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Category: robotics/AI – Page 2,212

Microsoft has a wild hologram that translates HoloLens keynotes into Japanese

What if neither distance nor language mattered? What if technology could help you be anywhere you need to be and speak any language? Using AI technology and holographic experiences this is possible, and it is revolutionary.

Microsoft has created a hologram that will transform someone into a digital speaker of another language. The software giant unveiled the technology during a keynote at the Microsoft Inspire partner conference this morning in Las Vegas. Microsoft recently scanned Julia White, a company executive for Azure, at a Mixed Reality capture studio to transform her into an exact hologram replica.

The digital version appeared onstage to translate the keynote into Japanese. Microsoft has used its Azure AI technologies and neural text-to-speech to make this possible. It works by taking recordings of White’s voice, in order to create a personalized voice signature, to make it sound like she’s speaking Japanese.

Microsoft has shown off holograms of people before, but the translation aspect is a step beyond what has been possible with HoloLens. This looks like it’s just a demonstration for now, and you’d need access to a Mixed Reality capture studio to even start to take advantage of this. Microsoft’s studios are equipped with lighting rigs and high-resolution cameras to capture a fully accurate digital hologram of someone, which isn’t something that can be done easily at home with a smartphone just yet.

ISS receives prototype bacteria-based space mining kit

Stand by to start space mining – not on an asteroid, but aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Delivered to the station by an unmanned Dragon cargo ship on July 27, an experimental mining kit developed by a team led by the University of Edinburgh will use bacteria to study how microorganisms can be used to extract minerals and metals from rocks on asteroids, moons, and planets.

Large dataset enables prediction of repair after CRISPR–Cas9 editing in primary T cells

Understanding of repair outcomes after Cas9-induced DNA cleavage is still limited, especially in primary human cells. We sequence repair outcomes at 1,656 on-target genomic sites in primary human T cells and use these data to train a machine learning model, which we have called CRISPR Repair Outcome (SPROUT). SPROUT accurately predicts the length, probability and sequence of nucleotide insertions and deletions, and will facilitate design of SpCas9 guide RNAs in therapeutically important primary human cells.

America is drowning in garbage. Now robots are being put on duty to help solve the recycling crisis

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.

Microsoft Invests $1 Billion in OpenAI’s Mission to Build Artificial General Intelligence

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.

‘Limitless Potential’ of Artificial Protein Ushers in New Era of ‘Smart’ Cell Therapies

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.

10 insights from my first 5 episodes of The Ageless Starman podcast

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

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