Susan D'Agostino

Jan 3, 2025 | quantamagazine.org | Ben Brubaker |Bill Andrews |Susan D'Agostino

Introduction Pose a question to a Magic 8 Ball, and it’ll answer yes, no or something annoyingly indecisive. We think of it as a kid’s toy, but theoretical computer scientists employ a similar tool. They often imagine they can consult hypothetical devices called oracles that can instantly, and correctly, answer specific questions. These fanciful thought experiments have inspired new algorithms and helped researchers map the landscape of computation.

Dec 9, 2024 | quantamagazine.org | Ben Brubaker |Susan D'Agostino |Max G. Levy |John Pavlus

Introduction How do you construct a perfect machine out of imperfect parts? That’s the central challenge for researchers building quantum computers. The trouble is that their elementary building blocks, called qubits, are exceedingly sensitive to disturbance from the outside world. Today’s prototype quantum computers are too error-prone to do anything useful. In the 1990s, researchers worked out the theoretical foundations for a way to overcome these errors, called quantum error correction.

Oct 24, 2023 | quantamagazine.org | Susan D'Agostino

IntroductionWhen Alexei Efros moved with his family from Russia to California as a teenager in the 1980s, he brought his Soviet-built personal computer, an Elektronika BK-0010. The machine had no external storage and overheated every few hours, so in order to play video games, he had to write code, troubleshoot, and play fast — before the machine shut down. That cycle, repeated most days, accelerated his learning.

Oct 21, 2023 | maharlikanews.com | Susan D'Agostino

Is there a potential interplay of AI and climate change that carries risk? AI should mostly help climate change. I don't see AI using climate change as a weapon unless we had a loss-of-control situation. Then, changing the climate might be a way [for AI] to accelerate our destruction or wreak havoc in society. But how could a machine change the climate? This is an important question.

Oct 16, 2023 | wired.com | Susan D'Agostino

The main artery in Montreal’s Little Italy is lined with cafés, wine bars, and pastry shops that spill into tree-lined, residential side streets. Generations of farmers, butchers, bakers, and fishmongers sell farm-to-table goods in the neighborhood’s large, open-air market, the Marché Jean-Talon. But the quiet enclave also accommodates a modern, 90,000-square-foot global AI hub known as Mila–Quebec AI Institute.