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ZAPOPAN, Mexico (AP) — First the scientists dress dead swine in clothes, then they dispose of the carcasses. Some they wrap in packing tape, others they chop up. They stuff the animals into plastic bags or wrap them in blankets. They cover them in lime or burn them. Some are buried alone, others in groups.

Then they watch.

The pigs are playing an unlikely role as proxies for humans in research to help find the staggering number of people who have gone missing in Mexico during decades of drug cartel violence.

Families of the missing are usually left to look for their loved ones with little support from authorities. But now, government scientists are testing the newest satellite, geophysical and biological mapping techniques — along with the pigs — to offer clues that they hope could lead to the discovery of at least some of the bodies.

The ranks of Mexico’s missing exploded in the years following the launch of then-President Felipe Calderón’s war against drug cartels in 2006. A strategy that targeted the leaders of a handful of powerful cartels led to a splintering of organized crime and the multiplication of violence to control territory.

With near complete impunity, owing to the complicity or inaction of the authorities, cartels found that making anyone they think is in their way disappear was better than leaving bodies in the street. Mexican administrations have sometimes been unwilling to recognize the problem and at other times are staggered by the scale of violence their justice system is unprepared to address.

Mexico’s disappeared could populate a small city. Official data in 2013 tallied 26,000 missing, but the count now surpasses 130,000 — more than any other Latin American nation. The United Nations has said there are indications that the disappearances are “generalized or systematic.”

If the missing people are found — dead or alive — it is usually by their loved ones. Guided by information from witnesses, parents and siblings search for graves by walking through cartel territory, plunging a metal rod into the earth and sniffing for the scent of death.

Around 6,000 clandestine graves have been found since 2007, and new discoveries are made all the time. Tens of thousands of remains have yet to be identified.

Jalisco, which is home to the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, has the largest number of people reported missing in Mexico: 15,500. In March, human bone fragments and hundreds of items of clothing were discovered at a cartel ranch in the state. Authorities denied it was the site of a mass grave.

José Luis Silván, a coordinator of the mapping project and scientist at CentroGeo, a federal research institute focused on geospacial information, said Jalisco’s disappeared are “why we’re here.”

The mapping project, launched in 2023, is a collaboration by Guadalajara University, Mexico’s National Autonomous University and the University of Oxford in England, alongside the Jalisco Search Commission, a state agency that organizes local searches with relatives.

“No other country is pushing so strongly, so creatively” to test and combine new techniques, said Derek Congram, a Canadian forensic anthropologist, whose expertise in geographic information systems inspired the Mexican project.

Still, Congram warns, technology “is not a panacea.”

“Ninety percent of searches are resolved with a good witness and digging,” he said.

Silván walks by a site where scientists buried 14 pigs about two years ago. He says they may not know how well the technology works, where and when it can be used, or under what conditions, for at least three years.

“Flowers came up because of the phosphorous at the surface, we didn’t see that last year,” he said as he took measurements at one of the gravesites. “The mothers who search say that that little yellow flower always blooms over the tombs and they use them as a guide.”

Pigs and humans are closely related, famously sharing about 98% of DNA. But for the mapping project, the physical similarities also matter. According to the U.S. National Library of Medicine, pigs resemble humans in size, fat distribution and the structure and thickness of skin.

A big Colombian drone mounted with a hyperspectral camera flies over the pig burial site. Generally used by mining companies, the camera measures light reflected by substances in the soil, including nitrogen, potassium, phosphorus, and shows how they vary as the pigs decompose. The colorful image it produces offers clues of what to look for in the hunt for graves.

“This isn’t pure science,” Silván said. “It is science and action. Everything learned has to be applied immediately, rather than wait for it to mature, because there’s urgency.”

Researchers also employ thermal drones, laser scanners and other gadgets to register anomalies, underground movements and electrical currents. One set of graves is encased behind a pane of transparent acrylic, providing a window for scientists to observe the pigs’ decomposition in real time.

The Jalisco commission compares and analyzes flies, beetles, plants and soil recovered from the human and pig graves.

Each grave is a living “micro ecosystem,” said Tunuari Chávez, the commission’s director of context analysis.

Triggered by the disappearance of 43 students in 2014, Silván and his colleagues started gathering information about ground-penetrating radar, electric resistivity and satellite imagery from around the world. They studied University of Tennessee research on human corpses buried at a “body farm.” They looked at grave-mapping techniques used in the Balkans, Colombia and Ukraine.

“What good is science or technology if it doesn’t solve problems?” he said.

They learned new applications of satellite analysis, then began their first experiments burying pigs and studying the substances criminals use to dispose of bodies. They found lime is easily detected, but hydrocarbons, hydrochloric acid and burned flesh are not.

