What could be the next big thing in technology after the digital revolution? According to Chuo University engineering professor, the answer could come from Mother Nature. "Traditionally, people wanted industrial robots to be able to work precisely to help with mass production. But today, demand is high for robots that can live together with people or that can operate in situations where people cannot," said Taro Nakamura, who has developed several robots modeled on living organisms. "People are now looking for new knowledge to bring about innovation. And I believe the next paradigm shift will start by learning about nature," the professor said.

As enterprise enters further into the digital age, data has become the strategic asset that knowledge workers, small or large, rely on to guide their decisions. However, managing such large volumes of data has exposed some unprecedented challenges for the enterprises. Enterprises have learned that the data that they hold, comes in a variety of formats, resides in different and distributed systems and is specific to the organization and its domain. Setting these challenges as the backdrop, IBM's Watson division has built solutions that not only allow for data connectivity but also the analysis of unstructured data and its customization to an enterprise domain. IBM Watson Explorer is Watson's flagship product for text analytics and discovery.

In this post you discovered gradient descent for machine learning.

Mark 2016 as the year that researchers applied artificial intelligence (AI) to the challenges of cybersecurity. If machines can steer our cars and predict our shopping habits, then why not watch over our networks and servers too? IBM in May 2016 announced Watson for Cyber Security, in which the IT behemoth began teaching its pattern-recognition supercomputer to learn the difference between safe and risky data. That could ease the burden on overworked cybersecurity professionals, IBM hopes. Several universities involved with that project began having students train the system within the past several weeks, explained IBM Watson's Jeb Linton, chief security architect.

Ever thought your selfies were as good as a Rembrandt? Well, Facebook hears you, and it's got something to help. This morning, the company announced that a number of AI-powered art filters would soon be arriving on its mobile app, allowing users to overlay photos, videos, and even live broadcasts with various artistic styles. This type of AI feature is known as "style transfer" and has been around for a while now. Russian app Prisma popularized it earlier this year, and in October, Facebook showed off a prototype version working with live video.

What is artificial intelligence and how is it being used? What benefits is it likely to bring for society and for government? What is artificial intelligence and how is it being used? What benefits is it likely to bring for society and for government?

This story is part of a series inspired by the subjects and speakers appearing at BBC Future's World-Changing Ideas Summit in Sydney on 15 November. Find out more about the inspiring people coming to the meeting, including: Researcher Alex Gillespie on what artificial intelligence means for us Researcher Helen Christensen on how tech can spot and treat mental health issues Alan Finkel, Australia's chief scientist, on the future of energy BBC TV presenter Michael Mosley on the science of food and health Uber's Kevin Corti on the hidden patterns of city transport Researcher and TV presenter Emma Johnston on the impact of cities on oceans Experimental architect Rachel Armstrong on interstellar travel If you believe some AI-watchers, we are racing towards the Singularity – a point at which artificial intelligence outstrips our own and machines go on to improve themselves at an exponential rate. If that happens – and it's a big if – what will become of us? In the last few years, several high-profile voices, from Stephen Hawking to Elon Musk and Bill Gates have warned that we should be more concerned about possible dangerous outcomes of supersmart AI. And they've put their money where their mouth is: Musk is among several billionaire backers of OpenAI, an orgnisation dedicated to developing AI that will benefit humanity.

Last week I attended IBM (IBM) World of Watson as both a speaker and an attendee, and today as I sit in my neighborhood Starbucks (SBUX) thinking about everything, all I can say is WOW! This was one of the most interesting, inspiring and amazing events I have ever attended. And we are still in the very early stages of Watson, Cognitive and AI. I invite you to follow me as I learn more and write more about the wonderful world of Watson, all the companies that work with it and how it will change our industries, our businesses and our lives. As a wireless analyst and columnist, I come at this world of Watson from the wireless, telecom, internet and television angle.

It will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with the technology world that the rate of cyber attacks, the development of malware, and the exploitation of zero-day flaws makes is very difficult for IT teams and security specialists to keep up with let alone get ahead of cyber threats. Research from Symantec noted that nearly one million new malware threats emerge daily, and while there are many tools to make detecting rogue code an easier process, dealing with such an enormous amount of new threats appears to be an almost insurmountable task even for the best security teams and anti-virus systems. The answer to this, and the potential future of cyber security, looks to be the use of machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) to apply clever computers and smart software to a problem that leaves humans on the back foot in the fight against hackers. Rather than sift through data harvested from across IT networks, machine learning algorithms can be trained to detect certain malware and threat signatures and proactively sniff out threats, bypassing the need for cyber security experts to disappear into a warren of file paths and scripts to find tell-tale signs of malware. Webroot is one such cyber security company applying machine learning techniques to power its threat intelligence service without requiring resource sapping and time-consuming manual processes.

Humans have been storing, retrieving, manipulating, and communicating information since the Sumerians in Mesopotamia developed writing in 3000 BCE. Since then, we have continuously developed more and more sophisticated means to communicate and push information. Whether unconsciously or consciously, we seem to always need more data, faster than ever. And with every technological breakthrough that comes along, we also have a set of new concepts that reshape our world. We can think back, for example, to Gutenberg's printing press.