Computing2258 articles archived since 1845

Seeing Forever: Storing Bits Isn't the Same as Preserving Them, by David Pogue

Digital photos and videos are great, but don't expect your grandkids to see them

Physicists entangle a record-breaking 14 quantum bits

Quantum information science is a bit like classroom management—the larger the group, the harder it is to keep everything together.

But to build a practical quantum computer physicists will need many particles working in synchrony as quantum bits, or quibits...

A Stimulating Solution for Math Problems

A device that sends electric current through the brain improves numerical skills

Being John Malkovich: Personal Control of Individual Brain Cells

An advanced brain-machine interface enables patients to control individual nerve cells deep inside their own brains

Too Hard for Science?: Making astronauts with printers

If printers have the power to manufacture organs, why not brains? Or people? In "Too Hard for Science?" I interview scientists about ideas they would love to explore that they don't think could be investigated...

Your Avatar, Your Guide: Digital Doubles Can Improve Social Skills—or Create False Memories

Seeing a digital doppelgänger can change your mind--for better or worse

The Anti-Predictor: A Chat with Mathematical Sociologist Duncan Watts

The Yahoo! Labs scientist and author explains why the "law of the few" is bunk, why history is full of failed hedgehogs, and why we can't make good predictions about just those things we most want to predict...

Poetic masterpiece of Claude Shannon, father of information theory, published for the first time

There may be no scientist more obscure relative to his immense accomplishments than Claude Elwood Shannon, who died just over a decade ago, on February 24, 2001, at the age of 84.

Behind the scenes with the Fe Maidens at this year's FIRST Robotics Competition [Video]

Scientific American was back at the FIRST New York City regional robotics competition this year. We've covered the event more generally in the past but this year decided to focus on one team in particular—not an easy decision to make when you consider there were dozens of talented, hard-working squads competing for a chance to go to the championship round next month in St...

Robots Arrive at Fukushima Nuclear Site with Unclear Mission

Generally, bots have proved effective operating in high-radiation environments, but Japan's nuclear crisis poses new challenges

Satellite images show tsunami-ravaged Japan coast

When devastation extends as far as the human eye can see, digital eyes in the sky can provide essential information for emergency response efforts.

Seconds Before the Big One

Earthquake detection systems can sound the alarm in the moments before a big tremor strikes—time enough to save lives

April 2011 Briefing Memo

MIND in Pictures: I Think, Therefore I Scan

Readers Respond to "Mind Over Magic?"--and More...

Letters to the editor about the November/December 2010 issue of Scientific American MIND Readers Respond to "Mind Over Magic?"—and More...

Can You See Me Now?

A camera with a unique, spherical lens may bring single-shot gigapixel cameras closer to reality

From iPhones to SciPhones

Scientists are developing iPhone apps that aid in research and that appeal to "citizen scientists" as well

Social media for science: The geologic perspective

Last week, I spent a pleasant hour over lunch talking to my 60-year-old aunt and her 80-something husband about "this Twitter thing" and how one defines a blog.

Where Are the Talking Robots?

Teaching a machine to speak has been a dream for decades. First, we have to figure out how we know what we know about language

2011 Lemelson-M.I.T. Student Inventor Prizes Offer a Glimpse of the Future in Medical and Security Screening Tech [Slide Show]

Automatic gear shifting for safer and more efficient wheelchairs; a technique for harnessing terahertz spectroscopy; "humanized" lab mice; and cheaper, more accurate malaria testing--meet this year's crop of Lemelson-M.I.T...