Latest Articles
Cryptography Tricks Make a Hard Problem a Little Easier
Researchers have shown how to find the simplest description of a data set faster than by simply checking every possibility.
The Researcher Who Explores Computation by Conjuring New Worlds
Russell Impagliazzo studies hard problems, the limits of cryptography, the nature of randomness and more.
How Chain-of-Thought Reasoning Helps Neural Networks Compute
Large language models do better at solving problems when they show their work. Researchers are beginning to understand why.
Never-Repeating Tiles Can Safeguard Quantum Information
Two researchers have proved that Penrose tilings, famous patterns that never repeat, are mathematically equivalent to a kind of quantum error correction.
‘Magical’ Error Correction Scheme Proved Inherently Inefficient
Locally correctable codes need barely any information to fix errors, but they’re extremely long. Now we know that the simplest versions can’t get any shorter.
The ‘Accidental Activist’ Who Changed the Face of Mathematics
Throughout her 60-year career, Lenore Blum has developed new perspectives on logic and computation while championing women in mathematics and computer science. Now consciousness is on her mind.
An Easy-Sounding Problem Yields Numbers Too Big for Our Universe
Researchers prove that navigating certain systems of vectors is among the most complex computational problems.
Thirty Years Later, a Speed Boost for Quantum Factoring
Shor’s algorithm will enable future quantum computers to factor large numbers quickly, undermining many online security protocols. Now a researcher has shown how to do it even faster.
Tiny Language Models Come of Age
To better understand how neural networks learn to simulate writing, researchers trained simpler versions on synthetic children’s stories.