Adapted from Dancing With Roomba, written by Joe Jones, who was iRobot’s first full-time employee and the original designer of the Roomba robot vacuum.After developing a prototype robot that was effective at cleaning both hard floors and carpets using a relatively simple carpet-s … | Continue reading
This is a sponsored article brought to you by MBZUAI.If you’ve ever tried to guess how a cell will change shape after a drug or a gene edit, you know it’s part science, part art, and mostly expensive trial-and-error. Imaging thousands of conditions is slow; exploring millions is … | Continue reading
Nokia Bell Labs has a lot to celebrate. The research giant marked its 100th anniversary in May at its venerable campus in Murray Hill—part of New Providence, N.J.—where major technological developments have occurred, such as the Bellmac-32 microprocessor and the satellite Earth s … | Continue reading
Walk into a typical data center and one of the first things that jumps out at you is the noise—the low, buzzing sound of thousands of fans: fans next to individual computer chips, fans on the back panels of server racks, fans on the network switches. All of those fans are pushing … | Continue reading
The bacteria Geobacter sulfurreducens came from humble beginnings; it was first isolated from dirt in a ditch in Norman, Oklahoma. But now, the surprisingly remarkable microbes are the key to the first ever artificial neurons that can directly interact with living cells.G. sulfur … | Continue reading
This article is part of our exclusive IEEE Journal Watch series in partnership with IEEE Xplore. The rapid buildout of fast-charging stations for electric vehicles is testing the limits of today’s power grid. With individual chargers drawing 350 to 500 kilowatts (or more), which … | Continue reading
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.World Robot Summit: 10–12 October 20 … | Continue reading
This is a sponsored article brought to you by ADIPEC.Returning to Abu Dhabi between 3 and 6 November, ADIPEC 2025 – the world’s largest energy event – aims to show how AI is turning ideas into real-world impact across the energy value chain and redrawing the global opportunity ma … | Continue reading
Without support from her family, Mini Thomas says, she would not have had a successful career in academia.The IEEE senior member has held several leadership positions in India, including dean of engineering at the Delhi Technological University (formerly the Delhi College of Engi … | Continue reading
In the drive to make a practical quantum computer, researchers are developing bigger and better quantum networks—ones with capabilities that will complement and enhance quantum computing. Put another way, building a functioning quantum network that can exchange many qubits secure … | Continue reading
This article is crossposted from IEEE Spectrum’s careers newsletter. Sign up now to get insider tips, expert advice, and practical strategies, written in partnership with tech career development company Taro and delivered to your inbox for free!Cursor, the AI-native code editor, … | Continue reading
The internet’s next existential crisis won’t be disinformation or deepfakes. It will be copper.The world is building AI like it’s Minecraft, stacking data centers, transmission lines, and cooling systems with little regard for the physical limits beneath them. Everyone is focused … | Continue reading
Physics simulations have a problem—engineers who need those simulations’ results often don’t have time to wait. Add in real-world settings with multiple independent calculations required (for example, separate thermal, mechanical, and electromagnetic elements in the system), and … | Continue reading
While most of the AI world is racing to build ever-bigger language models like OpenAI’s GPT-5 and Anthropic’s Claude Sonnet 4.5, the Israeli AI startup AI21 is taking a different path.AI21 has just unveiled Jamba Reasoning 3B, a 3-billion-parameter model. This compact, open-sourc … | Continue reading
When you’re buying a new item of clothing, you probably don’t give much thought to the design and assembly processes the garment went through before arriving at the store.Creating a piece of apparel starts with a designer sketching out an idea. Then a pattern is made, the fabric … | Continue reading
Aeva Technologies, a developer of lidar systems based in Mountain View, Calif., has unveiled the Aeva Eve 1V, a high-precision, non-contact motion sensor built on its frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) sensing technology. The company says that the Eve 1V measures an objec … | Continue reading
Natron Energy, a Santa Clara, California-based sodium-ion battery startup, ceased operation on 3 September due to funding issues. Just a year ago, the company made headlines for its plans to build a first-of-its-kind US $1.4 billion factory in North Carolina to manufacture up to … | Continue reading
This is a sponsored article brought to you by COMSOL.Simulation software is useful in the analysis of new designs for improving power grid resilience, ensuring efficient and reliable power distribution, and developing components that integrate alternative energy sources, such as … | Continue reading
Since the early 2000s, I’ve been actively volunteering for nonprofits and local community organizations including my children’s school’s parent-teacher organization. There I worked with teachers and other parents to plan and implement annual programs that enriched the students an … | Continue reading
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.World Robot Summit: 10–12 October 20 … | Continue reading
Most of us have heard the adage “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” But when it comes to personal health, many people overlook preventative measures such as diet and exercise. Instead, they tend to rely on medical professionals to save the day after they’ve gotten … | Continue reading
Taiwan failed to pass an August referendum on whether or not a nuclear plant should be restarted, if it were deemed safe to operate. While the more than 4 million votes for “yes” outnumbered the more than 1.5 million “no” votes, the number of affirmative votes failed to surpass t … | Continue reading
Engineers are masters of scale. They harness energy from the sun, wind, rivers, atoms, and ores. They manipulate electrons, photons, and crystals to compute and communicate. They devise instruments that detect perturbations in the fabric of space-time. And they grapple with chall … | Continue reading
This article is crossposted from IEEE Spectrum’s careers newsletter. Sign up now to get insider tips, expert advice, and practical strategies, written in partnership with tech career development company Taro and delivered to your inbox for free!In 2015, I joined Pinterest as a so … | Continue reading
This article is part of The Scale Issue.Longest Continuously Operating Electronic ComputerVoyager 1 and its twin space probe, both launched by NASA in 1977, were the first human-made objects to reach interstellar space. But that’s ...
