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What Is Computer Science About? Or, the Most Dangerous Bug

Computer science has a bug. No compiler will ever catch it.

It might be the most dangerous one we’ve ever shipped. And with #AI, we’re about to ship it everywhere.

It starts with a deceptively simple question: what is #ComputerScience actually about?

If you said “computers,” you’re in good company.

I’d argue you’re also wrong.

The answer, and the bug, are in this article. It involves a telescope and your neighbor’s window.

Read it. Then tell me where I’m wrong.

SRI NEWSLETTER: Space Renaissance International at the 33rd UN/IAF Workshop and IAC 2026

Advancing Space for All: Scientific Contributions, Sustainable Development and International Cooperation in Antalya

Space Renaissance International (SRI) participated in the 33rd UN/IAF Workshop on Space Economy Opportunities for Emerging Nations (3–4 October) and the 77th International Astronautical Congress (IAC) 2026 (5–9 October) in Antalya, Türkiye.

Under the theme The World Needs More Space, the Congress brought together the international space community to exchange scientific knowledge, address emerging challenges and explore new opportunities for cooperation.

The components of agent memory

“Do Androids dream of electric sheep?”

Philip K. Dick posed the question in 1968 as science fiction. In 2026, it turns out “dreaming” is the precise architectural breakthrough required to solve enterprise AI’s biggest bottleneck: agentic amnesia.

Every time an autonomous workflow resets, it burns expensive tokens re-learning lessons it paid for yesterday. Without long-term memory maintenance, scaling AI agents doesn’t increase efficiency—it just compounds API costs and error rates.

In Anthropic’s research (“Components of Agent Memory”), they outline why agents need dedicated offline “dreaming” phases to transform raw logs into reliable enterprise tools:

* Token Optimization: Converts bulky, high-token session logs into lean, curated reference wikis—preventing context window bloat on routine runs.

* Production Reliability:* Audits past execution transcripts to turn real-world failures into permanent system rules, eliminating repeated failure modes.

Superconducting detector can count one, two or three photons at once

A Dutch physicist has reportedly come up with a superconducting light detector that can distinguish between one, two, and even three or more photons at once, and make quantum computers more accurate.

Built by Erik Baalbergen, PhD, a physicist at Leiden University in the Netherlands, the detector can not only identify whether light is present. It can also count how many individual light particles, or photons, hit its surface.

New tech passes the smell test

Our sense of smell shapes how we navigate our environment, but it’s a sensation that’s notoriously difficult to recreate in the digital world.

Jinghua LiTo overcome this challenge, researchers have developed a device that uses an artificial intelligence e-nose to detect and analyze odors. Combined with a wearable release system called Scentronic, which uses machine learning algorithms to classify data in real time, the system passed the smell test in the lab by encouraging better interactions between humans and machines.

“This work combines innovations in hardware and software to bring new solutions to societal challenges,” said Jinghua Li, senior author of the study and an assistant professor of materials science and engineering at The Ohio State University. “Our long-term goal here is to incorporate these systems into compact and personalized devices.”

Vibrating mirrors of light create analog of a black hole event horizon

Optical cavities are pairs of light-trapping mirrors and underpin the operation of lasers, atomic clocks and many types of precision sensors. If the distance between the mirrors is changed rapidly enough, some theories predict that the waves inside them should bunch together into short, intense pulses. So far, however, this prediction has never been tested directly.

Through new experiments, David Weld and colleagues at the University of California, Santa Barbara, have confirmed it for the first time by swapping the roles of light and matter. Strikingly, they found that the cavity behaves in ways that mimic the strange physics of curved spacetime.

Their results have been published in Physical Review Letters.

How a metabolite protects the enzyme that consumes it

Metabolites are consumed by enzymes to produce other vital molecules as well as to control metabolite levels. But how do cells avoid consuming too much? Researchers from the MPI of Biochemistry, with the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and the de Duve Institute in Brussels, have deciphered such molecular regulation in tryptophan metabolism. The essential amino acid tryptophan binds to a second site on the enzyme TDO2, distinct from where it is consumed. This sequesters a region needed by two effectors, the kinase CK2 and the ubiquitin ligase CUL1–β-TrCP, which act sequentially to signal TDO2 degradation. The findings are now published in Molecular Cell.

The essential amino acid tryptophan is a key building block for proteins and also serves as a precursor for serotonin, melatonin, niacin (vitamin B3) and NAD+. These molecules are vital for the nervous and immune systems and the cell’s energy supply. As tryptophan can only be obtained through dietary supply, the body must maintain tryptophan levels within a physiological range.

The enzyme tryptophan 2,3-dioxygenase (TDO2) carries out the first and rate-limiting step of the kynurenine pathway. While the cell requires the downstream products of TDO2, it must also avoid consuming too much tryptophan.