Category Archives: Futurism

In BriefMicrosoft unveiled a new cloud-based programmable hardwarethat's capable of handling deep learning operations faster and inreal-time. Dubbed Brainwave, the system operates on a massivehardware network of Intel's latest Statix 10 chips. Accelerating Machine Learning

At the 2017 Hot Chips symposium today, Microsoft unveiled a new hardware capable of boosting artificial intelligence (AI) programs. CalledBrainwave, Microsoft believes itll boost how machine learning models functionby designing them forprogrammable silicon.

We designed the system for real-time AI, which means the system processes requests as fast as it receives them, with ultra-low latency, Microsoft explained in a press release. Real-time AI is becoming increasingly important as cloud infrastructures process live data streams, whether they be search queries, videos, sensor streams, or interactions with users.

The model is larger than other AI-dedicated hardware available. It features a Gated Recurrent Unit model running at a speed of 39.5 teraflops on Intels new Stratix 10 field programmable gate array (FPGA) chip. Plus, it doesnt use so-called batching operations, which means it provides real-time insights for machine learning systems by handling requests as they come in.

We call it real-time AI because the idea here is that you send in a request, you want the answer back, Microsoft Research engineer Doug Burger said at the symposium, Venture Beat reports. If its a video stream, if its a conversation, if its looking for intruders, anomaly detection, all the things where you care about interaction and quick results, you want those in real time.

Brainwave allows for cloud-based deep learning models to be performed seamlessly across a the massive FPGA infrastructure Microsoft has installed in its data centers over the past few years. According to Burger, this means that AI features in applications receive more rapid support from Microsoft services. By running on a host of FPGAs, machine learning models that might be too big for just one FPGA chip receive simultaneous support from multiple hardware boards.Click to View Full Infographic

In addition toperformance speeds faster and more flexible than other CPUs or GPUs, Brainwave also incorporates software designed to support a host of popular deep learning frameworks. So, as Burger said, its thuspossible for Microsofts programmable hardware to operate at par with chips dedicated for machine learning operations like Googles Tensor Processing Unit. In fact, he believes that its possible to increase performance in the future from 39.5 teraflops to 90 teraflops by further improving operations with the Stratix 10 chip.

As machine learning models and algorithms see greater employmentby a plethora of applications, hooking these to Brainwave would reduce user waiting timefor these apps to respond. Microsoft hasnt yet made Brainwave available to customers, and no timeline has been set. But they areworking to make it accessible to third-party customers through Microsofts Azure cloud platform.

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Microsoft Releases a New Deep Learning Acceleration Platform Called Brainwave - Futurism

In Brief A team of astronomers created the first ever two-dimensional velocity map of a star and the movement of its atmospheric gasses, a feat never before done in a star other than the Sun. Their technique could be used to study other stars in the future. Look at the Stars

Red supergiant (RSG) stars are considered the most voluminous starsin the universe. The two most famous examples of RSGs are Betelgeuse and Antares, and to the naked eye the latter appears to shine with a strong red tint as it sits at the heart of the constellation Scorpius. However, RSGs are known to exhibit a certain kind of behavior thats baffled astronomers for a long while.Click to View Full Infographic

A team of astronomers decided to figure out this strange phenomenon by taking a closer look at Antares, a star already at near the end of its life. How stars like Antares lose mass so quickly in the final phase of their evolution has been a problem for over half a century, Keiichi Ohnaka from the Universidad Catlica del Norte in Chile and lead author of the study said in a press release.

His team used the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) at the Paranal Observatory in Chile, with which they mapped the surface and movement of the surface material of Antares. The result: they managed to take the best image of an extra-solar stars surface ever. Their research has been published by the ESO.

This was made possible by the VLTIs ability to combine light from four of its telescopes to create a virtual telescope that works like a single mirror thats 200 meters across. It, in turn, allowed the team to recreate a two-dimensional velocity map of a star, the first such beyond our solar system.

The VLTI is the only facility that can directly measure the gas motions in the extended atmosphere of Antares a crucial step towards clarifying this problem, Ohnaka explained in the release. By calculating the difference between the speed of the atmospheric gas in Antares at different positions and the average speed of the entire star relative to the VLTIs imaging array, he made it possible to map the relative speed of atmospheric gas across the surface area of Antares, on the ground, as it were. While this revealed the motions of gas clumps, it merely hinted at a process behind suchmovement thats still to be identified.The next challenge is to identify whats driving the turbulent motions, he added.

Ohnakas team has made it possible to study a stars surface from a far more effective viewpoint. They hope to duplicate this successin the study ofother stars. In the future, this observing technique can be applied to different types of stars to study their surfaces and atmospheres in unprecedented detail. This has been limited to just the Sun up to now, Ohnaka said. Our work brings stellar astrophysics to a new dimension and opens an entirely new window to observe stars.

