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To tackle this environmental catastrophe, U.S. companies and researchers are developing AI-assisted robotic technology that can work with humans in processing plants and improve quality control. The goal is to have robots do a better job at sorting garbage and reduce the contamination and health hazards human workers face in recycling plants every day. Sorting trash is a dirty and dangerous job. Recycling workers are more than twice as likely as other workers to be injured on the job, according to a report at the University of Illinois School of Public Health. The profession also has high fatality rates.


The U.S. is facing a recycling crisis that is burying cities and towns in tens of millions of tons of garbage a day. The problem began last year when China, the world’s largest recyclable processor, stopped accepting most American scrap plastic and cardboard due to contamination problems, and a glut of plastics overwhelming its own processing facilities. Historically, China recycled the bulk of U.S. waste.

Contamination in the U.S. is high since recyclables are often dumped into one bin instead of multi-streamed or separated from the source. Now China has strict standards for recycling materials it will accept, requiring contamination levels in a plastic bale, for example, contain one-tenth of 1%.

The situation is dire for many local economies as recycling costs skyrocket. It’s forced many cities and some small communities to stop recycling all together. Now more waste is ending up in landfills and incinerators.

But that always looked like a tall order when faced with stiff competition from tech giants like Google, IBM, and Amazon, all happy to pour billions into AI research. Faced with that reality, OpenAI has undergone a significant metamorphosis in the last couple of years.

Musk stepped away last year, citing conflicts of interest as his electric car company Tesla invests in self-driving technology and disagreements over the direction of the organization. Earlier this year a for-profit arm was also spun off to enable OpenAI to raise investment in its effort to keep up.

A byzantine legal structure will supposedly bind the new company to the original mission of the nonprofit. OpenAI LP is controlled by OpenAI’s board and obligated to advance the nonprofit’s charter. Returns for investors are also capped at 100 times their stake, with any additional value going to the nonprofit, though that’s a highly ambitious target that needs to be hit before any limits on profiteering would kick in.

Medicine has a “Goldilocks” problem. Many therapies are safe and effective only when administered at just the right time and in very precise doses – when given too early or too late, in too large or too small an amount, medicines can be ineffective or even harmful. But in many situations, doctors have no way of knowing when or how much to dispense.

Now, a team of bioengineers led by UC San Francisco’s Hana El-Samad, PhD, and the University of Washington’s David Baker, PhD, have devised a remarkable solution to this problem – “smart” cells that behave like tiny autonomous robots which, in the future, may be used to detect damage and disease, and deliver help at just the right time and in just the right amount.

1. The 4 main things happening in Hyperbaric oxygen treatment: 1.- A decrease of inflammation 2.- An increase in the amount of oxygen in circulation and reversing hypoxia. 3.- Stimulate the release of stem cells from the brain along with the bone-derived stem cells. 4.- Kill infection. Why it matters for regenerative and dementia treatment? Listen to Dr. Scott Sherr explaining in detail in http://www.mendelhaim.com/podcast/2. For more information on Dr. Scott’s work go to https://www.hyperbaricmedicalsolutions.com/integrative-hbot/scott-sherr.

2. Raising money for academic research is a hard point, according to all of my guests, but even when we talk about Hyperbaric treatment there is a lack of money and the number of chambers declines in u.s. In Israel by the way, the demand is increasing and it takes a few months waiting in lines to start getting the treatment, this can turn into a big business opportunity in my opinion as to the risk for such research on participants is not as big as other medical research.

3. Longevity investment is a relatively new field and is lack of a method to invest by, the Three criteria that Sergey Young from the Longevity Vision Fund examine before investing in new companies are 1- will the product be affordable to touch millions of people’s lives and not only help the rich. 2- Looking for sectors that enjoy the technological exponential development paste such as AI, early diagnostics, stem cells, warbles, and organ transplants. 3 — Network, if you are a new startup and trying to raise from The Longevity vision fund, question yourself before, Do you have partners that can market your product such as big pharma or health care chain or a big manufacturer, do you collaborate with the best academic institutes in the longevity research. Go listen to the full episode Mission Alpha with Sergey Young on http://www.mendelhaim.com/podcast/3

Seventy-five people filed into a Washington State Convention Center meeting room Wednesday to hear about the latest advancements in artificial intelligence. In a pitching session reminiscent of a speed-dating event, about 10 Northwest startups hurriedly shared their accomplishments and aspirations with Japanese investors eager to stoke business relationships.

Master of ceremonies Tom Sato, co-founder of Kirkland-based investing firm Innovation Finders Capital, lightened the mood by cracking jokes as he translated the English-speaking founders’ business plans into Japanese, cautioning the attendees that he faced a challenge: “I have to understand what the hell they’re talking about.”

The A.I. Age | This 12-month series of stories explores the social and economic questions arising from the fast-spreading uses of artificial intelligence. The series is funded with the help of the Harvard-MIT Ethics and Governance of AI Initiative. Seattle Times editors and reporters operate independently of our funders and maintain editorial control over the coverage.

Three New Jersey teens brought home two international awards for their artificial intelligence robot, who competed at the International Robocup Junior Championship in Sydney, Australia earlier this month.

The team — made up of high school juniors Julian Lee of Livingston and Jeffrey Cheng from Bridgewater, and senior Alexander Lisenko, also of Bridgewater — won the third place World Title for Individual Team Tournament, and the Judge’s Award for Best Rescue Engineering Strategy in the Rescue Maze League.

The trio belongs to Storming Robots, a New Jersey-based Robotics Learning Lab, and competed against teams of 14- to 19-year-olds from around the world in the July 4–9 contest.

If your interest lies with robotics there are a multitude of different platforms for you to build. [Teemu Laurila] was frustrated with what was on offer, so designed his own with four-wheel double wishbone suspension and mecanum wheels for maximum flexibility.

It’s a design that has been through multiple revisions since its first iteration in 2015, and along the way it’s clear some thought has gone into it. That double wishbone suspension features an angle for a high ground clearance, and is fully sprung. Drive comes from small motor/gearboxes at each axle. The chassis meanwhile has plenty of space for a single-board computer, and has been specifically designed with the BeagleBone Black in mind.

This build isn’t fully DIY, as the mecanum wheels appear to be off-the-shelf items, but the rest of the project makes up for this. If you need to make your own, it’s hardly as though there aren’t any projects from which you can borrow components.