IEEE Spectrum

Google started its #LLM journey way behind OpenAI and Meta, but recently Gemini 2.5 has been making waves. 🌐 Meta’s Llama 4’s recent release was somewhat bungled ֎ OpenAI’s GPT-4.5 API access was wound down after less than 3 months 🤖 Meanwhile, Google’s Gemini 2.5 Pro has had both a strong performance and a reasonable cost https://lnkd.in/gRk67hrQ

Worried about how the current set of tariffs will affect your electronics? Senior editor Samuel K. Moore interviewed IPC chief economist Shawn DuBravac, PhD, CFA about the impacts. Here are some highlights: 📈If the 125 percent tariffs on China hold, smartphone prices could increase by 91 percent 📦 Supply chains struggle to adjust in an uncertain environment 💻 The cheapest products will likely have the highest percentage price increase 🔀 Staff are being relocated from innovation to cost efficiency https://lnkd.in/ePfBPhpt

#China is halting #rareEarth exports, which could impact American production in: 💡 Electronics manufacturing 📺 Defense programs 🚘 The automobile industry But the US does have rare earth deposits, it’s just a matter of mining them and then refining the materials properly. That’s what @MP Materials is trying to do. Read about the only company in North America that is mining rare earth ore:

Key findings from Stanford University’s #AI Index Report: 📈 #AIjobs are on the rise all over the world 🐍 #Python is a top skill for AI job postings 💼 #GenerativeAI job postings are increasing Get the full picture in our breakdown of the careers news in the report: https://lnkd.in/d6bBkYCc 

QuantX Labs is sending a frequency comb—a key component of optical atomic clocks—to outer space this December. These high tech devices emit light at millions of evenly spaced frequencies. Optical atomic clocks in space would enable even more precise #GPS services. Read all about optical atomic clocks: https://lnkd.in/gcxrU72c

The world has a lot of depleted uranium, which is created as a byproduct of producing nuclear fuel. The USA alone has 750,000 tons of the stuff. Now researchers at the Japan Atomic Energy Agency have figured out how to make large-scale flow batteries using depleted uranium. The batteries could, somewhat ironically, help deployment of intermittent renewable energy resources like solar and wind. https://lnkd.in/eRBqj9vM

One of the big, interesting questions of computer science now is whether large language models actually "understand" the world in some sense at least vaguely similar to the way we understand the world. Sebastien Bubeck of OpenAI is one of a relative minority of top experts who believes this to be true. He recently debated Emily M. Bender of the University of Washington in a session moderated by IEEE Spectrum's Eliza Strickland. You can watch the whole fascinating session here: https://lnkd.in/edS4Nu-S

At its recent seminar for journalists, Airbus announced that it was working on a 100-seat airliner that will be fuel-cell powered, superconducting, and completely-zero-emission (if fueled with "green" hydrogen). The aircraft is expected to have a range of at least 1,000 nautical miles. This could be a game changer for the aviation industry. https://lnkd.in/es_MkE7X

Nigeria's electrical infrastructure is terrible even by the standards of the developing world. The grid only reaches about 60% of the population, providing them with a couple of hours of electricity a day. But an innovative, grass-roots initiative, based on renewable-energy microgrids, is starting to get real traction. Lucas Laursen reports from Nigeria https://lnkd.in/eVnvAC3b

Aerospace-tech contributor Tereza Pultarova's excellent new story is about Ukraine's deployment of a new class of killer drones that have enough autonomy to be able to navigate on their own to their targets, even in the face of heavy and persistent jamming. Coming soon to this war: drones that make the kill/no kill decision on their own. https://lnkd.in/eTJm46Q3