Heads of OpenAI, Google Deepmind and Anthropic say the threat is as great as pandemics and nuclear war.
Category: robotics/AI – Page 759
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Emerging Threat: EG.5 Variant Raises Global Concerns
A new and fast-spreading variant of the coronavirus, known as EG.5, is causing worries worldwide. This variant is contributing to at least 8% of new COVID-19 cases, a significant increase from the previous month. To help us understand this situation, we’re joined by Dr. Bob, the Director of the Institute for Autoimmune and Rheumatic Diseases at St. Joseph Health, and an expert in this field.
Though almost every cell in your body contains a copy of each of your genes, only a small fraction of these genes will be expressed, or turned on. These activations are controlled by specialized snippets of DNA called enhancers, which act like skillful on-off switches. This selective activation allows cells to adopt specific functions in the body, determining whether they become—for example—heart cells, muscle cells, or brain cells.
However, these enhancers don’t always turn on the right genes at the right time, contributing to the development of genetic diseases like cancer and diabetes. A team of Johns Hopkins biomedical engineers has developed a machine-learning model that can predict which enhancers play a role in normal development and disease—an innovation that could someday power the development of enhancer-targeted therapies to treat diseases by turning genes on and off at will. The study results appeared in Nature Genetics.
“We’ve known that enhancers control transitions between cell types for a long time, but what is exciting about this work is that mathematical modeling is showing us how they might be controlled,” said study leader Michael Beer, a professor of biomedical engineering and genetic medicine at Johns Hopkins University.
Reichman University’s new Innovation Institute, which is set to formally open this spring under the auspices of the new Graziella Drahi Innovation Building, aims to encourage interdisciplinary, innovative and applied research as a cooperation between the different academic schools. The establishment of the Innovation Institute comes along with a new vision for the University, which puts the emphasis on the fields of synthetic biology, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Advanced Reality (XR). Prof. Noam Lemelshtrich Latar, the Head of the Institute, identifies these as fields of the future, and the new Innovation Institute will focus on interdisciplinary applied research and the ramifications of these fields on the subjects that are researched and taught at the schools, for example, how law and ethics influence new medical practices and scientific research.
Synthetic biology is a new interdisciplinary field that integrates biology, chemistry, computer science, electrical and genetic engineering, enabling fast manipulation of biological systems to achieve a desired product.
Prof. Lemelshtrich Latar, with Dr. Jonathan Giron, who was the Institute’s Chief Operating Officer, has made a significant revolution at the University, when they raised a meaningful donation to establish the Scojen Institute for Synthetic Biology. The vision of the Scojen Institute is to conduct applied scientific research by employing top global scientists at Reichman University to become the leading synthetic biology research Institute in Israel. The donation will allow recruiting four world-leading scientists in various scopes of synthetic biology in life sciences. The first scientist and Head of the Scojen Institute has already been recruited – Prof. Yosi Shacham Diamand, a leading global scientist in bio-sensors and the integration of electronics and biology. The Scojen Institute labs will be located in the Graziella Drahi Innovation Building and will be one part of the future Dina Recanati School of Medicine, set to open in the academic year 2024–2025.
A research team at Stanford and Google has created a virtual village for 25 AI agents to live in. They said the goal of this experiment was to create AI capable of believable, human-like behavior. These AI bots can plan parties, discuss elections, and select birthday gifts, the researchers said.
A research team at Stanford and Google has created a virtual village where 25 artificial-intelligence agents lead lives eerily reminiscent of our own.
In the virtual village, AI agents plan parties and discuss elections as part of an experiment to create more human-like bots.
The human brain is the most complex and powerful computer in the world — and, as far as we know, the universe.
Today’s most sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms are only just beginning to offer a partial simulation of a very limited number of the brain’s functions. AI is, however, much faster when it comes to certain operations like mathematics and language.
This means it comes as no surprise that a great deal of thought and research has gone into combining the two. The idea is to use AI to better understand the workings of the brain and eventually create more accurate simulations of it. One day, it may also help us to create systems with the complexity and diversity of… More.
Explore the thrilling convergence of AI and the human brain as cutting-edge technologies like Neuralink blur the lines between science fiction and reality.
The permission was given by California Public Utilities Commission after a 3–1 vote.
In a massive win for driverless cars in the United States, California has permitted Cruise and Waymo to conduct full-fledged commercial passenger service using driverless vehicles in San Francisco.
The permission granted by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) allows both firms to charge fees for journeys at any time of day. The approval comes after a disputed six-hour hearing on the matter that included residents voicing their concerns about autonomous vehicles (AVs) roaming their roads. Hearing all the arguments, the commission voted 3-to-1 to allow the two businesses to run their cars across San Francisco at any time of the day.
Last year, fast-casual restaurant chain Chipotle brought in a new employee: Chippy the chip-making robot. Chippy was tasked with slicing corn tortillas into triangles, frying them, tossing them with lime juice and salt, and dividing them into portions. The bot must have done a pretty good job, because now the restaurant is bringing in one of its cousins: an avocado-prepping robot called Autocado.
Turning avocados into guacamole can be a tedious process. You have to slice the fruit open, remove its thin peel, and take out its pit. Then there’s the mashing and mixing in of other ingredients. Pretty doable for a batch of guac for two to four people, but less so when you up the final consumer count to, oh, 750,000 per day.
Chipotle restaurants have employees specifically dedicated to making guacamole, but it takes almost an hour to make one batch, and employees listed the task as one of the “less favorable” among other things they do at the restaurant.
Thoughts on the future of artificial intelligence, universal accelerating change, “inner space,” Google, the metaverse, the wearable web, technology evaluation and empowerment, and cybertwins, including “digital mom”. SIAI Interview, Oct 2007. Filmed by Doug Wolens, I-MagineMedia, author of the excellent new documentary The Singularity, 2012. This is one of my favorite short interviews. Hope you like it!
Breakthrough insights in science, technology & the future; philosophy & moral progress; artificial intelligence/robotics, biotechnology.