H+ Weekly - H+ Weekly - Issue #387

.
H+ WEEKLY

.
Issue #387

This week - edible drone; an implant tapping directly into the human speech system; Meta's new protein-predicting AI; and more!

SPONSORED
Humble Tech Book Bundle: Math and Mechatronics by Mercury
Whether you’re an engineering student preparing for an exam or a seasoned pro seeking to deepen your knowledge, this bundle of 20+ ebooks from Mercury is here to assist. Study stress, strain, and fluid mechanics in the Mechanical Engineering and Mechatronics Handbook. Hone critical math skills with Essentials of Modern Algebra. Explore thermodynamics, learn to use MATLAB, and much more, and help support World Central Kitchen & Whale and Dolphin Conservation!

Support the newsletter

MORE THAN A HUMAN

This Implant Turns Brain Waves Into Words
Edward Chang shares his research into a neuroprosthetic that enables paralysed patients to communicate by thinking about what they want to say. The implant taps directly into the speech system promising quicker and more natural communication (Shoutout to Alexandra for sharing this article with me).

I make prosthetic arms with Lego
Can you build a prosthetic arm with Lego? As David Aguilar shows, yes, you can.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

Machine learning could vastly speed up the search for new metals
Machine learning could help develop new types of metals with useful properties, such as resistance to extreme temperatures and rust, according to new research. Instead of a process of trial and error, the new approach uses AI to find promising combinations of metals which then can be tested in a lab by humans.

AI Predicts What Chemicals Will Smell like to a Human
Researchers from Google Research created an AI that can predict how a chemical will smell like based only on its structure. This opens the possibility of digitising smells and be a foundation for a new breed of AIs that can synthesise any scent.

AI Language Models Are Struggling to “Get” Math
Computers are good at math until you give them word problems to solve. AI researchers have learned the hard way that training language models to solve math problems is hard. However, a new AI from Google named Minerva has made enormous progress, reaching 50 to 80% accuracy while other AIs got 7-20%.

▶️ The Hard Tradeoffs of Edge AI Hardware (14:10)
Not every AI application needs a full data center to crunch numbers. Sometimes you have to fit a neural network on a small device and make it as energy efficient as possible. In this video, Asianometry explains how engineers approach the problem of edge AI, from both a software perspective (like shrinking and optimizing neural nets) and from a hardware perspective.

ROBOTICS

Eat This Drone
Swiss engineers present a drone whose wings are made from rice cakes. It might sound ridiculous but the idea here is that in case of emergency, these drones can deliver life-saving supplies and then you can eat them. "The edible wing tastes like a crunchy rice crisp cookie with a little touch of raw gelatin (which worked as an edible glue to hold the rice cookies as a flat plate shape). No artificial flavor has been added yet", said the lead researcher.

BIOTECHNOLOGY

AlphaFold’s new rival? Meta AI predicts shape of 600 million proteins
There is a new kid on the protein-predicting AIs scene. It comes from Meta and it is named ESMFold. Meta's researchers admitted their AI isn’t quite as accurate as AlphaFold but it is about 60% faster for short sequences than DeepMind's AlphaFold.

This issue was brought to you by our awesome patrons Floris, Eric, Andrew, dux and Tom! You too can support the newsletter on Patreon.

Thank you for subscribing,
Conrad Gray (@conradthegray)

If you have any questions or suggestions, just reply to this email or tweet at @hplusweekly. I'd like to hear what do you think about H+ Weekly.

Follow H+ Weekly!

You are receiving this email because you signed in to H+ Weekly newsletter

Our mailing address is:

H+ Weekly

London

London, London EC4 2AA

United Kingdom

Add us to your address book

Unsubscribe Update subscription preferences

This email was sent to you
why did I get this? unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences
H+ Weekly · London · London, London EC4 2AA · United Kingdom

H+ Weekly - H+ Weekly - Issue #387

MORE THAN A HUMAN

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

ROBOTICS

BIOTECHNOLOGY

Older messages

H+ Weekly - Issue #386

H+ Weekly - Issue #385

H+ Weekly - Issue #384

H+ Weekly - Issue #383

H+ Weekly - Issue #382

You Might Also Like

Charted | Global Economic Confidence in 2025, by Country 🌎

Top Tech Deals 🎅 Sony Headphones, iPhone Cases, 4K Projector, and More!

Why the Race to AGI is Humanitys Defining Moment

Iran's Charming Kitten Deploys BellaCPP: A New C++ Variant of BellaCiao Malware

Software Testing Weekly - Issue 251

Daily Coding Problem: Problem #1647 [Medium]

Sentiment Analysis, Topological Sort, Web Security, and More

🤫 Do Not Disturb Mode Is My Secret to Sanity — 8 Gadgets I Want To See Nintendo Make

😱 AzureEdge.net DNS Retiring Jan. 2025, 🚀 Microsoft Phi-4 AI Outperforms, 🔒 Microsoft Secure Future Initiative

Mapped | The Top Health Insurance Companies by State 🏥