The healthcare space is growing by leaps and bounds. According to a report, global healthcare expenditure is expected to reach USD 10 trillion by 2022. Owing to multiple factors like technological advancements, expensive infrastructure, growing health-related awareness, and a rise in chronic health conditions, the healthcare market is evolving faster than ever. With time, the use of technology has brought structural changes to the healthcare industry, for the better. Whether it's managing endless administrative processes in hospitals, providing personalized care and treatment, or facilitating better access, technological advancements like mobile healthcare, also known as mHealth, and machine learning in healthcare have streamlined the healthcare sector to a great extent.

Japan has passed a bill to build "super cities" which address societal issues using emerging technologies such as AI. The bill, passed on Wednesday, aims to accelerate the sweeping change of regulations across various fields to support the creation of such futuristic cities. Addressing issues such as depopulation and an aging society will be the focus of the super cities. Technologies including big data and AI will be key to successfully tackling the challenging problems. Large amounts of data will be collected and organised from across administrative organisations. Local governments will be selected for the ambitious projects which will launch forums with the national government and private companies to take forward the plans. Draft plans will be created from this deep public-private collaboration that will subsequently be submitted to the state government if approved by local residents.

IIT-Ropar, one of the eight new IITs established by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (MHRD), Government of India, and TSW, the executive education division of Times Professional Learning (a part of The Times of India Group), have launched a Post Graduate Certificate Programme in Artificial Intelligence & Deep Learning. The programme will be coordinated by The Indo-Taiwan Joint Research Centre (ITJRC) on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML), at IIT-Ropar. Supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology, Taiwan, ITJRC is a bilateral centre for collaborative research in disruptive technologies like AI and ML. The programme, with its focus on Artificial Intelligence and Deep Learning, has an eligibility criterion of a minimum of 2 years of work experience in the IT industry. Though an engineering degree is a desirable prerequisite for this programme, one does not need a coding or mathematics background to be eligible.

Russian researchers from HSE University and Open University for the Humanities and Economics have demonstrated that artificial intelligence is able to infer people's personality from'selfie' photographs better than human raters do. Conscientiousness emerged to be more easily recognizable than the other four traits. Personality predictions based on female faces appeared to be more reliable than those for male faces. The technology can be used to find the'best matches' in customer service, dating or online tutoring. The article, "Assessing the Big Five personality traits using real-life static facial images," will be published on May 22 in Scientific Reports.

Google warned on Thursday that the EU's definition of artificial intelligence was too broad and that Brussels must refrain from over-regulating a crucial technology. The search and advertising giant made its argument in feedback to the European Commission, the EU's powerful regulator that has reached out to big tech as it draws up ways to set new rules for AI. The EU has not decided yet on how to regulate AI, but is putting most of its focus on what it calls "high risk" sectors, such as healthcare and transport. It's plans, to be spearheaded by EU commissioners Margrethe Vestager and Thierry Breton, are not expected until the end of the year. "A clear and widely understood definition of AI will be a critical foundational element for an effective AI regulatory framework," the company said in its 45-page submission.

According to BlueWeave Consulting, The global Artificial Intelligence market & Advanced Machine has reached USD 29.8 Billion in 2019 and projected to reach USD 281.24 Billion by 2026 and anticipated to grow with CAGR of 37.95% during the forecast period from 2020-2026, owing to increasing overall global investment in Artificial Intelligence Technology. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a computer science algorithm and analytics-driven approach to replicate human intelligence in a machine and Machine learning (ML) is an enhanced application of artificial intelligence, which allows software applications to predict the resulted accurately. The development of powerful and affordable cloud computing infrastructure is having a substantial impact on the growth potential of artificial intelligence and advanced machine learning market. In addition, diversifying application areas of the technology, as well as a growing level of customer satisfaction by users of AI & ML services and products is another factor that is currently driving the Artificial Intelligence & Advanced Machine Learning market. Moreover, in the coming years, applications of machine learning in various industry verticals is expected to rise exponentially.

Despite those obstacles, Indiana University School of Medicine faculty and Regenstrief Institute research scientists had their research published in Nature Communications on April 14, which is an even more significant feat considering one of the leading authors has been quarantined in Wuhan, China for the last two months of their work. The team consists of Affiliated Scientist Jie Zhang, PhD, Regenstrief Institute Research Scientist Kun Huang, PhD, both Indiana University School of Medicine faculty members, Jun Cheng, PhD, of Shenzhen University and colleagues including Liang Cheng, M.D. of IU School of Medicine. The study was led by Dr. Zhang, an assistant professor of medical and molecular genetics at IU School of Medicine. The work focuses on the application of machine learning and image analysis to help researchers distinguish a rare subtype of kidney cancer (translocational renal cell carcinoma, or tRCC) from other subtypes by examining the features of cells and tissues on a microscopic level. Dr. Zhang said the structural similarities have caused a high rate of misdiagnosis.

C-SON (centralized self-organized network) technology has been in use for a number of years to automate the configuration of a base stations, noted Jarrett's colleague, Emmanuel Lugagne-Delpon, SVP at Orange Labs Networks, and now it is being enhanced in two ways using AI capabilities (see the graphic above). The first is "predicting the evolution of the traffic of a cell and the congestion of the cell. The tool is making decisions to re-route traffic to neighbouring base stations, to help avoid congestion, improve customer service and make better use of network resources," noted Lugagne-Delpon. The second is using real-time traffic predictions to switch modules (such as antennas) off when not needed to reduce power consumption, which can cut base station energy consumption by a few per cent, stated the Orange executive. "In these instances we can close the loop – AI is not only providing data but is also taking decisions and actions and the use case is automated," he added.

EuroKids International, India's leading early childhood education company, has a portfolio of six brands – EuroKids Pre-School, Kangaroo Kids Pre-School, EuroKids DayCare, EuroSchool and Billabong High International. Major investments in technology, has enabled the company to continue engagement with its 100,000 students across the chain of schools, during the lockdowns. "As a responsible educational organisation, we are mindful of our duties towards the next generation at all times, and particularly during times like these. We use technology and digital platforms to enable and enhance the learning experience for our students. Even during the lockdown, our virtual schools are engaging with students," says Prajodh Rajan, Cofounder & CEO, EuroKids International, further stating that in addition to academic and non-academic learning engagements, they have rolled out programmes to help children stay positive during the lockdown phase.

AI has become the need of the hour and all the industries are now integrating analytics and AI to drive the decision-making process. Bhagirath Kumar Lader, who is the Chief Manager (Business Information System) at GAIL led us through a session briefing Artificial Intelligence essentials for business leaders in today's age. Lader is one of the key members of the digital transformation team at GAIL and carries huge knowledge about how AI, ML and DL are crucial to businesses. He gave us a quick overview of the motivation for AI, AI essentials, AI hype vs reality while taking us through use cases. While AI is a crucial part of businesses, one of the key drivers of its implementation is its ability to make the decision which is usually considered the forte of humans.