Digital Government

How NIH’s Research-Driving, Centralized Hub for COVID-19 Patient Data is Evolving

Scientists are drawing insights via an enclave of patient records from 7.6 million individuals.

Emerging Tech

Air Force Looks to Kaiju for Advanced Anti-Aircraft Countermeasures

Project Kaiju—expected in January—will include nine efforts named after famous giant monsters.

Ideas

Elon Musk’s Tesla Bot Raises Serious Concerns – but Probably Not the Ones You Think

The Tesla Bot comes with a whole portfolio of risks that are hard to quantify and easy to overlook and yet inevitably end up tripping up innovators.

Emerging Tech

Scientists Are Using New Satellite Tech to Find Glow-in-the-Dark Milky Seas of Maritime Lore

For centuries, sailors have told tales of huge swaths of ocean glowing on dark nights.

Ideas

These 3 Energy Storage Technologies Can Help Solve the Challenge of Moving to 100% Renewable Electricity

Energy storage can make facilities like solar farms more profitable by letting them store power for cloudy days.

Artificial Intelligence

Critical Update: When Seeing No Longer Means Believing, What’s a Government to Do?

Agencies and lawmakers are moving to combat deepfakes and other synthetic media used as powerful tools in disinformation campaigns.

Emerging Tech

Rescue Robots Get a Speed Upgrade for Rough Terrain

A new planning algorithm helps robots figure out how to balance with hands and feet.

Digital Government

IG: State Office of the Science and Tech Adviser Needs Stable Leadership and a Formal Strategy

The 10-year-old office has done good work, the inspector general found, but suffers from staff turnover and a lack of strategic vision.

Ideas

Lesson from a Robot Swarm: Change Group Behavior by Talking One-on-One Rather than Getting on a Soapbox

Persuading people one-on-one might be the best route to getting them to recognize better alternatives.

Emerging Tech

Fish Fins Are Teaching Us the Secret to Flexible Robots and New Shape-Changing Materials

Materials based on a segmented structure could be used in underwater propulsion and improve the agility and speed of fish-inspired submarines.

Ideas

An AI Expert Explains Why It’s Hard to Give Computers Something You Take for Granted: Common Sense

Common sense includes an intuitive understanding of basic physics – something computers lack.

Emerging Tech

Oak Ridge-Made Software Platform Digitally Twins All U.S. Buildings

Those involved aim to help improve nationwide decision-making about energy efficiency.

Ideas

Female Scientists Set Back by the Pandemic May Never Make Up Lost Time

The reason is the inequitable structure of rewards in science.

Podcasts

Critical Update: How Federal Agencies Can Help Avert Quantum Catastrophe

The White House is working on plans to roll out new cryptographic systems that will require epic levels of funding from Congress and coordination, both within the government and in partnership with industry. 

Digital Government

National Labs Move to Support Researchers Seeking Name Changes on Past Work

As part of broader inclusivity campaigns, the labs aim to relieve some burdens faced by transgender authors or others whose names have changed over their professions.

Emerging Tech

Algorithm Could Improve How Self-Driving Cars Take on Narrow Streets

This kind of exchange requires drivers—human or machine—to make decisions based on largely unwritten rules of the road, researchers said.