Category: Science & Technology News

Imagine playing fetch with a delightful virtual pet named Leopard through augmented reality (AR) on your phone. This interactive experience, reminiscent of popular games like Pokemon Go, is now a reality thanks to Niantic, the creators of Pokemon Go. But it doesn’t stop there. Niantic envisions this as a prototype for a future world of AR glasses, which may arrive in the next decade. Excitingly, it also marks the debut of a new Amazon shopping service, adding an intriguing dimension to the gameplay.

More than Just a Virtual Pet: Peridot, available for Android and iOS, is an app that introduces AR-enabled virtual pets, drawing inspiration from the concept of Tamagotchi. Originally conceived as a design idea for Niantic’s vision of virtual companions on future AR glasses and headsets, Peridot has evolved into a fully realized game. It offers a wide range of hatchable and breedable pets that users can nurture and feed through their smartphones.

In the age of large language models (LLMs) and ChatGPT, AI is poised to make a weird internet even weirder – turning the content-driven social media apps, news sites and media platforms of today into future uncanny valleys that blur the line between man and machine.

As advances in AI make it more difficult to discern bots from humans, Sam Altman, the co-founder of Open AI – the company behind ChatGPT – thinks blockchains can help.

Altman’s crypto project, Worldcoin, rose to prominence last year with a controversial, Silicon Valley vision for a universal basic income (UBI): a crypto token that can be distributed in equal quantity to everyone in the world.Worldcoin is back again this week with a new launch – this one poised to be its biggest yet. World App, Worldcoin’s crypto wallet, built on the Ethereum sidechain Polygon, is the first product from the elusive identity upstart that anyone, anywhere will be able to download.

The world of soft robotics is expanding rapidly, with MIT recently unveiling SoftZoo, a virtual open framework platform that simulates 3D model animals performing various tasks in different environmental settings. Researchers can use the program to design and optimize their own creations, with the aim of co-designing the soft robot bodies and their controllers for specific tasks.

SoftZoo offers an open source program that enables researchers to experiment and test their robot ideas. This allows them to find the best configuration for a robot’s shape, thereby enabling them to design soft robotics algorithms that can perform various tasks. The platform helps users understand the best strategies for robots to interact with their environments.

Researchers have developed a lidar system that utilizes quantum detection technology to acquire 3D images while underwater. This is the first demonstration of a prototype system that can capture detailed information in extremely low-light conditions found underwater. The high sensitivity of this system allows it to be useful for a wide range of applications, including inspecting underwater installations such as wind farm cables and turbines, surveying submerged archaeology sites, and for security and defense purposes.

Capturing 3D images through ocean water can be challenging because of the light-limited conditions and particles in the water that scatter light and distort the image. However, single-photon detection, a quantum-based technique, allows for high penetration and works in low-light conditions.

Researchers from Heriot-Watt University and the University of Edinburgh describe experiments in which an entire single-photon lidar system was submerged in a large water tank in Optics Express. The new demonstrations bring the technology closer to practical applications compared to the team’s earlier experiments with underwater single-photon detection, which were performed in carefully controlled laboratory conditions with the optical setup placed outside the water tank and data analysis performed offline.

As we age, our cells naturally degrade and become less efficient, leading to decreased mobility and vitality. However, researchers from the University of California San Diego have discovered a way to extend cell lifespan and promote longevity using a synthetic genetic clock.

Using yeast cells, the team was able to increase their lifespan by 82% on average by “rewiring” their genetic circuits. While the research focused on yeast cells, the team believes it could eventually lead to ways to promote healthier aging in humans.

The key to the study was editing the genetic circuits responsible for regulating cellular processes and mitigating wear and tear. By understanding how these circuits function, scientists can tweak them to promote longevity.