About Us
Founded in 1944, the American Committee for the Weizmann Institute of Science develops philanthropic support for the Weizmann Institute in Israel, and advances its mission of science for the benefit of humanity.
Jun 13, 2019...
HiGrade app lets consumers check the potency of any THC cannabis strain with a smartphone. Photo: courtesy
Will this bud get you buzzed, relieve your pain, or leave you dazed and confused?
The HiGrade cannabis analytics app uses your smartphone camera and machine learning algorithms to reveal your dry cannabis flowers’ level of THC, the psychoactive compound in cannabis.
The app can be used, where legal, by medical cannabis users to get a more accurate dose, or by recreational users to be more mindful about what they’re smoking.
Feb 24, 2020... In October 2019, Google announced that its quantum computer, Sycamore, had done a calculation in three minutes and 20 seconds that would have taken the world’s fastest supercomputer 10,000 years. “Quantum supremacy,” Google claimed for itself. We now have a quantum computer, it was saying, capable of performing calculations that no regular, “classical” computer is capable of doing in a reasonable time.
https://www.weizmann-usa.org/news-media/in-the-news/zero-knowledge-keeps-your-secrets-safe/
Jun 06, 2010...
If you feel secure keying your credit card information onto a website, thank Prof. Shafrira Goldwasser.
At the end of April, this Israeli professor traveled to Philadelphia's Franklin Institute to accept the 2010 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Computer and Cognitive Science for her fundamental contributions to cryptography theory, the basis of techniques for encoding anything from secret messages to financial information on the Internet.
Jan 28, 2013...
REHOVOT, ISRAEL—January 28, 2013—The European Commission has officially announced the selection of the Human Brain Project (HBP) as one of its two Future Emerging Technologies (FET) Flagship projects. The new project will federate European efforts to address one of the greatest challenges of modern science: understanding the human brain.
The goal of the Human Brain Project: Pull together all our existing knowledge about the human brain and reconstruct the brain, piece by piece, in supercomputer-based models and simulations. Such models offer the prospect of a new understanding of the human brain and the diseases that affect it, as well as advancing completely new computing and robotic technologies. The European Commission supported this vision, announcing that it has selected the HBP as one of two projects to be funded through the new FET Flagship Program, which supports highly innovative technology.
Feb 08, 2012...
Magisto's founders Oren Boiman, left, and Alex Rav-Acha.
Most video is boring: Cats doing flips, babies taking their first steps, your second-cousin-once-removed’s bar mitzvah party. Yet we can’t help ourselves from churning it out. Some 48 hours of video are uploaded to YouTube every minute. And it’s just getting worse with the proliferation of smart phones, which can take high-quality video (Apple’s new iPhone 4S even offers HD).
Sep 02, 2010... On her first tour of her freshman dorm at the University of California, Davis in the fall of 1992, neurophysiologist and science journalist Kirsten Sanford met an engineering student who talked to her about signing up for an electronic mail account—a term she had never heard before. At the time, the Internet was little more than green text on a black screen, and hardly anyone she knew used it. But Sanford was intrigued. “The idea that I could send messages immediately to people without having to stamp a letter was fascinating.”
May 08, 2019... Meet physicist Prof. Erez Berg, the 2019 Physical Sciences & Engineering Laureate of the Blavatnik Awards for Young Scientists. Prof. Berg has conducted influential studies to gain insights into quantum materials—materials whose electronic properties cannot be characterized by traditional physics. His research holds major promise for devising new ways of storing and manipulating quantum information, with implications for a new computing age, as well as next-generation electronics, superconducting power lines, and MRI technologies. The Blavatnik Awards, presented by The Blavatnik Family Foundation, the New York Academy of Sciences, and the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities (IASH), recognize early-career scientists and engineers in Israel for both their extraordinary achievements and promise for future discoveries. Of the three 2019 laureates, two were from the Weizmann Institute; the other Weizmann winner was Dr. Michal Rivlin of the Department of Neurobiology. Video courtesy of the New York Academy of Sciences.
Mar 25, 2013...
The computer under construction. Photo courtesy of Weizmann Institute
In a glass case in the computer sciences building at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, stands a somewhat nondescript item. It’s an old-fashioned machine with lots of wires emerging from it, connecting it to receivers and other electronic components. Only a small sign in the corner reveals its significance.
This is WEIZAC — an acronym for “Weizmann Automated Computer,” the first electronic computer built in the country, in 1954-5 and operational until 1964. It was, the sign tells us, developed in the institute’s applied mathematics department.
Nov 13, 2018...
Encryption startup Duality Technologies' cofounders. Courtesy of Duality Technologies
In the 1980s, Shafi Goldwasser co-invented “zero knowledge proofs,” a cryptographic breakthrough that, improbably, enables someone to prove a fact as true without revealing any information about that fact. For example, an investor seeking to prove her status as an accredited investor could demonstrate that her salary exceeds a certain minimum threshold while withholding the exact amount. (You can read more about the concept—one of the hottest area of research in the field of blockchain tech—in this Fortune feature from last year.)
Jul 13, 2013...
Kertesz. 'Israel has an abundance of talent and motivation, but not of biotech investments. [Biotech] requires tens of millions of dollars and years of development, which aren’t always fruitful.' Photo by Eyal Toueg
A small American start-up managed to streamline complex DNA-sequencing techniques. Its co-founder, Mickey Kertesz, thinks the greatest breakthrough may come in the field of cancer treatment.
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