Devious humour and painful puns: will the cryptic crossword remain the last thing AI can’t conquer?

When human solvers battle artificial intelligence, who is able to think more cryptically, faster? And are some devious clues just too tough for software?

The chatbot optimisation game: can we trust AI web searches?

Google and its rivals are increasingly employing AI-generated summaries, but research indicates their results are far from authoritative and open to manipulation

Graphene-chip implant in UK trial could transform brain tumour surgery

Cancer cell detector made of material that won its inventors Nobel prize is hailed as ‘clinical milestone’

Experiencing intense emotions with others makes people feel more connected, study finds

Participants bonded more after watching films that sparked intense emotions

Winner of Royal Society Trivedi science book prize assesses whether humans really could colonise Mars

Kelly and Zach Weinersmith’s book overturns Elon Musk’s claim that we could live on the red planet within years while stressing the good reasons to pursue space settlement

NHS in England to trial AI tool to predict risk of fatal heart disease

‘Superhuman’ technology known as Aire can detect potential problems doctors cannot see from ECG results

Long-extinct animals could be resurrected as robots to shed light on evolution

Researchers hope to recreate entire bodies of ancient creatures using paleo-inspired robotics

‘It was to make bank managers less uptight’: the toy that put Newton’s law on executive desks

The eccentric British design firm behind Ballrace, the bestselling shiny 1970s Newton’s cradle, is celebrated in a new book

Pay attention! 12 ways to improve your focus and concentration span

From gamifying your to-do list to going for a regular morning walk, top tips for improving concentration from psychotherapists, health coaches and other experts

AI mediation tool may help reduce culture war rifts, say researchers

System built by Google DeepMind team takes individual views and generates a set of group statements

‘Race science’ group say they accessed sensitive UK health data

Exclusive: Fringe network recorded boasting of securing data from UK Biobank trove donated by 500,000 volunteers

UK’s Alan Turing Institute launches redundancy consultation process

Institute for AI and data science sends memo saying it will concentrate on fewer projects

‘I’m empowering my song to go and make love with different people’: Imogen Heap on how her AI twin will rewrite pop

Known for her wild “Imogenation”, Heap has always reworked pop with tech, but her new data-mining project is her boldest yet. She explains why ‘you can’t stop progress’

AI gives voice to dead animals in Cambridge exhibition

Creatures can converse and share their stories by voice or text through visitors’ mobile phones at Museum of Zoology

Nobel winner Geoffrey Hinton is the ‘godfather of AI’. Here’s an offer he shouldn’t refuse…

The computer scientist’s dogged belief in the potential of neural networks helped unlock machine learning. But he’d be wise to remember the experience of a fellow laureate