Computers

About 36 million people have blindness including 1 million children. Additionally, 216 million people experience moderate to severe visual impairment. However, STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) education maintains a reliance on three-dimensional imagery for education. Most of this imagery is inaccessible to students with blindness. A breakthrough study by Bryan … [Read more...] about Candy-like models used to make STEM accessible to visually impaired students

A new study from the University of Kent, Toulouse Business School, ESSCA School of Management (Paris) and ESADE Business School (Spain) has revealed the three primary risks and benefits perceived by consumers towards autonomous vehicles (self-driving cars). The increased development of autonomous vehicles worldwide inspired the researchers to uncover how consumers feel towards … [Read more...] about Hacking and loss of driving skills are major consumer concerns for self-driving cars

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology developed by researchers at the University of Waterloo is capable of assessing the severity of COVID-19 cases with a promising degree of accuracy. A study, which is part of the COVID-Net open-source initiative launched more than a year ago, involved researchers from Waterloo and spin-off start-up company DarwinAI, as well as radiologists … [Read more...] about Helping doctors manage COVID-19: New tool uses AI technology to assess the severity of lung infections and inform treatment

This new 3D effect can be the foundation for topological quantum phenomena, which are believed to be particularly robust and therefore promising candidates for extremely powerful quantum technologies. These results have just been published in the scientific journal Nature Communications. Dr. Tobias Meng and Dr. Johannes Gooth are early career researchers in the … [Read more...] about Electrons waiting for their turn: New model explains 3D quantum material

Until now, competing types of robotic hand designs offered a trade-off between strength and durability. One commonly used design, employing a rigid pin joint that mimics the mechanism in human finger joints, can lift heavy payloads, but is easily damaged in collisions, particularly if hit from the side. Meanwhile, fully compliant hands, typically made of molded silicone, are … [Read more...] about A helping hand for working robots: A reimagined robot hand combines strength with resilience, sidestepping the problems that accompany existing designs.

New estimates suggest that mass gatherings during an election in the Malaysian state of Sabah directly caused 70 percent of COVID-19 cases detected in Sabah after the election, and indirectly caused 64.4 percent of cases elsewhere in Malaysia. Jue Tao Lim of the National University of Singapore, Kenwin Maung of the University of Rochester, New York, and colleagues present these … [Read more...] about Mass gatherings during Malaysian election directly and indirectly boosted COVID-19 spread, study suggests: New computational method could deepen understanding of direct and spill-over effects of gatherings

Researchers from Tulane University and University of Maryland published a new paper in the Journal of Marketing that examines the dynamic interplay between free and paid versions of an app over its lifetime and suggests a possible remedy for the failure of apps. The study, forthcoming in the Journal of Marketing, is titled "Managing the Versioning Decision over an App's … [Read more...] about When to release free and paid apps for maximal revenue

What if a robot could organize your closet or chop your vegetables? A sous chef in every home could someday be a reality. Still, while advances in artificial intelligence and machine learning have made better robotics possible, there is still quite a wide gap between what humans and robots can do. Closing that gap will require overcoming a number of obstacles in robot … [Read more...] about The path to more human-like robot object manipulation skills

For years, food producers who make lightly preserved, ready-to-eat food have had to follow a set of guidelines to stop growth of Clostridium botulinum bacteria and production of a strong neurotoxin. The toxin can cause a serious illness called botulism. For refrigerated products, the guidelines for controlling Clostridium botulinum indicate that the water contained in the … [Read more...] about Mathematical model developed to prevent botulism

Nobody likes driving in a blizzard, including autonomous vehicles. To make self-driving cars safer on snowy roads, engineers look at the problem from the car's point of view. A major challenge for fully autonomous vehicles is navigating bad weather. Snow especially confounds crucial sensor data that helps a vehicle gauge depth, find obstacles and keep on the correct side of the … [Read more...] about Driving in the snow is a team effort for AI sensors