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  • Stroke MRI Study Assesses Impact of Motion Artifacts Upon AI and Radiologist Lesion Detection

    Stroke MRI Study Assesses Impact of Motion Artifacts Upon AI and Radiologist Lesion Detection

    New research demonstrates that advancing age and limb motor symptoms in patients with suspected stroke are associated with increased brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) motion artifacts that can reduce accuracy in detecting hemorrhagic lesions.

    For the retrospective study, recently published in European Radiology, researchers examined brain MRI data from 775 adult patients (median age of 68) with suspected stroke. The study authors noted 216 cases of acute ischemic lesions, 12 patients with hemorrhagic lesions and 20 cases involving space-occupying lesions.

    The researchers found that motion artifacts on brain MRI occurred in 57 patients (7.4 percent). A multivariable analysis determined that advancing age was associated with an odds ratio (OR) per decade of 1.61 for the presence of motion artifacts. Patients with limb motor symptoms had more the double the likelihood of motion artifacts (OR 2.36) on brain MRI, according to the study authors.

    Here are a couple of examples of motion artifacts in MRI scans and false negative predictions with AI (left column). For the top images (B), the studied AI tool overlooked bilateral hygromas/subdural hematomas in an 83-year-old man with right-sided facial palsy and hemiparesis. For the bottom images (C), AI did not detect a small right-sided extra-axial tumor in a 66-year-old woman with aphasia. (Images courtesy of European Radiology.)

    While researchers did not see a significant impact of motion artifacts on the detection of ischemic and space-occupying lesions, they noted a 21 percent reduction in artificial intelligence (AI) accuracy and a 7 percent reduction in radiologist accuracy for detecting hemorrhagic lesions.

    “Our study indicated that motion artifacts were independently associated with higher patient age and motor symptoms. Motion artifacts were associated with lower diagnostic test accuracy and specificity for hemorrhage detection, and they explained up to one-fifth of the incorrect AI hemorrhage predictions,” wrote lead study author Christian Hedeager Krag, M.D., who is affiliated with the Department of Radiology at the University Hospital Copenhagen-Herlev and Gentofte in Copenhagen, Denmark, and colleagues.

    Three Key Takeaways

    1. Advancing age and limb motor symptoms increase motion artifacts.
      Patients with suspected stroke who are older or have limb motor symptoms are at significantly higher risk of MRI motion artifacts, which can impair diagnostic accuracy.
    2. Motion artifacts may reduce hemorrhage detection accuracy.
      Motion artifacts were linked to a 21 percent reduction in AI diagnostic accuracy and a 7 percent reduction in radiologist accuracy for detecting hemorrhagic lesions, though they did not significantly affect ischemic or space-occupying lesion detection.
    3. Protocol adjustments may help minimize artifacts. Patients at higher risk for motion artifacts may benefit from tailored MRI protocols, such as shorter sequence acquisitions or the application of deep learning-based artifact reduction techniques.

    The researchers noted longer mean sequence acquisition (92.3 seconds vs. 91.9 seconds) in patients with motion artifacts. They also found that 76 percent of patients with motion artifacts had 3D MRI sequences and noted a 21 percent higher incidence of gradient recalled (GR) susceptibility-weighted imaging (SWI)/T2 sequences among patients with motion artifacts (53 percent vs. 32 percent).

    “Patients with a high predicted risk of motion artifacts could be scheduled for a specific protocol with shorter sequences and deep learning artifact reduction to minimize motion artifacts,” posited Krag and colleagues.

    (Editor’s note: For related content, see “Can Abbreviated MRI Have an Impact in Neuroimaging?,” “Could Deep Learning Offer Quicker Acute Stroke Detection on Brain MRI Without the Need for T2WI Sequences?” and “Can Deep Learning MRI Have an Impact in Suspected Stroke Cases?”)

    In regard to study limitations, the authors acknowledged that a small number of cases involving hemorrhages and intracranial tumors thwarted a full analysis of the impact of MRI motion artifacts upon these lesions. The researchers also acknowledged that a lack of blinding to clinical information may have had an impact on reported diagnostic accuracy.

