NextGenLog

Putting Humans Continually In the AI Loop

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Fri, 15 Aug 2025 06:19:00 -0700

In learning contexts such as acquiring a new skill, having a human in the loop refers to an optimization process through which a steep learning curve for the first newbie is progressively flattened for each succeeding-generation newbie by incorporating the lessons learned in each generation into improved teaching methods. Thus, the learning time is progressively shortened, until a fully optimized procedure is achieved. FULL TEXT

Exascale Supercomputers Tracking Down Dark Matter, Dark Energy

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 8 Apr 2025 09:35:00 -0700

Detailed cosmological simulations by exascale supercomputers are playing a role in solving the mysteries of dark matter and dark energy. FULL TEXT

Explaining AI Explainability

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Mon, 3 Mar 2025 12:03:00 -0800

Having an AI system explain how it reaches its conclusions, legally required in some cases, is still a challenge. FULL TEXT

AI Upgrades the Internet of Things

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Mon, 17 Feb 2025 09:21:00 -0800

Adding AI to IoT helps process streams of data for intelligent decision-making and new applications. FULL TEXT

Dark Patterned Voices Manipulate Users

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Wed, 23 Oct 2024 16:47:00 -0700

Untrustworthy conversational agents present a significant threat for manipulation of the user FULL TEXT

CONVERSATION AS THE COMMAND

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 27 Jun 2024 14:16:00 -0700

By combining large language models (LLMs) with vision-language models (VLMs, which label images), it is possible for autonomous robots to achieve their tasks by conversing with humans in natural language. This feat makes “conversation the command,” instead of requiring operators to issue robots explicit commands in their own structured language. FULL TEXT

Edge AI Devices Eye Lifetime Learning

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 14 Mar 2024 14:33:00 -0700

Helping artificial intelligence to adapt and learn, now and later.

Above added neurons (gold) to the original set (black) learn new capabilities in-the-field. FULL TEXT

How to Find a Needle in a Haystack

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 13 Feb 2024 08:46:00 -0800

When time is of the essence, artificially intelligent pattern recognition algorithms are coming to the rescue. FULL TEXT

National Lab Works to Cap, Reduce Carbon

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Fri, 22 Dec 2023 09:11:00 -0800

Ford getting boost from exascale supercomputers at Argonne National Laboratory to improve manufacturing efficiency and to explore new materials for clean energy applications.

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Cybersecurity Protects Agriculture Food Chain

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 5 Dec 2023 09:50:00 -0800

Explained Mary Lancaster at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Food and Agriculture Risk Modeling (FARM) project will identify potential vulnerabilities within today's digital agricultural software and equipment. Credit: Uvation

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Earbuds to Monitor Brain, Body

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 9 Nov 2023 08:07:00 -0800

The diagnostic goals are to monitor interactions between the earbud readouts of brainwaves, vital signs, and chemical biomarkers in real-world settings by correlating electrical brainwave patterns with the body's chemical biomarkers. The therapeutic goal is to foster improved brain function by monitoring the brain/body followed with appropriate theraputic feedback through the earbuds to improve the patient's condition.

Fabrication process of the prototype earbud showing the printed sensors (middle) bonded with the flexible circuit board (top), and assembled to the outside of earbuds in the optimal sensor assembly area (bottom) with double-sided medical tape. FULL TEXT

Department of Energy Accelerates Emerging Technologies

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 24 Oct 2023 08:15:00 -0700

The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory aims to use computational chemistry expertise to advance the next generation of molecular modeling capabilities. FULL TEXT

Nanophotonics Flattens Smartphone Camera Bump

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 19 Sep 2023 11:11:00 -0700

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Optical Vectors Beam Multi-Bits

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 8 Aug 2023 11:42:00 -0700

Optical communications—the backbone of the internet—use modulated lasers to transmit over a hundred different colored channels (using wavelength-division multiplexing) each with a hundred gigabits per second of speed. Multi-bit encoding modes—instead of just 1s and 0s—have been proven in the lab to increase throughput even further, but all suffer from errors introduced by noise in the channels, especially over free-space channels such as to satellites, submarines or even through living cells, according to researchers at the University of the Witwatersrand (Johannesburg, South Africa). Now Wits’ researchers have demonstrated a mode-division multiplexing (MDM) scheme using a quantitative measure for a vector (polarized) beam’s purity, its vector-quality factor (technically, its polarization separability) as the information carrier that can encode not just 1s and 0s, but countless modes of vector light that are virtually unaffected by channel noise.

