Category Generative AI

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. How do our bodies remember? “Like riding a bike” is shorthand for the remarkable way that our bodies…

MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here. “Like riding a bike” is shorthand for the remarkable way that our bodies…

Attentive readers might have noticed my absence over the last couple of weeks. I’ve been trying to recover from a bout of illness. It got me thinking about the immune system, and how little I know about my own immune…

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. How healthy am I? My immunome knows the score.   Made up of 1.8 trillion cells and trillions more…

The story is a collaboration between MIT Technology Review and Aventine, a non-profit research foundation that creates and supports content about how technology and science are changing the way we live. It’s not often you get a text about the…

On Monday, we published our 2025 edition of Climate Tech Companies to Watch. This marks the third time we’ve put the list together, and it’s become one of my favorite projects to work on every year.  In the journalism world,…

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. The Trump administration may cut funding for two major direct-air capture plants The US Department of Energy appears…

The US Department of Energy appears poised to terminate funding for a pair of large carbon-sucking factories that were originally set to receive more than $1 billion in government grants, according to a department-issued list of projects obtained by MIT…

Kids have always played with and talked to stuffed animals. But now their toys can talk back, thanks to a wave of companies that are fitting children’s playthings with chatbots and voice assistants.  It’s a trend that has particularly taken…

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. This company is planning a lithium empire from the shores of the Great Salt Lake On a bright…

BOX ELDER COUNTY, Utah – On a bright afternoon in August, the shore on the North Arm of the Great Salt Lake looks like something out of a science fiction film set in a scorching alien world. The desert sun…

Last week OpenAI released Sora, a TikTok-style app that presents an endless feed of exclusively AI-generated videos, each up to 10 seconds long. The app allows you to create a “cameo” of yourself—a hyperrealistic avatar that mimics your appearance and…

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. Introducing: 10 climate tech companies to watch Every year, the MIT Technology Review newsroom produces a list of…

MIT Technology Review’s reporters and editors faced a dilemma as we began to mull nominees for this year’s list of Climate Tech Companies to Watch. How do you pick companies poised to succeed in a moment of such deep uncertainty,…

HiNa Battery Technology is a trailblazer in developing and mass-producing batteries using sodium, a widely available element that can be extracted from sea salt. The startup’s products—already powering small vehicles and energy storage plants in China—provide a valuable alternative to…

It’s a foregone conclusion that the world will not meet the goals for limiting emissions and global warming laid out in the 2015 Paris Agreement. Many people want to blame politicians and corporations for this failure, but there’s an even…

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. Microsoft says AI can create “zero day” threats in biology A team at Microsoft says it used artificial…

A team at Microsoft says it used artificial intelligence to discover a “zero day” vulnerability in the biosecurity systems used to prevent the misuse of DNA. These screening systems are designed to stop people from purchasing genetic sequences that could…

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. EV tax credits are dead in the US. Now what? Federal EV tax credits in the US officially…

On Wednesday, federal EV tax credits in the US officially came to an end. Those credits, expanded and extended in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, gave drivers up to $7,500 in credits toward the purchase of a new electric vehicle.…

In late 2023, a long-trusted virtualization staple became the biggest open question on the enterprise IT roadmap. Amid concerns of VMware licensing changes and steeper support costs, analysts noticed an exodus mentality. Forrester predicted that one in five large VMware…

Every year, MIT Technology Review recognizes dozens of young researchers on our Innovators Under 35 list. We checked back in with recent honorees to see how they’re faring amid sweeping changes to science and technology policy within the US. Learn about the…

Talk of AI is inescapable. It’s often the main topic of discussion at board and executive meetings, at corporate retreats, and in the media. A record 58% of S&P 500 companies mentioned AI in their second-quarter earnings calls, according to…

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. OpenAI is huge in India. Its models are steeped in caste bias. Caste bias is rampant in OpenAI’s…

When Dhiraj Singha began applying for postdoctoral sociology fellowships in Bengaluru, India, in March, he wanted to make sure the English in his application was pitch-perfect. So he turned to ChatGPT. He was surprised to see that in addition to…