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  • These Massive Runaway Stars Were Birthed in a Chaotic Cluster

    These Massive Runaway Stars Were Birthed in a Chaotic Cluster

    Stars are born in clusters, and the early days in these clusters are messy. Stars move chaotically and haven’t settled into regular routines. Inevitably, some stars are kicked out of their birth clusters through all of the gravitational interactions.

    The Large Magellanic Cloud, though much less massive than the Milky Way, is home to a very unusual star cluster named NGC 2070. NGC 2070 is a large open star cluster within the Tarantula Nebula in the LMC. NGC 2070’s central cluster makes astronomers sit up and take notice. It’s called R136, and it holds an extremely dense concentration of massive O-type stars and Wolf-Rayet stars. O-type stars are very hot, and very rare, but since they’re so luminous they’re not difficult to spot. Wolf-Rayet stars are also massive, hot, and highly luminous.

    The extraordinary luminosity of the stars in R136, which altogether have about 60,000 solar masses, provides most of the energy that illuminates the entire Tarantula Nebula. For this reason, it’s called a starburst region. It contains many of the most massive and luminous stars astronomers know of.

    This JWST image of the Tarantula Nebula highlights the brilliant central cluster R136. This tightly-packed region of extremely luminous stars lights up the nebula. Image Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb ERO Production Team

    R136 is very young, only about one or two million years old. The region is extremely chaotic, and in 2024, astronomers found 55 massive runaway stars coming from the cluster in two waves. A 2024 paper reporting these findings also discovered that 23–33% of the most luminous stars initially born in R136 are runaways.

    New research published in Physical Review Letters examined what’s behind some of these stellar ejections, focusing on a binary star named Mel 34. It’s titled “Origin of the Most Recently Ejected OB Runaway Star from the R136 Cluster.” The lead author is Simon Portegies Zwart, Professor of Numerical Star Dynamics at Leiden University in the Netherlands.

    The 2024 paper used data from the ESA’s Gaia mission to show that three of R136’s ejected stars were evicted from the core about 60,000 years ago. However, what caused the triple ejection was unknown. In the new research, Portegies Zwart and his co-researchers reconstructed their ejection, showing that there were five stars involved in the expulsion.

    Mel 39 is a binary star with two massive stars, one with 140 solar masses, and the other with 80. Mel 39 is travelling away from the R136 cluster at 64 km/s. It’s in the same orbital plane as Mel 34, the other ejected binary. Mel 34 is one of the most massive known binaries, with the larger of the pair having 139 solar masses, and the other one with 127 solar masses. When combined with VFTS 590, the other star involved, and its 46 solar masses, the five stars constitute more than 530 solar masses.

    The researchers relied on Gaia’s precise astrometry to untangle the backstory of these five stars and their ejection from R136. Mel 34 was the last of the stars to be ejected, and tracing it backwards in time and space helped the researchers reconstruct the interactions that led up to the ejection.

    “Because of the Gaia satellite’s outstanding precision, we can now retrace the most recently ejected binary star, Mel 34, back to the center of R136 and reconstruct the events that 52 000 years ago led to its removal from R136,” the authors write. “The deterministic nature of the Newtonian dynamics in the scattering enables us to reconstruct the encounter that ejected Mel 34.”

    Gravitational interactions follow Newton’s laws of motion, which are deterministic. That means the same starting conditions always produce the same results, unlike quantum laws. So by measuring Mel 34’s trajectory, position, and velocity, the researchers ‘mathematically reversed’ Mel 34’s path, and recovered a picture of the expulsion of the stars. In a sense, each star is like a fossil record of its origins that allows backwards tracing.

