New 'moonshot challenge' at Harvard aims to make giant leap in AI

Humanity has big hopes for artificial intelligence, but in reality machines have a long way to go to catch up with the human brain. Enter Harvard University, which has just won a $28 million grant to change all that. The grant aims to help scientists figure out why mammalian brains are so good at learning, and then design better computers accordingly. Harvard researchers will record activity in the brain's visual cortex in "unprecedented detail," map its connections and then reverse-engineer the data to inspire better computer algorithms for learning. "This is a moonshot challenge, akin to the Human Genome Project in scope," said project leader David Cox, assistant professor of molecular and cellular biology and computer science at Harvard.