Category Archives: Singularity

With the conclusion of the Infinity Saga and the exits of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has more question marks than its had in years. And with a dearth of real information, rumors are flying about whats in store for the future of the franchise.

The latest tantalizing piece of potential information concerns Captain Marvel. Showbiz CheatSheet, citing current narrative projections in the MCU and leaks from Marvel insiders, reports that in addition to the long-rumored A-Force, Captain Marvel is the natural choice to lead another rumored superhero team: The Ultimates.

Marvel head Kevin Feige has said that Captain Marvel will be a core piece of the puzzle moving forward, and leading both the all-female A-Force and the mixed-gender Ultimates would certainly make that a promise kept.

The A-Force came to be in a short-lived comic series published in 2015 and 2016. It includes Captain Marvel, Medusa, She-Hulk, Singularity, Nico Minoru, and Dazzler Thor.

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She-Hulk is coming to her own Disney+ series. Jane Foster is taking on the mantle of Mighty Thor inThor: Love and Thunder. It would make sense to put Captain Marvel, a character played by an Oscar winner who already has a solo Marvel film under her belt, at the head of the team of characters whove already debuted in the MCU.

Like the A-Force, The Ultimates was also a limited comic book series published in the early aughts. It currently counts Black Panther, Ms. America (who will reportedly appear in a Disney+ show), Spectrum (who appeared inCaptain Marvel), and Blue Marvel as members. With the exception of the latter, an Ultimates movie would have the same advantage of featuring characters who already exist in the MCU.

It also seems likely that Marvel wants to get Captain Marvel and Black Panther on screen together, and an Ultimates movie would be a relatively easy way to do so.

Alas, however, these are just rumors, and whats at least as likely as an elaborate secret plan already being hatched is that Feige and company are still making decisions about the future.

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Captain Marvel Might Be Leading Two Superhero Teams in Future MCU Films - Fatherly

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Captain Marvel #14, by Kelly Thompson, Lee Garbett, Tamra Bonvillain and VC's Clayton Cowles, on sale now.

Vox Supreme, the powerful mutated Kree who nearly destroyed the Inhumans, is using Captain Marvel to kill her fellow Avengers in a bid to get their genetic material. Threatening the lives of innocents all around the world with a series of hidden bombs, the villain has forced Carol intoa new costume through which he can monitor her actions to ensure her compliance. However, Captain Marvel hasproven tricky so far, hiding Thor and Tony Stark/Iron Man inside Singularity's pocket dimension and substituting clones for her comrades to buy time as she figures out how to diffuse Vox Supreme's bombs.

As she continues her quest in Captain Marvel#14,Carol comes face to face with an Avenger she might not be able to match: Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk.

RELATED:X-Men: Whats In Marvels Next Wave of Mutant Comics

After explaining the situation to Thor and Tony in Singularity, Carol reports back to Vox Supreme, who threatens to kill more innocents if she doesn't work faster. The villain suspects Captain Marvel is attempting to undermine his operation due to the time she's spent in Singularity, where he's unable to monitor her. Ultimately, though, he decides he's still getting what he wants. His plans for the clones isn't entirely clear, but their genetic material is indeed furthering some nefarious goal.

Captain Marvel proceeds to pursue her next target: Avengers chairman T'Challa/Black Panther. Heading to find Black Panther just outside of Palo Alto,the Wakandan hero gets the jump on Carol, blasting her out of the sky. However, since he doesn't know his attacker is Captain Marvel due to her new suit, he's caught off guard by her immense powers and is knocked out.

That's when She-Hulk arrives.

RELATED: Marvel's She-Hulk Show Reportedly Starts Filming This Summer

Created by Stan Lee and John Buscema, Walters first appeared in 1980's Savage She-Hulk #1. She got her powers after receiving a blood transfusion from Bruce Banner/Hulk, her cousin. Although she's not as powerful as her unstoppable cousin in most conditions, She-Hulk is still incredibly formidable and retains more of her personality and sense. Currently, she's a member of the main Avengers team and has proven herself an absolute powerhouse in their battles.

When She-Hulk comes on the scene inCaptain Marvel#14, she hits Carol with a massive punch that sends her flying. Captain Marvel immediately admits that she wasn't expecting to take on She-Hulk.

