MIT engineers develop a magnetic transistor for more energy-efficient electronics
A new device concept opens the door to compact, high-performance transistors with built-in memory.
MIT News
3 Questions: How AI could optimize the power grid
While the growing energy demands of AI are worrying, some techniques can also help make power grids cleaner and more efficient.
MIT News
Video Friday: Robots Are Everywhere at CES 2026
Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.ICRA 2026: 1–5 June 2026, VIENNAEnjoy today’s videos! We’re excited to announce the product version of our Atlas® robot. This enterprise-grade humanoid robot offers impressive strength and range of motion, precise manipulation, and intelligent adaptability—designed to power the new industrial revolution. [ Boston Dynamics ]I appreciate the creativity and technical innovation here, but realistically, if you’ve got more than one floor in your ..
IEEE Spectrum > RoboticsThe Download: the case for AI slop, and helping CRISPR fulfill its promise
This is today’s edition ofThe Download,our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. How I learned to stop worrying and love AI slop —Caiwei Chen If I were to locate the moment AI slop broke through into popular consciousness, I’d pick the video of rabbits bouncing…
MIT Technology Review
A new CRISPR startup is betting regulators will ease up on gene-editing
Here at MIT Technology Review we’ve been writing about the gene-editing technology CRISPR since 2013, calling it the biggest biotech breakthrough of the century. Yet so far, there’s been only one gene-editing drug approved. It’s been used commercially on only about 40 patients, all with sickle-cell disease. It’s becoming clear that the impact of CRISPR…
MIT Technology Review
Discrete spatial diffusion models data while obeying scientific principles
Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory have developed a new approach that addresses the limitations of generative AI models. Unlike generative diffusion models, the team's Discrete Spatial Diffusion approach honors scientific and physics principles. The team validated their model on two challenging scientific applications—subsurface rock microstructures and lithium-ion battery electrodes—with promising results.
Phys.org > Computer Sciences
Decoding the Arctic to predict winter weather
With the help of AI, MIT Research Scientist Judah Cohen is reshaping subseasonal forecasting, with the goal of extending the lead time for predicting impactful weather.
MIT News
AI Coding Assistants Are Getting Worse
In recent months, I’ve noticed a troubling trend with AI coding assistants. After two years of steady improvements, over the course of 2025, most of the core models reached a quality plateau, and more recently, seem to be in decline. A task that might have taken five hours assisted by AI, and perhaps ten hours without it, is now more commonly taking seven or eight hours, or even longer. It’s reached the point where I am sometimes going back and using older versions of large language models (LLMs).I use LLM-generated code extensively in my role as CEO of Carrington Labs, a provider of predictive-analytics risk models for lenders. My team has a sandbox where we create, deploy, and run AI-g..
IEEE Spectrum > ComputingHow AI Accelerates PMUT Design for Biomedical Ultrasonic Applications
This whitepaper provides MEMS engineers, biomedical device developers, and multiphysics simulation specialists with a practical AI-accelerated workflow for optimizing piezoelectric micromachined ultrasonic transducers (PMUTs), enabling you to explore complex design trade-offs between sensitivity and bandwidth while achieving validated performance improvements in minutes instead of days using standard cloud infrastructure.What you will learn about:MultiphysicsAI combines cloud-based FEM simulation with neural surrogates to transform PMUT design from trial-and-error iteration into systematic inverse optimizationTraining on 10,000 randomized geometries produces AI surrogates with 1% mean error ..
IEEE Spectrum > Artificial IntelligenceAmerica’s new dietary guidelines ignore decades of scientific research
The new year has barely begun, but the first days of 2026 have brought big news for health. On Monday, the US’s federal health agency upended its recommendations for routine childhood vaccinations—a move that health associations worry puts children at unnecessary risk of preventable disease. There was more news from the federal government on Wednesday,…
MIT Technology Review
The Download: mimicking pregnancy’s first moments in a lab, and AI parameters explained
This is today’s edition ofThe Download,our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Researchers are getting organoids pregnant with human embryos At first glance, it looks like the start of a human pregnancy: A ball-shaped embryo presses into the lining of the uterus then grips tight,…
MIT Technology Review
Using unstructured data to fuel enterprise AI success
Enterprises are sitting on vast quantities of unstructured data, from call records and video footage to customer complaint histories and supply chain signals. Yet this invaluable business intelligence, estimated to make up as much as 90% of the data generated by organizations, historically remained dormant because its unstructured nature makes analysis extremely difficult. But if…
MIT Technology Review
What new legal challenges mean for the future of US offshore wind
For offshore wind power in the US, the new year is bringing new legal battles. On December 22, the Trump administration announced it would pause the leases of five wind farms currently under construction off the US East Coast. Developers were ordered to stop work immediately. The cited reason? National security, specifically concerns that turbines…
MIT Technology Review
Supporting the DSIT Trusted Third Party Assurance Roadmap: A TechUK Workshop Series
This May, TechUK is convening a four-part workshop series designed to support the successful implementation of DSIT's Trusted Third Party Assurance roadmap. As the UK works to strengthen its leading AI assurance ecosystem and build confidence in third-party assurance mechanisms, this series will bring together the voices and expertise needed to turn vision into reality.
