Top Tech 2022 - IEEE Spectrum
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Top Tech 2022

Technology trends and developments that will make news in 2022
Photo of the lower part of a rocket in an engineering bay.
AerospaceMagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

Top Tech 2022: A Special Report

Preview two dozen exciting technical developments that are in the pipeline for the coming year

1 min read
Television screen displaying closeup of crystals
Consumer ElectronicsCES NewsMagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

Digging Into the New QD-OLED TVs

Formerly rival technologies have come together in Samsung displays

5 min read
An illustration of a satellite holding a ray gun in a cartoon style hand.
AerospaceMagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022ComputingJanuary 2022Special Reports

12 Exciting Engineering Milestones to Look for in 2022

An electric aircraft race, a new dark-matter detector, and a permanent Chinese space station await

7 min read
A large, black, propeller-driven drone stands in front of a warehouse
AerospaceMagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

Drone Startup to Fly Pallets Without Pilots

Dronamics will test a radical new vision of long-range cargo transport in Europe

3 min read
An illustration of a robotic hand pointing and a car with skid marks behind the back wheels.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special ReportsTransportation

Europe Mandates Automatic Emergency Braking

Safety advocates project it could save 4,000 lives per year

3 min read
A row of 24 computer racks stand on one side of a large room.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022ComputingJanuary 2022Special Reports

Frontier Supercomputer to Usher in Exascale Computing

Oak Ridge National Lab may be the first to reach 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 operations per second

3 min read
Photograph shows a bullet-shaped spacecraft suspended just above the top of the Space Launch System booster, inside a cavernous building.
AerospaceMagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

NASA’s Space Launch System Will Lift Off

But with rival rockets readying for flight, the value of SLS is murky

7 min read
A gold rectangle with multicolored patterns.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022SemiconductorsSpecial Reports

Memory Chips That Compute Will Accelerate AI

Samsung could double performance of neural nets with processing-in-memory

4 min read
A photo illustration of a red coin purse with transparent bitcoin going into it.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special ReportsConsumer Electronics

A Bitcoin Wallet for the Masses

Square simplified credit-card transactions. Now it wants to build cryptocurrency hardware

3 min read
Artist rendering of the interior of a large cylindrical nuclear fusion reactor.
MagazineEnergyFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

Magnetic-Confinement Fusion Without the Magnets

Zap Energy’s new Z-pinch fusion reactor promises a simpler approach to an elusive goal

4 min read
A large dome-shaped robotic vehicle for collecting polymetallic nodules rests on the bottom of the ocean.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special ReportsTransportation

Should the Cobalt for EVs Come From the Congo or the Seafloor?

The Metals Company’s pilot program raises muddy questions

4 min read
A spray bottle, spraying clouds out from the nozzle.
Climate TechMagazineEnergyFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special ReportsClimate Change

Test of Planet-Cooling Scheme Could Start in 2022

A controversial geoengineering plan aims to spray reflective particles into the stratosphere

9 min read
Image of a brain on a blue background, with lines showing different parts of the brain.
MagazineBiomedicalFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

Worldwide Campaign for Neurorights Notches Its First Win

Chile plans to regulate all neurotech and ban the sale of brain data

7 min read
A photo of the interior of a large ice skating rink, with three skaters in the foreground
MagazineEnergyFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022Special Reports

China Will Attempt First Carbon-Neutral Winter Olympics

A variety of climate-friendly strategies will be on show, along with the athletes

4 min read
A robot near a conveyor belt with a box being placed by the robot.
MagazineFeatureTop Tech 2022January 2022RoboticsSpecial Reports

A Robot for the Worst Job in the Warehouse

Boston Dynamics’ Stretch can move 800 heavy boxes per hour

4 min read