Tag Archives: tech

NEUROSCIENCE
This Is a Map of Half a Billion Connections in a Tiny Bit of Mouse Brain
Tatyana Woodall | MIT Technology Review
“Neuroscientists have released the most detailed 3D map of the mammalian brain ever made, created from an animal whose brain architecture is very similar to our own—the mouse. The map and underlying data set, which are now freely available to the public, depict more than 200,000 neurons and half a billion neural connections contained inside a cube of mouse brain no bigger than a grain of sand.”

SPACE
SpaceX Stacks the Full Starship Launch System for the First Time, Standing Nearly 400 Feet Tall
Darrell Etherington | TechCrunch
“SpaceX has achieved another major milestone in its Starship fully reusable launch system: It stacked the Starship spacecraft itself on top of a prototype of its Super Heavy booster, which itself is loaded up with a full complement of 29 Raptor rocket engines, and the Starship on top has six itself. The stacked spacecraft now represents the tallest assembled rocket ever developed in history.”

ROBOTICS
A New Generation of AI-Powered Robots Is Taking Over Warehouses
Karen Hao | MIT Technology Review
“In the months before the first reports of covid-19 would emerge, a new kind of robot headed to work. Built on years of breakthroughs in deep learning, it could pick up all kinds of objects with remarkable accuracy, making it a shoo-in for jobs like sorting products into packages at warehouses. …Within a few years, any task that previously required hands to perform could be partially or fully automated away.”

FUTURE
The Pentagon Is Using AI to Predict Events Days Into the Future
Eric Mack | CNET
“The Pentagon hasn’t released many specific details on what exactly GIDE involves, but it certainly doesn’t include any precogs bathing in creepy opaque white liquids. Rather, the idea seems to be combining data with machine learning and other forms of artificial intelligence to gain enough of an informational edge to enable the proactive approach [commander of NORAD Gen. Glen D.] VanHerck describes.”

AUTOMATION
China Targets the Robotaxi Industry
Craig S. Smith | IEEE Spectrum
“China’s self-driving vehicle market is moving faster than that of the United States thanks to government regulatory support. In the past year, Baidu and AV competitor AutoX, backed by e-commerce giant Alibaba, have announced a series of steps in the race toward what promises to be a massive market.”

VIRTUAL REALITY
Facebook Can Project Your Eyes Onto a VR Headset, and It’s Exactly as Uncanny as It Sounds
Adi Robertson | The Verge
“Facebook Reality Labs wants to help people see your eyes while you’re in virtual reality—even if the results sit somewhere between mildly unsettling and nightmarish. Earlier this week, FRL released a paper on ‘reverse passthrough VR,’ a recipe for making VR headsets less physically isolating. Researchers devised a method for translating your face onto the front of a headset, although they emphasize it’s still firmly experimental.”

ENERGY
China Says It’s Closing in on a Thorium Nuclear Reactor
Prachi Patel | IEEE Spectrum
“There is no denying the need for nuclear power in a world that hungers for clean, carbon-free energy. At the same time, there’s a need for safer technologies that bear less proliferation risk. Molten salt nuclear reactors (MSRs) fit the bill—and, according to at least one source, China may be well on their way to developing MSR technology.”

SECURITY
Watch a Hacker Hijack a Capsule Hotel’s Lights, Fans, and Beds
Andy Greenberg | Wired
“The hacker, who is French but asked to be called by his handle, Kyasupā, says he found half a dozen hackable vulnerabilities in the internet-of-things systems used in a capsule hotel he stayed at in 2019. They allowed him to hijack the controls for any room at the hotel to mess with its lights, ventilation, and even the beds in each room that convert to a couch, all of which are designed to be managed by networked systems linked to an iPod Touch given to every guest.”

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ROBOTICS
This Robot Made a 100,000-Domino ‘Super Mario Bros.’ Mural in 24 Hours
I. Bonifacic | Engadget
“Created by YouTuber and former NASA engineer Mark Rober, the Dominator is the result of more than five years of work. …[Rober’s team] programmed more than 14,000 lines of code, and outfitted it with components like omnidirectional wheels and 3D-printed funnels to create what Rober says is a ‘friendly robot that’s super good at only one thing: setting up a butt-ton of dominos really, really fast.’i”

INNOVATION
I’m Sorry Dave, I’m Afraid I Invented That: Australian Court Finds AI Systems Can Be Recognized Under Patent Law
Josh Taylor | The Guardian
“[A]iFederal court judge says allowing artificial intelligence systems, as well as humans, to be inventors is ‘consistent with promoting innovation.’ ‘In my view, an inventor as recognized under the act can be an artificial intelligence system or device,’ [justice Jonathan Beach] said. …[He] said there needed to be a consideration beyond the mere dictionary definition of ‘inventor’ as being a human.”

