The week's developments in AI, quantum, and biotech, explained | 29.11.23

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From drug discovery to embodied AI, this week has been huge for AI & DeepTech. Let’s kick off with Sam Altman: rumours are surfacing that shortly before his exile, researchers warned of an AI so good at maths that it could be the first sign of humanity-threatening AGI. Could this maths-whiz bot really be the cause of OpenAI’s board reshuffle? 

Meanwhile, CogX speaker NU Quantum is crafting a new 'internet of qubits' as an innovative way to tackle quantum scalability, and Varjo’s new XR headset claims to have vision as clear as a human's. 

And, there’s more where that came from – keep reading for the latest in heat-based computing, and the coolest AI tools to command, code, and create!

🚀 Don't miss your chance to secure your spot at the CogX Festival 2024! A limited number of super early bird tickets are now up for grabs at a 75% discount.

Innovation and Releases

🤖 A humanity-threatening maths-bot could be behind Altman’s dismissal. Shortly before his exile, researchers from project Q* – an AGI taskforce – warned of an AI with unexpected maths abilities. Its skills are rumoured to surpass its training data, a capability not seen in current LLMs.

👓 A new XR headset promises mixed reality as clear as human sight. The device – from Finnish startup Varjo – combines an HR display with LiDAR sensors, and gaze-directed autofocus to mimic human vision. The device will target automotive and pilot training. 

🔬 Cradle raised $24 million for its protein design platform that uses AI to mimic “amino acid languages” that create stable proteins, saving time in drug discovery. Whilst attracting major interest from big pharma, CEO and CogX speaker van Grieken claims the field is still in its infancy: "maybe at GPT 0.5". 

🌐 Quantum networking company, NU Quantum, secured £7 million in pre-series A funding. The quantum startup – and CogX speaker – is the first to network smaller quantum computers to form an ‘internet of qubits’, with the goal of improving quantum scalability.

AI Tools of the Week

💻 Command - AiTerm is a free terminal assistant that turns your natural language prompts into executable commands. 

📖 Create - TaleAI allows users to play and create immersive AI storytelling games, from 1-2 sentences of inspiration.

📸 Code - Screenshot To Code generates HTML/Tailwind/JS code from a screenshot alone, with a built-in code editor.

Latest Research

👾 Meet STEVE – the embodied AI entity in virtual space. STEVE can talk, code and see, allowing it to process its environment, reason iteratively through tasks, and execute gameplay. Its performance, tested on Minecraft, vastly outperforms previous methods.

🔥 Harnessing heat may be the future of sustainable computing. Researchers have developed a method to use surplus heat in technical devices for energy-efficient processing. The method uses magnetic strips and metal spacers to steer and amplify heat signals. 

🪨 The dolomite problem, and how solving it will help semiconductors. The longstanding geology mystery, wherein dolomite was unable to be grown in a lab, has been solved by researchers. Their innovative approach can be used to accelerate semiconductor production.

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In case you missed it

CogX talk 'From Cells to Cities' explores the impact of AI, quantum and system biology in understanding health and wellbeing:

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