This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. We’re consuming toxic chemicals. Now we need to figure out how they’re affecting us. What are chemical pollutants doing to our bodies? It’s a timely question given that last week, people in Philadelphia…

31 March 2023

To say that semiconductor technology is part of the fabric of modern society is not an overstatement—it underpins everything from our cars to our phones to our home appliances.  In 2021, the semiconductor industry shipped a record 1.15 trillion chips, and sales topped half a trillion dollars worldwide, while thousands of new chip designs entered…

31 March 2023

This article is from The Checkup, MIT Technology Review’s weekly biotech newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Thursday, sign up here. What are chemical pollutants doing to our bodies? It’s a question that’s been on my mind this week, for a few reasons. Last week, people in Philadelphia cleared grocery shelves of bottled…

31 March 2023

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Inside the cozy but creepy world of VR sleep rooms People are gathering in virtual spaces to relax, and even sleep, with their headsets on. VR sleep rooms are becoming popular among people…

30 March 2023

This article is from The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up here. I spent last week in Washington, DC, and when I wasn’t fawning over the cherry blossoms, I was soaking up all the newest and wildest ideas in energy.  The Advanced Research Projects Agency…

30 March 2023

Lo-fi chill music was playing in the distance. Shooting stars sliced through the sparkling galaxy overhead. I was defying physics, hovering in space, on my back. Relaxed, I yawned and stretched, my fist punching a pillow that I had forgotten about. I was, of course, not in space. Physically, I was on a chaise in…

29 March 2023

As the emergence of radically disruptive technologies over the last decades has created, destroyed, or fundamentally changed many business models, most organizations have undergone some kind of digital transformation in response. Many have been reluctant, however, to acknowledge the degree to which they need to disrupt their standard way of working to succeed in this…

29 March 2023

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Chinese creators use Midjourney’s AI to generate retro urban “photography” Across social media, a number of creators are generating nostalgic photographs of China with the help of AI. Even though these images get…

29 March 2023

China Report is MIT Technology Review’s newsletter about technology developments in China. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Tuesday. If you saw these images pop up on your timeline, would you be able to tell if they were real photographs of the southwestern city of Chongqing in the 1990s? In fact, none of them…

29 March 2023

The industrial metaverse—a metaverse sector that mirrors and simulates real machines, factories, cities, transportation networks, and other highly complex systems—will offer to its participants fully immersive, real-time, interactive, persistent, and synchronous representations and simulations of the real world.  Existing and developing technologies, including digital twins, artificial intelligence and machine learning, extended reality, blockchain, and cloud…

29 March 2023