Magazine

The Innovation issue

January/February 2025

Introducing the 2025 10 Breakthrough Technologies! Fast-learning robots, next-gen jet fuel, new HIV protection meds, the largest camera ever built to document the cosmos, and more. Plus: digital twins, high-tech fisheries, and the AI Hype Index.

Read the issue

Letter from the editor

Driving into the future

Spencer Lowell

Features

Categorized in Culture
10 Breakthrough Technologies 2025
What will really matter in the long run? That’s the question we tackle each year as we compile this annual list.
Categorized in Artificial intelligence
AI means the end of internet search as we’ve known it
Despite fewer clicks, copyright fights, and sometimes iffy answers, AI could unlock new ways to summon all the world’s knowledge.
Categorized in Culture
Will we ever trust robots?
If most robots still need remote human operators to be safe and effective, why should we welcome them into our homes?
Categorized in Climate change and energy
The world’s first industrial-scale plant for green steel promises a cleaner future
The Swedish startup Stegra has raised close to $7 billion to produce zero-emissions steel using green hydrogen starting in 2026.
Categorized in Space
The Vera C. Rubin Observatory is ready to transform our understanding of the cosmos
The telescope will catalogue billions of new objects and produce a new map of the entire night sky every three days with the largest digital camera ever made.

Also in this issue
- AI is changing how we study bird migration
  After decades of frustration, machine-learning tools are unlocking a treasure trove of acoustic data for ecologists.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence
- This international surveillance project aims to protect wheat from deadly diseases
  Backed by the Gates Foundation, the Wheat Disease Early Warning Advisory System is on the front lines, looking for early signals of crop-killing rust infections.
  
  Categorized in Climate change and energy
- How poop could help feed the planet
  Once you get over the ick factor, new technologies are efficiently transforming human waste into agricultural solutions.
  
  Categorized in Biotechnology and health
- Google DeepMind has a new way to look inside an AI’s “mind”
  Autoencoders are letting us peer into the black box of artificial intelligence. They could help us create AI that is better understood, and more easily controlled.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence
- Kids are learning how to make their own little language models
  A new program aims to teach them how AI works, by getting hands-on.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence
- These stunning images trace ships’ routes as they move
  Publicly available data helps monitor ship traffic to avoid disruption of undersea internet cables, identify whale strikes, and study the footprint of underwater noise.
  
  Categorized in Culture
- Digital twins of human organs are here. They’re set to transform medical treatment.
  The models can be used to plan surgeries and in the future could be used to help trial new drugs.
  
  Categorized in Biotechnology and health
- How Silicon Valley is disrupting democracy
  Two books explore the price we’ve paid in handing over unprecedented power to Big Tech—and explain why it’s imperative we start taking it back.
  
  Categorized in Culture
- China wants to restore the sea with high-tech marine ranches
  China is the world's top fish consumer and is spending billions on technology designed to restock the oceans. But will this expensive experiment actually work?
  
  Categorized in Culture
- How wind tech could help decarbonize cargo shipping
  Wind is an underutilized resource that has the potential to steer the notoriously dirty shipping industry toward a greener future.
  
  Categorized in Field notes
- The AI Hype Index: Robot pets, simulated humans, and Apple’s AI text summaries
  MIT Technology Review’s highly subjective take on the latest buzz about AI.
  
  Categorized in Artificial intelligence

Updated

Magazine

The Innovation issue

Letter from the editor

Features

10 Breakthrough Technologies 2025

AI means the end of internet search as we’ve known it

Will we ever trust robots?

The world’s first industrial-scale plant for green steel promises a cleaner future

The Vera C. Rubin Observatory is ready to transform our understanding of the cosmos

AI is changing how we study bird migration

This international surveillance project aims to protect wheat from deadly diseases

How poop could help feed the planet

Google DeepMind has a new way to look inside an AI’s “mind”

Kids are learning how to make their own little language models

These stunning images trace ships’ routes as they move

Digital twins of human organs are here. They’re set to transform medical treatment.

How Silicon Valley is disrupting democracy

China wants to restore the sea with high-tech marine ranches

How wind tech could help decarbonize cargo shipping

The AI Hype Index: Robot pets, simulated humans, and Apple’s AI text summaries

Past issues

The latest iteration of a legacy

Advertise with MIT Technology Review

About

Help