TikTok faces an uncertain fate in the U.S. once again.
After a surprise flurry of activity in the House this week, TikTok is the target of a new government push to separate the company from its Chinese ownership or force it out of the country.
TikTok is based in Los Angeles and Singapore, but is owned by Chinese tech giant ByteDance. That relationship that has raised eyebrows among U.S. officials, who warn that the app could be leveraged to further the interests of an adversary.
Excitement about the era of Quantum Error Correction is reaching a fever pitch.
By Prof Michael J Biercuk, CEO and Founder, Q-CTRL
Excitement about the era of Quantum Error Correction (QEC) is reaching a fever pitch. This has been a topic under development for many years by academics and government agencies as QEC is a foundational concept in quantum computing.
More recently, industry roadmaps have not only openly embraced QEC, but hardware teams have also started to show convincing demonstrations that it can really be implemented to address the fundamental roadblock for quantum computing – hardware noise and error. This rapid progress has upended notions that the sector could be stagnating in so-called NISQ era, and reset expectations among observers.
QUITO, March 3 (Reuters) — Ecuador’s La Cumbre volcano, part of the Galapagos archipelago, has started to erupt, the government of the South American country reported on Sunday.
There was no immediate danger posed because the island where the volcano is located is uninhabited, the environment ministry confirmed.
“Gas emission and thermal anomalies were detected through satellite systems,” the ministry said in a statement, adding that while they would continue to monitor the volcano, the eruption would not affect tourism to the islands.
Amid underwater mountains off the coast of Chile, scientists believe they’ve discovered 100 or so new species with the aid of a robot capable of diving more than 14,000 feet. Researchers say it demonstrates how the Chilean government’s ocean protections are bolstering biodiversity and providing a model for other countries. John Yang reports.
Notice: Transcripts are machine and human generated and lightly edited for accuracy. They may contain errors.
India has waded into global AI debate by issuing an advisory that requires “significant” tech firms to get government permission before launching new models.
India’s Ministry of Electronics and IT issued the advisory to firms on Friday. The advisory — not published on public domain but a copy of which TechCrunch has reviewed — also asks tech firms to ensure that their services or products “do not permit any bias or discrimination or threaten the integrity of the electoral process.”
Though the ministry admits the advisory is not legally binding, India’s IT Deputy Minister Rajeev Chandrasekhar says the notice is “signalling that this is the future of regulation.” He adds: “We are doing it as an advisory today asking you to comply with it.”
Some of Apple’s biggest investors are set to pressure the company tomorrow to reveal its use of artificial intelligence tools (via the Financial Times).
Apple’s annual shareholder meeting takes place tomorrow, allowing those with a major stake in the company to put forward proposals. One resolution proposed by the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) asks Apple to disclose its use of AI and any ethical guidelines that the company has adopted regarding the technology.
Professor Nadeem Sarwar is Corporate Vice President, Co-Founder and Head, Transformational Prevention Unit, Novo Nordisk (https://www.novonordisk.com/partnerin…), Co-Chair UK Dementia Mission (a UK Government Ministerial appointment) and Honorary Professor, University of Edinburgh Medical School.
Professor Sarwar joined Novo Nordisk in June 2023 as Corporate Vice President, Co-Founder and Head of Novo Nordisk’s new Transformational Prevention Unit (TPU) whose mission is to increase obesity-free life years, so people live healthier and longer lives. To achieve this, the TPU is establishing an integrated ecosystem that will deliver science-first, empowering, and scalable commercial solutions that predict and pre-empt obesity and its consequences through innovative partnerships, with solutions intending to push the boundaries of what is possible with drugs, genomics, microbiome, digital health, and behavioral science.
Professor Sarwar’s expertise stems from scientific and business models at the intersection of genomics, data sciences and digital technologies for therapeutic and health innovation and he utilizes this expertise to steer the strategy and implementation of the predictive and pre-emptive obesity solutions being developed by the TPU, spanning both R\&D and commercial strategy.
Professor Sarwar joins Novo Nordisk with extensive executive experience in academia (Cambridge, Edinburgh), pharma (Pfizer, Eisai, Novo Nordisk), biotech (Genetics Guided Demantia Discovery — G2D2), company incubation (Eisai Innovation Biolabs), and government (UK Dementia Mission). He has successfully built and led organizations across the UK, US, Japan, and Denmark; and contributed to delivery of therapeutics into clinical trials for cardiometabolic diseases, oncology, SLE, COVID-19 and neurodegeneration.
India’s government has approved $15.2 billion worth of investments in semiconductor fabrication plants, including a Tata Group proposal to build the country’s first major chipmaking facility.
Dr. John Swierk: “This is also the first study to explicitly look at inks sold in the United States and is probably the most comprehensive because it looks at the pigments, which nominally stay in the skin, and the carrier package, which is what the pigment is suspended in.”
Do the ingredients in tattoo inks match the labels on their respective bottles? This is what a recent study published in Analytical Chemistry hopes to address as a team of researchers from Binghamton University investigated the accuracy of ink ingredients and what’s labeled on their containers. This study holds the potential to help scientists, artists, and their customers better understand the health risks, to include allergic reactions and other risks, of using the wrong ink ingredients for tattoos.
For the study, the researchers examined ingredients from 54 inks emanating from nine common brands within the United States with the goal of ascertaining their exact chemical compositions compared to what was labeled on their respective bottles. In the end, the researchers identified that 45 of the 54 inks possessed a myriad of pigments and/or additives that were not properly labeled on the bottles that could pose health risks to customers receiving ink tattoos, including allergic skin reactions and other long-term health risks, including non-skin-related risks, such as cancer. Despite the alarming findings, the researchers could not ascertain which unlisted ingredients were intentionally or accidentally added to the inks.
This study comes as Congress passed the Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act (MoCRA) in 2022, which grants the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) first-time power to monitor tattoo ink ingredients and their labels. Until MoCRA, the cosmetic industry was almost entirely unregulated.
The two years flew past, and now the facility is ready to begin mass production later this year, with TSMC tapping Sony’s assistance to get the plant operational in Japan. The new Kumamoto fab plant has been dubbed “Nightless Castle” as there were workers there on 24-hour shifts, which is how the new TSMC plant was built in just two years, with plants regularly taking three or more years to get up and running.
Sony is an investor and a customer for TSMC’s new plant in Japan; with the new fab plant getting up and running so quickly in Japan, that wouldn’t necessarily be done in other countries. Why? TSMC had efficient government support, strict construction timetables, and a low-cost workforce that was flooding the site and then working 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
