The first artificial intelligence (AI) research center in Viet Nam was officially launched on March 31 in Ha Noi.]]> The number of 5G subscriptions in Viet Nam is forecasted to reach 6.3 million by 2025, according to a report on 5G development in Southeast Asia by the network equipment maker Cisco.]]> Engineers at the University of Illinois have taken a step forward in developing a saltwater desalination process that is potentially cheaper than reverse osmosis and borrows f-rom battery technology. In their study, the researchers are focusing on new materials that could make desalination of brackish waters economically desirable and energy efficient.]]> Physicists at the University of California, Riverside have developed a photodetector -- a device that senses light -- by combining two distinct inorganic materials and producing quantum mechanical processes that could revolutionize the way solar energy is collected.]]> ]]> ]]> ON JANUARY 1st the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation did something that may help to change the practice of science. It brought into force a policy, foreshadowed two years earlier, that research it supports (it is the world’s biggest source of c-haritable money for scientific endeavours, to the tune of some $4bn a year) must, when published, be freely available to all. On March 23rd it followed this up by announcing that it will pay the cost of putting such research in one particular repository of freely available papers.]]> Al-ternative metrics extend the concept of citation beyond journal mentions]]>