Helen Branswell covers issues broadly related to infectious diseases, including outbreaks, preparedness, research, and vaccine development. Follow her on Mastodon and Bluesky. You can reach Helen on ...

While the creation of this new entity marks a big step toward avoiding a U.S. ban, as well as easing trade and tech-related tensions between Washington and Beijing, there is still uncertainty ...

Instagram is introducing a new tool that lets you see and control your algorithm, starting with Reels, the company announced on Wednesday. The new tool, called “Your Algorithm,” lets you view the ...

The original version of this story appeared in Quanta Magazine. If you want to solve a tricky problem, it often helps to get organized. You might, for example, break the problem into pieces and tackle ...

Kelley Cotter has received funding from the National Science Foundation. Chinese tech giant ByteDance finalized its agreement to sell a majority stake in its video platform TikTok to a group of U.S.

Algorithms, which are just sets of instructions expressed in code, are harder to restrict than physical goods. But governments, including the U.S., have long tried to prevent their export. The ...

You’re at the checkout screen after an online shopping spree, ready to enter your credit card number. You type it in and instantly see a red error message ...

Do you remember the early days of social media? The promise of connection, of democratic empowerment, of barriers crumbling and gates opening? In those heady days, the co-founder of Twitter said that ...

How do the algorithms that populate our social media feeds actually work? In a piece for Time Magazine excerpted from his recent book Robin Hood Math, Noah Giansiracusa sheds light on the algorithms ...

Ever wondered how social media platforms decide how to fill our feeds? They use algorithms, of course, but how do these algorithms work? A series of corporate leaks over the past few years provides a ...