That's not a deal breaker with a 5-megaton warhead, but it does rule out destroying enemy missile silos. Still, the R-36 would retain use when it came to wiping out the White House, Pentagon, U.S. nuclear bombers sitting on the tarmac, and other vital U.S. installations in a surprise attack.
The Soviet military conducted six tests of the R-36, each at the exact time of day when the missiles were illuminated but the recording cameras were in shadow. The illuminated crescent was caused by the weapon's braking maneuver, in which the de-orbit engine fired up and spewed exhaust as the weapon turned 180 degrees. This created a clearly visible letter “C” in the early evening sky. This slowed the R-36 down so that it entered low earth orbit, and would be fired back up again later to begin the de-orbiting process.
Although the Soviets initially explained away the tests as launches of “scientific research satellites,” American intelligence eventually figured out what they were up to and called the USSR out on it. Within eight months of the first test, according to Oberg, the U.S. claimed the R-36 was a first-strike weapon that used an orbit/de-orbit scheme.
This would run afoul of the Outer Space Treaty, which was nearing completion and which would ban the placement of nuclear weapons in orbit. It would also run counter to U.N. Resolution 1884, passed in 1963, which called on the U.S. and U.S.S.R. not to place nuclear weapons in space.
The Soviet Union never came clean about the R-36. Eighteen of the weapons were based in silos near Tyuratam, and later banned by the SALT II arms control treaty. The weapons had long since been obsolete, foiled by the deployment of new, southward-facing American early warning radars and Soviet ballistic missile submarines that could launch an attack from that direction much more quickly. The UFOs, it turned out, were not so unidentified after all.
You Might Also Like
The Do's and Don'ts of Using Painter's Tape
The Best Portable BBQ Grills for Cooking Anywhere
Can a Smart Watch Prolong Your Life?
Advertisement