Contributor

B. David Zarley

Senior Staff Writer

Contact

[email protected]

B. David Zarley is a senior staff writer for Freethink, where he covers health and medicine, including infectious disease, psychedelic research, mental health, and the brain. A graduate of SUNY Fredonia, his work has also appeared in The Atlantic, The Verge, Jezebel, Frieze, Sports Illustrated, VICE, Paste Magazine, and numerous other publications. He lives in Chicago and can be reached via Signal by request. Send him story ideas!

A digital illustration of a circuit board shaped like a brain, featuring a trash bin icon in the center, evokes digital fossils against a black background.

AI thinks “vegetative electron microscopy” is real — it’s not

The appearance of a nonsense term in multiple scientific papers has exposed how flawed data in training sets can become embedded in AIs.

B. David Zarley

A satellite with extended solar panels orbits above Earth, with the planet’s blue surface and atmosphere visible in the background.

Aerospace

The billionaire building space lasers to power Earth

Space startup Aetherflux has a mission straight out of sci-fi: harvest solar power in orbit and beam it down to Earth via laser.

B. David Zarley

A soldier protected from toxic exposure by a mask

Inventions

Military vet’s lightweight mask is protecting soldiers from toxic fumes

A Canadian military veteran's innovative mask is protecting soldiers, police, and first responders from toxic exposure.

B. David Zarley

a large red Eli Lilly sign on the side of a building.

Medicine

New obesity drug cut weight by 58 pounds in trial, making it the most effective yet

Eli Lilly announced results from a phase 2 clinical trial of the newest entrant in the obesity treatment space.

B. David Zarley

A statue of a man holding an open-source computer with a rainbow background.

Open-source “Davids” are taking on GPT-4 and other Goliaths

Powerful tech companies keep LLMs like GPT-4 shrouded in secrecy. But a new wave of open-source LLMs is giving the power of chatbots to the people.

B. David Zarley

a man holds a smartphone screen to another man's forehead to measure his temperature

Public Health

Your smartphone may become a thermometer

Researchers at the University of Washington are developing an app that can turn the ubiquitous smartphone into an accurate thermometer.

B. David Zarley

Google’s “RoboCat” will power new general purpose robots

In a bid to help develop general purpose robots, Google has created a robotic training, self-improving AI, “RoboCat.”

B. David Zarley

An aerial view of a dry landscape undergoing prescribed burns.

Disaster Response

California will begin backing intentional burns to control wildfire

After decades of suppression, California is now supporting prescribed burns and cultural burns.

B. David Zarley

Cars

Toyota claims it will double the range of EVs in less than 3 years

Toyota’s been a bit behind the EV game, but claims game-changing batteries and new EV models are on the way.

B. David Zarley

Cars

Tesla Superchargers will soon work with Ford and GM EVs

Ford and GM vehicles will be able to use the 12,000 Superchargers in early 2024, helping potentially set a new charging standard.

B. David Zarley