    Runaway stars stand out from the background due to their trajectories and velocities. In 2010, the Hubble Space Telescope found another star ejected from a different part of the Tarantula Nebula. The heavyweight star, called 30 Dor #016, is 90 times more massive than the Sun and is travelling at more than 400,000 kilometers per hour from its home. Image Credit: By NASA, ESA, J. Walsh (ST-ECF) Acknowledgment: Z. Levay (STScI) Credit for ESO image: ESO Acknowledgments: J. Alves (Calar Alto, Spain), B. Vandame, and Y. Beletski (ESO) Processing by B. Fosbury (ST-ECF) - http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1008/, CC BY 3.0. Runaway stars stand out from the background due to their trajectories and velocities. In 2010, the Hubble Space Telescope found another star ejected from a different part of the Tarantula Nebula. The heavyweight star, called 30 Dor #016, is 90 times more massive than the Sun and is travelling at more than 400,000 kilometers per hour from its home. Image Credit: By NASA, ESA, J. Walsh (ST-ECF) Acknowledgment: Z. Levay (STScI) Credit for ESO image: ESO Acknowledgments: J. Alves (Calar Alto, Spain), B. Vandame, and Y. Beletski (ESO) Processing by B. Fosbury (ST-ECF) – http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/heic1008/, CC BY 3.0.

    “We then predict that Mel 39 is a binary star with an 80⁢𝑀⊙ companion star that orbits within ∼1° in the same plane as Mel 34 and escapes the cluster with a velocity of ∼64  km/s,” the authors explain.

    The reconstruction simulations show that the ejection involved five stars, the Mel 34 and Mel 39 binaries and VFTS 590. Since two are binaries, the system acts like a triple star, where VFTS 590 and Mel 34 orbit Mel 39. These results were unexpected, according to the authors. “The participation of five stars is unexpected because runaway stars were not expected to result from triple interactions,” they explain in their paper.

    These stars are travelling rapidly away from R136 due to the interactions, but there fates are sealed. All five of these massive stars will eventually explode as supernovae in a few million years. “The five stars will undergo supernova explosions in the coming 5 Myr at a distance of ∼180–332  pc from their birth location (R136),” the researchers explain in their paper.

    “The resulting black hole binaries, however, are not expected to merge within a Hubble time,” they conclude.

    The ejected stars in this study aren’t R136’s only runaway stars. Its 55 runaway stars paint a picture of R136 as an extreme, dynamically active region. With all of these ejected stars, many of them extremely bright, the star cluster is an excellent natural laboratory to study how massive clusters like this one evolve.

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  • Tears and hugs as Princess Leonor completes naval training

    Tears and hugs as Princess Leonor completes naval training



     Princess Leonor earns Grand Cross of Naval Merit

    Princess Leonor of Spain shared a heartfelt embrace with her younger sister, Infanta Sofia, as she concluded her naval training in Marin on Wednesday. 

    During the ceremonial event, King Felipe VI awarded his eldest daughter the prestigious Grand Cross of Naval Merit-one of Spain’s highest military honours-while Queen Letizia and Infanta Sofia looked on with pride and applauded. 

    The 19-year-old heir to the Spanish throne looked radiant in her crisp white naval uniform as she smiled and embraced the 18-year-old sister in a moving moment.

    King Felipe, dressed in full military attire, also shared an embrace with Leonor after formally presenting the decoration. After receiving the honour, the princess stepped onto the royal platform to reunite with her family. 

    Tears and hugs as Princess Leonor completes naval training

    Queen Letizia, dressed in an elegant navy ruffled gown, appeared visibly moved as she warmly hugged her daughter.

    The event, held at the Spanish Naval Academy, marked the official presentation of Royal Dispatches, symbolising the officers’ transition into active duty. 

    Princess Leonor wore her hair in a sleek braided beneath her sailor cap, complementing her uniform perfectly. Receiving the Grand Cross of Naval Merit signifies a major milestone in her military journey as she continues her path toward becoming Spain’s future monarch and head of the armed forces.

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  • New software makes it easy for Chinese police to extract phone data

    New software makes it easy for Chinese police to extract phone data

    July 16 (UPI) — Mobile security company Lookout has found a new system that police departments in China use to extract data from confiscated phones.

    The software is called Massistant, created by Chinese company Xiamen Meiya Pico, and it specializes in extracting different types of data, including private communications, multimedia files, geographical tracking records, voice recordings and contact databases. It can even extract messages on Signal.

