Science fiction and technological innovation feed off each other in an ongoing back-and-forth that can play out over decades.
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Articles on Invention
Displaying 1 - 20 of 50 articles
Researchers had college students and AI take a standardized test in creative thinking, and all of them were scored by trained evaluators who didn’t know in advance that some had been completed by AI.
Can one invention revolutionise propellers, whose basic design has been around for over 100 years? Not so fast.
Ada Lovelace said computers could not invent. But a century later, Alan Turing pointed out inventiveness in machines could be found in their capacity to produce surprising and innovative results.
See a package of Cup Noodles and you might think of dorm rooms and cheap calories. But there was a time when eating out of Cup Noodle’s iconic packaging exuded cosmopolitanism.
On Oct. 1, 1971, Godfrey Hounsfield’s invention took its first pictures of a human brain, using X-rays and an ingenious algorithm to identify a woman’s tumor from outside of her skull.
Boosting the number of female inventors isn’t just a matter of fairness. Inventions by men are more likely to ignore women’s needs.
The ubiquity of mobile phones is a defining feature of the 21st century, but it’s been possible to place a phone call on the go since shortly after World War II.
Too many patents and too little information about them makes it hard for the system to weed out patents that unfairly block inventors.
The story of invention in America typically features larger-than-life caricatures of white men like Thomas Edison while largely ignoring the contributions of women and people of color.
Curved origami isn’t just elegant art. It’s also a versatile way to vary the amount of force applied by robots and other machines.
What if roads and bridges could signal structural problems that need repair?
Drawing thoughtfully on the Powerhouse Museum’s collection, this exhibition lovingly exposes the humanity behind biomedical technology.
Many great innovators have personality traits in common. Comfort with uncertainty is critical, but passion, curiosity and a number of other learnable skills can prime you for an innovate idea.
DIY labs have disrupted industries from alcohol to pharmaceuticals. During the coronavirus pandemic, curious people have more opportunities to innovate from home.
Inventors in states with more socially liberal laws on the books end up with more diverse collaborators – and more higher-impact patents.
During a pandemic, what would MacGyver do? He’d cobble together masks and ventilators from the things around him. Now health-care workers are doing the same. But there are risks.
A team of physicists, virologists and computer scientists are seeking to develop a coronavirus diagnostic tool that could deliver rapid results.
A simple chemical reaction turns the red pigment of beets into a new, nontoxic blue dye.
Inspired by amber and hard candy, researchers figured out a new, needle-free, shelf-stable way to preserve vaccines, making them easier to ship and administer around the world.
Top contributors
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Senior Visiting Fellow, UNSW Sydney
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Associate Professor of Communication and African and African Diaspora Studies and Associate Professor of Law (By Courtesy), Boston College
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Laureate Professor in Chemical Engineering, University of Newcastle
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Scientia Fellow/ Associate Lecturer, UNSW Sydney
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Lecturer in Law, Deakin Law School, Deakin University
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Visiting Professor, University of Technology Sydney
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Associate Professor of Art History, Penn State
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Professor of Physical Chemistry and Director of the Grantham Centre for Sustainable Futures, University of Sheffield
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Affiliate, School of Mathematics, Monash University
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James Watt Chair, Professor of Engineering Science, University of Glasgow
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Associate Professor of Public Policy and Women's Studies, University of Michigan
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Senior Lecturer and Researcher in Innovation and Digital Leadership, University of Brighton
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Associate Professor, Faculty of Information Technology, Monash University
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Professor of Science Communication and Chemistry, University of Hull
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Former Associate Vice Provost, The University of Texas at Austin
