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Category: robotics/AI – Page 1,077

FDNY, NYPD explain robotic technology used by first responders during parking garage collapse

The robotic dog is officially named Bergh, after Henry Bergh, who founded the ASPCA.

Bergh weighs 70 pounds and can go up stairs. It can fall or get knocked over and get back up. It can even open doors.

Last week, Bergh was put into action for the first time at the building collapse. Officials say there was no way to know if other people were trapped. Bergh entered the first floor and second floor, going about 25 feet into the building and stopping so the operator could use a thermal camera to detect heat. One of the robotic dogs was able to find the garage’s general manager, 59-year-old Willis Moore, who was killed.

Engineers ‘grow’ atomically thin transistors on top of computer chips

Emerging AI applications, like chatbots that generate natural human language, demand denser, more powerful computer chips. But semiconductor chips are traditionally made with bulk materials, which are boxy 3D structures, so stacking multiple layers of transistors to create denser integrations is very difficult.

However, semiconductor transistors made from ultrathin 2D materials, each only about three atoms in thickness, could be stacked up to create more powerful chips. To this end, MIT researchers have now demonstrated a that can effectively and efficiently “grow” layers of 2D transition metal dichalcogenide (TMD) materials directly on top of a fully fabricated silicon chip to enable denser integrations.

Growing 2D materials directly onto a silicon CMOS wafer has posed a major challenge because the process usually requires temperatures of about 600 degrees Celsius, while silicon transistors and circuits could break down when heated above 400 degrees. Now, the interdisciplinary team of MIT researchers has developed a low-temperature growth process that does not damage the chip. The technology allows 2D semiconductor transistors to be directly integrated on top of standard silicon circuits.

New Therapy Found to Prevent Aggressive Brain Cancer Recurrence in Mice

A new gel-based treatment for glioblastoma—a highly aggressive form of brain cancer—has shown to be 100% effective at preventing recurrence in mice. Researchers hope the therapy will translate well into human physiology, where it could help resolve tens of thousands of cancer diagnoses every year.

Glioblastoma manifests as a tumor growing on the brain or spinal cord. While many glioblastoma patients have the tumor surgically removed, the mass often returns, even in cases involving post-surgical radiation or chemotherapy. The disease is so persistent that the average patient lives only 12 to 16 months after diagnosis, making glioblastoma one of the most lethal forms of cancer currently understood.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University are working to improve patients’ life expectancies using an injectable gel that blocks cancer’s path. According to a paper published Tuesday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the gel is made up of nano-sized filaments derived from the drug paclitaxel, which is used alongside chemotherapy to treat other forms of cancer. The gel serves as a vehicle for aCD47, an antibody that prompts macrophages to ingest tumor cells.

Google’s cloud business turns profitable for the first time on record

Google has been vying to win business from big corporations and government agencies that are deciding between major tech vendors as they move from traditional data centers to the cloud and rely on more compute-heavy applications involving artificial intelligence. Amazon Web Services, the leader in cloud infrastructure, popularized the market in the mid-2000s and has been profitable every quarter since 2014. Microsoft, the second-biggest player in the space, doesn’t report profitability figures for its Azure unit.

Alphabet started disclosing cloud revenue in 2020, and the following year began providing information on the scale of its operating losses.

Last week Alphabet restated operating income for cloud and its other segments, resulting in lower cloud losses in 2021 and 2022. The restated numbers show the cloud unit had a $186 million operating loss in the fourth quarter, compared with $480 million before the change, for example.

Microsoft outperforms Google in Q1 as AI set to take center-stage

Its partnership with OpenAI gives Microsoft a head start.

After years of playing second fiddle to Google in the search engine market, Microsoft is set to become a technology leader again as businesses and individuals worldwide look to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) into everything they do. In the Q1 2023 earnings reported recently, the 48-year-old company has outperformed its younger rival, Alphabet.

For years, Microsoft was mainly a market leader in operating systems. Still, the changing nature of computing technologies meant it has ventured into other areas, such as cloud computing and gaming, through its Xbox platform.

China’s NetEase launches ChatGPT rival that builds apps with text prompts

CodeWave’s platform generates the code necessary to develop the app from descriptions of the users’ intended app functionality.

One of China’s largest video gaming companies, NetEase, has introduced CodeWave, a “low-code” application development platform powered by its large language model (LLM).

This makes NetEase, the newest major Chinese tech company, to provide such artificial intelligence (AI) service, allowing users “to build apps with text prompts,” according to a new report by South China Morning Post (SCMP) on Wednesday.