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A gibbous moon hangs over a lonely mountain trail in the Italian Alps, above the village of Malles Venosta, whose lights dot the valley below. Benjamin Wiesmair stands next to a moth trap as tall as he is, his face, bushy beard, and hair bun lit by its purple glow. He’s wearing a … | Continue reading
Five years ago, Eric Aguilar was fed up.He had worked on lidar and other sensors for years at Tesla and Google X, but the technology always seemed too expensive and, more importantly, unreliable. He replaced the lidar sensors when they broke—which was all too often, and seemingly … | Continue reading
When Microsoft researchers in 2023 identified a new kind of material that could dramatically reduce the amount of lithium needed in rechargeable batteries, it felt like combing through a haystack in record time. That’s because their discovery began as 32 million possibilities and … | Continue reading
What happens when you say “Hello” to ChatGPT?Such a simple query might seem trivial, but making it possible across billions of sessions requires immense scale. While OpenAI reveals little information about its operations, we’ve used the scraps we do have to estimate the impact of … | Continue reading
This is a sponsored article brought to you by IP.comAround the world, innovation is no longer just a function of invention. It is a strategic asset, deeply linked to economic resilience—and increasingly reliant on ever-evolving technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). As i … | Continue reading
IEEE Collabratec reached a milestone in August: more than 100,000 IEEE members (plus 250,000 nonmembers) on the online networking platform. To commemorate the achievement, IEEE released a 100,000-member badge for users.The badges recognize members for their participation in IEEE … | Continue reading
Autonomous vehicles have eyes—cameras, lidar, radar. But ears? That’s what researchers at Fraunhofer Institute for Digital Media Technology’s Oldenburg Branch for Hearing, Speech and Audio Technology in Germany are building with the Hearing Car. The idea is to outfit vehicles wit … | Continue reading
Low Earth orbit, where most satellites operate, has become a whirlwind of metal shards and dead, tumbling debris.Anyone with hardware or human crew in orbit knows the drill. Orbital collision warnings can be unremitting. Whether the object is a defunct satellite or a stray hunk o … | Continue reading
One of the robotics projects that I’ve been most excited about for years now is iRonCub, from Daniele Pucci’s Artificial and Mechanical Intelligence Lab at IIT in Genoa, Italy. Since 2017, Pucci has been developing a jet propulsion system that will enable an iCub robot (originall … | Continue reading
We forge ahead with scientific quests,but even zealous efforts hit a walltrying to make what nature most detests:nothing at all.It seems like such a little thing to do—removing every molecule. We findthat though we displace almost all, a fewremain behind.It takes attentive planni … | Continue reading
This article was originally published by Canary Media.At a dock along the banks of the Cousins River, Chad Strater loaded up his small aluminum workboat with power tools and a winch. Strater, who owns a marine construction business, was setting out to tinker with floating equipme … | Continue reading
Intel PIIX3Manufacturer: IntelCategory: InterfacingYear: 1996Until the mid-1990s, using peripheral equipment with a computer often meant plugging one of a bewildering variety of computer connector cables, installing device drivers from 3.5” floppy discs or CD-ROMS, and slotting s … | Continue reading
To the naked eye, the stars are diamond flecks scattered across the inner surface of a celestial sphere. Telescopes have brought depth to our vision, mapping the true distances to cosmic objects. But the universe they reveal appears utterly beyond the human scale of space and tim … | Continue reading
Have you ever thought “IEEE Spectrum is terrific, but I just wish I had a way to experience even more of it, perhaps at a local science and technology museum?” Well, I am pleased to say that your very specific wish has been granted! In collaboration with the IEEE History Center a … | Continue reading
“How did we get here?”That existential question about the universe has captivated humankind for centuries. Many scientists have attempted to answer it, including the Rev. Georges Lemaître, a Belgian cosmologist and Catholic priest. In 1927 he theorized that the universe was creat … | Continue reading
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.CoRL 2025: 27–30 September 2025, SEO … | Continue reading
A critical vulnerability in the Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) Wi-Fi configuration interface used by several different Unitree robots can result in a root level takeover by an attacker, security researchers disclosed on 20 September. The exploit impacts Unitree’s Go2 and B2 quadruped … | Continue reading
In 2017, Demis John noticed a staffing problem among the semiconductor companies in Santa Barbara. The area had about 28 small semiconductor companies at the time, many launched from the nanofabrication facility housed at University of California, Santa Barbara, where John works. … | Continue reading
As AI tools become more common in people’s everyday work, researchers are looking to uncover its effects on the job market—especially for early career workers.A paper from the Stanford Digital Economy Lab, part of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI, has now found early … | Continue reading
There’s no such thing as a complete vacuum. Even in the cosmic void between galaxies, there’s an estimated density of about one hydrogen or helium atom per cubic meter. But these estimates are largely theoretical—no one has yet launched a sensor into intergalactic space and beame … | Continue reading
Since 2013, we’ve been metaphorically peering over the shoulders of programmers to create our annual interactive rankings of the most popular programming languages. But fundamental shifts in how people are coding may not just make it...
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Our Top Programming Languages interactive tries to tackle the problem of estimating a language’s popularity by looking for proxy signals. We do this by constructing measures of popularity from a variety of data sources that we believe are good proxies for active interest for each … | Continue reading
This article is part of our special report The Scale Issue.If you want to get a sense of the truly global scale of the electronics industry, look no further than your smartphone. The processor that powers it started as a humble rock, and by the time it found its way into your dev … | Continue reading