We’re used to rovers exploring the Moon or Mars to have legs and wheels for moving around, but a team at Texas A&M led by Robert Ambrose wants to go more geometrical with a new mobile robot shaped like a ball for literally rolling about rough terrain.
If you’re into vintage cult television, you’ve probably heard of The Prisoner – a bizarre mixture of spy thriller, science fiction, political allegory, and psychedelic weirdness that has yet to be surpassed. Following the adventures of a nameless kidnapped secret agent known only as No. 6, who’d been spirited off to a place called The Village, it was famous for its many strange and mysterious dramatic touches and men in wetsuits riding folding bicycles.
Another strange inclusion was a strange robot that looked like a giant white rubber globe that bounced and rolled around the place, engulfing and suffocating anyone who tried to escape or just got out of line. It was absolutely terrifying to me as a child as well as being a remarkable bit of instant innovation because originally the thing was supposed to be a robotic go-kart, but that broke down the first time on set, so the prop man came up with a substitute using a weather balloon weighted down with water and moved with a giant fan off camera.
RoboBall
Inspired by this 60s TV classic or not, the RoboBall project began at NASA in 2003 and when Ambrose came to Texas A&M Robotics and Automation Design Lab (RAD Lab) he revived it along with graduate students Rishi Jangale and Derek Pravecek and funding from the Chancellor’s Research Initiative and Governor’s University Research Initiative.
The results were the prototypes RoboBall II and RoboBall III that are designed to explore how such spherical robots could be used to explore rough terrain and craters on the Moon.
RoboBall II is essentially the lab bench version with a 2-ft (61-cm) diameter. It has a soft outer shell and inside is a propulsion system composed of a pendulum and motors attached to an axle. As the pendulum swings, it transfers momentum to the sphere, causing it to roll in the desired direction by altering the angle of the pendulum. In tests, it was able to traverse grass, gravel, sand, and even water at speeds of up to 20 mph (32 km/h).
RoboBall III in action
Emily Oswald/Texas A&M Engineering
RoboBall III is the deluxe version coming in at a diameter of 6 ft (183 cm) and is configured for more practical use as well as the ability to carry a payload of sensors, cameras, and sampling tools. Like RoboBall II, it shares the ability to roll around and it can also inflate and deflate itself to alter its traction so it can operate on a variety of surfaces as well as reducing wear and tear.
And, of course, tipping over is never a problem because there is no right-side up.
According to the team, the next step is to carry out field tests on the beaches of Galveston to test water-to-land transitions and continuing work on how to integrate payload modules. In addition, the team is looking at terrestrial applications, including search and rescue.
“Imagine a swarm of these balls deployed after a hurricane,” said Jangale. “They could map flooded areas, find survivors and bring back essential data – all without risking human lives.”
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Giuliani played a key role in attempt to overturn Trump’s loss in the 2020 election by promoting false claims of fraud.
Published On 1 Sep 20251 Sep 2025
United States President Donald Trump says he will award Rudy Giuliani, a former New York City mayor and close ally who participated in efforts to overturn Trump’s loss in the 2020 election, with the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Trump said on Monday that he would grant the country’s highest civilian honour to Giuliani, calling him a “great patriot” in a post on his social media website, Truth Social.
“As President of the United States of America, I am pleased to announce that Rudy Giuliani, the greatest Mayor in the history of New York City, and an equally great American Patriot, will receive THE PRESIDENTIAL MEDAL OF FREEDOM, our Country’s highest civilian honor,” Trump wrote.
Giuliani rose to prominence in US politics for leading New York City during the September 11, 2001, attacks and their aftermath. He later became a lawyer for Trump, taking part in an effort to keep him in office, despite his loss in the 2020 election, by spreading Trump’s false claims of significant fraud.
The disgraced former mayor was later disbarred for those actions, and a pair of Georgia election workers who said they received death threats after Giuliani falsely accused them of helping to rig the voting process won a $148m defamation judgement against him.
The 81-year-old Giuliani was hospitalised on Saturday after a car crash in the state of New Hampshire.
He suffered a fractured thoracic vertebra, along with multiple lacerations, contusions and injuries to his left arm and leg, according to his security chief, Michael Ragusa, who said on Monday that he would be released “soon”.