TRANSPORTATION
Watch Joby Aviation’s Electric Air Taxi Complete a 150-Mile Flight
Andrew J. Hawkins | The Verge
“Granted, it doesn’t sound too impressive, but it’s actually among the longest flights ever performed by an electric aircraft. It’s equivalent to a trip between Seattle and Vancouver, or Los Angeles to San Diego—the type of regional trip conducted hundreds of times a day by regional partners to major airlines. Swapping out those polluting airplanes for a zero-emissions aircraft like Joby’s could be a major step toward the reduction of CO2 emissions.”

COMPUTING
Intel’s Ambitious Plan to Regain Chipmaking Leadership
Will Knight | Wired
“The technology changes laid out in the road map include a new transistor design and a new way of delivering power to a chip, both slated to debut in 2024 under the name Intel20A, which references the sub-nanometer angstrom scale. …Intel is also developing new ways of stacking the components in a chip together that promise improved performance and design flexibility.”

SCIENCE
Eternal Change for No Energy: A Time Crystal Finally Made Real
Natalie Wolchover | Quanta
“…researchers at Google in collaboration with physicists at Stanford, Princeton and other universities say that they have used Google’s quantum computer to demonstrate a genuine ‘time crystal’ for the first time. A novel phase of matter that physicists have strived to realize for many years, a time crystal is an object whose parts move in a regular, repeating cycle, sustaining this constant change without burning any energy.”

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Fast, Efficient Neural Networks Copy Dragonfly Brains
Frances Chance | IEEE Spectrum
“By harnessing the speed, simplicity, and efficiency of the dragonfly nervous system, we aim to design computers that perform these functions faster and at a fraction of the power that conventional systems consume.”

DIGITAL CURRENCY
Why Does the Federal Reserve Need a Digital Currency?
John Detrixhe | Quartz
“As physical cash goes away, so do the properties that make it special. …Is it time for America’s central bank to create a digital dollar? Congress is asking. And in hearings on July 27, a group of experts laid out their reasons why the Federal Reserve needs to go digital. Here are a few of their arguments.”

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COMPUTING
Tapping Into the Brain to Help a Paralyzed Man Speak
Pam Belluck | The New York Times
“He has not been able to speak since 2003, when he was paralyzed at age 20 by a severe stroke after a terrible car crash. Now, in a scientific milestone, researchers have tapped into the speech areas of his brain—allowing him to produce comprehensible words and sentences simply by trying to say them. When the man, known by his nickname, Pancho, tries to speak, electrodes implanted in his brain transmit signals to a computer that displays his intended words on the screen.”

TRANSPORTATION
This Tiny, $6,800 Car Runs on Solar Power
Adele Peters | Fast Company
“The Squad, a new urban car from an Amsterdam-based startup, is barely bigger than a bicycle: Parked sideways, up to four of the vehicles can fit in a standard parking spot. The electric two-seater’s tiny size is one reason that it doesn’t use much energy—and in a typical day of city driving, it can run entirely on power from a solar panel on its own roof. A swappable battery provides extra power when needed.”

3D PRINTING
World’s First 3D-Printed Stainless Steel Bridge Spans a Dutch Canal
Adam Williams | New Atlas
“MX3D has finally realized its ambitious plan to install what’s described as the world’s first 3D-printed steel bridge over a canal in Amsterdam. The Queen of the Netherlands has officially opened the bridge to the public and, as well as an eye-catching design, it features hidden sensors that are collecting data on its structural integrity, crowd behavior, and more.”

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
The Computer Scientist Training AI to Think With Analogies
John Pavlus | Quanta
“Melanie Mitchell has worked on digital minds for decades. She says they’ll never truly be like ours until they can make analogies. … ‘Today’s state-of-the-art neural networks are very good at certain tasks,’ she said, ‘but they’re very bad at taking what they’ve learned in one kind of situation and transferring it to another’—the essence of analogy.”

SPACE
Here’s Why Richard Branson’s Flight Matters—and Yes, It Really Matters
Eric Berger | Ars Technica
“During the last 50 years, the vast majority of human flights into space—more than 95 percent—have been undertaken by government astronauts on government-designed and -funded vehicles. Starting with Branson and going forward, it seems likely that 95 percent of human spaceflights over the next half century, if not more, will take place on privately built vehicles by private citizens. It’s a moment that has been a long time coming.”

ENVIRONMENT
Sweeping ‘Green Deal’ Promises to Revamp EU Economy, Slash Carbon Pollution
Tim De Chant | Ars Technica
“The…proposal would cut carbon pollution 55 percent below 1990 levels by leaning heavily on renewable energy and electric vehicles while also introducing a border carbon adjustment on imports and taxing aviation and maritime fuels. Together, the reforms signal the beginning of the end of fossil fuels in the EU. ‘The fossil fuel economy has reached its limits,’ said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.”

