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  • 15 Must-Hear Albums Arriving In July 2025: Kesha, BSB, Burna Boy & More

    15 Must-Hear Albums Arriving In July 2025: Kesha, BSB, Burna Boy & More

    From major comebacks to bold debuts, July is shaping up to be an exciting month in an already stellar 2025 in music. Two-time GRAMMY nominee Kesha kicks the month off with . (PERIOD), her first album after departing RCA and Kemosabe Records. Mid-month, Backstreet Boys will revisit their legacy on Millennium 2.0. and rising phenomenon Alex Warren will release his debut LP, You’ll Be Alright, Kid. The original Alice Cooper Group will round out July with their first album in 50 years, The Revenge of Alice Cooper. 

    Elsewhere in the month, several artists will bravely share deep, vulnerable feelings on new releases. Those include Jessie Murph’s Sex Hysteria, Jackson Wang’s MAGIC MAN II, Indigo De Souza’s Precipice, Dean Lewis’ The Epilogue, and FLETCHER’s poignant Would You Still Love Me If You Really Knew Me?

    Others will embrace fantasy and fun, such as Wet Leg’s sophomore LP Moisturizer, GWAR’s chaotic The Return of Gor Gor, Laura Jane Grace in the Trauma Tropes’ Adventure Club, Paul Weller’s Find El Dorado, and Fitz and the Tantrums’ Man on the Moon. What’s more, July might be the month where rapper Roddy Ricch finally shares The Navy Album with the world.

    To guide you through these fruitful upcoming four weeks, GRAMMY.com put together a list with the 15 Must-Hear Albums of July.

    Kesha — . (Period) (July 4)

    This year, Independence Day will mark another celebration for pop icon Kesha. Her upcoming album, . (PERIOD), will arrive on July 4 through her own Kesha Records under exclusive licensing to ADA Warner Music. It also marks her first record since departing RCA and Kemosabe Records in 2023.

    The 11-song tracklist will include 2024’s hit “Joyride,” “Yippee Ki-Yay” with T-Pain, “Delusional,” “Boy Crazy,” and the recent Slayyyter and Rose Gray collaboration, “Attention!” In a press release, the album is described as “a defiant act of self-expression that refuses to adhere to expectations or play it safe.” Kesha is “at her most powerful best, turning her experiences into vibrant, audacious art with a spiked heel at the neck of pop culture,” the release continued.

    In support of the album, Kesha announced TITS OUT, a co-headline tour with Scissor Sisters starting on July 1. “I’m going TITS OUT this summer to bring as much safety, fun, acceptance, love, connection, and celebration to this country because we are just as much the fabric of this FREE nation as anyone else,” she shared in a statement. “We will not be quiet, and we will fight through joy!”

    Learn more: Kesha Reveals The 10 Most Important Songs Of Her Career, From “Tik Tok” To “Eat The Acid”

    Burna Boy — No Sign Of Weakness (July 11)

    Nigerian Afrobeats star Burna Boy is also making a return in July with No Sign of Weakness, has been teased since last year, and was preceded by singles “Bundle by Bundle,” “Update,” “Sweet Love,” and “TaTaTa” featuring Travis Scott.

    A follow-up to 2023’s I Told Them…., No Sign of Weakness promises a fresh take on the artist’s Afro-fusion sounds, solidifying his presence as one of the world’s most exciting and influential artists. In order to commemorate the release, Burna Boy has announced a historic 16-city North American headline run. Beginning on Nov. 12 at Colorado’s iconic Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Burna will become the first Nigerian artist to ever headline the venue, and will continue through cities like Seattle, Oakland, Houston, and Los Angeles. 

    With the exception of the Red Rocks show, all performances will feature a custom-designed 360-degree stage in the middle of the arena floor, creating an immersive and intimate experience for fans.

    Backstreet Boys — Millennium 2.0 (July 11)

    As unbelievable as it sounds, Backstreet Boys’ chart-topping, GRAMMY-nominated, and signature album Millennium has turned 25 this year. To celebrate this milestone in true “Larger Than Life” fashion, the eternal boy band announced a deluxe version titled Millennium 2.0.

    Read more: How Pop Ushered In Y2K: Revisiting Songs & Performances By Prince, Jennifer Lopez, Backstreet Boys & More

    Millennium 2.0 will fittingly comprise 25 tracks, including all 12 remastered originals, live recordings from their 1999-2000 tour, demos, B-sides, and their latest single, “HEY,” which can be heard upon pre-saving the album. “Thank you for still loving this album more than 25 years later and we can’t wait to make a ton of new Millennium Memories with you!” the band shared on Instagram. “It’s time for (us) to go to work y’all…”

    The album drops just as BSB kick off their Into The Millennium residency at Las Vegas’ The Sphere. Totalling 21 shows — with three extra dates due to overwhelming demand — they will become the first pop act to perform at the venue.

    Learn more: 25 Years Of Backstreet Boys’ “I Want It That Way”: 10 Covers By Ed Sheeran, Lil Uzi Vert & More

    Wet Leg — Moisturizer (July 11)

    The Isle of Wight five-piece Wet Leg, founded by Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers, will heat up the summer with their sophomore record, Moisturizer. Following their GRAMMY-winning 2022 self-titled debut, the album was also produced by Dan Carey, and is spearheaded by singles “Catch These Fists,” “CPR,” and “Davina McCall.”

    The new LP was written while the band lived together in the remote English town of Southwold. There, they would work by day, and watch horror movies by night. “We were just kind of having fun and exploring,” Chambers said in press materials, while Teasdale concurred: “We focused on: Is this going to be fun to play live? It was very natural that we would write the second record together.”

    Joined by musicians Ellis Durand, Henry Holmes, and Joshua Mobaraki, Wet Leg spent the greater part of the past few years touring, “evolving into a feral, electrifying live force.” Moisturizer is said to capture that energy, “delivering a sound that’s tighter, bolder, and more self-assured, yet still brimming with the same quick wit and raw, unrefined energy.” The band will kick off a 19-stop North American tour starting Sept. 1 in Seattle.