    “It’s a big concern,” said Kristina Balaam, the researcher for Lookout who performed the malware analysis. “I think anybody who’s traveling in the region needs to be aware that the device that they bring into the country could very well be confiscated and anything that’s on it could be collected.”

    She found several posts on local Chinese forums in which people said they found the malware installed on their devices after interacting with the police.

    “It seems to be pretty broadly used, especially from what I’ve seen in the rumblings on these Chinese forums,” Balaam said.

    The malware must get installed on an unlocked device and works with a hardware tower connected to a desktop computer, according to a description and pictures of the system on Xiamen Meiya Pico’s website.

    Chinese law on cell phone confiscation has expanded. Since 2024, Chinese security staff can examine electronic devices without a warrant or active criminal case. This is especially the case with border crossings.

    “If somebody is moving through a border checkpoint and their device is confiscated, they have to grant access to it,” Balaam said.

    Massistant leaves traces of its installation on the seized devices, so users can potentially detect and remove it by finding it on their devices or using Android Debug Bridge to remove the software. But Balaam warned that by the time Massistant is installed, it’s already too late and authorities have access to the user’s data.

    She said that Massistant is just one of many spyware/malware created by Chinese surveillance tech companies, something she called “a big ecosystem.”

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  • US says ‘specific steps’ agreed to end Syria violence after Israeli strikes hit Damascus

    US says ‘specific steps’ agreed to end Syria violence after Israeli strikes hit Damascus

    Reuters Smoke rises after an Israeli strike on Syria's defence ministry headquarters in Damascus, Syria (16 July 2025)Reuters

    Syria’s defence ministry headquarters in central Damascus was hit by Israeli strikes

    Israel’s military struck the Syrian defence ministry in Damascus and government forces in southern Syria on Wednesday, as deadly sectarian fighting in the mostly Druze province of Suweida continued for a fourth day.

    Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said its forces were “working to save our Druze brothers and to eliminate the regime’s gangs”. The Syrian foreign ministry accused Israel of “treacherous aggression”.

    More than 300 people are reported to have been killed in Suweida since Sunday, when clashes between Druze militias and Bedouin tribes erupted.

    US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said he was “very worried” about the violence in the south but believed it would end within hours.

    “We have agreed on specific steps that will bring this troubling and horrifying situation to an end tonight,” he wrote on X on Wednesday evening.

    Syria’s foreign ministry said the country “welcomes the efforts made by the US and Arabian sides” to “resolve the current crisis” peacefully.

    Israel has not yet commented on the ceasefire bid.

    Syrian troops have started to withdraw from Suweida, according to Syria’s state news agency Sana.

    It says the military is leaving the city as part of an agreement between the Syrian government and the Suweida’s religious leaders, following the “completion of the army’s pursuit of outlaw groups”.

    The Israeli military began striking Syrian security forces and their weapons on Monday, after they were deployed to the city of Suweida for the first time since Sunni Islamist-led rebels overthrew President Bashar al-Assad in December.

    A BBC map showing Syria, Israel, the occupied Golan Heights and Suweida city

    Minority groups including the Druze – whose religion is an offshoot of Shia Islam with its own unique identity and beliefs – are suspicious of interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa and his government, despite his pledges to protect them.

    Their fears have been heightened by several outbreaks of sectarian violence over the past eight months, including one in May in which dozens of people were reportedly killed in clashes between Druze, security forces, and allied Islamist fighters in Damascus and Suweida.

    In the wake of that fighting, the government reached an agreement with Druze militias to hire local security forces in Suweida province from their ranks.

    Netanyahu has said he is committed to preventing harm to the Druze in Syria because of their deep ties to those living in Israel and the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

    Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz wrote on X on Wednesday afternoon that “the warnings in Damascus” had ended and that the Israeli military would “continue to operate vigorously in Suweida to destroy the forces that attacked the Druze until they withdraw completely”.

