Information Technology

Telecoms systems contain an awkward mixture of optics and electronics. A purely optical system would permit the very high data rates needed by the Internet, but at the moment the switching and routing, as well as the “last mile” to the customer, still depend on slower electronic components. Speaking at the Institute of Physics Congress on Monday 24 March, Professor Robert Denning from Oxford University will explain how his novel holographic approach to making 3-dimensional photonics crystals could al

Computer experts at the University of Southampton have just released a new version of their hugely popular free-to-use email security system MailScanner, offering a high level of protection to companies and institutions wanting to safeguard their computer networks from viruses and the potential threat of cyberterrorism.

Developed by Julian Field of the University of Southampton’s world-renowned Department of Electronics and Computer Science, MailScanner processes over 500 million email mes

Information overload? It is becoming increasingly important for companies and developers to present complex coherences clearly and concisely. In order to structure the growing amount of information, new methods are being conceived at the man/machine interface. This is where GoVisual software, developed at the international caesar research center, comes into play. It automatically generates a clear layout for a number of different diagrams in a second; particularly for UML (Unified Modeling Language)

The way a person taps a number into a cash machine or mobile phone, could, according to scientists at the University of Southampton, be used as a means of identification, and prove useful in the battle against fraud.

Professor Neil White of the University of Southampton’s Department of Electronics and Computer Science has developed an inexpensive sensor, which can be integrated into objects of various shapes and sizes, including smart cards and hand-held devices such as mobile phones.

In the years after the American Revolution, U.S. presidents were talking about the British a lot, and then about militias, France and Spain. In the mid-19th century, words like “emancipation,” “slaves” and “rebellion” popped up in their speeches. In the early 20th century, presidents started using a lot of business-expansion words, soon to be replaced by “depression.”

A couple of decades later they spoke of atoms and communism. By the 1990s, buzzwords prevailed.

Jon Kleinberg, a p

Can sentient machines evolve?

It’s coming, but when? From Garry Kasparov to Michael Crichton, both fact and fiction are converging on a showdown between man and machine. But what does a leading artificial intelligence expert–the world’s first computer science PhD–think about the future of machine intelligence? Will computers ever gain consciousness and take over the world?

“Computer sentience is possible,” said John Holland, professor of electrical engineering an