Shock Therapy's Value Found in Brain 'Noise'

Plus: AI's "chain-of-thought" reasoning; Alien-hunting method scrutinized; Michel Talagrand wins the Abel Prize; New Quanta Science Podcast; New video

Math and Science News from Quanta Magazine View this email in your browser NEUROSCIENCE | ALL TOPICS   Brain's 'Background Noise' May Explain Value of Shock Therapy By ELIZABETH LANDAU Electroconvulsive therapy is highly effective in treating major depressive disorder, but no one knows why it works. New research suggests it may restore balance between excitation and inhibition in the brain. Read the blog NATURAL LANGUAGE PROCESSING   How Chain-of-Thought Reasoning Helps Neural Networks Compute By BEN BRUBAKER Large language models do better at solving problems when they show their work. Researchers are starting to understand why. Read the article Related:  Researchers Gain New Understanding From Simple AI By Mordechai Rorvig (2022) ABEL PRIZE   Michel Talagrand Wins Abel Prize for Work Wrangling Randomness By JORDANA CEPELEWICZ The French mathematician spent decades developing a set of tools now widely used for taming random processes. Read the blog Related:  Dennis Sullivan, Uniter of Topology and Chaos, Wins the Abel Prize By Jordana Cepelewicz (2023) ASTROBIOLOGY   Doubts Grow About the Biosignature Approach to Alien-Hunting By ELISE CUTTS Recent controversies bode ill for the effort to detect life on other planets by analyzing the gases in their atmospheres. Read the blog QUANTA SCIENCE PODCAST   Echoes of Electromagnetism Found in Number Theory By KEVIN HARTNETT; Podcast hosted by SUSAN VALOT A new magnum opus posits the existence of a hidden mathematical link akin to the connection between electricity and magnetism. Listen to the podcast   QUANTIZED ACADEMY   Math That Connects Where We're Going to Where We've Been By PATRICK HONNER Recursion builds bridges between ideas from across different math classes and illustrates the power of creative mathematical thinking. Read the column Related:  The Astonishing Behavior of Recursive Sequences By Alex Stone (2023) IN CASE YOU MISSED IT   Why Is This Basic Computer Science Problem So Hard? Video by CHRISTOPHER WEBB YOUNG and EMILY BUDER How can a programmer ensure a critical piece of software is bug-free? Theoretical computer scientists use a fundamental question called the reachability problem, which determines whether a computer will reach or avoid various dangerous states when running a program. Watch the video   Follow Quanta Unsubscribe | About Quanta | My Bookmarks Privacy Policy | Terms | Contact Us   Copyright © 2024 Quanta Magazine, an editorially independent division of the Simons Foundation Simons Foundation 160 5th Avenue, 7th Floor New York, NY 10010