Scientific Computing

Life sciences executives are entering 2025 with data-driven optimism, according to Deloitte’s newly released “2025 Life Sciences Outlook.” Survey findings from 150 global C-suite executives show that 75% remain upbeat about the year ahead, with 68% anticipating revenue increases and 57% expecting margin expansions. Two key factors emerge from executive interviews: enhanced clarity following the…

Google’s unveiling of the Willow quantum processor could go down in history as a big moment in the pursuit of fault-tolerant quantum computing. A BBC article called the advance “mind-boggling.” And in many respects, it is. The processor completed a specialized computation in five minutes that would theoretically take today’s fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years—a…

While some R&D sectors declined, others expanded. GM sold an EV battery plant and is the second biggest automaker withdrawing from China. At the same time, Nvidia expanded in Vietnam, Amazon built an AI-based supercomputer, and OpenAI joined Anduril to boost the U.S. military’s drone technology. The R&D World Index (RDWI) for the week ending…

While the term “biotechnology” was coined in 1919, “techbio” dates back roughly a century after that. Around 2019, the VC firm Artis Ventures set up a venture capital fund named Artis techbio with the aim of uniting software, computational biology, and drug development into a cohesive framework. The ambition behind this idea has sometimes surpassed…

For Avandra CEO and founder Ryan Tarzy, the potential of AI in healthcare is personal. He lost his father to pancreatic cancer, a disease often caught too late in the United States. At the recent Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference, he encountered a telling example of what emerging medical tech can achieve. “At…

A good number of organizations rushing to deploy AI in pharmaceutical and genomics research have their priorities backward. They need not only a solid data infrastructure but also true data savviness before forging ahead with deep learning or large language models, argues Stavros Papadopoulos, CEO and founder of TileDB, the developer of data platform for…

Scientists at the University of California, Irvine, have discovered atomic-scale processes that enhance superconductivity in iron selenide (FeSe), an iron-based material. The findings, published in Nature, could inform future advancements in quantum computing, electronics, and other technologies. UC Irvine’s Materials Research Institute (IMRI) researchers imaged atomic vibrations using advanced spectroscopy instruments. They identified new phonons…

If you read much about AI, you’ve likely noticed the growing number of models capable of “reasoning” and acting autonomously. This isn’t just about chatbots; it’s transforming scientific discovery. Google DeepMind recently launched a 15-day weather forecasting agent, bringing new levels of accuracy to complex atmospheric modeling. OpenAI’s latest reasoning model, o1, has demonstrated potential…

Alice & Bob, a company specializing in quantum computing, has released its first white paper and accompanying five-year roadmap. The document highlights the company’s strategy to develop practical quantum computing using its proprietary cat qubit technology. This technology aims to achieve high-fidelity logical qubits with lower hardware and energy demands than other approaches. The roadmap…

A team of researchers at the Allen Institute for AI and UC San Diego have introduced a climate modeling approach boasting 25× speed-ups and associated energy savings over the emulated physics-based model FV3GFS. Specifically, the method takes about 2 hours and 56 minutes to run a 10-year simulation The physics-based FV3GFS model takes about 78 hours…

As many as 2.1 million manufacturing jobs could go unfilled by 2030, according to an influential 2021 projection from Deloitte and The Manufacturing Institute. Meanwhile, the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a growth rate of 0.1% from 2023 to 2030, yielding only 110,000 projected new jobs, resulting in a potential overall change from 12.9 million…

Imagine a future where needing a new heart means you become your own donor. “It’s going to be your cells, your design—an exact replica of your heart, only made healthy,” said Steven Levine, Ph.D., senior director of virtual human modeling at Dassault Systèmes, in a recent interview. For Levine, the goal of transforming cardiac care…

Integrated energy company Idemitsu Kosan Co. (Idemitsu) has expanded its partnership with Enthought, a specialist in digital transformation for science-driven companies. This move supports Idemitsu’s ambition to scale the development and production of innovative battery materials. The expanded partnership will include new technical consulting and implementation services and continued participation in Enthought’s Materials Informatics (MI)…

Industrial and commercial sectors often measure innovation by market capitalization and R&D spending, but these metrics fail to capture the full picture. Tech companies dominate market headlines with AI product launches and chip releases — and our own ranking of most innovative firms of 2024. In addition, tech firms currently hold the top market cap…

Yes, questions remain about whether AI chipmaker NVIDIA can maintain its momentum in 2025. NVIDIA’s upcoming Blackwell AI chips have encountered thermal problems when integrated into server racks designed to house up to 72 units. Despite these recent technical hurdles, the company remains an innovation juggernaut. 1. Why NVIDIA is the R&D leader of 2024…

The relentless demand for faster, smaller and more efficient electronic devices is finally pushing existing silicon technology to its physical limits. Decades of phenomenal innovation have largely delivered the prophesy of Moore’s Law, which predicts that the number of transistors that can be crammed onto a silicon chip should double every two years, but there…

From AMD cutting 4% of its workers as it continues an AI push to LAMs, AI continues to shake up the technology landscape. While a Reuters report suggests that genAI progress may be cooling, several prominent figures such as Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt have refuted it. OpenAI explores novel…

The race to create AI agents that can operate computers and perform tasks more autonomously is ramping up, with OpenAI preparing to launch its “Operator” tool in January, according to Bloomberg. The tool, which would allow AI to perform tasks like fill out spreadsheets, book travel or write code on behalf of users, will initially…

From enterprise software to drug discovery, artificial intelligence is triggering seismic shifts in corporate R&D strategies. SAP is investing €2 billion annually in AI while planning to cut up to 10,000 jobs. OpenAI is pivoting from its nonprofit roots toward a for-profit model valued at $80 billion. Hardware giants like Intel and AMD are slashing…

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times for hardware companies. For a handful of hardware companies, 2024 was a tough year. Intel, Dell, AMD, IBM jointly cut more than 23,000 jobs this year. Intel alone slashed 15,000 positions as it targeted $10 billion in cost savings by 2025. The PC…

In many respects, 2024 was a year of building upon the foundations laid by previous technological and scientific advances. While AI continued to evolve at a rapid clip, progress was in many ways more incremental than last year when GPT-4 redefined expectations for genAI. But AI continues to make definable improvements across a range of…

The R&D World Index climbed modestly this week thanks to Intel’s substantial gains and strategic expansions in Asia. At the same time, automotive heavyweight Honda faced significant setbacks, highlighting a week of contrasting fortunes in the R&D landscape. The R&D World Index (RDWI) for the week ending November 8, 2024, closed at 3,918.29 for the…

NVIDIA’s dominance in the AI hardware landscape is undeniable. The company has a solid IP strategy, too, with a portfolio of 273 granted AI patents across seven internationally jurisdictions as of late October 2024. NVIDIA’s stock has soared 187.6% so far this year, driving its market capitalization to $3.43 trillion. In addition, data center segment,…

The R&D World Index (RDWI) for the week ending November 1, 2024, closed at 3,855.65 for the 25 companies in the RDWI. The Index was down -2.70% (or -107.16 basis points). Eight RDWI members gained value last week from 0.16% (Alibaba) to 8.36% (AbbVie). Seventeen RDWI members lost value the previous from -0.43% (Cisco) to…

A 2016 survey by Nature found that over 70% of researchers have tried and failed to reproduce another scientist’s experiments, and more than half have failed to reproduce their own. One significant challenge contributing to this crisis is the difficulty scientists face in understanding experimental parameters across studies. “The basic problem was massive amounts of…