news 2018

Authenticating historic manuscripts can be a complicated and at times destructive process, with parts of the paper or ink damaged. However, a cross-disciplinary team of researchers from the University of Glasgow have found a novel way to accurately authenticate ancient documents in a minimally destructive way.

A three-year research project led by a University of Birmingham academic, working with colleagues from Goldsmiths and University College London, has indicated that virtual reality (VR) could become a vital tool for training General Practitioners (GPs) to look out for hard-to-detect signs of child abuse.

A new type of artificial-intelligence-driven chemistry could revolutionise the way molecules are discovered, scientists claim. In a new paper published today in the journal Nature , chemists from the University of Glasgow discuss how they have trained an artificially-intelligent organic chemical synthesis robot to automatically explore a very large number of chemical reactions.

As manufacturing shifts towards smart factories, with interconnected production systems and automation, engineers at the University of Nottingham are leading a £1.9m project to develop a predictive toolkit to optimise productivity and communication between human workers and robots. DigiTOP is one of seven national projects to create novel digital tools, techniques and processes to support the translation of digital capabilities into the manufacturing sector, funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).

100 times faster broadband is coming: 5G passes first test for indoor coverage at University of Sussex Initial testing on the next generation of mobile technology with the capability of delivering 100 times faster broadband has been successful, engineers at the University of Sussex and collaborators from telecom consultancy firm Plum have confirmed.

The new prosthetic hand interprets muscular signals from brain activity with machine learning to make movements more natural. Scientists at Imperial College London and the University of Göttingen have used machine learning to improve the performance of prosthetic hands. The new bionic hand is not only more natural but it is also superior in terms of functionality in daily tasks than what's currently available to patients.

Researchers create an open access database on emotional responses to multisensorial stimuli Researchers from the Sussex Computer Human Interaction (SCHI) Lab at the University of Sussex have created the world's first open-access database on participants' responses to visual, auditory and haptic stimuli.

Can you play by the rules and make lots of money or is it worth taking risks' That's the question researchers at the University of Nottingham are asking with a unique virtual reality game. The Corrupt Kitchen VR Experience puts players in charge of a burger business and gives them ten minutes to make as much money as possible.

An algorithm to monitor the joints of patients with arthritis, which could change the way that the severity of the condition is assessed, has been developed by a team of engineers, physicians and radiologists led by the University of Cambridge. Using this technique, we'll hopefully be able to identify osteoarthritis earlier, and look at potential treatments before it becomes debilitating.

When life gives you lemons, you take more risks Anyone needing a little excitement in their lives could do worse than suck a lemon, surprising new research at the University of Sussex suggests. Scientists at the Sussex Computer Human Interaction ( SCHI ) Lab say they have found for the first time empirical evidence that sour tastes lead to more risk-taking behaviour in a paper published in Scientific Reports today (7 June).

Experiments that measure the lifetime of neutrons reveal a perplexing and unresolved discrepancy. While this lifetime has been measured to a precision within 1 percent using different techniques, apparent conflicts in the measurements offer the exciting possibility of learning about as-yet undiscovered physics.

A trio of students from the University of Glasgow have developed a sophisticated artificial intelligence which could underpin the next phase of gravitational wave astronomy. In a new paper published today in the journal Physical Review Letters, the researchers discuss how they used artificial intelligence tools to train an AI 'brain' to search for gravitational wave signals.

The largest-ever dataset on typing speeds and styles, based on 136 million keystrokes from 168,000 volunteers, finds that the fastest typists not only make fewer errors, but they often type the next key before the previous one has been released. Crowdsourcing experiments that allow us to analyse how people interact with computers on a large scale are instrumental for identifying solution principles for the design of next-generation user interfaces.

Researchers have developed an online questionnaire which measures a range of personality traits to identify individuals who are more likely to fall victim to internet scams and other forms of cybercrime. Scams have been around for hundreds of years, and over the centuries, they haven't really changed that much - the only difference now is with the internet, it requires a lot less effort to do it.

On World Water Day, a University of Glasgow computer scientist is highlighting how residents of a remote Indian village have benefited from social robot which helped them with their daily burden of water-gathering. Dr Amol Deshmukh, a research associate in the School of Computing Science, recently completed a project with partners from Amrita University which aimed to explore how a water-carrying robot would affect the lives of villagers in Ayyampathy in southern India.

Fear of making mistakes and wider concerns about their social responsibility are among reasons why older people are rejecting digital technologies, a new study reveals. Despite increasing numbers of older adults accessing the Internet, and many recent retirees having used computers during their careers, the digital divide between older adults and younger people still exists.

Cambridge researchers are pioneering a form of machine learning that starts with only a little prior knowledge and continually learns from the world around it. This is just like a human would learn. We don't start knowing everything. We learn things incrementally, from only a few examples, and we know when we are not yet confident in our understanding Zoubin Ghahramani In the centre of the screen is a tiny unicycle.

The new Science and Universities Minister Sam Gyimah praised the 'brilliant' robotics being developed at Imperial College London. The Minister chose Imperial for his first official visit to a university and announced a £70 million funding boost for UK medicines. This investment will not only support high-value, highly-skilled jobs but will develop lifesaving treatments that could change lives across the UK.

In new University of Glasgow research published today (January 15) in the journal PNAS , a robot equipped with artificial intelligence was able to build unstable oil-in-water droplets as models for new artificial life forms. It was also able to predict their properties ahead of time even though conventional physical methods failed to do so.