AI in Computer
Games
Is Cyberspace Getting
Safer?
The Homeland Security Department's National Cyber Security
Division (NCSD) is evaluating the progress of cybersecurity
over the past year and outlining future security projects.
Among the 2003 milestones the NCSD notes is the government's
creation of a critical infrastructure information ...
[read more]
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Software Bug Blamed for
Blackout Alarm Failure
A Feb. 12 statement from industry officials attributes
alarm failures that may have exacerbated last summer's
Northeast power outage to a software glitch in the FirstEnergy
infrastructure. A joint U.S.-Canadian task force probing the
blackout reported in November 2003 that FirstEnergy staffers
...
[read more]
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W3C Wraps Up Semantic Web
Standards
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) declared the Resource
Definition Framework (RDF) and the OWL Web Ontology Language
(OWL) standards for the Semantic Web on Feb. 10. The Semantic
Web was envisioned by W3C director Tim Berners-Lee as a tool
that uses metadata to embed more meaning in data ...
[read more]
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Intel Reports a Research
Leap to a Faster Chip
Intel has developed a prototype of a high-speed
transistor-like device that is able to exploit laser
communications, signaling a transformation in the delivery of
digital information and entertainment. The silicon-based chip
is cheaper and easier to manufacture, and achieves much higher
data rates ...
[read more]
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Airline Passenger Screening
System Faces Delays
A Feb. 12 report from the General Accounting Office (GAO)
indicates that the testing and deployment of the
Transportation Security Administration's (TSA)
Computer-Assisted Passenger PreScreening System (CAPPS II) is
being held up, which could seriously impact the program's
effectiveness. The GAO ...
[read more]
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No More Scrambled Internet
Video or Garbled Audio
Using a three-year, $350,000 Information Technology
Research grant from the National Science Foundation, Marwan
Krunz of the University of Arizona's Electrical and Computer
Engineering department is developing Internet routing software
that could allow ISPs to ensure quality of service by ...
[read more]
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Scientists: The Latest Mac
Converts
The Apple Macintosh has become a favorite of the scientific
community, and is proving essential to projects ranging from
the current NASA Mars mission to bioinformatics to the life
sciences. Matt Golombek of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory
reports that 90 percent of his colleagues employ ...
[read more]
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Smart Software Gives
Surveillance Eyes a 'Brain'
Computer science laboratory researchers at the University
of Rochester have been able to outfit surveillance cameras
with a rudimentary software brain" developed by associate
professor of computer science Randal Nelson. The software
enables the cameras to look for specific objects, such as a
...
[read more]
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Makers Scramble to Put Some
Bend in 'Electric Paper'
Royal Philips Electronics, Gyricon, and the U.S. Army are
just a few of the competitors in a race to build flexible
electronic-paper displays, which could finally turn a corner
with recent breakthroughs in organic electronics and polymer
transistors. Many commercial e-paper products, ...
[read more]
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Web Users Re-Visit in
Steps
In a project funded by IBM and the National Science
Foundation, scientists at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and
State University are studying how people re-find information
on the Web in the hopes of developing tools for retrieving Web
pages faster on a variety of devices, including desktops and
...
[read more]
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Could National Security
Concerns Slow VoIP?
The FCC is expected to soon release proposed regulations to
ascertain whether telecom rules should apply to Voice over
Internet Protocol (VoIP), a critical issue for both the FBI
and VoIP providers. The FBI is concerned that, without
regulation, VoIP will give criminals a tool to circumvent ...
[read more]
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Acxiom Is Watching
You
Privacy advocates are aroused with suspicion and anger that
the government's CAPPS II airline passenger pre-screening
system may have been spawned by retired Army General Wesley
Clark's lobbying efforts on behalf of Acxiom, a data
management company that conceived of a system for ...
[read more]
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Benign Viruses Shine on
the Silicon Assembly Line
MIT associate professor of materials science Angela M.
Belcher is using a benign virus as a scaffolding on which is
grown uniform inorganic crystals that organize into
semiconducting nanowires. Belcher says the virus, whose DNA
has been reprogrammed to attract specific materials, forms
wires of ...
[read more]
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UC San Diego Scientists
Unveil Pilot Project for Automated Monitoring of Animal
Behavior
The goal of UC San Diego's Smart Vivarium Project, which
brings together computer vision, artificial intelligence,
cameras, sensors, and information technology, is to augment
the quality of animal research as well as facilitate better
animal health care. Pilot project leader Serge Belongie ...
[read more]
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The Attractions of
Technology
Engineers and technology professionals like what they are
doing, according to a survey of IEEE members conducted by IEEE
Spectrum and IEEE-USA; more than 75 percent of respondents
said the desire to "invent, build, or design things," as well
as to "solve real-world problems," were their main reasons ...
[read more]
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Grids in the
Enterprise
The enterprise case for grid computing is stronger than
ever with the convergence of commodity components, open-source
system software, and germinating bandwidth, combined with
approximately 40 years of development culminating in the
January announcement of the WS-Resource framework. The ...
[read more]
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Coming Soon to Your IM
Client: Spim
Instant-messaging spam (spim) may not be as widespread as
email spam, but experts believe spim could become just as
problematic as junk email as IM proliferates throughout the
corporate sector: Analyst Sara Radicati estimates that IM is
used as a corporate service by 26 percent of ...
[read more]
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Virtual
Nanotech
Nanotechnology researchers are taking advantage of
increasing computer power to simulate nanoscale materials,
structures, and devices to test their properties, optimal
configurations, and practical uses before they are fabricated,
thus saving a lot of physical trial and error. For ...
[read more]
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AI in Computer
Games
Artificial intelligence (AI) technology used in computer
games is distinct from AI used in academic projects, since the
academic AI approach consumes too many resources for game
development, refinement, and testing; in addition, most AI
research carries few practical benefits for gaming, but ...
[read more]
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