Good morning, Core readers!

If you’re reading this before your coffee, you’re already ahead of me.

Today’s edition has a little bit of everything: lab-grown chicken nuggets that sound like a sci-fi snack, alien gases on distant planets raising very non-fiction eyebrows, and AI models that can now think with images.

Get ready - today's reality reads like a plot twist.

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🚨 Be the First to Know:

• All of Puerto Rico is blacked out as Easter weekend approaches.
• An assassination linked to the textile industry kills a Chinese couple in Rome.
• It's official: Iran and the US are meeting in Rome for the 2nd round of nuclear talks.

Something's in the Air

Scientists using the James Webb Space Telescope have picked up the clearest signs yet of potential life beyond Earth. The discovery? Two life-linked gases — DMS and DMDS — floating in the atmosphere of exoplanet K2-18 b, a so-called “hycean world” that may be covered in warm oceans.

On Earth, these gases are only made by living organisms. No, they’re not claiming aliens (yet), but what are the odds that this is a biological signal? 99.7%. Welcome to observational astrobiology, and this planet has just become the most compelling lead in humanity's centuries-old search for company.

Now It's Got Eyes

Something quietly revolutionary just happened in the AI world—and yep, it’s close to home. OpenAI has just unveiled two new models: o3 and o4-mini. For the first time, they don’t just look at images… they think with them.

OpenAI @OpenAI Introducing OpenAI o3 and o4-mini—our smartest and most capable models to date. For the first time, our reasoning models can agentically use and combine every tool within ChatGPT, including web search, Python, image analysis, file interpretation, and image generation. 1:33 PM • Apr 16, 2025 1378 Retweets 8758 Likes Read 358 replies

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Need help solving a whiteboard sketch? Upload it. A diagram that only makes sense to you? Your AI gets it now, too. These new models integrate visual info directly into their reasoning chain.

Also worth noting: they both utilize all ChatGPT tools independently, allowing them to solve multi-step problems without constant hand-holding. Welcome to the next frontier. (Also, yes, we’re still bad at naming things.)

Who Needs a Farm?

Scientists in Tokyo have just served up a nugget-sized leap into the future: lab-grown chicken that’s actually chunky. Using a fiber system that mimics blood vessels, researchers managed to grow a 10g piece of meat with texture closer to the real thing—no feathers (or slaughter) involved.

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The breakthrough could pave the way for sustainable, structured meat cuts—and maybe even edible organs someday. It’s not quite “Blade Runner” dining yet… but dinner just got weirder, and maybe kinder.

💬 Beyond the Core

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Bank on it! You want this guy to find your wallet if it's missing.

Rack Pack: White House press secretary's style stirs controversy—but not for the reasons you'd think.

📸 Lens to Life

​Colorful scenes from Thailand's Songkran Water Festival.

🧮 Core Count: 1,600,000

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🗓️ Flashback:

1492 - Christopher Columbus signs a contract with Spanish monarchs King Ferdinand II and Queen Isabella I to find the "Indies" in order to convert them to Catholicism.

1895 - The Treaty of Shimonoseki was signed, ending the First Sino-Japanese War (1894-95)

1917 - Vladimir Lenin issued his radical "April Theses," calling for the Soviets to take power during the Russian Revolution.

1961 - 1,400 Cuban exiles landed in the Bay of Pigs in a doomed attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro.

1970 - Paul McCartney releases his first solo album, "McCartney".

1982 - Queen Elizabeth II and Prime Minister Trudeau sign the Constitution Act, which includes the "Charter of Rights and Freedoms".

2011 - HBO premieres "Game of Thrones," a fantasy series based on George R. R. Martin's novels.

2012 - The 8th-century St. Cuthbert Gospel, Europe's oldest intact book, was purchased by the British Library for £ 9 million.

Before you go...

I hope you enjoyed this newsletter. Before moving on, would you consider supporting my work as we prepare for a pivotal, uncertain year?

I rely on readers like you—yes, you! It takes a few dollars a month to keep The Core going.

I'm glad we could get together here. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow!

​Fatih Taskiran​
​Founder & Chief Daydreamer at The Core​

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