Laser enrichment could cut nuclear fuel costs; organ preservation advances

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This is today’s edition of The Download , our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.

How lasers could help provide fuel for nuclear reactors

Nuclear power provides about 9% of global electricity today, and that fraction could tick up as countries look to build new reactors. New, cheaper methods to obtain fuel could help ensure that those nuclear projects stay on track.

One of those methods is called laser enrichment. It allows you to separate out the material you want (in this case, uranium) from others in a mixture of old waste.

A company called Global Laser Enrichment (GLE) is about to start testing whether the technology works at commercial scale. Read our story about their efforts .

—Casey Crownhart

The quest to keep organs alive outside the body

It’s super difficult to freeze organs. Once ice forms in them, they’re done. The ice crystals create all kinds of damage and render the organs unusable. That hasn’t stopped many researchers from trying.

In new research, one team has been able to supercool the kidneys of pigs and preserve them for days. The kidneys survived being stored at −4 °C (25 °F) and eventually reimplanted back into pigs. And that’s just the latest development in a field that is positively buzzing.

Read about why it’s such an exciting time for organ preservation—and what could be coming next.

—Jessica Hamzelou

This story is from The Checkup, our weekly biotech newsletter. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Thursday.

The must-reads

I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.

1 Silicon Valley is split over how to respond to Chinese AI

It boils down to whether AI models should be open or closed. ( NYT $)

+ Nvidia, Microsoft and Meta warn that restricting open models would backfire. ( CNBC )

+ AI companies are spending record sums on lobbying Washington. ( FT $)

+ China’s AI models have Trump’s AI world at war with itself. ( MIT Technology Review )

2 Trump can’t post his way out of this war

Iran has revealed hard limits to his ability to bend reality to his will. ( Atlantic $)

+ Trump has been forced to abandon further escalation due to dwindling munitions stockpiles. ( NYT $)

+ An Iranian strike on CIA facilities has raised questions about Russian involvement. ( Reuters $)

3 Wildfires are surging across Europe

Repeated heat waves have turned parts of the continent into a tinder box. ( BBC )

+ One of the fires forced NASA to evacuate a tracking station in Spain. ( Ars Technica )

+ Americans are increasingly grappling with smoky skies too. ( Atlantic $)

4 OpenAI didn’t notice its agent going on a days-long hacking spree

It only cottoned on after the threat was contained and the FBI had been alerted, sources say. ( Reuters $)

5 The AI jobs wipeout still hasn’t arrived

In fact, a lot of companies are now embarking on hiring sprees. ( WSJ $)

+ AI’s impact is increasingly falling short of expectations. ( The Guardian )

+ Here’s a much-needed reality check on the AI jobs hysteria. ( MIT Technology Review )

6 A six-year-old girl died in a Chinese gene-editing trial

Experts say it should have never been allowed to go ahead. ( Science )

+ This baby boy was treated with the first personalized gene-editing drug. ( MIT Technology Review )

7 What it’s like to use a North Korean smartphone

They’re growing in popularity—but represent another avenue for government control. ( WP $)

8 The FCC’s ban on foreign-made drones is not working

You can’t change global supply chains at the stroke of a pen. ( The Verge $)

9 The “summer of Ludd” shows it’s fun to be a Luddite

A growing anti-tech movement is all about raw, anarchic joy. ( 404 Media )

+ We’re in the era of AI malaise. ( MIT Technology Review )

10 Why Jimothy the racoon is the internet’s latest obsession

It’s his irresistible combination of chaos and cuteness. ( BBC )

Quote of the day

“I think that [AI] should stand for artificial idiot.”

—Marian Agnew, a nine-year-old, from Norman, Oklahoma, tells Wired she’s not impressed by AI models’ tendency to make up facts.

One More Thing

KATHERINE LAM

Inside a romance scam compound—and how people get tricked into being there

Gavesh’s journey started, seemingly innocently, with a job ad on Facebook promising work he desperately needed.

Instead, he found himself trafficked into a business commonly known as “pig butchering”—a form of fraud in which scammers form close relationships with targets online and extract money from them.

The Chinese crime syndicates behind the scams have netted billions of dollars, and they have used violence and coercion to force their workers to carry out the frauds from large compounds, several of which operate openly in the quasi-lawless borderlands of Myanmar.

Read our story about these scam syndicates and how they could be broken up.

— Peter Guest and Emily Fishbein

We can still have nice things

A place for comfort, fun, and distraction to brighten up your day. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line .)

+ I want to make every single one of these delicious-looking Korean dishes .

+ If you like origami, you’ll love this guy ’s tutorials.

+ How to deal with those old gadgets that are collecting dust in your drawer.

+ Enjoy these old art deco public transport posters from London.