In Seattle, a meteorologist analyzes dynamic atmospheric models to predict the next major storm system. In Stuttgart, an automotive engineer examines crash-test simulations for vehicle safety certification. And in Singapore, a financial analyst simulates portfolio stress tests to hedge against global economic shocks.  Each of…

For all the excitement around GPUs—the workhorses of today’s AI revolution—the central processing unit (CPU) remains the backbone of high-performance computing (HPC). CPUs still handle 80% to 90% of HPC workloads globally, powering everything from climate modeling to semiconductor design.…

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. Scientists can see Earth’s permafrost thawing from space Something is rotten in the city of Nunapitchuk. In recent…

Something is rotten in the city of Nunapitchuk. In recent years, a crack has formed in the middle of a house. Sewage has leached into the earth. Soil has eroded around buildings, leaving them perched atop precarious lumps of dirt.…

On Thursday, I published a story about the police-tech giant Flock Safety selling its drones to the private sector to track shoplifters. Keith Kauffman, a former police chief who now leads Flock’s drone efforts, described the ideal scenario: A security…

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. US investigators are using AI to detect child abuse images made by AI Generative AI has enabled the…

The need to cut emissions and adapt to our warming world is growing more urgent. This year, we’ve seen temperatures reach record highs, as they have nearly every year for the last decade. Climate-fueled natural disasters are affecting communities around…

Generative AI has enabled the production of child sexual abuse images to skyrocket. Now the leading investigator of child exploitation in the US is experimenting with using AI to distinguish AI-generated images from material depicting real victims, according to a…

Shoplifters in the US could soon be chased down by drones The news: Flock Safety, whose drones were once reserved for police departments, is now offering them for private-sector security, the company has announced. Potential customers include businesses trying to…

Flock Safety, whose drones were once reserved for police departments, is now offering them for private-sector security, the company announced today, with potential customers including including businesses intent on curbing shoplifting.  Companies in the US can now place Flock’s drone…

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. How AI and Wikipedia have sent vulnerable languages into a doom spiral Wikipedia is the most ambitious multilingual…

This week, Commonwealth Fusion Systems announced it has another customer for its first commercial fusion power plant, in Virginia. Eni, one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies, signed a billion-dollar deal to buy electricity from the facility. One…

When Kenneth Wehr started managing the Greenlandic-language version of Wikipedia four years ago, his first act was to delete almost everything. It had to go, he thought, if it had any chance of surviving. Wehr, who’s 26, isn’t from Greenland—he…

Conversations around birth control usually focus on women, but Kevin Eisenfrats, one of the MIT Technology Review 2025 Innovators Under 35, is working to change that. His company, Contraline, is working toward testing new birth control options for men. Speakers: Kevin…

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. It’s surprisingly easy to stumble into a relationship with an AI chatbot The news: The first large-scale computational…

MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here. At a press conference on Monday, President Trump announced that his…

Separating AI reality from hyped-up fiction isn’t always easy. That’s why we’ve created the AI Hype Index—a simple, at-a-glance summary of everything you need to know about the state of the industry. Millions of us use chatbots every day, even…

It’s a tale as old as time. Looking for help with her art project, she strikes up a conversation with her assistant. One thing leads to another, and suddenly she has a boyfriend she’s introducing to her friends and family.…

Every year, MIT Technology Review selects one individual whose work we admire to recognize as Innovator of the Year. For 2025, we chose Sneha Goenka, who designed the computations behind the world’s fastest whole-genome sequencing method. Thanks to her work, physicians…

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. AI models are using material from retracted scientific papers The news: Some AI chatbots rely on flawed research from…

Some AI chatbots rely on flawed research from retracted scientific papers to answer questions, according to recent studies. The findings, confirmed by MIT Technology Review, raise questions about how reliable AI tools are at evaluating scientific research and could complicate…

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. This medical startup uses LLMs to run appointments and make diagnoses Patients at a small number of clinics…

