Lifeboat Foundation

TrackML was a Kaggle competition in 2018 with $25 000 in cash prizes where the challenge was to reconstruct particle tracks from 3D points left in silicon detectors. CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research) provided data over particles collision events. The rate at which they occur over there is in the neighborhood of hundreds of millions of collisions per second, or tens of petabytes per year. There is a clear need to be as efficient as possible when sifting through such an amount of data, and this is where machine learning methods may be of help.

Particles, in this case protons, are boosted to high energies inside the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) — each beam can reach 6.5 TeV giving a total of 13 TeV when colliding. Electromagnetic fields are used to accelerate the electrically charged protons in a 27 kilometers long loop. When the proton beams collide they produce a diverse set of subatomic byproducts which quickly decay, holding valuable information for some of the most fundamental questions in physics.

Detectors are made of layers upon layers of subdetectors, each designed to look for specific particles or properties. There are calorimeters that measure energy, particle-identification detectors to pin down what kind of particle it is and tracking devices to calculate the path of a particle. [1] We are of course interested in the tracking, tiny electrical signals are recorded as particles move through those types of detectors. What I will discuss is methods to reconstruct these recorded patterns of tracks, specifically algorithms involving machine learning.

Innovation comes from all ages, and this is further seen in the story of Xóchitl Guadalupe Cruz, an eight-year-old girl from Chiapas, Mexico who invented an entirely solar-powered device for heating water. The impact her invention could have on others around the world is immense, and this has inspired the UNAM’s (National Autonomous University of Mexico) Institute of Nuclear Sciences to award her.

To those in developed countries, her invention may not seem all that revolutionary as access to warm or hot water is commonplace, but for those in many other areas of the world, including her town in Mexico, this would be a luxury.

Continue reading “8 Year-Old Mexican Girl Invents A Solar Water Heater & Wins Nuclear Science Prize” »

Small Robot Company aims to take its crop-monitoring robot through to an initial production run, and beyond.

It hopes to create an AI that can control 250 robots at a time.

The conductor on the podium has no baton, no tailcoat, and no musical score, but Android Alter 3 is kicking up a storm as it guides a symphony orchestra’s players through their paces. Robot playing orchestra.

AMD’s upcoming Radeon Instinct MI100 HPC accelerator which would feature the Arcturus GPU has been spotted by Komachi. The existence of the AMD Arcturus GPU was confirmed all the way back in 2018 and two years later, we are finally starting to get details regarding the specifications for AMD’s next HPC/AI accelerator.

AMD Arcturus GPU Powered Radeon Instinct MI100 HPC / AI Accelerator Features 32 GB HBM2, 200W TDP In Early Prototypes

The “Arcturus” codename comes from the red giant star which is the brightest in the constellation of Bootes and among the brightest stars that can be seen from space. Similar to Vega and Navi, both of which are also some of the brightest stars visible in the night sky, the naming scheme takes inspiration from the time since RTG was created and the founding father, Raja Koduri (ex AMD RTG President), put a lot of emphasis on bright stars when they first introduced Polaris.

Advancements in robotics are continually taking place in the fields of space exploration, health care, public safety, entertainment, defense, and more. These machines—some fully autonomous, some requiring human input—extend our grasp, enhance our capabilities, and travel as our surrogates to places too dangerous or difficult for us to go. Gathered here are recent images of robotic technology, including a machine built to draw portraits, battle robots, a dance performance, an autonomous mobile vending machine, an art installation, an agri-bot, a robotic priest, a Mars rover, a grocery-store bot, and much more.

Worlds, a Dallas-based startup that uses AI to help large organizations monitor their physical spaces, has raised $10 million.

Facial recognition technology is likely not as safe as you may have thought. This was illustrated by a recent test where 3D printed busts of peoples’ heads were used to unlock smartphones.

Out of five tested phones, only one refused to open when presented with the fake head.

Other biometric security measures are also showing less resilience to hacking than you might expect. A group of Japanese researchers recently showed it was possible to copy a person’s fingerprints from pictures like the ones many of us post on social media.