Researchers have discovered why many animal species can spend their whole lives outdoors with no apparent concern about
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For the last week, a poker-playing computer algorithm has been putting money on the line against four human players. The software, called Claudico, was developed by a team led by Carnegie Mellon computer scientist Tuomas Sandholm. After a week of games at a Pittsburgh casino, the program is currently down, but it's far from out.
An earlier version of Claudico managed to come in first at an all-algorithm poker tournament, so its creators were interested in seeing how it would do against top human players. To attract those, Microsoft Research put up a $100,000 purse. To provide some scientific value, the tournament has unusual rules: each hand the computer receives will also be given to a human player, so their actions and results can be compared. The tournament will also go on for another week to ensure that enough hands are dealt to get some statistically significant results.
Computers have solved Limit Texas Hold'em (in that they've generated an optimal strategy for every hand), but the tournament will use the no-limit form, which is significantly more complicated. To try to optimize Claudico's performance, the team used a supercomputing cluster with 16TB of RAM, which is needed to help hold as many of the possible outcomes of a given hand as possible.
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A new agreement between the United States and the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) will pave the
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In the dusty sky toward the constellation Taurus and the Orion Arm of our Milky Way Galaxy, this broad mosaic follows dark and faint reflection nebulae along the region's fertile molecular cloud. The six degree wide field of view starts with long dark nebula LDN 1495 stretching from the lower left, and extends beyond the (upside down) bird-like visage of the Baby Eagle Nebula, LBN 777, at lower right. Small bluish reflection nebulae surround scattered fainter Taurus stars, sights often skipped over in favor of the constellation's better known, brighter celestial spectacles. Associated with the young, variable star RY Tau, the yellowish nebula VdB 27 is toward the upper left. Only 400 light-years or so distant, the Taurus molecular cloud is one of the closest regions of low-mass star formation. At that distance this dark vista would span over 40 light-years.An amphibious robot that can swim through the oceans of distant moons and planets could be the next
The post Soft robot to swim through Europa’s oceans has been published on Technology Org.
