President Donald Trump plans to sign an executive order directing federal agencies to prioritize research and development in artificial intelligence. The plan, called the American AI Initiative, comes after China and other countries have pledged big investments to advance and apply AI technology in fields ranging from warfighting to health care. The White House plan doesn't include any funding details. The administration says it's up to Congress to appropriate money. The order directs federal agencies to make government data and computing resources more available to artificial intelligence experts while maintaining security and confidentiality.

Applying just a bit of strain to a piece of semiconductor or other crystalline material can deform the orderly arrangement of atoms in its structure enough to cause dramatic changes in its properties, such as the way it conducts electricity, transmits light, or conducts heat. Now, a team of researchers at MIT and in Russia and Singapore have found ways to use artificial intelligence to help predict and control these changes, potentially opening up new avenues of research on advanced materials for future high-tech devices. The findings appear this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, in a paper authored by MIT professor of nuclear science and engineering and of materials science and engineering Ju Li, MIT Principal Research Scientist Ming Dao, and MIT graduate student Zhe Shi, with Evgeni Tsymbalov and Alexander Shapeev at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology in Russia, and Subra Suresh, the Vannevar Bush Professor Emeritus and former dean of engineering at MIT and current president of Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. Already, based on earlier work at MIT, some degree of elastic strain has been incorporated in some silicon processor chips. Even a 1 percent change in the structure can in some cases improve the speed of the device by 50 percent, by allowing electrons to move through the material faster.

A British arts engineering company says it has created the world's first AI robot that can draw people by using a microchip in her eye. Using Artificial Intelligence, the robot, called Ai-Da, can sketch subjects who pose for her by using a pencil placed in her robotic arm. Ai-Da is coordinated through algorithms which process human features to enable her to draw and paint ultra realistic portraits of her subjects. Designer Aidan Meller, who is overseeing the final stages of her construction at Cornish robotics company Engineered Arts hopes that she will begin to talk'soon'. A British arts engineering company says it has created the world's first AI robot that can draw people by using a microchip in her eye.

Russia is planning to disconnect itself from the internet as part of a planned experiment designed to protect the country from state-backed cyber attacks. Internet service providers in the country are working with the Russian government in preparation for the test, which comes in response to a proposed new law that will see all internet traffic pass through Russian servers. When it is passed, the Digital Economy National Program legislation requires the local internet, known as the Runet, to pass through exchange points managed by Russia's telecommunications regulator Roskomnazor. The test will see the Runet separated from the wider internet for a short period of time at some point before 1 April, according to local news agency RosBiznesKonsalting (RBK). Once in force, the Digital Economy National Program will simultaneously protect Russia in the event of cyber war, while also filtering internet traffic to the country in a similar way to the'Great Firewall of China'.

Activists claim the new rules – particularly Article 11 and Article 13 – could undermine central parts of the internet. Google and its subsidiary YouTube have argued that the new rules could prevent web users from being able to search and share content as freely as current laws allow. Uber has halted testing of driverless vehicles after a woman was killed by one of their cars in Tempe, Arizona. The I.F.O. is fuelled by eight electric engines, which is able to push the flying object to an estimated top speed of about 120mph The giant human-like robot bears a striking resemblance to the military robots starring in the movie'Avatar' and is claimed as a world first by its creators from a South Korean robotic company Waseda University's saxophonist robot WAS-5, developed by professor Atsuo Takanishi and Kaptain Rock playing one string light saber guitar perform jam session A man looks at an exhibit entitled'Mimus' a giant industrial robot which has been reprogrammed to interact with humans during a photocall at the new Design Museum in South Kensington, London Electrification Guru Dr. Wolfgang Ziebart talks about the electric Jaguar I-PACE concept SUV before it was unveiled before the Los Angeles Auto Show in Los Angeles, California, U.S The Jaguar I-PACE Concept car is the start of a new era for Jaguar. Japan's On-Art Corp's CEO Kazuya Kanemaru poses with his company's eight metre tall dinosaur-shaped mechanical suit robot'TRX03' and other robots during a demonstration in Tokyo, Japan Japan's On-Art Corp's eight metre tall dinosaur-shaped mechanical suit robot'TRX03' performs during its unveiling in Tokyo, Japan Singulato Motors co-founder and CEO Shen Haiyin poses in his company's concept car Tigercar P0 at a workshop in Beijing, China A picture shows Singulato Motors' concept car Tigercar P0 at a workshop in Beijing, China Connected company president Shigeki Tomoyama addresses a press briefing as he elaborates on Toyota's "connected strategy" in Tokyo.

Diagnosing an illness requires taking in a lot of information and connecting the dots. Artificial intelligence may be well-suited to such a task and in recent tests one system could diagnose children's illnesses better than some doctors. Kang Zhang at the University of California in San Diego and his colleagues trained an AI on medical records from 1.3 million patient visits at a major medical centre in Guangzhou, China. The patients were all under 18 years old and visited their doctor between January 2016 and January 2017. Their medical charts include text written by doctors and laboratory test results.

China is home to the most number of artificial intelligence start-ups valued at US$1 billion or above, according to CB Insights, a research firm that tracks venture capital activity. Six of the 11 so-called unicorns in the annual compilation of top AI start-ups are from China, with SenseTime taking top spot with a valuation of US$4.5 billion. Two Chinese facial recognition companies on the list, SenseTime and Face, also received the most equity funding among all AI start-ups, raising US$1.6 billion and US$608 million respectively, according to CB Insights. Other top AI unicorns from China include Yitu Technology, 4Paradigm, and autonomous driving companies Pony.ai and Momenta. The rankings highlight China's efforts in developing technology that has been dubbed the fourth industrial revolution.

As FinTech applies data and technology to financial services in an effort to address industry challenges, artificial intelligence is essential to FinTech's existence and usage. Scope of the Report: The global Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Fintech market is valued at xx million USD in 2018 and is expected to reach xx million USD by the end of 2024, growing at a CAGR of xx% between 2019 and 2024. The Asia-Pacific will occupy for more market share in following years, especially in China, also fast growing India and Southeast Asia regions. North America, especially The United States, will still play an important role which cannot be ignored. Any changes from United States might affect the development trend of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Fintech.

Artificial intelligence is widely heralded as something that could disrupt the jobs market across the board -- potentially eating into careers as varied as accountants, advertising agents, reporters and more -- but there are some industries in dire need of assistance where AI could make a wholly positive impact, a core one being healthcare. Despite being the world's second-largest economy, China is still coping with a serious shortage of medical resources. In 2015, the country had 1.8 physicians per 1,000 citizens, according to data compiled by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. That figure puts China behind the U.S. at 2.6 and was well below the OECD average of 3.4. The undersupply means a nation of overworked doctors who constantly struggle to finish screening patient scans.

The United States is engaged in an increasingly bitter trade war with China. And while American companies like Google and Amazon are now leaders in the field, A.I. experts are concerned that China could surpass the United States in the development of technologies that will power surveillance systems and autonomous weapons as well as driverless cars and a wide range of internet services. In July 2017, Chinese unveiled a plan to become the world leader in A.I., aiming to create an industry worth $150 billion to its economy by 2030, and two Chinese cities promised to invest $7 billion in the effort. Other governments, too, began making large investments, including South Korea, Britain, France and Canada. In the United States, the Defense Department has accelerated efforts to embrace A.I., shifting $75 million of its annual budget to a new office that will develop these technologies. Other government agencies also have major projects in the works.