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press releases.

Technology21 May 2024

3D printing robot uses AI machine learning for US Army research

Inside a lab in Boston University’s College of Engineering, a robot arm drops small, plastic objects into a box placed perfectly on the floor to catch them as they fall. One by one, these tiny structures—feather-light, cylindrical pieces, no bigger than an inch tall—fill the box. Some are red, others blue, purple, green, or black. Each object is the result of an experiment in robot autonomy. On its own, learning as it goes, the robot is searching for, and trying to make, an object with the most efficient ...

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Technology21 May 2024

'Hunting for treasures' with AI: Astronomers detect rare neutral atomic-carbon absorbers with deep neural network

Recently, an international team led by Prof. GE Jian from the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences conducted a search for rare weak signals in quasar spectral data released by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III (SDSS-III) program using deep learning neural networks. By introducing a new method to explore galaxy formation and evolution, the team showcased the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) in identifying rare weak signals in astronomical big data. This study was published ...

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Technology21 May 2024

Powering wearable devices with high-performing carbon nanotube yarns

Ikoma, Japan – With the growth of the Internet of Things, sustainable solution for powering wireless sensors and devices are considered important. Thermoelectric generators, for example, which have the ability to convert waste heat into electricity can offer a sustainable solution. Researchers around the world have been working on such solutions. A research team, led by Masakazu Nakamura from Nara Institute of Science and Technology (NAIST), Japan has also been working on flexible wearable thermoelectric generators that produce electricity from body heat by sewing nanomaterial called carbon nanotubes (CNTs) into fabric. Effective ...

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Technology20 May 2024

UCF researcher is developing algorithms to further space, sea exploration

Cislunar space, which stretches from the Earth to just beyond the moon’s orbit, is about to become heavily trafficked over the next 10 years. With NASA’s planned Artemis missions and other countries joining in the cislunar space race, there’s an interest in observing, tracking and predicting the orbit of objects like asteroids and satellites so they don’t collide with spacecraft. But the process of detecting and observing space objects, known as space domain awareness (SDA), faces challenges with the extensive volume of cislunar space. “Cislunar space is vast,” says Tarek Elgohary, an associate professor ...

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Technology20 May 2024

AI chips could get a sense of time

Image Artificial neural networks may soon be able to process time-dependent information, such as audio and video data, more efficiently. The first memristor with a 'relaxation time' that can be tuned is reported today in Nature Electronics, in a study led by the University of Michigan. Memristors, electrical components that store information in their electrical resistance, could reduce AI's energy needs by about a factor of 90 compared to today's graphical processing units. Already, AI is projected to account for about half a percent of the world's total electricity ...

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Technology20 May 2024

World leaders still need to wake up to AI risks, say leading experts ahead of AI Safety Summit

UNDER EMBARGO UNTIL 19:00 BST / 14:00 ET MONDAY 20 MAY 2024. World leaders still need to wake up to AI risks, say leading experts ahead of AI Safety Summit More information, including a copy of the paper, can be found online at the Science press package at https://www.eurekalert.org/press/scipak/, or can be requested from scipak@aaas.org Leading AI scientists are calling for stronger action on AI risks from world leaders, warning that progress has been insufficient since the first AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park six months ago. Then, the world’s leaders pledged to govern AI responsibly. However, as the second AI Safety Summit in Seoul ...

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Technology20 May 2024

*FREE* Managing extreme AI risks amidst rapid technological development

Although researchers have warned of the extreme risks posed by rapidly developing artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, there is a lack of consensus about how to manage them. In a Policy Forum, Yoshua Bengio and colleagues examine the risks of advancing AI technologies – from the social and economic impacts, malicious uses, and the possible loss of human control over autonomous AI systems – and recommend directions for proactive and adaptive governance to mitigate them. They call on major technology companies and public funders to invest more – at least one-third of their budgets – into assessing and ...

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Technology20 May 2024

Robot-phobia could exasperate hotel, restaurant labor shortage

VANCOUVER, Wash. – Using more robots to close labor gaps in the hospitality industry may backfire and cause more human workers to quit, according to a Washington State University study. The study, involving more than 620 lodging and food service employees, found that “robot-phobia” – specifically the fear that robots and technology will take human jobs – increased workers’ job insecurity and stress, leading to greater intentions to leave their jobs. The impact was more pronounced with employees who had ...

