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Welcome to the fourth round of our five-round bout! There was no shortage of impassioned debate when we gathered to anoint the top 25 innovations in the history of Best of What’s New. But a dozen editors locked in a room can only get you so far. How do you rank the best of the best – the iPhone versus the Large Hadron Collider, the TiVo versus the Chunnel? How do you name the one product that has affected more, lasting change than all others?...

Most children who catch RSV have mild cold-like symptoms, but a fraction become very ill. By one global estimate, the virus is responsible for about 1 in 28 deaths among children four weeks to six months old. No US-approved vaccines exist for this pathogen. But, just as newly made immunizations drove down deaths and hospitalizations from COVID, jabs for RSV would be a welcome tool, able to forestall future outbreaks....

The Galaxy Tab S8 will feature an 11-inch 2560 x 1600p display with a 120Hz refresh rate. As with the Tab S7 series, the jump to an S8+ gets you a slightly larger, and ultimately better, display: the 12.4-inch 2800 x 1752p Super AMOLED display. Then, of course, there’s the Ultra, which has a 14.6-inch 2960 x 1848 Super AMOLED display. The pixel density does scale down slightly as the screens get bigger, likely because all three models feature the same 8-core 4nm processor, a presumed upgrade over the Tab S7 series....

Constant trembling in Saturn’s body causes its rings to wiggle in waves that can be detected as seismic signatures. Using data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which recorded these signatures back in 2013, planetary scientists used those measurements to peer inside the gas giant’s center. The numbers told them that Saturn’s middle must be a diffuse core, approximately 60 percent of the planet’s radius, containing 17 Earth masses of ice and rock....

“There were already clues from Voyager and Cassini measurements that the rings had not formed with Saturn,” says Luciano Iess, a researcher at Sapienza University of Rome and the lead author of the new study. “But now we have a much more concrete evidence, which was only possible to obtain during the final phase of the mission—the Grand Finale.” He’s referring to the last days of Cassini—in which the spacecraft ended its 13-year orbit of the Saturnian system in a wild last hurrah, making six close dives toward the planet between the atmosphere and the rings, and finally diving headfirst into the atmosphere to collect as much data as possible before disintegrating....

Available on sale for 56 percent off, this drone bundle features two flyers, both of which are equipped with a 4K front camera and 720p bottom camera, allowing you to take the clearest, most stunning footage. For starters, you have the Alpha Z PRO, which packs a wide-angle camera with 90-degree adjustment and altitude hold mode that allows you to stabilize the drone’s flight for more crisp pictures and video....

So we tore the speakers open to investigate. Instead of a Möbius strip, each speaker has a long C-shaped duct in the back that provides a larger space for low tones to resonate. The end of the duct is flared like a trumpet bell and seamlessly joins the speaker’s front face (behind the black grille) to minimize bass-distorting turbulence. That smooth surface reminded someone at Sony of an obscure mathematical construct that’s related to a Möbius strip and, in a corporate game of Telephone, the information got twisted into describing the ducts themselves as having a “unique mobius-band shape....

A set of remarkable LIDAR scans of Yosemite National Park in California, published by forest ecologists at the University of Washington and the remote imaging company NV5 Geospatial in EOS this month, offers a glimpse into the subtle distinctions in forests—and the huge consequences for wildfire–across an area of 100 square miles. The project started as part of the US Geological Survey’s 3D Elevation Program, which creates topographic maps of landscapes all over the country....

The drone can also be piloted using controls on the smartphone. Maximum range for the drone is over 300 feet with WiFi, and the drone flies up to 20mph. (That’s about 10 seconds of flying in a straight line before it’s out of WiFi range.) The batteries on board last for about 10 minutes of continuous flight, and videos taken during flight are saved onto a MicroSD card. PowerupFPV will launch on Kickstarter in November, with an expected price of $200 for a basic kit....

