Here are some of the most important and disruptive developments in AI that you may or may not have seen this past month:
A new AI-powered drug discovery model has just been developed by Iambic Therapeutics called “Enchant”. There has been a lot of talk about how AI will influence pharmaceutics, could this be the watershed moment that brings humanity forward in creating life saving medication? The model predicts early-stage drug performance, helping to reduce development costs and improve success rates by accurately forecasting efficacy and safety outcomes before human testing.
Read more here.
2. Harvard’s new model for cancer detectionWhen you see that name in relation to a project, you know there will be boffins hard at work. CHIEF (Clinical Histopathology Imaging Evaluation Foundation) is a highly specialised AI vision model designed for ultra-detailed analysis of cancer cell images, trained on an impressive 44 terabytes of data – that’s like analysing 44 million high-quality photos (assuming one photo is one megabyte). It has drastically outperformed other models in the same domain, with incredible accuracy.
Read the academic paper here.
3. Anthropic’s “computer use”
Seemingly always in the shadow of OpenAI, Anthropic has now released a feature that will have an impact that goes beyond that of a typical Large Language Model (LLM) like ChatGPT. The benign task of using an internet browser feels so human in a way that this is weirdly scary. “Computer use” is a new feature that allows users to enable Claude (their own LLM) to operate a computer just like a human would. The best way to understand what this means is to watch this video:
Microsoft, announced the release of Copilot studio, which allows users to create their own AI agents (imagine them like virtual employees), as well as 10 pre-installed agents. This one is highly concentrated on corporate tasks and will likely shake up the industry! Could this be the tool that sees the trillions of corporate investment in AI come to fruition? Public rollout will only be next month but “these new agents are designed to help every sales, service, finance and supply chain team drive business value” says Microsoft.
Read their full blog post here.
5. Revolutionising creativity at Adobe’s MAX event Adobe has massively ramped up how it now incorporates AI, at their event Adobe MAX. They demonstrated many new “projects” that creatives will be able to use on their platform, which are much more time-efficient and precise than the manual labour that had to be performed previously. Transforming photo, video, audio, and 3D creation that would take hours, if not days, can now be done in minutes, all with the addition of AI technology. Probably most impressive, is their “perfect blend” tool which allows users to blend two separate images almost seamlessly and their AI-generated sound effects.
There are quite a lot of new fascinating innovations that they released so check them out here.
6. Tesla’s “We, Robot”Cybercabs, humanoid robots, robovans and a good old lawsuit by the production team of “bladerunner 2049”. It was a display that typified what Elon Musk is all about: showmanship and innovation (leaving his political escapades aside). “The future of autonomy and artificial intelligence will be realised through the creation of a fleet of autonomous vehicles and robots” say Tesla. How soon all of this will reach the mainstream is a question not many people know the answer to. Musk says they will be in production by 2026, but the man famously does not stick to the timelines he sets out to.
7. Anduril release autonomous Kamikaze drones
With all of its positive aspects, AI is going to impact nearly every facet of human life in the future, and warfare is not exempt. Anduril Industries has launched the Bolt-M, an autonomous attack drone that performs precision strike missions without needing specialised operators. Even when connection is lost with operators, the drone is still able to carry out the intended mission. With the amount of drone strikes that have been going on in wars such as in Ukraine, it is likely to have an impact globally.
8. An intelligent garden
On the softer, more wholesome side of the spectrum. Microsoft, in collaboration with garden designer Tom Massey, have developed the Avanade “intelligent” garden, an AI powered garden that will be presented at the Chelsea Flower show in 2025. Sensors in the soil are partnered with an AI model trained on Royal Horticultural Society plant data and gardening advice, meaning visitors can ask the garden: “How are you?” and it will answer exactly on how it is and what it needs. Which is pretty mad if you ask me!
9. Nuclear renaissance
Over the course of the past month there has been numerous large corporations and even countries that have announced they are turning to nuclear power in order to support the high energy demands of AI data centres. Amazon, Microsoft and Google have all announced plans to use nuclear power plants as their key source of energy. These major tech companies are investing billions in fulfilling the massive energy demands of AI. Japan also announced plans to restart their nuclear plants to achieve the same goal, even though they pulled the plug on nuclear activity following the disaster in 2011.
10. The ‘Godfather’ of AI
After having won the Nobel prize in physicts and being widely regarded as one of the most prominent figures in the Artificial Intelligence space, Geoffrey Hinton sat down with BBC Newsnight for an insightful interview. He touches on subjects such as: AI safety, the future of AI and it exceeding human intelligence.
AI is advancing at a never before seen rate, defying Moore’s Law (which states computing power roughly doubles every two years). Staying up to date is crucial to critically assessing the technology’s impact on society, and every single aspect of life as we know it. You can read September’s AI news here:
Read also: This month in AI news: the age of sophisticated reasoning is upon us
