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Mar 17, 2023

Machine Intelligence and Humanity Benefit From “Spiral” of Mutual Learning

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Summary: Humans and computers can interact via multiple modes and channels to respectively gain wisdom and deepen intelligence.

Source: Intelligent Computing.

Deyi Li from the Chinese Association for Artificial Intelligence believes that humans and machines have a mutually beneficial relationship.

Mar 17, 2023

CRISPR Gene-Editing Technique Reverses Vision Loss in Mice

Posted by in categories: bioengineering, biotech/medical, genetics

Summary: Using a highly versatile form of CRISPR gene editing, researchers successfully restored vision in mice with retinitis pigmentosa.

Source: Rockefeller University Press.

Researchers in China have successfully restored the vision of mice with retinitis pigmentosa, one of the major causes of blindness in humans.

Mar 17, 2023

Engineered living materials for sustainable and resilient architecture

Posted by in categories: biological, sustainability

Progress in biomimetics allows for the fabrication of man-made materials and surfaces with properties similar to biological ones. These advancements enable the development of a new generation of building materials for architecture that have remarkable properties typically unachievable with a traditional approach.

Mar 17, 2023

How Our Native Language Shapes Our Brain Wiring

Posted by in category: neuroscience

Summary: Our native language may affect the way in which our brains are wired and underlie the way we think, a new study reports. Using neuroimaging to analyze neural connectivity in native German and native Arabic speakers, researchers found stronger connectivity between the right and left hemispheres in Arabic speakers, and stronger connectivity in the left hemisphere language area in German speakers.

Source: Max Planck Institute.

Scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Leipzig have found evidence that the language we speak shapes the connectivity in our brains that may underlie the way we think.

Mar 17, 2023

80,000 Mouse Brain Cells Used to Build a Living Computer

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Tens of thousands of living brain cells have been used to build a simple computer that can recognise patterns of light and electricity. It could eventually be used in robotics.

By Karmela Padavic-Callaghan

Mar 17, 2023

Team develops see-through aerogel made from wood that better insulates double-paned windows

Posted by in categories: energy, physics

A team of physicists and material scientists at the University of Colorado has developed a way to better insulate double-paned glass used for windows by adding a transparent aerogel. In their paper published in the journal Nature Energy the group describes how their aerogel is made and how much of a boost in energy efficiency can be expected from windows using the material. Nature Energy has also published a Research Briefing in the same journal issue that outlines the work done by the team.

Since most homeowners prefer to have that allow them to see outside, is inevitable. Over the past several decades, heat loss from windows has been improved by adding a second pane of —the two panes are typically separated by a gap of insulating air. Still, such windows do not provide nearly the same degree of insulation as insulated walls. In this new approach, the team in Colorado has come up with a way to improve the insulation properties of double-paned glass.

To make the aerogel (a gel with pockets of air in it), the research team soaked nanofibers of cellulose extracted from wood in water. Next, the wood nanofibers were removed and were then dunked in an ethanol solution. Once saturated, the nanofibers were heated in a pressurized oven—this forced the ethanol pockets to be replaced with air. Next, the nanofibers, which were transparent, were coated with a water-repellent material to prevent condensation when situated between panes of glass.

Mar 17, 2023

Heart failure: Hunger hormone ghrelin may improve heart function

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Researchers have found that an activated form of the hunger hormone ghrelin can help people with heart failure by increasing the heart’s pump capacity.

Mar 17, 2023

The Model That Changes Everything: Alpaca Breakthrough (ft. Apple’s LLM, BritGPT, Ernie and AlexaTM)

Posted by in categories: economics, robotics/AI

8 years of cost reduction in 5 weeks: how Stanford’s Alpaca model changes everything, including the economics of OpenAI and GPT 4. The breakthrough, using self-instruct, has big implications for Apple’s secret large language model, Baidu’s ErnieBot, Amazon’s attempts and even governmental efforts, like the newly announced BritGPT.

I will go through how Stanford put the model together, why it costs so little, and demonstrate in action versus Chatgpt and GPT 4. And what are the implications of short-circuiting human annotation like this? With analysis of a tweet by Eliezer Yudkowsky, I delve into the workings of the model and the questions it rises.

Continue reading “The Model That Changes Everything: Alpaca Breakthrough (ft. Apple’s LLM, BritGPT, Ernie and AlexaTM)” »

Mar 17, 2023

Adapting to Alien Places may not be a Big Problem for Life. Ask Any of These Strange Creatures!

Posted by in category: futurism

Posted on Big Think.

Mar 17, 2023

Dual immunotherapy plus chemotherapy before surgery improves patient outcomes in operable lung cancer

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

In a Phase II trial led by researchers from The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, adding ipilimumab to a neoadjuvant, or pre-surgical, combination of nivolumab plus platinum-based chemotherapy, resulted in a major pathologic response (MPR) in half of all treated patients with early-stage, resectable non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC).

New findings from the NEOSTAR trial, published today in Nature Medicine, provide further support for neoadjuvant immunotherapy-based treatment as an approach to reduce viable tumor at surgery and to improve outcomes in NSCLC. The combination also was associated with an increase in immune cell infiltration and a favorable gut microbiome composition.

The current study reports on the latest two arms of the NEOSTAR trial, evaluating neoadjuvant nivolumab plus chemotherapy (double combination) and neoadjuvant ipilimumab plus nivolumab and chemotherapy (triple combination). Both treatment arms met their prespecified primary endpoint boundaries of six or more patients achieving MPR, defined as 10% or less residual viable tumor (RVT) in the resected tumor specimen at surgery, a candidate surrogate endpoint of improved survival outcomes from prior studies.