Archives — August 2026

The skeleton with a sickle placed over her throat. (Poliński et al., J. Archaeol. Sci. Rep., 2026) Polish countryside, 17th century. A young woman from high society is buried in a remote cemetery away from the village, because of the manner of her death. To keep her from returning from the dead, a padlock is clamped around her big toe. But it doesn't work. She soon rises from her grave and causes more misfortune for those around her. So the townsfolk take more drastic measures: They return to her grave and place a sickle across her neck, blade facing down, ready to slit her throat if she tries to rise once more. That's the startling scene archaeologists stumbled upon in Pień, Poland, discovering first the graveyard and then this particular burial in 2022. "These observed practices can be described as anti-demonic, protecting the living from dangerous deceased individuals," the researchers write in a paper describing the find, published in the Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports. "[This woman] would likely have been blamed for unspecified misfortunes (e.g., diseases, famine) that often plagued the 17th-century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. "'Grave 75' in situ.

WorldPoliticians from Canada and the U. S. have thrown varying degrees of personal insults back and forth across the border this week, but the two governments' trade negotiators avoided getting personal — at least in public. Experts believe the two trade leads are striking a different tone because they have a different role to play as the dispute heats up. Politicial scientists, PR expert say negotiators are staying out of the fray as part of wider strategyRhianna Schmunk · CBC News · Posted: Aug 29, 2026 4:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: August 29Listen to this articleEstimated 6 minutesThe audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results. Canada-U. S. Trade Minister Dominic LeBlanc, left, and U. S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer outside Greer's office on Aug. 19, the day after the Trump administration temporarily delayed tariffs on Canada.

The warning signs of Parkinson's appear to be all around us. Scientists have found clues to the disease's emergence in people's hair, in their blood, and in their earwax too. The way you talk, your mental health, and even where you live have all shown varying links to the condition, which affects movement and muscle control. But despite the potential of these signals, Parkinson's disease – considered the fastest-growing neurological disorder worldwide in terms of disability and death – still relies heavily on clinical assessments for formal diagnosis. The lack of easily accessible, definitive biomarkers also makes early diagnosis complicated. However, a test concept described in Discover Computing could reveal a new path forward. In a study, a team of researchers in India developed an AI-based system capable of detecting Parkinson's disease with striking accuracy, based on how people completed a simple drawing test. Handwriting and drawing analysis is viewed as a promising non-invasive screening tool for future disease, and scientists are increasingly pairing it with AI tools that can detect signs of neurodegenerative conditions based on subtle clues in your penmanship.

Veterans Fred VanVleet and Steven Adams are expected to be ready for the start of the upcoming season. How important are they to the roster?

Scientists have figured out how to secretly enrich white bread with spinach – and it could have an immediate and measurable impact on the body's insulin response. In a recent crossover trial, funded by Monash University in Australia and published in Future Foods, researchers tested a novel bread recipe on 15 healthy adults. After a night of fasting, participants were randomized to either consume white bread for breakfast or bread secretly enriched with spinach. The next week, they ate the other type of bread. Both options smelled and tasted pretty much the same, and participants weren't told which bread they were eating on either day, although one option was admittedly greenish. Compared to the white bread, the spinach-enhanced bread contained 28 percent more fiber, 58 percent more folate, 78 percent more calcium, 90 percent more iron, and two times as much potassium. After breakfast, all participants showed relatively similar blood glucose patterns, regardless of which bread they ate. But the insulin of those who unknowingly ate spinach did something intriguing. When participants ate the spinach bread, insulin peaked roughly 30 minutes later than when they ate the white bread.

Addisu Gobena broke the course record to win the TCS Sydney Marathon in 2:04:42, while world champion Peres Jepchirchir was a clear winner of the women’s race in 2:18:31 at the World Athletics Platinum Label road race and Abbott World Marathon Majors event on Sunday (30). Ethiopia’s Gobena emerged from a seven-man lead group in the closing stages to take his second career marathon victory, finishing three seconds ahead of compatriot Chimdessa Debele. Lesotho’s Tebello Ramakongoana was third in 2:04:57 as the first seven men all finished inside Hailemaryam Kiros’ previous course record of 2:06:06.

In just four years, artificial intelligence has emerged onto the world stage and transformed it. In the autumn of 2022, ChatGPT went viral: it made amusing mistakes and yet still gave the impression that something momentous was happening. Machines could now converse and understand human instructions. Their limits remain to be seen, but their impact on the economy and on everyday life is already clear. The following charts trace that rapid rise. Models keep getting betterChatbots from OpenAI, Anthropic and Google improve with every new release. To measure their progress, the industry has developed a series of competency tests known as benchmarks, and the results point to steady gains over time. In 2023, the leading model of the day, GPT-4, scored 36% on GPQA, a benchmark designed to test doctoral-level scientific knowledge, well below the roughly 65% that PhD holders achieve in their own fields. Today, the best models are approaching 95%, pushing the benchmark to its limits as a measure of progress. The same pattern has been seen in coding and mathematics benchmarks.

