US DOE’s ARPA‑E ROCKS programme has selected Fieldstone Bio, TerraCore and MIT to build a field‑deployable system that maps critical minerals directly on drill core, delivering quantitative, core‑length metal distributions in hours instead of weeks. The method combines engineered microbial sensors, tuned to emit distinct signals for metals such as gold, copper, molybdenum and arsenic at parts‑per‑billion sensitivity, with compact hyperspectral imaging cameras already used in core logging. Scout Discoveries will supply active Western US drill sites and fresh core to validate performance, with the sensor library to be expanded to rare earths and nickel.

Endurance Gold’s 2026 drilling at the Reliance project in southern British Columbia has returned high-grade step-outs outside the current resource, including 14.7 metres at 7.67 g/t gold and 0.13% antimony from 75.9 metres in DDH26-128 and 12 metres at 3.07 g/t gold from 98.2 metres in DDH26-129, a 60-metre step-out along the Eagle trend. The 8,000-metre diamond programme, with seven holes (1,899 metres) already completed at southern Eagle and two deep tests at Imperial, targets conversion of near-surface ounces and deeper Royal Shear extensions. Reliance currently hosts 19.6 million inferred tonnes at 2.3 g/t gold (1.45 million oz), with metallurgical work aiming to improve recoveries beyond earlier 84.7% gold to concentrate.

Caterpillar’s autonomous 794 AC haul truck fleet at Anglo American’s Quellaveco copper mine in Moquegua, Peru has passed 500 Mt of material moved, with Ferreyros supporting the deployment as Caterpillar’s local representative. The fully autonomous trucks operate on steep, high-altitude pit ramps typical of Andean copper operations, integrating with digital fleet management and high-precision guidance systems. The milestone signals growing confidence in large-scale autonomous haulage for greenfield copper projects, with implications for haul road design, traffic management rules, and maintenance planning.