Articles for author: Priya Nair

October 3, 2025

Priya Nair

How AI Tools Are Accelerating America’s Education Collapse

The newest assessment findings have thrown American education into sharp focus, revealing a crisis that has been simmering for years. National test results show middle and high school students stumbling at levels not witnessed in decades. Barely more than a third of seniors are ready for college-level work, and fewer than a quarter are proficient in mathematics. These are not minor setbacks; they are indicators of a system that is struggling to hold itself together. What makes this deterioration alarming is not only its magnitude but its direction. Educational standards, once considered merely stagnant, are now in free fall. Each

October 1, 2025

Priya Nair

Anchorage Police Deploy License Plate Readers and Security Network

The Anchorage Police Department will soon be able to automatically read license plates and search a network of public and private cameras across the city. The move into broader surveillance is part of an $11.8 million technology upgrade contract the Anchorage Assembly approved Tuesday. Police say the upgrade will streamline evidence gathering and improve their ability to respond with real-time information. Others worry that the new capabilities, particularly automated license plate readers, could create potential privacy intrusions. The five-year agreement with Arizona-based Axon Enterprise approved Tuesday includes training, technical support, new drones, stun weapons and body cameras. The Assembly also

September 30, 2025

Priya Nair

Exploring Dejima Japan’s Historic Western Trading Post

The feudal rulers of Japan faced a dilemma in the early 1600s. Contact with European merchants during the recently concluded Sengoku era of civil war had revealed just how far Japan was falling behind the West in areas like science, technology, and trade, so they wanted to keep access to foreign goods and knowledge. At the same time, there were fears that outside influences, especially the spread of foreign religions, could undermine the authority of the Shogunate — for example, when samurai lord Omura Sumitada converted to Christianity and declared his plan to hand Nagasaki over to Jesuit missionaries. To

September 30, 2025

Priya Nair

Diabetic Retinopathy Often Goes Undetected Until Vision Loss Occurs

Diabetic retinopathy is fast becoming the primary cause of vision impairment in India, with the disease often remaining undetected until vision deterioration has occurred, health specialists said on Saturday, ahead of World Retina Day. World Retina Day is observed each year on the last Sunday of September to increase awareness about retinal health. With India being the diabetes capital of the world, diabetic retinopathy is surfacing as a major public health concern in the nation. Therefore, early identification is vital, the specialists noted. “Diabetes is already an epidemic in India, and diabetic retinopathy is quickly emerging as a public health

September 30, 2025

Priya Nair

PM Modi Launches Rs 50,000 Crore Development Projects in Odisha

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday laid the foundation stone and inaugurated development projects valued at more than Rs 50,000 crore spanning telecommunications, railways, higher education, healthcare, skill development and rural housing sectors. The prime minister put down the foundation stone for Rs 11,000 crore infrastructure expansion projects at eight IITs — Tirupati, Palakkad, Bhilai, Jammu, Dharwad, Jodhpur, Patna and Indore — to add 12,000 seats over the next four years. Modi also laid the foundation for the construction of a rail flyover between Sambalpur City and Sarala with an outlay of Rs 273 crore, and for establishing a semiconductor

September 29, 2025

Priya Nair

Talent Agencies Pursue AI Actress Tilly Norwood

Actor, comedian and technologist Eline Van der Velden has disclosed that her newly launched AI talent studio Xicoia is in discussions with several talent agents interested in signing its first creation, AI actress Tilly Norward. Van der Velden discussed the development on a panel at the Zurich Summit on Saturday, where she presented her AI production company Particle6 and then took part in a conversation about AI advancements in the entertainment sector alongside Verena Puhm, head of Luma AI’s new Studio Dream Lab LA. Both Van der Velden and Puhm implied that studios and other media and entertainment firms have

September 29, 2025

Priya Nair

Key Insights From Variety’s Entertainment Technology Summit

The summit brought together leading executives, marketing chiefs, technologists, entrepreneurs and creators across film, television and gaming on Thursday for a full day of keynote addresses, panel conversations and networking opportunities. Industry figures from Warner Bros. Discovery, Meta, Paramount+, Vizio, Netflix, Fox Entertainment and others offered their perspectives on prevailing trends, tools and tactics that are transforming the entertainment business. Keynote talks featured Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer, who publicly addressed their four-year pact with Paramount for the first time as well as the future of “Stranger Things” as it heads into its final season this fall on Netflix. Later,

September 28, 2025

Priya Nair

Strategic Alliance Advances US Gallium and Critical Mineral Independence

US Critical Materials Corp., a prominent rare earth exploration and processing technology firm, is pleased to announce a strategic advisory partnership with GreenMet, a Washington, D.C.-based advisory group specializing in critical minerals strategy and financing. This collaboration represents a key move in advancing domestic rare earth production, with gallium — a mineral of increasing national security significance — taking center stage. US Critical Materials holds the highest-grade reported gallium deposit in the United States, with concentrations averaging 300 ppm — well above the 50 ppm that the U.S. had been importing, largely from China. Gallium, vital for advanced semiconductors, defense

September 27, 2025

Priya Nair

Sunrise New Energy Ranks Among Top Global Battery Material Suppliers

Sunrise New Energy Co., Ltd., an innovator in battery anode materials, has been named one of the top eleven global suppliers of synthetic graphite anode materials, serving both energy storage and electric vehicle (EV) batteries. This recognition highlights the company’s strong growth momentum and continual improvements in technology and capacity. After nearly four years of sustained effort, Sunrise has submitted 97 domestic and international patent applications and has been granted 39 patents, including three patents in the U.S., Japan, and South Korea. According to a market landscape report, Sunrise is ranked among the top eleven worldwide by shipment volume. A

September 27, 2025

Priya Nair

Microsoft’s Microfluidic Cooling Boosts Chip Performance

Microsoft is progressing with a novel approach to cool microchips that it says could result in more energy-efficient data centers down the line. The technique, known as microfluidics, uses liquid coolant running directly through the silicon. After laboratory experiments, Microsoft reported that this approach can dissipate heat up to three times more effectively than the cold plates currently used in data centers. The company said this week that it managed to build a microfluidic cooling solution for a server handling core services for a simulated Microsoft Teams meeting. If they can replicate that performance outside the lab, microfluidics could reduce