To boldly go where no man has gone before. That's the mission of the USS Enterprise -- and arguably the aim of a 1-million prize being offered through a foundation created to honor the father of the "Star Trek" franchise. The Roddenberry Foundation -- named for Gene Roddenberry -- announced Tuesday that this year's biennial award would focus on artificial intelligence that benefits humanity. Lior Ipp, chief executive of the foundation, told The Times there's a growing recognition that AI is becoming more ubiquitous and will affect all aspects of our lives. "We are trying to … catalyze folks to think about what AI looks like if it's used for good," Ipp said, "and what it means to use AI responsibly, ethically and toward solving some of the thorny global challenges that exist in the world."

The broad agreement builds on past international AI agreements. Last year, the United States, China, the European Union, Britain and more than 20 other countries signed onto the so-called Bletchley Declaration, which sought to avoid the existential safety risks of the technology and promote international cooperation on research. However, following criticism that developing nations had been left out of other international AI agreements, the Biden administration pursued a new agreement with the United Nations.

Machine-learning researchers make many decisions when designing new models. They decide how many layers to include in neural networks and what weights to give inputs at each node. The result of all this human decision-making is that complex models end up being "designed by intuition" rather than systematically, says Frank Hutter, head of the machine-learning lab at the University of Freiburg in Germany. A growing field called automated machine learning, or autoML, aims to eliminate the guesswork. The idea is to have algorithms take over the decisions that researchers currently have to make when designing models.

Although automated machine learning has been around for almost a decade, researchers are still working to refine it. Last week, a new conference in Baltimore--which organizers described as the first international conference on the subject--showcased efforts to improve autoML's accuracy and streamline its performance. There's been a swell of interest in autoML's potential to simplify machine learning. Companies like Amazon and Google already offer low-code machine-learning tools that take advantage of autoML techniques. If these techniques become more efficient, it could accelerate research and allow more people to use machine learning. The idea is to get to a point where people can choose a question they want to ask, point an autoML tool at it, and receive the result they are looking for.

Anumana, a joint venture between EHR data company nference and the Mayo Clinic, announced last week it had entered a strategic partnership with pharma giant Novartis to develop artificial intelligence tools to detect cardiovascular diseases. The collaboration will focus on deploying AI algorithms that analyze ECGs to find left ventricular dysfunction, which can lead to heart failure, and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, which can cause heart attack and stroke. The companies are pitching the partnership as a way to detect potentially deadly heart conditions and intervene before serious complications occur. "Many heart diseases develop for years before signs and symptoms appear, but the first event may be life threatening," Dr. Paul Friedman, chair of Anumana's Mayo Clinic board of advisors, said in a statement. "AI enables us to uncover hidden signals our bodies transmit to detect otherwise occult heart diseases, potentially years before symptoms appear. This collaboration has the potential to transform the use of a ubiquitous inexpensive test, the ECG, with the aim of democratizing disease detection and helping medical care teams to proactively manage heart disease ahead of time, and prevent some clinical events from ever happening."

Organisations are increasingly investing in AI because they see its potential. In the 2021 federal budget, the Australian government committed to investing more than $120 million in AI over the next four to six years through programs including the development of the National Artificial Intelligence Centre ($53.8 million over four years) and the establishment of the Next Generation AI Graduates Program ($24.7 million over six years). The government has also committed to providing $33.7 million over four years to support projects to develop AI based solutions to national challenges, and $12 million over five years to catalyse AI opportunities by co-funding up to 36 competitive grants to develop AI solutions that address local or regional problems. However, despite the increased investment in and use of AI across industries and businesses, there are lingering concerns over the technology's capacity to deliver on expectations. According to our recent 2021 Digital Readiness Survey, more than 86 per cent of Australian and New Zealand-based organisations reported an increase in the use of AI from two years ago, but only 25 per cent said their confidence in AI had significantly increased.

There is a growing consensus that artificial intelligence ethics instruction is critical, and must extend beyond computer sciences courses. Ethics and technology have always been tightly interwoven, but as artificial intelligence (AI) marches forward and impacts society in new and novel ways, the stakes--and repercussions--are growing. "There is potential for (AI) to be used in ways that society disapproves of," observes David S. Touretzky, a research professor in the computer science department at Carnegie Mellon University. One idea that's gaining momentum is AI ethics instruction in schools. Groups such as AI4K12 and the MIT Media Lab have begun to study the issue and develop AI learning frameworks for K-12 students.

Bindu Reddy wants to give more people access to artificial intelligence. The former Amazon Web Services and Google engineer, wants small and medium sized companies to be able to use AI in the same way that large companies do, and make sure big tech companies aren't dominating the sector. Reddy previously started the AI verticals division at AWS, creating AI for particular domains or use-cases. Earlier in her career she was the Head of Product for Google social apps, where she helped build Google, Blogger Google Video, Google Docs and Google Sites. She said during her time at Google and Amazon Web Services she noticed that big companies had a gap between the research being done in AI and the products being developed.

Artificial intelligence has been the talk of the town these days. Frequent news updates and developments are being reported and a lot of organizations are trying to develop their own AIs and integrate them into their business structure. But is this a reality or just an availability bias? Well, reality states that only a few firms are successfully using AIs as compared to those struggling to reap its benefits. AI-based chatbots are very common in most organization's websites and customer care services. Machine learning has allowed these bots to improve their interaction with customers.

The University of Sydney's Westmead Applied Research Centre has been awarded a $1 million grant from technology giant Google to research and develop ways artificial intelligence could be used in digital tools to reduce the risk of heart attacks. Westmead Applied Research Centre will utilise the Google AI Impact challenge grant to create customised digital health tools that enable clinicians and health services to support more people to prevent cardiovascular disease. By combining clinical and consumer-derived data, such as from mobile phone apps and wearables, the program will offer tailored advice using machine learning to assess participants who have been to the hospital with chest pain, harnessing their digital footprint to reduce the risk of a heart attack. Dr. Harry Klimis, a cardiologist and researcher at WARC, explained to HealthcareITNews that modifiable risk factors account for more than 90 percent of the risk of heart attack worldwide. These include abnormal cholesterol, hypertension, smoking, excess alcohol consumption, physical inactivity, diabetes, obesity, psychosocial factors and diet.