MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's defense ministry said on Thursday it was investigating which country produced explosives used in recent drone attacks on Russian bases in Syria, RIA news agency cited the ministry as saying.

If armies of Terminators start wiping out humanity, their ancestors might be traced to an upmarket grocery home delivery service that sells fancy toilet roll. Ocado Technology, the innovation arm of the grocery retailer, today unveiled the first prototype of its SecondHands project, a humanoid robot called ARMAR-6 that will one day shadow and collaborate with maintenance workers in Ocado's three warehouses in the UK. The grocery company wants ARMAR-6 to learn to understand what people are working on, anticipate any help they might need, and step in with manual assistance at the appropriate time. For example, if a technician asks for a spanner, the robot should identify the tool among others in a toolkit, use its natural language skills to ask the technician "Do you mean this spanner or that one?", and then hand it

With all the health tracking gadgets – pedometers, calorimeters, fitness pals – something is changing. Diseases or health problems that were once terminal, have become minor but new have surfaced. Tony Young particularly emphasized the use of technology – information technology in particular – as a driver for transformation and growth in future. With all the data collected, analyzed and then made available back to the users of the gadgets, the healthcare and the insurance industries are undergoing a major transformation today. Insurance – general or life, is no longer the focus of the traditional insurance practices.

We're excited for Sarah Catanzaro to join us this week! Sarah is an investor at Amplify Partners. Sara and I spoke this week on topics ranging from machine learning's impact on social media to the role it plays within companies. Can you start by shedding light on your background and the types of companies you invest in? I recently joined Amplify Partners, a seed stage VC that invests in technical founders solving technical problems.

It is no doubt that the sub-field of machine learning / artificial intelligence has increasingly gained more popularity in the past couple of years. As Big Data is the hottest trend in the tech industry at the moment, machine learning is incredibly powerful to make predictions or calculated suggestions based on large amounts of data. Some of the most common examples of machine learning are Netflix's algorithms to make movie suggestions based on movies you have watched in the past or Amazon's algorithms that recommend books based on books you have bought before. So if you want to learn more about machine learning, how do you start? For me, my first introduction is when I took an Artificial Intelligence class when I was studying abroad in Copenhagen. My lecturer is a full-time Applied Math and CS professor at the Technical University of Denmark, in which his research areas are logic and artificial, focusing primarily on the use of logic to model human-like planning, reasoning and problem solving.

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The chairman of the Commons Science and Technology Committee has thrown his weight behind recommendations for the widespread introduction of artificial intelligence (AI) to the NHS. Norman Lamb said the rewards could be "immense" in terms of cost savings and diagnosing patients more quickly. But he warned people's privacy must be protected and that the health service should get a "fair deal" from technology companies implementing the systems. The report, by the Reform think-tank, said AI could be used to target treatment by predicting which individuals or groups might be at risk of illness, to send patients to the most appropriate services or to enable them to "self-care". The technology can also be used to improve diagnoses, Reform said, including for breast cancer – 30 times faster and more accurately than humans, the group claimed.

Automation is here, in fact it's everywhere – in our homes, and in our offices! We are already feeling the effects, and are perhaps more reliant on automation than we care to think about. For example, you're probably reading this post now because an algorithm promoted it on your news feed. Both Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk have expressed their concerns about an overly-automated future. These stem from a'Terminator' scenario where Artificial Intelligence may be able to outsmart and overpower us, threatening our entire existence (in fact, you can study this at Cambridge University).

IN A POST entitled "Machine Learning: Bane or Blessing for Mankind?", I noted that the renowned theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking along with his colleagues Stuart Russell, Max Tegmark, and Frank Wilczek recommend moving cautiously in the development of artificial intelligence (AI), especially in the area of autonomous weapon systems. Hawking and his colleagues understand, however, that the AI genie has already been released from the bottle and there is no way to get it back in. After noting Hawking's concerns, Ron Neale comments, "Such a warning about the application of AI and its derivative intelligent machines (IMs), especially in the area of military application, might be appropriate. But what if IMs are really just a new branch on the tree of evolution that has led us from the original Protists to where we are today?"

At least 15 trusts in England are said to be interested in new machine learning software designed to support the diagnosis of heart disease, which its developer is planning to offer for free to the NHS. The machine learning algorithm, developed by Oxford-based start-up Ultromics, analyses echocardiogram images for signs of disease. The system is said to be capable of spotting warning signs that might be missed by a clinician, so reducing the risk of a patient suffering a heart attack or other complications. Ultromics hit the headlines over the festive period after it was reported its machine learning software could be rolled out to NHS trusts for free starting this summer. CEO Ross Upton suggested the technology could save the NHS £300 million a year by reducing the number of people who are incorrectly sent for heart surgery, or are otherwise given the all-clear and later suffer a heart attack that requires treatment.