As much as we would like to think science is fascinating and cool, everyone knows that behind closed doors, the lab researches can get daunting and, well, a little boring. So the folks at IBM decided to have a little fun with science and used one-of-a-kind equipments to manipulate atoms and create a one minute stop-motion movie. Read that again. They manipulated atom particles to shape characters and letters and pieced together a short stop-motion film. Where are these guys’ Oscars?
The movie, A Boy And His Atom, is an adorable short about a kid who finds a single particle and lets his imagination unfold. The IBM team was able to manually move the atoms around for the correct shapes and sequences with its proprietary “scanning tunneling microscope” which uses vibrations, temperature, and pressure levels to precisely control the atoms. Using needles, the team was able to physically attract the atoms on a copper surface to move them into position. Then, they used a microscope to capture each of the 242 frames, combining the photos into the world’s literally smallest movie.
“Capturing, positioning and shaping atoms to create an original motion picture on the atomic-level is a precise science and entirely novel,” said Andreas Heinrich, Principle Investigator, IBM Research. “At IBM, researchers don’t just read about science, we do it. This movie is a fun way to share the atomic-scale world while opening up a dialogue with students and others on the new frontiers of math and science.”
The video speaks best for itself, so watch the little movie below to restore your faith and interest in science.
San Francisco startup Dimensional advertised for people to walk robot dogs through city streets. The New York Times reported that the job could include carrying a roughly 33-pound robot back to the office if it overheated. A lift home is an awkward requirement for a labor-saving machine.
Keeping the hardware running is only one challenge. Anthropic's robotics tests found that language models mostly failed when controlling joints directly, but did better when directing trained controllers. Giving an AI agent a body doesn't teach it to handle ordinary household objects.
Soon, a mattress protector may be more than a bed cover. Australian medtech company Sleeptite and researchers at RMIT University have received a US patent for FlexiSense, a smart bedding technology that tracks body position and posture to help caregivers identify when older residents may be at risk of falling.
The technology is being developed for Sleeptite’s in-bed monitoring system, REMi, and was recently on display at The MedTech Conference in Boston. A peer-reviewed study in Flexible and Printed Electronics says the sensors can also be made at scale without sacrificing performance or durability.
AI companies spend enormous amounts of time convincing us their technology is safe and secure. But what happens when those same companies become targets of increasingly sophisticated AI-powered attacks? Anthropic, the company behind Claude, is now facing that question. According to a Washington Post report, cybersecurity startup Cathedral discovered vulnerabilities that let its researchers access sensitive information in Anthropic's internal systems.
The researchers used AI agents to identify potential entry points in less than 12 hours. Interestingly, they didn't need to crack Claude itself. Instead, they exploited weaknesses in third-party business applications that Anthropic uses for everyday operations. Anthropic's security testing program disclosed the findings, which allows outside researchers to identify and report vulnerabilities.