WASHINGTON — U.S. Space Command, the Defense Department’s combatant command responsible for space operations, has achieved full operational capability, its commander Gen. James Dickinson announced Dec. 15.

In short, this means that U.S. Space Command is now fully up and running. It has the staff, infrastructure and plans it needs to handle its mission of conducting space operations and protecting American and allied assets and interests in space.

U.S. Space Command, established in 2019 in Colorado Springs, is tasked to monitor space activity and threats, support other military units with space capabilities like communications and surveillance, respond to crises involving space, deter aggression and defeat enemies if needed.

Elucidating human contact networks could help predict and prevent the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and future pandemic threats. A new study from Scripps Research scientists and collaborators points to which public health protocols worked to mitigate the spread of COVID-19—and which ones didn’t.

In the study, published online in Cell on December 14, 2023, the Scripps Research-led team of scientists investigated the efficacy of different mandates—including stay-at-home measures, social distancing and travel restrictions —at preventing local and regional transmission during different phases of the COVID-19 pandemic.

They found that local transmission was driven by the amount of travel between locations, not by how geographically nearby they were. The study also revealed that the partial closure of the U.S.-Mexico border was ineffective at preventing cross-border transmission of the virus. These findings, in combination with ongoing genomic surveillance, could help guide public health policy to prevent future pandemics and mitigate the new “endemic” phase of COVID-19.

When it comes to spurring the development of cutting-edge technologies, the Chinese government is rather pragmatic in its policymaking process. In the field of autonomous driving, the country has made some big strides in defining the parameters and limitations for service providers, removing regulatory ambiguity and granting industry players the freedom to test the nascent technology.

The trial guidelines, unveiled by the Ministry of Transport recently, target AV services like robotaxis, self-driving trucks and robobuses. The release arrived about 16 months after the department began seeking public opinions on the regulatory framework, and policymakers have reached a consensus that self-driving vehicles are subject to rigorous surveillance measures to ensure utmost safety.

Prior to the introduction of the nationwide guidelines, policymaking for AVs in China had been playing out in a more decentralized fashion, with local governments formulating their own rules for service providers on their turf. Major tech clusters like Beijing, Shenzhen and Guangzhou, for example, have been frontrunners in allowing companies to test AVs with minimum human interference.

LONDON (AP) — European Union negotiators clinched a deal Friday on the world’s first comprehensive artificial intelligence rules, paving the way for legal oversight of technology used in popular generative AI services like ChatGPT that has promised to transform everyday life and spurred warnings of existential dangers to humanity.

Negotiators from the European Parliament and the bloc’s 27 member countries overcame big differences on controversial points including generative AI and police use of facial recognition surveillance to sign a tentative political agreement for the Artificial Intelligence Act.

“Deal!” tweeted European Commissioner Thierry Breton, just before midnight. “The EU becomes the very first continent to set clear rules for the use of AI.”

Are bright cities making it worse for birds during their migrations? Find out here!

A recent study published in Nature Communications examines how increased levels of artificial light, specifically in urban areas, has contributed to increased bird deaths during their annual migrations. This study comes as hundreds of birds were killed after colliding with a Chicago building, and despite a 2021 study recommending that reduced building lights would reduce bird collisions by 60 percent. This recent study holds the potential to help scientists and the public better understand how rapidly expanding urban areas are impacting bird migration and their safety.

For the study, the researchers used the Next Generation Radar (NEXRAD), which is jointly operated by the U.S. Air Force, Federal Aviation Administration, and the U.S. National Weather Service, to track bird migration stopover density during spring (March 15 to June 15) and fall (August 15 to November 15) seasons between 2016 and 2020. After analyzing more than 10 million radar observations, the researchers found that light pollution was the second-highest ranked reason for birds stopping for breaks out of 49 reasons measured for the study, with the top reason being elevation.

