Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog

Category: education – Page 149

Women innovators across the United States have been selected as AAAS IF/THEN® Ambassadors by the American Association for the Advancement of Science and Lyda Hill Philanthropies to share their stories and serve as high-profile role models for middle-school girls.

Information about the 125 women selected as AAAS IF/THEN® Ambassadors can be found at www.ifthenshecan.org/ambassadors.

IF/THEN®, a national initiative of Lyda Hill Philanthropies, seeks to further women in science, technology, engineering and math by empowering current innovators and inspiring the next generation of pioneers.

Read more | >

Circa 2018

As the national power grid becomes increasingly dependent on computers and data sharing—providing significant benefits for utilities, customers, and communities—it has also become more vulnerable to both physical and cyber threats.

While evolving standards with strict enforcement help reduce risks, efforts focused on response and recovery capabilities are just as critical–as is research aimed at creating a well-defended next generation smart grid. The Daily Herd recently sat down with Michael Ahern to discuss the many challenges involved in securing the against physical and cyber –both now and in the future.

In addition to his role as director in WPI’s Corporate and Professional Education and instructor for the Foisie Business School, Ahern also leads a WPI research team supporting BAE Systems as part of the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency’s Rapid Attack Detection, Isolation, and Characterization Systems (DARPA RADICS) intitative.

Continue reading “Protecting the power grid from cyber attacks” | >

Aristo has passed an American eighth grade science test. If you are told Aristo is an earnest kid who loves to read all he can about Faraday and plays the drums you will say so what, big deal.

Aristo, though, is an program and scientists would like the world to know this is a big deal, as “a benchmark in AI development,” as Melissa Locker called it in Fast Company.

We mean, just think about it. Cade Metz, in The New York Times, has thought about it. “Four years ago, more than 700 computer scientists competed in a contest to build artificial intelligence that could pass an eighth-grade science test. There was $80,000 in prize money on the line. They all flunked. Even the most sophisticated system couldn’t do better than 60% on the test. AI couldn’t match the language and logic skills that students are expected to have when they enter .”

Read more | >

Our team is committed to making quantum sciences more approachable by investing heavily in the education to support this growing community and establishing the emerging technology as the next generation of computing. We need more students, educators, developers, and domain experts with “quantum ready” skills. This is why our team is proud to release educational resources and tools, while also increasing the capacity and capability of our IBM Q systems.

Learn Quantum Computing Using Qiskit - textbook title
We are rolling out new systems and a new feature that allows for reserving time on an IBM Q system through the IBM Q Experience. This will initially be available to members of the IBM Q Network. Members will be able to reserve blocks of uninterrupted time for their users to experiment and test ideas using our advanced systems and software. Moreover, educators and academic members can take advantage of scheduling time to dynamically demonstrate quantum computing concepts on our hardware in the classroom. All the while, students can use the IBM Q Experience to follow along directly from a web browser without any additional installation required.

We published an open-source online textbook, called Learn Quantum Computation Using Qiskit, as a tool for self-learners and educators preparing the next generation of quantum developers. Written by experienced educators and leading researchers in the field, this textbook explores quantum computing through practical problems that are run on both simulators and real quantum hardware, with the aim of helping students connect theory to practice. And most importantly, because this textbook is open-source, the field’s top educators and contributors will continually update this text to ensure that students learn the latest and most-relevant quantum computing skills. The textbook also includes problem sets that can be included in coursework. Professors interested in the solutions to these problem sets should contact me – Abraham Asfaw. Additional information about the structure of the textbook can be found here.

Read more | >

Ira Pastor, ideaXme longevity and aging ambassador and founder of Bioquark, interviews James Strole, Co-Founder and Co-Director of People Unlimited and Director of the Coalition For Radical Life Extension.

Ira Pastor Comments:

On the last several shows we have spent time on different hierarchical levels the biologic-architecture of the life, disease and aging process. We’ve spent some time talking about the genome, the microbiome, tissue engineering, systems biology, quantum biology, organism hydrodynamics, biosemiotics, and chronobiology.