With the clock ticking before Vox Supreme kills more innocents, Captain Marvel will now have to fight She-Hulk and subdue her long enough to get both her and Black Panther into Singularity. Jennifer Walters is definitely someone you don't want to fight without a plan, but Captain Marvel's anonymity may give her a major advantage. However, even if she does succeed, Carol is only making Vox Supreme stronger and furthering his malicious plans by bringing him Avengers clones. So unless she can figure out a solution soon, she'll have even bigger problems than a Hulk.

Captain Marvel #15 releases Feb. 19 from Marvel Comics.

KEEP READING:Captain America and Cyclops Join Marvel Snapshots in April

Did the DC Universe Just Get Rebooted... Again?

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Captain Marvel Faces the ONE Avenger Who Can Stop Her Rampage - CBR - Comic Book Resources

Bells ring out to mark a new day dawning on Arcadia, the quiet island of Battleworld where Marvel's mightiest women reside. As She-Hulk takes over command from the night shift, a team led by Captain Marvel patrols to ensure the island's safety. Carefree, the fliers, including Dazzler, Nico Minoru, and America Chavez, soar out over the ocean.

From the depths a megalodon appears, snapping its gnarly teeth at our fearless heroes and snagging America's hoodie. As she is dragged deep underwater, the team fights the giant shark, defending the people of Arcadia and trying to limit damage to their community. America wrestles free, Dazzler wounds the beast, and a very miffed America decides she doesn't need some megalodon stinking up the place, lifting it over her head and chucking it as far as she can.

America has saved everyone, but that doesn't matter in Battleworld, a land ruled and held together by the will of God Emperor Doom. Doom's laws are immutable and the consequences for breaking them weighty. The Thors who are essentially Doom's cops on Battleworld arrive and arrest America, taking her from her home, her people, and the family she has with Loki (in a female form) and Nico.

She-Hulk tries to fight for America to be allowed to stay but is met with draconian claims about law and order and the command that she do her job as Baroness of Arcadia. But it seems like Doom and his lackeys don't remember which giant green badass they're messing with.

Written by G. Willow Wilson and Marguerite Bennett, with pencils by Jorge Molina, inks by Jorge Molina and Craig Yeung, colors by Laura Martin and Matt Milla, and letters by Cory Petit, 2015's A-Force boasts the first all-female Avengers team. The events of the five-issue series take place as a part of Marvel's "Secret Wars" crossover event during which all the various universes that exist within the Marvel comics are destroyed and the surviving pieces of reality are cobbled together to form Battleworld.

Each domain of Battleworld looks completely different, and there are multiple versions of your favorite heroes living in different domains. In Arcadia, the all-female Avengers, who call themselves A-Force, live peacefully in their little feminist utopia. That is until the fateful day America is arrested and imprisoned.

This beloved series made FANGRRLS favorite comics of the decade list, and after "Secret Wars" ended the series lived on as A-Force (2016), continuing the story back in the non-Battleworld Marvel universe.

When the aforementioned giant shark is followed in quick succession by the arrival of a universe incarnated as a girl and a Sentinel (of X-Men fame), it becomes apparent that someone is trying to destabilize Arcadia. If She-Hulk wasn't already pissed, these additional anomalies make her angry enough to risk incurring Doom's wrath exploring one of the portals that open up over Arcadia. Her exploration leads her to discover the traitor in A-Force's midst: Loki.

With the Thors descending on Arcadia and Loki wresting control from She-Hulk, our heroes flee. In the process, Medusa is killed by the Thors and Singularity hides A-Force inside her she is a pocket universe after all. They eventually return and expose Loki for the power-hungry jerk she is, but not before Loki tears down the wall keeping the undead separate from the living. The forces of Arcadia fight back the surging hordes of death incarnate with Singularity's help, seemingly killing her in the process.

Arcadia is never the same after the events of A-Force. Where She-Hulk believed she was building a garden, a paradise away from the terrors of Battleworld, she finds that just under the surface is rot the rot of corruption, the rot of authoritarianism, the rot of a utopia based in lies. And once that rot is revealed, it's impossible to pretend it's not there. From complacency to feminist revolution and back again, A-Force is a story about how we delude ourselves into thinking everything is fine, but when we pay attention, we find ourselves in a complicated web of power, deceit, and cruelty, whether in a fictional story or IRL today.

