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Electric cars are more expensive than petrol ones, mainly because the batteries cost a lot. But new technology could turn these expensive devices into an asset, offering owners benefits such as reduced utility bills, lower rents or free parking.Ford Motor, General Motors, BMW and other automakers are exploring how electric car batteries could be used to store excess renewable energy to help utilities manage fluctuations in energy supply and demand. Automakers would earn money by acting as intermediaries between car owners and energy suppliers.Millions of cars could be thought of as a huge energy system that, for the first time, will be connected to another huge energy system, the electric grid, said Matthias Preindl, associate professor of power electronic systems at Columbia University....

Wandering alone along the southern fringes of Saudi Arabia’s mountainous Asir Province, some eight miles from the Yemeni border, in a nondescript town with a prominent sculpture of a rifle balanced on an ornately painted plinth, I met a man, Nawab Khan, who was building a palace out of mud.Actually, he was rebuilding the structure, restoring it. And when I came across him, he hadn’t yet begun his work for the day; he was seated on the side of the road beneath its red-and-white windows — cross-legged, on a rug, leaning over a pot of tea and a bowl of dates.Two weeks earlier, on the far side of the country, a fellow traveler had pointed at a map and described the crumbling buildings here, in Dhahran al-Janub, arranged in a colorful open-air museum. Finding myself nearby, I’d detoured to have...

One of the nation's leading medical advisory organizations has weighed in on long-term Covid with a 265-page report that recognizes the severity and persistence of the condition for millions of Americans.More than four years into the coronavirus pandemic, long Covid continues to harm many people's ability to function, according to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, a nongovernmental institution that advises federal agencies on subject of science and medicine.“Long Covid can impact people across the lifespan, from children to older adults, as well as across sex, gender, racial, ethnic and other demographic groups,” he said, concluding that “the Long Covid is associated with a wide range of new or worsening health conditions and includes more than 200 sympt...

Amanda Knox, an American convicted and later cleared of killing her roommate while they studied in Italy, lost another trial in an Italian court on Wednesday against defamation charges linked to the 2007 murder.Ms. Knox was convicted by a Florence court on charges of defaming a man who ran a bar where she worked, falsely accusing him of killing her roommate, 21-year-old Meredith Kercher, in 2007. Ms. Knox was convicted by court to three years in prison, time he has already served.Ms Knox was initially found guilty of defaming the man, Diya Lumumba, also known as Patrick, in 2009, a conviction upheld by various Italian courts. At the time of the murder, Mr Lumumba ran a bar called Le Chic where Ms Knox worked part-time.Ms. Knox declined to speak to reporters after Wednesday's sentencin...

Israel organized and funded an influence campaign last year aimed at U.S. lawmakers and the American public with pro-Israel messages, as it aimed to foster support for its actions in the war with Gaza, according to officials involved in the initiative and related documents to the conflict. operation.The covert campaign was commissioned by Israel's Ministry of Diaspora Affairs, a government body that connects Jews around the world with the State of Israel, four Israeli officials said. According to officials and documents, the ministry allocated about $2 million for the operation and hired Stoic, a Tel Aviv political marketing firm, to carry it out.The campaign began in October and remains active on Platform X. At its peak, it used hundreds of fake accounts posing as real Americans on ...

The House voted mostly along party lines Tuesday to impose sweeping sanctions on International Criminal Court officials, rebuking efforts by the court's top prosecutor to charge top Israeli leaders with war crimes in connection with the offensive against Hamas.The bill would force President Biden to restrict entry to the United States, revoke visas and impose financial restrictions on anyone in court who is involved in attempting to investigate, arrest, detain or prosecute “protected persons” or allies of the United States . It would also target anyone providing “financial, material or technological support” to such efforts.Biden's advisers said he is "strongly opposed" to the measure because it would impose sanctions on such a broad group of officials, including court staff membe...

An independent advisory panel to the Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday rejected the use of MDMA-assisted therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder, highlighting the unprecedented regulatory challenges of a new therapy using the drug commonly known as Ecstasy.Before the vote, committee members expressed concerns about the design of the two studies submitted by the drug's sponsor, Lykos Therapeutics. Many questions focused on whether study participants were generally able to correctly guess whether they had taken MDMA, also known as Ecstasy or Molly. The jury voted 9-2 on the effectiveness of MDMA-assisted therapy and 10-1 on whether the benefits of the proposed treatment outweighed the risks.Other speakers expressed concerns about the drug's potential cardiovascular effects...

The two contenders to become Britain's next prime minister clashed furiously over taxes, immigration and health policy Tuesday in a televised debate that at times descended into bad-tempered exchanges as the political rivals argued with each other.The clash came exactly a month before the crucial general election that will determine whether the opposition Labor Party can capitalize on its strong lead in opinion polls and end 14 turbulent years of Conservative-led government during which the party has had five different prime ministers.Soon after the debate began, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said that his opponent, Labor leader Keir Starmer, would raise taxes on British citizens by £2,000 a year if he won the election, repeating the same claim numerous times. “Absolute rubbish,” Starmer...

A group of OpenAI insiders are calling out what they say is a culture of recklessness and secrecy at the San Francisco artificial intelligence company, which is racing to build the most powerful artificial intelligence systems ever created.The group, which includes nine current and former OpenAI employees, has rallied in recent days around shared concerns that the company hasn't done enough to prevent its artificial intelligence systems from becoming dangerous.Members say OpenAI, which started as a nonprofit research lab and went public with the release of ChatGPT in 2022, is prioritizing profits and growth in an effort to build artificial general intelligence, or AGI, the industry term for a computer. program capable of doing everything a human can do.They also allege that OpenAI use...

Some Palestinians in Gaza expressed hope that peace talks could advance after President Biden endorsed an Israeli road map to a permanent ceasefire and called on Hamas to accept the plan. But many remained skeptical that U.S. influence would help bring an immediate end to the war and their suffering.After eight months of devastating bombing, many in Gaza believe Hamas should make any compromises necessary to end the war and allow reconstruction to begin.“I hope Hamas accepts this deal,” said Ayman Skeik, a 31-year-old trader from Gaza City displaced in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza. “But I'm still afraid that it won't be reached.”Declaring Hamas no longer capable of carrying out a major terrorist attack on Israel, President Biden said Friday that the time has come for a permanent c...