Technologies

NASA’s Lucy blasts off on historic mission to Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids

The asteroids are 4.6-billion-year-old relics from the solar system’s earliest days.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas V 401 rocket flared to life under the cover of dark at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Floridajust after 2:30 a.m. local time Saturday morning. Encased within the pencil-shaped payload fairing atop the rocket was NASA’s latest interplanetary explorer: a spacecraft named Lucy.

It was the 100th launch from Cape Canaveral Space Launch Complex 41. Approximately 58 minutes after launch the probe, which is about as wide as a bus, was released from the second stage rocket booster to begin its long journey toward Jupiter’s orbit. The United Launch Alliance team celebrated with hugs and clapping in its mission control room.

«It was one of the most exciting experiences of my life,» Hal Levison, principal investigator of the Lucy mission, said post-launch. «It was truly awesome, in the old-fashioned meaning of the word.»

Over the next two years, Lucy will use Earth’s gravity twice to swing toward the solar system’s largest planet. But the gas giant isn’t Lucy’s destination. Instead, it’ll explore a series of asteroids, locked in Jupiter’s orbit, known as the Trojans.

These asteroids have never been studied up close before and move as huge swarms, or camps, at the «Lagrangian points» in Jupiter’s orbit. The Lagrangian points are regions where gravity’s push and pull lock the camps in place, leading and trailing Jupiter in its journey around the sun in perpetuity.

The collection of amorphous space rocks is like a series of cosmic fossils, providing a window into the earliest era of our solar system, some 4.6 billion years ago. Lucy will act as a cosmic palaeontologist, flying past these eight different «fossils» at a distance and studying their surfaces with infrared imagers and cameras.

«No spacecraft has visited so many objects before, and each is a potential window into the material and conditions of the early solar system,» says Alan Duffy, an astrophysicist at Swinburne University in Melbourne.

The idea of examining fossils is core to the mission’s philosophy — right down to its name. «Lucy» is derived from a hominid skeleton discovered in Ethiopia in 1974. The skeleton was dubbed Lucy because the Beatles’ song Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds was playing in the scientists’ camp after the find. Words from all four Beatles are contained on a plaque inside the spacecraft.

Though the early morning launch and separation was marked down as a success on Lucy’s extensive to-do list, the spacecraft had to overcome one final, giant hurdle before it was ready to sail out of Earth’s backyard. About one hour into its flight, the probe experienced «20 minutes of terror,» as it unfurled its 24 foot wide decagonal solar panels.

The panels are critical to the spacecraft’s success and will power Lucy during the 12-year journey toward the Trojans. They can supply about 500 watts of power — about the same amount of energy necessary to run a washing machine, according to NASA. And Lucy will need every watt, because it’ll be the farthest solar-powered spacecraft should it reach its destinations.

Ninety-one minutes after launch, the team acquired a signal from Lucy confirming the solar panels had deployed. «Things were splendid today,» said Omar Baez, the senior launch director of NASA’s Launch Services Program.

That means Lucy is alive and well and now there’s a lot of ground to cover before it reaches its first object of interest: Donaldjohanson, a space rock positioned in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. That flyby will occur in April 2025.

From there, Lucy will swing toward the Trojans, reaching four worlds throughout 2027 and 2028 in the Greek camp, the swarm of rocks leading Jupiter in orbit. Another Earth flyby will help propel Lucy to its final targets, Patroclus and its binary companion Menoetius, in the Trojan camp trailing Jupiter in 2033. In total, the spacecraft will cover 4 billion miles.

Lucy’s ambitious main mission won’t necessarily end with Patroclus and Menoetius, either. The spacecraft’s orbit will see it drift through the swarms for years to come. NASA has a good track record with extending missions — but you’ll have to keep your fingers crossed that everything goes well for the next decade.

Technologies

What a Proposed Moratorium on State AI Rules Could Mean for You

Congressional Republicans have proposed a 10-year pause on the enforcement of state regulations around artificial intelligence.

States couldn’t enforce regulations on artificial intelligence technology for a decade under a plan being considered in the US House of Representatives. The legislation, in an amendment to the federal government’s budget bill, says no state or political subdivision «may enforce any law or regulation regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems or automated decision systems» for 10 years. The proposal would still need the approval of both chambers of Congress and President Donald Trump before it can become law. The House is expected to vote on the full budget package this week.

AI developers and some lawmakers have said federal action is necessary to keep states from creating a patchwork of different rules and regulations across the US that could slow the technology’s growth. The rapid growth in generative AI since ChatGPT exploded on the scene in late 2022 has led companies to fit the technology in as many spaces as possible. The economic implications are significant, as the US and China race to see which country’s tech will predominate, but generative AI poses privacy, transparency and other risks for consumers that lawmakers have sought to temper.

«We need, as an industry and as a country, one clear federal standard, whatever it may be,» Alexandr Wang, founder and CEO of the data company Scale AI, told lawmakers during an April hearing. «But we need one, we need clarity as to one federal standard and have preemption to prevent this outcome where you have 50 different standards.»

Efforts to limit the ability of states to regulate artificial intelligence could mean fewer consumer protections around a technology that is increasingly seeping into every aspect of American life. «There have been a lot of discussions at the state level, and I would think that it’s important for us to approach this problem at multiple levels,» said Anjana Susarla, a professor at Michigan State University who studies AI. «We could approach it at the national level. We can approach it at the state level too. I think we need both.»

