“A sundial for sounding the hours,” from Athanasius Kircher’s Ars magna lucis et umbrae (Rome, 1646) (courtesy Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering & Technology) On Time: The Quest for Precision ...

MOST of us have been brought up on a myth about the machine, and it is one that is not quickly seen through, because it has just enough glittering flakes of truth in it to take our attention off the ...

It surprises us that mechanical inventions, like the motor car and the airplane, take so long to work themselves into literature. We can’t remember ever having read anything that quite gave us the ...

Man-versus-machine interactions rarely end well for either side (witness Space Odyssey‘s HAL 9000 or any Borg from Star Trek), unless the unique nature of each form is put to collaborative effect as a ...

Reddit user u/forgeris recently asked, "What's an invention that quietly changed the world but doesn't get enough credit?" Thousands of people shared their thoughts, and I'm honestly so fascinated by ...

TIME magazine recently released its Best Inventions of 2025, highlighting the emerging technology and products that are “changing how we live, work, play, and think about what’s possible.” UC’s ever ...

From drones to self-driving cars, most robots today aren’t the humanoid versions imagined in science fiction. One exception is the R1 from China-based Unitree Robotics. Introduced in July with a ...

Many people take cover when thunderclouds threaten. Experimental drones from Japanese tech giant NTT rush toward them to "tame the lightning," says Senior Research Engineer Atsushi Nagao. In a ...