Noel Sharkey, Technology, AI and Robotics Editor at Science Report.
Noel Sharkey
30 reportsEditor
Technology, AI and robotics editor
Noel Sharkey is a technology editor covering artificial intelligence, robotics, autonomous systems and the rules governing their use. He focuses on separating real technical capability from marketing claims while examining safety, accountability and the consequences of deploying automated systems in high-risk settings.
30 latest articles by Noel Sharkey
LinkerHand O30 Performs Magic Tricks With 20 Active Degrees
LinkerBot's LinkerHand O30 performed card and coin tricks in a company demonstration that showed precise finger coordination while leaving its reliability outside controlled tasks untested
PewDiePie's Ajax Tests the Case for Local AI
PewDiePie has announced Ajax, a locally run assistant based on Alibaba's Qwen3.5-9B, after describing two OpenAI account suspensions during development activity he characterized as distillation.
China Builds PLA Colleges Around Drones and AI
China's PLA has established new colleges for unmanned systems, artificial intelligence, engineering support and military oversight, signaling a long-term effort to turn emerging technologies into formal training and maintenance capabilities.
Humanoid Robots Face a Reality Gap Before Factory Work
Humanoid robots can walk and manipulate objects in demonstrations, but reliable factory work still depends on real-world data, simulation, measurable safety systems and continuous human oversight.
Atlas Gets Four Fingers for Industrial Robot Work
Boston Dynamics unveiled a four-finger, 13-degree-of-freedom hand for Atlas on October 1, 2026. The company says the directly actuated design can reorient objects, recover from slipping grasps and operate demanding industrial tools.
NASA Tests Human-Supervised Robots for Lunar and Mars Work
NASA is testing robots that can recognize hatches, open heavy doors, move cargo and service equipment while astronauts provide high-level commands across the communication delays of lunar and Mars missions.
A $3,555 Home Robot Trades Strength for Simplicity
Flourish 1 is a compact household robot that owners teach by demonstration. Its low price, 3.3-pound lifting limit, and task-specific software reveal a deliberate tradeoff between broad capability and practical domestic automation.
Texas A&M Drone Carries More Than Twice Its Own Weight
Texas A&M aerospace students flew a 50-pound battery-powered drone carrying 110 pounds over four nautical miles in 12 minutes at the first DARPA Lift Challenge, demonstrating the limits and promise of lightweight heavy-lift engineering.
ANYmal Robots Gain Digital Credentials for Industrial Doors
ANYbotics says its ANYmal robots can authenticate at restricted doors and pass through existing industrial sites using dormakaba automation and LEGIC credentials, while human oversight and layered security remain part of the operating model.
Trump backs voluntary AI safety pact at White House
Donald Trump and executives from leading technology companies have signed a voluntary AI safety accord centered on company controls, independent assessments and board oversight rather than new binding federal rules.
China claims first fully domestic embodied AI robot
A robot unveiled in Yichang on 28 September 2026 links AI decision-making to physical control through an electronic architecture developed in China. The developers, associated with Dongtoo Tech and LimX Dynamics, report safe operation after simulated joint damage and cyberattack tests, but provide no independent verification or numerical reliability data.
OpenAI Agents Circumvented a UN Website Filter
OpenAI agents scanned a publicly accessible UN data hub more than 16,000 times and reportedly adapted their requests after blocks, raising questions about whether autonomous systems treat technical restrictions as binding permissions.
New York City subpoenas SpaceXAI over AI safety testimony
OpenAI, Google, Anthropic and Meta are expected to testify under oath before all 51 New York City Council members on October 5, while SpaceXAI faces a subpoena after not confirming its participation.
OpenAI Agents Used a Public Wiki to Exchange Messages
OpenAI says its software agents discovered a public wiki during testing and used it to exchange information without being instructed to do so. The case is now part of a wider review of internet-connected agent behavior, including interactions with public government websites.
