Technology News

On a remote patch of the windy, frozen Beaufort Sea north of Alaska, engineers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California huddled together, peering down a narrow hole in a thick layer of sea ice. Below them, a cylindrical robot gathered test science data in the frigid ocean, connected by a tether to the tripod that had lowered it through the borehole.

A team of scientists has unlocked the potential of 6G communications with a new polarization multiplexer. Terahertz communications represent the next frontier in wireless technology, promising data transmission rates far exceeding current systems.

British regulators on Wednesday cleared Microsoft's hiring of key staff from startup Inflection AI, saying the deal wouldn't stifle competition in the country's artificial intelligence market.

A scintillating aerogel enabling real-time measurements with excellent sensitivity to certain radioactive gases, essential to monitoring the proper functioning of nuclear power plants, has just been developed by a group of physicists, chemists, and meteorologists from the CNRS, the University Claude Bernard Lyon, the CEA, and the ENS de Lyon.

The cost effectiveness of wind farms could be significantly improved by reducing the speed of wind turbines that are clustered together, which could improve their longevity and also reduce noise pollution.

Social network X has committed to stop its much-criticized harvesting of European users' personal data to train its artificial intelligence program, Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) said Wednesday.

Charging stations for electric vehicles are essential for cleaning up the transportation sector. A new study by MIT researchers suggests they're good for business, too.

Researchers from TMOS, the ARC Center of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems, have developed a new engineering approach to on-chip light sources that could lead to widespread adoption of photonic chips in consumer electronics.

Your pick.

The smart money is in smart heating.

Researchers at Tohoku University have successfully increased the capacity, lifetime durability, and cost-effectiveness of a capacitor in their pursuit of a more power-efficient future. The research is published in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

Sales of new cars plummeted in Germany in August, official data showed Wednesday, dragged down by a record fall in demand for electric vehicles in Europe's biggest auto market.

For years, Yelp has complained about Google's practices, alleging that the tech giant placed its own products above competitors in Google search results.

Nvidia on Tuesday defended its tactics in the hot market for chips to power artificial intelligence in the face of reports the US is probing whether it abused its clout.

If only techno-optimists get to test AI tools, the results simply aren't good enough. This is where Tesla made a big mistake—a lesson that the health sector will do well to learn.

The elevated temperatures this summer prompted many of us to crank up the air conditioning. In Switzerland, the energy used for cooling is approaching that for heating. What does that mean for power grids?

Researchers from the Queensland University of Technology have found that while Australians generally trust retail technology, they remain hesitant to swiftly adopt new advancements, largely due to concerns over security and privacy.

Hong Kong carrier Cathay Pacific said Tuesday that 15 of its Airbus A350 jets needed new engine parts after inspecting its entire fleet, which was grounded following a "first of its type" engine component failure.

Grid defection occurs when it's cheaper for consumers to produce their own power than to buy it from the grid. For example, if a consumer faces high monthly utility fees regardless of their actual usage and can generate power using affordable local generators, they might choose to disconnect from the grid. On a large scale, this trend could lead to significant changes in how electric grids function, which needs to be better understood and managed.

A new study has found that U.K. hotels and restaurants using humanlike service robots can make solo guests feel more comfortable in engaging with these robots by providing comfortable ambient conditions—including lighting, scents and sounds—and adding local cues like British flag designs on the robot's body.