Eni, one of the world’s largest oil and gas companies, just agreed to buy $1 billion in electricity from a power plant being built by Commonwealth Fusion Systems. The deal is the latest to illustrate just how much investment Commonwealth…

Imagine this: You’ve been feeling unwell, so you call up your doctor’s office to make an appointment. To your surprise, they schedule you in for the next day. At the appointment, you aren’t rushed through describing your health concerns; instead,…

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. A pivotal meeting on vaccine guidance is underway—and former CDC leaders are alarmed This week has been an…

Update Friday 6am ET: The advisory CDC panel recommended that children under the age of 4 do not receive the combined MMRV vaccine (for measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella) but instead receive two separate shots. This week has been an…

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. AI-designed viruses are here and already killing bacteria Artificial intelligence can draw cat pictures and write emails. Now…

Hydrogen is sometimes held up as a master key for the energy transition. It can be made using several low-emissions methods and could play a role in cleaning up industries ranging from agriculture and chemicals to aviation and long-distance shipping.…

Artificial intelligence can draw cat pictures and write emails. Now the same technology can compose a working genome. A research team in California says it used AI to propose new genetic codes for viruses—and managed to get several of these…

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. How to measure the returns on R&D spending Given the draconian cuts to US federal funding for science,…

MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here. Given the draconian cuts to US federal funding for science, including…

Automation has become a defining force in the customer experience. Between the chatbots that answer our questions and the recommendation systems that shape our choices, AI-driven tools are now embedded in nearly every interaction. But the latest wave of so-called…

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. The looming crackdown on AI companionship As long as there has been AI, there have been people sounding…

As long as there has been AI, there have been people sounding alarms about what it might do to us: rogue superintelligence, mass unemployment, or environmental ruin from data center sprawl. But this week showed that another threat entirely—that of…

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. Meet tomorrow’s rising stars of computing Each year, MIT Technology Review honors 35 outstanding people under the age…

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 can’t “make American children healthy again” without tackling the gun crisis This week, the Trump administration released…

MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here. It’s been a big year for video generation. In the last…

Note for readers: This newsletter discusses gun violence, a raw and tragic issue in America. It was already in progress on Wednesday when a school shooting occurred at Evergreen High School in Colorado and Charlie Kirk was shot and killed…

Generative AI has the potential to transform the finance function. By taking on some of the more mundane tasks that can occupy a lot of time, generative AI tools can help free up capacity for more high-value strategic work. For…

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. How Trump’s policies are affecting early-career scientists—in their own words Every year MIT Technology Review celebrates accomplished young…

Last week, a legal battle over lab-grown meat kicked off in Texas. On September 1, a two-year ban on the technology went into effect across the state; the following day, two companies filed a lawsuit against state officials. The two…

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. Video: AI and our energy future In May, MIT Technology Review published an unprecedented and comprehensive look at…

In July 2024, a botched update to the software defenses managed by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike caused more than 8 million Windows systems to fail. From hospitals to manufacturers, stock markets to retail stores, the outage caused parts of the global…

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. Meet the AI honorees on our 35 Innovators Under 35 list for 2025 Each year, we select 35…

Earlier this year, when my colleague Casey Crownhart and I spent six months researching the climate and energy burden of AI, we came to see one number in particular as our white whale: how much energy the leading AI models,…

The rising popularity of AI is driving an increase in electricity demand so significant it has the potential to reshape our grid. Energy consumption by data centers has gone up by 80% from 2020 to 2025 and is likely to…

In Silicon Valley’s imagined future, AI models are so empathetic that we’ll use them as therapists. They’ll provide mental-health care for millions, unimpeded by the pesky requirements for human counselors, like the need for graduate degrees, malpractice insurance, and sleep.…

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. Introducing: our 35 Innovators Under 35 list for 2025 The world is full of extraordinary young people brimming…

This story is part of MIT Technology Review’s “America Undone” series, examining how the foundations of US success in science and innovation are currently under threat. You can read the rest here. Every year MIT Technology Review celebrates accomplished young scientists,…

