Frontier research

Artificial intelligence can be used to create deep fakes - audio, pictures and videos that make people say and do things they never did. Image credit - PxHere

frontier research | industry | social sciences

15 April 2019

Can artificial intelligence help end fake news?

Fake news has already fanned the flames of distrust towards media, politics and established institutions around the world. And while new technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) might make things even worse, it can also be used to combat misinformation.

M87’s supermassive black hole, imaged for the first time, is 53 million light years away, but wide enough for astronomers to see it from Earth. Image credit - EHT Collaboration

space | frontier research

10 April 2019

Astronomers reveal first-ever image of a black hole

Scientists have revealed the first ever image of a black hole, a major milestone in astrophysics which not only backs up Einstein’s theory of general relativity but also opens up a new era of black hole observations.

M87’s supermassive black hole, imaged for the first time, is six billion times as massive as our sun. Image credit - EHT Collaboration

space | frontier research

10 April 2019

In a picture: ‘Now we know what a black hole looks like’

The first-ever image of an event horizon – the gravitational boundary of a black hole beyond which light cannot escape – was revealed on 10 April and is the best evidence yet that these phenomena really do exist. It was the result of a global collaboration of hundreds of scientists, using multiple telescopes around the world to pick up the high-frequency radio waves emitted by matter pulled into the event horizon.

When two objects such as black holes or neutron stars merge, they cause the frequency of the gravitational waves to increase, which would sound like a chirp. Image Credit - LSC/Alex Nitz

space | frontier research

05 April 2019

Gravitational waves helping to expose black holes, dark matter and theoretical particles

Gravitational waves – the invisible ripples in the fabric of space predicted by Albert Einstein – are opening up a new era of astronomy that is allowing scientists to see parts of the universe once thought to be invisible, such as black holes, dark matter and theoretical subatomic particles called axions.

Voting in a polling booth and online voting are like apples and pears - it's not a matter of just replacing one with another, says Dr Kremer. Image credit - Santeri Viinamäki, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0

frontier research | ict | security

01 April 2019

‘Online voting isn’t ready for high-stakes elections’

Online voting is often considered a way to improve voter turnout and security. But according to Dr Steve Kremer of the French Institute for Research in Computer Science and Automation, computer scientists have got a long way to go before they make it a viable alternative to pencils and paper.

Smaller, autonomous satellites could help analyse the internal structure of clouds to give a more detailed view of Earth's changing climate. Image credit - Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, NASA Johnson Space Center

space | frontier research | industry

27 March 2019

Fleets of autonomous satellites to coordinate tasks among themselves

Space missions have long benefited from some autonomous operations being carried out aboard spacecraft, but with a sharp increase expected in the number of satellites being launched in the next few years, researchers are using automation and artificial intelligence to make them smarter and more effective.

The moon's lack of tectonic activity preserves its oldest rocks. Image Credit - ANDY SMITH ASTRONOMY

space | frontier research

25 February 2019

How scientists are piecing together the history of the moon

In the solar system’s early days, a first Earth is thought to have been pulverised by a planet that scientists call Theia. We don’t know what it was made of or where it came from, only that it may have been the size of Mars. The powerful collision destroyed both planets so completely that scientists can only guess what they were like.

An ant has the navigation skills to cover hundreds of metres in a single day and still find its way home. Melophorus Bagoti ant. Image Credit - Antoine Wystrach

frontier research | science in society

20 February 2019

Studying ant cooperation is revealing how brains work together

As a child, you almost certainly at one stage spent hours watching ants move about from their nest. Maybe you dropped a piece of food and watched as a group of ants came and picked it up, carrying it home in an impressive display of cooperation.

New findings suggest that if the moon formed after a giant impact after water had had been received, it should have gotten a share of that water. The question is - where did it go? Image Credit - ANDY SMITH ASTRONOMY

space | frontier research

19 February 2019

The moon’s water: where did it come from – and where did it all go?

Fragments of moon rock brought back from the lunar surface by astronauts on the Apollo space missions are providing new insights about where our planet’s life-giving water came from.