Daily Archives: May 26, 2020

Flare Up

Scientists found something peculiar coming from the center of the Milky Way galaxy: a previously-undiscovered signal they think is coming fromthe supermassive black hole at the heart of our galaxy.

The team of Keio University researchers think that the signal is caused when the accretion disk around the black hole flares up and give off extremely rapidly-rotating radio spots, according to research published last month in The Astrophysical Journal Letters a glimpse at the unimaginable chaos at the core of our galaxy.

The flickering signals arent entirely new scientists have previously discovered larger and slower flare ups. But thanks to the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), now scientists can detect more minute emanations than ever before.

This emission could be related with some exotic phenomena occurring at the very vicinity of the supermassive black hole, Keio University professor Tomoharu Oka said in a press release.

The fluctuations likely come from the dizzying rotationof gas around the surface of the black hole which could help explain why its so difficult to directly observe it.

In general, the faster the movement is, the more difficult it is to take a photo of the object, Oka said.

READ MORE: ALMA spots twinkling heart of Milky Way [National Institutes of Natural Sciences]

More on supermassive black holes: A Supermassive Black Hole Yeeted This Star at 3.7 Million MPH

More here:
Astronomers Detect Signal Coming From the Heart of Our Galaxy - Futurism

A team of researchers from the Higher School of Economics University and Open University in Moscow, Russia claim they have demonstrated that an artificial intelligence can make accurate personality judgments based on selfies alone more accurately than some humans.

The researchers suggest the technology could be used to help match people up in online dating services or help companies sell products that are tailored to individual personalities.

Thats apropos, because two co-authors listed on a paper about the research published today in Scientific Reports a journal run by Nature are affiliated with a Russian AI psychological profiling company called BestFitMe, which helps companies hire the right employees.

As detailed in the paper, the team asked 12,000 volunteers to complete a questionnaire that they used to build a database of personality traits. To go along with that data, the volunteers also uploaded a total of 31,000 selfies.

The questionnaire was based around the Big Five personality traits, five core traits that psychological researchers often use to describe subjects personalities, including openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

After training a neural network on the dataset, the researchers found that it could accurately predict personality traits based on real-life photographs taken in uncontrolled conditions, as they write in their paper.

While accurate, the precision of their AI leaves something to be desired. They found that their AI can can make a correct guess about the relative standing of two randomly chosen individuals on a personality dimension in 58% of cases.

That result isnt exactly groundbreaking but its a little better than just guessing, which is vaguely impressive.

Strikingly, the researchers claim their AI is better at predicting the traits than humans. While rating personality traits by human close relatives or colleagues was far more accurate than when rated by strangers, they found that the AI outperforms an average human rater who meets the target in person without any prior acquaintance, according to the paper.

Considering the woeful accuracy, and the fact that some of the authors listed on the study are working on commercializing similar tech, these results should be taken with a hefty grain of salt.

Neural networks have generated some impressive results, but any research that draws self-serving conclusions especially when they require some statistical gymnastics should be treated with scrutiny.

READ MORE: Artificial intelligence can make personality judgments based on photographs [National Research University Higher School of Economics]

More on AI: Mind-Melting AI Makes Frank Sinatra Sing Toxic by Britney Spears

Excerpt from:
Researchers: This AI Can Judge Personality Based on Selfies Alone - Futurism

Researchers say theyve created a proof-of-concept bionic eye that could surpass the sensitivity of a human one.

In the future, we can use this for better vision prostheses and humanoid robotics, researcher Zhiyong Fan, at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, told Science News.

The eye, as detailed in a paper published in the prestigious journal Nature today, is in essence a three dimensional artificial retina that features a highly dense array of extremely light-sensitive nanowires.

The team, led by Fan, lined a curved aluminum oxide membrane with tiny sensors made of perovskite, a light-sensitive material thats been used in solar cells.

Wires that mimic the brains visual cortex relay the visual information gathered by these sensors to a computer for processing.

The nanowires are so sensitive they could surpass the optical wavelength range of the human eye, allowing it to respond to 800 nanometer wavelengths, the threshold between visual light and infrared radiation.

That means it could see things in the dark when the human eye can no longer keep up.

A human user of the artificial eye will gain night vision capability, Fan told Inverse.

The researchers also claim the eye can react to changes in light faster than a human one, allowing it to adjust to changing conditions in a fraction of the time.

Each square centimeter of the artificial retina can hold about 460 million nanosize sensors, dwarfing the estimated 10 million cells in the human retina. This suggests that it could surpass the visual fidelity of the human eye.

Fan told Inverse that we have not demonstrated the full potential in terms of resolution at this moment, promising that eventually a user of our artificial eye will be able to see smaller objects and further distance.

Other researchers who were not involved in the project pointed out that plenty of work still has to be done to eventually be able to connect it to the human visual system, as Scientific American reports.

But some are hopeful.

