Lifeboat Foundation

While removing the plastic waste that currently contaminates the ocean today will be crucial for protecting marine ecosystems, it is arguably more important that we stop any more plastic trash from entering the ocean. Fortunately for humanity, The Ocean Cleanup, a nonprofit taking on plastic waste in the ocean today, also has a novel solution for stopping plastic from entering it via rivers.

The solution comes in the form of a solar-powered barge named the “Interceptor”. The 24-meter-long (78 feet) vessel resembles a large houseboat and uses a curved barrier to catch waste floating downstream. The trash, much of it plastic, is directed to the “mouth” of the barge — which operates autonomously and silently — from where it rolls up a conveyor belt and is dropped into dumpsters. Apparently, the Interceptor is capable of collecting up to 50 tons of waste a day.

Currently the Klang River in Malaysia is home to one of these Interceptors where it can be seen quietly scooping up trash. The Klang river alone sends more than 15,000 tons annually into the sea, making it one of the 50 most-polluting rivers across the globe. As well as the barge in Malaysia, one has been stationed in Jakarta, the overcrowded capital of neighboring Indonesia, while two others will be sent to Vietnam and the Dominican Republic.

Circa 2017

Artificial intelligence has been used crack one of the codes originally deciphered in the 1940s at Bletchley Park.

It took just 13 minutes and cost £10.

Continue reading “AI cracks Enigma code in 13 minutes” »

Icefin robot swam more than 1 kilometer to reach Thwaites Glacier’s grounding line.

It designed Meena to be able to talk about, well, anything you want.

Amid today’s technological wizardry, it’s easy to forget that several decades have passed since a single innovation has dramatically raised the quality of life for millions of people. Summoning a car with one’s phone is nifty, but it pales in comparison with discovering penicillin or electrifying cities. Artificial intelligence is being heralded as the next big thing, but a cluster of scientists, technologists and investors are aiming higher. In the vernacular of Silicon Valley, where many of them are based, their goal is nothing less than disrupting death, and their story is at the center of “Immortality, Inc.” by science journalist Chip Walter.

The efforts of scientists and investors to defy the aging process—and extend the human life span—are still in their infancy.

Inspired by the functioning of the human brain and based on a biological mechanism called neuromodulation, it allows intelligent agents to adapt to unknown situations.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) has enabled the development of high-performance automatic learning techniques in recent years. However, these techniques are often applied task by task, which implies that an intelligent agent trained for one task will perform poorly on other tasks, even very similar ones. To overcome this problem, researchers at the University of Liège (ULiège) have developed a new algorithm based on a biological mechanism called neuromodulation. This algorithm makes it possible to create intelligent agents capable of performing tasks not encountered during training. This novel and exceptional result is presented this week in the magazine PLOS ONE.

Despite the immense progress in the field of AI in recent years, we are still very far from human intelligence. Indeed, if current AI techniques allow to train computer agents to perform certain tasks better than humans when they are trained specifically for them, the performance of these same agents is often very disappointing when they are put in conditions (even slightly) different from those experienced during training.

Japan is constructing an 18-meter-tall, 25-ton Gundam robot powered by a combination of electric and hydraulic actuators.

Japan has had a robust robot culture for decades, thanks (at least in part) to the success of the Gundam series, which are bipedal humanoid robots controlled by a human who rides inside of them. I would tell you how many different TV series and video games and manga there are about Gundam, but I’m certain I can’t count that high—there’s like seriously a lot of Gundam stuff out there. One of the most visible bits of Gundam stuff is a real life full-scale Gundam statue in Tokyo, but who really wants a statue, right? C’mon, Japan! Bring us the real thing!

Continue reading “Japan Is Building a Giant Gundam Robot That Can Walk” »

Sweating is a useful skill for humans, stopping us from overheating. Now robots are learning to do it, too, and for the same reason. New research describes a soft robot gripper that sweats to lower its temperature. It has its downsides (like sweaty fingers), but it could be useful in future robot designs.

A team of researchers affiliated with multiple institutions in China and one in Korea has developed a micro-robot system that regenerated knee cartilage in rabbits. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes their system and how well it worked.

In many developed countries, the population is growing older, which means aging-related health conditions are on the rise. One such ailment common in older people is degeneration of the cartilage in the knees and hips. When this happens, a common treatment is replacing the knee or hip joint with an artificial device. In this new effort, the researchers have found a better way to handle the problem—regrowing the cartilage.

Prior research has shown that mesenchymal stem cells found in bone marrow and fat can be coaxed into growing into cartilage cells. And researchers have also found that stem cells can be used to repair damaged cartilage. The challenge is placing the cells in the body where they are needed and keeping them in place until they attach to the surrounding tissue. In this new effort, the researchers have created a system that was able to overcome these hurdles—at least in rabbits.