Utopias aren't real in part because they are so hard to maintain. What makes for a perfect life? The answer depends on who you are, both in terms of your power and privilege and in terms of your personality. And how do you maintain that perfect life when some people aren't pleased with their station within it? Doom's solution an exacting and unquestionable system that metes out punishment without regard for context or cause works, but it only works for some, as becomes apparent in other "Secret Wars" stories.

If A-Force represents feminism within an imperfect world created by Doom (aka the patriarchy), then by extension, there is also a traitor in our midst. Until we are all committed to making our feminism anti-racist, queer-inclusive, trans-celebratory, fat-loving, anti-ableist, and so much more, we are the traitors we worry about. We are as power-hungry as Loki if we are unwilling to use our privilege to change the world.

After all, a feminist utopia that relies on extreme punishment, incarceration, and bowing to a patriarch is no utopia at all.

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A-Force brought a feminist utopia to life only to reveal its flaws - SYFY WIRE

Flying to the shelves this week from Marvel Comics,Captain Marvel #14 delves deeper into Kelly Thompsons The Last Avenger story arc with our favorite half-Kree hero.

Captain Marvel #14is a lot lighter in tone than the last two issues. This is mostly due to how much weve figured out at this point. With new light shed on Carols plan, fans can smile again knowing the good Captain has not actually gone rogue.

While Carols methods have been ruthless and unforgiving, her reasons have finally become clear. With this new villain mashup Vox Supreme puppeteering her every move, Carol has to be careful and quick thinking. Especially with the lives of countless Kree refugees at stake.

From the start, this issue follows a different pace from the previous two. We dont jump into Carol pounding on her next Avenger target hard and fast like before. In fact, we actually start with a little humor instead.

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Thompson seems to be slowly adjusting her readers (and potentially herself) back to a comfort zone after shocking them in issue #12 with what seemed to be Carol killing Thor. Its an interesting way to present this to us. First, shock the fans and grab the attention of the public in general. Then slowly bring us back to her usual style and so the old fans are comfortable and the newcomers see what shes all about.

After establishing what Carols working with as her plan right now, we do get back to her taking on her next target. Since we now know its all a ruse, it loses that dark tone, but Vox Supreme makes up for it in a few ways.

For starters, Voxs design is just eerie overall. His method of forcing Carol into doing this is somewhat cookie-cutter for villains, but it is still effective. Especially since hes detonated one his bombs from the start.

Theres just something about sickly neon green accenting black that just yells EVIL

What we now have is a story that is still very different from Thompsons usual works but is still familiar enough to not feel completely foreign. But most importantly, is the story still interesting now that the question is Captain Marvel going to kill all of the Avengers? has been answered?

The honest answer is yes. While the hook was Evil Carol what we have now is the mystery of this new villains full plan. What is Vox Supremes goal? Why did he appear now? And why is he using Carol specifically?

Captain Marvel #14even makes these questions more apparent. Tony and Carol are both unsure what to make of it. Carol even attempts to dig at Voxs plans before he shuts her out completely. We havent been given much to work with ourselves in figuring it out, and even though shes clearly not evil, Carol is still fighting the Avengers. This is still an active hook for the series.

Visually this comic is no slouch either. Each character shown has very defining features that stand out in their design. Thors monstrous upper body contrasts with Tonys smaller physique but Tonys overall more put together compared to Thor looking so rough. Carol, on the other hand, looks tired. Yes, the large shadows around her eyes really bring that home but more than that her expressions have this distaste to them.

This image kind of sums up the above paragraph.

The colors for this issue by Tamra Bonvillain are well decided on. Voxs pallet reminds me of a can of Monster Energy Drink, which is both weird and cool given his overall design. The backgrounds are very immersive from the space theme inside Singularity, to the vast dry area of Northern California.

Captain Marvel #14is lettered by VCs Clayton Cowles who also adds to the contrast between Tony and Thor. Thor is expressed very loud and bombastic while Tony, entirely because Carol damaged his windpipe, is struggling to speak at all.

This was a necessary issue to take a break from most of the nonstop action the previous two had. It explains the situation Carol is in more while also leaving us with many more questions on where we go from here.

This story arc has been fairly welcoming to anyone who may not have kept up withCaptain Marvelin recent times. Id still recommend checking out Thompsons entire run with the character, as well as her other works. But anyone with an interest in the story arc alone can jump right intoCaptain Marvel #12 with average knowledge of the Marvel Universe and go from there.

