Computers & Math News

August 18, 2026

Top Headlines

Caltech Breakthrough Brings Fiber-optic Performance to Silicon Chips

Aug. 17, 2026 Caltech scientists have created ultra-low-loss optical pathways on silicon chips that approach the efficiency of fiber optics and dramatically outperform existing technology at visible wavelengths. The breakthrough could unlock more powerful lasers, ...

Scientists Turn DNA Into a Memory Device That Uses 100x Less Power

Aug. 17, 2026 Researchers combined synthetic DNA with a semiconductor to create an ultra-low-power memory device capable of storing and processing information in the same place. The bio-hybrid technology could eventually help make AI systems and next-generation ...

Scientists Tracked Kids for 8 Years — The Screen Time Result Was Unexpected

Aug. 17, 2026 An eight-year Finnish study found that children who spent more time on screens tended to show better cognitive processing as teenagers, challenging common assumptions about screen use. Researchers ...

Tiny Graphene Wrinkles Create Surprisingly Powerful Electrical Effects

Aug. 16, 2026 Scientists have discovered that tiny, sharply curved wrinkles in graphene can dramatically alter its electrical behavior, creating surprisingly strong charge separation. The finding suggests future electronics could be tuned by reshaping materials ...

World’s First Superconducting Quantum Heat Engine Could Help Unlock Massive Quantum Computers

Aug. 14, 2026 A tiny superconducting engine has successfully converted heat near absolute zero into useful work, demonstrating the first cyclic quantum heat engine of its kind. Future versions could operate ...

Ordinary WiFi Can Now Identify You with Near-perfect Accuracy

Aug. 12, 2026 Ordinary WiFi networks could quietly become powerful surveillance tools, allowing people to be identified without cameras, special sensors, or even carrying a connected device. Researchers showed that unencrypted signals routinely exchanged between ...

A 0.42-nanometer Breakthrough Could Push Transistors Beyond Silicon

Aug. 9, 2026 Atomically thin semiconductors could enable dramatically smaller and more efficient chips, but a stubborn problem at the boundary between materials has limited their performance. Researchers have now engineered that atomic interface to protect ...

New Fuel Cell Breakthrough Could Help Power Energy-hungry Data Centers

Aug. 8, 2026 A new nanostructured carbon design lets fuel-cell catalysts use tiny amounts of platinum while remaining remarkably stable and efficient. The breakthrough could help hydrogen fuel cells become a more practical way to power data centers, vehicles, ...

Sunlight Creates Quantum Entanglement Once Thought to Require Lasers

Aug. 7, 2026 Scientists have generated quantum entanglement directly from sunlight, potentially offering a lower-energy alternative to the lasers normally used in quantum technology. Their outdoor experiment produced entangled photons with about 94% similarity ...

Claude Fable 5 AI Finds a Tiny Formula That Topples an 87-year-old Math Conjecture

Aug. 5, 2026 A mathematician working at Anthropic says he used the AI model Claude Fable 5 to uncover a remarkably simple counterexample to the Jacobian conjecture, a famous problem that has resisted ...

Scientists Twist Crystal Layers and Reshape Matter from Within

Aug. 3, 2026 Researchers have found a way to build much larger “twisted” oxide materials while precisely controlling how their atomic layers line up. Because these materials can be made over large areas and transferred onto different surfaces, the technique ...

AI Can Tell If Your Brain Is Aging Faster Than You Are

July 31, 2026 A person’s sleeping brain may reveal warning signs of dementia long before memory problems begin. Researchers used machine learning to analyze EEG recordings from about 7,000 adults and found that an older-than-expected “brain age” was tied to ...

Latest Headlines

updated 3:33am EDT

Mathematicians Prove Perfectly Fair Elections Are Impossible

Aug. 2, 2026 Mathematicians have shown that no electoral system can perfectly balance local representation, proportional national results, and a fixed-size parliament once enough parties compete. A newly proposed ...

Scientists Create an “electron Lighthouse” With Laser Light

July 28, 2026 Scientists have created an “electron lighthouse” that uses laser light to launch and steer electrons through a semiconductor without an applied electrical field. The quantum effect could ...

Your AI Calorie-Tracking App May Be Off by 345 Calories

July 26, 2026 Popular AI-powered food apps may make calorie counting easier, but they may also leave out a surprisingly large part of the meal. Four apps underestimated calories and fat by about one-third when ...

Inside the Backrooms: The Internet’s Creepiest Place Is Becoming a Tourist Attraction

July 26, 2026 The Backrooms began as a single eerie image of empty yellow rooms, but internet users transformed it into a vast fictional world that feels ...

Sweden’s Hidden Rare Earth Deposits Could Help Break China’s Grip

July 24, 2026 Sweden could become an important source of rare earth elements needed for magnets and green technologies. Instead of extracting one target metal, researchers are cataloging everything contained in ...

MIT’s New Lidar Chip Could Give Self-Driving Cars a Wider View

July 22, 2026 MIT engineers have found a way to give chip-based lidar a wider, clearer view without relying on moving parts. Their design uses differently shaped antennas that can sit close together without ...

New Cancer Strategy Could Stop Tumors Before Resistance Takes Hold

July 22, 2026 Researchers are applying evolutionary theory to cancer by changing treatments before tumors have time to develop resistance. Mathematical models suggest that rapid, carefully timed switches between ...

New Programmable Photonic Chip Can Control How Fast Light Moves

July 21, 2026 Scientists have created a programmable optical chip that can slow light on demand, giving engineers far greater control over how optical signals propagate through a circuit. The technology could ...