    Jackson Wang — MAGIC MAN II (July 18)

    “I created MAGIC MAN to figure out my pain, as a mask representing my darkest emotions, my internal emotions,” said Hong Kong-born musician Jackson Wang in a statement. That 2022 sophomore record plunged him into experiencing “nothing but the crucial reality of what humanity is.”

    “I was in a very dark place mentally and physically. I thought I could never recover,” he added, explaining that this was the reason he took a year-long break to figure himself out. The result of his time off is MAGIC MAN II, an album about “being true to myself, listening to my heart and accepting all the good and the bad.”

    The album is structured in four chapters that explore different stages of grief — from manic highs, to losing one’s identity, to ultimately finding acceptance. For a preview of those sounds, Wang has released a handful of singles, including “High Alone,” “GBAD,” and “BUCK” featuring Indian singer Diljit Dosanjh. 

    Jessie Murph — Sex Hysteria (July 18)

    Jessie Murph is set to give this summer some Sex Hysteria. According to a statement, the 20-year-old singer goes through “a bold departure” from her first record, 2024’s That Ain’t No Man That’s The Devil, and opens up for the first time about “themes of sexuality, generational trauma and self-discovery with a vulnerability and honesty that marks a new chapter in her artistic evolution.”

    The 15-track LP is said to be “both a provocation and a reclamation,” with Murph confronting family wounds and reclaiming her body and her desires. The sophomore record pushes back “against the shame and stigma that often silence women who dare to be loud, sexual, or emotionally honest.”

    Sex Hysteria will include Murph’s trap country hit “Blue Strips,” as well as “Gucci Mane” and “Touch Me Like a Gangster.” Starting July 27, she will embark on a worldwide tour, crossing North America, Europe, and Australia and New Zealand throughout the rest of the year.

    Laura Jane Grace in the Trauma Tropes — Adventure Club (July 18)

    The upcoming album by Against Me!’s Laura Jane Grace and her new band, Laura Jane Grace in the Trauma Tropes, is a retelling of the quartet’s experiences in a life-changing songwriting retreat in Greece. Made possible by a grant through the Onassis Air Program, Adventure Club was recorded in Athens, and features Grace’s wife Paris Campbell Grace on vocals, as well as Athens-based musicians Jacopo “Jack” Fokas (bass) and Orestis Lagadinos (drums).

    Read more: For Laura Jane Grace, Record Cycles Can Be A ‘Hole In My Head’ — And She’s OK With That

    The 12-song collection is “a record about learning to take up space, about feeling free to be yourself as the bullshit of our ahistoric moment mounts,” per a release. “Protest songs and personal tunes have never been a binary for Grace, and she delivers some of her most profound — and, yes, playful — work ever at that particular intersection here. But the most prominent thread through Adventure Club’s dozen tracks is one of evolution, of letting yourself become something new.”

    Adventure Club follows Grace’s 2024 Hole in My Head. In August, she and the Trauma Tropes will hit the road for a string of concerts across North America alongside Trapper Schoepp, Team Nonexistent, and Murder by Death.

    FLETCHER — Would You Still Love Me If You Really Knew Me? (July 18)

    Queer icon FLETCHER poses a poignant question on her new album: Would You Still Love Me If You Really Knew Me? The LP is her most intimate and honest work so far, as she shared on a handwritten note: “this is my heart split open on record” and is “both an open wound and an act of liberation.”

    The singer born Cari Elise Fletcher built her career on sexual fluidity and singing about relationships had exclusively with women. However, things took a turn in her personal life last year, when she found herself falling for a man instead. The result was the single “Boy,” one of the biggest, rawest revelations she makes on Would You Still Love Me If You Really Knew Me? “I kissed a boy,” she sings. “And I know it’s not what you wanted to hear/ And it wasn’t on your bingo card this year/ Well it wasn’t on mine/ I fell in love.”

    Learn more: FLETCHER Is “F—ing Unhinged” & Proud Of It On ‘In Search Of The Antidote’

    In a recent interview with Rolling Stone, FLETCHER acknowledged that “There will be people that feel disappointed and feel confused and have questions. Girl, I had questions and I was confused too. It shocked me just as much as anybody else.” But by staying true to her feelings and fully sharing her journey, FLETCHER welcomes a stronger, truer version of herself to the world.

    Alex Warren — You’ll Be Alright, Kid (July 18)

    Alex Warren’s much-anticipated debut studio album is just around the corner. You’ll Be Alright, Kid arrives via Atlantic Records, and adds 10 new tracks to his 2024 EP of the same name.

    The 21-song record will also include Warren’s recent viral hits “Ordinary” and “Bloodline” with Jelly Roll, as well as new single “On My Mind” featuring BLACKPINK’s Rosé. And while You’ll Be Alright, Kid (Chapter 1) focused on dealing with grief, the LP expands upon themes of healing and resilience. Most of the album was co-written by Warren in partnership with Cal Shapiro and Mags Duval, and produced by Adam Yaron.

    Throughout the summer, Warren will play sets at several festivals around the world, including Lollapalooza Paris and Chicago, Norway’s Slottsfjell, and Canada’s Osheaga. The singer will also perform live in a string of North American cities during September and October.

    Roddy Ricch — The Navy Album (July 18)

    After several delays, Roddy Ricch was set to drop his much-awaited third LP, The Navy Album, on April 25, but the release was postponed once again. Two months later and it finally seems like the album will come out on July 18, as pre-save links on his Instagram note.

    In December 2024, after announcing another postponement, the Compton rapper shared second single “Lonely Road,” featuring Terrace Martin on the saxophone. The track joins 2024’s “Survivor’s Remorse” — which samples Kelly Clarkson’s 2023 song, “Me” — as the sole previews of the album so far. According to Apple Music, Ricch’s other 2024 single, “911,” didn’t make the final tracklist.

