The robotics program at Disney has taken a giant, back-flipping leap forward with the unveiling of a humanoid robot capable of performing stunts just like a human. A video of the Stuntronics robot shows the autonomous machine launching into the air from a swing and performing several flips, before landing in a net. The unveiling of the acrobatic robot comes just one month after Disney revealed its much more rudimental Stickman robot. Both robots come out of Disney's Imagineering Research and Development department, which was set up a decade ago to explore virtual reality, robotics and other emerging technologies. The Stickman robot was the first step towards creating the human-scale robot, capable of performing backflips and other stunts.

Silicon Valley has a long and secretive history of building hardware and software for the military and law enforcement. In contrast, a recent wave of employee protests against some of those government contracts has been short, fast, and surprisingly public--tearing through corporate campuses, mailing lists, and message boards inside some of the world's most powerful companies. The revolt is part of a growing political awakening among some tech employees about the uses of the products they build. What began as concern inside Google about a Pentagon contract to tap the company's artificial-intelligence smarts was catalyzed by outrage over Trump administration immigration policies. Now, it seems to be spreading quickly.

Wanxiang Group and Thingswise, supported by Dell Technologies, Xilinx, China Unicom, and China Academy of Information and Communication Technology (CAICT) are pushing the limits of factory automation improvements starting with a new testbed sponsored by the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) and powered by The Linux Foundation's EdgeX Foundry open edge computing framework. Earlier this month, the IIC announced the Optimizing Manufacturing Processes by Artificial Intelligence (OMPAI) testbed, exploring the application of artificial intelligence (AI) and industrial internet technologies, deployed from the edge to the cloud. Clearly, given the ambitious vision to make machines smarter to build better and more beautiful cars, it takes an ecosystem to turn what used to be heavily human tasks and into machine driven routines, and the IIC, arguably the largest and most active global organization supporting the advancement of the Industrial Internet, brought the talent together initially. The OMPAI testbed is led by IIC members Wanxiang Group and Thingswise, two technology innovation driven companies in the world's largest automotive market, China. The automotive industry in China has been the largest in the world measured by automobile unit production since 2008, and since 2009, annual production of automobiles in China exceeds that of the European Union and that of the United States and Japan combined.

Crypto is decentralizing, AI is centralizing, according to Peter Thiel. Although the venture capitalist has followed this remark with a somewhat strange ideological classification for these technologies, the premise rings true. Artificial intelligence advancement is now in the hands of huge companies such as Google, IBM, Microsoft and their Chinese counterparts. Machine learning relies on data – the more the better – and platforms such as these have proven skilled in collecting it. They have used their competitive edge to make AI products better which draws in more users and more data – a great example of leveraging network effects.

Technology break-through in Natural Language Processing (NLP), Voice Recognition (VR), Deep Learning and cutting-edge fields have sparked a debate whether Artificial Intelligence (AI) will eventually replace recruiters in the short- or long- term. As this debate rages on Recruitment businesses around the world are embracing AI to automate recruiting processes. At the very least, the introduction of AI-driven systems has seen wide-scale adoption. Innovative technology advancements in Recruitment industry have received favourable reviews as businesses are keen to utilize AI to take the effort out from tedious tasks. In this regard, it is clear that leveraging AI to automate processes allows recruiters to focus on what actually makes money i.e. talking to candidates and making placements.

The World Health Organization has been working on an update for its diagnostic manual, the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). In June 2018 it released its latest version of the ICD-11 for implementation. Parents have long thrown around the word "addiction" when complaining about how long their kids spend on the Xbox but now there's a medical condition. The response has been divided. Some researchers welcome this validation of their years of work in the area, while others argue that the evidence is still lacking.

In the eastern Chinese city of Hangzhou, an ambulance speeds through traffic on a wave of green lights, helped along by an artificial intelligence (AI) system and big data. The system, which involves sending information to a centralized computer linked to the city's transport networks, is part of a trial by Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. The Chinese tech giant is hoping to use its cloud and data systems to tackle issues hobbling China's healthcare system like snarled city traffic, long patient queues and a lack of doctors. Alibaba's push into healthcare reflects a wider trend in China, where technology firms are racing to shake up a creaking state-run health sector and take a slice of spending that McKinsey & Co estimates will hit $1 trillion by 2020. Tencent-backed WeDoctor, which offers online consultations and doctor appointments, raised $500 million in May at a valuation of $5.5 billion.

The UK faces huge opportunities but major competition with the likes of China and Canada investing mega-bucks to establish centres of excellence and gravity. The UK Government is putting AI and Data at the heart of its Industrial Strategy alongside the other Grand Challenges and the time to act is now. At the beginning of July, I start a new role at Innovate UK. I'll be the new Director for AI and the Data Economy. My first role was as the Technologist covering Information and Communication Technologies so I've come back home, via enabling technologies, high value manufacturing and strategy.

Artificial Intelligence needs a strong and reliable computational back-end to perform. Today's most extended IT systems provide just enough process power to make it work in its most basic state: AI is limited to specialized machine learning algorithms, capable of performing specific tasks in an automated way. However, and after the release of new quantum developments, qubits are ready to take over the old and modest bits, and along the way, to bringing AI to a new life level. Quantum computers, instead, upgrades the model as they are able to use qubits within the binary system. These qubits provide an amplified process power to any given task, making computational more effective and fast.

Posted By C. M. Rubin on Jun 11, 2018 "Through rapid genetic sequencing, scientists can identify many different strains of Borrelia burgdorferi as well as new tick-borne microbial infections, such as Borrelia miyamotoi, Borrelia mayonii, and the Heartland virus." Most likely, you or someone you know has been affected by Lyme disease, the most common tick-borne illness in the US with more than 300,000 cases diagnosed each year. In a timely new book, Conquering Lyme Disease (Columbia University Press), Columbia University Medical Center physicians Brian A. Fallon and Jennifer Sotsky reveal that despite the challenges to find a cure for this complex, debilitating disease, precision medicine and biotechnology are accelerating the discovery of new tools with which doctors will be able to diagnose it and treat patients. Could groundbreaking technologies that rapidly increase our understanding and open up new pathways mean a cure for Lyme disease one day soon? The Global Search for Education is pleased to welcome Dr. Brian Fallon to find out how tech is tackling the ticks.