“From dark matter research to mass testing of brain implants in China. What scientific and technological discoveries await humanity in 2025?”, — write: epravda.com.ua
The year 2025 promises to bring new breakthroughs in technologies that will change people’s lives in various fields: from artificial intelligence (AI) to space and transport. Traditionally, AI will remain one of the main topics for the last few years. In 2025, its capabilities will expand significantly, as new AI agents will not only process user requests, but will also be able to autonomously solve complex tasks, plan trips, and even make important decisions. No less prospects are opening up in space exploration. The latest observatories, equipped with the most powerful telescopes and cameras, are preparing to study dark matter and mysterious dark energy, creating detailed maps of the universe. New space missions will not only expand knowledge about the cosmos, but may also provide answers to fundamental questions about the origin and evolution of galaxies. Another key area of development will be unmanned transport. Self-driving cars are no longer science fiction, but a reality that changes the perception of urban mobility. Companies in the world are actively working on the implementation of robotaxis. In 2025, robot taxis will become a reality in many cities of the world.Advertisement: This year, the perception of YouTube may also change: the language of the video will not be an obstacle. The European Parliament has chosen seven technologies and events that are worth paying attention to in 2025. Dominance of artificial intelligence agents In 2025, a new breakthrough in the development of artificial intelligence is expected due to the emergence of so-called AI agents – autonomous digital assistants capable of performing complex tasks without the participation of the user. Advertising: Unlike regular chatbots, such agents can make decisions and initiate actions. An AI agent will be able to plan a vacation based on a person’s wishes: from searching for tickets to booking hotels. AI agents can rethink what was previously built into assistants like Apple’s Siri. Read also: The impact of artificial intelligence: why the “Nobel” in physics and chemistry was given to psychologists and mathematicians OpenAI CEO Sam Altman calls AI agents the next breakthrough in the field of AI. The company is working on its own project codenamed Operator. At the same time, Microsoft, Nvidia and Google are actively integrating AI agents with their products and services. Microsoft plans to add them to office applications to automate routine tasks and improve user productivity. Sam Altman, CEO OpenAI Photo: Getty Images AI agents are already being used in the field of customer service. Salesforce, the developer of the cloud-based CRM platform of the same name, has signed more than 200 agreements with companies to implement agents to automate interactions with customers. And the insurance company Nsure launched its own AI agent, which handles 60% of customer requests and is constantly improving thanks to training on new data. Despite some skepticism about this trend, AI agents are able to radically change the approach to work. They can not only perform repetitive tasks, but also help with research, planning and project management. This can make them indispensable “virtual colleagues” in business. The implementation of AI agents is expected to become one of the trends of 2025, contributing to the automation of business processes and opening up new opportunities for companies and users. They can change the way people interact with technology, greatly increasing the efficiency of work in many areas. A telescope that will change the perception of space The Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile is preparing to become one of the most advanced laboratories for the study of the universe. In 2025, it will start the large-scale Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST) project, the purpose of which is to create a detailed map of the cosmos and study mysterious phenomena: dark matter and dark energy. Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile’s Atacama Desert Photo: Getty Images The observatory is equipped with the world’s largest digital camera with a resolution of 3,200 megapixels. Together with the 8.4-meter (the diameter of the main mirror) telescope, it will scan the sky of the southern hemisphere of the Earth, take millions of pictures and generate a huge amount of data. In ten years, the observatory will collect 15 petabytes of information, which scientists will use to analyze billions of space objects. One of the key tasks is to reveal the secrets of dark matter and dark energy. According to scientists, they account for 95% of the mass of the universe, but they remain almost invisible. Also, the project will make it possible to better understand how space changes over time, and create a kind of “video recording” of its development. Observatory named after Vera Rubin, interior view Photo: Getty Images The project is managed by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) and funded by US government agencies and international partners. The observatory is located on top of Cerro Pachon in the Atacama Desert, the driest place on Earth. Clear and dry skies will provide ideal conditions for astronomical observations. The scientific community from around the world is waiting for discoveries that will greatly expand humanity’s understanding of space. Video content on YouTube becomes universal At the end of 2024, YouTube announced that the function of automatic video dubbing based on AI became available for hundreds of thousands of channels. The new technology allows automatic creation of translated audio tracks for videos, expanding their accessibility to foreign language audiences. In 2019, 300 hours of video were uploaded to YouTube every minute, which is about 432 thousand. hours every day Photo: Getty Images The launch of the automatic duplication function was first announced back in 2023, but then it worked in a test mode for a limited group of content creators. It can now be used by creators of educational and informational videos, such as cooking and crafting tutorials. Read also: Fewer bots and war fatigue: are YouTubers making big money The technology works on the basis of Google Gemini, which provides natural reproduction of human speech. However, the developers admit that the feature still has some drawbacks. To use automatic dubbing, the author just needs to upload the video to the platform. YouTube will automatically detect the language and create dubbed versions in other languages. Currently, English, French, German, Hindi, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, and Spanish languages are supported.How YouTube’s automatic video translation will work In 2025, YouTube plans to expand this feature to other types of content. The company is also working on the next update of Expressive Speech, which will allow to more