    Following 2021’s Live Life Fast and 2022’s mixtape Feed Tha Streets III, the upcoming album was produced by Terrace Martin, Turbo, Omar Grand, Evrgrn, and others, and will be released via Atlantic Records and Bird Vision Entertainment. Most recently, Ricch shared “Underdog” as a part of the star-studded F1: The Movie soundtrack.

    Bush — I Beat Loneliness (July 18)

    Rock band Bush are gearing up to release their tenth studio album, I Beat Loneliness. In advance, they shared “60 Ways to Forget People,” an impactful track that explores  “the complexities of heartbreak, personal transformation, and the painful process of letting go,” per the band’s press release.

    “What I feel about this record is it addresses the common struggles we all have,” said frontman Gavin Rossdale. “‘60 Ways to Forget People’ is an ode to sacrifice and a dedication to the focus it takes to be better. All the time and in all things.” Produced by Rossdale and Erik Ron, the record includes 12 tracks that deepen the band’s post-grunge sound into more mature, sleek productions, as can heard on lead single “The Land Of Milk And Honey.”

    Following the release, Bush will tour North America until the end of August, and then head over to Europe for a series of shows from September through November.

    Indigo De Souza — Precipice (July 25)

    In 2024, Hurricane Helene flooded Indigo De Souza’s home and destroyed many of her belongings. Forced to cancel events and launch a fundraiser to help with the costs, it was a liminal experience in her life  — one of the many that shaped her upcoming fourth studio album, Precipice.

    “I feel constantly on the precipice, of something horrible, or something beautiful — something that will change my life for better or for worse,” De Souza said in a statement. “Music gives me ways to harness that feeling. Ways to push forward in new directions.” To harness that spirit, she tried blind studio sessions in Los Angeles and found a seamless connection with producer Elliott Kozel.

    “I’d been wanting to work on more pop-leaning music for a while, so when I came out to L.A. I made sure to meet with people that could help bring that to life,” she said. “I wanted to make music that could fill your heart with euphoria while you dance along.” A preview of those sounds can be heard on pre-releases “Crying Over Nothing” and “Heartthrob.” De Souza will also tour 10 U.S. cities in October, with support from alt artist mothé.

    GWAR — The Return of Gor Gor (July 25)

    Legendary shock rockers GWAR are celebrating their 40th anniversary with The Return of Gor Gor. The multi-format album and 32-page comic book chronicles the comeback of Gor Gor, GWAR’s long-lost Tyrannosaurus Rex pet, who mysteriously disappeared following the death of their former frontman, Oderus Urungus.

    Current vocalist Blöthar The Berserker commented on the album: “The last time I saw Gor Gor, he was just a wee fart dragon. He had crawled on the hood of my Kia Soul and was holding on for dear life while I drove to the store to buy Clamato. I bathed him in wiper fluid and used my wipers to knock him off my sweet ride. Next thing I know, he’s a 20-foot tall trans-species prostitute working a pickle park. Apparently, he’s all grown up and looking for revenge. This record chronicles his struggles as a young Dino-American trying to make his way in a cruel world.”

    In support of Gor Gor and the new release, GWAR will headline a North American tour kicking off Oct. 18 in Salt Lake City and wrapping up Nov. 22 in Norfolk, Virginia.

    Fitz and the Tantrums — Man On The Moon (July 25)

    Pop-rock group Fitz and the Tantrums’ sixth studio album, Man On The Moon, arrives July 25. The follow-up to 2022’s Let Yourself Free is described as the band’s “most daring” yet in press materials, a “no-nonsense collection of soulful, pop-inflected masterpieces” that reflect “a band that’s confident in their signature style, yet unafraid to venture into bold new territory.”

    “I decided I was simply going to write for my heart and for my soul and nobody else,” explained frontman Michael “Fitz” Fitzpatrick. “At this point in our career, myself and the band feel we have complete creative license. Because, c’mon, nobody knows what the rules are anymore. So I’m not going to chase some vapor in the wind. I’m going to just do what I want.”

    “We’ve never wanted to be stuck in a box. We refused to do that,” added co-lead vocalist Noelle Scaggs. “With this project, we’re daring to be different.” A taste of this new sound can be heard on the title track and lead single, as well as March’s “Ruin the Night.”

    Fitz and The Tantrums will embark on a summer tour right before the album drops and hitting 31 North American cities. The tour will feature Aloe Blacc and Neal Francis as special guests on select dates, and Ax and the Hatchetman, SNACKTIME and Gable Price and Friends as openers.

    Alice Cooper — The Revenge of Alice Cooper (July 25)

    It’s not every band that has the luxury of reuniting five decades after their rise to fame. The original Alice Cooper Group understands this privilege, and is making sure to come back in the most chaotic, boisterous way. The Revenge of Alice Cooper channels “a high-voltage journey into vintage horror and classic ’70s shock rock, capturing the sound, energy, and mischief” that made the band legendary, according to a press statement.

    Comprising 14 tracks, including singles “Black Mamba” and “Wild Ones,” the LP also features a posthumous appearance by Glen Buxton, the band’s original guitarist who passed away in 1997, on “What Happened To You.” Furthermore, the box set and limited smart formats of the album include two exclusive new tracks: a long-lost 1970 version of “Return of The Spiders,” and the vintage blend “Titanic Overunderture.”

    The Revenge of Alice Cooper is said to be “a celebration of friendship, nostalgia, and the timeless sound that solidified Alice Cooper as a rock icon,” and fan can expect a “powerful and nostalgic experience that bridges the gap between the band’s storied past and their vibrant present.”

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  • Next-gen coating mimics clouds to manage heat, evade detection

    Next-gen coating mimics clouds to manage heat, evade detection

    Researchers at Finland’s Aalto University have engineered a wafer-thin “cloud” metasurface that can flip between bright white and deep grey, shifting a surface from powerful daytime cooling to rapid solar heating while remaining almost invisible to infrared cameras. The invention, achieved without dedicated project funding, could reshape how buildings, vehicles, and textiles manage heat and hide from thermal sensors.

