The potential for artificial intelligence has, for decades, been mostly relegated to the larger-than-life imaginations of Hollywood directors. From Blade Runner to Terminator, it always seems to take place in some distant and dystopian future. And yet, if there's one thing to be learned from Google's recent acquisition of the artificial intelligence startup DeepMind for a reported 400 million, it's that the heyday for this type of technology is not a century or even decades away. The global market for artificial intelligence was valued at 900 million in 2013, according to the market research firm Research and Markets. Meanwhile, a study out of Oxford University last year found that in the near future artificially intelligent technology could take over nearly half of all U.S. jobs.

Tesla Motors' (TSLA) poaching of key Apple (AAPL) and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) engineers could squeeze graphics-chips partner Nvidia (NVDA), an MKM analyst wrote Monday ahead of Nvidia's April 5 analyst day. But MKM analyst Ian Ing reiterated his buy rating and 39 price target on Nvidia stock, which was up 1% in afternoon trading on the stock market today, earlier touching an eight-year high at 34.98. Nvidia and Tesla have partnered in machine-learning -- widely seen as key to autonomous driving -- for the better part of a decade. Last year, Nvidia's automotive segment grew 80% -- to 320 million in revenue. Together, the duo faces stiff autonomous-driving competition from rivals like General Motors (GM), Alphabet (GOOGL) and Apple.

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

Ford's Sync 3 communications and entertainment system is displayed during a Ford Motor Co. press event for CES 2016 at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center on January 5, 2016 in Las Vegas (Photo: Ethan Miller, Getty Images) As we become more reliant on our smartphones, car companies that do a good job integrating them into vehicles' communication, audio and navigation systems have a huge advantage. It shouldn't be asking too much to get into a car, turn the radio on and tune to a station without reading the owner's manual, but frequently it is. So automakers are trying to make their systems as simple as possible, drawing inspiration from the maker of toys for toddlers. "We talk about the Fisher-Price approach: simple design, really big buttons and really large type," said Gary Jablonski, product development manager for Ford's Sync system. Sync drew raves when it debuted as the auto industry's first voice recognition system in 2007.

KOLKATA, India -- Across a bustling intersection from one of the first dead-letters offices, a pale blue sign beseeches pedestrians to join the future. Several hundred feet separate old, colonial India from the promise of a new, technologically transformed country. An Uber sign urges traffic safety and a gentle nudge for the ride-sharing service, which is wildly popular here. In Kolkata, capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, there are traces of the future amid decaying buildings and staggering poverty. Samsung Electronics and Dell signs mark the entrance to a dilapidated Victorian structure in the heart of the city. Kolkata is India's untold story in tech.

SAN FRANCISCO - Alphabet may be working on its own version of Amazon's increasingly popular voice recognition device the Echo. According to a report in The Information, one of the products that Alphabet's Nest division is working on is a "Google voice recognition device" designed to compete with Amazon Echo. The Echo has been a surprising hit. It is a Wi-Fi-enabled cylinder roughly the size of a Pringles equipped with powerful microphones and speakers. The runs a voice recognition digital assistant named Alexa that allows users to ask questions, call up music, order items on Amazon and a growing list of other tasks simply using their voice.

You are likely pretty good at picking things up. Part of the reason that you're pretty good at picking things up is that when you were little, you spent a lot of time trying and failing to pick things up, and learning from your experiences. For roboticists who don't want to wait through the equivalent of an entire robotic childhood, there are ways to streamline the process: at Google Research, they've set up more than a dozen robotic arms and let them work for months on picking up objects that are heavy, light, flat, large, small, rigid, soft, and translucent (although not all at once). We talk to the researchers about how their approach is unique, and why 800,000 grasps (!) is just the beginning. Part of what makes animals so good at grasping things are our eyes, as opposed to just our hands.

Many people around the world have more Denisovan DNA than previously thought, which has contributed to their sense of smell and ability to thrive at high altitudes, according to a study released Monday. Researchers know that modern humans with ancestry outside of Africa inherited up to 2.1 percent of their DNA from Neanderthals. But far less was known about Denisovans, who are believed to have shared origins with Neanderthals and account for up to 5 percent of DNA in some present day populations. The latest work, from a research team at Harvard Medical School and UCLA, developed a world map of ancient DNA. In doing so, they found that populations in Oceania populations had the highest percentage of ancient DNA – 2 percent Neanderthal and 5 percent Denisovan - while South Asians had more Denisovan DNA – 0.1 percent in Sherpas - than expected.

Sentiment Analysis (detecting document's polarity, subjectivity and emotional states) is a difficult problem and several times I bumped into unexpected and interesting results. One of the strangest things that I found is that despite the fact that neutral class can improve under specific conditions the classification accuracy, it is often ignored by most researchers.

A lot of the computational plumbing that powers Google owes something to Jeff Dean. He built early versions of the company's Web search and ad systems. And he invented MapReduce, a system for working with big data sets that triggered a major shift across the computing industry. Dean is now laboring to reinvent the inner workings of Google and the wider world all over again. He leads the Google Brain research group, which aims to advance machine learning--the art of making software figure out how to do things for itself instead of being explicitly programmed.