“Cities pose multiple risks to migrating birds,” said Dr. Geoff Henebry, who is a professor at the Center for Global Change and Earth Observations at Michigan State University and a co-author on the study. “They also offer resources for the tired birds to rest and refuel. Our study is notable in that it combines big data – and a lot of processing – from the weather surveillance radar network with big data from multiple spaceborne sensors to address key questions regarding the influence of urban areas on bird migration.”

The Royal New Zealand Navy is currently awaiting the arrival of its latest Uncrewed Surface Vessel, the wind-powered “Bluebottle,” ahead of a 7-month sea trial.

The Royal New Zealand Navy (RNZN) will soon receive its first 22.3-foot (6.8-meter) long renewable-powered Uncrewed Surface Vessel (USV) to trial on a short-term lease, the New Zealand Defense Force has announced. Called “Bluebottle,” the USV will provide persistent surveillance around the waters of New Zealand for fishery protection, border protection, or meteorological data.

Autonomous border control

HMNZS Aotearoa is currently transporting the USV from Sydney to Auckland. Once operational, “Bluebottle” will undertake maritime tasks without fuel or personnel on its planned seven-month-long trial. Designed and built by Sydney-based Ocius Technology, the company has sold several USVs to the Australian Defence Force and collaborated with the Australian Border Force, energy, and scientific agencies.

It comes 3 years after Amazon debuted its ‘handy’ authentication service for consumers.

Amazon’s cloud computing subsidiary AWS (Amazon Web Services) has lifted the lid on a new palm-scanning identity service that allows companies to authenticate people when entering physical premises.

The announcement comes as part of AWS’s annual Re: Invent conference, which is running in Las Vegas for the duration of this week.

Amazon One Enterprise, as the new service is called, builds on the company’s existing Amazon One offering which it debuted back in 2020 to enable biometric payments in Amazon’s own surveillance-powered cashierless stores. Visitors to Amazon Go stores can associate their payment card with their palm-print, allowing them to enter the store and complete their transaction by hovering their hand over a scanner.

Japan’s Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) is applying its Deep Anomaly Surveillance (DeAnoS) artificial intelligence tool, originally designed for telecom networks, to predict anomalies in nuclear fusion reactors.

DeAnoS is like a detective, trying to understand which part of the equation is making things weird.

Atomic fusion reactors are at the forefront of scientific innovation, harnessing the enormous energy released by atomic nuclei fusion. This process, which is similar to the Sun’s power source, involves the union of two light atomic nuclei, which results in the development of a heavier nucleus and the release of a massive quantity of energy.

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. (AP) — Artificial intelligence employed by the U.S. military has piloted pint-sized surveillance drones in special operations forces’ missions and helped Ukraine in its war against Russia. It tracks soldiers’ fitness, predicts when Air Force planes need maintenance and helps keep tabs on rivals in space.

Now, the Pentagon is intent on fielding multiple thousands of relatively inexpensive, expendable AI-enabled autonomous vehicles by 2026 to keep pace with China. The ambitious initiative — dubbed Replicator — seeks to “galvanize progress in the too-slow shift of U.S. military innovation to leverage platforms that are small, smart, cheap, and many,” Deputy Secretary of Defense Kathleen Hicks said in August.

While its funding is uncertain and details vague, Replicator is expected to accelerate hard decisions on what AI tech is mature and trustworthy enough to deploy — including on weaponized systems.

Influenza viruses are believed to have sparked at least 14 human pandemics in the past 500 years; the most devastating of which began in 1918. Yet, despite intense study and considerable advances in public health, virus surveillance and virology, there is no simple answer to this pressing question: when and how will the next flu pandemic arise?

NIAID scientists including Jeffery K. Taubenberger, M.D., Ph.D., consider the many potential pathways to future influenza pandemics in a new viewpoints essay in Science Translational Medicine. There are no hard and fast ‘rules’ specifying, for example, what characteristics a given avian influenza virus must possess to allow it to efficiently infect… More.

Influenza pandemics have emerged for centuries but still cannot be accurately predicted.