We consider the problem of approximating the set of eigenvalues of the covariance matrix of a multivariate distribution (equivalently, the problem of approximating the "population spectrum"), given access to samples drawn from the distribution. The eigenvalues of the covariance of a distribution contain basic information about the distribution, including the presence or lack of structure in the distribution, the effective dimensionality of the distribution, and the applicability of higher-level machine learning and multivariate statistical tools. We consider this fundamental recovery problem in the regime where the number of samples is comparable, or even sublinear in the dimensionality of the distribution in question. First, we propose a theoretically optimal and computationally efficient algorithm for recovering the moments of the eigenvalues of the population covariance matrix. We then leverage this accurate moment recovery, via a Wasserstein distance argument, to show that the vector of eigenvalues can be accurately recovered. We provide finite--sample bounds on the expected error of the recovered eigenvalues, which imply that our estimator is asymptotically consistent as the dimensionality of the distribution and sample size tend towards infinity, even in the sublinear sample regime where the ratio of the sample size to the dimensionality tends to zero. In addition to our theoretical results, we show that our approach performs well in practice for a broad range of distributions and sample sizes.

Microsoft has launched an app that'narrates the world' to people who are blind or visually impaired using AI. The app can, for example, recognize friends' faces and guess their emotions, read text out loud when it comes into view and even has experimental features that can describe scenes - for example, it identified a young girl throwing a frisbee in the park. The app, which is free and available on iOS-only, relies on holding up one's smartphone camera to hear information about the world. The app can also describe strangers around you. In a video demonstrating the app's abilities, the app described a young woman with glasses (left) by saying: '28-year-old female, wearing glasses, looking happy' (right) To use the app, the user must point their phone's camera, select a channel and hear a description of their surroundings.

When Swedbank customers face a problem, they reach out to Nina, the bank's virtual assistant. Visitors to Mizuho Bank are greeted by Pepper, a humanoid robot standing four feet tall. Santander allows payments to be activated by voice, and JP Morgan Chase now uses machine learning to review commercial loan agreements in seconds, a task that used to take 3,60,000 manhours every year. Wherever you look in the world of financial services, you will find some form of artificial intelligence (AI) at work. AI technologies such as machine learning and speech recognition are quietly working behind the scenes to improve lending decisions and prevent fraud.

Here are the slides I gave recently as member of panel Sci-Fi Dreams: How visions of the future are shaping the development of intelligent technology, at the Centre for the Future of Intelligence 2017 conference. I presented three short stories about robot stories. The FP7 TRUCE Project invited a number of scientists – mostly within the field of Artificial Life – to suggest ideas for short stories. Those stories were then sent to a panel of writers, who chose one of the stories. I submitted an idea called The feeling of what it is like to be a robot and was delighted when Lucy Caldwell contacted me.

Engineers are studying human behaviour in great detail in order to make robots that not only look like us, but can also understand us and interact with us in socially acceptable ways. These studies are teaching us many things about our own human nature, as my recent paper explains. The robots in films like Blade Runner are very humanlike, with thoughts and feelings, motives and desires. But making robots that are just like us is a huge challenge. Technical limitations make it currently impossible to make robots identical to humans, although Hiroshi Ishiguru has made a geminoid (a humanlike robot that looks like himself), and David Hanson has made a number of impressive android heads.

Alibaba (BABA) is charting a way to push the application of artificial intelligence (AI) in diagnostics and healthcare to make medical treatment more accessible, timely, and affordable. Alibaba Cloud is actively working on AI-powered solutions to tackle heath care problems in China and globally. Here's a look at Alibaba's efforts to bring AI to the healthcare arena and why this exercise matters. The World Health Organization database reveals that the world's most populous nation, China, has a shortage of physicians with only 1.49 doctors available for every 1,000 people, lower than 2.55 in the U.S., 2.8 in the UK, and 3.37 in Australia. There is a further shortage of specialist doctors (such as radiologists and oncologists) despite the huge workload; such mismatches increase the chances of misdiagnosis and wrong treatment.

A quick, hassle-free way to stay on top of robotics news, our robotics digest is released on the first Monday of every month. Sign up to get it in your inbox. Let's kick off our June review by looking at some great new robotics research and development in action: Inspired by arthropod insects and spiders, Harvard Professor George Whitesides and Alex Nemiroski--a former postdoctoral fellow in Whitesides' Harvard lab--have created a type of semi-soft robot capable of standing and walking. The team also created a robotic water strider capable of pushing itself along the liquid surface. The robots are described in a recently published paper in the journal Soft Robotics.

Microsoft hast just launched Seeing AI, an iOS app that it appropriately describes as a'talking camera for the blind'; I've been giving it a whirl this morning and it's actually pretty impressive. Fire up the free app and point your iPhone at anything, whether it's a document, a menu card, a room or even a friend, and Seeing AI will tell you what it is with its voice. I tried it on a bunch of objects and spaces, and the app was astonishingly quick and accurate for the most part. It managed to recognize a guitar, identified me by my face and told me just how far away I was, and even described my living room and shower with some basic details. It was also able to read out the blurb of a book and the ingredients on a ramen packet, and even identified the contents of a photo I sent to the app from the share sheet in Twitter.

The fight between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor promises to be the biggest bout of 2017, though it won't be cheap to watch. Buying the fight on pay-per-view will cost nearly $100, and no tickets can be had for fewer than $500. The upcoming Aug. 26 bout has been compared to the fight between Mayweather and Manny Pacquiao on May 2, 2015. It generated a record 4.6 million buys, even though it cost $99.95 in HD. Mayweather-McGregor will also cost $99.95,

The Premier League is considering live-streaming matches online, a new report claims. Viewing figures hit a seven-year low last season, and bosses are said to be "weighing up" the idea of making games available to watch through a Netflix-style streaming service. The dip has largely been blamed on the rise of so-called "fully loaded Kodi boxes", but increasingly expensive ticket prices and TV packages, as well as changing viewing habits, are also key factors. 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.