An Ordinary Laptop Solved a Problem Thought to Require a Quantum Computer

July 20, 2026 A quantum problem once described as impossible for classical computers has now been solved using relatively modest hardware. Researchers used tensor networks to compress the overwhelming wave ...

New AI Blood Test Predicts Heart Disease 15 Years Early

July 19, 2026 A new AI-powered blood test could give people a remarkably early warning of serious heart and circulation problems. Developed by researchers at the University of Hong Kong, CardiOmicScore analyzes ...

“Silly Sprinklers” Help Scientists Finally Solve Feynman’s Famous Sprinkler Mystery

July 17, 2026 A team of mathematicians used whimsical "silly sprinklers" to solve a physics mystery that has puzzled scientists for decades. Their experiments showed that the rotation of both normal and ...

Quantum Breakthrough Links Light and Magnetism in Atomically Thin Materials

July 16, 2026 A new review highlights exciting progress in atomically thin quantum materials where light and magnetism work together in ways never before possible. In these materials, light-generated excitons can ...

Alan Turing's Biggest AI Assumption May Have Been Wrong

July 13, 2026 A new book claims AI has been built on a flawed assumption dating back to Alan Turing's famous 1950 paper. Peter J. Denning argues that the most important parts of human intelligence, including ...

Tiny Bubbles Could Revolutionize Inkjet Printing

July 11, 2026 Ultra-fine bubbles may offer a cleaner way to perfect inkjet printing for next-generation electronics. By simply changing the number of bubbles in each droplet, researchers were able to dramatically ...

Incredible New Material Makes Heat Programmable

July 7, 2026 A newly developed material can control and "program" heat, allowing it to direct thermal radiation, switch modes, and remember its settings without continuous power. The innovation could ...

Scientists Used AI to Crack One of Water's Biggest Mysteries

July 8, 2026 Water’s odd behavior becomes even more dramatic when it is supercooled, but scientists have struggled to compare the many different ways of describing its microscopic structure. Researchers at the ...

AI Just Supercharged the Race to Find Room Temperature Superconductors

July 7, 2026 Scientists have combined machine learning with quantum physics to discover two new superconductors and create a much faster way to search for many more. The technique could bring researchers ...

A 200-Year-Old Physics Experiment Could Help Build Future Computers

July 13, 2026 Scientists at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore have discovered a surprisingly simple way to create exotic light structures called optical skyrmions using a 200-year-old optical effect ...

Physicists Say Quantum Mechanics May Not Need Imaginary Numbers After All

July 13, 2026 Physicists from Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf (HHU) have examined a fundamental property of quantum mechanics in collaboration with the German Aerospace Center (DLR). In the scientific ...

This Simple Twist Could Bring Quantum Computers Closer to Reality

June 20, 2026 Researchers found that twisting layered sheets of hexagonal boron nitride can dramatically change the light produced by quantum emitters embedded within the material. The technique offers an ...

Harvard Scientists Turn a Silicon Chip Into a DNA Writing Machine

July 8, 2026 Scientists have created a silicon chip that can write dozens of DNA sequences simultaneously using electricity and water-based enzymes, offering a cleaner alternative to conventional DNA ...

The Milky Way’s Weird Gamma-Ray Glow May Be Dark Matter After All

June 30, 2026 A strange gamma-ray glow at the center of the Milky Way has long sparked debate over whether it comes from hidden neutron stars or elusive dark matter. By applying machine learning to more than a ...

Researchers Found a Wordle Strategy That Wins 99% of the Time

June 19, 2026 Researchers developed a Wordle-solving strategy that succeeds 99% of the time by focusing on information gain rather than likely answers. The method uses Shannon entropy to identify guesses that ...

SpaceX Wants to Build AI Data Centers in Space. Will It Work?

June 18, 2026 The race to build data centers in space is gaining momentum as AI drives unprecedented demand for computing power. Orbital facilities could tap into abundant solar energy and avoid many of the ...

New Plasma Trick Could Unlock Smaller, More Powerful Computer Chips

June 17, 2026 A new technique could solve one of the biggest challenges in making future computer chips from ultrathin materials. Researchers found that coating molybdenum disulfide with oxygen or fluorine lets ...

Brain-Inspired Chip Runs Near Absolute Zero and Could Transform Quantum Computing

June 12, 2026 Scientists at the University of Hong Kong have created a remarkable new type of brain-inspired chip that can function just above absolute zero, one of the coldest environments imaginable. By using a ...

AI Could Uncover New Physics Faster but There’s a Surprising Catch

June 11, 2026 Scientists found that transfer learning can make the search for new physics in the universe much faster, slashing the need for expensive simulations. Yet the approach can backfire when AI relies too ...

New AI Model Reveals How Neutron Star Mergers Forge Heavy Elements

July 8, 2026 Researchers have created an AI-based simulation that makes it much faster to model how neutron star mergers produce many of the universe's heaviest elements. The new tool could improve ...

Oxford Physicists Just Made Schrödinger’s Cat Even Stranger

June 15, 2026 Oxford physicists have created an entirely new type of Schrödinger’s cat-like quantum state using components that are themselves highly quantum in nature. The advance could open new possibilities ...

AI-Designed Universal Coronavirus Vaccine Passes First Human Trial

June 5, 2026 Scientists have successfully tested an AI-designed universal coronavirus vaccine in humans for the first time, finding it to be safe and well tolerated. The vaccine generated immune responses against ...