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Piecing together the puzzle of future solar cell materials

Global electricity use is increasing rapidly and must be addressed sustainably. Developing new materials could give us much more efficient solar cell materials than at present; materials so thin and flexible that they could encase anything from mobile phones or entire buildings.

Using computer simulation and , researchers at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden have now taken an important step toward understanding and handling halide perovskites, among the most promising but notoriously enigmatic materials.

Electricity use is constantly increasing globally and, according to the International Energy Agency, its proportion of the world’s total energy consumption is expected to exceed 50% in 25 years, compared to the current 20%.

WhatsApp adds message translation to iPhone and Android apps

WhatsApp has started rolling out a new translation feature that enables Android and iPhone users to translate messages in chats, groups, and channel updates.

While iOS users can only use it to translate manually after tapping ‘Translate,’ Android users will also be able to enable automatic translation, allowing all messages in a chat thread to be translated without having to tap each one individually.

“We’re rolling out message translations to Android and iPhone users gradually from today, in a few select languages to start with more to follow,” the company said on Tuesday.

Lasers just made atoms dance, unlocking the future of electronics

Scientists at Michigan State University have discovered how to use ultrafast lasers to wiggle atoms in exotic materials, temporarily altering their electronic behavior. By combining cutting-edge microscopes with quantum simulations, they created a nanoscale switch that could revolutionize smartphones, laptops, and even future quantum computers.

Loneliness and anxiety fuel smartphone and social media addiction in ‘night owls,’ new study finds

Young adult “night owls” (or “evening types”—those who prefer to stay up late) are significantly more at risk of developing problematic relationships with smartphones and social media, according to a new study.

Problematic smartphone use is characterized by anxiety when separated from one’s phone, neglecting responsibilities in favor of phone use, and compulsively checking notifications. Social media addiction is similarly marked by excessive, uncontrolled usage that interferes with daily life.

Nearly 40% of U.K. students are now believed to exhibit signs of social media addiction, with at particularly high risk. Past research has linked eveningness to a range of adverse outcomes, including poor sleep quality, depression, and addictive behaviors. But until now, no study has investigated the mechanisms underlying the link between being an evening person and problematic technology use.

Tiny Multicolor Metalenses Could Revolutionize Drone and Phone Cameras

Engineers created multi-layer metalenses that focus several wavelengths. The design could revolutionize portable optical devices. Researchers have introduced a new way to create multicolored lenses that could pave the way for a generation of compact, low-cost, and high-performance optics for port

World-first quantum computer made with standard laptop chips launched

A UK startup has made a revolutionary advancement after delivering the world’s first full-stack quantum computer, built using the same silicon chip technology found in smartphones and laptops.

London-based Quantum Motion, a quantum computing startup that develops scalable quantum computing tech using silicon, launched the industry’s first full-stack quantum computer made with silicon. It was deployed at the UK National Quantum Computing Centre (NQCC).

Single-shot laser technique captures plasma evolution at 100 billion frames per second

Plasma, ionized gas and the fourth state of matter, makes up over 99% of the ordinary matter in the universe. Understanding its properties is critical for developing fusion energy sources, modeling astrophysical objects like stars and improving manufacturing techniques for semiconductors in modern cell phones.

But watching and determining what happens inside high-density plasmas is difficult. Events can unfold in trillionths of a second and behave in complex, unpredictable ways.

In a study published in Optica, researchers at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) developed a new diagnostic that captures evolution in time and space with a single shot. This breakthrough creates plasma movies with 100 billion frames per second, illuminating ultrafast dynamics that were previously impossible to observe.

Google nukes 224 Android malware apps behind massive ad fraud campaign

A massive Android ad fraud operation dubbed “SlopAds” was disrupted after 224 malicious applications on Google Play were used to generate 2.3 billion ad requests per day.

The ad fraud campaign was discovered by HUMAN’s Satori Threat Intelligence team, which reported that the apps were downloaded over 38 million times and employed obfuscation and steganography to conceal the malicious behavior from Google and security tools.

The campaign was worldwide, with users installing the apps from 228 countries and territories, and SlopAds traffic accounting for 2.3 billion bid requests every day. The highest concentration of ad impressions originated from the United States (30%), followed by India (10%) and Brazil (7%).

Pesa: I am happy to report that things are progressing nicely with My Instant AI 🤖

Thanks to some longstanding relationships with senior executives in the prepaid and gift card industry has provided us with some unprecedented opportunities.

Our engineers are hard at work building more AI tools and utilities into the user interface and our administrative management dashboard as well.

It won’t be more than a few weeks before our first distributor is interconnected and starting to sell My Instant AI e-PIN codes.

There are many different ways to sell this product. Some will be selling it in their online stores, using their own sales and payment engines, while pulling PINs from our API in real-time as they are sold.

Others will have carded product that has a value applied to it and then activated at the checkout in a retail environment.

Some mobile phone and wireless network providers are including a card in the box, and preloading a shortcut to our platform as an app on the phone’s home screen.

Tesla AI5 & AI6 Chips “Compressing Reality”?! What Did Elon See?!

Elon Musk has revealed Tesla’s new AI chips, AI5 and AI6, which will drive the company’s shift towards AI-powered services, enabling significant advancements in Full Self-Driving capabilities and potentially revolutionizing the self-driving car industry and beyond.

## Questions to inspire discussion.

Tesla’s AI Chip Advancements.

🚀 Q: What are the key features of Tesla’s AI5 and AI6 chips? A: Tesla’s AI5 and AI6 chips are inference-first, designed for high-throughput and efficient processing of AI models on devices like autos, Optimus, and Grok voice agents, being 40x faster than previous models.

💻 Q: How do Tesla’s AI5 and AI6 chips compare to previous models? A: Tesla’s AI5 chip is a 40x improvement over AI4, with 500 TOPS expanding to 5,000 TOPS, enabling excellent performance in full self-driving and Optimus humanoid robots.

🧠 Q: What is the significance of softmax in Tesla’s AI5 chip? A: AI5 is designed to run softmax natively in a few steps, unlike AI4 which relies on CPU and runs softmax in 40 steps in emulation mode.

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