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How social norms evolved over time and differ across countries

When humans interact with each other and engage in everyday activities, they typically follow various undefined rules, also known as social norms. These rules include things like greeting acquaintances in specific ways upon meeting them, not interrupting others when they speak, waiting in line for one’s turn at the post office, and countless other behaviors.

Social norms can differ significantly across and geographical regions. In addition, these unspoken rules are known to have changed considerably across history, as societies evolved and the values guiding people’s behavior changed.

Researchers at the Institute for Future Studies in Stockholm and other institutes in Sweden recently carried out a large-scale study investigating the evolution of social norms across time, while also exploring the similarities and differences between the norms in 90 societies worldwide. Their paper, published in Communications Psychology, identifies a common trend in the recent evolution of norms in most societies, while also uncovering characteristic patterns in different types of societies.

DeepMind introduces AI agent that learns to complete various tasks in a scalable world model

Over the past decade, deep learning has transformed how artificial intelligence (AI) agents perceive and act in digital environments, allowing them to master board games, control simulated robots and reliably tackle various other tasks. Yet most of these systems still depend on enormous amounts of direct experience—millions of trial-and-error interactions—to achieve even modest competence.

This brute-force approach limits their usefulness in the physical world, where such experimentation would be slow, costly, or unsafe.

To overcome these limitations, researchers have turned to world models—simulated environments where agents can safely practice and learn.

Insights into Persistent SARS-CoV-2 Reservoirs in Chronic Long COVID

Long COVID (LC), also known as post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 infection (PASC), is a heterogeneous and debilitating chronic disease that currently affects 10 to 20 million people in the U.S. and over 420 million people globally. With no approved treatments, the long-term global health and economic impact of chronic LC remains high and growing. LC affects children, adolescents, and healthy adults and is characterized by over 200 diverse symptoms that persist for months to years after the acute COVID-19 infection is resolved. These symptoms target twelve major organ systems, causing dyspnea, vascular damage, cognitive impairments (“brain fog”), physical and mental fatigue, anxiety, and depression. This heterogeneity of LC symptoms, along with the lack of specific biomarkers and diagnostic tests, presents a significant challenge to the development of LC treatments.

Exploration of tumor-immune landscape in colorectal adenocarcinoma using AI-powered multiplexed image analysis

Colorectal cancer is a high disease burden cancer and is the second leading cause of cancer deaths worldwide. The first-line treatment option is surgical resection of cancerous tissue. However, the clinical picture becomes more complex for recurrent disease, which occurs in roughly 20% of patients, and a variety of therapies such as adjuvants and immunotherapies have been employed to manage this manifestation of colon cancer. As a result, novel therapeutics are in demand, and a deeper understanding of the tumor microenvironment of colon cancer tissues, such as colon adenocarcinoma, or CAC, is needed.

Intel’s New ASIC Business to “Serve a Broad Range of External Customers”, Signaling the Next Big Opportunity for Its Foundry & x86 Ecosystem

Intel has decided to tap into the ASIC and design business as its next major venture, and the effort will play a crucial role.

Yale Scientists Solve a Century-Old Brain Wave Mystery

Yale scientists traced gamma brain waves to thalamus-cortex interactions. The discovery could reveal how brain rhythms shape perception and disease. For more than a century, scientists have observed rhythmic waves of synchronized neuronal activity in the brain. Now, for the first time, researcher

NVIDIA Now Working On Its Own Robotaxis

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Because why not?

NVIDIA has actually been involved in the robotaxi world for years, providing different hardware needs to various automakers who have been automating more and more driving. For example, I just noticed that four years ago I wrote about AutoX robotaxis using NVIDIA Drive. NVIDIA also put out a blog post highlighting that “Cruise, Zoox, DiDi, Oxbotica, Pony.ai and AutoX [were] developing level 4/5 systems on NVIDIA’s autonomous vehicle platform.” It also acquired DeepMap at that time. “DeepMap expected to extend NVIDIA mapping products, scale worldwide map operations and expand NVIDIA’s full-self driving expertise,” the company announced in 2021.

Astronomers Stunned by Bizarre Three-Planet System That Rewrites the Rules of Space

An international team of scientists has announced the discovery of three Earth-sized planets orbiting within the binary star system TOI-2267, located approximately 190 light-years from Earth. An international group of scientists has announced the discovery of three Earth-sized planets orbiting wi

Scientists just made gene editing far more powerful

Scientists at The University of Texas at Austin have developed a revolutionary gene-editing method using bacterial retrons that can correct multiple disease-causing mutations at once. Unlike traditional tools limited to one or two mutations, this retron-based system replaces large defective DNA regions, dramatically improving efficiency and inclusivity for patients with complex disorders like cystic fibrosis.

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