Scientists are developing robots that might someday be able to creep through the pitch-black mines to help prevent spills. A 2015 spill from Colorado's Gold King Mine unleashed 3 million gallons of water that fouled rivers in three states with toxins.

Based on almost half-a-billion connected devices it sells every year, Samsung Electronics will lead the consumer-centred Artificial Intelligence (AI) world, a top company official has said. "Samsung will begin an exciting journey open to boundless possibilities in new user experiences by integrating AI into the open IoT ecosystem it is currently developing," Larry Heck, Head of Artificial Intelligence, Samsung Research America said on Friday. Citing examples of various Samsung products showcased at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier in January, the expert said the South Korean tech giant is highlighting its latest innovations in its vision to drive IoT supported by AI, Yonhap News Agency reported. "Moving forward, Samsung will continue to remain focused on holistically integrating AI into a connected setting, such as the home or the office, in contrast to other players primarily pursuing implementation of AI on a few devices and services," he said. Heck said the company's perspective on AI is to build an ecosystem that is user-centric rather than device-centric, as many IoT devices with AI support will generate a vast array of usage patterns and scenarios in the future.

Artificial intelligence (AI) today is the new frontier in the digital transformation journey enterprises have already embarked on. But adoption to solve real problems and drive business outcomes has been slow. Driving up adoption is critical to unlock the real promise of AI and is going to depend on how we approach AI. And that opportunity is in front of us thanks to industry-optimized augmented intelligence. Most realistic and successful AI initiatives have been focused on augmenting human abilities with powerful machine intelligence.

By December, more than 6,985 stores closed across the US, according to retail think-tank Fung Global Retail & Technology. It also beats the previous all-time high of 6,163 store closings that took place during the 2008 financial crisis, according to estimates by Credit Suisse. The reality is that many stores are closing for the same reason they've always closed -- they simply don't meet the needs and demands of customers. But at a time when consumers are empowered with choice and market conditions are increasingly volatile, new technologies can help brands and retailers drive valuable business efficiencies, and improve the overall customer experience and value proposition. "The biggest upside to technology in fashion will be the ability to offer consistency, and being able to personalise the customer's shopping patterns," said Robert Burke, chief executive of retail consultancy firm Robert Burke Associates.

These Indian subsistence farmers know just what to do: Pull out their smartphones and take their picture. The farmers then upload the images with GPS locations to a cloud-based artificial intelligence (AI) app named Plantix. The app identifies the crop type in the image and spits out a diagnosis of a disease, pest or nutrient deficiency. Plantix also aids farmers by recommending targeted biological or chemical treatments for ailing plants, reducing the volume of agrochemicals in groundwater and waterways that can result from overuse or incorrect application of herbicides and pesticides. "Nearly every household in India has a smartphone, and many want to see how Plantix works," says Srikanth Rupavatharam, a digital agriculture scientist with the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) in Hyderabad, India, which is collaborating with Plantix's developer to adapt the tool for Telugu and Hindi languages.

Despite the advancements in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence, Robots have not learnt how to show emotion… just yet…but when we think of robots, more often than not images of clunky humanoid contraptions, metal with hinged joints and bulky movement spring to mind (excuse the pun). Whilst there are lots of applications for hard robotic machines such as factory lines, farming, military purposes, robots are evolving into more pliable and adaptable artificial organisms. As the use of robotics increases, as does the need for more malleable machines that can assist in more intricate tasks. Building on this need, we've found ourselves entering into a new and exciting realm of engineering, the next generation of robots – soft robotics. The field of soft robotics is still in its infancy and there's still a lot of new ground to cover.

OpenMinTED invites researchers, service providers and SMEs to submit proposals related to the development and integration of existing text mining/NLP applications or software components.

Marketing typically has the largest discretionary budget in any organization because of the variety of activities we do, but now it also has the largest discretionary technology budget. That shift of dollars away from IT has been causing tensions for some time, but marketers now must be at the head of the table when purchasing everything from CRM, to business intelligence and analytics tools, to ecommerce platforms, and of course the website. Just like technology, customer experience budget and planning will move more towards marketing--as will customer satisfaction KPIs. The entire customer journey from pre-sale to customer advocacy is part of the overall brand experience. "Predictive analytics driven by AI and machine learning are going to change the way we do just about everything" One of the biggest obstacles marketers still run into is resistance to change.

Archaeologists have uncovered the 250-year-old kitchen of Thomas Jefferson's enslaved chef, James Hemings, who introduced mac and cheese and meringues into US culture. Hemings became the property of Thomas Jefferson in January of 1774 when he was just nine years old. His younger sister is Sally Hemings, who had six children believed to have been fathered by Jefferson after the death of his wife Martha Jefferson. Archaeologists have uncovered the 250-year-old kitchen of Thomas Jefferson's enslaved chef, James Hemings, who introduced mac and cheese into US culture. Growing up, Hemings was one of Jefferson's favorite servants and even accompanied him to Paris, France, in 1784.