Welcome to the July 7, 2025 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.

HEADLINES AT A GLANCE

• EU Launches Quantum Strategy
• Scientists Use AI to Mimic the Mind
• U.S. Lifts Export Control of Chip Design Software to China
• 3D Interactive Digital Room Derived from Brief Video
• Large Language Models Are Improving Exponentially
• AI Robot Inks Tattoos
• China Unveils Support for Medical Uses of BCIs
• Algorithm Simulates GKP Codes for Quantum Computing
• 454 Hints That a Chatbot Wrote Part of a Biomedical Researcher's Paper
• Imaging Technique Reconstructs the Shapes of Hidden Objects
• ACM Publications See Impact Factor Success in Latest JCR

EU Launches Quantum Strategy

The European Commission last week released a plan aimed at making the EU a global leader in quantum technologies. The bloc's quantum strategy aims to enhance coordination among member states; streamline quantum investments; and expand quantum chip pilot lines, computing facilities, and other public infrastructure.
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Scientists Use AI to Mimic the Mind

Scientists trained a large language model on 10 million psychology experiment questions, aiming to better understand the human mind. An international team including Marcel Binz of Germany's Helmholtz Munich trained Meta's open-source LLaMA (Large Language Model Meta AI) on the responses of more than 60,000 volunteers to 160 psychology experiments. The resulting modified model, named Centaur, in testing accurately predicted what a volunteer’s remaining responses would look like.
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U.S. Lifts Export Control of Chip Design Software to China

The U.S. has lifted export controls on certain chip design software to China. Siemens, Synopsys, and Cadence Design Systems, three of the world’s largest electronic design automation software developers, were informed by the U.S. government that sales of their products to China no longer require special approval.
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3D Interactive Digital Room Derived from Brief Video

A process developed by Cornell University researchers uses AI to turn a brief video of a space into an interactive 3D simulation. The DRAWER (Digital Reconstruction and Articulation With Environment Realism) method includes a perception model that determines which parts of the scene are mobile and how they should move, as well as a model that fills in the unseen insides of objects in the room.
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Large Language Models Are Improving Exponentially

Large language models (LLMs) are doubling their capabilities every seven months, according to a metric developed by researchers at the nonprofit Model Evaluation & Threat Research. The task-completion time horizon metric measures the average amount of time human programmers would take to perform a task that can be completed with a certain degree of reliability by an LLM. According to the researchers, LLMs should be able to perform software-based tasks that take humans one month of 40-hour workweeks with 50% reliability in days, possibly hours, by 2030.
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AI Robot Inks Tattoos

Blackdot has developed an AI-driven tattooing robot whose precision, according to the Austin startup, boosts predictability and reduces pain. Designs are converted into a set of dots by Blackdot’s proprietary algorithm. Once a human operator starts the process, the device’s computer-vision-equipped arm scans the skin and extends its triple-pointed needle to initiate the tattoo. Bang Bang Tattoo in Manhattan, which calls the device Aero for “Artist Enabled Robotic Operator,” has used it to perform about 30 tattoos on volunteers since its installation in April.
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China Unveils Support for Medical Uses of BCIs

China's National Medical Products Administration (NMPA) last week unveiled policies to support the development of medical-use brain-computer interfaces (BCIs). The NMPA said it would promote “research on safety and efficacy evaluation methods for medical devices based on BCI technology." The agency also said that it would accelerate the development of general standards and establish standardization technical organizations for medical robots and AI-powered devices.
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Algorithm Simulates GKP Codes for Quantum Computing

An algorithm developed by researchers at Sweden's Chalmers University of Technology, Italy's University of Milan, Spain's University of Granada, and Japan's University of Tokyo simulates quantum computations that use a Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) code, which stores quantum information in a way that enables quantum computers to more easily correct errors. Said Chalmers' Giulia Ferrini, "This opens up entirely new ways of simulating quantum computations that we have previously been unable to test but are crucial for being able to build stable and scalable quantum computers."
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454 Hints That a Chatbot Wrote Part of a Biomedical Researcher's Paper

Researchers at Germany's University of Tübingen identified 454 words overused by chatbots compared with human authors. The researchers analyzed more than 15 million biomedical abstracts published from 2010 to 2024 and found as least 13.5% were written using the assistance of chatbots. In less-selective journals, they found up to 40% of abstracts by authors from some countries were generated using AI.
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Imaging Technique Reconstructs the Shapes of Hidden Objects

An imaging technique developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers produces accurate 3D reconstructions of objects hidden from view using millimeter wave (mmWave) signals. With the mmNorm system, the reflections of mmWave signals off hidden objects are fed into an algorithm that estimates the object's surface shape. Measurements are taken by a radar attached to a robotic arm as it moves around a hidden object, with mmNorm estimating the surface’s curvature by comparing the signal strength at various locations.
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ACM Publications See Impact Factor Success in Latest JCR

More than 75% of ACM journals indexed in the latest Journal Citation Reports (JCR) from Clarivate Analytics increased their impact factors, and the highest number of ACM journals to date ranked in the first quartile in one or more categories. The rankings come as ACM is moving to full open access publishing in 2026. “The stellar performance of ACM’s publications in the JCR is a strong indication of the real-world benefits of ACM’s transition to open access publishing across our program," said ACM Director of Publications Scott Delman.
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