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. Putin says organ transplants could grant immortality. Not quite. —Jessica Hamzelou Earlier this week, my editor forwarded me…

This week I’m writing from Manchester, where I’ve been attending a conference on aging. Wednesday was full of talks and presentations by scientists who are trying to understand the nitty-gritty of aging—all the way down to the molecular level. Once we…

Agentic AI is coming of age. And with it comes new opportunities in the financial services sector. Banks are increasingly employing agentic AI to optimize processes, navigate complex systems, and sift through vast quantities of unstructured data to make decisions…

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. Synthesia’s AI clones are more expressive than ever. Soon they’ll be able to talk back. —Rhiannon Williams Earlier…

During Black Friday in 2024, Stripe processed more than $31 billion in transactions, with processing rates peaking at 137,000 transactions per minute, the highest in the company’s history. The financial-services firm had to analyze every transaction in real time to prevent…

Earlier this summer, I walked through the glassy lobby of a fancy office in London, into an elevator, and then along a corridor into a clean, carpeted room. Natural light flooded in through its windows, and a large pair of…

On a spring day in 1954, Bell Labs researchers showed off the first practical solar panels at a press conference in Murray Hill, New Jersey, using sunlight to spin a toy Ferris wheel before a stunned crowd. The solar future…

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. Material Cultures looks to the past to build the future Despite decades of green certifications, better material sourcing,…

As brands compete for increasingly price conscious consumers, customer experience (CX) has become a decisive differentiator. Yet many struggle to deliver, constrained by outdated systems, fragmented data, and organizational silos that limit both agility and consistency. The current wave of…

Artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping how the world operates. With its potential to automate repetitive tasks, analyze vast datasets, and augment human capabilities, the use of AI technologies is already driving changes across industries. In health care and pharmaceuticals, machine…

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. Therapists are secretly using ChatGPT. Clients are triggered. Declan would never have found out his therapist was using…

As healthcare faces mounting pressures, from rising costs and an aging population to widening disparities, forward thinking innovations are more essential than ever. Accelerator programs have proven to be powerful launchpads for health tech companies, often combining resources, mentorship, and…

In a market flooded with AI promises, health care decision-makers are no longer dazzled by flashy demos or abstract potential. Today, they want pragmatic and pressure-tested products. They want solutions that work for their clinicians, staff, patients, and their bottom line.…

Everywhere I look, I see AI clones. On X and LinkedIn, “thought leaders” and influencers offer their followers a chance to ask questions of their digital replicas. OnlyFans creators are having AI models of themselves chat, for a price, with…

Declan would never have found out his therapist was using ChatGPT had it not been for a technical mishap. The connection was patchy during one of their online sessions, so Declan suggested they turn off their video feeds. Instead, his…

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.  Can an AI doppelgänger help me do my job? —James O’Donnell Digital clones—AI models that replicate a specific…

Next week, we’ll publish our 2025 list of Innovators Under 35, highlighting smart and talented people who are working in many areas of emerging technology. This new class features 35 accomplished founders, hardware engineers, roboticists, materials scientists, and others who…

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. The case against humans in space Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are bitter rivals in the commercial space…

For just the second time in nearly two decades, the United States has granted an export license to an American company planning to sell nuclear technology to India, MIT Technology Review has learned. The decision to greenlight Clean Core Thorium…

A lot of Americans don’t eat well. And they’re paying for it with their health. A diet high in sugar, sodium, and saturated fat can increase the risk of problems like diabetes, heart disease, and kidney disease, to name a…

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. Google’s still not giving us the full picture on AI energy use  —Casey Crownhart Google just announced that…

Over the past 20 years building advanced AI systems—from academic labs to enterprise deployments—I’ve witnessed AI’s waves of success rise and fall. My journey began during the “AI Winter,” when billions were invested in expert systems that ultimately underdelivered. Flash…

Google just announced that a typical query to its Gemini app uses about 0.24 watt-hours of electricity. That’s about the same as running a microwave for one second—something that, to me, feels virtually insignificant. I run the microwave for so…