Is AI that predicts which paintings are memorable and famous, regardless of content, style, or context, a threat to creativity or tool for positive change?
Using light to power wireless brain-like computers
An optical device uses light-based signals for computation and communication and is a vital step toward advanced neuromorphic computers.
What are neuromorphic computers?
To make computers faster and more efficient, scientists are using the brain as a model in this blossoming area of computer science.
Eliminating computer errors by combining computation and memory
A device brings memory and processing together, helping minimizing errors and avoiding increasing energy demands due to huge amounts of data.
Reviving mechanical computers for use in extreme environments
Putting a modern spin on old tech, scientists create a mechanical computer from metamaterials for situations where electronic computers break down.
With fewer disruptive studies, is science becoming an echo chamber?
An analysis of 45 million papers and 3.9 million patents since 1945 shows that the rate of disruptiveness in science is steeply declining.
Science in pictures
Check out atomic glimpses of graphene ribbons, double bubble microspheres, and a solar evaporator made from bone.
AI without computers
An AI made from plasma learns to play tic-tac-toe using varying and controllable mixtures of gases, in a major step forward.
Ada Lovelace, prophet of the computer age
Credited as one of the first computer scientists, Ada Lovelace saw the potential of computers a century before any were ever built.
Computer model determines how conferences can be primed for collaboration
Researchers have harnessed the power of math and data to understand how they can better foster collaboration at scientific conferences.