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Sep 18, 2018

Orbital Insight acquires computer vision startup FeatureX

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

SAN FRANCISCO — Orbital Insight, a Silicon Valley geospatial analytics company, announced the purchase Sept. 18 of FeatureX, a Boston-based artificial intelligence firm specializing in computer vision for satellite imagery. The terms of the purchase were not disclosed.

It was the first acquisition made by Orbital Insight, a firm that has raised $78.7 million to date, including $50 million in a Series C funding round completed in May 2017.

FeatureX founder Gil Syswerda will join Orbital Insight as its technology research vice president, working in the company’s Boston office. FeatureX specializes in applying computer vision to satellite imagery to detect objects, enhance images and facilitate deep learning.

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Sep 18, 2018

TESS Shares 1st Science Image in Hunt to Find New Worlds

Posted by in categories: science, space

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, which began science operations in July, has released its first full frame image using all four of its cameras.

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Sep 18, 2018

The Application Of AI To Augment Physicians And Reduce Burnout

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, health, information science, policy, robotics/AI

Recently, there has been an explosion of interest in applying artificial intelligence (AI) to medicine. Whether explicitly or implicitly, much of this interest has centered on using AI to automate decision-making tasks that are currently done by physicians. This includes two seminal papers in the Journal of the American Medical Association demonstrating that AI-based algorithms have similar or higher accuracy than physicians: one in diagnostic assessment of metastatic breast cancer compared to pathologists and the other in detecting diabetic retinopathy compared to ophthalmologists.

While promising, these applications of AI in medicine raise a number of novel regulatory and policy issues around efficacy, safety, health workforce, and payment. They have also triggered concerns from the medical and patient communities about AI replacing doctors. And, except in narrow domains of practice, general AI systems may fall far short of the hype.

We posit that the applications of AI to “augment” physicians may be more realistic and broader reaching than those that portend to replace existing health care services. In particular, with the right support from policy makers, physicians, patients, and the technology community, we see opportunities for AI to be a solution for—rather than a contributor to—burnout among physicians and achieving the quadruple aim of improving health, enhancing the experience of care, reducing cost, and attaining joy in work for health professionals.

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Sep 18, 2018

Stockton U. may build $41M science center at former Atlantic City airport

Posted by in categories: science, transportation

Stockton University will conduct a study on a proposed environmental center.

The Press of Atlantic City reports Atlantic City and the university received a $100,000 state grant last week to conduct the feasibility study on the new Marine and Environmental Science Center. According to university officials, the facility would cost about $41 million to build.

The facility would be built on a 15-acre portion of Bader Field. Stockton University’s current science facility in Port Republic was built in the early 1900s.

Continue reading “Stockton U. may build $41M science center at former Atlantic City airport” »

Sep 18, 2018

How we’ll leave Earth for good

Posted by in category: futurism

It might sound like pie in the sky, but the idea of leaving Earth for good is one that scientists are taking seriously — we investigate in the new issue of BBC Focus.

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Sep 18, 2018

If You’re Not Using PhoneSoap Yet, You Need To Be

Posted by in category: mobile phones

Because if you’re not sanitizing your phone each day, you might as well be drinking from the toilet.

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Sep 18, 2018

Alphabet AI Is Helping Release Sterile Mosquitoes in Singapore

Posted by in categories: information science, robotics/AI, sex

Alphabet’s healthcare and tech company Verily will use a sex-sorting computer vision algorithm to help Singapore battle mosquitoes.

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Sep 18, 2018

Software could lead to personalized leukemia treatments

Posted by in category: futurism

New research lays the foundation for the development of highly personalized immune therapies for people with acute myeloid leukemia.

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Sep 18, 2018

High blood pressure breakthrough: Over 500 genes uncovered

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics

The world’s largest genetic study of hypertension finds that the number of genetic loci involved is three times larger than previously thought.

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Sep 18, 2018

DARPA Announces $2 Billion Campaign to Develop Next Wave of AI Technologies

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, cyborgs, military, robotics/AI

Over its 60-year history, DARPA has played a leading role in the creation and advancement of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies that have produced game-changing capabilities for the Department of Defense. Starting in the 1960s, DARPA research shaped the first wave of AI technologies, which focused on handcrafted knowledge, or rule-based systems capable of narrowly defined tasks. While a critical step forward for the field, these systems were fragile and limited. Starting in the 1990s, DARPA helped usher in a second wave of AI machine learning technologies that created statistical pattern recognizers from large amounts of data. The agency’s funding of natural language understanding, problem solving, navigation and perception technologies has led to the creation of self-driving cars, personal assistants, and near-natural prosthetics, in addition to a myriad of critical and valuable military and commercial applications. However, these second wave AI technologies are dependent on large amounts of high quality training data, do not adapt to changing conditions, offer limited performance guarantees, and are unable to provide users with explanations of their results.

To address the limitations of these first and second wave AI technologies, DARPA seeks to explore new theories and applications that could make it possible for machines to adapt to changing situations. DARPA sees this next generation of AI as a third wave of technological advance, one of contextual adaptation. To better define a path forward, DARPA is announcing today a multi-year investment of more than $2 billion in new and existing programs called the “AI Next” campaign. Agency director, Dr. Steven Walker, officially unveiled the large-scale effort during closing remarks today at DARPA’s D60 Symposium taking place Wednesday through Friday at the Gaylord Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland.

“With AI Next, we are making multiple research investments aimed at transforming computers from specialized tools to partners in problem-solving,” said Dr. Walker. “Today, machines lack contextual reasoning capabilities, and their training must cover every eventuality, which is not only costly, but ultimately impossible. We want to explore how machines can acquire human-like communication and reasoning capabilities, with the ability to recognize new situations and environments and adapt to them.”

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