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A nuclear startup called Ampera is turning heads this week with what it claims is the world's first subcritical, solid-state, factory-built thorium reactor — and it's three-D printed. The company is pitching the module as a power source for AI data centers, part of a broader architecture it calls Integrated Energy Architecture. Whether the technology delivers at scale remains to be seen, but the ambition is striking.
Shifting to software, Microsoft's three-month campaign to meaningfully fix Windows eleven is now old enough to evaluate. The effort began in late March of two thousand twenty six, targeting a long list of user complaints about the operating system. Early signals suggest incremental progress, though observers note that Microsoft still has considerable ground to cover before the fixes feel transformative.
And for anyone who's ever wanted to lose an afternoon in the cosmos, NASA has a surprisingly rich archive of space photography spanning decades — stars, moons, planets, and galaxies, most of it free to use and share. Wired has mapped out exactly where to find these images and how to navigate the collection, which is more expansive than most people realize.
That's your update for today. Keep surfing. Tech Beat out.