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Technology17 May 2024

Ukraine blackouts caused by malware attacks warn against evolving cybersecurity threats to the physical world

On a cold winter night in 2016, Ukrainians experienced the first-ever known blackout caused by malicious code (malware) designed to autonomously attack the power grid. One-fifth of Kyiv’s citizens were plunged into darkness as attackers used malware to target the capital city’s power grid. Six years later, in the early months of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war, a second attack attempted to combine kinetic and cyber attacks to take down Ukraine’s power grid. Malware attacks against physical ...

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Technology17 May 2024

University of Bristol researchers develop world’s smallest quantum light detector on a silicon chip

Researchers at the University of Bristol have made an important breakthrough in scaling quantum technology by integrating the world’s tiniest quantum light detector onto a silicon chip. A critical moment in unlocking the information age was when scientists and engineers were first able to miniaturise transistors onto cheap micro-chips in the 1960s. Now, for the first time, University of Bristol academics have demonstrated the integration of a quantum light detector – smaller than a human hair – onto a silicon chip, moving us one step closer to the age of quantum technologies using light. Making high performance electronics ...

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Technology17 May 2024

Model disgorgement: the key to fixing AI bias and copyright infringement?

By Ian Scheffler By now, the challenges posed by generative AI are no secret. Models like OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Anthropic’s Claude and Meta’s Llama have been known to “hallucinate,” inventing potentially misleading responses, as well as divulge sensitive information, like copyrighted materials. One potential solution to some of these issues is “model disgorgement,” a set of techniques that force models to purge themselves of content that leads to copyright infringement or biased responses. In ...

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Technology17 May 2024

Researchers in Portugal develop an image analysis AI platform to boost worldwide research

A team of researchers from the Instituto Gulbenkian de Ciência (IGC) in Portugal, together with Åbo Akademi University in Finland, the AI4Life consortium, and other collaborators, have developed an innovative open-source platform called DL4MicEverywhere published today in the journal Nature Methods*. This platform provides life scientists with easy access to advanced artificial intelligence (AI) for the analysis of microscopy images. Itenables other researchers, ...

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Technology17 May 2024

Researchers use machine-learning modeling tools to improve zinc-finger nuclease editing technology

Genome editing is making inroads into biomedical research and medicine. By employing biomolecule modeling tools, a Japanese research team is accelerating the pace and cutting the cost of zinc finger nuclease (ZFN) technology, a primary gene editing tool. In a recently published study, researchers from Hiroshima University and the Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology demonstrated how machine learning-driven modular assembly systems can improve gene editing. The study was published on April 10 in the journal Advanced Science. “Genome editing is ...

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Technology16 May 2024

Detecting influence campaigns on X with AI and network science

In the age of generative-AI and large language models (LLMs), massive amounts of inauthentic content can be rapidly broadcasted on social media platforms. As a result, malicious actors are becoming more sophisticated, hijacking hashtags, artificially amplifying misleading content, and mass resharing propaganda. These actions are often orchestrated by state-sponsored information operations (IOs), which attempt to sway public opinion during major geopolitical events such as the US elections, the Covid-19 pandemic, and more. Combating ...

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Technology16 May 2024

Airborne technology developed at USC brings new hope to map shallow aquifers in Earth’s most arid deserts

Water shortages are expanding across the Earth. This is particularly acute in desert areas of the Middle East that are subject to both drought and extreme conditions such as flooding. As a result of these uncertainties, there is an increasing reliance on shallow aquifers to mitigate these shortages. However, the characteristics of these aquifers remain poorly understood due to the reliance on sporadic well logs for their management. To address this challenge a team of researchers at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering Ming Hsieh Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering along with collaborators ...

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Technology16 May 2024

Ground-breaking accelerated discovery research unveils 21 novel materials for advanced organic solid-state laser technology: a global collaboration success story

Organic solid-state lasers (OSLs) hold immense promise for a wide range of applications due to their flexibility, colour tunability, and efficiency. However, they are difficult to make, and with over 150,000 possible experiments required to conduct to find successful new materials, discovering them all would be the work of several lifetimes. In fact, in the previous few decades, only 10-20 new OSL materials have been tested. Researchers with the Acceleration Consortium based at the University of Toronto, took up this challenge and used self-driving lab (SDL) technology that, once set up, enabled them to synthesize and test over 1000 potential OSL materials ...

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Technology16 May 2024

Finding quantum order in chaos

If you zoom in on a chemical reaction to the quantum level, you’ll notice that particles behave like waves that can ripple and collide. Scientists have long sought to understand quantum coherence, the ability of particles to maintain phase relationships and exist in multiple states simultaneously; this is akin to all parts of a wave being synchronized. It has been an open question whether quantum coherence can persist through a chemical reaction where bonds dynamically break and form. Now, for the first time, a team of Harvard scientists has demonstrated the survival of quantum coherence in a chemical reaction involving ultracold molecules. These findings highlight the potential of ...

