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As a kid, I loved the 1980s aquatic adventure show Danger Bay. True to the TV show’s name, danger was always lurking at the Vancouver Aquarium, where the show was set. In one memorable episode, young Jonah and a friend get trapped in a sabotaged mini-submarine, and Jonah’s dad, a marine-mammal veterinarian, comes to the rescue in a bubble-shaped underwater vehicle. Good stuff! Only recently—as in when I started working on this column—did I learn that the rescue vehicle was not a stage prop but rather a real-world research submersible named Deep Rover.What Was Deep Rover and What Did It Do? Built in 1984 a

To stay competitive, many small businesses need advanced wireless communication networks, not only to communicate but also to leverage technologies such as artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things, and robotics. Often, however, the businesses lack the technical expertise needed to install, configure, and maintain the systems.Bhaskara Rallabandi, who spent more than two decades working for major telecom companies, decided to use his expertise to help small businesses. Rallabandi, an IEEE senior member, is an expert certified by the

Facial recognition technology (FRT) dates back 60 years. Just over a decade ago, deep-learning methods tipped the technology into more useful—and menacing—territory. Now, retailers, your neighbors, and law enforcement are all storing your face and building up a fragmentary photo album of your life.Yet the story those photos can tell inevitably has errors. FRT makers, like those of any diagnostic technology, must balance two types of errors: false positives and false negatives. There are three possible outcomes.Three Possible Outcomes

In a landmark case, a jury found this week that Meta and YouTube negligently designed their platforms and harmed the plaintiff, a 20-year-old woman referred to as Kaley G.M. The jury agreed with the plaintiff that social media is addictive and harmful and was deliberately designed to be that way. This finding aligns with my view as a clinical psychologist: that social media addiction is not a failure of users, but a feature of the platforms themselves. I believe that accountability must extend beyond individuals to the systems and incentives that shape their behavior.In my clinical practi

In today’s technological landscape, the only constant is the rate of obsolescence. As engineers move deeper into the eras of 6G, ubiquitous artificial intelligence, and hyper-miniaturized electronics, a traditional degree is only a starting point.To remain competitive in today’s job market, technical specialists must evolve into future-ready professionals by cultivating more than just niche expertise. Success now demands a high degree of adaptive intelligence and strategic communication, allowing specialists to translate complex data into actionable business decisions as industry shifts accelerate.To bridge the gap between technical proficiency and organizational leadership, the

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your friends at IEEE Spectrum robotics. We also post a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next few months. Please send us your events for inclusion.ICRA 2026: 1–5 June 2026, VIENNARSS 2026: 13–17 July 2026, SYDNEYSummer School on Multi-Robot Systems: 29 July–4 August 2026, PRAGUEEnjoy today’s videos!

We’re all familiar with mixing red, yellow, and blue paint in various ratios to instantly make all kinds of colors. This works great for oils or watercolors, but fails when it comes to cans of spray paint. The paint droplets can’t be blended once they are aerosolized. Consequently, although spray cans are great for applying even coats of paint to large areas very quickly, spray-paint artists need a separate can for every color they want to use—until now.Back in 2018, when I first saw professional spray artists lugging dozens to hundreds of cans to their work sites, I was inspired to start noodling on a solution. I’ve worked at Google X, Alphabet’s “

This sponsored article is brought to you by NYU Tandon School of Engineering.Within a 6 mile radius of New York University’s (NYU) campus, there are more than 500 tech industry giants, banks, and hospitals. This isn’t just a fact about real estate, it’s the foundation for advancing quantum discovery and application.While the world races to harness quantum technology, NYU is betting that the ultimate advantage lies not solely in a lab, but in the dense, demanding, and hyper-connected urban ecosystem that surrounds it. With the launch of its

This article is crossposted from IEEE Spectrum’s careers newsletter. Sign up now to get insider tips, expert advice, and practical strategies, written in partnership with tech career development company Parsity and delivered to your inbox for free!Engineers Aren’t Bad at Communication. They’re Just Speaking to the Wrong Audience.There’s a persistent myth that engineers are bad communicators. In my experience, that’s not true.Engineers are often excellent communicators—inside their domain. We’re

This is a sponsored article brought to you by General Motors. Visit their new Engineering Blog for more insights.Autonomous driving is one of the most demanding problems in physical AI. An automated system must interpret a chaotic, ever-changing world in real time—navigating uncertainty, predicting human behavior, and operating safely across an immense range of environments and edge cases.At General Motors, we approach this problem from a simple premise: while most moments on the road are predictable, the rare, ambiguous, and unexpected events — the long tail — are what ultimately defines whether an autonomous system is safe, reli