The method Ohnaka and his team used could also provide better imaging of exoplanets that could help us glimpse atmospheric movements in these planets. Learning about what goes on in the atmospheres of exoplanets is crucial to knowingwhich of these could sustain life.

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Researchers Capture the Best Image of Any Star Ever Taken - Futurism

In Brief A group of planetary scientists studying Mars' atmosphere have finally obtained proof that it snows on the red planet. The snowstorms don't drop a lot of snow, but the way they form can make landings harder for future spacecraft.

We now have evidence that Mars gets its share of snow and that far from being only light flurries, theyre sometimes violent snowstorms.

These storms are much different from what was previously thought of the red planets weather, which only occurs at night and comes with intense gusts of wind. This new forecastcame from a combination of data on water-ice clouds, collected by the Mars Global Surveyor and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft over the years, and data gathered by NASAs Phoenix Lander, which ventured to Mars in 2008.

Its the first time anyone has shown that snowstorms, or water-ice microbursts, occur presently on Mars, said lead researcher Aymeric Spiga, a planetary scientist from the Universit Pierre and Marie Curie in Paris, to New Scientist. Any snow particles formed were thought to fall only very slowly through their own weight.

Spiga explains that previous attempts to find snowstorms were unsuccessfulbecause scientists were using the wrong models, or only one model at a time. Spiga and his team used more sophisticated and fine-scale modelling, allowing them to simulate Mars atmosphere in greater detail.

Many of the snowstorms will gradually come to an end before reaching the planets surface, but others can make it to ground level if a cloud forms closer to the surface. That said, the amount of snow isnt enough to ski on, or even to make a decent snowman.

The way it forms, however, could have an impact onfuture attempts to land on the planet for colonization.

Well, the associated winds found in the storm are rather vigorous, explained Franck Montmessin, another member of Spigas team studying Mars atmosphere, to ResearchGates blog. Since they occur in the lower part of the atmosphere, one might want to avoid these turbulent events to ensure a safe landing.

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New Research Shows Mars Experiences Violent Snowstorms - Futurism

In Brief New data from GTM Research suggests that rapid adoption of solar power could mean that its global gigawatt capacity rivals that of nuclear power by the end of 2017. While nuclear currently far exceeds solar in terms of energy generation, some predict solar could be the world's largest source of energy by 2050. Sunny Forecast

Solar energy has been on the rise, and based on new data from GTM Research, it could rival nuclear energy in terms of global capacity by the end of 2017.

The data, which is available in the most recent edition of Global Solar Demand Monitor, indicates that solar power will reach a capacity of roughly 390 gigawatts this year. Meanwhile, the latest figures from the Nuclear Energy Institute suggest that the world is currently home to 391.5 gigawatts of nuclear plants.

Solar growth is slowing slightly following a massive jump from 50.3 gigawatts added in 2015 to 77.8 gigawatts added in 2016, 81.1 gigawatts will likely be added in 2017. However, GTM Research expects that growth will continue at a steady rate, with total global capacity reaching 871 gigawatts by 2022.

Capacity is just one piece of the puzzle, though. Nuclear energy is still well ahead of solar in terms of electricity generated, outputting 2,476,671 gigawatt-hours compared to solars 375,000. That being said, the International Energy Agency projects that solar could feasibly become the worlds largest source of energy by 2050 due to its falling cost and increasing convenience.

Solar energy can help us reduce our reliance on fossil fuels, which we desperately need to do as our net emission of 37 gigatonnes of CO per year are wreaking havoc on the planet, causing global warming, extreme weather events, and millions of deaths.

Building solar panels has become much more cost-effective in recent years, which has fostered large-scale solar initiatives all over the world. Now, with Teslas solar roof panels set to provide homeowners with an inexpensive, aesthetically pleasing, and convenient way to take advantage of solar on an individual basis, the technology seems more poised than ever before for energy domination.

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In Brief The top three cryptocurrencies have gone through some changes in the last day, with Bitcoin and Ethereum dropping in price and Bitcoin Cash sharply falling, only to see another meteoric rise.

Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, and Ethereum experienced a few changes since Monday, with some rising to new heights and others dipping down.

As reported by Business Insider, both Bitcoin and Ethereum, the two biggest cryptocurrencies, have seen a single-digit percentage drop, while Bitcoin Cash has seen a double-digit rise.

Bitcoin dropped 2.2 percent against the US dollar as of Tuesday morning, and is now valued at $4,004.67. Ethereum, which recently announced its Metropolis update, saw a slightly larger drop than Bitcoin, dropping 3 percent to $310.32. This drop continued the currencys struggles to hit $350, and its unclear how the Metropolis update will further affect Ether token prices.

