Technology

Vertex will pay tens of millions to license a controversial CRISPR patent

December 13, 2023
Vertex Pharmaceuticals has agreed to buy rights to use a dominant CRISPR patent owned by the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, avoiding a potential lawsuit over its new gene-editing treatment for sickle-cell disease. The agreement allows Vertex to start selling its treatment, approved last Friday, without fear of patent infringement claims. The one-time treatment…

The Download: carbon removal concerns, and Yahoo’s China controversy 

December 13, 2023
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Two former Department of Energy staffers warn we’re doing carbon removal all wrong The carbon removal industry is just starting to take off, but some experts are warning that it’s already headed in…

Yahoo’s decades-long China controversy and the responsibility of tech companies

December 13, 2023
This story first appeared in China Report, MIT Technology Review’s newsletter about technology in China. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Tuesday. It’s a perennial debate: whether American tech companies are contributing to government control of the internet in China. But long before Apple ceded control of local user data to the state or…

Hyperplane wants to bring AI to banks

December 13, 2023

Hyperplane, a San Francisco-based startup that is building foundation models to help banks predict customer behavior, is coming out of stealth today by announcing a $6 million funding round led by former Stripe exec Lachy Groom, who was joined by SV Angel, Clocktower Technology Ventures, Liquid2 Ventures, Soma Capital, Latitud, Atman Capital, Crestone VC and […]

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Two former Department of Energy staffers warn we’re doing carbon removal all wrong

December 13, 2023
The carbon removal industry is just starting to take off, but some experts are warning that it’s already headed in the wrong direction. Two former staffers of the US agency responsible for advancing the technology argue that the profit-driven industry’s focus on cleaning up corporate emissions will come at the expense of helping to pull…

Mapping the micro and macro of biology with spatial omics and AI

December 12, 2023
37 trillion. That is the number or cells that form a human being. How they all work together to sustain life is possibly the biggest unsolved puzzle in biology. A group of up-and-coming technologies for spatially resolved multi omics, here collectively called “spatial omics,” may provide researchers with the solution. Over the last 20 years,…

The Download: Yahoo’s misdeeds in China, and AI Act takeaways

December 12, 2023
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Inside the decades-long fight over Yahoo’s misdeeds in China When you think of Big Tech these days, Yahoo is probably not top of mind. But for Chinese dissident Xu Wanping, the company still…

Inside the decades-long fight over Yahoo’s misdeeds in China

December 12, 2023
When you think of Big Tech these days, Yahoo is probably not top of mind. But for a 62-year-old Chinese dissident named Xu Wanping, the company still looms large—and has for nearly two decades.    In 2005, Xu was arrested for signing online petitions relating to anti-Japanese protests. He didn’t use his real name, but he…

Helicity Space raises $5M to unlock fusion propulsion – and fast travel in deep space

December 11, 2023

Helicity Space has closed a $5 million seed funding to accelerate development of a technology that could finally unlock fast, efficient travel in deep space. That technology is fusion propulsion, which has long been the domain of science fiction. The startup says that they have discovered a way to use plasma jets for fusion reaction. […]

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