I hope to see Carol continue to take on the remaining Avengers almost as a test to see if she could. But I am more interested in knowing where the grand scheme of this tale is leading. As such I will continue to look forward to each issue and I still recommend checking this story out for anyone who hasnt.

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CAPTAIN MARVEL #14 Gives Us Answers But Then More Questions. - Monkeys Fighting Robots

VENTURA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--XponentialWorks, a venture, advisory and product development firm, announced today its sponsoring of the annual Abundance 360 Summit, which will be held in Beverly Hills on January 19-21. An arm of Singularity University, Abundance 360 is Peter H. Diamandis' membership-only community of unique exponential entrepreneurs.

Abundance 360 Beverly Hills is an opportunity for members to preview technologies and trends that are transforming our lives and speeding up the pace of technological advancement. Diamandis and XponentialWorks founder Avi Reichental are among the tech leaders who will guide discussions on how artificial intelligence, networks, digital manufacturing and robotics are transforming our world with the power to alter how we live, work and play.

The on-site XponentialWorks Tech Hub will also offer participants a place to have in-depth conversations with cutting-edge companies across AI, virtual and augmented reality, robotics, and experience hands-on hardware and software demonstrations. Among the companies showcasing their technologies at the XponentialWorks Tech Hub are Nexa3D, Kobotix, Arcimoto and Jenavi.

President Kennedy declared the first moonshot in the 1960s, and this years Abundance 360 will provide participants with the same kind of inspiration to embrace technologies and generate exponential leaps in their own projects, said Peter H. Diamandis. For the second year, I have the privilege to work with Avi Reichental and XponentialWorks to provide insight on how to maximize these technologies and boldly experiment to make the future a reality. The XponentialWorks Tech Hub, in particular, will allow members to engage with inventive companies, giving participants a hands-on experience in experimenting with these technologies.

We are very excited to once again partner with Peter Diamandis in sponsoring Abundance 360 at the start of a new decade, said Avi Reichental, Founder of XponentialWorks. Peters work is cutting edge, and its always an honor and a privilege to work alongside him on this annual event. I look forward to hearing the ideas participants develop out of their involvement at this extraordinary event."

About XponentialWorks

XponentialWorks is a venture investment, corporate advisory and product development company, specializing in artificial intelligence, digital manufacturing, 3D printing, robotics, and the digital transformation of traditional businesses. As a curator of leaders in Industry 4.0, the firm has built a unique ecosystem that unites the forces of early-stage companies with the experience and deep market knowledge of mature companies. XponentialWorks mentors and invests in the growth and success of promising early stage companies and acts as an edge organization for the benefit of larger, mid-market companies undertaking digital transformation. Learn more at https://xponentialworks.com.

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XponentialWorks Partners With Singularity University to Sponsor the 2020 Abundance 360 Beverly Hills Summit - Business Wire

Team Singularity, the Danish esports organization, has announced they have signed a new Danish roster. The organization told the world that they wanted to return to their roots, without making it an academy team. The mission to find the right squad took longer than expected, but the now formalized team is set to take on 2020 as Singularity EU.

Joining Team Singularity are several amateur pro Danish players. The Danish scene is ripe with potential CSGO superstars, and this team has claimed a few names. The new Singularity roster consists of:

One of the recognizable names on this team is Mertz, who was recently part of the Heroic line-up before they made roster changes in November. As for the rest of them, they have played with and against each other. For example, TOBIZ and Casle have a history of working alongside each other in Dust2 tournaments.

With Singularity looking to get on their feet immediately, they may have found the right team to do it. Peter Casle Toftbo Ardenskjold, coach & team manager said: The idea is to have a team of mass firepower, a calm IGL with a clear plan and who listens to me a lot as a coach. Two stars if you will and then two players with a lot of development potential who are ready to become stars of the future.

This roster is Team Singularitys second CSGO team, as they operate a team in the North American region. Both teams will represent the organization and will aim to compete at relevant tournaments as fully supported teams.

This is exciting times for the Danish scene, which has one of the most unique and strongest talent pools available. Several months ago, Tricked Esports sold their roster Mad_Lions and picked up a new roster this week. Meanwhile, North has changed their branding to match its Scandinavian identity. The continued investment in the region only shows the strength of Denmarks output into esports.

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Singularity Acquire Danish Roster, Return to their Roots - Hotspawn

Scientific progress is not usually straightforward. Researchers pursue and abandon lines of inquiry. Results languish. Theories take decades to cohere.