Humans have indulged in this meaty treat since the Stone Age. Archaeologists unearthed evidence of 30,000-year-old snail shells emptied, cooked, and discarded in Spain. Similarly insightful garbage has been unearthed across the Balearic Sea in Algeria, and along the African coast into Tanzania: snails all the way down. The preparation may have changed—ancient humans charbroiled their catch, while contemporary Europeans typically sauté snails in garlic sauce—but the fundamental appetite persists....

This is definitely not a reason to discard them altogether. But if the strongest noise-canceling headphones are what you’re after, it would make sense to compromise some of the $299 AONIC 50’s sound character for better ANC in a similar, equally priced, model. Shure AONIC 50: fit Shure claims the AONIC 50 headphones deliver comfort even after hours of listening. I found that to be true, just not right away....

“We found in the beginning of the pandemic that we were getting lots more phone calls from people who were seeking treatment,” says study author Cynthia Bulik, who heads up the University of North Carolina’s Center of Excellence for Eating Disorders. She and her colleagues set out to collect data on how people with eating disorders were handling their condition amidst the pandemic. In April, they recruited 511 study participants from the United States and another 510 from the Netherlands, and had them complete an online survey....

A new bill would allow space mining companies to own pieces of space. Although they couldn’t own a whole asteroid, for example, the bill would ensure that space mining businesses would legally own the resources they extract from that asteroid. Last week the bill passed in the Senate with a few amendments, and yesterday those amendments were accepted in the House of Representatives. Now the bill is off to the Oval Office, where space policy experts predict President Obama will sign it into law....

The C. elegans worm is a favorite of cellular researchers, paradoxically, because it is at once simple and complex. It has a functioning nervous system, but the worm itself is made up of less than 1000 cells, the lineage of which has been mapped for each one. That means researchers know what to expect out of just about every individual part of the animal down to the cellular level. So when they discovered that just two neurons were responsible for the other 957 cells’ behavior in stress situations, they were quite surprised....

Depending on who you are, you’ll have a different answer—and it’s probably not a bad thing, given that there’s no one perfect form. But when it comes to plastic surgery, especially reconstructive surgery for cancer and other illnesses, it can be tricky for experts to figure out if they’ve done a good job. Now scientists think they have some pointers that could help surgeons and their patients get the results they expect....

“This has a clear fingerprint of climate change, where increasing temperatures will drive this vicious cycle, especially in places like the Western US, where rainfall has been noticeably lessening,” meteorologist Brandon Miller told CNN. More than 48 million people across the western states are now under heat advisory watches or warnings from the National Weather Service . In places like Los Angeles, temperatures are creeping up nearly 25 degrees higher than the average temperature for this time of year....

The show doesn’t officially start until Tuesday, January 7th, but there are some clear trends poised to make an impact at this year’s show. Here’s a rundown of what to expect before they kick open the doors and let all the new gadgets run free into the world to thrive, multiply, or die horribly. 8K TVs Massive walls of screens define the CES aesthetic. Last year, we started to see 8K UHD (ultra-high definition) panels popping up in small numbers from companies like LG....

But maybe the real issue with desks isn’t the battle between the finicky creative process and ever-demanding productivity. With more gadgets than ever (and their respective chargers), and the challenge of living and working in the same space, the problem is just having enough room to get any work done at all. Being tidy isn’t enough for the modern desk. We need a place for everything, and some key items will help you maximize your space, no matter how big it is....

After four thousand years, the inhabitants of the overworld have finally taken an interest. Countless termite mounds dot the landscape of northeastern Brazil, where they are known as murundus, but only recently have they come to the attention of entomologists. According to a new theory described Monday in Current Biology, the button-sized insects built these monuments not to live in, but rather as debris depositories for their underground excavations. The scale of their activity cements the critters’ reputation as ecosystem engineers on par with any other species on the planet....

Musk and Tesla have hyped their supposed “Full Self-Driving Mode” software for years, repeatedly promising a completely driverless experience was just around the corner for customers. Tesla’s website currently features a demonstration video that at one point claims “the person in the driver’s seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself.” Musk himself has taken part in multiple interviews from a Tesla’s driver seat with the system engaged....