Automated Evolution Tackles Tough Tasks

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 13 Jul 2023 09:42:00 -0700

Deep neural networks (DNNs) using reinforcement learning are getting harder to come by, due to sensitivity to the initial hyper-parameters chosen (such as the width and depth of the DNN, as well as other application-specific initial conditions). However, these limitations have recently been overcome by combining RL with evolutionary computation (EC), which maintains a population of learning agents, each with unique initial conditions, that together "evolve" an optimal solution. FULL TEXT

Keeping Hackers Off the Electrical Grid

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 20 Jun 2023 07:28:00 -0700

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MXenes Shield Against Radar, RF, Stealth

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 23 Feb 2023 11:48:00 -0800

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Holy Grail of Batteries Obsolete Lithium Ion

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Wed, 8 Feb 2023 08:20:00 -0800

Rechargeable batteries have become the lifeblood of electronics, enabling the mobile revolution. Unfortunately, today's rechargeable batteries incorporate flammable liquid cores. That could change soon, however by switching to rechargeable batteries that have solid cores with nothing to spill, nothing to catch on fire, nothing to potentially explode. FULL TEXT

Bluetooth Hacked Yet Again

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 15 Dec 2022 09:51:00 -0800

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rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 22 Nov 2022 12:04:00 -0800

Artificial intelligence (AI)—in particular, machine learning (ML)— recently began to solve problems for which quantum computers are targeted, according to researchers at the California Institute of Technology (CalTech), the Flatiron Institute (New York City), and IBM (Yorktown Heights, NY) FULL TEXT

Battery Free Internet of Things

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Wed, 9 Nov 2022 08:46:00 -0800

Energy harvesting reaps energy that would otherwise go to waste—from sources ranging from solar rays to vibrations to ambient gradations in heat, ocean waves/tides, wind, and even the metabolisms of living organisms. These sources can be tuned to produce electricity that is safe, sustainable, and deployable in conditions not suited to the use of batteries. FULL TEXT

AI in your Ears

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 13:40:00 -0700

ClearBuds enhance a speaker's voice and reduce background noise through the use of binaural microphone hardware in the earbuds and real-time machine learning software (deep learning neural networks) running on a smartphone app. FULL TEXT

Quantum Datacenter Intranet Advances

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 14 Apr 2022 15:04:00 -0700

"Recently, landmark experiments have carried out specialized tasks beyond the practical reach of supercomputers," said independent quantum expert Hendrik Bluhm at Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule (RWTH) Aachen University and the Forschungszentrum Jülich Research Centee in Germany.
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Confidential Computing Foils Hackers

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Tue, 11 Jan 2022 09:27:00 -0800

"Confidential Computing is positioned to become the de facto technology for future computational security," according to Stephen Walli, governing board chair of the Confidential Computing Consortium... FULL TEXT

Dialing the Trust Level Down to Zero

rcj@SpiritOne.com (R. Colin Johnson) — Thu, 23 Sep 2021 11:40:00 -0700

Twenty-first century cybersecurity has been steadily moving away from the "perimeter" mentality—authenticating users with passwords, then giving them free access to a computer system's resources at their security level. Stolen passwords, especially those with high levels of access, have resulted in catastrophic releases of vast swaths of personal information (like credit card numbers), government secrets (witness WikiLeaks' releases of classified information), and related crimes (including ransomware). FULL TEXT