But sometimes the accumulation of scientific knowledge proceeds more directly, with one discovery triggering the next like a cascade of dominoes.

Thats been the case recently with the mathematical study of fluid mechanics. A startling experimental discovery in 2013 set in motion a series of mathematical proofs that have unsettled centuries of thinking.

Its been a very dynamic and exciting story, said Alexander Kiselev, a mathematician at Duke University and a coauthor of one of the proofs.

The discoveries center on the Euler equations, posed by Leonhard Euler in 1757. Mathematicians and physicists have used them to model how fluids evolve over time. If you toss a rock into a still pond, how will the water be moving five seconds later? The Euler equations can tell you.

Though, not literally. The Euler equations describe an idealized world in which fluids have a number of properties not found in reality. The equations assume, for example, that fluids have no viscosity (internal currents dont create friction as they move past one another) and that theyre incompressible (you cant squeeze a fluid into a smaller space than it already occupies).

Within this idealized world, the equations use Newtons laws of motion to predict the future states of a fluid. Ultimately, mathematicians who study the Euler equations want to know whether the equations always work. Are there scenarios that effectively cause the equations to crash and prevent them from describing a fluid any further into the future?

In 2013, a pair of mathematicians seemed to find such a scenario. Thomas Hou of the California Institute of Technology and Guo Luo, now of the City University of Hong Kong, were running numerical simulations on a computer. They provided a numerical description of the initial state of a fluid and let the computer apply the Euler equations to determine the fluids motion in the future.

Hou and Luo focused on a particular scenario that you could nearly simulate at home. But first, to help think about the surprisingly complicated ways in which fluids can flow, lets consider a scenario you really can try at home.

Imagine a flat-bottomed, cylindrical cup full of tea, with some tea leaves that have settled at the bottom. Now stir the tea clockwise. At first the whole fluid rotates almost as a single body, sweeping the leaves along for the ride.

As the stirring proceeds, though, the centrifugal force of the rotating liquid interacts with the side of the cup to create what physicists call a secondary flow a more complicated motion that arises in response to the initial motion of the stirring. These secondary flows, which go down at the sides of the cylinder and up at the center, are evident in the motion of the tea leaves: They collect in the center at the bottom of the cup and then remain practically stationary even as the tea around them continues to swirl.

The phenomenon, observed for centuries, is called the tea leaf paradox. In 1926 Albert Einstein provided the first mathematical explanation for this behavior.

The scenario that Hou and Luo considered is slightly more complicated. Again, imagine a fluid in a cylinder. This time, the fluid in the top half of the cylinder is rotating clockwise, as in the tea cup, but in the bottom half its rotating counterclockwise. The motions produce several secondary flows. Eddies develop, in the form of swirls running up and down the sides of the cylinder.

From the top the fluid is spiraling down, and from the bottom it is swirling up in the opposite direction, Hou said.

As Hou and Luo ran their numerical simulation, they observed something surprising happening halfway down the cup, right where the conflicting flows came together. The Euler equations reported that the vorticity (or spin) of the fluid at that point was amplifying dramatically. In fact, their simulation showed that according to the Euler equations, the vorticity at that point was growing so fast that it was on track to become infinite in a finite amount of time.

Such infinite values are known as singularities. If the Euler equations were to produce a singularity, theyd break down mathematicians call it blowing up and would no longer be able to describe the future motion of a fluid. This is because the equations cant compute with infinite quantities.

Hou and Luos discovery caused a sensation. For more than 200 years, mathematicians had hunted for scenarios in which the Euler equations faltered. Many had performed numerical simulations that they thought were on track to produce singularities, but none held up under repeated experimentation with faster computers. Hou and Luo finally seemed to have found one that would stick.

Many researchers believe that this is the most convincing singularity scenario we have, said Vladimir Sverak of the University of Minnesota.

But a computer simulation is merely evidence. Its not a proof.

Computers are limited in the sense that they cannot go to the infinitesimal scale, Kiselev said. The result could look very convincing, but you dont know. Maybe if you get a better supercomputer you see things start to disintegrate.

So mathematicians rushed to see if they could prove that what Hou and Luo had observed was really occurring mathematically.

Kiselev and Sverak learned about the simulation in 2013, during a presentation by Hou at a summer workshop at Stanford University. It prompted them to begin working on an important open problem about the rate at which vorticity grows in two-dimensional fluids. They managed to prove a long-conjectured property of the growth rate by considering a version of the scenario Hou and Luo had used in their simulation.

