Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
September 2020
From ACM TechNews
The U.K. Is Building Its First Commercial Quantum Computer
U.K. science minister Amanda Solloway says Britain's first commercial quantum computer, supported by government and industry, will be available for use by businesses within several years.
From ACM TechNews
Tree-Climbing Robot Can Safely Harvest Coconuts
Researchers at India's Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham University have designed a robot to climb trees and safely harvest coconuts.
From ACM TechNews
Helping Companies Prioritize Their Cybersecurity Investments
A platform developed by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology can quantify security risks for companies without requiring them to disclose sensitive data.
From ACM TechNews
Method for Automated Control Leverages Advances in AI
Researchers at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory developed a method for designing automated control systems that incorporate advances in deep learning and control theory.
From ACM News
Anticipating the Feeling Economy
As artificial intelligence proliferates, human emotional intelligence increasingly will be prized in workers.
From ACM News
Computers Can't Cut Red Tape
Modernizing government technology can be helpful during a crisis. To a point.
From ACM TechNews
26-Year-Old is First Woman to Win Africa Prize for Innovation
BACE Group CEO Charlette N'Guessan, 26, is the first woman named to receive the 2020 Royal Academy of Engineering's Africa Prize for Engineering Innovation.
From ACM TechNews
Public Webcams Are Telling Us Whether People Are Social Distancing
Since April, computer scientists at Purdue University have been using an online database of public cameras to track compliance with social-distancing guidelines.
From ACM TechNews
AI Removes Unwanted Objects From Photos
A new algorithm uses artificial intelligence to digitally remove unwanted objects in photos.
From ACM TechNews
Natural Radiation Can Interfere With Quantum Computers
Researchers found that low-level ionizing radiation in the environment can degrade the performance of superconducting quantum bits, or qubits.
From ACM TechNews
Chinese Scientists Say Their Neuromorphic Computer Darwin Mouse Has the Same Number of Neurons as a Real Mouse
Scientists in China said they have created the world's largest neuromorphic computer.
From ACM TechNews
Swiss Official Airs Concerns About Data Privacy in U.S.
Switzerland's Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner Adrian Lobsiger called a U.S.-Swiss program for shielding personal information shared between the two nations inadequate.
From ACM TechNews
Stanford Launches AI-Powered TV News Analyzer
Researchers have launched an interactive tool powered by artificial intelligence that enables the public to search cable TV news transcripts and compute the screen time of public figures.
From ACM News
A Robot Wrote This Entire Article. Are You Scared Yet, Human?
We asked GPT-3, OpenAI's powerful new language generator, to write an essay for us from scratch. The assignment? To convince us robots come in peace
From ACM TechNews
Scientists Model Neural Activity From Living Human Cells on Brain-on-a-Chip Devices
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory scientists developed three-dimensional brain-on-chip devices that mimic the neural activity of brain cells cultured outside the human body.
From ACM TechNews
Visa Unveils More Powerful AI Tool That Approves or Denies Card Transactions
Visa has introduced a more advanced artificial intelligence tool to approve or deny credit and debit transactions when banks' networks are down.
From ACM TechNews
Apple Mistakenly Approved Widely Used Malware to Run on Macs
Security researchers found that Apple inadvertently passed a well-known form of malware for use on Mac systems through its notarization process.
From ACM News
Minding the Gaps
Boosting diversity in the computer science field remains a challenge even after years of effort. A growing focus on universities may deliver results.
From ACM TechNews
Online Voting Company Pushes to Make It Harder for Researchers to Find Security Flaws
The Voatz electronic-voting company argued in a brief filed with the U.S. Supreme Court that security researchers should only seek flaws in e-voting systems with companies' permission.
From ACM TechNews
Developers: These Are the Programming Languages that Pay the Most
A survey by freelance hiring platform Upwork found that freelance software developers who work with old, relatively unpopular coding languages command the highest salaries.
From ACM TechNews
Toward an ML Model That Can Reason About Everyday Actions
Researchers trained a hybrid language-vision machine learning model to recognize abstract concepts in video.
From ACM TechNews
Computing Professor's App Manages NJIT Converged Learning
An app created by developers at the New Jersey Institute of Technology working with colleagues at Aegean AI Inc.,helps manage converged learning at universities.
From ACM TechNews
Robot Trucks Seek Inroads Into Freight Business
Startups are developing prototype autonomous trucks to haul freight while reducing transportation costs and expediting deliveries.
From ACM TechNews
Intel Researchers Design Smartphone-Powered Robot That Costs $50 to Assemble
Intel researchers have created a wheeled robot powered by a smartphone that costs just $50 to assemble.
From ACM News
Coding with Wonder Woman: Microsoft Project to Educate the Next Generation of Programmers
In partnership with NASA, Smithsonian Learning Labs, and others, the lessons use space exploration, museums, and popular movies to teach the principles of programming.
From ACM TechNews
Army Scientists Take Spin on Quantum Research
Researchers at the Army Research Laboratory have developed a method of enhancing quantum systems to give soldiers more reliable and secure capabilities in the field.
From ACM TechNews
Microsoft, Energy Dept. to Develop Disaster-Response AI Tools
The U.S. Department of Energy and Microsoft are partnering to develop artificial intelligence tools to improve first-responders' capabilities with regard to natural disasters.
From ACM TechNews
Can Art Help Save Marine Life? Socio-Ecological Artist Designs Coral Reefs Using VR
Socio-ecological artist Colleen Flanigan used Google's Tilt Brush app to create a "living sculpture" that she hopes will revive coral communities.
From ACM TechNews
Robotic Tank Is Designed to Crawl Through Your Intestine
Researchers at the University of Colorado's Advanced Medical Technologies Lab have created a tank robot that can actively drive through a person's intestines.
From ACM News
Testing Asimov's Idea for Power From Space
Isaac Asimov's notion of capturing energy in space and beaming it to the Earth’s surface faces its first orbital testing.