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Aug 16, 2023

The computer scientist who hunts for costly bugs in crypto code

Posted by in categories: blockchains, computing

Programming errors on the blockchain can mean $100 million lost in the blink of an eye. Ronghui Gu and his company CertiK are trying to help.

Aug 15, 2023

These little piggies helped their neighbors, but why? New research design may help shed light

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Pigs are generally considered to have high intelligence, and new research shows that they may also be empathic to other members of their social groups, helping them during instances of need. But is this behavior truly unselfish, or is it driven by goal-specific motivations?

To investigate, researchers from the Research Institute for Farm Animal Biology in Germany and Austria’s University of Veterinary Medicine Institute of Animal Welfare Science have studied helping behavior among social groups of domestic pigs. Their work, titled “Spontaneous helping in pigs is mediated by helper’s social attention and distress signals of individuals in need,” is published in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

In the wild, animals will often help members of their social groups in times of distress, defending them against predators or releasing them from traps, snares, or other types of confinement. There is no general consensus over whether such helping behavior is truly empathic, or whether it might be driven by a more selfish motivation.

Aug 15, 2023

Cleveland Clinic Study Shows Deep Brain Stimulation Encouraging for Stroke Patients

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Click image for animation of DBS for post-stroke rehabilitation

A first-in-human trial of deep brain stimulation (DBS) for post-stroke rehabilitation patients by Cleveland Clinic researchers has shown that using DBS to target the dentate nucleus – which regulates fine-control of voluntary movements, cognition, language, and sensory functions in the brain – is safe and feasible.

Continue reading “Cleveland Clinic Study Shows Deep Brain Stimulation Encouraging for Stroke Patients” »

Aug 15, 2023

Researchers find risk of premature birth 50% higher in mothers with poor mental health

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

New work led by researchers at the University of Exeter, King’s College London, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and the University of Liverpool has found that women who had at least one contact with mental health services in the seven years prior to their pregnancy were at increased risk of preterm birth.

The study, “Obstetric and neonatal outcomes in pregnant women with and without a history of specialist mental care: a national population-based cohort study using linked routinely collected data in England,” published in Lancet Psychiatry, analyzed data from more than two million , and found that one in 10 women who had used mental health services before their pregnancy had a , compared to one in 15 in those who had not.

Researchers also found that women who had used mental health services faced a higher risk of giving birth to a baby that was small for its gestational age, increasing from 65 per 1,000 births in women who had not used mental health services to 75 per 1,000 births in women who had.

Aug 15, 2023

A new bio-inspired solar leaf design with increased harvesting efficiency

Posted by in categories: solar power, sustainability

New research suggests a new solar energy design, inspired by nature, may pave the way for future renewable energy technologies.

Photovoltaic solar energy is obtained by converting sunshine into —and researchers from Imperial have developed a new leaf-like design with increased efficiency.

The new photovoltaic leaf (PV-leaf) technology uses low-cost materials and could inspire the next generation of renewable energy technologies.

Aug 15, 2023

Hand-held tube containing aluminum foil balls produces enough electricity to power LED array when shaken

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, materials

A team of mechanical engineers from Chung-Ang University, Massachusetts General Hospital, LS Materials and Yonsei University has found that a hand-held cylinder containing crumpled aluminum foil balls is capable of producing enough electricity when shaken to light a small LED grid. In their paper published in the journal Advanced Science, the group describes other materials used in the cylinder and possible uses for such a device.

Prior research has shown that a wide variety of materials can be used to generate , and that some constructions can capture that . Researchers have suggested such devices could be useful as the power needs of personal electronics decrease. In this new effort, the researchers have looked to aluminum foil as a material for generating static electricity and capturing it to power an external device.

Continue reading “Hand-held tube containing aluminum foil balls produces enough electricity to power LED array when shaken” »

Aug 15, 2023

A Leap in Performance — New Breakthrough Boosts Quantum AI

Posted by in categories: information science, quantum physics, robotics/AI

A groundbreaking theoretical proof reveals that using a technique called overparametrization enhances performance in quantum machine learning.

Machine learning is a subset of artificial intelligence (AI) that deals with the development of algorithms and statistical models that enable computers to learn from data and make predictions or decisions without being explicitly programmed to do so. Machine learning is used to identify patterns in data, classify data into different categories, or make predictions about future events. It can be categorized into three main types of learning: supervised, unsupervised and reinforcement learning.

Aug 15, 2023

The Space Force Is Launching Its Own Swarm of Tiny Satellites

Posted by in categories: military, satellites

Defense satellites used to be big, costly, and “juicy” targets for attack. Now the Pentagon is aiming for a more resilient network of nearly 1,000 mini orbiters.

Aug 15, 2023

Scientists reconstruct Pink Floyd song by listening to people’s brainwaves

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, media & arts, mobile phones

Now that’s something. Funny this came up on my feed as I’m jamming to music on my phone to destress.


Breakthrough raises hopes that musicality of natural speech can be restored in patients with disabling neurological conditions.

Aug 15, 2023

Apple’s entire M3 chip lineup just leaked, and it blows M2 out of the water

Posted by in categories: computing, mobile phones

Part of the reason that these chips are becoming so much more efficient and getting so many more cores on a similar die size to the chips that have come before is the 3nm process. Apple is heavily invested in the new chip creation tech, having ordered almost the entirety of the first printing of the process, making sure that it has an advantage over the competition. The first device that we might see with a 3nm process chip is the iPhone 15 Pro, and then it’s likely that the M3 chips will follow.

Whatever happens with these new chips, it’s looking like it’s going to be an exciting time for Apple silicon and the latest Apple hardware to use it.