Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
August 2011
From ACM News
Quantum Computing Claims Produce Uncertainty
A Canadian company developing a quantum computer made news in May when it sold a system to defense manufacturer Lockheed-Martin for $10 million, though skeptics question whether the machine made by D-Wave Systems, of Burnaby,…
From ACM News
Nasa's Dawn Spacecraft Begins Science Orbits of Vesta
NASA's Dawn spacecraft, the first ever to orbit an object in the main asteroid belt, is spiraling toward its first of four intensive science orbits. That initial orbit of the rocky world Vesta begins Aug. 11, at an altitude…
From ACM News
What Will We Watch As Drones Evolve?
Every week it seems there are reports about U.S. drones—unmanned, remote-controlled aerial vehicles—tracking down suspected terrorists in remote, unreachable areas of Yemen, Somalia, Libya, or Pakistan. Drone technology is…
From ACM News
Will Insect-Like Flying Machines Revolutionize Surveillance?
Research at the University of Oxford is playing a key role in the development of revolutionary insect-sized vehicles with micro-cameras, suitable for different purposes like helping in emergency situations considered too dangerous…
From ACM TechNews
Taking Mobile Applications Into the Cloud
Microsoft's Mobile Computer Research Center director Victor Bahl, speaking at the recent Microsoft Research Faculty Summit 2011, discussed Project Hawaii, an initiative that provides students at more than 20 universities with…
From ACM News
Santa Clara niversity Math Scholar Fights Crime with Mad Math Skills
George Mohler is a crime-fighting, math professor superhero—not that he'd ever call himself that.
From ACM News
'Fluid Cloak' to Help Submarines Leave No Wake
Super-stealthy submarines may one day glide through the water without creating a wake, if a plan to channel fluid intelligently around objects can be made to work.
From ACM TechNews
Face-Id Tools Pose New Risk
Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) researchers are studying how facial-recognition tools can be detrimental to privacy. In a recent test, the researchers were able to identify about 33% of the people they tested, only using…
From ACM TechNews
Progress Hits Snag: Tiny Chips se Outsize Power
A research team recently presented a paper at the International Symposium on Computer Architecture that highlights the problem of developing smaller, more densely packed transistors to continue the rapid development of electronic…
From ACM News
Researchers Say Vulnerabilities Could Let Hackers Spring Prisoners From Cells
Vulnerabilities in electronic systems that control prison doors could allow hackers or others to spring prisoners from their jail cells, according to researchers.
From ACM News
Expert Hacks Car System, Says Problems Reach to Scada Systems
Researcher Don A. Bailey will be showing at the Black Hat security conference how easy it is to open and even start a car remotely by hacking the cellular network-based security system. Even more disturbing is the message…
From ACM News
The Auteur vs. the Committee
At Apple, one is the magic number.
From Communications of the ACM
A New Benchmark For Artificial Intelligence
Computers are unable to defeat the world's best Go players, but that may change with the application of a new strategy that promises to revolutionize artificial intelligence.
From Communications of the ACM
Supercomputing's Exaflop Target
The twin challenges of parallelism and energy consumption are enlivening supercomputers' progress.
From Communications of the ACM
Life, Translated
The Holy Grail of language translation is to develop a machine-based system that can handle the task transparently and accurately.