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Technology16 May 2024

Noise survey highlights need for new direction at Canadian airports #ASA186

OTTAWA, Ontario, May 16, 2024 – The COVID-19 pandemic changed life in many ways, including stopping nearly all commercial flights. At the Toronto Pearson International Airport, airplane traffic dropped by 80% in the first few months of lockdown. For a nearby group of researchers, this presented a unique opportunity. Julia Jovanovic will present the results of a survey conducted on aircraft noise and annoyance during the pandemic era Thursday, May 16, at 11:10 a.m. EDT as part of a joint meeting of the Acoustical Society of America and ...

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Technology16 May 2024

To optimize guide-dog robots, first listen to the visually impaired

May 16, 2024 To Optimize Guide-Dog Robots, First Listen to the Visually Impaired Award-winning research led by UMass Amherst shows to be successful, Guide-dog users and trainers need to provide insight into features that make robotic helpers useful in the real world AMHERST, Mass. — What features does a robotic guide dog need? Ask the blind, say the authors of an award-winning paper. Led by researchers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, a study identifying how to develop robot guide dogs with insights from guide dog users and trainers won a Best Paper Award at ...

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Technology16 May 2024

One in three people die due to atherosclerosis: A new initiative aims to find new ways to prevent it

One in three people around the world die from cardiovascular disease, which is mainly caused by atherosclerosis. This makes atherosclerosis the leading cause of death globally. Additionally, many people live with serious manifestations of atherosclerosis, for example, following a heart attack or a stroke. Atherosclerosis not only represents a significant burden for these individuals, but also a heavy burden on healthcare systems and societies in all parts of the world. “Atherosclerosis may develop from an early age and often remains 'silent’, that is, without symptoms, ...

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Technology16 May 2024

University of Oregon researchers uncover how jelly sea creatures might shape modern robotics

Scientists at the University of Oregon have discovered that colonies of gelatinous sea animals swim through the ocean in giant corkscrew shapes using coordinated jet propulsion, an unusual kind of locomotion that could inspire new designs for efficient underwater vehicles. The research involves salps, small creatures that look similar to jellyfish that take a nightly journey from the depths of the ocean to the surface. Observing that migration with special cameras helped UO researchers and their colleagues capture the macroplankton’s graceful, coordinated swimming behavior. “The largest migration on the planet ...

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Technology15 May 2024

Next-generation sustainable electronics are doped with air

Semiconductors are the foundation of all modern electronics. Now, researchers at Linköping University, Sweden, have developed a new method where organic semiconductors can become more conductive with the help of air as a dopant. The study, published in the journal Nature, is a significant step towards future cheap and sustainable organic semiconductors. “We believe this method could significantly influence the way we dope organic semiconductors. All components are affordable, easily accessible, and potentially environmentally friendly, which is a prerequisite for future sustainable ...

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Technology15 May 2024

New campaign aims to empower Asian American communities with lifesaving CPR skills

DALLAS, May 15, 2024 — Despite strides in cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training, consumer research from the American Heart Association reveals only 1 in 4 Asian American individuals are confident they could correctly perform Hands-Only CPR, compared with a comparable confidence rate of more 1/3 of the general population. The same survey showed nearly 70% of Asian American adults are hesitant to perform Hands-Only CPR because they are worried they will hurt the person who has suffered ...

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Technology15 May 2024

Circe Bioscience licenses technology to decarbonize industry with microbes developed at Wyss Institute at Harvard University

The Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University announced today that Circe, a startup developed at the Institute and spun out of Harvard, has signed a worldwide, exclusive licensing agreement coordinated by Harvard’s Office of Technology Development (OTD) to commercialize a novel bioproduction technology that could significantly reduce the carbon emissions of industries from food to aviation fuel. Circe has raised more than $8 million to date from investors including Regen Ventures, Undeterred Capital, Ponderosa Ventures, Bee Partners, and Elementum Ventures. “One of the great challenges ...

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Technology15 May 2024

Using AI to improve building energy use and comfort

University of Waterloo researchers have developed a new method that can lead to significant energy savings in buildings. The team identified 28 major heat loss regions in a multi-unit residential building with the most severe ones being at wall intersections and around windows. A potential energy savings of 25 per cent is expected if 70 per cent of the discovered regions are fixed. Building enclosures rely on heat and moisture control to avoid significant energy loss due to airflow leakage, which makes buildings less comfortable and more costly to maintain. This problem will likely be compounded by climate change due to volatile temperature ...

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