Although they can be small enough to waltz on your fingernail, spiders are capable of feats of breathtakingly beautiful and complex engineering. That is, of course, their webs – structures that have fascinated and fired the human imagination for millennia. Now, we have the most detailed analysis yet of how they do so. A team of scientists deployed night-vision cameras and artificial intelligence to study every position of all eight of a spider's legs during the construction of a web. The result is a model that can predict the stages of web building based on the posture of the spider's legs.

From movie suggestions to self-driving vehicles, machine learning has revolutionized modern life. Experts are now using it to help solve one of humanity's biggest problems: climate change. With machine learning, we can use our abundance of historical climate data and observations to improve predictions of Earth's future climate. And these predictions will have a major role in lessening our climate impact in the years ahead. Machine learning is a branch of artificial intelligence.

From movie suggestions to self-driving vehicles, machine learning has revolutionised modern life. Experts are now using it to help solve one of humanity's biggest problems: climate change. With machine learning, we can use our abundance of historical climate data and observations to improve predictions of Earth's future climate. And these predictions will have a major role in lessening our climate impact in the years ahead. Machine learning is a branch of artificial intelligence.

The world's first high-resolution 3D image of a monkey brain has been revealed, in a breakthrough that could pave the way for treatments for human diseases including Parkinson's. A detailed map of a complete macaque monkey brain was created using fluorescent imaging techniques by a team from the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. The team used a new technique to show how nerve cells are organised and connected within the monkey brain at a'micron resolution'. The human brain comprises nearly a hundred billion nerve cells with delicate and complex connections, and while up to 17 times larger than that of a macaque, it is similar enough for comparisons to be made between the two, researchers claim. Until now, a mouse brain was the largest to be mapped, taking days to create a complete 3D image, but the new technique made it possible to move up to a macaque brain, which is about 200 times larger in volume than that of a mouse.

The human brain is the most ridiculously complex computer that's ever existed, and mapping this dense tangle of neurons, synapses and other cells is nigh on impossible. But engineers at Google and Harvard have given it the best shot yet, producing a browsable, searchable 3D map of a small section of human cerebral cortex. With about 86 billion neurons connecting via 100 trillion synapses, it's a Herculean task to figure out exactly what each of them does and how those connections form the basis of thought, emotion, memory, behavior and consciousness. Daunting as it may be, though, teams of scientists around the world are rolling up their sleeves and trying to build a wiring diagram for the human brain – a so-called "connectome." Last year, researchers at Google and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute paved the way with a fruit fly brain connectome that encompassed about half of the insect's full brain.

British engineers are set to build a spacecraft that will track down and'ambush' comets in order to study them in unprecedented detail. The mission, dubbed the'comet chaser', will feature three main components, a mothership built by a company called Thales Alenia Space based in the UK, and two robotic probes which will be manufactured by the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA). Astronomers hope the highly-detailed 3D-scans of the space rock's surface will reveal secrets about the formation of comets and the early universe. British engineers are set to build a spacecraft that will track down and ambush comets in order to scan them in unprecedented detail. Comets are chunks of icy rock spewed out from fierce explosions following the universe's inception.

When human settlers one day reach distant worlds, they might take refuge inside extensive underground networks known as planetary caves. Scientists in recent years have proposed volcanic caves as a potential place for safe habitats on the moon and Mars. But, to understand how this might work, we must first look at similar systems here at home. A team of ESA-backed researchers recently ventured into the La Cueva de los Verdes lava tube in Spain to map the nearly 5 mile (8 kilometer) 'lava tube' in unprecedented detail, revealing the intricate features of the'volcanic wormhole.' The team used what's known as the point cloud technique to map La Cueva de Los Verdes in unprecedented detail, capturing millions of measurements with lasers and cameras.

Stunning drone footage has revealed the incredible progress on the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope – a massive instrument that will one day produce the'deepest, widest image of the universe' ever captured. Construction on the telescope in Chile began in 2015, with plans for it to begin operations around 2022. Now, nearly three years later, the new video shows how the enormous mountaintop facility has begun to take shape. Stunning drone footage has revealed the incredible progress on the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope – a massive instrument that will one day produce the'deepest, widest image of the universe' ever captured The video, published this week by the LSST team, was submitted by Assembly Integration Verification Manager Jacques Sebag, who captured the amazing view using a drone. At the time, the team was working with subcontractor Besalco to move the facility's mobile roof to a flatter area on the north side of the building.

Apple's eagerly anticipated new iPhone may not be called iPhone 8 after all, it has been claimed. However, Apple will also unveil an iPhone 8 and 8 plus at the event - but these will be lower specced models that were previously expected to be called the 7s and 7s Plus. The firm sent invites to key media for the event, which is also expected to see the launch of an iPhone 7s and 7s Plus, a new version of the Apple Watch and a new 4K Apple TV. It is believed the will lack the edge to edge OLED screen of the edition model, and instead be an upgraded model that looks similar to the existing design. 'One casemaker has updated their internal SKUs based on the information and is actively printing packaging which I was able to see in the form of preliminary artwork,' 9to5mac's Seth Weintraub claims.

Apple will unveil the eagerly anticipated iPhone 8 at a special event on 12th September in the Steve Jobs Theater inside it new'Spaceship' HQ in Cupertino. The firm today sent invites to key media for the event, which is also expected to see the launch of an iPhone 7s and 7s Plus, a new version of the Apple Watch and a new 4K Apple TV. They say'Let's meet at our place'. The firm sent invites to key media for the event, which is also expected to see the launch of an iPhone 7s and 7s Plus, a new version of the Apple Watch and a new 4K Apple TV. It is believed the new iPhone 8 will go on sale on September 22nd.