In the past few years, rapid development has been witnessed in spacecraft formation to complete complex missions instead of the traditional single spacecraft. Spacecraft formation refers to a spatial distribution of a group composed of 2 or more spacecraft without physical contact. Those who join in the formation are called member spacecraft. There exists certain communication relationship between member spacecraft. The spacecraft formation is able to complete the tasks related to the target cooperatively through the collaborative control strategies. The formation offers low cost, strong reliability, and high flexibility in comparison to a single spacecraft for executing the mission. This has garnered considerable attention and warrants investigation. However, little research has discussed spacecraft formation to surround a noncooperative target with unknown dynamics. It is still challenging for the surrounding control to enclose the target with unknown dynamics that refers to the target’s orbit maneuver.In the past few years, rapid development has been witnessed in spacecraft formation to complete complex missions instead of the traditional single spacecraft. Spacecraft formation refers to a spatial distribution of a group composed of 2 or more spacecraft without physical contact. Those who join in the formation are called member spacecraft. There exists certain communication relationship between member spacecraft. The spacecraft formation is able to complete the tasks related to the target cooperatively through the collaborative control strategies. The formation offers low cost, strong reliability, and high flexibility in comparison to a single spacecraft for executing the mission. This has garnered considerable attention and warrants investigation. However, little research has discussed spacecraft formation to surround a noncooperative target with unknown dynamics. It is still challenging for the surrounding control to enclose the target with unknown dynamics that refers to the target’s orbit maneuver.

Magnetic skyrmions are particle-like objects that can be used as information carriers in memory and computing devices. Researchers from Waseda University recently studied the flow behaviors of many skyrmions in structured magnets and found that skyrmions can behave like chiral fluids. They proposed that fully developed skyrmion flows can be used for fluidics, which significantly reduces complexity of skyrmion logic, as it eliminates the need for deterministic creation, precise control, and detection of individual skyrmions.

Researchers at the University of Waterloo have developed a machine learning approach that could help public health officials anticipate disease outbreaks by analyzing vaccine skepticism on social media. Using the mathematical concept of tipping points, the team showed that online misinformation spreads much like a contagion and can signal heightened outbreak risk well before illness appears. Their model, tested on posts from California ahead of a 2014 measles outbreak, detected early warning patterns that traditional tweet-counting methods missed. This work supports Waterloo’s efforts to strengthen evidence-based decision-making and rebuild public trust in science, and the model could eventually be adapted across platforms like TikTok and Instagram to help identify communities nearing a critical shift in vaccination sentiment.

A research paper by scientists at the City University of Hong Kong proposed a hybrid model-based and online data-driven control method for a tendon-driven continuum robot, which requires no prior dataset collection or training. The method incorporates the Jacobian derived from the piecewise constant curvature model with online Jacobian error compensation using a Kalman filter.

The new research paper, published on Aug. 7 in the journal Cyborg and Bionic Systems, presented an approach eliminates the need for offline dataset collection and training. Experiments conducted on a planar continuum manipulator demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in improving tracking accuracy for both position and attitude. Additionally, the effects of various model parameters are analyzed through comparative experiments.