news 2023

Sophisticated new analysis of the physical processes which create the sounds of speech could help empower people with speech impairments and create new applications for voice recognition technologies, researchers say. Sophisticated new analysis of the physical processes which create the sounds of speech could help empower people with speech impairments and create new applications for voice recognition technologies, researchers say.

Being amazed by powerful graphics is not enough for a person to feel fully engaged in a VR world - even more important is a strong emotional response. Published on Monday 11 December 2023 Last updated on Monday 11 December 2023 Being wowed by powerful graphics is not enough for a person to feel fully immersed in a virtual-reality (VR) world - a strong emotional response to the simulated environment is essential too, according to a new study from the University of Bath.

Researchers have developed an adaptable algorithm that could improve road safety by predicting when drivers are able to safely interact with in-vehicle systems or receive messages, such as traffic alerts, incoming calls or driving directions.

A new machine learning tool from Imperial could help researchers track animal behaviour and pave the way for more AI use in the biological sciences. Biologists often study large numbers of animals to collect data on collective and individual behaviour. New machine learning tools promise to help scientists process the huge amount of data this work generates more quickly while lessening workload.

Alongside colleagues from four other universities, Dr Eva Krumhuber (UCL Psychology & Language Sciences) writes in The Conversation that images of white faces generated by the StyleGAN2 algorithm look more "human" than actual people's faces. Does ChatGPT ever give you the eerie sense you're interacting with another human being?  Artificial intelligence (AI) has reached an astounding level of realism, to the point that some tools can even fool people into thinking they are interacting with another human.

A form of brain-inspired computing that exploits the intrinsic physical properties of a material to dramatically reduce energy use is now a step closer to reality, thanks to a new study led by UCL and Imperial College London researchers. Such an approach, known as physical reservoir computing, has until now been limited due to its lack of reconfigurability.

HotGestures give users 'superhuman' ability to open and control tools in virtual reality Researchers have developed a virtual reality application where a range of 3D modelling tools can be opened and controlled using just the movement of a user's hand. We need new ways of interacting with technology, and we think this is a step in that direction Per Ola Kristensson The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, used machine learning to develop 'HotGestures' - analogous to the hot keys used in many desktop applications.

Two studies by computer scientists at the University of Bath make a case for using deepfakes in training videos. Published on Thursday 5 October 2023 Last updated on Thursday 5 October 2023 Watching a training video featuring a deepfake version of yourself, as opposed to a clip featuring somebody else, makes learning faster, easier and more fun, according to new research led by the REVEAL research centre at the University of Bath.

Researchers at UCL and Moorfields Eye Hospital have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) system that has the potential to not only identify sight-threatening eye diseases but also predict general health, including heart attacks, stroke, and Parkinson's disease. RETFound , one of the first AI foundation models in healthcare, and the first in ophthalmology, was developed using millions of eye scans from the NHS.

Digital Volume Correlation (DVC) is a powerful image analysis technique used in the field of materials science and engineering to study the mechanical behaviour and deformation of complex 3D structures. By comparing voxel intensities in a pair of 3D digital images captured at different states of loading or deformation, DVC allows researchers to track and quantify displacements, strains, and other mechanical properties with high precision and non-invasively.

Having a good imagination and high levels of suggestibility makes you feel more present during virtual reality experiences, say computer scientists at Bath. Published on Thursday 24 August 2023 Last updated on Thursday 24 August 2023 People with vivid imaginations are more likely than others to believe they truly inhabit the worlds they visit in virtual reality (VR) according to new research led by the University of Bath.

A team of researchers at the University of Oxford, led by the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences , have developed a new model that reliably predicts a woman's likelihood of developing and then dying of breast cancer within a decade. The study, published today in The Lancet Digital Health , analysed anonymised data from 11.6 million women aged 20-90 from 2000 to 2020.

A team of computer security experts have developed a set of recommendations to help defend against 'thermal attacks' which can steal personal information. A team of computer security experts have developed a set of recommendations to help defend against 'thermal attacks' which can steal personal information.

Researchers are developing a way to incorporate one of the most human of characteristics - uncertainty - into machine learning systems. Uncertainty is central in how humans reason about the world but many AI models fail to take this into account Katherine Collins Human error and uncertainty are concepts that many artificial intelligence systems fail to grasp, particularly in systems where a human provides feedback to a machine learning model.

New research from UCL has found that humans were only able to detect artificially generated speech 73% of the time, with the same accuracy in both English and Mandarin. The study, published today in PLOS ONE , is the first to assess human ability to detect artificially generated speech in a language other than English.

Cambridge scientists have set out principles for how computational science - which powers discoveries from unveiling the mysteries of the universe to developing treatments to fight cancer to improving our understanding of the human genome, but can have a substantial carbon footprint - can be made more environmentally sustainable.

Researchers have trained a robotic -chef- to watch and learn from cooking videos, and recreate the dish itself. We wanted to see whether we could train a robot chef to learn in the same incremental way that humans can - by identifying the ingredients and how they go together in the dish Greg Sochacki The researchers, from the University of Cambridge, programmed their robotic chef with a -cookbook- of eight simple salad recipes.

Researchers have found a stark gender imbalance after carrying out the largest-ever study of video game dialogue, published today. The research, published in the journal Royal Society Open Science , analysed more than 13,000 video-game characters and found that men speak twice as much as women. The study, led by Dr Stephanie Rennick at the University of Glasgow and Dr Seán G. Roberts at Cardiff University, performed the first large-scale test of gender imbalance in the dialogue of 50 role-playing video games (RPGs).

Researchers have created atomically thin artificial neurons capable of processing both light and electric signals for computing. The material enables the simultaneous existence of separate feedforward and feedback paths within a neural network, boosting the ability to solve complex problems. For decades, scientists have been investigating how to recreate the versatile computational capabilities of biological neurons to develop faster and more energy-efficient machine learning systems.

Stress data collected by wearable tech and shared between close friends could help enable new forms of mutual care for mental health, research suggests. Computing scientists from Scotland and China are behind the finding, which is set to be presented at the ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems in Germany later this month.