Mathematicians had spent a long time searching for such a useful scenario Hou and Luos simulation suggested to Kiselev and Sverak where they might find one.

It was sort of like having a target to aim for, Kiselev said. Its one thing if youre hunting and you dont even see your target. Its another thing when you know where it is.

Subsequent proofs over the years have extended the mathematical understanding of singularity formation in the Euler equations. In 2019, Tarek Elgindi of the University of California, San Diego, (along with his collaborators Tej-eddine Ghoul and Nader Masmoudi) published two proofs detailing circumstances in which the Euler equations produced singularities. The earlier paper by Kiselev and Sverak was one of the starting points for his work.

Elgindis proofs involve slightly specialized conditions and fall short of the complete understanding of singularity formation within the Euler equations that mathematicians seek. Still, they are among the strongest results ever achieved in the discipline. Quanta described the work in our recent feature Famous Fluid Equations Spring a Leak.

In the same way that eddies in a stream alter downstream currents, Elgindis work itself prompted a new round of mathematical discovery. In October 2019, Hou and Jiajie Chen adapted some of Elgindis methods to create a rigorous mathematical proof of a scenario closely related to the one in the 2013 experiment. They proved that in this slightly modified scenario, the singularity theyd observed forming in the Euler equations really does occur.

They took [Elgindis] ideas and applied them to the scenario from 2013, Sverak said. The circle was complete.

Theres still more work to be done, of course. Hous new proof has some technical qualifications that prevent it from establishing the existence of the singularity in the exact situation he modeled in 2013. But after a remarkable six-year run and with renewed momentum, Hou believes hell soon surmount those challenges, too.

I think were very close, he said.

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For Fluid Equations, a Steady Flow of Progress - Quanta Magazine

Among the many things weve become addicted to on our smartphones is checking the weather. If youre anything like me, you open a weather app at least twice a day: in the morning to know what to expect for the day ahead, maybe before your commute home so you can prepare for possible rain or snow, and sometimes before bed to get an idea of what to wear or what activities to plan for the next day. Depending where you live, how much time you spend outside, and how prone your area is to rapid weather changes, maybe you check the forecast even more frequently than that.

The fact that our phones now contain hour-by-hour breakdowns of temperature and likelihood of precipitation means we can be well-informed and well-prepared. But these forecasts are coming at a greater cost than we know, and theyre not always right.

On Monday, a post on Googles AI blog shared a machine learning method the company is developing for weather prediction. Google calls the technique nowcasting because its set up to predict weather zero to six hours ahead of time, and is focused around weather events like thunderstorms that can quickly morph from clear skies to heavy rains to gusting wind and back again.

By simplifying its methodology and actually using less data than existing forecasting techniques, the company believes it can give us accurate, timely weather predictions, especially ones relating to precipitation.

One of the biggest problems with existing forecasting is the amount of data it incorporates, and the amount of computing power needed to process and make sense of all that data. The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) alone collects 100 terabytes of data per day. Its input to forecasting models that simulate everything from atmospheric dynamics and thermal radiation to lake and ocean effects.

The forecasting engines run on supercomputers, but theyre limited by their heavy need for computing power. According to Googles blog post, computational demands limit weather prediction to a spatial resolution of about 5 kilometers (3.1 miles), and the simulations take several hours to run. If, for example, it takes six hours to compute a forecast, that allows only three to four runs per day and results in forecasts based on data thats six hours old or more.

Google presents its method as being far simpler, describing it as highly localized, data-driven, physics-free, and low-latency. Essentially, the method turns weather forecasting into a computer vision problem; based on progressive images of the formation and movement of clouds over a short time period, a machine learning algorithm predicts how the pattern will evolve over the subsequent few hours.

Specifically, Google uses a convolutional neural network (CNN), a type of deep learning algorithm whose architecture is particularly conducive to image analysis. The physics-free descriptor means the neural network learns only from its training data and doesnt incorporate knowledge of how the atmosphere works; all it has to go off of are patterns it identifies in the images its fed.

Google points out that from a computing power perspective, this method is much more economical than existing forecast techniques, especially once the model is already trained. The company claims its algorithm can generate forecasts that have a one-kilometer resolution with a latency of five to ten minutes.

