New algorithm helps turn low-resolution images into detailed photos, 'CSI'-style

The EnhanceNet-PAT algorithm could help with everything from restoring old photos to improving image recognition for self-driving cars. Anyone who has ever worked with image files knows that, unlike the fictional world of shows like CSI, there's no easy way to take a low-resolution image and magically transform it into a high-resolution picture using some fancy "enhance" tool. Fortunately, some brilliant computer scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Germany are working on the problem -- and they've come up with a pretty nifty algorithm to address it. What they have developed is a tool called EnhanceNet-PAT, which uses artificial intelligence to create high-definition versions of low-res images. While the solution is not a miracle fix, it does produce a noticeably better result than previous attempts, thanks to some smart machine-learning algorithms.