Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
November 2016
From ACM TechNews
Robots With Warm Skin Know What They're Touching
Georgia Institute of Technology researchers have developed a new kind of robotic skin that incorporates active heating.
From ACM News
Face Electrodes Let You Taste and Chew in Virtual Reality
You're having dinner in a virtual reality game. The banquet scene in front of you looks so real that your mouth is watering.
From ACM News
Five Possible Hacks to Worry About Before Election Day
President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia dismisses the idea that he has the power to interfere with Tuesday's election.
From ACM Careers
Scientists Can Publish Their Best Work at Any Age
Hoping that your next paper will be the big one?
From ACM News
Thanks For the Memory: How Cheap Ram Changes Computing
RAM (random access memory) is a component of every computer system, from tiny embedded controllers to enterprise servers.
From ACM TechNews
New Automatic Forest Fire Detection System By sing Surveillance Drones
Researchers from the Technical University of Madrid in Spain are developing the Forest Fire Detection Index to detect forest fires.
From ACM TechNews
Computer Science/stem Leaders Explain How to Spark STEM Interest in Youth
The time is ripe to encourage science, technology, engineering, and math interest in today's youth, according to scientists leading the SC16 international conference.
From ACM TechNews
Glasses Make Face Recognition Tech Think You're Milla Jovovich
Carnegie Mellon University researchers have designed eyeglasses with patterned frames that can obscure the identity of the wearer to facial-recognition algorithms.
From ACM TechNews
From Dinosaurs to Crime Scenes--How Our New Footprint Software Can Bring the Past to Life
Using three-dimensional technologies, law enforcement can digitally capture the data in a footprint left at the scene of a crime and subject it to detailed forensic analysis.
From ACM TechNews
Machine Learning to Help Physicians
New software from researchers at Germany's Fraunhofer Institute can aid physicians who must visually judge medical images to determine the course of cancer treatment.
From ACM News
How to Block the Ultrasonic Signals You Didn't Know Were Tracking You
Dystopian corporte surveillance threats today come at us from all directions. Companies offer "always-on" devices that listen for our voice commands, and marketers follow us around the web to create personalized user profiles…
From ACM News
Why Light Bulbs May Be the Next Hacker Target
The so-called Internet of Things, its proponents argue, offers many benefits: energy efficiency, technology so convenient it can anticipate what you want, even reduced congestion on the roads.
From ACM News
Getting Past The Ad Blockers
Online consumers use software to block ads; online advertisers can pay to be whitelisted by some ad-blocking software.
From ACM News
Schiaparelli Impact Site on Mars, in Color
On Nov. 1, 2016, the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter observed the impact site of Europe's Schiaparelli test lander, gaining the first color view of the site since…
From ACM News
Automated Cars Could Threaten Jobs of Professional Drivers
Ronald De Feo has watched robots take factory jobs for years. Now he sees them threatening a new class of worker: People who drive for a living.
From ACM TechNews
When Women Are More Like Men, They Still Face STEM Bias
A new study found women with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics degrees in the 1970s—1990s did not have the same employment opportunities as men.
From ACM TechNews
Researchers Aim to Make Digital Assistants Like Siri Less Annoying
Researchers continue to work on developing digital assistant technology that will help run people's lives more smoothly.
From ACM TechNews
The Secret to Small Drone Obstacle Avoidance Is to Just Crash Into Stuff
Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania's GRASP Lab are working to develop autonomous quadcopters that can fly through windows without running into them.
From ACM TechNews
A Tiny Machine
University of California, Santa Barbara researchers have developed a design for a functional nanoscale computing device.
From ACM News
Pasta Spirals Link Neutron Stars and the Machinery of Your Cells
The conditions are vastly different, but the pasta is the same.
From ACM News
Digitizing the Cia: John Brennan's Attempt to Lead America's Spies Into the Age of Cyberwar
When America goes to the polls on Nov. 8, according to current and former U.S. intelligence officials, it will likely experience the culmination of a new form of information war.
From ACM News
New Research Center to Explore Ethics of Artificial Intelligence
The ethics center is being established at a time of growing international concern about the impact of artificial intelligence technologies.
From ACM News
Inside Darpa's Plan to Make Old Aircraft Autonomous With Robot Arms
There's a reason Tesla and its competitors use the term "autopilot" for their semi-autonomous cars: Aviation is way ahead of the auto industry when it comes to making machines handle themselves.
From ACM TechNews
China's Policing Robot: Cattle Prod Meets Supercomputer
Chinese researchers have developed an "intelligent security robot" and deployed it in a Shenzhen airport.
From ACM TechNews
The Kids Who Might Save the Internet
The future of the Internet may lie in the hands of a new generation of computer-savvy children forming a hacker community disposed toward fortifying Web security.
From ACM TechNews
Wearable Health: Exploring Human-Centered Solutions of On-Body Technologies to Improve Healthcare
George Mason University professor Vivian Motti proposes the concept of noninvasive, wearable technologies to improve healthcare, as well as education.
From ACM TechNews
Google Teaches 'ais' to Invent Their Own Crypto and Avoid Eavesdropping
Google Brain researchers say they have developed artificial intelligence technology that can form encryptions and communicate securely.
From ACM TechNews
Making Computers Explain Themselves
Researchers have developed a method for training neural networks so they provide not only predictions and classifications, but also rationales for their decisions.
From ACM TechNews
Paralyzed People Inhabit Distant Robot Bodies With Thought Alone
The European Union's VERE project aims to dissolve the boundary between the human body and a surrogate.
From ACM News
Mexico Taking S Factory Jobs? Blame Robots Instead
Donald Trump blames Mexico and China for stealing millions of jobs from the United States.