Search engines are one of society’s primary gateways to information and people, but they are also conduits for misinformation. Similar to problematic social media algorithms, search engines learn to serve you what you and others have clicked on before. Because people are drawn to the sensational, this dance between algorithms and human nature can foster...
Imagine you are sitting on the couch in your living room reading. You do it almost every night. But then, suddenly, when you look up you notice this time something is different. Your favorite picture hanging on the wall is tilted ever so slightly. In a study involving epilepsy patients, National Institutes of Health scientists...
The SARS-CoV-1 coronavirus pandemic has left a significant footprint on the global economy. For this reason, it had a substantial impact on the behaviour of all financial instruments, including cryptocurrencies. It turns out that the fluctuations experienced by the virtual currency market during this period reflect changes in other capital and commodity markets. This market...
During the first two months of the pandemic lockdown, Americans dramatically reduced their use of preventive and elective health care, while increasing use of telemedicine — but the switch was not enough to offset reductions in in-person care, according to a new study. The analysis, one of the first to quantify the cuts in elective...
When a frightful creature startles you, your brain may activate its fear-processing circuitry, sending your heart racing to help you escape the threat. It’s also the job of the brain’s fear-processing circuits to help you learn from experience to recognize which situations are truly dangerous and to respond appropriately–so if the scare comes from a...
Wine researchers are developing a fast and simple method of authenticating wine – a potential solution against the estimated billions of dollars’ worth of wine fraud globally, but also offering a possible means of building regional branding. The team of scientists were able to identify the geographical origins of wines originating from three wine regions...
Computer scientists at Saarland University show how these special textiles can be produced in a comparatively easy way, thus opening up new use cases. “Our goal was to integrate interactive functionalities directly into the fibers of textiles instead of just attaching electronic components to them,” says Jürgen Steimle, computer science professor at Saarland University. In...
The COVID-19 pandemic has spawned an infodemic, a vast and complicated mix of information, misinformation and disinformation. In this environment, false narratives – the virus was “planned,” that it originated as a bioweapon, that COVID-19 symptoms are caused by 5G wireless communications technology – have spread like wildfire across social media and other communication platforms....
Teleportation is most commonly the stuff of science fiction and, for many, would conjure up the immortal phrase “Beam me up Scotty”. However, a new study has described how its status in science fact could actually be employed as another, and perhaps unlikely, form of entertainment – live music. Dr. Alexis Kirke, Senior Research Fellow...
The presence of technology startups can drive economic growth for their home cities. So how can cities better appeal to entrepreneurs? A new study from the McCombs School of Business at The University of Texas at Austin shows the connections they can offer matter more than big money. The research shows that today’s successful tech...
