The spring COMMON NAViGATE conference has not yet started, the IBM Think 2021 conference has just ended and so has Google I/O 2021, and only a month ago we participated in Nvidia's GPU Technical Conference 2021. A whole lotta things are rattling around in our brains, and we are still thinking about some of the things people have been saying about artificial intelligence, the instantiation of which based on machine learning techniques seems to work quite well but no one really knows, in the same way a COBOL or RPG program is absolutely deterministic, why it works. This is what happens when you let software write software – algorithms, really, for categorizing and transforming media formats that describe reality. This is just the first phase of AI, the one that IBM and its peers are still talking about. But there is a next-phase, an evolutionary jump that is coming, we think, and it will be an interesting one that will impact all IBM i shops and all of us on planet Earth as we live our lives. More than the relational database or the spreadsheet or the word processor or the Web browser or the iPhone ever did.

In the 1960s, the Star Trek television series brought the vision of artificial intelligence into the living rooms of millions of people. AI was everywhere in the show, in the form of machines that had all the intelligence of humans -- and a lot more. Take, for example, the universal translator on the USS Enterprise. It could translate alien languages into English or any other language instantaneously. That, of course, was all science fiction back in the days when Lyndon B. Johnson was the U.S. president, as were a lot of the other AI applications in use on the starship.

MedWand is the closest thing we seen so far to a Tricorder. The scanner combines a stethoscope, thermometer, electrocardiogram and more in a small hand-held device. There's no need to explain to fans of Star-Trek what a Tricorder is. They'll have head of it. Multiple versions appear in the Sci-Fi movie including one that is used to help diagnose diseases and collect bodily information about a patient.

The original 1960s Star Trek series took place in a universe of the future with personal communicators, holograms, and the technology to send humans beyond our solar system. In many ways that future is here. We have smartphones, virtual reality, space travel -- and now the tricorder. In the show, the tricorder was a handheld medical device that could scan a patient, read his or her vital signs, and diagnose problems in minutes. A working prototype invented by a Philadelphia-based emergency room physician Basil Harris may not look like the ones used by Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy and Commander Beverly Crusher throughout the sci-fi series, but it's advanced enough to offer a medical diagnosis in minutes and anyone can use it.

Since I'm told that some of you may be unfamiliar with "Star Trek" lore, the tricorder was (will be?) a two-piece mobile medical diagnostic tool used by Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy, ship's surgeon of the United Star Ship (USS) Enterprise (NCC-1701), in "Star Trek: TOS" (The Original Series), which debuted on Sept. 8, 1966. The two pieces of the tool included a roughly two-inch-long cylinder that looked a lot like a salt shaker (it was), and a rectangular box with a screen. Its use usually precipitated Dr. McCoy's declaration of, "I'm a doctor, not a bricklayer," or something similar. In 2012, the Qualcomm Foundation decided to put up a $10 million purse to sponsor an Xprize contest to develop such a device. According to contest rules, the winning entry had to had to weigh no more than five pounds, diagnose at least 16 different conditions based on analysis of five vital signs, and be usable by anybody, without the help of a medical professional.

Toya T Peterson speaks on medical devices from the Sci-Fi world that could one day become reality. The handheld medical device used in the popular Star Trek Enterprise might soon become a reality. With Qualcomm having began a contest to see if anyone can create a working tricorder (that weighs less than 5 pounds and fits in the palm!), the healthcare industry might be able to benefit from this great innovation. With the ability to diagnose different conditions (ranging from anemia, diabetes, pneumonia, sleep apnea, and chronic diseases amongst others) and monitor vital signs (like blood pressure, heart rate, temperature and respiratory rate) of patients, the tricorder can be used by patients in the comforts of their homes, without having to visit the doctor. While Ender's Game featured a surgical robot performing brain surgery, robotic medical assistants majorly enable safe patient lifting, reducing incidents of workplace injuries, and hence improved clinician staff retention and satisfaction as well as patient satisfaction.

Google employees, squeezed onto metal risers and standing in the back of a meeting room, erupted in cheers as newly arrived executive Andrew Conrad announced they would try to turn science fiction into reality: The tech giant had formed a biotech venture to create a futuristic device like Star Trek's iconic "Tricorder" diagnostic wizard -- and use it to cure cancer. Conrad, recalled an employee who was present, displayed images on the room's big screens showing nanoparticles tracking down cancer cells in the bloodstream and flashing signals to a Fitbit-style wristband. He promised a working prototype of the cancer early-detection device within six months. That was three years ago. Recently departed employees said the prototype didn't work as hoped, and the Tricorder project is floundering. Tricorder is not the only misfire for Google's ambitious and extravagantly funded biotech venture, now named Verily Life Sciences. It has announced three signature projects meant to transform medicine, and a STAT examination found that all of them are plagued by serious, if not fatal, scientific shortcomings, even as Verily has vigorously promoted their promise.

Google employees, squeezed onto metal risers and standing in the back of a meeting room, erupted in cheers as newly arrived executive Andrew Conrad announced they would try to turn science fiction into reality: The tech giant had formed a biotech venture to create a futuristic device like Star Trek's iconic "Tricorder" diagnostic wizard -- and use it to cure cancer. Conrad, recalled an employee who was present, displayed images on the room's big screens showing nanoparticles tracking down cancer cells in the bloodstream and flashing signals to a Fitbit-style wristband. He promised a working prototype of the cancer early-detection device within six months. That was three years ago. Recently departed employees said the prototype didn't work as hoped, and the Tricorder project is floundering. Tricorder is not the only misfire for Google's ambitious and extravagantly funded biotech venture, now named Verily Life Sciences. It has announced three signature projects meant to transform medicine, and a STAT examination found that all of them are plagued by serious, if not fatal, scientific shortcomings, even as Verily has vigorously promoted their promise.