The Queensland government has announced a AU 1 million investment in remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) technology, expected to benefit the LNG, agriculture, mining, energy, telecommunications, search and rescue, and environmental management industries. In addition to the cash injection, the state government has partnered with aerospace giant The Boeing Company, in conjunction with Boeing subsidiary Insitu Pacific, Shell's QGC project, and Telstra to further the drone research. Local small to medium-sized businesses specialising in related technology such as aerial photography, surveying, product development, and training for drone operators will also be consulted as part of the venture. "The project aims to capitalise on the capabilities inherent in drones to carry out remote-monitoring and inspection of key infrastructure and data analysis to allow for better decision-making," Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said in a statement. In addition to creating 500 new jobs, Palaszczuk said she expects the technologies to be developed will include an improved airspace situational awareness prototype system that will enable the safe operation of RPAs over a broad area, as well as tools for enhanced data analytics.

After nearly four years of deployment, the Curiosity rover mission launched by NASA is reportedly making scientific decisions on its own with the help of AEGIS software. According to reports, the Martian explorer integrated with the Curiosity rover mission currently fetches few rock targets to collide with the laser on its ChemCam instrument with the assistance from AEGIS. Commenting on the discovery, a NASA spokesperson revealed that a new software upgrade codenamed as AEGIS enables the rover to make important decisions on its own. However, this transition happens when Mars is out of sync with Curiosity's platform at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and will deliver more data in less time. Furthermore, this is the first time a robot has been able to pick relevant science related targets on their own on any planetary mission.

BEIJING--Wang Peixin has seen the future, and he's sure it features robots serving up fried dumplings. On a recent day, a white robot wearing a flowered kerchief rolled across Mr. Wang's Together Restaurant, a plate of pork-and-water-chestnut dumplings upon its built-in tray. As it traveled, it played an upbeat pop tune. A trio of customers hummed along and whipped out their phones to film its journey. "Young people like to pursue what's new, and robots are a fashionable, modern style of service," said Mr. Wang, who owns the Together Restaurant in central Beijing.

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity now has the ability to decide what targets it wants to capture with a camera or hit with its laser all on its own. The space agency announced this week that using artificial intelligence (A.I.) software, developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the robotic rover is "frequently" choosing multiple targets per week all on its own. Most targets are still chosen by scientists curious about particular rocks or areas of soil they've seen in images that Curiosity has sent back to Earth, but the fact that the rover can make some of its own decisions about what to focus on adds a new, and important, capability to the mission. "This autonomy is particularly useful at times when getting the science team in the loop is difficult or impossible -- in the middle of a long drive, perhaps, or when the schedules of Earth, Mars and spacecraft activities lead to delays in sharing information between the planets," said NASA robotics engineer Tara Estlin, in a statement. Curiosity, which has been working on Mars since it landed in August 2012, has been searching for evidence that the Red Planet was ever capable of sustaining life – even in microbial form.

Nasa has announced that it has found evidence of flowing water on Mars. Scientists have long speculated that Recurring Slope Lineae -- or dark patches -- on Mars were made up of briny water but the new findings prove that those patches are caused by liquid water, which it has established by finding hydrated salts. Several hundred camped outside the London store in Covent Garden. The 6s will have new features like a vastly improved camera and a pressure-sensitive "3D Touch" display

At the end of last week, a team of Virginia Tech researchers revealed the first look at a hefty new robotic jellyfish that it's building for the U.S. Navy. This is not the Navy's first robotic jellyfish. A year ago, America learned about the descriptively named Robojelly, a self-charging blob-bot built by the same team hailed or its deceptively natural-looking ability to swim through water and morph into new shapes much like a real jellyfish. Ultimately, it's supposed to be equipped with a stealthy engine that sucks hydrogen out of the water around it for fuel. The new robot is a lot like the old robot but bigger.

Will your next doctor be a human being--or a machine? Will you have a choice? If you do, what should you know before making it?This book introduces the reader to the pitfalls and promises of artificial intelligence (AI) in its modern incarnation and the growing trend of systems to "reach off the Web" into the real world. The convergence of AI, social networking, and modern computing is creating an historic inflection point in the partnership between human beings and machines with potentially profound impacts on the future not only of computing but of our world and species.AI experts and researchers James Hendler--co-originator of the Semantic Web (Web 3.0)--and Alice Mulvehill--developer of AI-based operational systems for DARPA, the Air Force, and NASA--explore the social implications of AI systems in the context of a close examination of the technologies that make them possible. The authors critically evaluate the utopian claims and dystopian counterclaims of AI prognosticators.

Artificial intelligence and robotics have enjoyed a resurgence of interest, and there is renewed optimism about their place in our future. But what do they mean for us? You submitted your questions about artificial intelligence and robotics, and we put them – and some of our own – to The Conversation's experts. It is 100% plausible that we'll have human-like artificial intelligence. I say this even though the human brain is the most complex system in the universe that we know of. But there are also no physical laws we know of that would prevent us reproducing or exceeding its capabilities. Popular AI from Issac Asimov to Steven Spielberg is plausible. What the question doesn't address is: when will it be plausible?

David Bruemmer is the co-founder, president and CTO of 5D Robotics. One might ask why we would ever want to create robots that can do human work when we have so many people who need jobs. The goal of robotics should not be to replace humans with robots, but rather to improve productivity and safety, removing humans from harm's way and enabling them to focus on things that humans should be doing. We can agree that humans shouldn't be carrying heavy loads, exposing themselves to radiation or finding land mines. What is less clear is the gray area, where the line that divides human and robot competency is becoming blurred.

Google's DeepMind has reduced its power consumption thanks to artificial intelligence Google is using the firm's artificial intelligence system to control parts of its data centers, DeepMind cofounder Demis Hassabis told Bloomberg on Tuesday. DeepMind, which Google acquired in 2014, is using its AI engine to change how data center servers and cooling systems work to reduce power consumption. The company didn't say how much it's saving Google. Hassabis tipped a 15 percent improvement in power efficiency since Google launched the program this year, which he said is a "huge savings in terms of cost." The average electricity price in the US can range from 25 to 40 per megawatt hour, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.