Month: December 2023

Enlarge / This image from the NIRCam on the James Webb Space Telescope shows the central portion of the star cluster IC 348. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, and K. Luhman and C. Alves de Oliveira)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 14, and today we're traveling about 1,000 light-years from Earth to a star cluster in the constellation Perseus. Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have looked there as part of their search to answer a simple question: How small can a star be?

Webb is an ideal tool for such a search because the smallest stars—brown dwarfs, which emit light from the fusion of deuterium—are most visible in infrared light. Astronomers focused on this star cluster, IC 348, because it is young and should have new brown dwarfs. Such small stars emit the most light when they're young, so the smallest stars would be at the most visible point of their lifetime.

Enlarge / This image from the NIRCam on the James Webb Space Telescope shows the central portion of the star cluster IC 348. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, and K. Luhman and C. Alves de Oliveira)

Welcome to the Daily Telescope. There is a little too much darkness in this world and not enough light, a little too much pseudoscience and not enough science. We'll let other publications offer you a daily horoscope. At Ars Technica, we're going to take a different route, finding inspiration from very real images of a universe that is filled with stars and wonder.

Good morning. It's December 14, and today we're traveling about 1,000 light-years from Earth to a star cluster in the constellation Perseus. Astronomers using the James Webb Space Telescope have looked there as part of their search to answer a simple question: How small can a star be?

Webb is an ideal tool for such a search because the smallest stars—brown dwarfs, which emit light from the fusion of deuterium—are most visible in infrared light. Astronomers focused on this star cluster, IC 348, because it is young and should have new brown dwarfs. Such small stars emit the most light when they're young, so the smallest stars would be at the most visible point of their lifetime.

Enlarge / Reflective screens and creases aren't the only concerns with foldable PCs. (credit: Scharon Harding)

Although foldable smartphones have been available for five years, the devices are still trying to justify themselves. And after using a foldable-screen laptop as my primary PC for about four weeks, I'm not sure they're ready for prime time.

I'm leaving my time with HP's first foldable laptop with a sense of anticipation for the future of laptops, which I think would benefit from a resurgence of creative ideas that cater to the unique ways people use their computers. But I seriously question if the benefits of having a 17-inch screen in a 12-inch laptop body are worth the trade-offs inherent in today's foldable PCs.

Early participants in the foldable laptop world have an opportunity to define the space, while consumers can decide if this is something they even want. HP's foldable is the most beefed-up option ever, and weeks of use have shown me a lot about what I want and don't want to see when the dust settles.

Enlarge / Reflective screens and creases aren't the only concerns with foldable PCs. (credit: Scharon Harding)

Although foldable smartphones have been available for five years, the devices are still trying to justify themselves. And after using a foldable-screen laptop as my primary PC for about four weeks, I'm not sure they're ready for prime time.

I'm leaving my time with HP's first foldable laptop with a sense of anticipation for the future of laptops, which I think would benefit from a resurgence of creative ideas that cater to the unique ways people use their computers. But I seriously question if the benefits of having a 17-inch screen in a 12-inch laptop body are worth the trade-offs inherent in today's foldable PCs.

Early participants in the foldable laptop world have an opportunity to define the space, while consumers can decide if this is something they even want. HP's foldable is the most beefed-up option ever, and weeks of use have shown me a lot about what I want and don't want to see when the dust settles.