Three French students made history after an artwork they generated using artificial intelligence sold for $432,500 at a Christie's auction in New York, CNN reported. The piece called "Edmond de Balemy" betrayed estimations of $7,000-10,000 and sold at the staggering six-figure price. "Christie's continually stays attuned to changes in the art market and how technology can impact the creation and consumption of art," Richard Lloyd, international head of prints and multiples at Christie's, said in a statement before the auction. Pakistani artist's work auctioned for Rs34 million in London "AI has already been incorporated as a tool by contemporary artists and as this technology further develops, we are excited to participate in these continued conversations. To best engage in the dialogue, we are offering a public platform to exhibit an artwork that has entirely been realised by an algorithm."

WASHINGTON: US regulators Wednesday approved the first device that uses artificial intelligence to detect eye damage from diabetes, allowing regular doctors to diagnose the condition without interpreting any data or images. The device, called IDx-DR, can diagnose a condition called diabetic retinopathy, the most common cause of vision loss among the more than 30 million Americans living with diabetes. Its software uses an artificial intelligence algorithm to analyse images of the eye, taken with a retinal camera called the Topcon NW400, the FDA said. Telefonica launches'Aura' voice assistant in six countries "A doctor uploads the digital images of the patient's retinas to a cloud server on which IDx-DR software is installed," said the agency in a statement. The answer comes back that the patient's eye problem is "more than mild" and they should seek treatment from a specialist, or it is negative for diabetic retinopathy and the patient can be rescreened in a year.

Automated programs are likely to play a key role in finding cures for some of the most difficult-to-treat diseases. WASHINGTON: Your next doctor could very well be a bot. And bots, or automated programs, are likely to play a key role in finding cures for some of the most difficult-to-treat diseases and conditions. Artificial intelligence is rapidly moving into health care, led by some of the biggest technology companies and emerging startups using it to diagnose and respond to a raft of conditions. While technology has always played a role in medical care, a wave of investment from Silicon Valley and a flood of data from connected devices appear to be spurring innovation.

The writer is the editor and translator of Why I write: Essays by Saadat Hasan Manto, published by Westland in 2014. He is executive director of Amnesty International India. The views expressed here are his own. In the United States, there has been a strange issue that is being discussed. It is being written about in books, and there are talks on it (which one can access on YouTube), but there is yet no action on it, though this is expected soon. The issue is that of artificial intelligence becoming smarter than man.

WASHINGTON: The Pentagon may soon be unleashing a 21st-century version of locusts on its adversaries after officials on Monday said it had successfully tested a swarm of 103 micro-drones. The important step in the development of new autonomous weapon systems was made possible by improvements in artificial intelligence, holding open the possibility that groups of small robots could act together under human direction. Military strategists have high hopes for such drone swarms that would be cheap to produce and able to overwhelm opponents' defenses with their great numbers. The test of the world's largest micro-drone swarm in California in October included 103 Perdix micro-drones measuring around six inches (16 centimeters) launched from three F/A-18 Super Hornet fighter jets, the Pentagon said in a statement. "The micro-drones demonstrated advanced swarm behaviors such as collective decision-making, adaptive formation flying and self-healing," it said.

Mark Zuckerberg on Monday introduced the world to "Jarvis", an artificial intelligence system the Facebook chief created in his spare time, which can choose and play music, turn on lights, and recognize visitors, deciding whether to open the front door. Jarvis, named after the virtual assistant in the Iron Man movies, could be a step toward a new product, Zuckerberg wrote, although he cautioned that the system he had created in 100 hours over the last year was customized for his house. Zuckerberg announced results of the project, a personal challenge he set for himself this year, as digital home assistants by Google Inc and Amazon.com Inc compete for holiday sales and are expected to outsell popular emerging gadgets such as virtual reality headsets and drones. Creating Jarvis proved humanity is "both closer and farther off" from an AI breakthrough than we imagine, Zuckerberg wrote.