    Unlike conventional white paints that scatter sunlight but glow hot in thermal imaging, the new white state of the plasmonic metasurface bounces sunlight back into space while keeping mid-infrared emissivity so low that heat cameras see almost nothing. 

    Switch the same film to its grey state, and the material absorbs sunlight more efficiently than matte black, yet still refuses to radiate tell-tale warmth. Inspired by how cumulus clouds brighten or darken as they evolve, the dual behavior answers a growing demand for passive, energy-free solutions that can cool, heat, or camouflage on command.

    Cloud physics on a chip

    The metasurface owes its versatility to an ensemble of disordered metallic nanostructures that manipulate light through multiple scattering, strong absorption, and what the team calls “polarizonic reflection.” In the white state, solar photons ricochet through the labyrinth of nanoscale features and back into the sky, providing radiative cooling under full sun. 

    In the grey state, those same nanostructures trap visible light and convert it to heat. Crucially, both modes keep emissivity in the 8–13 micron range, where most thermal cameras peer, well below the threshold that would reveal the material.

    “We’ve engineered a nanoscale cloud on every surface. It can tune its colour and temperature like a real cloud, between cooling white and heating grey, while staying hidden from thermal cameras,” Professor Mady Elbahri from Aalto University said.

    Traditional coatings face a trade-off, Elbahri’s group notes. White titanium dioxide paints cool reasonably well in shade but lose their edge under direct sun and glow brightly in thermal imaging. Black surfaces absorb but radiate heat as efficiently, lighting up infrared sensors. The new metasurface sidesteps both problems.

    Cooling white, heating grey, and both are invisible

    Graduate student Adel Assad, who helped fabricate the coatings, contrasted the approach with today’s best “cool white” paints. “This new white plasmonic metasurface scatters sunlight through disordered metallic nanostructures while minimising thermal emission, cooling surfaces in full sunlight and remaining thermally camouflaged. This feature makes the innovation groundbreaking,” he said.

    In tests, the grey mode reached temperatures higher than conventional black coatings but still emitted little infrared. “This grey surface gets hotter than black, but without sending out heat that heat sensors can see. This could be a game-changer for smart textiles, building materials, and camouflage,” added post-doctoral researcher Moheb Abdelaziz in an article on the university website.

    Potential applications span zero-energy façades that swap from cooling to heating with the seasons, garments that keep wearers comfortable without electronics, and low-visibility drones or sensors that need to evade infrared detection. Because the metasurface is only a few hundred nanometres thick, it could be deposited on steel panels, polymer films, or even fibres without adding weight.

    Next steps and a lesson in persistence

    The team aims to integrate electrochromic or phase-change layers so users can trigger the white-to-grey transformation in real time, perhaps through a small voltage or environmental cue. The researchers also plan durability studies under UV exposure, humidity, and mechanical stress to qualify the coating for outdoor use.

    Elbahri said the breakthrough rarely happened. “With no dedicated funding after initial setbacks, we relied on shared vision and collaboration, especially with our partners in Germany, to turn doubt into discovery. It’s proof that science, like clouds, can rise against the odds,” he reflected.

    If the technology moves from lab benches to factory lines, surfaces could soon act like programmable skies, reflecting, absorbing, or concealing heat as effortlessly as a passing cloud.

    The findings were published in the journal Advanced Materials in June 2025.

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  • Cambodia, South Korea record new avian flu cases in poultry

    Since mid-June, Cambodia’s veterinary authority has confirmed six further highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) outbreaks in poultry flocks.

    Based on official notifications to the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH), these bring the nation’s total outbreaks over the past 12 months to 16. Directly impacted have been close to 8,000 domestic birds.

    In the recent outbreaks, village flocks affected ranged in size from 25 to more than 650 birds. Two were in Pursat — the first infections in this western province. There were also two outbreaks in each of Takeo and Siem Reap, which are located in the far south and northwest of the country, respectively.

    Detection of the H5N1 serotype of the HPAI virus at one of the Takeo province outbreaks was confirmed after an infection was suspected in a resident of the village. Sick or dead poultry at the other locations raised suspicions of HPAI in the other village flocks. 

    2 more outbreaks in South Korean poultry

    Over the past two weeks, HPAI outbreaks linked to the same virus variant have been confirmed in two poultry flocks. The first ended a near two-month hiatus in South Korea.

    Testing positive for the virus in mid-June was a flock of around 28,000 birds at a farm in the central province of North Chungcheong, according to the latest WOAH notification. 

    According to the agriculture ministry, the infection was revealed in ducks as a result of routine pre-shipment testing.

    Just last week, a flock of around 1,000 native chickens tested positive for the same virus at a premises in the southeastern province of South Gyeongsang.

    The ministry reports that the farm was not authorized to keep livestock, and numerous biosecurity-related deficiencies emerged during the follow-up inspection there.

    Following this latest development, the authorities have increased surveillance of native chicken flocks, as well as dealers and traditional markets that handle these birds. Furthermore, for a period of 14 days, the proportion of birds subject to pre-shipment testing will be raised from 10% to 30%.

    The risk of further spread of HPAI in South Korea is not considered by the ministry to be high. This is based on experience from 2024, when just four outbreaks were reported in the country during the months of July and August. 

    These latest outbreaks bring South Korea’s total since October of 2024 to 49.

    HPAI developments elsewhere in Asia-Pacific birds

    Animal health agencies of Australia and Japan have recently declared to WOAH that earlier HPAI outbreak series in their respective countries have been “resolved.”

    In Australia, a total of more than 596,000 poultry were directly impacted by the disease at four farms in the state of Victoria earlier this year. All these outbreaks started during the month of February, with birds testing positive for the H7N8 serotype of HPAI.

    The H5N1 HPAI virus was detected at a total of 51 poultry farms in Japan between October of 2024 and January of this year. As a result, more than 9.2 million birds died or were culled and destroyed to prevent the further spread of the virus.

    Among Japan’s wild birds, however, the HPAI situation is ongoing.

