Communications of the ACM
An edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.
From ACM News
2013 Chemistry Nobel Goes to Computer Modeling of Chemical Reactions
What is actually happening at the atomic scale when two elements react?
From ACM News
How the Fifa 14 Soccer Video Game Finally Got Its Physics Right
When the soccer video game FIFA 14 went on sale last week, it boasted a ball that, at long last, could sail smartly through the air.
From ACM News
Cache and Not Carry: Next Mars Rover to Collect Samples For Return to Earth—someday
Have rover, need payload. That's the state of things for NASA, which is planning to launch its next rover to Mars in 2020.
From ACM News
Integrating Left Brain and Right, on a Computer
As computers have matured over time, the human brain has no way of keeping up with silicon's rapid-fire calculating abilities.
From ACM News
Manage Your Smart Home with a Single Gesture
Our homes will get a lot smarter in the coming years, allowing us to use a smartphone to manage an integrated system of appliances and other electronics from any...
From ACM News
How Social Media Is Changing Disaster Response
When Hurricane Katrina ravaged the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005, Facebook was the new kid on the block. There was no Twitter for news updates, and the iPhone was not...
From ACM Opinion
When Will Smartglasses and Other Wearable Computers Hit the Mainstream?
Google has stoked our collective imagination via relentless promotion of its Google Glass wearable computer in recent months.
From ACM News
In the Fog of Battle Acoustic Sensors Pinpoint Gunfire By Measuring Air Movement
Sensors originally designed to alert pilots of single-engine planes to the location of nearby aircraft are instead finding a military role locating unseen battle...
From ACM News
The Reading Brain in the Digital Age: The Science of Paper Versus Screens
In a viral YouTube video from October 2011 a one-year-old girl sweeps her fingers across an iPad's touchscreen, shuffling groups of icons.
From ACM Opinion
Is High-Tech Security at Public Events Counterproductive?
Which is more intrusive: security screening and metal detectors every few blocks, or a drone flying high above it taking video of every little thing you do?
From ACM News
Crash Course: Training the Brain of a Driverless Car
Early attempts at driverless cars have had little difficulty gathering the loads of data required to operate autonomously.
From ACM News
Small Gadgets That Make You Healthier
At any moment, someone in the U.S. most likely is having an asthma attack.
From ACM Opinion
When Will the Internet Reach Its Limit (and How Do We Stop It from Happening)?
The number of smartphones, tablets and other network-connected gadgets will outnumber humans by the end of the year.
From ACM Opinion
Bluebrain: Noah Hutton's 10-Year Documentary About the Mission to Reverse Engineer the Human Brain
"Nothing quite like it exists yet, but we have begun building it," Henry Markram wrote in the June 2012 issue of Scientific American. He was referring to a "fantastic...
From ACM News
Gps-Free Tech Can Track Miners' and Soldiers' Boots nderground
A mining crew is trapped deep underground after a cave-in. Firefighters run into a smoke-spewing high-rise to battle a violent blaze. A team of soldiers breaches...
From ACM News
Virtues of the Virtual Autopsy
Once a common medical procedure, the standard autopsy is passing out of use.
From ACM News
Information Nation: Digital Social Experiment to Put a Human Face on Big Data
Imagine seeing life through one eyeball but then being given the ability to view the world through two or even three eyeballs at once.
From ACM News
Coning In: New Ways to Tap Old Data Boost Hurricane Forecast Accuracy
Despite advances in weather prediction technology, meteorologists must still qualify any hurricane forecasts with a "cone of uncertainty," which depicts just how...
From ACM News
Instant Health Checks For Buildings and Bridges
During 2011's deadly onslaught of earthquakes, floods and tornadoes, countless buildings had to be evacuated while workers checked to make sure they were stable...
From ACM TechNews