The Medal of Freedom, first introduced in 1963, is typically awarded to people who have made substantial contributions to the prosperity, values, or security of the US, world peace, or other significant social, public, or private endeavours.
The man who was caught on camera snatching a hat off a young boy at the US Open has said he made a “huge mistake” after footage of the incident went viral.
Piotr Szczerek, a Polish chief executive of a paving firm, said he was “convinced” tennis star Kamil Majchrzak had been “passing his hat in my direction”.
“I know I did something that seemed like consciously collecting a memento from a child,” he wrote in a statement. “This wasn’t my intention, but it doesn’t change the fact that I hurt the boy and disappointed the fans.”
The video, taken during Majchrzak’s match on Thursday, showed the tennis player offering his cap to a child, before Mr Szczerek appears to take it.
Versions of the clip were shared widely on social media and prompted criticism of Mr Szczerek’s actions.
The 50-year-old wrote on social media on Monday: “I would like to unequivocally apologise to the injured boy, his family, as well as all the fans and the player himself.”
He added that he had given the hat back to the boy, and hoped that it had “at least partially repaired the damage that was done”.
Majchrzak, 29, who had just won his match against Russian ninth seed Karen Khachanov when the incident unfolded, told the BBC he believed he “did what most of athletes would do in this kind of situation”, adding he hoped the boy and his family “had a great day”.
He earlier indicated to the New York Post that he felt there had been some kind of confusion.
“I was pointing, giving the hat, but I had a lot going on after my match, after being super tired and super excited for the win,” he said.
“I just missed it… I’m sure the guy was also acting in the moment of heat, in the moment of emotions.”
Getty Images
The man said he was “convinced” tennis star Kamil Majchrzak, pictured above, was passing the hat in his direction
The tennis star reunited with the boy over the weekend, sharing clips of him giving the young fan a cap and other merchandise on Instagram.
“Today after warm up, I had a nice meeting,” the tennis star wrote, adding: “Do you recognise [the cap]?”
Majchrzak, ranked 76th in the world in men’s singles, came back from two sets down to beat Khachanov in a second-round match at Flushing Meadows, but was forced to retire injured during the first set of his third-round tie against Switzerland’s Leandro Riedi on Saturday.
He later confirmed he had torn an intercostal muscle.
Mr Szczerek and his wife Anna founded his paving company Drogbruk in 1999, polish outlet Tenis Magazyn reported. The company sponsors sporting events and Polish athletes.
The couple and their two sons are amateur tennis players who compete in local leagues, and have hosted Polish tennis pro Urszula Radwańska on their home court, according to Tenis Magazyn.
Miki Habryn can finally sleep at night. For many months, in the run-up to and after President Trump had won the election, that wasn’t the case.
Up until June this year Habryn was living what many would call the American dream. She had a job at ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, surrounded by some of the brightest minds in artificial intelligence. Her pay was comfortably in the six-figures, and she owned a house in San Francisco, the first city she had ever lived in which felt like home.
Her six-year old daughter, Steffi, was enjoying school and her wife, Eden, was thriving in her career as an artist.
But the family couldn’t shake their concern about the direction U.S. politics was moving in. While Habryn was born in Poland and raised in Australia from the age of five, her partner and child had only ever known life in the States.
When President Trump returned to the Oval Office, the family made the decision to leave San Francisco—and Habryn’s dream job—and move to Stockholm, Sweden. There they hope to stay indefinitely.
Habryn said she made the choice to leave the the U.S., where she had lived since 2007, one night in March. She said: “My wife was traveling on the East Coast and I was home with Steffi. And something about that particular night, I was awake worrying about things which was not uncommon, and I just got to the point of: It’s time to go, I can’t just stay here and do nothing, but doing anything comes with such terrible risks for me because of my status.”
“If I came to the attention of, or got arrested by the federal authorities, the outcome of that could be tragic. It turns out that my wife, on the same day, reached the same conclusion.”
Habryn explains the “status” she refers to: “During the campaign it was immigrants and transgender people that was occupying the airways and since I’m both, they’ve got me coming and going effectively.”
The family are not alone in their decision to leave Trump’s America. While it’s hard to pin down the number of people leaving the U.S. every year (the Department of State previously told Fortune it does not keep such records) in 2024 applications from Americans to live in the United Kingdom alone spiked 26% compared to a year prior. More than 6,100 Americans applied for British citizenship last year, a record number.