accurately convey the tone, emotions and atmosphere of the original speaker. Physicists on the way to advanced research In 2025, the European Spallation Source (ESS) will be launched in Lund, Sweden – an advanced platform for materials and fundamental science research. The ESS project promises to become the most powerful center for the generation of neutron pulses in the world. It was built over ten years, and was created with the participation of 13 European countries, where Sweden and Denmark are the host countries. Spallation, the basis of ESS operation, involves accelerating protons to nearly the speed of light and directing them at a heavy metal target. As a result, the core of the target is destroyed, ex releasing a large number of neutrons and other subatomic particles. This technology will open new perspectives for the creation of innovative materials, the study of physical processes and the development of future technologies. The European Spallation Source (ESS) project ESS will become an important tool for the creation of innovative materials: efficient solar cells, ultra-strong structures, the latest medicines and even for understanding the work of cells on molecular level. Meanwhile, CERN, a leading physics laboratory near Geneva, is working on an equally large-scale project. We are talking about a super collider: a giant ring particle accelerator 91 km long, the cost of which is estimated at 17 billion dollars. It should become the successor of the Large Hadron Collider. In 2025, a detailed feasibility study of the project should be completed, which will assess the cost, technical implementation and environmental impact. This report will be decisive for the decision to build the facility in 2028. Scientists hope that these projects will help to better understand the world at the level of elementary particles and pave the way to new discoveries. Robotaxis becomes a reality Robotaxis are actively developing. In the US, Waymo, owned by Alphabet (Google’s parent company), launched self-driving taxi services in 2020. It provides 150 thousand trips for a week in San Francisco, Los Angeles and Phoenix. Its fleet includes more than 700 cars. In 2025, the company plans to expand to Austin and Atlanta. The successful testing of Waymo’s technology in Tokyo, which will begin this year, will be an important stage in its adaptation to new conditions, in particular to left-hand traffic. Waymo self-driving car on the streets of San Francisco Photo: Getty Images In addition, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced the launch of self-driving robot taxis in California and Texas in 2025. The electric car maker is testing the service in the San Francisco Bay Area for its employees. Musk believes that autonomous driving will become the new standard, but the company faces challenges due to the lack of a detailed business plan and high safety requirements. Zoox robot taxi in San Francisco, December 2024 Photo: Getty Images Another market entrant, Amazon-backed Zoox, is preparing to introduce a unique solution: cars without steering wheels and pedals, in which passengers sit facing each other. The car is equipped with special screens and personalized settings to increase comfort during trips. Instead, Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors, has partnered with Uber to integrate its cars with the ride-hailing platform by 2025. Meanwhile, Cruise is working to rebuild trust after the pedestrian incident. Trends in the expansion of robotaxi services show that the coming years will be decisive for the industry. The leaders of the sector are the USA and China. 16,000 people are testing the latter in 20 cities. autonomous vehicles. The biggest operators are Alibaba-backed AutoX and Baidu Apollo Go, which has attracted customers with low prices but has been challenged by pedestrian collisions. In the UK, robotaxis could also appear in 2025 thanks to the new law on autonomous vehicles. And the Croatian startup Verne, in partnership with Intel Mobileye, plans to launch compact drones in 11 cities in the EU and the Middle East. A unique feature is a physical switch for passengers, allowing them to start or end their ride, giving them a sense of control. According to IDTechEx estimates, in 2045 the sale of robotics will reach 174 billion dollars.Beijing is catching up with Musk In 2025, China is going to test its own brain implant technologies that can compete with Elon Musk’s Neuralink implants. China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology plans to create such devices for use in medicine, rehabilitation and virtual reality. Read also: Breakthrough in medicine or a new bubble: what’s wrong with Elon Musk’s Neuralink startup One of the promising developments is NEO – a wireless device that minimally interferes with the body and uses eight electrodes placed over the sensorimotor cortex of the brain. The device, developed by Shanghai Neuracle Medical Technology, aims to help people with paralysis move their limbs. A person with an implanted chip from the Chinese company NEO Tsinghua University Clinical trials of NEO began in 2023. One of the participants with a spinal cord injury was able to eat, drink and pick up objects independently after nine months of using the device. This year, it is planned to involve 30-50 patients with spinal cord injuries to implant the device. These tests will be an important stage for obtaining regulatory approval and entering the market. The Moon, the Sun and the mysteries of the universe In 2024, for the first time in history, the private spacecraft Odysseus landed on the Moon. In 2025, attention to the Earth’s satellite and space in general will not decrease. In January, the Japanese company Ispace will try to repeat its success. It plans to launch the Venture Moon mission, which will deliver a lander to the moon. The American company Intuitive Machines will send its lander there, equipped with an ice drill and a spectrometer from NASA to study the surface of the moon. As part of the same mission, NASA will launch the Lunar Trailblazer satellite, which will map the lunar surface and study water. Lunar lander Resilience, developed by Ispace Photo: Getty Images In addition, two missions will launch in 2025 to study the solar wind, the flow of charged particles that affect Earth and other planets. The SMILE satellite – an initiative of the European Space Agency and the Chinese Academy of Sciences – will investigate how the solar wind interacts with the Earth’s magnetic field. The NASA Punch mission will create three-dimensional images of the Sun’s atmosphere, which will help to understand how the star’s energy is distributed in space. NASA SPHEREx Space Telescope The real event will be the launch of the NASA SPHEREx observatory. It is a telescope the size of a small car. It can conduct a panoramic survey of the sky, creating a map of space in a three-dimensional format. For two years, it will collect data on more than 450 million galaxies and 100 million stars in the Milky Way