Chávez’s team worked to combine the science with what they knew about how the cartels operate. For example, they determined that disappearances in Jalisco commonly happened along cartel routes between Pacific ports, drug manufacturing facilities and the U.S. border, and that most of the missing are found in the same municipality where they disappeared.

The experience of the families of the missing also informs the research.

Some observed that graves are often found under trees whose roots grow vertically, so those digging the graves can remain in the shade. Mothers of missing loved ones invited by researchers to visit one of the pig burial sites were able to identify most of the unmarked graves by sight alone, because of the plants and soil placement, Silván said.

“The knowledge flows in both directions,” he said.

Maribel Cedeño, who has been looking for her missing brother for four years, said she believes the drones and other technology will be helpful.

“I never imagined being in this situation, finding bodies, becoming such an expert,” she said of her quest.

Héctor Flores has been searching for his son since 2021. He questions why so much time and effort has been invested in methods that have not led to concrete discoveries, when the families have proven track records with little official support.

Although the research has not yet concluded, the Jalisco Search Commission is already using a thermal drone, a laser scanner and a multispectral camera to help families look for their missing relatives in some cases. But it is unclear whether authorities across Mexico will ever be willing to use, or able to afford, the high-tech aides.

Congram, the forensic scientist, said researchers are aware of the limitations of technology, but that “you always have to try, fail, fail again and keep trying.”

Most U.S. adults say they use artificial intelligence to search for information, but fewer are using it for work, drafting email or shopping.

Younger adults are most likely to be leaning into AI, with many using it for brainstorming and work tasks.

The new findings from an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll show that 60% of Americans overall — and 74% of those under 30 — use AI to find information at least some of the time.

The poll highlights the ubiquity of AI in some areas — as well as its limits in others. Only about 4 in 10 Americans say they have used AI for work tasks or coming up with ideas, a sign that the tech industry’s promises of highly productive AI assistants still haven’t touched most livelihoods after years of promotion and investment.

At the same time, wider AI adoption by younger Americans shows that could change.

There’s a particularly large age divide on brainstorming: About 6 in 10 adults under age 30 have used AI for coming up with ideas, compared with only 2 in 10 of those age 60 or older. Young adults are also more likely to use AI to come up with ideas at least “daily.”

Bridging the generations are people like Courtney Thayer, 34, who’s embracing AI in some parts of her life and avoiding it in others.

Thayer said she is regularly using ChatGPT to come up with ideas about planning what to eat, while also having it calculate the nutritional value of the pumpkin-banana-oat bread she’s been baking for years.

“I asked it to make a meal prep for the week, then to add an Asian flair,” said Thayer, of Des Moines, Iowa. “It wasn’t the most flavorful thing I’ve ever had in my life, but it’s a nice stepping off point. More importantly, I use it for the amount so that I’m not over-serving myself and ending up with wasted food.”

The audiologist has embraced AI at work, too, in part because AI technology is imbued in the hearing aids she recommends to patients but also because it makes it easier and faster to draft professional emails.

She avoids it for important information, particularly medical advice, after witnessing chatbots “hallucinate” false information about topics she spent years studying.

Roughly 4 in 10 Americans say they use AI for work tasks at least sometimes, while about one-third say they use it for helping to write emails, create or edit images, or for entertainment, according to the poll. About one-quarter say they use it to shop.

Younger adults are more likely than older ones to say they have used artificial intelligence to help with various tasks, the poll shows.

Of the eight options offered in the poll questions, searching for information is the most common way Americans have interacted with AI. And even that may be an undercount, since it’s not always apparent how AI is surfacing what information people see online.

For more than a year, the dominant search engine, Google, has automatically provided AI-generated responses that attempt to answer a person’s search query, appearing at the top of results.

Perhaps defying emerging media consumption trends, 28-year-old Sanaa Wilson usually skips right past those AI-generated summaries.

“It has to be a basic question like, ‘What day does Christmas land on in 2025?’” said the Los Angeles-area resident. “I’ll be like, ‘That makes sense. I trust it.’ But when it gets to specific news, related to what’s happening in California or what’s happening to the education system and stuff like that, I will scroll down a little bit further.”

Wilson, a freelance data scientist, does use AI heavily at work to help with coding, which she said has saved her hundreds of dollars she would have had to pay for training. She also occasionally uses it to come up with work-related ideas, an attempt to bring back a little of the collaborative brainstorming experience she remembers from college life but doesn’t have now.

When it first came out, Wilson said she also used ChatGPT to help write emails, until she learned more about its environmental impact and the possibility it would erode her own writing and thinking skills over time.

“It’s just an email. I can work it out,” she said. “However many minutes it takes, or seconds it takes, I can still type it myself.”

The least common of the eight AI uses was AI companionship, though even that showed an age divide.

