New Delhi: Microsoft India and the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) have partnered to conduct capacity building programmes for high school teachers with an aim to integrate cloud-powered technology in K12 teaching. Meant for teachers of grades 8-10, the programme will be conducted in 10 cities across the country, starting 11 September 2019. This programme will provide teachers better access to the latest Information and Communication Technology (ICT) tools and help them integrate technology into teaching in a safe and secure manner, thereby enhancing the learning experience and 21st century skills of all students. The 1000 teachers nominated by CBSE will undergo a 3-day project-based training for practical, hands-on knowledge of Microsoft 365 tools such as OneNote, Flipgrid, Teams, Outlook & Minecraft and Paint3D Microsoft. They will also learn about digital story-telling, creation of personalized learning experiences for diverse learners, use of Teams for virtual lessons and how to leverage Artificial intelligence (AI) tools to create Bots and demystify concepts around AI.

The AI startup e-bot7 has secured €5.5 million in financing for further growth by the investors RTP Global, 42CAP, Main Incubator (early-stage investor of the Commerzbank Group), and a renowned business angel. With the new capital, the startup will further expand its position in the European market, by investing in both its technology and business team. E-bot7 was founded in 2016 by Fabian Beringer, Xaver Lehmann, and Maximilian Gerer, who have been included in the Forbes "30 Under 30" list, in order to promote the topic of AI on a political level. The founders are also mentors of renowned programs such as the Founders Institute in Silicon Valley, TechFounders, InsurTech Hub and many more. "Our goal is not only to offer the best AI-based technology and revolutionise customer service, but also to make it as easy as possible for companies to introduce and use such a technology," said Lehmann.

Many UK universities are struggling financially, but there's one option that is rarely discussed: replacing lecturers with artificial intelligence (AI) machines. This might sound like sci-fi – after all, the lists of occupations vulnerable to AI rarely include teaching, which is still seen as too creative for computers. But a growing database of information harvested from online courses – clickstreams, eye-tracking and even emotion-detection – could make AI lecturers a common feature in the near future. Forget robo-lecturers whirring away in front of whiteboards: AI teaching will mostly happen online, in 24/7 virtual classrooms. AI machines will learn to teach by ferreting out complex patterns in student behaviour – what you click, how long you watch, what mistakes you make, even what time of day you work best.

Many UK universities are struggling financially, but there's one option that is rarely discussed: replacing lecturers with artificial intelligence (AI) machines. This might sound like sci-fi – after all, the lists of occupations vulnerable to AI rarely include teaching, which is still seen as too creative for computers. But a growing database of information harvested from online courses – clickstreams, eye-tracking and even emotion-detection – could make AI lecturers a common feature in the near future. Forget robo-lecturers whirring away in front of whiteboards: AI teaching will mostly happen online, in 24/7 virtual classrooms. AI machines will learn to teach by ferreting out complex patterns in student behaviour – what you click, how long you watch, what mistakes you make, even what time of day you work best.

AS THE NAVY plane swooped low over the jungle, it dropped a bundle of devices into the canopy below. Some were microphones, listening for guerrilla footsteps or truck ignitions. Others were seismic detectors, attuned to minute vibrations in the ground. Strangest of all were the olfactory sensors, sniffing out ammonia in human urine. Tens of thousands of these electronic organs beamed their data to drones and on to computers.

A country's dexterity with artificial intelligence technology might be the next strong source of national pride and international power. Knowing it would lay the foundation for the future of medicine, IBM captured the world's imagination in 2011 with Watson, a supercomputer that not only won Jeopardy!, but beat trivia superstar Ken Jennings in the process. The novel cognitive computing technology was quickly adapted to "read" the thousands of medical research papers published weekly in order to diagnose cancer patients more accurately than human doctors seemingly could. It's a banner technology for IBM, a company that remains no slouch in its 105 years of operation Now five years after Watson's debut, Japanese researchers at Kyoto University and Fujitsu are collaborating to build their own computing technology that's fairly characterized as a response to Watson. Skipping the game shows and going straight to medical applications, the Japanese system aims to close the gap in understanding how our genes determine our health by accounting for a patient's genetic code in its computer-generated diagnoses.

A country's dexterity with artificial intelligence technology might be the next strong source of national pride and international power. Knowing it would lay the foundation for the future of medicine, IBM captured the world's imagination in 2011 with Watson, a supercomputer that not only won Jeopardy!, but beat trivia superstar Ken Jennings in the process. The novel cognitive computing technology was quickly adapted to "read" the thousands of medical research papers published weekly in order to diagnose cancer patients more accurately than human doctors seemingly could. It's a banner technology for IBM, a company that remains no slouch in its 105 years of operation Now five years after Watson's debut, Japanese researchers at Kyoto University and Fujitsu are collaborating to build their own computing technology that's fairly characterized as a response to Watson. Skipping the game shows and going straight to medical applications, the Japanese system aims to close the gap in understanding how our genes determine our health by accounting for a patient's genetic code in its computer-generated diagnoses.

Chinese authorities may already be signaling there's a need to take a tougher stance on facial recognition technologies. Citing the case of Zao, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said it's necessary to "strengthen the security assessment of new technologies and businesses" and guard against "network fraud and other hidden dangers," according to CNBC's translation of its statement on social media platform, WeChat. From a professional standpoint, it's impossible for face-swapping technology to pose a security threat to facial recognition payment, Zao said in an online statement Tuesday. If Zao sparks greater scrutiny on the security of facial recognition, Chinese authorities may tighten further in this area. China's delayed implementation of regulations -- intentional or not -- has helped some major technology companies flourish.

Artificial Intelligence and related fields like deep learning and machine learning have come to dominate discussions about where our society is headed, with debate often polarised between declaring AI to be the savior of society or its potential downfall. The truth lies somewhere in the middle: AI won't destroy our civilization, but we can't cede responsibility for saving it to AI, either. In any case, AI-related technologies are versatile and powerful and can provide the basis for change in our world. We caught up with some leading experts in the field to ask them for their view on the future of AI. Prof. Barry O'Sullivan is Director of the Insight Centre for Data Analytics, Computer Science, at University College Cork, Ireland.

SOMEBODY LESS driven than Tom Siebel would have long since thrown in the towel. In 2006 the entrepreneur, then 53 years old, sold his first firm, Siebel Systems, which made computer programs to track customer relations, to Oracle, a giant of business software. That left him a billionaire--but a restless one. In 2009, a few months after Mr Siebel had launched a new startup, he was trampled by an elephant while on safari in Tanzania. When, a dozen surgeries later, he could work again, the enterprise almost went bankrupt.