IN A NUTSHELL 🐙 Researchers at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln have developed synthetic skins that mimic the color-changing abilities of marine creatures. ⚙️ These innovative skins utilize autonomous materials that respond to environmental stimuli without the need for traditional electronics. 📱 Potential applications include wearable devices and soft robotics, offering flexibility and adaptability in various
For over a decade, researchers have considered boson sampling—a quantum computing protocol involving light particles—as a key milestone toward demonstrating the advantages of quantum methods over classical computing. But while previous experiments showed that boson sampling is hard to simulate with classical computers, practical uses have remained out of reach.
Now, in Optica Quantum, researchers from the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) present the first practical application of boson sampling for image recognition, a vital task across many fields, from forensic science to medical diagnostics. Their approach uses just three photons and a linear optical network, marking a significant step towards low energy quantum AI systems.
Solving life’s great mysteries often requires detective work, using observed outcomes to determine their cause. For instance, nuclear physicists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility analyze the aftermath of particle interactions to understand the structure of the atomic nucleus.
This type of subatomic sleuthing is known as the inverse problem. It is the opposite of a forward problem, where causes are used to calculate the effects. Inverse problems arise in many descriptions of physical phenomena, and often their solution is limited by the experimental data available.
That’s why scientists at Jefferson Lab and DOE’s Argonne National Laboratory, as part of the QuantOm Collaboration, have led the development of an artificial intelligence (AI) technique that can reliably solve these types of puzzles on supercomputers at large scales.
Quantum computers can solve extraordinarily complex problems, unlocking new possibilities in fields such as drug development, encryption, AI, and logistics. Now, researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden have developed a highly efficient amplifier that activates only when reading information from qubits. The study was published in the journal IEEE Transactions on Microwave Theory and Techniques.
Thanks to its smart design, it consumes just one-tenth of the power consumed by the best amplifiers available today. This reduces qubit decoherence and lays the foundation for more powerful quantum computers with significantly more qubits and enhanced performance.
Bits, which are the building blocks of a conventional computer, can only ever have the value of 1 or 0. By contrast, the common building blocks of a quantum computer, quantum bits or qubits, can exist in states having the value 1 and 0 simultaneously, as well as all states in between in any combination.
An MRI scan revealed a brain tumor located in a difficult area, and performing a biopsy would carry significant risks for the patient, who had initially sought medical help due to double vision. Cases like this, discussed by a multidisciplinary team of cancer specialists, led researchers at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin, along with their collaborators, to search for alternative diagnostic methods.
Their solution is an AI model that analyzes specific features in the genetic material of tumors, particularly their epigenetic fingerprint, which can be obtained from sources such as cerebrospinal fluid. As reported in the journal Nature Cancer, the model classifies tumors both rapidly and with high accuracy.
IN A NUTSHELL 🌍 North Star, developed by an ex-Harvard professor, is an AI tool designed to predict and prevent wars by simulating world leaders’ decisions. 🔮 The tool creates digital twins of leaders to foresee outcomes of geopolitical events, offering insights for better decision-making. 💼 Investors see peace tech as a burgeoning market, drawing
A new study has revealed compelling evidence that brain criticality—a dynamic balance between neural excitation and inhibition—has a strong genetic foundation and is associated with cognitive performance. The research was published on June 23 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Led by Prof. Liu Ning from the Institute of Biophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and Prof. Yu Shan from the Institute of Automation of CAS, the team analyzed resting-state functional MRI (rs-fMRI) data from the Human Connectome Project S1200 release. The dataset included 250 monozygotic twins, 142 dizygotic twins, and 437 unrelated individuals, providing a robust framework for examining the heritability of critical brain dynamics.
The results showed that brain criticality is significantly influenced by genetic factors, with stronger genetic effects observed in primary sensory cortices compared to higher-order association regions. These findings suggest that the capacity of the brain to maintain near-critical dynamics—previously associated with optimal information processing and cognitive flexibility—is, to a substantial degree, inherited.
Greg Egan’s Diaspora is one of the most ambitious and mind-bending science fiction novels ever published. It came out in 1997 and originally started as a short story called “Wang’s Carpets.” That story ended up as a chapter in the novel. Diaspora is: dense, smart, and way ahead of its time.
This is hard science fiction to the core. Egan invents entire new branches of physics. He reimagines life, consciousness, time, space — even what it means to be human. The book doesn’t ease you in. There’s a glossary, invented physics theories like Kozuch Theory, and characters that don’t even have genders. But if you stick with it, what you get isn’t just a story, it’s a look at what the future might actually become.
By the year 2,975, humanity isn’t one species anymore. It’s split into three groups: Fleshers: The biological humans, including the “statics” (unchanged baseline humans) and all sorts of heavily modified versions — underwater people, gene-hacked thinkers, even “dream apes” who gave up speech to live closer to nature. Gleisners: AIs in robotic bodies that live in space. They care about the physical world and experience time like regular humans. They’re kind of old-school — still sending ships to the stars, trying to build things in real space. Citizens: These are digital minds that live entirely in simulated worlds called polises.
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