A quick guide to the most important AI law you’ve never heard of

It’s a Wild West out there for artificial intelligence. AI applications are increasingly used to make important decisions about humans’ lives with little to no oversight or accountability. This can have devastating consequences: wrongful arrests, incorrect grades for students, and even financial ruin. Women, marginalized groups, and people of color often bear the brunt of […]

Mercury removal made easy in toxic environments

Mercury pollution is a global problem in water, air and soil near goldmines, cement and some metal production, and other heavy industries burning fossil fuels—with removal too expensive or difficult in some of the poorest countries in the world. Now Flinders University experts have expanded testing of a sustainable extraction material capable of absorbing almost […]

Astronomers spot quadruple stars that may spark supernova explosions

A quadruple star system discovered in 2017 and recently observed at the University of Canterbury Mt. John Observatory could represent a new channel by which thermonuclear supernova explosions can occur in the universe, according to results published in Nature Astronomy today (13 May) by an international team of astronomers. The rare double-binary star system HD74438 […]

More efficient optical quantum gates

Future quantum computers are expected not only to solve particularly tricky computing tasks, but also to be connected to a network for the secure exchange of data. In principle, quantum gates could be used for these purposes. But until now, it has not been possible to realize them with sufficient efficiency. By a sophisticated combination […]

Chemists synthesize psychotropic compound from rainforest tree

The bark of the Galbulimima belgraveana tree, found only in remote rainforests of Papua New Guinea and northern Australia, has long been used by indigenous people for both healing and ceremony. A tea brewed from the bark not only induces a dreamlike state but is said to ease pain and fever. To probe these effects, […]

Fish and humans: A new approach to Bloom syndrome research

Researchers at Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) have created a new disease model that has contributed to a better understanding of Bloom syndrome and the sex determination processes of zebrafish. The study, linking two seemingly unrelated topics, was carried out by the research teams of Mihály Kovács (Department of Biochemistry) and Máté Varga (Department of Genetics) […]

A gene in tuberculosis bacteria is found essential for siderophore secretion and virulence

Lei Zhang, Ph.D., and Michael Niederweis, Ph.D., of the University of Alabama at Birmingham have made what they call “a major step” in understanding how Mycobacterium tuberculosis acquires iron from its human host—a process essential for the pathogenesis of this bacterium. Tuberculosis kills more than 1 million people each year, but without iron, M. tuberculosis […]

NASA’s ECOSTRESS detects ‘heat islands’ in extreme Indian heat wave

A relentless heat wave has blanketed India and Pakistan since mid-March, causing dozens of deaths, fires, increased air pollution, and reduced crop yields. Weather forecasts show no prospect of relief any time soon. NASA’s Ecosystem Spaceborne Thermal Radiometer Experiment on Space Station instrument (ECOSTRESS) has been measuring these temperatures from space, at the highest spatial […]

New nanomechanical oscillators with record-low loss

The vibrational modes of nanomechanical resonators are analogous to different notes of a guitar string and have similar properties such as frequency (pitch) and lifetime. The lifetime is characterized by the quality factor, which is the number of times that the resonator oscillates until its energy is reduced by 70%. The quality factor is crucial […]

Small microring array enables large complex-valued matrix multiplication

Optical computing uses photons instead of electrons to perform computations, which can significantly increase the speed and energy efficiency of computations by overcoming the inherent limitations of electrons. The basic principle of optical computing is the light-matter interaction. Matrix computing has become one of the most widely used and indispensable information processing tools in science […]