Computing

  1. Computing

    Straining for Speed

    Hitting fundamental limits on how small they can make certain structures within semiconductor transistors, chip makers are deforming the silicon crystals from which those transistors are made to eke out some extra speed.

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  2. Computing

    Paint by Pixel

    Aaron Hertzmann is both a computer scientist and a painter. Among his art-related programming projects, he has developed a way for computers to refashion images and animations to reflect different painting styles. Other work includes a stretched “canvas” that projects a continually-changing painting of the viewer and a learning-by-example system that animates characters based on […]

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  3. Computing

    Virtual stampede sees faces in crowd

    A new computer model based on particle interactions suggests ways to prevent a panicked crowd from stampeding.

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  4. Computing

    Resistance leaps as magnetism mounts

    A tiny traffic island for electrons promises to serve as an extraordinarily sensitive detector of magnetic fields.

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  5. Computing

    Going to digital extremes

    A researcher designs the ultimate laptop, stretching the laws of physics to their limits to achieve blazing computation rates.

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  6. Computing

    Computer Game Art and History

    Curious about early video games or recent developments in game technology? This Web site accompanies the “Game On” exhibition, developed by the Barbicon Gallery and the National Museums of Scotland. An exhibition guide briefly explains what the various displays include. The education section offers tips for creating a video game as a classroom project. The […]

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  7. Computing

    Computation Takes a Quantum Leap

    A quantum computation involving a custom-built molecule furnishes experimental evidence that a quantum computer can solve certain mathematical problems more efficiently than can a conventional computer.

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  8. Computing

    Minding Your Business

    By means of novel sensors and mathematical models, scientists are teaching the basics of human social interactions to computers, which should ease the ever-expanding collaboration between people and machines.

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  9. Computing

    Tight packaging for digitized surfaces

    A novel digital compression scheme may make it practical to transmit detailed models of three-dimensional surfaces over the Internet.

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  10. Computing

    Computer grid cracks problem

    A large network of powerful computers solved a 32-year-old optimization challenge known as the "nug30" quadratic assignment problem.

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  11. Computing

    Strength and weakness in diversity

    Although the Internet's redundancy and diversity help it survive local node malfunctions despite its vast size and complexity, it is vulnerable to attacks aimed specifically at the most highly connected nodes.

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  12. Computing

    Pictures Only a Computer Could Love

    New, unconventional lenses shape scenes into pictures for computers, not people, so that computer-equipped microscopes, cameras, and other optical devices can see more with less.

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