Just under 2 in 10 of all adults and about a quarter of those under 30 say they’ve used AI for companionship.

Wilson has no interest in AI companions, though she isn’t surprised that others do because of the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on her generation’s social experiences.

“I totally understand and sympathize behind why people in my age group are leveraging it in that way,” Wilson said.

Thayer, the audiologist, also has no interest in AI companionship, though she tries to be polite with chatbots, just in case they’re keeping track.

“I mean, I am nice to it, just because I’ve watched movies, right?” Thayer said, laughing. “So I’ll say, ‘Can you make me a meal plan, please?’ And, ‘Can you modify this, please?’ And then I’ll say, ‘Thank you.’”

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The AP-NORC poll of 1,437 adults was conducted July 10-14, using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.6 percentage points.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Americans’ view of the U.S. economy improved this month, but Americans remain concerned about the impact of tariffs on their economic futures.

The Conference Board said Tuesday that its consumer confidence index rose two points to 97.2 in July, up from 95.2 the previous month.

The increase in confidence was in line with analysts’ forecasts.

In April, American consumers’ confidence in the economy sank to its lowest reading since May 2020, largely due to anxiety over the impact of President Donald Trump’s tariffs.

A measure of Americans’ short-term expectations for their income, business conditions and the job market rose 4.5 points to 74.4, however that’s still well below 80, the marker that can signal a recession ahead.

Consumers’ assessments of their current economic situation inched down by 1.5 points to 131.5.

NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stock indexes are tiptoeing around their record levels on Tuesday as an incredibly busy week for Wall Street picks up momentum.

The S&P 500 was up 0.2% in morning trading after setting an all-time high in six straight days. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 8 points, or less than 0.1%, as of 10:15 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was adding 0.2% to its own record.

JetBlue Airways climbed 3.7%, and SoFi Technologies jumped 17.1%, but Merck dropped 4.7% following a torrent of profit reports from big U.S. companies. They’re among the hundreds of companies telling investors this week how much they made during the spring, including nearly a third of the stocks in the S&P 500 index.

Treasury yields eased in the bond market as the Federal Reserve gets set to begin a two-day meeting where they will decide what to do with short-term interest rates. Despite angry lobbying from President Donald Trump for lower rates, which would give the economy a boost, the widespread expectation is that the Fed will wait for more data about how Trump’s tariffs are affecting inflation and the economy before making its next move.

The U.S. economy has seemed to hold up OK so far despite the pressures of tariffs, though it does appear to be slowing.

One report on Tuesday said that U.S. employers were advertising fewer job openings at the end of June than a month before, though still a bit more than economists expected. A separate report said confidence rose among U.S. consumers, but a measure of their expectations for the economy in the short term remains below the level that typically signals a recession ahead.

“Consumer confidence has stabilized since May, rebounding from April’s plunge, but remains below last year’s heady levels,” according to Stephanie Guichard, senior economist, global indicators, at The Conference Board.

Chinese stock indexes, meanwhile, were mixed as top trade officials from the world’s two largest economies headed into a second day of talks about tariffs. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng were meeting in Sweden’s capital and working against an Aug. 12 deadline. If they don’t reach a deal or at least an extension on their truce by then, triple-digit tariffs are set to resume.

Later this week, another deadline is looming on Friday for many of Trump’s proposed tariffs on other countries. And if that weren’t enough, several highly anticipated economic reports are also on the way, including the latest monthly update on the job market.

This jam-packed week could prove pivotal in determining whether the U.S. stock market can keep climbing to more records or succumb to criticism that it’s grown too expensive following its quick leap in recent months.

One way companies can tamp down such criticism is to deliver solid growth in profits.

That helped Cadence Design Systems, whose stock came into the day with a gain of 11.1% for the year so far. The computational software company said it’s continuing to benefit from the flood of investment into the artificial-intelligence industry, and it raised its forecast for revenue growth this year. Its stock rose 10.2%.

But investors have also been punishing stocks of companies that have failed to meet expectations so far this reporting season.

UnitedHealth Group dropped 3.7% after reporting a profit for the spring that fell short of analysts’ expectations. It also gave a forecast for profit over all of 2025 that investors found disappointing. The health care giant said it expected to earn at least $16 per share, when analysts were looking for something close to $20, according to FactSet.

Shares of Novo Nordisk that trade in the United States tumbled 20.5% after the Danish company cut its forecast for sales growth this year, in part because of lower expectations for its Wegovy weight-loss drug because of high competition. It also named a new chief executive officer.

In stock markets abroad, Japan’s Nikkei fell 0.8%, but indexes elsewhere rose across much of Asia and Europe.

In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year U.S. Treasury eased to 4.37% from 4.42% late Monday.

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AP Business Writers Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed.