Jeremy Hsu

New York

Tech Reporter at New Scientist

Tech reporting @NewScientist. Also keen on history and climate issues. Also checking out Mastodon @[email protected]

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Articles

Office Hours: An Old Tool for New Challenges

2 days ago | insidehighered.com | Jeremy Hsu

May 13, 2025 Rethinking office hours and how we talk about them can unlock new opportunities for improving student learning, Jeremy Hsu writes. You have /5 articles left. Sign up for a free account or log in. fizkes/iStock/Getty Images Plus One day, a seemingly mundane email made me realize that I could do much more with my office hours.
New way to pull uranium from water can help China's nuclear power push

3 days ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

Chinese researchers have developed an extremely energy-efficient and low-cost technology for extracting uranium from seawater, a potential boon to the countryâ€™s nuclear power ambitions. China currently leads the world in building new nuclear power plants, and shoring up its supply of uranium will help these efforts. The worldâ€™s oceans hold an estimate 4.5 billion tonnes of uranium â€“ more than 1000 times the uranium available in the ground â€“ but it is extremely diluted.
AI hallucinations are getting worse - and they're here to stay

5 days ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

AI chatbots from tech companies such as OpenAI and Google have been getting so-called reasoning upgrades over the past months – ideally to make them better at giving us answers we can trust, but recent testing suggests they are sometimes doing worse than previous models. The errors made by chatbots, known as “hallucinations”, have been a problem from the start, and it is becoming clear we may never get rid of them.
US government is using AI for unprecedented social media surveillance

1 week ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

The US government is expanding its surveillance of social media to monitor millions of visitors and immigrants – and its embrace of more data analytics and artificial intelligence tools could increase scrutiny of US citizens as well. “It is nearly – if not entirely – impossible for the government to focus only on non-citizens and not look at anyone else’s social media,” says Rachel Levinson-Waldman at the Brennan Center for Justice, a public policy non-profit…
Tiny rewards can protect the grid from a surge in electric vehicles

1 week ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

A small financial reward can persuade many electric vehicle owners to charge their electric cars during off-peak nighttime hours – even when behavioural nudges fail to have the same effect. That is the finding of a real-world trial that demonstrated how modest monetary incentives can ease the demand on power grids during peak usage hours. Such flexibility could be crucial as the number of people driving electric vehicles continues to grow worldwide.
Deepfake makers can now evade an unusual detection method

2 weeks ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

Deepfake videos that feature digital manipulations of peopleâ€™s facial expressions and voices can also depict realistic heartbeats, making them even harder to spot. â€śWe now know that just because a person in a video has a measurable pulse, it doesnâ€™t mean that we can assume they are real,â€ť says Hany Farid at the University of California, Berkeley, who was not involved in the research. This development comes as deepfakes that have been digitally altered or generated…
US government defunds research on misinformation

2 weeks ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

The US National Science Foundation (NSF) has terminated government research grants for studying misinformation and disinformation. The defunding comes at a time when propaganda and scams fuelled by the latest artificial intelligence technologies are flooding social media networks, and tech companies are abandoning content moderation efforts and eliminating fact-checking teams.
Jets wrapped in 'shark skin' material could fly further on less fuel

3 weeks ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

A material with microscopic grooves mimicking those of shark skin could help commercial airliners β and even supersonic jets or military aircraft β save on fuel and reduce carbon emissions when cruising through the skies. Commercial and military customers have already signed up to test the material, which is applied as patches. It was developed by Australian aerospace company MicroTau, and is designed to reduce drag when the grooves align with…
Zo spot je de komende weken de Èta-Aquariden- en Lyriden-meteorenzwerm

3 weeks ago | newscientist.nl | Jeremy Hsu

De Lyriden- en Èta-Aquariden-meteorenzwermen zijn beide te zien vanaf eind april. De Lyriden pieken in de nacht van 21 op 22 april. De Èta-Aquariden zie je het best op 5 mei tussen middernacht en zonsopkomst. De meteorenregens Lyriden en Èta-Aquariden verschijnen binnenkort aan de nachtelijke hemel. Deze ‘vallende sterren’ ontstaan doordat de aarde door een spoor van ruimtestof en gruis vliegt. Dit jaar zijn ze enkele dagen na elkaar zichtbaar in april.
Quantum GPS can help planes navigate when regular GPS is jammed

3 weeks ago | newscientist.com | Jeremy Hsu

A quantum magnetic navigation system has been tested to guide an aircraft â€“ and it outperformed standard backup systems that planes rely on when GPS signals are jammed. GPS and other global navigation satellite systems use radio signals transmitted between space and Earth. But these radio waves are relatively weak and are vulnerable to intentional jamming, as we saw in 2024 when GPS jamming and spoofing affected transatlantic flights.