    After a hiatus of more than two years, the H5N2 variant of HPAI was detected in a wild bird in April, according to a retrospective report to WOAH.

    More than 100 wild birds have also tested positive for the H5N1 virus serotype in Japan over recent months, according to a separate notification.

    Furthermore, the same virus variant was detected after three sea otters were found dead around the island of Hokkaido in early May.  

    Most recent disease update from the Department of Agriculture’s Bureau of Animal Industry (dated June 26) in the Philippines indicates no new HPAI cases in poultry since the end of April.

    As of June 16, nine HPAI outbreaks had occurred in Vietnamese poultry so far this year, reported DanViet, citing agriculture ministry data. Across six provinces, more than 21,300 birds had died, and 25,200 had been culled in 2025 up to that point.

    Compared with 2024, the number of provinces affected this year is lower, but more than twice as many poultry have been lost to the disease, according to this source.   

    Further human infections reported in Cambodia, China

    Cambodia has been experiencing a recent spike in human infections with the avian influenza A(H5N1) virus.

    A recent update by Avian Flu Diary puts the country’s total cases so far this year at seven. Of these, four have been confirmed during the month of June. This was the situation on June 24, based on data from the country’s health ministry.

    As in previous cases in Cambodia, the latest patient is known to have had contact with sick and dead poultry. 

    The source notes that several of those people infected there have died. This is linked to the greater virulence of the virus circulating in the country — recently designated as clade 2.3.2.1e — than the clade 2.3.4.4b variant circulating elsewhere, including in the U.S. and Europe.

    In recent weeks, four human infections with flu viruses of avian origin have been confirmed in China. These are covered in recent updates on the situation in the Western Pacific Region from the World Health Organization (WHO).

    Three of these involved the H9N2 virus — one in each of the provinces of Henan, Hunan, and Sichuan. All started in mid-May following contact with poultry. Two adult patients required hospital treatment, but they and a six-year-old boy are reported to have recovered.

    The fourth Chinese patient was a farmer from Shaanxi province who may have contracted an H10N3 infection while traveling in Inner Mongolia. While still under treatment in hospital, her condition was reported to be improving. This is the sixth confirmed human infection with this virus in the world.

    View our continuing coverage of the global avian influenza situation in poultry, and on disease developments in the U.S. dairy sector.

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  • ‘I have a lot of sympathy for Elon Musk’: Succession creator Jesse Armstrong on his tech bros AI satire Mountainhead | Mountainhead

    ‘I have a lot of sympathy for Elon Musk’: Succession creator Jesse Armstrong on his tech bros AI satire Mountainhead | Mountainhead

    When he gets to his London office on the morning this piece is published, Jesse Armstrong will read it in print, or not at all. Though the building has wifi, he doesn’t use it. “If you’re a procrastinator, which most writers are, it’s just a killer.” Online rabbit holes swallow whole days. “In the end, it’s better to be left with the inadequacies of your thoughts.” He gives himself a mock pep talk. “‘It’s just you and me now, brain.’”

    Today, the showrunner of Succession and co-creator of Peep Show is back at home, in walking distance of his workspace. He could be any London dad: 54, salt-and-pepper beard, summer striped T-shirt. But staying offline could feel like a statement too, given Armstrong is also the writer-director of Mountainhead, a film about tech bros. Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Open AI’s Sam Altman, guru financiers Peter Thiel and Marc Andreessen: all these and more are mixed up in the movie’s characters, sharing a comic hang in a ski mansion. Outside, an AI launched by one of the group has sparked global chaos. Inside, there is snippy friction about the intra-billionaire pecking order.

    Mountainhead feels like a pulled-back curtain. But Armstrong also resisted another rabbit hole: spending time in Silicon Valley for research. He tried that kind of thing before. Contrary to rumour, Succession never did involve backdoor chats with the children of Rupert Murdoch. Once the show became a phenomenon, though, he did meet with masters of finance and corporate media, picking their brains for insights at luxe New York restaurants. “And they’d be charismatic, and namedrop the 20 most famous people in the world, and I’d feel this buzz of excitement by association. Then later I’d look at my notes, and what they’d actually said read like complete inane bullshit. ‘Make the move!’ ‘Be the balls!’”

    Ski mansion schemers … from left, Cory Michael Smith, Steve Carell, Ramy Youssef and Jason Schwartzman in Mountainhead. Photograph: HBO/2025 Home Box Office, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

    So Armstrong returned to his office and, more generally, his kind. “I’m a writer,” he says, “and a writer type. And I’m happy with other writer types.” In America, when Succession exploded, you could sense an assumption the mind behind it must be an English Aaron Sorkin: a slick character as glamorous as the world he wrote about. Instead, here was the dry figure who compares making Mountainhead to an early job at budget supermarket Kwik Save. (Both, he says, boiled down to managing workload.)

    Rather than stalk Sam Altman, he read biographies and hoovered up podcasts. Amid the oligarchs’ tales of favourite Roman emperors, he kept finding a common thread: a wilful positivity about their own effect on the world. “And it must be delightful to really believe, ‘You know what? It’s going to be fine. AI’s going to cure cancer, and don’t worry about burning up the planet powering the AI to do it, because we’ll just fix that too.’”

    Part of the trick, he says, is perspective. At a certain level, money and power give life the feel of an eternal view from a private plane. “Whereas reality is standing in the road, dodging cars, thinking ‘Oh God! This is fucking terrifying!’”

    Success and Succession have not made Armstrong an optimist. But they did give him the professional heft to direct Mountainhead as well as write it, and to do so at unprecedented pace. Film and TV move achingly slowly; it was last November that he decided he wanted to make a movie about the junction of AI, crypto and libertarian politics. By May, he was preparing for it to come out.

    He says now he wanted Mountainhead to be “a bobsleigh run. Short, and slightly bitter, and once you’re on, you’re on.” His voice quickens recalling a first meeting with Steve Carell, who he wanted to play Randall, “the group’s dark money Gandalf”. This was January. Without a script, Armstrong could only tell the actor the story he’d loosely planned. Carell sat in silence. “I thought, ‘Well, this has gone very badly.’” Then he said yes. “At which point it was like, ‘Fuck. This is actually going to happen. Now I have to write it.’”