Immigration experts also previously told Fortune their phones had been ringing off the hook—particularly since that infamous Trump and Biden debate, when many people felt the fate of the November election had been decided. Montreal-based immigration experts Moving2Canada, for example, saw inquiries spike in both 2016 and 2020 and in 2024 saw enquiries triple in volume after the Trump vs. Biden debate.
Life at OpenAI
Habryn is no stranger to working in America’s tech elite: She moved to the U.S. originally to work for Google in Mountain View where she stayed for the next 12 years. Her experience at OpenAI, where she worked from May 2024 to July 2025, is a familiar story to many in Big Tech: An intense atmosphere, “wonderful” people and riveting work.
“It’s challenging,” Habryn said. “I think it’s exciting but I was lucky enough to have a lot of security and confidence in my own abilities—I think without that it would have been very, very hard.”
The prospect of losing her dream role in the research department of one of the world’s most-talked about companies was a key issue which held Habryn back from making the move earlier. While her team was supportive of the decision, ultimately the legalities of Habryn’s work meant it couldn’t move with her.
“It was really hard,” she said. “That was probably the reason it took me as long as it did to make the decision, because honestly I had this period of grief stepping away from this. I’ve been working in tech for a long time … and really the only thing I want to be working on is AI.
“It was hard and I didn’t love making that decision but, ultimately, it was just a question of priority.”
Habryn is confident she will find interesting work when she needs to, and the family are settling into their newly purchased home in Stockholm—the family doubt they will ever return to the U.S. That comes with “guilt”, Habryn says: “I buy the narrative that you should fight for the things that you believe in and that there is value to staying and fighting for that. If it were not for Steffi, I think we would have.”
Ultimately her six-year-old daughter is their focus: “We set aside a lot of things that we love to do [because] we want Steffi to have a routine, a stable home, a stable school and all those things. The hardest thing about this whole move has been worrying about the impact on her and so the priority was that we don’t want to do this again, we’re going to move once, and we want to put down roots and spend the next 15/20 years there.”
Introducing the 2025 Fortune Global 500, the definitive ranking of the biggest companies in the world. Explore this year’s list.
Note: Map shows the area with a shake intensity of 4 or greater, which U.S.G.S. defines as “light,” though the earthquake may be felt outside the areas shown. All times on the map are Afghanistan time.The New York Times
A strong, 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck in Afghanistan on Sunday, according to the United States Geological Survey.
The temblor happened at 11:47 p.m. Afghanistan time about 22 miles north of Bāsawul, Afghanistan, data from the agency shows.
As seismologists review available data, they may revise the earthquake’s reported magnitude. Additional information collected about the earthquake may also prompt U.S.G.S. scientists to update the shake-severity map.
Aftershocks in the region
An aftershock is usually a smaller earthquake that follows a larger one in the same general area. Aftershocks are typically minor adjustments along the portion of a fault that slipped at the time of the initial earthquake.
Quakes and aftershocks within 100 miles
Aftershocks can occur days, weeks or even years after the first earthquake. These events can be of equal or larger magnitude to the initial earthquake, and they can continue to affect already damaged locations.
When quakes and aftershocks occurred
Source: United States Geological Survey | Notes: Shaking categories are based on the Modified Mercalli Intensity scale. When aftershock data is available, the corresponding maps and charts include earthquakes within 100 miles and seven days of the initial quake. All times above are Afghanistan time. Shake data is as of Sunday, Aug. 31 at 3:35 p.m. Eastern. Aftershocks data is as of Monday, Sept. 1 at 1:32 p.m. Eastern.
Jenni Pfaff has been appointed Chief People and Transformation Officer at HYBE AMERICA, the US division of South Korea-headquartered entertainment company HYBE.
Based in the company’s Los Angeles office, Pfaff will report directly to CEO and Chairman Isaac Lee.
Most recently, Pfaff served as Executive Vice President of Strategy, Integration, and Operations at Warner Chappell Music, a position she assumed in 2019.
Previously at Warner Chappell, she served as Global Head of People.
Earlier in her career, Pfaff held positions at PwC, Activision Blizzard, and Northrop Grumman.
In her new role at HYBE America, Pfaff will oversee all Human Resources functions, including recruiting and hiring, training and development, employee relations, performance management, feedback and coaching, and related initiatives.
