Bizarre Things: Computers & Math

December 24, 2024

Top Headlines

First Demonstration of Quantum Teleportation Over Busy Internet Cables

Dec. 20, 2024 — Quantum teleportation could provide near-instant communication over long distances. But, inside Internet cables, photons needed for teleportation are lost within the millions of light particles required for classical communications. A new study ...

Swarms of 'Ant-Like' Robots Lift Heavy Objects and Hurl Themselves Over Obstacles

Dec. 18, 2024 — Scientists have developed swarms of tiny magnetic robots that work together like ants to achieve Herculean feats, including traversing and picking up objects many times their size. The findings ...

Tiny Robots, Big Impact: Revolutionizing Infertility Treatment With Magnetic Microrobots

Dec. 17, 2024 — Infertility affects an estimated 186 million people worldwide, with fallopian tube obstruction contributing to 11%-67% of female infertility cases. Researchers have developed an innovative solution ...

Physicists 'Bootstrap' Validity of String Theory

Dec. 17, 2024 — String theory remains elusive as a 'provable' phenomenon. But a team of physicists has now taken a significant step forward in validating string theory by using an innovative mathematical method that points to its ...

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Physics and Emote Design: Quantifying Clarity in Digital Images

Dec. 16, 2024 — When analyzing artworks, understanding the visual clarity of compositions is crucial. Inspired by digital artists, researchers have created a metric to quantify clarity in digital images. As a ...

Fast, Rewritable Computing With DNA Origami Registers

Dec. 11, 2024 — DNA stores the instructions for life and, along with enzymes and other molecules, computes everything from hair color to risk of developing diseases. Harnessing that prowess and immense storage ...

Uncovering the Pigments and Techniques Used to Paint the Berlin Wall

Dec. 11, 2024 — Street art takes many forms, and the vibrant murals on the Berlin Wall both before and after its fall are expressions of people's opinions. But there was often secrecy around the processes for ...

Breakthrough Brings Body-Heat Powered Wearable Devices Closer to Reality

Dec. 12, 2024 — A research team has developed an ultra-thin, flexible film that could power next-generation wearable devices using body heat, eliminating the need for ...

Minuscule Robots for Targeted Drug Delivery

Dec. 11, 2024 — An interdisciplinary team has created tiny bubble-like microrobots that can deliver therapeutics right where they are needed and then be absorbed by the ...

Researchers Discover New Third Class of Magnetism That Could Transform Digital Devices

Dec. 11, 2024 — A new class of magnetism called altermagnetism has been imaged for the first time in a new study. The findings could lead to the development of new ...

AI Thought Knee X-Rays Show If You Drink Beer -- They Don't

Dec. 11, 2024 — A new study highlights a hidden challenge of using AI in medical imaging research -- the phenomenon of highly accurate yet potentially misleading results known as 'shortcut learning.' The researchers ...

Researchers 'See' Vulnerability to Gaming Addiction in the Adolescent Brain

Dec. 9, 2024 — Researchers found that adolescents with more symptoms of gaming addiction showed lower brain activity in the region involved in decision-making and reward processing; this blunted response to reward ...

Scientists Create AI That 'Watches' Videos by Mimicking the Brain

Dec. 9, 2024 — Imagine an artificial intelligence (AI) model that can watch and understand moving images with the subtlety of a human brain. Now, scientists have made this a reality by creating MovieNet: an ...

Not So Simple Machines: Cracking the Code for Materials That Can Learn

Dec. 9, 2024 — Physicists have devised an algorithm that provides a mathematical framework for how learning works in lattices called mechanical neural ...

Battery-Like Computer Memory Keeps Working Above 1000°F

Dec. 9, 2024 — Computer memory could one day withstand the blazing temperatures in fusion reactors, jet engines, geothermal wells and sweltering planets using a new solid-state memory device developed by a team of ...

Bird-Inspired Drone Can Jump for Take-Off

Dec. 6, 2024 — Researchers have built a drone that can walk, hop, and jump into flight with the aid of birdlike legs, greatly expanding the range of potential environments accessible to unmanned aerial ...

