Much of the discussion around artificial intelligence has been around how many jobs will be lost as a result of automation rather than any discussion about the ways AI will improve our ability to work safely and effectively. A good example of this comes from research undertaken by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory that looked at how AI can be used to collect building data to help keep firefighters safe when they enter an inferno. They developed a system called AUDREY, which stands for Assistant for Understanding Data through Reasoning, Extraction and synthesis, in conjunction with the Department of Homeland Security. AUDREY is capable of tracking the team of firefighters as they enter a building, all the time sending them data that is personalized to their location in the facility. It is even capable of giving them recommendations on where and what to do next.

The Defense Advance Research Projects Agency will fund the development of sensors and artificial intelligence systems that could help break into, extract, and analyze information from enemy devices and communication systems. The components and systems will arm the U.S. with more data to analyze enemy moves and strategy. Information is king in wars, and DARPA wants to develop technology that can break into enemy systems. "They are talking about going into any situation and extracting information at any time, [with] artificial intelligence systems that can attack and hack any network," said Jim McGregor, principal analyst at Tirias Research. DARPA wants to fund the development of sensors and electromagnetic systems that could break into point-to-point wired and wireless communications, even ones that are not linked to the internet.

Database-as-a-service offers multiple potential benefits, including lower database licensing and infrastructure costs, faster time to application development, and reduced administration overheads. These benefits are most likely to be experienced by database administrators and architects, although senior decision-makers and business users also stand to gain from having on-demand access to database services, rather than waiting for databases to be configured and deployed on dedicated physical or virtual server infrastructure. While 451 Research anticipates growing adoption of database-as-a-service (DBaaS), adoption is currently nascent compared with other cloud services, as enterprises look to make the most of their investments in on-premises database deployments, and also to identify the most appropriate workloads for transition or migration to DBaaS. This webinar explores the factors shaping those adoption trends, including the potential benefits and challenges to DBaaS adoption, the economics of the cloud as they relate to database workloads, and adoption lifecycles.

Last week, on September 8th, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's department successfully used a remote-controlled bomb squad robot to snatch a rifle out from under an armed and violent suspect. The standoff between the suspect and an armored SWAT team lasted for more than six hours, but concluded without a single shot fired. "The robot was a game changer here," Capt. Jack Ewell told the LA Times. "We didn't have to risk a deputy's life to disarm a very violent man."

An autonomous sail boat collects ocean data in the Dutch Harbor, Alaska. A whopping 97 percent of the Earth's water is in oceans, so it's vital that we monitor and understand them. Therefore, ocean data is regularly collected by government agencies, research scientists, and private companies. Currently, ocean research is conducted on large, expensive ships, but a couple of entrepreneurs in California have a new solution: autonomous sailing drones. A company called Saildrone launched commercially this year, and the founders have announced that they raised 14 million in Series A funding, led by Social Capital with investments from the Capricorn Investment Group and Lux Capital.

This week Dutch police announced that they are ready to use eagles to take down drones. The video footage is awesome -- majestic birds swoop down to snatch up tiny flying robots. Sure, the police already use horses for transportation and dogs for searches, but introducing a new animal assistant in this age of technology is...unexpected. Eventually, the police plan to manage their own flock of drone snatchers, which is why they purchased eagle chicks earlier this year. But until the chicks are ready for action, the police have partnered with Guard From Above, a Dutch company that trains birds of prey to intercept hostile drones.

Artificial intelligence systems will be able to give managers real-time insights about their business operations -- as well as detect early warnings of problems before they occur. This article is part of an MIT SMR initiative exploring how technology is reshaping the practice of management. Editor's Note: This article is one of a special series of 14 commissioned essays MIT Sloan Management Review is publishing to celebrate the launch of our new Frontiers initiative. Each essay gives the author's response to this question: "Within the next five years, how will technology change the practice of management in a way we have not yet witnessed?" Workers on the factory floor have suddenly gathered at a point along the production line.

Tesla Motors Inc.'s Autopilot has been in the news a lot of late, and not only because of the vehicles crashes involving (or not) the self-driving system or updates to it that would have prevented at least some of those crashes. On Wednesday, Tesla's erstwhile partner in its Autopilot development, Israeli chipmaker Mobileye, said it had decided to split with the Elon Musk-owned company because of concerns over Autopilot, with Tesla "pushing the envelope in terms of safety." Speaking to Reuters, Mobileye Chairman Amnon Shashua said of Autopilot: "It is not designed to cover all possible crash situations in a safe manner. It is a driver assistance system and not a driverless system." In response, a Tesla spokeswoman had initially said the company never advertised its Autopilot as a self-driving technology or its cars as autonomous vehicles.

Tesla faces new scrutiny in China about its vehicle Autopilot system after state television broadcast allegations that a man killed in a crash had activated the driver-assist feature of his car. The state broadcaster CCTV aired a report Wednesday about a January crash that killed 23-year-old Gao Yaning. The report included apparent dash cam footage of the car slamming into a slow-moving orange truck. An official interviewed in the report said the car's Autopilot feature was active at the time of the crash. CCTV reported Gao's family has sued Tesla in a Beijing court, though the lawsuit was not available in online court records.

President Obama may be urged to split the joint leadership of the National Security Agency and U.S. Cyber Command in favor of two distinct forces for cyberespionage and cyberwarfare as NSA officials announce that artificial intelligence will be a future part of U.S. cyber strategy. The potential move will be urged by the Pentagon and intelligence community and is driven by a sense that the two missions are fundamentally different as military hackers and cyberspies shouldn't compete to use the same networks and the job of leading both missions is too big for one person, according to the Washington Post. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter and Director of National Intelligence James Clapper are both reportedly pressing for the split, with Carter seeking to build Cyber Command into a full-fledged fighting force that has its own network accesses to conduct attacks, the post said while Clapper supports the idea in hopes that it will reduce tension over which force gets to use the networks . Last week, NSA leader Admiral Michael Rogers told an audience at the Intelligence & National Security Summit that ''he believes the two organizations should remain aligned but separate. In other news, earlier this week, Rogers told Congress that artificial intelligence will play a large role in the U.S. cyberspace strategy.