When compared to three common forecasting modelsthe NOAAs high resolution rapid refresh numerical forecast, an optical flow algorithm, and a persistence modelGoogle claims the precision of its method outperformed all of these for prediction timespans of less than five to six hours, emphasizing that low latency makes its predictions effectively instantaneous.

So instead of checking the weather on our phones a couple times a day or every few hours, it may not be long before we can access accurate forecasts every minute.

We could also just look out the windowor put our phones down and go for a walk outside.

Image Credit: Image by _Alicja_ from Pixabay

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How Google's New Weather AI Will Make Sure You Never Get Caught in the Rain - Singularity Hub

As you know if youve ever been to, heard of, or read about the annual Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, theres no shortage of tech in any form: gadgets, gizmos, and concepts abound. You probably couldnt see them all in a month even if you spent all day every day trying.

Given the sheer scale of the show, the number of exhibitors, and the inherent subjectivity of bestowing superlatives, its hard to pick out the coolest tech from CES. But Im going to do it anyway; in no particular order, here are some of the products and concepts that I personally found most intriguing at this years event.

Italian startup e-Novias Weart glove uses a sensing core to record tactile sensations and an actuation core to reproduce those sensations onto the wearers skin. Haptic gloves will bring touch to VR and AR experiences, making them that much more life-like. The tech could also be applied to digitization of materials and in gaming and entertainment.

I expected a full glove, but in fact there were two rings that attached to my fingers. Weart co-founder Giovanni Spagnoletti explained that theyre taking a modular approach, so as to better tailor the technology to different experiences. He then walked me through a virtual reality experience that was a sort of simulated science experiment: I had to lift a glass beaker, place it on a stove, pour in an ingredient, open a safe to access some dry ice, add that, and so on. As I went through the steps, I felt the beaker heat up and cool off at the expected times, and felt the liquid moving inside, as well as the pressure of my fingertips against the numbered buttons on the safe.

There was a slight delay between my taking an action and feeling the corresponding tactile sensation, but on the whole, the haptic glove definitely made the experience more realisticand more fun. Slightly less fun but definitely more significant, Spagnoletti told me Weart is working with a medical group to bring tactile sensations to VR training for surgeons.

Sarcos Robotics unveiled its Guardian XO full-body exoskeleton, which it says can safely lift up to 200 pounds across an extended work session. Whats cool about this particular exoskeleton is that its not just a prototype; the company announced a partnership with Delta airlines, which will be trialing the technology for aircraft maintenance, engine repair, and luggage handling. In a demo, I watched a petite female volunteer strap into the exoskeleton and easily lift a 50-pound weight with one hand, and a Sarcos employee lift and attach a heavy component of a propeller; she explained that the strength-augmenting function of the exoskeleton can easily be switched on or offand the wearers hands releasedto facilitate multi-step tasks.

Hyundai and Uber partnered to unveil an air taxi concept. With a 49-foot wingspan, 4 lift rotors, and 4 tilt rotors, the aircraft would be manned by a pilot and could carry 4 passengers at speeds up to 180 miles per hour. The companies say youll be able to ride across your city in one of these by 2030well see if the regulatory environment, public opinion, and other factors outside of technological capability let that happen.

As evident from its name, Mercedes sweet new Vision AVTR concept car was inspired by the movie Avatar; director James Cameron helped design it. The all-electric car has no steering wheel, transparent doors, seats made of vegan leather, and 33 reptilian-scale-like flaps on the back; its design is meant to connect the driver with both the car and the surrounding environment in a natural, seamless way.

Offered the chance to drive the car, I jumped on it. Placing my hand on the center console started the engine, and within seconds it had synced to my heartbeat, which reverberated through the car. The whole dashboard, from driver door to passenger door, is one big LED display. It showed a virtual landscape I could select by holding up my hand: as I moved my hand from left to right, different images were projected onto my open palm. Closing my hand on an image selected it, and suddenly it looked like I was in the middle of a lush green mountain range. Applying slight forward pressure on the center console made the car advance in the virtual landscape; it was essentially like playing a really cool video game.

Mercedes is aiming to have a carbon-neutral production fleet by 2039, and to reduce the amount of energy it uses during production by 40 percent by 2030. Its unclear whenor whetherthe man-machine-nature connecting features of the Vision AVTR will start showing up in production, but I for one will be on the lookout.

