Artificial intelligence is getting down in the weeds. An AI-powered robot that can distinguish weeds from crops and remove them could eventually be used as an alternative to chemical insecticides.
Kevin Patel and Nihar Chaniyara at tech start-up AutoRoboCulture in Gandhinagar, India, have created a prototype device, called Nindamani, specifically for cauliflower crops.
Bad news.
The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has ruled that artificial intelligence systems cannot be credited as an inventor in a patent, the agency announced earlier this week. The decision came in response to two patents — one for a food container and the other for a flashing light — that were created by an AI system called DABUS.
Among the USPTO’s arguments is the fact that US patent law repeatedly refers to inventors using humanlike terms such as “whoever” and pronouns like “himself” and “herself.” The group behind the applications had argued that the law’s references to an inventor as an “individual” could be applied to a machine, but the USPTO said this interpretation was too broad. “Under current law, only natural persons may be named as an inventor in a patent application,” the agency concluded.
Idaho-based beef purveyor Snake River Farms is donating 35,000 10-ounce steaks to Bay Area food banks, with a total value of $2 million, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. It’s part of a larger initiative the company announced last week, which will send $8 million worth of its American wagyu to cities around the country to feed hospital workers, laid-off restaurant staff and other communities affected by the Covid-19 crisis. Snake River is relying on regional distribution partners in Los Angeles, Seattle, New York and San Francisco to help them get their donation to nonprofits.
With restaurants shut down, Snake River Farms is giving its premium beef a good home.
👏🙌💪Farmers around the country have been forced to dump milk and waste fresh produce as schools, restaurants and other institutions remain closed due to the coronavirus pandemic. In response, Supermarket chain Publix launched a new initiative Wednesday to help struggling farmers — and get the food to Americans who need it most.
https://www.cbsnews.com/serviceworker.js
Farmers around the U.S. have been forced to dump milk and destroy produce as schools, restaurants and other institutions remain closed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
“A number of years ago, we talked about, ‘What if there wasn’t clean water? What if there wasn’t enough food? Where might we go? What might we do as a family?’ So, I think we should leave those preparations to ourselves,” Melinda Gates told BBC Radio Live on Thursday.
“We had prepared, and had some food in the basement in case needed, and now we’re all in the same situation,” she said.
Melinda said they could not prepare with a particular drug or vaccine, of course, as “there are no tools” for Covid-19.
Leroy Hood is one of the world’s leading scientists in molecular biotechnology and genomics.
Leroy Hood M.D., Ph.D.
A Personal View of Systems Biology and the Coming of “Big” Science.
This is a truly remarkable time in the biological sciences. Biology now has the opportunity to effectively attack some of the most fundamental problems of society, including healthcare, agriculture, bio-energy, a sustainable environment, and nutrition.
This is the truth of the looming “hunger pandemic,” which has the potential to engulf over a quarter of a billion people whose lives and livelihoods will be plunged into immediate danger, unless urgent and effective action is taken to keep commercial and humanitarian goods flowing, support communities with humanitarian assistance and provide governments with the additional health interventions required to control the spread of the virus.
If we can’t reach these people — if we can’t give them the lifesaving assistance they need because our funding has been cut or borders where we move our food have been closed — WFP’s analysis shows that 300,000 could starve to death every single day for the next three months.
When you consider that already, despite our best efforts, 21,000 people die of hunger every single day, the scale of the potential death toll is heart-rending. We could be looking at famine in about three dozen countries. In 10 countries, we have more than a million people who are on the verge of starvation as we speak.
Despite pushback from Hezbollah, the Lebanese parliament passed legislation Tuesday legalizing cannabis cultivation for medicinal and industrial purposes.
The first EU permits for insects as a “novel food” should be issued in mid-2020. This will end the legal uncertainty about breeding insects for human consumption in Europe. Now is the time to draw lessons from Belgium, which has served as a sandbox for the fledgling industry, about its future prospects. Are we really ready to eat insects?
Romy is an adorable little blond girl who, like all children under the age of 2½ in Belgium, goes to the crèche most weekdays. Her parents spend 20 minutes every evening preparing her lunch, carefully weighing out some carbs, freshly cooked vegetables, a protein-rich ingredient, some high-quality fat and a sprinkling of chopped herbs. It’s the recommended diet for a child her age. But unlike most of Belgium’s children, Romy gets a meal that eventually includes a teaspoon of cricket powder. In fact, she even loves to snack on some whole locusts from time to time. All this thanks to Belgian’s progressive regulatory system, which allowed a whole new sector in the Western agrifood landscape to open up here a few years ago.
In theory, Romy is well on track to help fulfil the prediction, or rather prescription, of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) for insects to become “a high-value source of animal protein for the rapidly growing world population.” But the challenges ahead are huge and Belgium, as a test ground, has gained some valuable experience. Along with a few other countries in Europe, Belgium has taken a bite at insects. But sometimes it hurts.
