The spacecraft, whose name means stork in Japanese, will deliver some 5.9 tons of supplies, the heaviest load transported by a Kounotori ship. It is the largest among the cargo ships owned by Japan, the United States and Russia. Friday's launch, which followed Russia's failure in the launch of a Soyuz rocket carrying a Progress supply ship on Dec. 1, has raised the success rate of Japan's H-2 rocket launches to 97.3 percent. Of the 37 launches so far, all but one succeeded. In addition to water and food, Kounotori 6 will also deliver Japanese-made large lithium-ion batteries to replace batteries used at the ISS, experimental equipment for a new cooling system and equipment to measure cosmic radiation in real time.

Chinese vessel Dong Hai Jiu 101 concluded its underwater search operations in a remote part of the southern Indian Ocean to locate the missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) said in its latest search update that the vessel "commenced passage to Fremantle to demobilise the Phoenix Remora III Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) before the vessel returns to Shanghai." The agency, which is leading the search for the missing Boeing 777-200, moved from deep tow operations to AUV (Autonomous Underwater Vehicle) and ROV operations in October 2016. Dong Hai Jiu 101 vessel has completed 33 dives with the ROV since October 2016. The vessel departed the search area on Dec. 3 and has completed its missions in the search for MH370.

The underwater search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 found an oil barrel and cable debris but no sign of the missing jet, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) said Wednesday. The agency, which is leading the search for the Boeing 777-200, released sonar images of the man-made objects that are currently being examined by a Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV). "The underwater search continues with an AUV searching areas of challenging terrain and an ROV examining a range of sonar contacts which have been previously identified. Over the past week, ROV missions have revealed those contacts to be geological or man-made objects," ATSB said. "Dive 17 identified a contact cluster as geological comprising basaltic rock outcrops on a slope."

The underwater search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 found man-made objects on the ocean floor, later revealed to be debris from a nearby shipwreck. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB), which is leading the search for the missing plane, said in its operational update Wednesday that sonar from Dong Hai Jiu 101 found the debris. The man-made object turned out to be a metal box likely a part of an ancient shipwreck previously detected during the underwater search. Another site of interest inspected by the Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) on board the Chinese vessel Dong Hai Jiu 101 revealed only a rock formation. "Dong Hai Jiu 101 has conducted a total of 13 ROV dives during the swing. Two dives were completed by Dong Hai Jiu 101 in the past week with one sonar contact identified as geology," ATSB said in the statement.

General Electric said on Tuesday it has acquired two tech startups to build its artificial intelligence capability, a move that helps it compete with IBM's Watson product. GE ge said the acquisitions of Bit Stew Systems and Wise.io will expand its Predix platform for industrial internet applications, which connects big machines such as power plants and aircraft engines to databases and analytical software. Terms of the deals weren't disclosed. Berkley, California-based Wise.io has advanced machine learning technology that GE sees "as really well-built for the industrial world," Bill Ruh, chief executive officer of GE Digital, GE's software arm, said in an interview. A branch of artificial intelligence, machine learning allows computers to adapt to new data without new programming.

On June 14, 2016, four researchers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory were preparing to ship a waist-high, ape-like robot named RoboSimian off-site. They had built the bot to rescue people from dangerous situations that human rescuers can't hack. The scientists swapped one lithium-ion battery for a fresh one, then left for lunch to let the new power supply charge. Left alone in the lab, RoboSimian's battery did what such batteries famously do: went boom. Plumes of smoke vented from the robot's exposed torso, followed by a burst of flame.

GM Wants IBM's Watson AI To Sell You Stuff While You Drive GM's Infotainment Systems Are About to Get Watson's Artificial Intelligence Artificial Intelligence: Computer Says Yes! Stay up-to-date on the topics you care about. We'll send you an email alert whenever a news article matches your alert term. It's free, and you can add new alerts at any time.

For those who hate mowing the lawn, a new robot could prove to be the answer. Described by its makers as the'world's first fully autonomous all-season garden robot', Kobi can cut grass, pick up leaves and even plough snow. The autonomous machine sports a rechargeable battery and will automatically dock itself in its charging station when it needs a power boost. Described by its makers as the'world's first fully autonomous all-season garden robot', Kobi can cut grass, pick up leaves and even plough snow Using GPS and built-in sensors, the robot helper can navigate around on its own. It can cut grass over a lawn measuring up to 7 acres (28,328 square metres) pick up leaves over an area of 3 acres (12,141 square metres) and shovel show over 0.37 acres (1,497 square metres).

General Electric (GE), the largest industrial company in the US, says it has developed processes that more than double the speed of innovation and which have the potential to completely restructure its own business. GE will next week launch its first business venture, called Fuse, that will test a hugely ambitious and radical approach to creating new companies through processes and technologies designed to harness the work of global crowds of experts. Dyan Finkhousen is Director of GE's Open Innovation and Advanced Manufacturing group. The GE startup "will usher in what we believe is the future of work," said Dyan Finkhousen, Director of GE's Open Innovation and Advanced Manufacturing group. See also: Emerging technologies to power your systems of insight Obama's report on the future of artificial intelligence: The main takeaways Robot security: Making sure machines don't become the latest big threat She was speaking at Brightidea's Synthesize user conference in San Francisco.

Three scientists won the Nobel Prize in chemistry on Wednesday for developing the world's smallest machines, work that could revolutionize computer technology and lead to a new type of battery. Frenchman Jean-Pierre Sauvage, British-born Fraser Stoddart and Dutch scientist Bernard "Ben" Feringa share the 8 million kronor ( 930,000) prize for the "design and synthesis of molecular machines," the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said. Machines at the molecular level are 1,000th the width of a human hair and have taken chemistry to a new dimension, the academy said. Molecular machines "will most likely be used in the development of things such as new materials, sensors and energy storage systems." Stoddart has already developed a molecule-based computer chip with 20 kB memory.