The Download: ancient DNA’s modern uses, and an AI-artist collaboration

—Stephen Ornes 

Both of the subscriber-only stories above are from the next edition of our print magazine, which is all about relationships. Subscribe now to get a copy when it lands on February 26!

The must-reads

I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.

1 US disease monitoring capabilities are disappearing
DOGE just fired half of a critical ‘disease detective’ team at the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. (CBS)
+ A measles outbreak in Texas is spreading rapidly. (NBC)
+ Louisiana said it’ll stop promoting mass vaccination programs, on the same day RFK Jr was sworn in as health secretary. (NYT $) 
+ Why childhood vaccines are a public health success story. (MIT Technology Review)

2 Who is Elon Musk accountable to? 
When you’re the world’s richest man, it seems the answer is: no one. (WSJ $)
+ Musk is using X to spread misinformation about DOGE’s targets. (WP $)
+ A Musk-linked group offered $5 million for proof of voter fraud. It couldn’t find any. (The Guardian)

3 South Korea removed DeepSeek from app stores
Quite a few countries have done this now, citing privacy concerns. (BBC)
+ Baidu and OpenAI are responding to DeepSeek with new launches. (CNN)
+ E-scooter brands are among many companies in China racing to integrate DeepSeek AI. (South China Morning Post $)
+ Four Chinese AI startups to watch beyond DeepSeek. (MIT Technology Review) 

4 Inside the US’s fragile nuclear renaissance
Tech companies are betting that it can help meet AI’s energy demands. But huge challenges lay ahead. (The Information $)
+ Why Microsoft made a deal to help restart Three Mile Island. (MIT Technology Review)

5 OpenAI’s board rejected Elon Musk’s offer to buy it for $97.4 billion
Unanimously. (WSJ $)
+ Musk did it to try to chuck a grenade into OpenAI’s process of transitioning from a research lab to a for-profit company. (Vox $)

6 A new system can clone your voice from just five seconds of audio
And the end result is scarily good. (The Register)
+ Motor neuron diseases took their voices. AI is bringing them back. (MIT Technology Review)

7 People who lost money on crypto are furious with Argentina’s President 
He’s facing impeachment calls over allegations he promoted a classic ‘pump and dump’ scam over the weekend. (CNN)

8 How musicians are using AI tools 🎧
AI makes it easy to do traditionally tricky engineering tasks like isolating and extracting sounds. (The Next Web)
+ A Disney director tried—and failed—to use an AI Hans Zimmer to create a soundtrack. (MIT Technology Review) 

9Meta is working on humanoid robots 
It’s hoping it can combine its experience in both hardware and AI to win in this increasingly crowded category. (Bloomberg $)
+ China’s EV giants are betting big on humanoid robots. (MIT Technology Review)

10 How Diablo hackers uncovered a speedrunning scandal 
This makes me wonder just how endemic cheating could be in the gaming community. (Ars Technica)