I think in about 10 years, we should see some very tangible practical applications of these bionic eyes, Hongrui Jiang, an electrical engineer at the University of WisconsinMadison who was not involved in the research, told Scientific American.

READ MORE: A new artificial eye mimics and may outperform human eyes [Science News]

More on bionic eyes: SCIENTISTS PLUGGED A BIONIC EYE DIRECTLY INTO THIS WOMANS BRAIN

Read more:
This Bionic Eye Is Better Than a Real One, Scientists Say - Futurism

Spaceman Simulator

NASA is looking for participants to spent eight months together inside a spaceflight simulator at the Russian Institute for Biomedical Problems in Moscow.

The goal is to study the effects of spending time in isolation and confinement sound familiar? while on lengthy space missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

Participants will experience environmental aspects similar to those astronauts are expected to experience on future missions to Mars, reads a NASA statement. They will also have to complete simulated space missions during their stay.

The eight month mission will follow a four-month study last year that simulated a journey to the Moon and back at the same Russian facility. The longest mission, called Mars500, went on for 520 days to simulate a trip to Mars.

According to a call for participants on its website, NASA is looking for healthy participants between the ages of 30 and 55 who have professional experience with science, technology, engineering or math experience. Participants also have to be proficient in Russian and English and of course be willing to be locked up for eight months.

Participants will also be compensated for their time spent inside the simulator, but its still unclear how much theyll get paid.

READ MORE: Love isolation? NASA wants you to spend 8 months locked in a Russian lab [Space.com]

More on space simulators: CHINA OPENS ITS FIRST MARS SIMULATION BASE

See the article here:
NASA Will Pay You to Chill in a Fake Mars Mission for 8 Months - Futurism

Thar Be Gold

As humanity pushes to settle the Moon, well need to find ways to quickly build shelters and replenish the water supply. As it turns out, the solution to those life-and-death challenges may lie well, within.

When it comes to fulfilling humanitys base needs food, water, and shelter on the Moon, the European Space Agency (ESA) thinks that the secret ingredient could be human urine, Wired reports. According to ESA research, it could serve as a crucial component of the best building material available to lunar settlers.

Wired reports that Moon settlers are likely to build using geomolymer: material made from mashing rocks with liquid to create a sort of clay. In a recent ESA study, building geopolymer rich in urea thats the stuff in your pee made the material stronger and more durable compared to water alone.

Water is very, very valuable on the lunar surface, ESA researcher Marlies Arnhof told Wired. So one of our main goals with this study was to reduce the amount of water necessary to produce a geopolymer.

But there are a challenges to the ESAs plan. The agency is only beginning to study, for instance, whether pee-laden huts would block cosmic radiation. Also, theres the unfortunate reality that pulling together enough urea to settle the Moon would require a herculean community effort.

I dont know if making pee would scale well, University of Central Florida planetary scientist Phil Metzger told Wired. I just dont think youre going to have that many people peeing on the moon.

READ MORE: On the Moon, Astronaut Pee Will Be a Hot Commodity [Wired]

More on Moon urine: Scientists: Astronauts Could Build Moon Base Using Human Urine

View original post here:
On the Moon, the Real Gold Might Be Human Urine - Futurism

Cult Futures is a new insight and incubation program launched by Cult, one of the worlds fastest growing independent creative agencies. Their latest white paper, The Creatology Report, explores the future of creativity and technology for brands. The first episode went live this week.

The panel will discuss the sensory internet, which explores how brands can thrive as the relationship between the internet and consumers is becoming so blurred that online interaction and real-world experience are fast becoming one and the same thing.

Laura Chen, head of marketing US at Elvie, and Nora Zukauskaite, global head of marketing UK and US at Ciate, join report collaborator award-winning futurist and author Lucie Greene to discuss the implications of technology that now has the capacity to live, breathe, talk and even read consumers minds.

The free live virtual event, hosted by Cults global managing director Bridey Lipscombe and head of strategy Charlotte Bunyan, starts at 4pm on Thursday 28 May. Tickets are available through Eventbrite.

Bridey Lipscombe, global managing director and co-founder of Cult, said: The Sensory Internet explores the increasing shift to more multi-sensory and frictionless ways to engage through digital, and heralds a more human AI experience. As our physical and digital worlds become further blurred, this is the perfect time to be discussing what this means for brands and consumers now and in the near future.

Lucie Greene, futurist: Were at an inflection point in the way we use and think about technology, which has been accelerated even more so with Covid-19. AR, gaming and AI innovations to social platforms are creating a raft of new immersive ways to connect, work and shop. Were seeing a new generation of creatives emerge who are collaborating with technologists, sound artists, developers, and engineers moving the notion of creativity into new realms.

To sign up to the event, please follow the link here.

Read Episode 1 of Cult Futures The Sensory Internet here.

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Original post:
Cult Futures announces virtual event with global wellness chiefs and futurist Lucie Greene - The Drum