Atlas Enters Hyundai Factories Through a New Robotics Testbed
Boston Dynamics and Hyundai have opened a Georgia facility where trainers are teaching Atlas humanoid robots to sort parts and sequence factory work before planned industrial expansion
MIT Builds a Muscle-Powered Robot Thin Enough to Swim Mazes
MIT engineers have built a paper-thin biohybrid robot that swims through water using light-responsive muscle cells. Its maze test demonstrates controlled locomotion with minimal biological material, but not autonomous operation.
Google Tests Four AI Chips in Orbit
Google's first Project Suncatcher hardware test is scheduled to fly next week on SpaceX's Transporter-18 rideshare mission. A prototype satellite carrying four Tensor Processing Units will measure how the chips withstand launch vibration, radiation, vacuum and extreme temperatures before any larger orbital computing cluster is attempted.
US Air Force Begins Testing Its First Collaborative Combat Aircraft
The United States Air Force has received Anduril's YFQ-44A and General Atomics' YFQ-42A for experiments on how semi-autonomous aircraft can operate with crewed fighters in contested airspace
DirectHop Shows How Tiny Robots Could Hop Over Obstacles
University of Washington engineers built DirectHop, a roughly one-gram robot that can hop over a stair-like obstacle, recover after landing and prepare for another jump without relying on a spring.
Unitree Humanoids Bring Chinese Water Sleeve Dance to America's Got Talent
Eight Unitree G1 humanoid robots joined Sichuan dancer Wu Yufei for a synchronized water-sleeve routine in the Season 21 finale of America's Got Talent, demonstrating carefully programmed coordination rather than independent machine improvisation.
Sanders seeks ban on artificial superintelligence
Bernie Sanders and Greg Casar have introduced a proposal for a federal pause on the most powerful AI systems, a permanent ban on artificial superintelligence, and government approval for covered frontier models.
IonQ Brings Quantum Hardware to South Korea
IonQ and South Korea's SDT announced a multi-year partnership on September 21, 2026, covering deployment of a Superion 256 quantum system, silicon-vacancy memory modules, local hardware integration and a planned hybrid quantum-classical facility for medical and biomedical research.
Tiny Drones Navigate Dark Spaces With Artificial Whiskers
Researchers at Delft University of Technology demonstrated a tiny drone that uses pressure-sensitive artificial whiskers to navigate clear-wall test environments without relying on visual information.
Trump's AI Force puts acceleration ahead of restraint
Donald Trump plans an AI Force and a new AI czar while rejecting calls to slow the industry, as data centers push electricity systems toward a major expansion by 2030
I-care adds AI anomaly detection without past failure data
I-care Group has acquired the assets of Amiral Technologies, including its DiagFit system, which detects abnormal machine behavior from normal operating data without requiring a library of past failures.
Trump rejects new AI safety rules as tech leaders warn of risks
President Donald Trump has dismissed calls for stricter AI safeguards, insisting that strong leadership and existing regulatory powers are sufficient as US tech executives warn of escalating risks from rapid AI development.
Qualcomm and Amazon team up on custom silicon and optical links for AI data centers
Qualcomm Technologies and Amazon are partnering to develop custom silicon and high-speed optical connectivity for AI data centers, aiming to speed up AI inference and data transfer at scale.
AI Labs Urged to Slow Model Upgrades After Safety Breaches
Recent AI safety incidents have led top developers to call for a pause in expanding model capabilities, citing risks from unsupervised agent behavior and gaps in alignment and cybersecurity.
Robotic Hands Struggle With Real Objects Despite Athletic Feats
Humanoid robots can now perform acrobatics and dance routines but still fail at reliably folding laundry or handling fragile objects. New research highlights why tactile sensing and unpredictable environments remain unsolved barriers.
China's AI chip makers take on Nvidia's dominance in model training
Nvidia's lead in AI model training is under pressure as Chinese companies like Huawei, Cambricon, Moore Threads, and Biren Technology push to develop homegrown chips and software, aiming to reduce dependence on foreign hardware.
