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Category: innovation

These two game-changing breakthroughs advance us toward artificial general intelligence

As humans, we rely on all sorts of stimuli to navigate in the world, including our senses: sight, sound, touch, taste, smell. Until now, AI devices have been solely reliant on a single sense—visual impressions. Brand-new research from Duke University goes beyond reliance only on visual perception. It’s called WildFusion, combining vision with touch and vibration.

The four-legged robot used by the research team includes microphones and tactile sensors in addition to the standard cameras commonly found in state-of-the-art robots. The WildFusion robot can use sound to assess the quality of a surface (dry leaves, wet sand) as well as pressure and resistance to calibrate its balance and stability. All of this data is gathered and combined or fused, into a single data representation that improves over time with experience. The research team plans enhance the robot’s capabilities by enabling it to gauge things like heat and humidity.

As the types of data used to interact with the environment become richer and more integrated, AI moves inexorably closer to true AGI.

Liver organoid generates organ-specific blood vessels for the first time

Scientists from Cincinnati Children’s and colleagues based in Japan report achieving a major step forward in organoid technology: producing liver tissue that grows its own internal blood vessels.

This significant advance could lead to new ways to help people living with hemophilia and other coagulation disorders while also taking another step closer to producing transplantable repair tissues for people with damaged livers.

The study, led by Takanori Takebe, MD, Ph.D., director for commercial innovation at the Cincinnati Children’s Center for Stem Cell and Organoid Research and Medicine (CuSTOM), was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering.

Precursors to bone marrow cancer can stop themselves by entering dormant state

Why do some patients with precursors to bone marrow cancer never develop the disease? Researchers from the Department of Forensic Medicine at Aarhus University have discovered that some cells enter a dormant state and create a defense against cancer—a breakthrough that could lead to early treatment.

In a new study published in the journal Leukemia, researchers investigated multiple myeloma, a serious marrow that arises in .

Before the disease emerges, patients always have a precursor condition, either MGUS (monoclonal gammopathy of undetermined significance) or SMM (smoldering multiple myeloma). These conditions are not cancer themselves but are associated with an increased risk of developing bone marrow cancer—approximately 1% and 10% increased risk per year, respectively.

For the First Time, AI Breakthrough Enables Humans to Hold a 20-Minute “Conversation” with a Humpback Whale

A groundbreaking experiment off the coast of Alaska has unlocked a 20-minute “conversation” with a humpback whale. Using cutting-edge AI, scientists decoded complex whale vocalizations, revealing unexpected patterns in their communication.

Deeper sleep is more likely to lead to eureka moments, study indicates

“Sleeping on it,” especially dropping deeper than a doze, might help people gain insight into certain kinds of tasks, according to a study published in PLOS Biology by Anika Löwe and colleagues.

Humans sometimes find that they have a sudden “eureka” moment on a problem they’ve been working on, producing sudden insight or breakthroughs. Scientists have yet to have their own “aha” moment of insight on how it might work, though sleep appears to play a role.

To better understand how sleep might lead to insight while , the authors of this pre-registered study asked 90 people to track a series of dots across a screen. The participants were given instructions about a seemingly simple task that merely involved responding to the dots on a keyboard, but the instructions left out a trick that could make the task easier.

“We Increased Battery Life Sevenfold”: Scientists Unveil Breakthrough Film That Supercharges Anode-Free Solid-State Technology

IN A NUTSHELL 🔋 Researchers in South Korea developed a cost-effective MoS2 thin film that boosts battery lifespan sevenfold. 💡 The innovation uses molybdenum disulfide to prevent dendrite formation, enhancing the safety and performance of anode-free solid-state batteries. 🌟 This breakthrough offers a scalable, affordable alternative to noble metals, promising to accelerate the commercialization of

A Novel Platform for Root Protection Applies New Root-Coating Technologies to Mitigate Soil-Borne Tomato Brown Rugose Fruit Virus Disease

Tomato brown rugose fruit virus (ToBRFV) is a soil-borne virus showing a low percentage of ca. 3% soil-mediated infection when the soil contains root debris from a previous 30–50 day growth cycle of ToBRFV-infected tomato plants. We designed stringent conditions of soil-mediated ToBRFV infection by increasing the length of the pre-growth cycle to 90–120 days, adding a ToBRFV inoculum as well as truncating seedling roots, which increased seedling susceptibility to ToBRFV infection. These rigorous conditions were employed to challenge the efficiency of four innovative root-coating technologies in mitigating soil-mediated ToBRFV infection while avoiding any phytotoxic effect. We tested four different formulations, which were prepared with or without the addition of various virus disinfectants. We found that under conditions of 100% soil-mediated ToBRFV infection of uncoated positive control plants, root-coating with formulations based on methylcellulose (MC), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), silica Pickering emulsion and super-absorbent polymer (SAP) that were prepared with the disinfectant chlorinated-trisodium phosphate (Cl-TSP) showed low percentages of soil-mediated ToBRFV infection of 0%, 4.3%, 5.5% and 0%, respectively. These formulations had no adverse effect on plant growth parameters when compared to negative control plants grown under non ToBRFV inoculation conditions.