US President Donald Trump has signed an executive order seeking to change the name of Lake Ontario to Lake America. The move comes after trade talks between the US and Canada collapsed last week, and the US imposed new 50% tariffs on $20bn (C$28bn) worth of Canadian goods. Canada will implement "dollar for dollar" counter-tariffs next month. The BBC spoke to Americans to get their reaction on the recent name change. Video by Meiying Wu29 August 2026CanadaDonald TrumpUnited StatesUS & CanadaEvery scrap of paper checked: Police hunting for synthetic drugs in Chicago jailBBC News hears from users, dealers, prison and recovery workers as America battles with a deadly new drug epidemic. US & CanadaCommunity 'heartbroken and horrified' after Oregon school shootingA 16-year-old killed three children and a teacher at a primary school in Oregon before he was killed by a bystander, police say. US & CanadaWatch: US man eyes pumpkin world record after fifth contest winHorticulture teacher Travis Gienger hauled his pumpkin from Minnesota to Half Moon Bay, California where he won the annual event.

Vasco beat Cruzeiro 3-1 at São Januário this Saturday (29), in Matchday 25 of the 2026 Brasileirão.+ 📊 Giant shuffle in the bottom four: the updated Brasileirão tableBefore kickoff, Vasco fans ...

Victor Munoz thumped in a deflected leveller to rescue a point for Liverpool in a 2-2 draw with Nottingham Forest. Andoni Iraola was heading towards defeat in his first Anfield Premier League game in charge of Liverpool when Morgan Gibbs-White converted a debatable penalty with 20 minutes to play. Liverpool's frustration was only heightened by an issue with the fourth official's electronic board seemingly delaying the manager's planned substitutions in the build up to the spot-kick.

Smith, a former first-round pick for the Cowboys, has now been released by the Jets.

Red Bull New York and the Philadelphia Union go to battle on Saturday night at Sports Illustrated Stadium on Anime Night, presented by the New Jersey Lottery. Jorge Ruvalcaba, Cade Cowell and Julian Hall lead the line for New York.

KANSAS CITY, KS – Vancouver Whitecaps FC continued their reign at the top of the MLS Western Conference with a thorough 3-0 victory against Sporting Kansas City at Sporting Park on Saturday. Thomas Müller got the party started with a first-half penalty kick. Brian White and Rayan Elloumi added second half strikes to ensure that Whitecaps FC (13W-4D-4L, 43 points) stayed in first place in the West.

Liverpool and Nottingham Forest go head to head in the Premier League this afternoon. Andoni Iraola will make his competitive debut at Anfield as the new Reds boss and the Merseysiders look to build o...

OpenAI said it's ending its contract with Cursor, a coding startup recently acquired by SpaceX, because it doesn't trust an Elon Musk-owned company to comply with its terms of service. The company said in a statement published on Friday night that it plans to shut off Cursor's access to OpenAI models on November 12. "This decision was incredibly tough, as we care deeply about our models being broadly available for developers," OpenAI said. "We are making this choice because we cannot be confident that SpaceX will use our technology within our terms of service, based on our experience with Elon Musk's companies violating contracts. "Spokespeople for SpaceX and OpenAI did not immediately return a request for comment. OpenAI did not accuse Cursor of violating any terms. It instead pointed to past conduct by another Musk-owned company, Twitter, which Musk bought in 2022 and merged with SpaceX earlier in February. OpenAI said in its blog post that Twitter had previously violated the terms of its contract, citing a New York Times story reporting that Musk cut off OpenAI's access to Twitter's data.

The special Mozart performance will take place at Istanbul’s Beyoğlu Sahne on Aug 30. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, one of the greatest composers in music history, is set to return to the stage centuries after his death through a combination of ghost screen hologram technology and mixed reality.

Founded by Jake Paul and Nakisa Bidarian in 2021, MVP launched with its first event on Saturday August 29th, with a mandate to put fighters first, bring new audiences to combat sports, and create greater opportunities and visibility for women and prospects in boxing. Five years later, MVP has transformed women’s boxing, delivered record-breaking global audiences, elevated fighter compensation and built a global combat sports platform spanning boxing and MMA.

Southern mountain caribou are a type of caribou found in mature forests of western Canada, where they subsist on lichen as a winter food. Habitat loss — primarily driven by logging — has transformed their mature forest habitat, upsetting the predator-prey balance and leading to caribou declines. In the past 20 years, 15 of 40 southern mountain caribou herds in British Columbia and Alberta have winked out, including a transboundary herd that once ranged into the U. S. states of Idaho and Washington. In June, the Syilx Okanagan Nation asked the Canadian government to issue an emergency order to protect caribou, with a spokesperson calling provincial efforts insufficient to stop logging of caribou habitat within Syilx Okanagan traditional territory; the Xatśūll First Nation joined the petition in July. “Under our Syilx Okanagan law, everything is sacred to us. We believe that Mother Earth is alive, all of kʷuləncutn, the creator’s creation, that it’s all alive,” Chief Dan Wilson of the Okanagan Indian Band, a Syilx Okanagan Nation, told Mongabay in a phone call.

Canadian labour groups and small-business advocates are calling for stronger federal support as the trade dispute with the United States intensifies and Ottawa prepares to impose billions of dollars in new retaliatory tariffs. The federal government announced Tuesday it will match new U. S. tariffs dollar-for-dollar on $27.6 billion worth of American goods after Washington imposed a 50-per-cent tariff on the same value of Canadian exports beginning Aug. 22.

Two remarkably successful theories explain nearly everything we observe in the universe, from tiny atoms and molecules to planets, stars, and galaxies. Quantum mechanics describes the behavior of matter at very small scales, while Einstein's theory of gravity explains how stars and black holes move and how the Universe expands. Despite their enormous success, the two theories still do not fit neatly together. Physicists have spent decades searching for a theory of "quantum gravity" that could combine them into one consistent description of nature.