Last September, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation released its annual Goalkeeper’s report, highlighting the extraordinary progress made in reducing extreme poverty around the world, while also warning that sustaining this progress would not be easy. We now have the first actual data points that ring the alarm bells about a new, unfolding story on... Continue Reading →

You didn't think scientists would let IBM's "world's smallest computer" boast go unchallenged, did you? Sure enough, University of Michigan has produced a temperature sensing 'computer' measuring 0.04 cubic millimeters, or about a tenth the size of IBM's former record-setter. It's so small that one grain of rice seems gigantic in comparison -- and it's... Continue Reading →

There's not a single state, county or metropolitan area in the entire United States where a full-time worker earning the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour can afford a modest 2-bedroom apartment. And if those workers wanted to? They'd have to work 122 hours a week. Every week. All year. This is according to... Continue Reading →

Marta Minujin, a 74-year-old artist from Argentina has come up with a replica of the classic monument of the Greek Parthenon and has built it using 100,000 copies of banned books. As per the artist, this was done in a bid to resist the political repression. A part of the Documenta 14 art festival, The... Continue Reading →

A new a study from McGill University and the University of Minnesota published in the journal Nature compared organic and conventional yields from 66 studies and over 300 trials. Researchers found that on average, conventional systems out-yielded organic farms by 25 percent — mostly for grains, and depending on conditions. Embracing the current conventional wisdom,... Continue Reading →

At age 69, Sandi Zahar takes home around $3,100 a month from Social Security and her part-time job, but still relies on a food bank. She has diabetes and is a cancer survivor, and estimates that about a third of her income goes to her health care costs. Her income is too high to qualify... Continue Reading →

Before I started working on real-world robots, I wrote about their fictional and historical ancestors. This isn’t so far removed from what I do now. In factories, labs, and of course science fiction, imaginary robots keep fueling our imagination about artificial humans and autonomous machines. Real-world robots remain surprisingly dysfunctional, although they are steadily infiltrating... Continue Reading →

Story Land is hosting its first ever Sensory Sensitive Weekend this Saturday and Sunday, which will cater to the autism community. The park hopes the weekend will make families feel more comfortable as they enjoy the attractions without dealing with sensory overload. Story Land will either turn ride and park music down or off and... Continue Reading →

Italy, a country steeped in ancient tradition, has taken a stride forward in the twenty-first century race towards automation, becoming the first country to showcase a robot-conducted orchestra. YuMi, a dual-armed robot designed by ABB, accompanied Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli and conducted the Lucca Philharmonic Orchestra at a gala event in Pisa's Teatro Verdi Tuesday... Continue Reading →

Chances are your job description has changed over the past five years. Or maybe your role didn’t even exist a short time ago. The workplace of today and the future looks quite different due to technology, the economy, the environment, and politics, according to the Institute for the Future (IFTF), a not-for-profit think tank that... Continue Reading →