Lifeboat Foundation

At Apple’s WWDC23, I think I saw the future. [Pausing to ponder.] Yeah, I’m pretty sure I saw the future–or at least Apple’s vision of the future of computing. On Tuesday morning, I got to try the Apple Vision Pro, the new $3,499 mixed-reality headset that was announced this week and ships next year.

I’m here to tell you the major details of my experience, but the overall impression I have is that the Vision Pro is the most impressive first-gen product I’ve seen from Apple–more impressive than the 1998 iMac, or the 2007 iPhone. And I’m fully aware that other companies have made VR headsets, but Apple does that thing that it does, where it puts its understanding of what makes a satisfying user experience and creates a new product in an existing market that sets a higher bar of excellence.

Yes, it’s expensive, and yes, this market hasn’t proven that it can move beyond being niche. Those are very important considerations to discuss in other articles. For now, I’ll convey my experiences and impressions here, from a one-hour demonstration at Apple Park. (I was not allowed to take photos or record video; the photos posted here were supplied by Apple.) The device I used is an early beta, so it’s possible—likely even—that the hardware or software could change before next year.

Basic, or “elementary,” cellular automata like The Game of Life appeal to researchers working in mathematics and computer science theory, but they can have practical applications too. Some of the elementary cellular automata can be used for random number generation, physics simulations, and cryptography. Others are computationally as powerful as conventional computing architectures—at least in principle. In a sense, these task-oriented cellular automata are akin to an ant colony in which the simple actions of individual ants combine to perform larger collective actions, such as digging tunnels, or collecting food and taking it back to the nest. More “advanced” cellular automata, which have more complicated rules (although still based on neighboring cells), can be used for practical computing tasks such as identifying objects in an image.

Marandi explains: “While we are fascinated by the type of complex behaviors that we can simulate with a relatively simple photonic hardware, we are really excited about the potential of more advanced photonic cellular automata for practical computing applications.”

Marandi says cellular automata are well suited to photonic computing for a couple of reasons. Since information processing is happening at an extremely local level (remember in cellular automata, cells interact only with their immediate neighbors), they eliminate the need for much of the hardware that makes photonic computing difficult: the various gates, switches, and devices that are otherwise required for moving and storing light-based information. And the high-bandwidth nature of photonic computing means cellular automata can run incredibly fast. In traditional computing, cellular automata might be designed in a computer language, which is built upon another layer of “machine” language below that, which itself sits atop the binary zeroes and ones that make up digital information.

When we communicate with others over wireless networks, information is sent to data centers where it is collected, stored, processed, and distributed. As computational energy usage continues to grow, it is on pace to potentially become the leading source of energy consumption in this century. Memory and logic are physically separated in most modern computers, and therefore the interaction between these two components is very energy intensive in accessing, manipulating, and re-storing data.

A team of researchers from Carnegie Mellon University and Penn State University is exploring materials that could possibly lead to the integration of the memory directly on top of the transistor. By changing the architecture of the microcircuit, processors could be much more efficient and consume less energy. In addition to creating proximity between these components, the nonvolatile materials studied have the potential to eliminate the need for computer memory systems to be refreshed regularly.

Their recent work published in Science explores materials that are ferroelectric, or have a spontaneous electric polarization that can be reversed by the application of an external electric field. Recently discovered wurtzite ferroelectrics, which are mainly composed of materials that are already incorporated in semiconductor technology for integrated circuits, allow for the integration of new power-efficient devices for applications such as non-volatile memory, electro-optics, and energy harvesting.

Researchers at the University at Albany’s RNA Institute have demonstrated a new approach to DNA nanostructure assembly that does not require magnesium. The method improves the biostability of the structures, making them more useful and reliable in a range of applications. The work appears in the journal Small this month.

When we think of DNA, the first association that comes to mind is likely genetics—the double helix structure within cells that houses an organism’s blueprint for growth and reproduction. A rapidly evolving area of DNA research is that of DNA nanostructures—synthetic molecules made up of the same building blocks as the DNA found in living cells, which are being engineered to solve critical challenges in applications ranging from medical diagnostics and drug delivery to materials science and data storage.

“In this work, we assembled DNA nanostructures without using magnesium, which is typically used in this process but comes with challenges that ultimately reduce the utility of the nanostructures that are produced,” said Arun Richard Chandrasekaran, corresponding author of the study and senior research scientist at the RNA Institute.

We’ve been waxing lyrical (and critical) about Apple’s Vision Pro here at TechCrunch this week – but, of course, there are other things happening in the world of wearable tech, as well. Sol Reader raised a $5 million seed round with a headset that doesn’t promise to do more. In fact, it is trying to do just the opposite: Focus your attention on just the book at hand. Or book on the face, as it were.

“I’m excited to see Apple’s demonstration of the future of general AR/VR for the masses. However, even if it’s eventually affordable and in a much smaller form factor, we’re still left with the haunting question: Do I really need more time with my smart devices,” said Ben Chelf, CEO at Sol. “At Sol, we’re less concerned with spatial computing or augmented and virtual realities and more interested in how our personal devices can encourage us to spend our time wisely. We are building the Sol Reader specifically for a single important use case — reading. And while Big Tech surely will improve specs and reduce cost over time, we can now provide a time-well-spent option at 10% of the cost of Apple’s Vision.”

The device is simple: It slips over your eyes like a pair of glasses and blocks all distractions while reading. Even as I’m typing that, I’m sensing some sadness: I have wanted this product to exist for many years – I was basically raised by books, and lost my ability to focus on reading over the past few years. Something broke in me during the pandemic – I was checking my phone every 10 seconds to see what Trump had done now and how close we were to a COVID-19-powered abyss. Suffice it to say, my mental health wasn’t at its finest – and I can’t praise the idea of Sol Reader enough. The idea of being able to set a timer and put a book on my face is extremely attractive to me.

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Boson sampling was once considered a problem looking for a solution. Now, it might be the bridge that brings quantum computing to the blockchain.

An international research team has succeeded for the first time in measuring the electron spin in matter—i.e., the curvature of space in which electrons live and move—within “kagome materials,” a new class of quantum materials.

The results obtained—published in Nature Physics —could revolutionize the way quantum materials are studied in the future, opening the door to new developments in quantum technologies, with possible applications in a variety of technological fields, from renewable energy to biomedicine, from electronics to quantum computers.

Success was achieved by an international collaboration of scientists, in which Domenico Di Sante, professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy “Augusto Righi,” participated for the University of Bologna as part of his Marie Curie BITMAP research project. He was joined by colleagues from CNR-IOM Trieste, Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, University of Milan, University of Würzburg (Germany), University of St. Andrews (UK), Boston College and University of Santa Barbara (U.S.).

Zuckerberg addressed Apple’s headset unveiling in a meeting with Meta employees, telling them that it ‘could be the vision of the future of computing, but like, it’s not the one that I want.’

Mark Zuckerberg doesn’t seem fazed by Apple’s introduction of the Vision Pro.

In a companywide meeting with Meta employees today that The Verge watched, the CEO said Apple’s device didn’t present any major breakthroughs in technology that Meta hadn’t “already explored” and that its vision for how people will use the device is “not the one that I want.” He also pointed to the fact that Meta’s upcoming Quest 3 headset will be much cheaper, at $499 compared to the Vision Pro’s $3,499 price tag, giving Meta… More.

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