Several groups hope to develop artificial-intelligence models that can predict how cells behave.

The “search-and-destroy microrobot system can chemically shred the resident bacterial biofilm.

As humans, we rely on all sorts of stimuli to navigate in the world, including our senses: sight, sound, touch, taste, smell. Until now, AI devices have been solely reliant on a single sense—visual impressions. Brand-new research from Duke University goes beyond reliance only on visual perception. It’s called WildFusion, combining vision with touch and vibration.

The four-legged robot used by the research team includes microphones and tactile sensors in addition to the standard cameras commonly found in state-of-the-art robots. The WildFusion robot can use sound to assess the quality of a surface (dry leaves, wet sand) as well as pressure and resistance to calibrate its balance and stability. All of this data is gathered and combined or fused, into a single data representation that improves over time with experience. The research team plans enhance the robot’s capabilities by enabling it to gauge things like heat and humidity.

As the types of data used to interact with the environment become richer and more integrated, AI moves inexorably closer to true AGI.

Forget brute force—Stanford engineers are using finesse to tackle deadly clots.

AI company Midjourney has released its first video model.

The US Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday approved Gilead Sciences’ twice-yearly injection to prevent HIV – a move the company hailed as a major breakthrough in the fight against the sexually transmitted virus.

Drugs to prevent HIV transmission, known as pre-exposure prophylaxis or PrEP, have existed for more than a decade. But because they typically require taking a daily pill, they have yet to make a significant dent in global infections.

“This is a historic day in the decades-long fight against HIV,” Gilead chairman and chief executive Daniel O’Day said in a statement.

A superbright Mars is currently visible alongside Regulus, the “Heart of the Lion” star located around 79 light-years from Earth.

A new method shows fish can learn and strategize in their natural habitats, challenging long-held views based on lab studies. For years, scientists have underestimated the intelligence of fish, often relying on lab-based studies that don’t reflect how these animals behave in their natural environ

From a data platform perspective, teams responsible for maintaining efficient, scalable infrastructure can benefit from M1’s support for structured function calling and its compatibility with automated pipelines. Its open-source nature allows teams to tailor performance to their stack without vendor lock-in.

Security leads may also find value in evaluating M1’s potential for secure, on-premises deployment of a high-capability model that doesn’t rely on transmitting sensitive data to third-party endpoints.

Taken together, MiniMax-M1 presents a flexible option for organizations looking to experiment with or scale up advanced AI capabilities while managing costs, staying within operational limits, and avoiding proprietary constraints.

At the core of this discovery, published in Science Advances, is barium titanate (BaTiO₃), a material known for its ability to convert light into electricity, though not very efficiently on its own.

The scientists found that by embedding thin layers of barium titanate between two other materials – strontium titanate and calcium titanate – they could create a structure that produces significantly more electricity than barium titanate alone, even while using less of it.

The improvement is striking. The layered structures generated up to 1,000 times more electricity than the same amount of standalone barium titanate. The researchers were also able to fine-tune this effect by adjusting the thickness of each layer, giving them control over the system’s performance.