computers

Alan Turing, Digital Pioneer

Arts, Culture & Media

Alan Turing’s pioneering vision for computers continues to shape our daily lives, decades after his death.

Robopainter

Arts, Culture & Media
Grace Hopper sits behind the UNIVAC (universal automatic computer) keyboard in the early '60s. As a mathematician and rear admiral in the US Navy, she helped design the UNIVAC I and many other related systems.

New book sheds light on overlooked women pioneers who paved the way for today’s internet

Books
Computer

US finally scores a win against Russian hacking

Justice
A pile of printer parts dusted with toners like carbon black, a probable carcinogen known to cause respiratory problems.

The US is still dumping some of its toxic e-waste overseas

Economics
Happy computer

Take a seat on the virtual couch with computers that can read your emotions

Technology

Laptops of the future will know that you’re stressed. MIT professor Rosalind Picard has been working to make smarter computers that anticipate our needs, and she says that future is closer than you think.

Handwriting

Close your laptop. Handwriting could make you smarter.

Education

You might type notes faster than you write them, but according to research, longhand is better for remembering and synthesizing information.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and US Energy Secretary Dr. Ernest Moniz sit side-by-side on April 2, 2015, in Lausanne, Switzerland, before the P5+1 member nations held a meeting to discuss ongoing nuclear negotiations with Iran.

The Iran nuclear deal wouldn’t have been possible without computer models

Global Politics

The Iran nuclear deal covers thousands of centrifuges and hundreds of kilograms of uranium and many other numbers and portions of substances and technologies. Those numbers are far from random, too. The technical details of the framework agreement were based on complex models developed by the US Department of Energy.

Jean Jennings Bartik (left) and Frances Bilas Spence (right)  were part of a team of six women who programmed the ENIAC.

Finding the forgotten women who programmed the world’s first electronic computer

Technology

Six women programmed ENIAC for the United States Army during World War II, but when the computer was presented to the public, they weren’t even thanked or named. Now a lawyer and filmmaker is trying to set the historical record straight and help rediscover all of science’s forgotten female pioneers.

An aircraft takes off from Heathrow Airport in west London.

A computer glitch paralyzes London’s Heathrow Airport for hours

Technology

British airspace was shut down this afternoon for several hours after a “computer glitch” halted flights to several airports. That included Heathrow, one of Europe’s busiest hubs — and the ripple effect was felt by flyers around the globe.