She will also lead internal Corporate Communications efforts.
“A strong company culture is a top priority as we continue to build HYBE AMERICA,” said Isaac Lee.
“Given Jenni’s strong background, I’m confident we will be good partners in building a company that is a magnet for artists, employees, and partners.”
Isaac Lee, HYBE
Added Lee: “Attracting and retaining top talent and providing them with a fulfilling work environment will help us succeed as a company. I believe in a collaborative environment and am always mindful of the impact our business has on various audiences.
“Given Jenni’s strong background, I’m confident we will be good partners in building a company that is a magnet for artists, employees, and partners.”
“One of the things that attracted me to HYBE AMERICA was the chance to be part of one of the most exciting and fastest-growing parts of the music and entertainment business.”
Jenni Pfaff
Jenni Pfaff added: “I’ve always been a builder. Leading through compassion and creating the best possible work environment is a priority for me.
“One of the things that attracted me to HYBE AMERICA was the chance to be part of one of the most exciting and fastest-growing parts of the music and entertainment business.”
Pfaff’s appointment at HYBE America follows a recent leadership shakeup at the company, which saw Scooter Braun step away from his role as CEO of HYBE America.
Isaac Lee, described as “a seasoned entertainment executive” who led HYBE Latin America as Chairman since November of 2023, became Chairman and CEO of HYBE Americas.
Lee was given oversight of BMLG (Big Machine Label Group) in Nashville and QC Media Holdings in Atlanta, as well as remaining as Chairman of HYBE’s Latin American operations in Mexico, Miami, and Medellin.Music Business Worldwide
The United States has floated a proposal for an economic zone in southern Lebanon in what analysts tell Al Jazeera is a far-fetched and poorly thought-out plan to incentivise the Lebanese government to push on with disarming Hezbollah.
The US envoy to the Middle East, Thomas Barrack, floated the economic zone during a visit to Lebanon on Tuesday but provided few details other than hints at financing.
“We, all of us – the Gulf, the US, the Lebanese – are all going to act together to create an economic forum that is going to produce a livelihood,” Barrack told journalists.
Experts said the idea could be based on similar zones in Jordan and Egypt, two countries with peace deals with Israel that Lebanon would be hard-pressed to replicate after last year’s Israeli war on Lebanon.
After the war, fought primarily against Hezbollah, a regional and domestic push to disarm the Lebanese group has grown, and the relatively new Lebanese government, which took office in January and is under US and Israeli pressure, has declared the intention to disarm the group.
The pressure to disarm Hezbollah
Israel and Hezbollah fought a war that started on October 8, 2023, but intensified in September last year until a ceasefire on November 27, which Israel has repeatedly broken with no repercussions.
Hezbollah’s military capabilities took a hit during the war, and Israel succeeded in assassinating many of its leaders.
Domestically, Hezbollah has seen its popularity outside its core constituency plummet over the past 20 years – from its status as the only Lebanese force able to repel Israel – as a result of its takeover of Beirut in 2008, its intervention in Syria on behalf of al-Assad’s regime and its backing of counterrevolutionary forces during the 2019 Lebanese uprising.
Many of its political allies, including the Free Patriotic Movement and one-time presidential candidate Sleiman Frangieh, have shifted their tone towards Hezbollah, expressing support for its disarmament.
The domestic opposition to Hezbollah said it supports its disarmament because that would concentrate power in the hands of the Lebanese state.
And now, removed from its perch as Lebanon’s hegemon and with its opponents demanding disarmament, Hezbollah is on the back foot.
Until now, Hezbollah has rejected the idea of disarmament and has heaped criticism on the government.
Protesters hold up Hezbollah flags around graffiti reading, “Barak is animal,” as they demonstrate against a visit by US envoy Tom Barrack to southern Lebanon on August 27, 2025 [AFP]
“We will not abandon the weapons that honour us nor the weapons that protect us from our enemy,” Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem said in a speech on August 25.
“If this government continues in its current form, it cannot be trusted to safeguard Lebanon’s sovereignty,” he added.
Trauma left behind by war
Israel killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon and displaced more than a million in a war in which it attacked Lebanon more than five times for every attack Hezbollah or an ally launched at Israel.
Despite the ceasefire stipulating that it withdraw from southern Lebanon, Israel has continued to occupy at least five points there and persists in destroying villages in the area.
