Communications of the ACM
The Promise of Holographic Displays
The computational expense of creating three-dimensional images that can be viewed by all is just one factor holding them back… From ACM NewsAn edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.
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Artificial-Intelligence Research Revives Its Old Ambitions
The birth of artificial-intelligence research as an autonomous discipline is generally thought to have been the monthlong Dartmouth Summer Research Project on Artificial...
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Terramechanics Research Aims to Keep Mars Rovers Rolling
In May 2009, the Mars rover Spirit cracked through a crusty layer of Martian topsoil, sinking into softer underlying sand.
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Views You Can se? How Online Ratings Affect Your Judgment
Are you influenced by the opinions of other people—say, in the comments sections of websites?
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Research Update: Genome Editing Becomes More Accurate
Earlier this year, MIT researchers developed a way to easily and efficiently edit the genomes of living cells. Now, the researchers have discovered key factors...
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Writing Programs Using Ordinary Language
In a pair of recent papers, researchers at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory have demonstrated that, for a few specific tasks, it's...
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New System ses Low-Power Wi-Fi Signal to Track Moving Humans—even Behind Walls
The comic-book hero Superman uses his X-ray vision to spot bad guys lurking behind walls and other objects.
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Seeing the Human Pulse
Researchers at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory have developed a new algorithm that can accurately measure the heart rates of people...
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Making Quantum Encryption Practical
One of the many promising applications of quantum mechanics in the information sciences is quantum key distribution (QKD) in which the counterintuitive behavior...
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Valuing Versatility
It's often said that we live in an age of increased specialization: physicians who treat just one ailment, scholars who study just one period, network administrators...
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Practicing Medicine at the Nanoscale
Modern medicine is largely based on treating patients with "small-molecule" drugs, which include pain relievers like aspirin and antibiotics such as penicillin.
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Teaching Robots Lateral Thinking
Many commercial robotic arms perform what roboticists call "pick and place" tasks: The arm picks up an object in one location and places it in another.
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Storing Data in Individual Molecules
Moore's law—the well-known doubling of computer chips' computational power every 18 months or so—has been paced by a similarly steady increase in the storage capacity...
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The Robotic Equivalent of a Swiss Army Knife
The device doesn't look like much: a caterpillar-sized assembly of metal rings and strips resembling something you might find buried in a home-workshop drawer.
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Proving Quantum Computers Feasible
Quantum computers are devices—still largely theoretical—that could perform certain types of computations much faster than classical computers; one way they might...
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Predicting What Topics Will Trend on Twitter
Twitter's home page features a regularly updated list of topics that are "trending," meaning that tweets about them have suddenly exploded in volume.
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3 Questions: A Web For Everyone
During the opening ceremonies of this summer’s Olympic games in London, a musical performance culminated with a stage-set house rising into the rafters to reveal...
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Automatic Building Mapping Could Help Emergency Responders
MIT researchers have built a wearable sensor system that automatically creates a digital map of the environment through which the wearer is moving.
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Making Web Applications More Efficient
Most major Websites these days maintain huge databases: Shopping sites have databases of inventory and customer ratings, travel sites have databases of seat availability...
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New Router Enhances the Precision of Woodworking
Anyone who has tried to build a piece of furniture from scratch knows the frustration of painstakingly cutting pieces of wood, only to discover that they won't...
From ACM TechNews