Mouse Embryos, the Boundaries of Life, and AI-Generated Pickup Lines: Lux Recommends #271
Welcome to Lux Recommends #271, this week’s edition of what we at Lux are reading and thinking about (want to receive this by email? Sign up here).
Articles
Scientists Grow Mouse Embryos in a Mechanical Womb: “Biologists have long held that a fetus needs a living uterus to develop. Maybe not anymore.” — Deena
Using artificial intelligence to generate 3D holograms in real-time: “A new method called tensor holography could enable the creation of holograms for virtual reality, 3D printing, medical imaging, and more — and it can run on a smartphone.” — Cameron
The Pastry A.I. That Learned to Fight Cancer: “In Japan, a system designed to distinguish croissants from bear claws has turned out to be capable of a whole lot more.” — Deena
40 of America’s Most Impressive Feats of Engineering: “From canals to bridges and rockets to roads, engineering in America has plenty to offer.” — friend of Lux Tom Kane
COVID‐19 shifts mortality salience, activities, and values in the United States: Big data analysis of online adaptation — Deena
Cancer has a smell. Someday your phone may detect it: “Our sense of smell is still a mystery. But that’s not stopping research on robot noses.” — friend of Lux Daniel Schatzman
Wormholes Open for Transport — Deena
Cosmic Chameleon: Hubble Telescope Captures Saturn Changing Colour Due to Seasonal Variations on the Ringed Planet — Adam K
GPT-3 tries pickup lines: Hilarious. — Sam
Rockstar: “Rockstar is a computer programming language designed for creating programs that are also hair metal power ballads.” — friend of Lux Guy Perelmuter
Bitcoin mining boom adds to chip price inflation — Lux friend Nicky Sid
How A Building Block Of Life Got Created In A Flash — Deena
Virtual Lab Finds the Right AI Tool for Each Chemistry Problem — Adam G
MIT’s New Artificial Intelligence Algorithm Designs Soft Robots That Sense — Deena
Lena: A fictional article about the first computational image of a human brain. Thought-provoking. — Sam
Books
Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth by Avi Loeb: “In late 2017, scientists at a Hawaiian observatory glimpsed an object soaring through our inner solar system, moving so quickly that it could only have come from another star. Avi Loeb, Harvard’s top astronomer, showed it was not an asteroid; it was moving too fast along a strange orbit, and left no trail of gas or debris in its wake. There was only one conceivable explanation: the object was a piece of advanced technology created by a distant alien civilization.” — Sam
Life’s Edge: The Search for What It Means to Be Alive by Carl Zimmer: “Carl Zimmer investigates one of the biggest questions of all: What is life? The answer seems obvious until you try to seriously answer it. Is the apple sitting on your kitchen counter alive, or is only the apple tree it came from deserving of the word? If we can’t answer that question here on earth, how will we know when and if we discover alien life on other worlds?” — Sam
Movies
Judas and the Black Messiah: “Bill O’Neal infiltrates the Black Panther Party per FBI Agent Mitchell and J. Edgar Hoover. As Party Chairman Fred Hampton ascends, falling for a fellow revolutionary en route, a battle wages for O’Neal’s soul.” — Adam G
Videos
If rockets were transparent — Adam K
A drone pilot has captured incredible footage of a volcano erupting in Iceland— Shaq
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