Waverly Labs unveiled its Ambassador translator earlier this year and has it on display at the show. Its worn on the ear and uses a far-field microphone array with speech recognition to translate real-time conversations in 20 different languages. Besides in-ear audio, translations can also appear as text on an app or be broadcast live in a conference environment.

I stopped by the booth and tested out the translator with Waverly senior software engineer Georgiy Konovalov. We each hooked on an earpiece, and first, he spoke to me in Russian. After a delay of a couple seconds, I heard his words inslightly robotic, but fully comprehensibleEnglish. Then we switched: I spoke to him in Spanish, my words popped up on his phone screen in Cyrillic, and he translated them back to English for me out loud.

On the whole, the demo was pretty cool. If youve ever been lost in a foreign country whose language you dont speak, imagine how handy a gadget like this would come in. Lets just hope that once theyre more widespread, these products dont end up discouraging people from learning languages.

Not to be outdone, Google also announced updates to its Translate product, which is being deployed at information desks in JFK airports international terminal, in sports stadiums in Qatar, and by some large hotel chains.

AI is making steady progress towards achieving human-like vision and hearingbut theres been less work done on mimicking our sense of smell (maybe because its less useful in everyday applications). Stratuscents digital nose, which it says is based on NASA patents, uses chemical receptors and AI to identify both simple chemicals and complex scents. The company is aiming to create the worlds first comprehensive database of everyday scents, which it says it will use to make intelligent decisions for customers. What kind of decisions remains to be seenand smelled.

Banner Image Credit: The Mercedes Vision AVTR concept car. Photo by Vanessa Bates Ramirez

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The Weird, the Wacky, the Just Plain Cool: Best of CES 2020 - Singularity Hub

STRANGE objects have been spotted orbiting the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way.

Astronomers aren't quite sure what they could be so they've used 13 years worth of data to identify them as a new class of object.

Andrea Ghez, co-author of a recent study about the mystery, said: "These objects look like gas and behave like stars."

The six objects are named G1 through to G6.

They appear to be interacting with the black hole known as Sagittarius A* and look like elongated blobs.

Some scientists have theorised that the blobs are gas clouds that each have a mass several times larger than Earth.

1

Another theory is that they are small stars covered in dust.

Either way, the objects are able to orbit the black hole's edge without getting pulled in and destroyed.

The objects appear compact but stretch out whenever their orbit takes them close to the black hole.

This close period can last from 170 to 1,600 years.

The first two G objects were discovered back in 2005 and 2012.

Because they were able to orbit the black hole without being ripped to shreds, the scientists knew they were looking at objects never seen before.

Ghez has stated that the objects can't just be gas clouds or they would have been dragged into the black hole.

Instead, they must have some sort of object within.

All the objects have different orbits and some are faster than others.

Co-author Mark Morris, UCLA professor of physics and astronomy, said: "One of the things that has gotten everyone excited about the G objects is that the stuff that gets pulled off of them by tidal forces as they sweep by the central black hole must inevitably fall into the black hole.

"When that happens, it might be able to produce an impressive fireworks show since the material eaten by the black hole will heat up and emit copious radiation before it disappears across the event horizon."

The astronomers now think that each G object could be a pair of binary stars that revolved around each other.

They also think these stars could have merged thanks to the gravitational pull of the supermassive black hole.

Ultimately, the onjects could explain how galaxies and black holes evolve.

Ghez said: "It's possible that many of the stars we've been watching and not understanding may be the end product of mergers that are calm now.

"We are learning how galaxies and black holes evolve. The way binary stars interact with each other and with the black hole is very different from how single stars interact with other single stars and with the black hole."

The team now wants to do more analysis to see if they can discover even more unusual objects.

What is a black hole? The key facts

Here's what you need to know...

What is a black hole?

What is an event horizon?

What is a singularity?

How are black holes created?

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In other space news, scientists have discovereda new planetorbiting the closest star to our Solar System.

Nasa has announced it will soon stop"hitching rides with Russia"and instead run all-American manned rocket flights starting this year.

And, the space agency is eyeing up a nearby asteroid that contains enough gold to makeeveryone on Earth a billionaire.

What are your thoughts on the six mystery objects orbiting the black hole? Let us know in the comments..

We pay for your stories! Do you have a story for The Sun Online Tech & Science team? Email us at tech@the-sun.co.uk

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Six mystery objects are orbiting our galaxys black hole and scientists are baffled - The Sun