During the fighting, Israel invaded southern Lebanon, sending people fleeing for their lives, thousands of whom still cannot go home after Israel turned the area into an uninhabitable buffer zone using intensive bombing and white phosphorus.
“People in south Lebanon are still traumatised by the recent war,” Lebanese political analyst Karim Emile Bitar said, indicating that this trauma will impede any acceptance of the US economic zone proposal.
“Many Arabs, Muslims and people in the Global South do not view the US as an honest broker,” he continued.
Analysts told Al Jazeera that Barrack was likely trying to incentivise the people of Lebanon, particularly those who support or are part of Hezbollah, to further pressure the government to carry on with the group’s disarmament.
“We have 40,000 people that are being paid by Iran to fight,” Barrack said. “What are you going to do with them? Take their weapon and say: ‘By the way, good luck planting olive trees’?”
Some media reports indicated the idea of an economic zone in southern Lebanon was first proposed in meetings between Israeli Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer and Barrack in Paris, the idea being that Lebanese state-owned factories would be built in the area adjacent to the border with Israel.
Other details are sparse. Each analyst Al Jazeera spoke with said the lack of details makes it hard to imagine what such an economic zone would entail.
Joseph Daher, the author of Hezbollah: Political Economy of the Party of God, pointed out that Jordan and Egypt have something called qualifying industrial zones (QIZs), which house manufacturing operations and were built after the 1993 Oslo Agreement with Israel.
To qualify for a QIZ, goods produced must have a portion of Israeli input. But both Jordan and Egypt also have normalised relations with Israel, something that many Lebanese would still vehemently reject.
Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem has refused to hand over the group’s weapons [Screengrab: al-Manar TV via Reuters]
Such economic zones face heavy criticism from experts too.
“They operate as isolated enclaves, disconnected from local communities, sometimes resulting in the displacement of communities and can, through their sheer presence as they require large amounts of land, lead to serious environmental consequences,” Yasser Elsheshtawy, an adjunct professor of architecture at Columbia University in New York and author of Temporary Cities: Resisting Transience in Arabia, told Al Jazeera.
“In many instances, they play a role in the abuse of workers’ rights as the right for forming unions is typically prohibited,” he added.
No buy-in
Even if such an economic project were enabled, many analysts are sceptical that it would receive support or trust from local workers or residents.
“I don’t see any desire or buy-in,” Michael Young, a Lebanese analyst and writer, told Al Jazeera. “If it ever takes off, there will be buy-in, but all this is very premature.”
Residents of southern Lebanon do not see the US as an honest actor or one that works in Lebanon’s interests, analysts said.
“The idea is rejected because there is no trust in America,” said Qassem Kassir, a Lebanese political analyst believed to be close to Hezbollah.
After a brutal war with Israel, a close US ally and largest recipient of US military aid, many Lebanese will also struggle to believe the US is acting in their best interests.
“[The economic zone] could offer oxygen and help a struggling economy,” Bitar said. “[However] it still needs to overcome a series of obstacles, and the major obstacle today is psychological. There is a lack of trust.”
The US has stood idly by for the most part as Israel has attacked its neighbours on multiple fronts in the past 23 months, including in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, Lebanon and Syria.
“The US has not been, especially in the past year and a half, pressuring Israel to stop its violation of human rights either in the genocide in Palestine, the occupation of Lebanon or in Syria,” Daher said.
“Quite the opposite – it has been supporting them.”
Lebanese supporters of Hezbollah, many of whom live in the area where the economic zone is being proposed, have shared their severe distrust of US intentions publicly on social media and other platforms.
Many in Lebanon do not view US President Donald Trump or his country as a good-faith or trustworthy actor representing their interests [Jonathan Ernst/Reuters]
Some have expressed disappointment with the Lebanese government and accused it of acting on behalf of US and Israeli interests.
Still, analysts said, regardless of a lack of trust in US plans for the region, there are few other political alternatives than to accept what the US and Israel are proposing.
“As a result of the aftermath of October 7 [2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel] and its destructive regional consequences, wide sectors of the population are having this total US-Israeli hegemony imposed upon them,” Daher said.
“The process of normalisation will take time to be imposed but is moving forward de facto, … so it is more about dealing with the situation as it is and the lack of political alternatives.”
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