Several states have already started regulating AI

The proposed language would bar states from enforcing any regulation, including those already on the books. The exceptions are rules and laws that make things easier for AI development and those that apply the same standards to non-AI models and systems that do similar things. These kinds of regulations are already starting to pop up. The biggest focus is not in the US, but in Europe, where the European Union has already implemented standards for AI. But states are starting to get in on the action.

Colorado passed a set of consumer protections last year, set to go into effect in 2026. California adopted more than a dozen AI-related laws last year. Other states have laws and regulations that often deal with specific issues such as deepfakes or require AI developers to publish information about their training data. At the local level, some regulations also address potential employment discrimination if AI systems are used in hiring.

«States are all over the map when it comes to what they want to regulate in AI,» said Arsen Kourinian, partner at the law firm Mayer Brown. So far in 2025, state lawmakers have introduced at least 550 proposals around AI, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. In the House committee hearing last month, Rep. Jay Obernolte, a Republican from California, signaled a desire to get ahead of more state-level regulation. «We have a limited amount of legislative runway to be able to get that problem solved before the states get too far ahead,» he said.

While some states have laws on the books, not all of them have gone into effect or seen any enforcement. That limits the potential short-term impact of a moratorium, said Cobun Zweifel-Keegan, managing director in Washington for the International Association of Privacy Professionals. «There isn’t really any enforcement yet.»

A moratorium would likely deter state legislators and policymakers from developing and proposing new regulations, Zweifel-Keegan said. «The federal government would become the primary and potentially sole regulator around AI systems,» he said.

What a moratorium on state AI regulation means

AI developers have asked for any guardrails placed on their work to be consistent and streamlined. During a Senate Commerce Committee hearing last week, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican from Texas, that an EU-style regulatory system «would be disastrous» for the industry. Altman suggested instead that the industry develop its own standards.

Asked by Sen. Brian Schatz, a Democrat from Hawaii, if industry self-regulation is enough at the moment, Altman said he thought some guardrails would be good but, «It’s easy for it to go too far. As I have learned more about how the world works, I am more afraid that it could go too far and have really bad consequences.» (Disclosure: Ziff Davis, parent company of CNET, in April filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.)

Concerns from companies — both the developers that create AI systems and the «deployers» who use them in interactions with consumers — often stem from fears that states will mandate significant work such as impact assessments or transparency notices before a product is released, Kourinian said. Consumer advocates have said more regulations are needed, and hampering the ability of states could hurt the privacy and safety of users.

«AI is being used widely to make decisions about people’s lives without transparency, accountability or recourse — it’s also facilitating chilling fraud, impersonation and surveillance,» Ben Winters, director of AI and privacy at the Consumer Federation of America, said in a statement. «A 10-year pause would lead to more discrimination, more deception and less control — simply put, it’s siding with tech companies over the people they impact.»

A moratorium on specific state rules and laws could result in more consumer protection issues being dealt with in court or by state attorneys general, Kourinian said. Existing laws around unfair and deceptive practices that are not specific to AI would still apply. «Time will tell how judges will interpret those issues,» he said.

Susarla said the pervasiveness of AI across industries means states might be able to regulate issues like privacy and transparency more broadly, without focusing on the technology. But a moratorium on AI regulation could lead to such policies being tied up in lawsuits. «It has to be some kind of balance between ‘we don’t want to stop innovation,’ but on the other hand, we also need to recognize that there can be real consequences,» she said.

Much policy around the governance of AI systems does happen because of those so-called technology-agnostic rules and laws, Zweifel-Keegan said. «It’s worth also remembering that there are a lot of existing laws and there is a potential to make new laws that don’t trigger the moratorium but do apply to AI systems as long as they apply to other systems,» he said.

Moratorium draws opposition ahead of House vote

House Democrats have said the proposed pause on regulations would hinder states’ ability to protect consumers. Rep. Jan Schakowsky called the move «reckless» in a committee hearing on AI regulation Wednesday. «Our job right now is to protect consumers,» the Illinois Democrat said.

Republicans, meanwhile, contended that state regulations could be too much of a burden on innovation in artificial intelligence. Rep. John Joyce, a Pennsylvania Republican, said in the same hearing that Congress should create a national regulatory framework rather than leaving it to the states. «We need a federal approach that ensures consumers are protected when AI tools are misused, and in a way that allows innovators to thrive.»

At the state level, a letter signed by 40 state attorneys general — of both parties — called for Congress to reject the moratorium and instead create that broader regulatory system. «This bill does not propose any regulatory scheme to replace or supplement the laws enacted or currently under consideration by the states, leaving Americans entirely unprotected from the potential harms of AI,» they wrote.

Technologies

AT&T Is Buying 95% of Lumen’s Quantum Fiber. Will Prices Go Up?

Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for May 22, #445

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle No. 445 for May 22.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle has some very long answers, which might be tough to unscramble. If you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Keeping an eye on things

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: They may save or defend.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints, but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

DATE, DATES, WRAP, ROTE, TOTE, CURT, SEEN, NEST, NETS, DRAW, WARD, STEW, TEES, TRUST, STEED, TEED, GUARD, TROT, TRAP

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you’ve got all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers: