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An edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.


The First Plastic Computer Processor
From ACM News

The First Plastic Computer Processor

Silicon may underpin the computers that surround us, but the rigid inflexibility of the semiconductor means it cannot reach everywhere. The first computer processor...

British Computer Scientists Reboot
From Communications of the ACM

British Computer Scientists Reboot

After a year of turmoil, computer scientists at King's College London have retained their jobs, but substantial challenges lie ahead.

Social Games, Virtual Goods
From Communications of the ACM

Social Games, Virtual Goods

The popularity of virtual goods and currencies in online gaming is changing how people think and act about money.

Engineering Sensation in Artificial Limbs
From Communications of the ACM

Engineering Sensation in Artificial Limbs

Advancements in mobile electronics have led to several prosthetics innovations in recent years, but providing reliable touch sensations to users remains an elusive...

The Quest For Randomness
From Communications of the ACM

The Quest For Randomness

It's not easy to generate a string of numbers that lack any pattern or rule, or even to define exactly what randomness means.

Keeping Tabs on the Infrastructure, Wirelessly
From ACM News

Keeping Tabs on the Infrastructure, Wirelessly

Engineers routinely inspect bridges and other structures for cracks and corrosion. But because they can’t always be there in person, one highly intelligent bridge...

Extremely Fast Mram Data Storage Within Reach
From ACM TechNews

Extremely Fast Mram Data Storage Within Reach

Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt researchers have developed a type of magnetic random access memory (MRAM) equipped with a special chip connection that results...

From ACM TechNews

Taiwan Researchers Turn to Silk for Flexible E-Devices

Silk membranes can be used for flexible e-book readers, LED displays, and RFID tools, according to researchers at the National Tsing Hua University. A team has...

Physicists Build Single-Atom Memory For Quantum Information
From ACM News

Physicists Build Single-Atom Memory For Quantum Information

A single atom of rubidium sits at the heart of an exotic new quantum memory device.

From ACM News

Silicon Valley's Innovators Take Aim at Your Wallet

Hang on to your wallets and purses. In the constant search for the next thing to disrupt, Silicon Valley's entrepreneurs and venture capitalists believe that...

Data as Art: 10 Striking Science Maps
From ACM News

Data as Art: 10 Striking Science Maps

The computer age triggered a seemingly endless stream of scientific data, but such incoming mountains of information come at a cost. The more data you amass,...

2010 Visualization Challenge
From ACM News

2010 Visualization Challenge

An "ocean" composed of a single layer of molecules; an intricate depiction of an HIV particle as a study in orange and gray; a phantasmagoria of fungi; a video...

Remapping Computer Circuitry to Avert Impending Bottlenecks
From ACM News

Remapping Computer Circuitry to Avert Impending Bottlenecks

Hewlett-Packard researchers have proposed a fundamental rethinking of the modern computer for the coming era of nanoelectronics—a marriage of memory and computing...

How We Know
From ACM News

How We Know

James Gleick's first chapter has the title "Drums That Talk." It explains the concept of information by looking at a simple example.

Memristors: Pass or Fail?
From Communications of the ACM

Memristors: Pass or Fail?

The device may revolutionize data storage, replacing flash memory and perhaps even disks. Whether they can be reliably and cheaply manufactured, though, is an open...

Twitter as Medium and Message
From Communications of the ACM

Twitter as Medium and Message

Researchers are mining Twitter's vast flow of data to measure public sentiment, follow political activity, and detect earthquakes and flu outbreaks.

Grid Computing's Future
From Communications of the ACM

Grid Computing's Future

Outreach programs and usability improvements are drawing many researchers to grid computing from disciplines that have not traditionally used such resources.

Better Than Human? What's Next for Jeopardy! Computer
From ACM News

Better Than Human? What's Next for Jeopardy! Computer

A medical robot; a Google-killer; a financial advisor; a tool for trawling legal documents; an aide for the intelligence services. These are just some of the...

Electronic Mining of Published Research May Lead to New Scientific Breakthroughs
From ACM TechNews

Electronic Mining of Published Research May Lead to New Scientific Breakthroughs

University of Chicago researchers are exploring how metaknowledge can be used to better understand science's social context and the biases that can affect research...

Extracting Business Ideas From It Logs
From ACM News

Extracting Business Ideas From It Logs

Many companies' IT infrastructure is automatically gathering a comprehensive picture of their whole business, in the form of everything from Web server and phone...
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