In the land rush to digitize the world, the home is the new frontier. Over the past few years, practically every household item within reach has been technologically upgraded and rendered "smart": toothbrushes, cutlery, baby monitors, refrigerators, thermostats, slow cookers, sprinkler systems, sex toys, even the locks in doors. Before they achieved enlightenment, they could perform only their rote, mechanical duties; now they can do so while connected to the internet. In the case of the telephone, this has been nothing short of revolutionary, but no other "smart" object has managed to replicate its success. The absurdity of the phenomenon was made unavoidably apparent in May, when a start-up unveiled a "smart tampon," called my.Flow.

New research suggests that computer models could help doctors achieve greater accuracy in the diagnosis of cancer and other diseases. A research team from Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have developed an artificial intelligence (AI) system which is able to train computers to analyse pathologic image data [PDF]. The scientists hope that the programme could one day aid in diagnosing disease. 'Our AI method is based on deep learning, a machine-learning algorithm used for a range of applications including speech recognition and image recognition,' explained Andrew Beck, director of bioinformatics at the Cancer Research Institute at BIDMC and associate professor at HMS. He added: 'This approach teaches machines to interpret the complex patterns and structure observed in real-life data by building multi-layer artificial neural networks, in a process which is thought to show similarities with the learning process that occurs in layers of neurons in the brain's neocortex, the region where thinking occurs.'

Young people may have their first sexual encounter with robots in the near future, according an expert, which could hinder their ability to form meaningful relationships. Speaking at the Cheltenham Science Festival, professor Noel Sharkey from Sheffield University cautioned that android sex dolls may have damaging reverberations for society. "Sex robots are accessible now and certainly [will be common] within the next 10 years. I think there will be an age limit. Certainly there should be, but if your dad or mum had one, you could sneak in and use it," he said.

The ability to represent complex high dimensional probability distributions in a compact form is one of the key insights in the field of graphical models. Factored representations are ubiquitous in machine learning and lead to major computational advantages. We explore a different type of compact representation based on discrete Fourier representations, complementing the classical approach based on conditional independencies. We show that a large class of probabilistic graphical models have a compact Fourier representation. This theoretical result opens up an entirely new way of approximating a probability distribution. We demonstrate the significance of this approach by applying it to the variable elimination algorithm. Compared with the traditional bucket representation and other approximate inference algorithms, we obtain significant improvements.

The researcher hired by Toyota Motor Corp. to spearhead its robotics and artificial intelligence efforts says the automaker's production principles can be applied to build affordable helper robots for rapidly aging societies. Robot makers are struggling with the same scale challenges that the auto industry overcame with the "miracle" that occurred when Henry Ford developed the assembly line, according to Gill Pratt, the chief executive officer of Toyota Research Institute. Toyota's vaunted production system later showed how to make cars both more cheaply and reliably, despite mistake-prone humans' role in manufacturing, he said. "My thought is, if the Toyota production system can be applied to cars, maybe it can also be applied to robots, because they're quite similar," Pratt told reporters Friday in Tokyo. He's particularly sanguine about the prospects for devices that would help the elderly age where they live.

Drowning in data is a real hazard with the Internet of Things (IoT). How should decisions be made with this flood of sensor data? A hybrid approach combining human intelligence and computing power works well. People are good at making decisions that require nuance and judgement, such as identifying hate speech in online postings. Computerized analytics is better at quickly processing large volumes of data.

Editor's Note: The author of this post is a legal technology and management consultant. The legal media has lately had a mania for tech headlines. Many commentators claim that tech, especially artificial intelligence (AI), will do something to Big Law. Tech more likely will do something in it: incremental change. I start with the case against disruption, then look at four headline-grabbing technologies: AI, Bots, Big Data, and Blockchain.

The artificial intelligence (AI) system is "based on deep learning, a machine-learning algorithm used for a range of applications including speech recognition and image recognition," explains Andrew Beck, an associate professor in pathology at Harvard Medical School, who heads the team developing the new system at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC), in Boston, MA. Prof. Beck and colleagues demonstrated the new AI system in a competition held at the annual meeting of the International Symposium of Biomedical Imaging (ISBI 2016) in Prague in April. He and his colleagues are developing AI methods that train computers to interpret pathology images to improve the accuracy of diagnoses. The approach they are using teaches computers to interpret the complex patterns seen in such images by "building multi-layer artificial neural networks," says Prof. Beck. The process is thought to be similar to the way learning takes place in the layers of neurons in the neocortex of the brain, the region where thinking occurs.

Nasa has announced that it has found evidence of flowing water on Mars. Scientists have long speculated that Recurring Slope Lineae -- or dark patches -- on Mars were made up of briny water but the new findings prove that those patches are caused by liquid water, which it has established by finding hydrated salts. Several hundred camped outside the London store in Covent Garden. The 6s will have new features like a vastly improved camera and a pressure-sensitive "3D Touch" display

With every passing day, it feels like the robot uprising is getting a little closer. Robots are being beaten down by their human overlords, even as we teach them to get stronger. Now, they're starting to break free. A robot in Russia escaped from a research lab in the town of Perm yesterday, June 15, reports the BBC. An engineer at robotics company Promobot had forgotten to close a gate, and the runaway bot caused a traffic jam as it bolted out into the world.