    Cocooned world … Succession. Photograph: Home Box Office/Graeme Hunter

    By March, the film was being shot in a 21,000 sq ft mansion in Deer Valley, Utah, then on the market for $65m. Carell aside, the cast included Cory Michael Smith, Ramy Youssef and Jason Schwartzman. For Armstrong, directing his first feature on a berserk turnaround was made easier by a deep fondness for actors. Standing in front of a camera, he says, paralyses him with self-consciousness. “So I honestly find what they do magical.”

    His own lack of talent as a performer proved important to the younger Armstrong. Between 1995 and 1997, he worked as an assistant to Labour MP Doug Henderson. It was an interesting time to have the job, with Tony Blair about to enter Downing Street. Is there a Sliding Doors world where a rising star assistant becomes an MP himself? One where, by now, Jesse Armstrong is home secretary?

    He shakes his head for several seconds. “I just wasn’t good at the job. Fundamentally, I didn’t understand politics.” He knows it sounds odd, having later written for insidery Westminster comedy The Thick of It. “But I couldn’t do the acting. I didn’t get it. I always thought like a writer, so in meetings where I should have been building my career, I’d just be thinking, ‘That’s weird. That’s funny. Why did you say that?’” (Armstrong once wrote for the Guardian about a meeting with then Conservative minister Ann Widdecombe, in which she sat under two posters: one a lurid anti-abortion message, the other Garfield.)

    Instead, he segued into comedy, and soon after Peep Show, the beloved squirm of a sitcom co-written with Sam Bain. At first glance, Succession is the obvious prequel to Mountainhead, a former newspaper empire giving way to tech superpower. But Armstrong sees a closer link between his new film and Peep Show: “Because it’s about men, and male hierarchies, and the pathos of men trying to connect.”

    He is tickled by the thought of his own story world, in which characters from different projects collide. “You can see Super Hans arriving at Mountainhead on a scooter, delivering the ketamine.” Then he pauses, suddenly anxious. Could he make sure I’ll mention Bain if I talk about Peep Show? “Because it was always Sam’s show as well.” And Hans owed so much to actor Matt King too, he says, “and then, of course, there’s David Mitchell and Robert Webb.”

    Should Armstrong ever make an Oscar acceptance speech, we will be there a while. Making sure due credit is given is of a piece with his near-pathological modesty. (He is a keen footballer. Which position? “Terrible.”) Being fair-minded matters too. He adds a postscript to his memory of leaving Westminster. “I’d also say I don’t in any way feel superior to people who do make a career in politics. I still believe we need good, professional politicians.”

    Turning back to Mountainhead, his even-handedness reaches a kind of event horizon. Armstrong , it transpires, feels sorry for Elon Musk. “Musk has done huge damage in the world, particularly with Doge, but I have a lot of sympathy for him.” The owner of X was brutally bullied as a schoolboy and according to a 2023 biography, had a difficult relationship with his father. “This is a traumatised human being,” says Armstrong. Still, not every bullied child ends up making apparent Nazi salutes onstage. “Yeah. That wasn’t great.”

    Ivory tower … with Steve Carell on the Mountainhead shoot. Photograph: Macall Polay/PR

    But there are other sides to Armstrong. For all the hints of bumble and awkwardness, he has also had the discipline to build a stellar career. And the more measured he is in person, the more Mountainhead feels like the work of a grinning Id, rising up to take a scalpel to his subjects, with their pretensions to philosophy, and dark indifference to life. (“I’m so excited about these atrocities,” a character beams as the world goes violently awry.) But his sympathy has its limits. “I do think the cocoon they’re in makes it hard for them to remember other people are actually real. But they’ve also been quick to give up trying. And some definitely feel the superior person shouldn’t have to try anyway.”

    More to the point, though, Armstrong finds the tech moguls funny. Much of the grimness of a Musk or Thiel is also brilliantly ridiculous: the epic lack of self-knowledge, the thinness of skin. Having studied them as he has, would he expect his real-life models to be enraged by the film? “Oh no. They’d instantly dismantle it in a way that would be 50% completely fair, and 50% totally facile. But they wouldn’t see any truth to it.”

    Still, Mountainhead is something very rare: a movie that feels as contemporary as TikTok. For Armstrong, after Succession and now this, you might think stories about the moment had become addictive. He frowns. Is a period piece next, in fact? Victorian bonnets? “Maybe. Genuinely maybe. Because I’m not actually that drawn to ripped-from-the-headlines ideas.” The frown deepens. “Am I not? I don’t know. I’m losing faith in my own answer, because I evidently am. I mean, I’m not going to claim I don’t like writing about right now. But honestly, at the same time – I’d be pleased to get out of it.”

    Mountainhead is available to own digitally now

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  • Anker Charger 2-pack deal: Two iPhone chargers for $12

    Anker Charger 2-pack deal: Two iPhone chargers for $12

    SAVE 37%: As of July 1, the Anker Charger, 20W, USB-C (2-Pack) is on sale for $11.99, down from its regular price of $18.99. That’s $7 off, or a savings of 37%.

    When you need a new iPhone charger, it’s usually a good idea to just go ahead and buy two: one for home and one for the bag. Anker makes that easy, with affordable iPhone chargers that become even better deals when they’re on sale — as they are right now ahead of Amazon Prime Day.

    Today, the Anker Charger, 20W, USB-C (2-Pack) is on sale at Amazon for $11.99, down from its regular price of $18.99. That’s 37% off for a savings of $7.

    SEE ALSO:

    Every color of the new M4 MacBook Air are now $150 off ahead of Prime Day

    This Anker pack comes with two brick plugs with USB-C connectors and two cords. Each plug comes with two sockets that support dual port charging, so you’ll be able to plug a second device into the charger without compromising output. These Anker chargers won’t only charge iPhones — they’re also compatible with other devices like iPads and iPad Pros.

