It seems like every airline has a different way of boarding a plane. But which way works best? Astrophysicist Jason Steffen has spent his career trying to crack the deepest mysteries of the universe, and 15 years ago he discovered and published what he says is the optimal boarding strategy. So why aren’t all commercial airlines using it? On the Science of Success, WSJ’s Ben Cohen looks at what goes into planning the most efficient boarding process and what airlines are doing to help customers have a smooth entry to their flights. 

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Further reading:

The Astrophysicist Who Has a Better Way to Board Airplanes 

Southwest Airlines Is Ditching Open Seating on Flights 

Southwest Fans Wonder if the Airline Has Changed Forever 

It Can’t Be This Hard to Board a Plane 

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The Pokémon videogame series has always been about traveling the world. But eight years after the launch of the mobile-phone game Pokémon Go, some players are taking that to extremes by using the game as a tool to plan their real-life travels. Salvador Rodriguez joins host Danny Lewis to talk about the people circling the globe in order to catch and trade the digital monsters.

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Further reading:

The Adults Who Book Vacations Based on…. Pokémon? 

Science of Success: The Mind at Work Behind an Iconic Song 

How Pokémon Became a Monster Hit 

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The Concorde has long been retired, but future skies may be filled with aircraft that can go even faster, criss-crossing the world in a matter of hours. Hypersonic engines that are being developed for military and government applications, like defense, drones and missiles, could one day propel future planes much faster than conventional engines for less money. Host Danny Lewis looks at the technical and business obstacles, and finds out what it would take to make hypersonic air travel a reality. 

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Further reading:

Silicon Valley’s Next Mission: Help the U.S. Catch China and Russia in Hypersonic Weapons 

How Hypersonic Flight Could Transform Transatlantic Flights 

Hypersonic Missiles Are Game-Changers, and America Doesn’t Have Them 

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From flights to hotels to entire itineraries, AI tools like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini Advanced can help you plan your next vacation. In fact, more than 30% of “active leisure travelers” have used artificial intelligence for travel planning, according to MMGY global, a travel marketing agency. But how soon might these bots go from travel planning tool to travel planning agent? WSJ’s Charlotte Gartenberg speaks with Google’s Amar Subramanya, vice president of engineering for Gemini experiences, about the future of using AI for travel planning.

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Further reading: 

How Well Can AI Plan Your Next Trip? We Tested Gemini and ChatGPT 

Don’t Trust an AI Chatbot With All Your Travel Plans Just Yet 

AI Apps For Travel 

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What makes for a luxury strawberry? Is it the taste? Texture? Color? Around five years ago, berry company Driscoll’s released a new, premium line of berries with a higher price tag. Some consumers are shelling out almost 70% more to get their hands on this fancy fruit. But what are the qualities of a premium berry? On this Science of Success, we delve into the food science behind breeding and selling Driscoll’s Sweetest Batch, from creating more objective benchmarks for the highly subjective experience of taste to how the company works with supertasters and sensory analysts to create the best possible berry.

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Further reading:

Why America’s Berries Have Never Tasted So Good 

How Designer Fruit Is Taking Over the Grocery Store 

Trying to Breed Better Fruit 

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Restaurants are a tough business with tight margins, from the cost of food to paying for staff. Kernel, the new venture by Steve Ells, the founder and former CEO of Chipotle Mexican Grill, is trying to fix that by introducing food-making robots and a "digital-first" approach to restaurants. In this conversation from the WSJ Global Food Forum in June, reporter Heather Haddon talks with Ells about his new bet on consumers’ desire to eat less meat, and on a business model that could solve some of the industry’s thorny challenges.

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Further reading:

Rise of the Restaurant Robots: Chipotle, Sweetgreen and Others Bet on Automation 

How Chipotle’s Founder Is Moving Beyond Burritos 

Chipotle’s Labor Costs Are Rising. Customers Will See It in Pricing. 

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To hear proponents talk about it, seaweed could solve a whole lot of problems. It could feed people, restore polluted habitats and be an economic boost for fishermen. Though seaweed aquaculture has grown in the U.S. in recent years, the country produced less than 1% of the global seaweed crop in 2019. Now, some companies are trying to get seaweed aquaculture to scale in the U.S. But there are regulatory hurdles to overcome, and researchers have questions about how a scaled industry would affect existing ecosystems. WSJ’s Alex Ossola looks at what it will take to make seaweed a bigger part of the American diet in the future.  

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Further reading:

Inside the Quest for a Super Kelp That Can Survive Hotter Oceans 

Cows Make Climate Change Worse. Could Seaweed Help? 

A Sargassum Bloom Is Hitting Florida: What to Know About the Seaweed Mass 

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No more mealy apples and flavorless oranges. There’s a growing category of produce available in your local grocery store: fruits and vegetables that have been carefully bred with flavor in mind. But these more delicious varieties tend to come in premium packaging—with a premium price to boot. WSJ contributor Elizabeth G. Dunn tells host Alex Ossola how this produce is bred and whether we can expect to see more of it in the future. 

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Further reading:

This Strawberry Will Blow Your Mind: Inside the Startlingly Delicious World of Designer Produce 

The Race to Save Ketchup: Building a Tomato for a Hotter World 

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They’re ugly. They’re clunky. They’re loud. And, worst of all, they spike your energy bills every summer. The window air conditioner is a dreaded summer staple in many homes. But one company is redefining how an AC functions by thinking outside the typical window box. For Science of Success, WSJ’s Ben Cohen tells the story of Midea’s U-shaped window AC that captured the collective consciousness for its noise reduction and energy efficiency.

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Further reading:

How Did the World’s Coolest Air Conditioner Get So Hot? 

The Race to Build a Better Air Conditioner

Does Turning Off Your A/C When You’re Not Home Actually Save Money? 

My Love Affair With Air-Conditioning 

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Our climate is changing. In the last 100 years, the planet has warmed about 1.5 degrees Celsius, according to NASA. But how can we learn more about our planet’s climate and what we can do to slow the changes? Gavin A. Schmidt, a top NASA climate scientist and director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, spoke with WSJ reporter Emily Glazer at the Future of Everything Festival on May 22, 2024 about the future of climate science and the data NASA is collecting on the Earth by looking at it from space.

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Further reading:

2023 Was the Hottest Year on Record 

Extreme Heat, Floods, Fire: Was Summer 2023 the New Normal? 

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