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Photography measures how much light of different color hits the photographic film. However, light is also a wave, and is therefore characterized by the phase. Phase specifies the position of a point within the wave cycle and correlates to depth of information, meaning that recording the phase of light scattered by an object can retrieve its full 3D shape, which cannot be obtained with a simple photograph. This is the basis of optical holography, popularized by fancy holograms in sci-fi movies like Star Wars.

But the problem is that the spatial resolution of the photo/hologram is limited by the wavelength of light, around or just-below 1 μm (0.001 mm). That’s fine for macroscopic objects, but it starts to fail when entering the realm of nanotechnology.

Now researchers from Fabrizio Carbone’s lab at EPFL have developed a method to see how light behaves on tiniest scale, well beyond wavelength limitations. The researchers used the most unusual photographic media: freely propagating . Used in their ultrafast electron microscope, the method can encode in a holographic light pattern trapped in a nanostructure, and is based on an exotic aspect of electron and light interaction.

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For a medievalist like myself, it doesn’t get much better than Deborah Harkness’s A Discovery of Witches. Both the internationally bestselling trilogy and the newly adapted TV show have many of the conventions of a kickass fantasy story. There’s a 1,500-year-old vampire, a powerful witch who can literally make it rain, and their prophesied love story. There’s the imminent threat of the end of all creatures—demons, vampires, and witches—and the ensuing battle between good and evil. And, at the heart of A Discovery of Witches is an enchanted alchemical manuscript hidden deep within Oxford University’s Bodleian Library, Ashmole 782, and the witch who was able to call it up for the first time in 500 years. That witch is a medievalist, badass feminist, and history of science professor, Dr. Diana Bishop.

The British television network SkyOne’s adaptation of the books will begin streaming in the U.S. today on Sundance Now and AMC’s Shudder. To give layfolk a sense of how dope an obscure, 15th-century alchemical manuscript can be, we’ve prepared a medievalist guide to some of its features—from the philosopher’s stone to the alchemical child and more.

Where many fantasy novels are complete works of fiction, perhaps inspired by the medieval period, but not in any way historically accurate, A Discovery of Witches combines the fantastical with the academic. Deborah Harkness, the author of the series, is a history of science professor at the University of Southern California. She wrote her doctoral thesis on the history of science and magic in Europe from 1500 to 1700—the same subject her protagonist, Dr. Diana Bishop (played by Teresa Palmer in the adaptation), is researching in Oxford’s Bodleian at the outset of A Discovery of Witches.

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By Timothy Revell

They say 10,000 hours makes an expert, but for video-game playing AIs much more is needed. After playing thousands of years’ worth of the video game Dota 2, artificial intelligence is now able to beat the world’s top amateurs.

Dota 2 is a multiplayer battle arena game. Two teams of five take on each other across a large map, defending their own base whilst trying to attack their opponents. It is the game that has the largest prize money of any e-sport, so there are many professional players able to play at a very high level.

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The flexible lasers, less than a thousandth of a millimetre thick, work as free-standing films and can stick to different materials including banknotes and contact lenses.

https://www.gizmodo.com.au/…/science-has-peaked-we-can-now…/

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There are certainly ways to use AI to reduce the collateral damage and harms of war, but fully autonomous weapons would also usher in a host of new moral, technical, and strategic dilemmas, which is why scientists and activists have pushed the United Nations and world governments to consider a preemptive ban. Their hope is that we can keep killer robots in the realm of science fiction.

We have the technology to make robots that kill without oversight. But should we?

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“Machine Learning: Living in the Age of AI,” examines the extraordinary ways in which people are interacting with AI today. Hobbyists and teenagers are now developing tech powered by machine learning and WIRED shows the impacts of AI on schoolchildren and farmers and senior citizens, as well as looking at the implications that rapidly accelerating technology can have. The film was directed by filmmaker Chris Cannucciari, produced by WIRED, and supported by McCann Worldgroup.

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