    Mashable Deals

    The Anker charger supports fast charging with 20W output. This means that even though you’re going third party, you’ll still be getting a speedy phone charge.

    The best early Prime Day deals to shop this week

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  • Casio’s Ring Watch is available online again

    Casio’s Ring Watch is available online again

    Casio’s $120 CRW001-1 (AKA the Ring Watch) is back in stock on Casio’s website for the first time since it launched — then swiftly sold out — in December. The Ring Watch was released to commemorate the 50th anniversary of its original digital watch. While it may look like a novelty, the fully-functional watch impressed The Verge’s Victoria Song as both a fashion statement and a practical gadget. The silver ring has a sub-inch screen and comes in one ring size: 10.5. However, Casio includes 16 and 19 millimeter spacers to accommodate smaller fingers.

    The Ring Watch’s LCD screen can display six digits, and be set to standard or military time. The three buttons around its face can start a stopwatch, display the date, or show the time in a different timezone. An alarm function will flash in the corner of its screen when the counter is complete.

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  • Meghan Markle launches ‘thoughtful’ collection of wines | Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex

    Meghan Markle launches ‘thoughtful’ collection of wines | Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex

    Meghan Markle has announced her latest foray into lifestyle branding, with the Duchess of Sussex expanding As Ever product line now set to feature a “thoughtful” collection of wines.

    A press release on Tuesday described the first wine to become available as “a light, fresh, and effortlessly celebratory 2023 Napa Valley Rosé, thoughtfully curated by Meghan, Duchess of Sussex”.

    “This debut rosé marks the beginning of As Ever’s thoughtful expansion into wine, with a Méthode Champenoise Napa Valley sparkling wine planned for the near future and additional varietals to follow,” it said.

    Meghan’s team also set the stage for where the wine might be best consumed: “Designed for summer’s best moments – from lunches that turn into dinners and sun-drenched weekends where the only thing louder than the music is the laughter.”

    The manufacturer, Fairwinds Estate in Napa valley, located six hours drive from the Montecito home Markle shares with Prince Harry, also makes wine for Barry Manilow, the estate of John Wayne and the TV series Yellowstone.

    Other celebrities who have also put their names to wine in recent years include Cameron Diaz (Avaline), director Francis Ford Coppola, Post Malone ( Maison No 9) and the ever-entrepreneurial Snoop Dogg, with 19 Crimes Cali Red.

    Some celebrities have done well with alcohol ventures, including Brad Pitt, whose Miravel rosé brand is valued at around $200m, and George Clooney’s Casa Amigos tequila brand, established in 2103 and sold for $1bn four years later.

    The bespoke or craft wine business is rapidly growing. Estimated at $35bn globally in 2019, it is projected to reach almost $49bn by 2027.

    Meghan’s growing list of As Ever products includes a crepe mix, a shortbread mix with flower sprinkles, apricot spread in “keepsake packaging”, a limited edition orange blossom honey, and various teas. All products on As Ever’s website were sold out as of Tuesday morning, along with the reassuring message to consumers: “More coming soon.”

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  • AI and automated biology combine to improve enzymes – News Bureau

    CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — By combining artificial intelligence with automated robotics and synthetic biology, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have dramatically improved performance of two important industrial enzymes — and created a user-friendly, fast process to improve many more.

    Led by Huimin Zhao, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at the U. of I., the team reported its findings in the journal Nature Communications.

     “Enzymes have been increasingly used in energy production, in therapeutics, even in consumer products like laundry detergent. But they are not as widely used as they could be, because they still have limitations. Our technology can help address those limitations efficiently,” said Zhao, who also is affiliated with the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology at the U. of I.

    Enzymes are proteins that carry out specific catalytic functions that drive many biological processes. Those seeking to harness enzymes to advance medicine, technology, energy or sustainability often run into roadblocks involving an enzyme’s efficiency or its ability to single out a desired target amidst a complex chemical environment, Zhao said.

    “Improving protein function, particularly enzyme function, is challenging because we don’t know exactly what kinds of mutations we should introduce — and it’s usually not just a single mutation; it’s a lot of synergistic mutations,” Zhao said. “With our model of integrating AI and automated synthetic biology, we offer an efficient way to solve that problem.”

    Zhao’s group previously reported an AI model to predict an enzyme’s function based on its sequence. In the new paper, the researchers take their AI a step farther: predicting what changes to a known protein would improve its function.

    “In a typically sized enzyme, the possible number of variations is larger than the number of atoms in the universe,” said Nilmani Singh, the co-first author of the paper. “So we use the AI method to help us create a relatively small library of potentially useful variant combinations, instead of randomly searching the whole protein sequence.”

    However, training and improving an AI model is more than just code; it requires a lot of input, data and feedback. So the Illinois team coupled their AI models with the automated capabilities offered by the iBioFoundry, a center at the U. of I. dedicated to quick, user-friendly engineering and testing of biological systems ranging from enzymes to whole cells. Zhao directs the iBioFoundry, which is supported by the National Science Foundation.  

    In the new paper, the researchers lay out their process: First, they ask the AI tool how to improve a desired enzyme’s performance. The AI tool searches datasets of known enzyme structures and suggests sequence changes. The automated protein-building machines at the iBioFoundry produce the suggested enzymes, which are then rapidly tested to characterize their functions. The data from those tests are fed into another AI model, which uses the information to improve the next round of suggested protein designs.

    “It’s a step toward a self-driving lab: a lab that designs its own proteins, makes the proteins, tests them and makes the next one,” said Stephan Lane, the manager of the iBioFoundry and co-first author. “The designing and learning is done by an AI algorithm, and the building and testing is done by robotics.”

    Using this method, the team produced variants of two key industrial enzymes with substantially improved performance. One enzyme, added to animal feed to improve its nutritional content, increased its activity by 26 times. The other, a catalyst used in industrial chemical synthesis, had 16 times greater activity and 90 times greater substrate preference, meaning it was far less likely to grab molecules that were not its target.    