FUTURE
Why I’m a Proud Solutionist
Jason Crawford | MIT Technology Review
“Debates about technology and progress are often framed in terms of ‘optimism’ vs. ‘pessimism.’ …It’s tempting to choose sides. …But this represents a false choice. History provides us with powerful examples of people who were brutally honest in identifying a crisis but were equally active in seeking solutions.”

ETHICS
As Use of AI Spreads, Congress Looks to Rein It In
Tom Simonite | Wired
“There’s bipartisan agreement in Washington that the US government should do more to support development of artificial intelligence technology. At the same time, parts of the US government are working to place limits on algorithms to prevent discrimination, injustice, or waste. The White House, lawmakers from both parties, and federal agencies including the Department of Defense and the National Institute for Standards and Technology are all working on bills or projects to constrain potential downsides of AI.”

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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Need to Fit Billions of Transistors on Your Chip? Let AI Do It
Will Knight | Wired
“Google, Nvidia, and others are training algorithms in the dark arts of designing semiconductors—some of which will be used to run artificial intelligence programs. …This should help companies draw up more powerful and efficient blueprints in much less time.”

DIGITAL MEDIA
AI Voice Actors Sound More Human Than Ever—and They’re Ready to Hire
Karen Hao | MIT Technology Review
“A new wave of startups are using deep learning to build synthetic voice actors for digital assistants, video-game characters, and corporate videos. …Companies can now license these voices to say whatever they need. They simply feed some text into the voice engine, and out will spool a crisp audio clip of a natural-sounding performance.”

AUGMENTED REALITY
5 Years After Pokémon Go, It’s Time for the Metaverse
Steven Levy | Wired
“That’s right, it’s now the fifth anniversary of Pokémon Go and the craze that marked its launch. That phenomenon was not only a milestone for the company behind the game, a Google offshoot called Niantic, but for the digital world in general. Pokémon Go was the first wildly popular implementation of augmented reality, a budding technology at the time, and it gave us a preview of what techno-pundits now believe is the next big thing.”

SPACE
Startups Aim Beyond Earth
Erin Woo | The New York Times
“Investors are putting more money than ever into space technology. Space start-ups raised over $7 billion in 2020, double the amount from just two years earlier, according to the space analytics firm BryceTech. …The boom, many executives, analysts and investors say, is fueled partly by advancements that have made it affordable for private companies—not just nations—to develop space technology and launch products into space.”

ENVIRONMENT
New Fabric Passively Cools Whatever It’s Covering—Including You
John Timmer | Ars Technica
“Without using energy, [passive cooling] materials take heat from whatever they’re covering and radiate it out to space. Most of these efforts have focused on building materials, with the goal of creating roofs that can keep buildings a few degrees cooler than the surrounding air. But now a team based in China has taken the same principles and applied them to fabric, creating a vest that keeps its users about 3º C cooler than they would be otherwise.”

SCIENCE
NASA Is Supporting the Search for Alien Megastructures
Daniel Oberhaus | Supercluster
“For the first time in history, America’s space agency is officially sponsoring a search for alien megastructures. ‘I’m encouraged that we’ve got NASA funding to support this,’ says [UC Berkeley’s Steve] Croft. ‘We’re using a NASA mission to fulfill a stated NASA objective—the search for life in the universe. But we’re doing it through a technosignature search that is not very expensive for NASA compared to some of their biosignature work.’i”

ROBOTICS
Boston Dynamics, BTS, and Ballet: The Next Act for Robotics
Sydney Skybetter | Wired
“Even though Boston Dynamics’ dancing robots are currently relegated to the realm of branded spectacle, I am consistently impressed by the company’s choreographic strides. In artists’ hands, these machines are becoming eminently capable of expression through performance. Boston Dynamics is a company that takes dance seriously, and, per its blog post, uses choreography as ‘a form of highly accelerated lifecycle testing for the hardware.’i”

INNOVATION
The Rise of ‘ARPA-Everything’ and What It Means for Science
Jeff Tollefson | Nature
“Enamored with the innovation that DARPA fostered in the United States, governments around the world, including in Europe and Japan, have attempted to duplicate the agency within their own borders. …Scientists who have studied the DARPA model say it works if applied properly, and to the right, ‘ARPA-able’ problems. But replicating DARPA’s recipe isn’t easy.”

AUTOMATION
No Driver? No Problem—This Is the Indy Autonomous Challenge
Gregory Leporati | Ars Technica
“The upcoming competition is, in many ways, the spiritual successor of the DARPA Grand Challenge, a robotics race from the early 2000s. …’If you could bring back the excitement of the DARPA Grand Challenge,’ [ESN’s president and CEO] Paul Mitchell continued, ‘and apply it to a really challenging edge use case, like high-speed racing, then that can leap the industry from where it is to where it needs to be to help us realize our autonomous future.’i”

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