Lifeboat Foundation

Would you like to play a game? The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency hopes so.

DARPA wants to build a gaming and social media platform that will engage a diverse community of creative minds to solve emerging science and technology problems.

The Gamifying the Search for Strategic Surprise (GS3) platform will serve as a “digital crucible” where teams of deep thinkers from a wide range of disciplines can work together to quickly solve problems relevant to DARPA’s mission of preventing technological surprise. After an inaugural group of invited players test the platform, it will be opened to the public.

DARPA scientists think they can use insects to deliver genetic changes to crops.

A novel quantum simulator has done what HPC’s have previously failed to do- to simulate the motion of electrons in large particle systems.

Pay-as-you-go solar systems have begun to light up homes in underserved parts of the continent, but will need to pack more punch to leapfrog the grid.

MNA– Head of Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council and Iran’s envoy to Armenia met with Armenian Minister of Transport, Communication and IT in Yerevan.

Seyed Kazem Sadjadi, the Ambassador of the Islamic Republic of Iran to Yerevan and Professor Saeed Sarkar, Secretary-General of the Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council (INIC) met with Vahan Martirosyan, the Minister of Transport, Communication and Information Technology of the Republic of Armenia on Wednesday in Yerevan.

The Armenian minister in the meeting welcomed the Iranian delegation for initiating cooperation and underlined that cooperation with Iran in areas of transportation and communication was of prime importance to Armenia. He voiced hope for expansion of bilateral cooperation in information technology.

Continue reading “Armenia eyeing nano coop. with Iran” »

Researchers have connected gut bacteria to the brain changes in Parkinson’s.

The US Army Research Laboratory (ARL) are at an advanced stage of with their synthetic biology research. The work could see bacteria being used to send signals and sense in a way similar to computers, the advantage being that it could potentially provide a more intuitive sensory experience to a piece of tech, and bypass some of the pitfalls unique to electrical structures. The research also has application for new 3D printing materials.

Deep learning is changing how Google’s search engine works. But its new-found efficiency takes a lot of painstaking human work behind the scenes.

Driven by a declining population, a trend for developing robotic babies has emerged in Japan as a means of encouraging couples to become “parents”. The approaches taken vary widely and are driven by different philosophical approaches that also beg a number of questions, not least whether these robo-tots will achieve the aim of their creators.

To understand all of this it is worth exploring the reasons behind the need to promote population growth in Japan. The issue stems from the disproportionate number of older people. Predictions from the UN suggest that by 2050 there will be about double the number of people living in Japan in the 70-plus age range compared to those aged 15–30. This is blamed on a number of factors including so-called “parasite singles”, more unmarried women and a lack of immigration.

Continue reading “Robot Babies From Japan Raise Questions About How Parents Bond With AI” »