Researchers Innovate Scalable Robotic Fibers With Light-Emitting, Self-Healing and Magnetic Properties

Dec. 6, 2024 — A team of interdisciplinary scientists has developed flexible fibers with self-healing, light-emitting and magnetic properties. The Scalable Hydrogel-clad Ionotronic Nickel-core Electroluminescent ...

A New Way to Create Realistic 3D Shapes Using Generative AI

Dec. 4, 2024 — An AI method enables the generation of sharp, high-quality 3D shapes that are closer to the quality of the best 2D image models. Previous approaches typically generated blurry or cartoonish 3D ...

Manta Rays Inspire Fast Swimming Soft Robot Yet

Dec. 4, 2024 — A team of researchers has beaten its own record for the fastest swimming soft robot, drawing inspiration from manta rays to improve their ability to control the robot's movement in the ...

Training AI Through Human Interactions Instead of Datasets

Dec. 3, 2024 — Researchers have developed a platform to help AI learn to perform complex tasks more like humans. Called 'GUIDE,' it works by allowing humans to observe AI's actions in real-time and ...

Researchers Demonstrate Self-Assembling Electronics

Dec. 2, 2024 — Researchers have demonstrated a new technique for self-assembling electronic devices. The proof-of-concept work was used to create diodes and transistors, and paves the way for self-assembling more ...

'Spooky Action' at a Very Short Distance: Scientists Map out Quantum Entanglement in Protons

Dec. 2, 2024 — Scientists have a new way to use data from high-energy particle smashups to peer inside protons. Their approach uses quantum information science to map out how particle tracks streaming from ...

Smallest Walking Robot Makes Microscale Measurements

Dec. 2, 2024 — Researchers have created the smallest walking robot yet. Its mission: to be tiny enough to interact with waves of visible light and still move independently, so that it can maneuver to specific ...

Innovative Robot Navigation Inspired by Brain Function Boosts Efficiency and Accuracy

Dec. 2, 2024 — A research team has taken inspiration from the brains of insects and animals for more energy-efficient robotic ...

Inside the 'Swat Team' -- How Insects React to Virtual Reality Gaming

Nov. 29, 2024 — Humans get a real buzz from the virtual world of gaming and augmented reality but now scientists have trialled the use of these new-age technologies on small animals, to test the reactions of tiny ...

The Next Evolution of AI Begins With Ours

Nov. 25, 2024 — The genome has space for only a small fraction of the information needed to control complex behaviors. So then how, for example, does a newborn sea turtle instinctually know to follow the moonlight? ...

Reality Check: Making Indoor Smartphone-Based Augmented Reality Work

Nov. 23, 2024 — To understand the practical challenges of indoor augmented reality applications on smartphones, researchers conducted 113 hours of extensive experiments and case studies over 316 patterns to ...

Synchronized Movement Between Robots and Humans Builds Trust, Study Finds

Nov. 20, 2024 — Trust between humans and robots is improved when the movement between both is harmonized, researchers have ...

New Theory Reveals the Shape of a Single Photon

Nov. 19, 2024 — A new theory, that explains how light and matter interact at the quantum level has enabled researchers to define for the first time the precise shape of a single ...

Effortless Robot Movements

Nov. 18, 2024 — Humans and animals move with remarkable economy without consciously thinking about it by utilizing the natural oscillation patterns of their bodies. A new tool can now utilize this knowledge for the ...

Gaming for the Good!

Nov. 18, 2024 — It turns out gaming is good for you! New research indicates massive multiplayer online gamers learn by gaming and their skills in the workplace are enriched by those seemingly endless hours ...

Invisible Touch: AI Can Feel and Measure Surfaces

Nov. 16, 2024 — Quantum-science advances using AI can measure very small surfaces and distances -- opening a world of medical, manufacturing and other ...

'Walk This Way': How Ants Create Trails to Multiple Food Sources

Nov. 16, 2024 — Researchers have discovered that in a foraging ant's search for food, it will leave pheromone trails connecting its colony to multiple food sources when they're available, successfully ...

AI Headphones Create a 'Sound Bubble,' Quieting All Sounds More Than a Few Feet Away

Nov. 14, 2024 — Researchers have created a headphone prototype that allows listeners to hear people speaking within a bubble with a programmable radius of 3 to 6 feet. Voices and sounds outside the bubble are ...