Bytes: What’s new in tech
Apple agrees to upgrade Android texts
Apple will finally reduce the pain of texting between iPhone and Android, said Samantha Kelly in CNN.com. After years of resisting to protect its “walled garden,” Apple has agreed to adopt a universal messaging standard, called rich communication services (RCS). Android users had complained that their messages to iPhones lacked the same quality and got shrouded in a noxious green bubble— stigmatizing non-Apple users. As a result of the change to RCS, iPhone users will now receive “read receipts, typing indicators, better support for group chats, and higher-quality media sharing of images and videos” regardless of what device the messages are coming from. One thing that likely won’t change, though, is the use of green (instead of blue) bubbles for messages coming from an Android device.
False election claims in Facebook ads
Meta will allow political ads on Facebook and Instagram that promote claims that the 2020 election was stolen, said Salvador Rodriguez in The Wall Street Journal. Meta actually “made the change last year, but it hasn’t gained wide attention.” Political advertisers can “say past elections were ‘rigged’ or ‘stolen,’” but will not be allowed to question the legitimacy of ongoing or coming elections. “Executives at Meta made the decision based on free-speech considerations after weighing past U.S. elections in which the results might have been contested,” such as the election of 1960, “when John F. Kennedy won in the midst of allegations of voter fraud from various Republicans.” Former President Donald Trump already ran a Facebook ad in August stating that “we had a rigged election in 2020.”
Teslas meet Ukrainian ingenuity
Totaled Teslas are finding new life in Ukraine, said Aarian Marshall and Gregory Barber in Wired. “Cars written off in North America have long found their way to Eastern European repair shops willing to take on damage that U.S. and Canadian car mechanics won’t touch,” and Ukrainian technicians are famously ingenious when it comes to resurrecting wrecks. Electric vehicles have become “a specialty.” The online auto-auction website Copart is a popular marketplace for damaged EVs, like the 2021 Tesla Model Y bought by 25-year-old Kyiv IT worker Roman Tyschenko for $24,000. It had a detached bumper and dented hood from an accident in Dallas. After Tyschenko put another $25,000 into it at a repair shop, the Tesla looks good as new.
First eyeball transplant
A man from Arkansas has undergone the world’s first face transplant to include a whole-eyeball transplant. Aaron James, 46, can’t see out of his new eye, although some sight might eventually return. Nevertheless, scientists say the operation is a groundbreaking achievement that could pave the way for more-advanced procedures. James was working as a lineman in 2021 when a live wire burned off much of his face. He lost his left eye, his entire nose, and his lips, and much of his left arm was stripped to the bone. The face transplant, which was performed earlier this year at NYU Langone in New York City, took 21 hours, using a donor face that had one eye still in the socket with the optic nerve intact. Surgeons injected stem cells into James’ own optic nerve, to stimulate the growth of new cells. Five months later, blood is flowing to the retina, and there’s no sign of transplant rejection. “Although there is no sight,” lead surgeon Eduardo Rodriguez tells NBCNews.com, “we’ve crossed a barrier that many didn’t think was possible.” James says the operation has been lifechanging. “I can go out and I’m really not stared at anymore,” he says. “I just look like a normal person walking down the street.” A normal person with two different-colored eyes, though: James’ own eye is blue, while the new one is brown.
Ticks that can kill a cow
Ticks that swarm in such numbers they can bleed a cow to death have spread across the U.S., reports The Washington Post. Tiny Asian longhorned ticks, which range from the size of a sesame seed to that of a pea, were first seen in the U.S. in 2017 in New Jersey. In 2021, a farmer in Ohio told researchers that two of his cows and a bull had been killed by a tick infestation, bleeding to death after being covered by tens of thousands of feasting arachnids. When the scientists dragged a muslin cloth along the pasture, they collected more than 9,000 ticks in just 90 minutes. The ticks are so numerous because the species is parthenogenetic, meaning the females can lay thousands of eggs without ever mating. At this point, the invasive ticks are endemic throughout the Midwest and up and down the East Coast. While pesticides can help curb the spread—especially when treatment is applied before adults lay their eggs—they won’t eliminate the problem entirely. “You cannot spray your way out of an Asian longhorned tick infestation,” says ecologist Risa Pesapane of Ohio State University. “There is no getting rid of them.”
Strawberries for the brain
Eating strawberries could help cut the risk of dementia. Researchers at the University of Cincinnati recruited 30 volunteers, all between 50 and 65 years old, who had complained of mild cognitive impairment. They asked the participants to refrain from eating berries, then gave half the group a daily supplement powder containing the equivalent of one cup of whole strawberries. The other half got a placebo. After 12 weeks, the strawberry powder group scored better on a test of their word-learning abilities and displayed a significant reduction in depressive symptoms. Lead author Robert Krikorian says the study, which received funding from the California Strawberry Commission, adds to research that people who regularly eat the berries have a slower rate of cognitive decline as they age. “Both strawberries and blueberries contain antioxidants called anthocyanins,” he tells the New York Post, “which have been implicated in a variety of berry health benefits such as metabolic and cognitive enhancements.” Strawberries also contain compounds that reduce inflammation, which is linked to dementia.