As exciting and promising as all of these research paths are, at the end of the day, in order for them to yield what many of us are looking for, radically extended healthspans and lifespans, and for them to be translated at scale, that is: approved by regulators, marketed by large pharma and CPG companies, and prescribed by a millions of clinicians (especially as the target market is all 7+ billion inhabitants of the planet), there needs to be an appropriate system of advocacy, education, awareness, and networking built around them to spread the word of the possibilities and the beautiful future that they can bring.

Continue reading “James Strole: Advocacy, Education, Awareness About Radical Life Extension” | >

“We can send signals to areas, such as schools in developing countries, that do not have the luxury of their own nuclear reactor facility and the associated educational infrastructure.” said Seungjin Kim, head of the Purdue’s School of Nuclear Engineering, in a July announcement. “As long as they have internet and this partnership with Purdue, they can see and study how the reactor works.”

PUR-1’s completion comes amidst a hunt for the next generation of nuclear tech. There are traveling wave reactors, which would hypothetically consume today’s nuclear waste and has garnered the interest of investors like Bill Gates. Then there are thorium reactors, which would would use less uranium and produce far less waste in the first place and has been promoted by Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang. Neither technology has been put into civilian practice yet.

For now, the digital nuclear plant is here. While it likely won’t revolutionize the industry as the other two technologies could, digitization might make plants run more efficiently and drive a low risk of accident even lower.

Read more | >

Purdue University will support public and private research partnerships at the nation’s first digitally operated nuclear reactor, the school said in a Tuesday press release. Scientists and engineers will look to answer the question of how reliable and resilient an all-digital nuclear reactor, named Purdue University Reactor Number One (PUR-1), can be.

“As the United States and the world continue to implement digital technology, that introduces both strengths and vulnerabilities that need to be explored and understood because our economy relies on the resiliency of these systems,” Clive Townsend, supervisor for the reactor, said in a statement.

Before PUR-1 was converted to digital technology, all US reactors worked using analog technology like vacuum tubes and hand-soldered wires, Townsend said in the release. Purdue’s facility will be the US’ first cyber-nuclear testbed for researchers and corporate partners. It’s licensed by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which ensures safe use of radioactive materials.

Read more | >

Should citizenship be restricted to humans?

Scene taken from the film Short Circuit 2 (1988).

FAIR USE NOTICE:

This video contains copyrighted material, the use of which has not always been specifically authorised by the copyright owner.

We are making such material available in our efforts to advance understanding of environmental, political, human rights, economic, democracy, scientific, and social justice issues, etc. We believe this constitutes a ‘fair use’ of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law.

Continue reading “Johnny 5 — The First Robotic US Citizen” | >

Singularity University, Singularity Hub, Singularity Summit, SU Labs, Singularity Labs, Exponential Medicine, Exponential Finance and all associated logos and design elements are trademarks and/or service marks of Singularity Education Group.

© 2019 Singularity Education Group. All Rights Reserved.

Singularity University is not a degree granting institution.

Read more | >

A team of Australian researchers has designed a reliable strategy for testing physical abilities of humanoid robots—robots that resemble the human body shape in their build and design. Using a blend of machine learning methods and algorithms, the research team succeeded in enabling test robots to effectively react to unknown changes in the simulated environment, improving their odds of functioning in the real world.

The findings, which were published in a joint publication of the IEEE and the Chinese Association of Automation Journal of Automatica Sinica in July, have promising implications in the broad use of in fields such as healthcare, education, disaster response and entertainment.

“Humanoid robots have the ability to move around in many ways and thereby imitate human motions to complete complex tasks. In order to be able to do that, their stability is essential, especially under dynamic and unpredictable conditions,” said corresponding author Dacheng Tao, Professor and ARC Laureate Fellow in the School of Computer Science and the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Sydney.

Read more | >