techUK
AI in critical national infrastructure: get involved in techUK’s webinar series and whitepaper
This April, techUK is launching an essential four-part webinar series followed by a whitepaper exploring the role of AI across our nation's critical infrastructure sectors. As AI technologies evolve, understanding their applications, risks, and opportunities in the systems that underpin modern society has never been more important.
techUK
An AI approach for single-image-based 3D character animation with preserved proportions
In Proceedings of the SIGGRAPH Asia 2025 Conference Papers, a research team affiliated with UNIST reports a new AI technology that can animate 3D characters to mimic the exact movements shown in a single 2D image, all while preserving natural proportions and avoiding distortions. This development could reduce the barriers to creating 3D content for the metaverse, animation and gaming industries.
Phys.org > Computer Sciences
Decoding black box AI with human-readable data descriptions and influence
Artificial intelligence (AI), particularly deep learning models, are often considered black boxes because their decision-making processes remain difficult to interpret. These models can accurately identify objects—such as recognizing a bird in a photo—but understanding exactly how they arrive at these conclusions is a significant challenge. Until now, most interpretability efforts have focused on analyzing the internal structures of the models themselves.
Phys.org > Computer Sciences
Deploying a hybrid approach to Web3 in the AI era
When the concept of “Web 3.0” first emerged about a decade ago the idea was clear: Create a more user-controlled internet that lets you do everything you can now, except without servers or intermediaries to manage the flow of information. Where Web2, which emerged in the early 2000s, relies on centralized systems to store data…
MIT Technology Review
The Download: war in Europe, and the company that wants to cool the planet
This is today’s edition ofThe Download,our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Europe’s drone-filled vision for the future of war Last spring, 3,000 British soldiers deployed an invisible automated intelligence network, known as a “digital targeting web,” as part of a NATO exercise called Hedgehog…
MIT Technology Review
LLMs contain a LOT of parameters. But what’s a parameter?
MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here. I am writing this because one of my editors woke up in the middle of the night and scribbled on a bedside notepad: “What is a…
MIT Technology Review
The man who made India digital isn’t done yet
Nandan Nilekani can’t stop trying to push India into the future. He started nearly 30 years ago, masterminding an ongoing experiment in technological state capacity that started with Aadhaar—the world’s largest digital identity system. Aadhaar means “foundation” in Hindi, and on that bedrock Nilekani and people working with him went on to build a sprawling…
MIT Technology ReviewHealth and social care programme wrapped – 2025 in review
A look back at the priorities, partnerships and progress that shaped 2025. Highlights from a year of collaboration across health and social care.
techUK
Announcing the new techUK Data Centres Council 2026/2028
Meet the Data Centre Council for the 2026-2028 term
techUK
Ten steps to designing more empathetic, human and effective educational video games
Video games have come to be regarded as valuable educational resources. Through a combination of interactive environments and learning objectives, they have proven to be an effective tool in multiple fields, from school education to corporate training. However, their full adoption in formal education remains limited by a lack of curricular integration and clear strategies to incorporate them into educational programs, a lack of specific teacher training and a shortage of technological and technical resources.
Phys.org > Computer Sciences
The Download: our predictions for AI, and good climate news
This is today’s edition ofThe Download,our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. What’s next for AI in 2026 In an industry in constant flux, sticking your neck out to predict what’s coming next may seem reckless. (AI bubble? What AI bubble?) But for the last…
MIT Technology Review
Europe’s drone-filled vision for the future of war
Last spring, 3,000 British soldiers of the 4th Light Brigade, also known as the Black Rats, descended upon the damp forests of Estonia’s eastern territories. They had rushed in from Yorkshire by air, sea, rail, and road. Once there, the Rats joined 14,000 other troops at the front line, dug in, and waited for the…
MIT Technology Review
Why AI predictions are so hard
This story originally appeared in The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get stories like this in your inbox first,sign up here. Sometimes AI feels like a niche topic to write about, but then the holidays happen, and I hear relatives of all ages talking about cases of chatbot-induced psychosis, blaming rising electricity prices…
MIT Technology Review