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Artificial Intelligence Must Know When to Ask for Human Help
Artificial intelligence systems are powerful tools for businesses and governments to process data and respond to changing situations, whether on the stock market or on a battlefield. But there are still some things AI isn’t ready for. We are scholars of computer science working to understand and improve the ways in which algorithms interact with… Read More
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Fingerprint and Face Scanners Aren’t as Secure as We Think They Are
Despite what every spy movie in the past 30 years would have you think, fingerprint and face scanners used to unlock your smartphone or other devices aren’t nearly as secure as they’re made out to be. While it’s not great if your password is made public in a data breach, at least you can easily… Read More
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A Secure Relationship With Passwords Means not Being Attached to How You Pick Them
When you are asked to create a password – either for a new online account or resetting login information for an existing account – you’re likely to choose a password you know you can remember. Many people use extremely basic passwords, or a more obscure one they reuse across many sites. Our research has found… Read More
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Don’t Click That Link! How Criminals Access Your Digital Devices and What Happens When They Do
Every day, often multiple times a day, you are invited to click on links sent to you by brands, politicians, friends and strangers. You download apps on your devices. Maybe you use QR codes. Most of these activities are secure because they come from sources that can be trusted. But sometimes criminals impersonate trustworthy sources… Read More
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Mentors Play Critical Role in Quality of College Experience, New Poll Suggests
In order to have a rewarding college experience, students should build a constellation of mentors. This constellation should be a diverse set of faculty, staff and peers who will get students out of their comfort zones and challenge them to learn more – and more deeply – than they thought they could. Students should begin… Read More
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Top Five Ways to Boost Your Health in 2019 – Based on the Latest Research
It’s the start of a new year and there is no doubt that 2019 will be as saturated with nutritional nonsense as 2018. From appetite suppressant lollypops to activated charcoal, the wellness industry was worth $4.2 trillion in 2017 and this figure is set to keep rising. With this in mind, the start of the… Read More
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How We’re Designing Musical Instruments with the Help of Disabled Musicians and VR
Most new digital technologies tend to be designed with an able-bodied user in mind. The first desktop computers required fine motor skills to navigate software menus using a mouse, and mobile phones need users to press buttons, swipe screens, and so on. To use such technology a person needs to be fairly dexterous. In our… Read More
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Holographic Teachers Were Supposed to Be Part of Our Future. What Happened?
Cast your mind back to the turn of last century. Experts predicted that by now classrooms would no longer feature human teachers, and holographic virtual entities would deliver lessons instead. This certainly hasn’t happened. The closest we have come is group video chat via apps like FaceTime, Zoom or Google Hangouts. But this doesn’t mean… Read More
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A Robot That Can Touch, Eat and Sleep? The Reality of Cyborgs Like Alita: Battle Angel
Alita: Battle Angel is an interesting and wild ride, jam-packed full of concepts around cybernetics, dystopian futures and cyberpunk themes. The film – in cinemas from today – revolves around Alita (Rosa Salazar), a female cyborg (with original human brain) that is recovered by cybernetic doctor Dyson Ido (Christoph Waltz) and brought into the world… Read More
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Experts Call for Halt to CRISPR Editing That Allows Gene Changes to Pass on to Children
Remember the global outrage four months ago at world-first claims a researcher had used the gene editing tool CRISPR to edit the genomes of twin girls? The molecular scissors known as CRISPR (CRISPR/cas9 in full) allow scientists to modify DNA with high precision and greater ease than previous technologies. Now researchers from the USA, Europe,… Read More
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Using Gene Drives to Control Wild Mosquito Populations and Wipe Out Malaria
What is the deadliest animal on earth? It’s a question that brings to mind fearsome lions, tigers, sharks and crocodiles. But the answer is an animal that is no more than 1 centimeter long. A few mosquito species, out of the thousands that populate different environments, are the deadliest animals on earth. Anopheles mosquitoes alone,… Read More
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CRISPR Babies Raise an Uncomfortable Reality – Abiding by Scientific Standards Doesn’t Guarantee Ethical Research
Uncertainty continues to swirl around scientist He Jiankui’s gene editing experiment in China. Using CRISPR technology, He modified a gene related to immune function in human embryos and transferred the embryos to their mother’s womb, producing twin girls. Many questions about the ethical acceptability of the experiment have focused on ethical oversight and informed consent.… Read More
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Will Talking to AI Voice Assistants Re-Engineer Our Human Conversations?
When you’re lost, Siri can be your best friend. But if she can’t retrieve the right address from your contacts, she can drive you crazy. And so it is with the legion of virtual personal assistants that are entering our lives. From Amazon’s Alexa to Google’s Home, people are busy talking to intelligent machines as… Read More
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How to Beat Exam Stress
Young people around Australia are currently undergoing end of secondary school exams, which can be a very stressful time. Nearly half (47%) of Australian students report they feel very tense when they study, and 67% report feeling very anxious even if they are well prepared for a test. All this stress can have an impact… Read More
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How (and Why) to Stay Optimistic When It Feels Like the Environment is Falling Apart
Humans love optimism. It’s a no-brainer – optimism makes us feel good and wanting more. This attraction has deep neurological roots that affect both our brain functions and how we process new information. For this reason, optimism is powerful. Optimistic individuals or groups frequently perform better in sports, are better negotiators in business, and recover… Read More
