ENG: Researchers from UC Santa Barbara, ETH Zurich and Miguel Hernández University have shown that deep learning could make future visual prostheses more precise and better adapted to individual users. The team studied a cortical visual prosthesis, which bypasses the eyes and optic nerves and stimulates the visual cortex directly. Their proof-of-concept work, published in Neuron, involved a blind participant with a temporary 96-electrode implant in the visual cortex. Electrical stimulation produced phosphenes, perceived spots or shapes of light, allowing the researchers to investigate how different stimulation patterns translated into neural activity and visual sensations.

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ENG: Researchers at the University of Chicago’s Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering have developed a computational framework that models the complete optical cycle of spin defects in solid materials such as diamond and silicon carbide. These microscopic defects can act as qubits for quantum technologies, including quantum sensing, because their electronic states can be manipulated and measured using light. However, accurately predicting how they release energy after excitation has remained a challenge. The new framework addresses this limitation by modeling internal conversion, a process in which excited electrons lose energy through atomic vibrations rather than emitting light.

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