“News Items is the first thing I read every morning”. — David Brooks.
1. The largest infrared digital camera ever built and its scientific companion, a massive mirror originally designed for a spy satellite, are now safely in orbit, after the flawless launch of NASA’s newest flagship telescope. The US$4.3-billion Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope lifted off atop a SpaceX rocket at 7:35 a.m. local time today from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and it will soon be on its way to its final location. The observatory is expected to yield a wealth of discoveries, from insight into the nature of ‘dark energy’, the forces causing the universe’s expansion, to millions of stars in the Milky Way and the planets that orbit them. It is named after Nancy Grace Roman (1925–2018), NASA’s first chief astronomer and a leading figure in many of the agency’s most impactful scientific programs, including the Hubble Space Telescope. (Sources: nature.com, science.nasa.gov)
2. IBM and researchers from the University of Chicago today announced a demonstration in quantum computing that achieves the fundamental criteria for quantum advantage: performing computations beyond the reach of leading classical simulation methods while providing trust that the computation returned accurate results. In their new paper, “Sampling hard circuits with verifiably high fidelity,” the researchers showed that these two goals could be simultaneously achieved by a novel construction of encoded quantum circuits, enabling one of the largest demonstrations of logical quantum computing to date. These circuits and their results are also now openly released on the Quantum Advantage Tracker. (Sources: newsroom.ibm.com, arxiv.org, github.com)
3. Several U.S. military leaders have advised Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that prolonging large-scale operations against Iran is unsustainable and risks weakening their ability to confront threats elsewhere. The warnings — detailed for Hegseth by the heads of the Army, Navy and Air Force and the four-star commanders overseeing U.S. operations throughout Europe, Asia and Latin America — appear in the Aug. 14 edition of the Secretary of Defense Orders Book (SDOB), these people said. They described the assessment to The Washington Post on the condition of anonymity because the document is classified. The Aug. 14 orders book directs some troops deployed in the Middle East to remain there through September and some others into 2027, said those familiar with the document. The prospect of extending those forces further compelled military leaders to voice their concern, these people said. Leaders of the U.S. European Command, the U.S. Pacific Command and the U.S. Southern Command, along with the Navy’s top admiral, responded with what is characterized in the SDOB as a “non-concur,” those familiar with the assessment said — meaning they disagree with the secretary’s order to extend their forces but will execute it nevertheless. (Source: washingtonpost.com. Italics mine.)
4. The U.S. has rushed so many munitions to the Middle East to fight Iran that military planners are concerned the loss of firepower is diminishing America’s ability to defend against potential threats from China and Russia, said U.S. officials. The cuts have been so deep that the U.S. inventories in Europe of PAC-3 Patriot air defense interceptors and Atacms surface-to-surface missiles are deemed to be “beyond critical,” some of the officials said. The U.S. and Iran have mostly halted direct attacks in recent weeks. But refilling weapons stocks moved from countries like Japan, South Korea and Germany could take years, leaving soft spots in the U.S. global military posture even as Western military officials don’t assess that full-scale attacks by China and Russia are imminent, officials said. (Source: wsj.com)