    He later posted that “the painful blows have begun”, above a video clip showing a TV presenter diving under a desk live on camera as an Israeli air strike hit the nearby entrance to the Syrian defence ministry in Umayyad Square, in central Damascus.

    Fadi Al Halabi, a London-based Syrian filmmaker who is visiting Damascus, said he was nearby when he heard the Israeli fighter jets approach.

    “People’s faces were so afraid. Everyone started running [in] the street. No-one knew where to go. Suddenly the air strike[s] began, targeting some of the most crowded areas, including the ministry of defence,” he told the BBC.

    The Israeli military said it also struck a “military target in the area” of the presidential palace in the capital, as well as armoured vehicles loaded with heavy machine guns and weapons on their way to Suweida, and firing posts and weapons storage facilities in southern Syria.

    Syria’s foreign ministry said the strikes targeted government institutions and civilian facilities in Damascus and Suweida and killed “several innocent civilians”.

    “This flagrant assault, which forms part of a deliberate policy pursued by the Israeli entity to inflame tensions, spread chaos, and undermine security and stability in Syria, constitutes a blatant violation of the United Nations Charter and international humanitarian law,” it added.

    The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a UK-based monitoring group, meanwhile reported that the humanitarian situation in Suweida city had rapidly deteriorated.

    It cited sources as saying there were clashes in several area of the city and that tanks had attacked the national hospital, causing panic among the scores of casualties from the fighting being treated there. They also said there were acute shortages of water and medical supplies.

    Later, the Syrian health ministry said government forces had entered the hospital and found “dozens of bodies” after “outlaw groups withdrew”, according to the official Sana news agency.

    A man named Hosam told the BBC he was in the centre of Suweida city and had witnessed civilians coming under fire from artillery and snipers.

    “I lost my neighbour today on the street. One of the snipers shot him. We tried to [get an] ambulance [to take] him to hospital, but we couldn’t,” he said.

    The SOHR says more than 300 people have been killed since Sunday in Suweida province.

    They include 69 Druze fighters and 40 civilians, 27 of whom were summarily killed by interior ministry and defence ministry forces, according to the group.

    At least 165 members of the government forces and 18 Bedouin tribal fighters have also been killed in the clashes, while 10 members of government forces have been killed in Israeli strikes, it says.

    The BBC is not able to verify the SOHR’s casualty figures.

    Reuters Syrian security forces celebrate by raising their rifles during clashes with Druze fighters in Suweida city, southern Syria (16 July 2025)Reuters

    The Syrian interior ministry said a ceasefire had been agreed on Wednesday night to end the fighting in Suweida city

    The fighting between Bedouin tribes and Druze militias in Suweida is said to have been sparked by the abduction of a Druze merchant on the highway to Damascus last Friday.

    On Sunday, armed Druze fighters reportedly encircled and later seized a neighbourhood of Suweida city that is inhabited by Bedouin. The clashes soon spread into other parts of Suweida province, with tribesmen reportedly launching attacks on nearby Druze towns and villages.

    Syria’s interior ministry later announced that its forces and those of the defence ministry would intervene and impose order, saying the “dangerous escalation comes in light of the absence of relevant official institutions”.

    Earlier this year, Israel’s prime minister demanded the complete demilitarisation of Suweida and two other southern provinces. He said Israel saw President Sharaa’s Sunni Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), as a threat. HTS is a former al-Qaeda affiliate that is still designated as a terrorist organisation by the UN and UK, but no longer by the US.

    The Israeli military has already carried out hundreds of strikes across Syria to destroy the country’s military assets since the fall of the Assad regime.

    And it has sent troops into the UN-monitored demilitarised buffer zone between the occupied Golan Heights and Syria, as well as several adjoining areas and the summit of Mount Hermon.

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  • Recent Developments in New Jersey and Dubai

    Recent Developments in New Jersey and Dubai

    Land records are typically maintained by a combination of local, state and federal government agencies. Most deeds, mortgages, encroachments and other interests affecting the title to real property are recorded at the local level. Some counties still rely on fragmented and outdated systems that are paper-based or poorly digitized. Other jurisdictions offer online access to records to allow officials and the public to search property information, plats and transaction histories. Technology innovations, such as digitization, geographic information systems (GIS) and online search tools, are improving the accessibility, reliability and management of land records. Digitization of land records will be required to tokenize residential, commercial, or mixed-use properties and portfolios. Blockchain platforms and smart contracts will need to be developed and deployed to automate token issuance, transfers, distributions and governance.

    Blockchain platforms are digital infrastructures that provide the tools and frameworks for building and managing applications that are decentralized, secure and transparent. They record data and transactions across a network of computers and employ protocols to validate transactions across the network. Once information is recorded, it cannot be altered retroactively. Most platforms support smart contracts or self-executing digital agreements that encode deal terms directly into computer code. These agreements automate processes and reduce the need for intermediaries, including attorneys, title companies, notaries and government officials. No single party controls the smart contract or its execution. Smart contracts should be secure, transparent and auditable to prevent manipulation and fraud. Once deployed, they can release funds, transfer digital assets or trigger notifications when specified conditions are met.

    The tokenization of real estate involves a number of steps: (1) a property or portfolio is professionally appraised to determine its market value; (2) a special-purpose-legal entity (SPV) is formed to hold the title to the property or portfolio and comply with applicable laws; (3) tokens for the property are issued on a blockchain platform, typically representing fractional ownership or income rights; (4) smart contracts are encoded onto the blockchain platform to automate token issuance and transfers; (5) investor eligibility requirements are defined, and tokens are traded on compliant blockchain platforms to enable secondary-market trading; and (6) transparent record-keeping and governance is handled on the blockchain platform, with regular reporting to investors. Benefits of tokenization include cost efficiencies due to the elimination of intermediaries and trustworthiness due to a blockchain record that cannot be easily tampered with.

    Teton County, Wyoming was the first county to implement a blockchain-based system for recording land titles and property records with Medici Land Governance, a subsidiary of Overstock.com (MLG) in 2019. The system is accessible through the clerk’s office and online GIS-ownership maps. It does not currently support property transfers or other transactions. Baltimore, Maryland’s blockchain land records pilot was launched in December 2023 and is focused on recording the city’s inventory of around 13,000 vacant properties. The pilot aims to streamline transactions, reduce title fraud and accelerate the rehabilitation of vacant homes. It was also developed in partnership with MLG, which is deploying similar systems globally, including in Tulum (Mexico), Liberia and Guyana.

    RealIT acquires properties in the United States and globally and places each into an SPV. Ownership of the SPV is divided into digital tokens, each representing a fractional interest. Investors purchase these tokens to gain rights to a proportional share of rental income and equity in the property. These tokens are issued on the Ethereum-blockchain platform to ensure transparency, security and ease of transfer. All transactions are recorded on the blockchain to provide confidence to investors. Token holders have voting rights with respect to certain property-management decisions. RealIT partners with local management firms to attract tenants, collect rent and maintain the properties. Since ReaIT commenced its business activities in 2019, over 700 properties have been tokenized in the United States and three other countries.

    Manifest uses blockchain technology to create new financial products (DeFi), especially in real estate. It has launched $USH, a tokenized-real-estate asset backed by investments in residential properties in the United States. This platform has expanded access to international investors, including in India. The growing list of companies offering platforms to enable fractional ownership of real estate in 2025 include Propy and AssetBlock in the United States, Polymath in Canada, SolidBlock in Israel, Brickblock in Germany and Antier Solutions in India.

    Bergen County, New Jersey, recently announced the largest blockchain-based-land-record-management project in the United States. It entered into a five-year agreement with Balcony, a blockchain-technology firm, in early June. Over 370,000 deeds, representing around $240 billion in real-property value, will be digitized and migrated onto the Avalanche-blockchain platform supporting decentralized applications, smart contracts and a wide range of use cases, including the tokenization of real-world assets. The project will cover all of the municipalities in the county and serve nearly one million residents. The county anticipates that the project will dramatically reduce deed processing times and streamline real estate transactions. The new system will also be designed to improve municipal revenue collection and enhance public trust in official land records.

    The Dubai Land Department (DLD) announced a multibillion-dollar-tokenization project to enable fractional ownership of real property in March of this year. This initiative was publicly launched on May 25 and is designed to transform property ownership by 2033, with tokenized assets projected to be valued at around $16 billion. DLD will collaborate with the Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority (VARA), the Dubai Future Foundation and the UAE Central Bank. DLD’s platform (Prypco Mint) will be integrated with its traditional land-registry systems. As a result of this project, fractional ownership of real estate will be available to UAE residents and investments will start at around $540. International investors will have access in the future.

    As noted above, jurisdictions tend to focus first on digitizing existing land records rather than a complete overhaul of legacy systems with blockchain technology. Bureaucratic resistance to change and opposition from potentially displaced intermediaries slows adoption. Integrating blockchain with legacy systems requires the development of standardized protocols to address risks, such as fraud and data fragmentation. Any transition to blockchain platforms requires substantial investments in infrastructure, training and public support, especially when communities distrust automated systems or government officials. Moreover, blockchain technology has limitations related to data storage, data integrity (if the historical data migrated over is not accurate), coding complexity, privacy features and processing speeds, and public and private networks can be hacked when access controls fail. Another significant concern is the evolving and currently insufficient regulatory framework surrounding the use of blockchain technology and smart contracts.

    Notwithstanding these obstacles, the adoption of blockchain platforms to tokenize real estate appears to be gaining traction. Regulatory-compliant solutions should be favored by large and small investors. Tokenization will expand beyond residential and commercial buildings to include data centers and other infrastructure. Citi Ventures has noted that tokenized real estate could serve as an alternative to REITs because it is more transparent, has lower fees and improved liquidity, with a broader reach to medium-income investors.

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  • New ‘Types’ of Autism Identified in Novel Genetic Study

    New ‘Types’ of Autism Identified in Novel Genetic Study

    There’s a common refrain in the autism community: “If you’ve met one person with autism, you’ve met one person with autism.”

    Dozens of behaviors and characteristics are linked to autism spectrum disorder (ASD), and no two people experience it the same way.

    Now, a new study published in Nature Genetics expands the contours of the autism spectrum by identifying four clinically and biologically distinct subtypes of the condition.

    “The research highlights that there are indeed different types of autism that carry different clinical, genetic, and biological profiles,” says the study’s coauthor Jennifer Foss-Feig, PhD, a clinical psychologist at the Seaver Autism Center for Research and Treatment at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City.

    “When someone with autism or their caregiver wonders how two people with autism can be quite so different — in development, in symptoms, or in support needs — this research suggests that it’s because they are different,” explains Dr. Foss-Feig, who serves as the vice president and senior scientific officer at the Simons Foundation Autism Research Initiative (SFARI).

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  • A&O Shearman guides Igneo through strategic acquisition of Infinity Aviation

    A&O Shearman guides Igneo through strategic acquisition of Infinity Aviation

    A&O Shearman advised Igneo Infrastructure Partners (Igneo) on its acquisition of Infinity Aviation Group, a leading fixed base operator (FBO) platform which operates a portfolio of on-airport assets at Boire Field (KASH), a public-use general aviation airport located in New Hampshire. The acquired assets include hangarage, line services, and fueling operations, supporting a broad range of aviation, business, and air cargo customers across the U.S.

    Igneo is a global infrastructure investment manager with USD20.5 billion in assets under management, recognized for its investment in high quality, mature, mid-market infrastructure companies and its commitment to building platform businesses. This transaction marks Igneo’s first investment in the North American aviation sector, its sixth platform investment in North America, and its eighth global investment in transportation and logistics.

    The multi-disciplinary aspect of the transaction—led by the Energy and Infrastructure team with key support from the Employment, Environment Health and Safety, and Tax teams— demonstrates A&O Shearman’s ability to service a wide range of issues within one firm.