    “We described two enzymes in the paper, but it’s truly a generalized approach. We only need a protein sequence and an assay,” Zhao said. “We want to try to apply it to as many enzymes as possible.”

    Next, the researchers plan to continue improving their AI models and upgrade equipment for even faster, higher-throughput synthesis and testing. They also have developed a user interface, enabling the system to run with a simple typed query. Their aim is to offer their method as a service for other researchers seeking to improve enzymes and speed drug development and innovations in energy and technology.

    “For the user interface, the motivation is to allow people with different backgrounds to use the tool,” said graduate student Tianhao Yu, a coauthor of the paper. “If an experimental scientist doesn’t know how to run Python programs, then they can use our interface to help them run the program. They just need to use English to describe their needs, and it will automatically run.”

    The National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy supported this work.

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  • Top 5 women’s health headlines you missed in June 2025

    Top 5 women’s health headlines you missed in June 2025

    Top 5 women’s health headlines you missed in June 2025 | Image Credit: © sebra – stock.adobe.com.

    June 2025 delivered pivotal updates across the field of women’s health, spanning clinical guidance, therapeutic innovation, policy statements, and new research insights.

    From ACOG’s condemnation of violence against reproductive health providers to promising trial data on managing vasomotor symptoms and recurrent bacterial vaginosis, this month’s developments reflect both the clinical and societal forces shaping OB/GYN practice today. Additional highlights include updated AAP recommendations on adolescent contraceptive care and new findings linking ADHD to increased risk of premenstrual dysphoric disorder.

    In this monthly roundup, Contemporary OB/GYN summarizes the most significant clinical findings, expert commentary, and policy developments from June 2025.

    Click on each headline below for full coverage and analysis.

    1. Elinzanetant found to reduce VMS from endocrine therapy for breast cancer

    A phase 3 trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that elinzanetant significantly reduced moderate-to-severe vasomotor symptoms in women receiving endocrine therapy for hormone receptor–positive breast cancer. Among the 474 participants, those receiving elinzanetant reported up to 3.5 fewer daily hot flash episodes by week 4 compared to placebo. Improvements in sleep and menopausal quality of life were also greater in the elinzanetant group. These findings address a critical need, as vasomotor symptoms often undermine adherence to endocrine therapy, potentially affecting long-term cancer outcomes.

    2. Secnidazole shows promise for recurrent BV treatment in new clinical trial

    New data presented at the 2025 ACOG Annual Clinical and Scientific Meeting support the long-term use of secnidazole oral granules for recurrent bacterial vaginosis (BV), a condition affecting nearly 1 in 3 reproductive-aged women in the U.S. In a small trial, once-weekly 2 g doses showed comparable or improved efficacy to CDC-recommended suppressive regimens. Lead investigator Chemen M. Neal, MD, emphasized the potential for simplified dosing to improve adherence and reduce recurrence. The findings also underscore the need for accurate diagnosis and sustained management of BV, which carries both physical and psychosocial burdens.

    3. ACOG condemns violence against reproductive health care providers

    In a joint statement, ACOG president Steven J. Fleischman, MD, and CEO Sandra E. Brooks, MD, condemned recent acts of violence targeting reproductive health care providers, including a bombing at a Minnesota fertility clinic and online harassment of clinicians. The statement, released following the 2025 ACOG Annual Clinical and Scientific Meeting, underscored the escalating risks ob-gyns face for delivering comprehensive reproductive care. Citing long-standing patterns of ideologically motivated violence, ACOG called for strengthened protections under policies like the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act and urged political leaders to oppose threats against providers.

    4. AAP issues updated guidance on contraception for adolescents

    The American Academy of Pediatrics updated its guidance on adolescent contraceptive care, urging pediatricians to provide developmentally appropriate, confidential counseling and access to the full spectrum of contraceptive methods. Published in the July 2025 issue of Pediatrics, the policy emphasizes equity, autonomy, and shared decision-making. The AAP highlights the need for proactive engagement given persistent gaps in contraceptive use among teens and calls for expanded access through telehealth and school-based care. Pediatricians are also encouraged to integrate contraception discussions with broader sexual health care, including STI screening and HPV vaccination.

    5. ADHD linked to higher risk of premenstrual dysphoric disorder

    Women with ADHD may face a significantly higher risk of premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), according to new findings published in the British Journal of Psychiatry. Using survey data from U.K. participants, researchers found PMDD symptoms were over three times more likely in women with ADHD, and risk was even higher when anxiety or depression was also present. PMDD was identified in 31.4% of those with ADHD versus 9.8% of those without. The study’s authors called for increased screening and a better understanding of how hormonal changes affect women with ADHD to address diagnostic disparities.

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  • Exclusive, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina starts from scratch in breakthrough year

    Exclusive, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina starts from scratch in breakthrough year

    Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, back to basics for the 2025 season

    At the start of the year, Davidovich Fokina found himself languishing down in 68th in the ATP rankings, a world away from his career-high rank of 21.

    Among his radical changes were an overhaul of his backroom team. The Málaga man brought in David Sánchez, who he had been working with the previous year, and Félix Mantilla as his key coaches.

    “There are many aspects, but I think the main one has been the life change that I made, the recruitment of the team that I really want,” Davidovich Fokina explains. “I left my former coach, moved to Monaco and said, ‘I have to start my whole team from scratch’.

    “With my manager, Gianmarco [Amatiste], who is also my best friend, we started to make calls and build the team bit by bit. We have a very good team, we are now looking for another coach, a second coach, but for now we are all here.”

    Hailing from the coastal town of Rincón de la Victoria, the world no. 27 is the second-highest ranked Spanish ATP player, behind five-time major champion Carlos Alcaraz.

    “There are quite a few Spaniards who are playing quite well nowadays,” he explains, “we also have a very good team for the Davis Cup, so I think that more young players will emerge to make us even stronger in the future.”

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