Quantum computer exports are being restricted by many countriesSaigh Anees/Shutterstock Secret international discussions have resulted in governments across the world imposing identical export controls on quantum computers, while refusing to disclose the scientific rationale behind the regulations. Although quantum computers...
In just over five years I will turn 60, which is a daunting prospect. I already have one age-related disease – hypertension – and, given the odds, will be lucky not to have been diagnosed with at least one more...
Google’s Sycamore quantum computerPeter Kneffel/dpa/Alamy In 2019, Google claimed that its Sycamore quantum computer could perform calculations that would take even the world’s most powerful classical supercomputer 10,000 years to complete – but now it seems that a non-quantum computer...
Tonje Bøe Birkeland as Tuva Tengel on a camel in Mongolia.Tonje Bøe Birkeland The imagined female scientists, explorers and adventurers seen in Tonje Bøe Birkeland’s photographs are echoes from a footnote in women’s history. In her ongoing series, The Characters,...
Air conditioner units on a roof of industrial buildingMarkus Thoenen/Alamy As the Paris Olympics and Paralympics approach, there are warnings the games could be the hottest on record, beating the current holder of that dubious title – Tokyo 2020 –...
Explore books dealing with multiverses and alternate worldsGremlin/Getty Images Since I became science fiction columnist for New Scientist, I have had to think a lot about what qualifies as sci-fi. Very often, a book could actually be classified as fantasy,...
I have been dreading the premiere of A Quiet Place: Day One, the just-released prequel to the movie franchise featuring blind but keen-hearing predatory aliens who invade Earth. As a psychologist, I know that terrifying images from films and television...
One big challenge in life is dividing things fairly. From sharing a tasty snack to allocating resources between nations, having a strategy to divvy things up equitably will make everyone a little happier. But it gets complicated when the thing...
Nest: still abandoned Brace yourselves. That abandoned bird’s nest is still seated in the mouth of the large, ancient, carved stone human face hanging high on a wall in the northernmost corner of the outdoor garden known as “Michelangelo’s Cloister”...
Top row: original images. Second row: images reconstructed by AI based on brain recordings from a macaque. Bottom row: images reconstructed by the AI system without an attention mechanismThirza Dado et al. Artificial intelligence systems can now create remarkably accurate...