    “This deal showcases our depth and breadth of advising on complex infrastructure transactions in strategic sectors,” said Jillian Ashley, A&O Shearman Energy & Infrastructure partner. “Our team’s sector expertise and commercial insight enabled us to provide tailored legal counsel to Igneo as they expand their North American portfolio and invest in the future of aviation infrastructure.”

    Supporting the transaction were Energy and Infrastructure associates Nisim (Niso) Matari and Aigul Gaisin, and law clerk Claire Hill. Specialist advice was provided by partner Ken Rivlin and associates Jake Ely and Olivia Kreft on environmental and sanctions matters; partner Brian Jebb and associates Hayde Faria and Alexandra Sentner on employment and compensation aspects; partner Caroline Lapidus, counsel Kara Altman, and associate Amirah Loury on tax; and partner Adam Sofen on real estate.

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  • FMC Corporation Declares Quarterly Dividend

    FMC Corporation Declares Quarterly Dividend

    PHILADELPHIA, July 16, 2025 /PRNewswire/ — FMC Corporation (NYSE: FMC) announced today that its board of directors declared a regular quarterly dividend of 58 cents per share, payable on October 16, 2025, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on September 30, 2025.

    About FMC

    FMC Corporation is a global agricultural sciences company dedicated to helping growers produce food, feed, fiber and fuel for an expanding world population while adapting to a changing environment. FMC’s innovative crop protection solutions – including biologicals, crop nutrition, digital and precision agriculture – enable growers and crop advisers to address their toughest challenges economically while protecting the environment. FMC is committed to discovering new herbicide, insecticide and fungicide active ingredients, product formulations and pioneering technologies that are consistently better for the planet. Visit fmc.com to learn more and follow us on LinkedIn®.

    Statement under the Safe Harbor Provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995: FMC and its representatives may from time to time make written or oral statements that are “forward-looking” and provide other than historical information, including statements contained in this press release, in FMC’s other filings with the SEC, and in presentations, reports or letters to FMC stockholders.

    In some cases, FMC has identified these forward-looking statements by such words or phrases as “outlook”, “will likely result,” “is confident that,” “expect,” “expects,” “should,” “could,” “may,” “will continue to,” “believe,” “believes,” “anticipates,” “predicts,” “forecasts,” “estimates,” “projects,” “potential,” “intends” or similar expressions identifying “forward-looking statements” within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, including the negative of those words or phrases. Such forward-looking statements are based on our current views and assumptions regarding future events, future business conditions and the outlook for the company based on currently available information. The forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results to be materially different from any results, levels of activity, performance or achievements expressed or implied by any forward-looking statement. These statements are qualified by reference to the risk factors included in Part I, Item 1A of our Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024 (the “2024 Form 10-K”), the section captioned “Forward-Looking Information” in Part II of the 2024 Form 10-K and to similar risk factors and cautionary statements in all other reports and forms filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). We wish to caution readers not to place undue reliance on any such forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made. Forward-looking statements are qualified in their entirety by the above cautionary statement.

    We specifically decline to undertake any obligation, and specifically disclaims any duty, to publicly update or revise any forward-looking statements that have been made to reflect events or circumstances after the date of such statements or to reflect the occurrence of anticipated or unanticipated events, except as may be required by law.

    SOURCE FMC Corporation

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  • ‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping’ Cast: Joseph Zada & More

    ‘The Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping’ Cast: Joseph Zada & More

    The Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping will welcome several new and already famous faces into the fold of the world based on the books by Suzanne Collins.

    The film, based on Collins’ newest prequel novel, will tell Haymitch Abernathy’s story. Haymitch competed in the second annual Quarter Quell, the 50th Hunger Games, and each of those anniversary competitions come with an added wrinkle to the Reaping. For Haymitch and his fellow tributes, there were twice the amount of children selected to compete in the arena.

    RELATED: Everything We Know About The ‘Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping’ Movie So Far

    Haymitch’s story will bridge that of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and Collins’ original trilogy, introducing younger versions of many already beloved characters as well as some never seen before. Find the full cast of The Hunger Games: Sunrise On The Reaping and their counterparts from previous films below:

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