Although Bitcoin Cash only split from Bitcoin very recently,at the beginning of August, it quickly became the third-biggest cryptocurrencyin the world. Compared to the top two, Bitcoin Cash rose by 15.6 percent, to $696.39. As impressive as this may be, Business Insider notes the young currency managed to top $1,000 last weekend, but skepticism about its staying power caused it to fall sharply.

Expect prices to fluctuate, as they often tend to do, especially when regarding Bitcoin. Trusted trader masterluc predicts the top digital currency will hit $15,000 by the end of 2017.

Disclosure: Several members of the Futurism team, including the editors of this piece, are personal investors in a number of cryptocurrency markets. Their personal investment perspectives have no impact on editorial content.

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Bitcoin Cash Price Rises While Bitcoin and Ethereum Drop - Futurism - Futurism

In BriefIn an effort to improve the efficiency of naturalphotosynthesis, a researcher at the University of California,Berkeley, has created cyborg bacteria. These bacteria were trainedto grow and cover their bodies with tiny semiconductor nanocrystalsthat act as efficient solar panels for harvesting sunlight. Cyborg Bacteria

Although most life on Earth relies upon photosynthesis as its source of energy, the process has a weak link: chlorophyll. Plants and other organisms use the green pigment to harvest sunlight during photosynthesis, but it is rather inefficient. To that end, scientists have been searching for ways to upgrade natural photosynthesis sohumans would be able to capture and use energy from the Sun more efficiently.

Now, Kelsey K. Sakimoto, a researcher at Peidong Yangs lab at the University of California, Berkeley, has come up with a new alternative to natural photosynthesis: cyborg bacteria that were trained to cover themselves in solar panels that are much more efficient than chlorophyll at converting sunlight into useful compounds.

Rather than rely on inefficient chlorophyll to harvest sunlight, Ive taught bacteria how to grow and cover their bodies with tiny semiconductor nanocrystals, Sakimotosaid in a press release. These nanocrystals are much more efficient than chlorophyll and can be grown at a fraction of the cost of manufactured solar panels.

To produce his cyborg bacteria, Sakimoto fed them the amino acid cysteine and the element cadmium. The bacteria then synthesized cadmium sulfide (CdS) nanoparticles, which efficiently absorb light, functioning as solar panels on the bacterias surfaces. The new hybrid organism, called M. thermoacetica-CdS, produces useful acetic acid from light energy, water, and CO2 at a rate that outperforms any sources of natural photosynthesis.

Today, Sakimoto is presenting his work at the 254th National Meeting and Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS).

Humanity is facing an ever-growing need for alternatives to fossil fuels as we face down the consequences of greenhouse gas emissionsand a rapidly increasing population that requires energy to sustain.

Artificial photosynthesisisnot a new concept, and a system that requires only sunlight and simple organic chemicals to generate renewable energy cheaply and cleanly is understandably highly desirable.

While some limited progress has been made in this area, until now, no proposed solution has been nearly efficient enough to warrant commercial use.

Sakiomotos bacteria, however, operate at an efficiency of more than 80 percent and are both self-replicating and self-regenerating, making this a zero-waste technology with multiple uses. Once covered with these tiny solar panels, the bacteria can synthesize food, fuels, and plastics, all using solar energy, he explained. These bacteria outperform natural photosynthesis.

While he does acknowledge that more research is needed, Sakiomotois hopefully that his cyborg bacteria could prove to be a viable alternative to fossil fuels, helping the world produce energy more cheaply and cleanly.

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Cyborg Bacteria Could Be the Key to Commercially Viable Artificial Photosynthesis - Futurism

In BriefNEO is going head-to-head with Ethereum, claiming that itsplatform provides more options for scripting smart contracts andenhanced reliability. New Kid on the Blockchain

Cryptocurrency is on the riseand, as a result, theres no shortage of companies looking to establish themselves as an essential part of the trading process. In addition to organizations fielding new coins, there are firms that handle other pieces of infrastructure, like Blockchain specialist NEO (formerly known as AntShares).

NEOs biggest competition is currently Ethereum, the blockchain platform behind the prosperous Ether token. Both offer support for programming languages Vitalik Buterin, who originally conceived Ethereum, has felt that the absence of such support has been a major detriment to cryptocurrency but the group behind NEO maintains that its implementation has several advantages.

Smart contracts are automated agreements between traders that can call upon all kinds of different checks and triggers, ranging from a particular date to the balance of a particular account. NEO allows developers to write smart contracts and other projects using familiar programming languages like .NET and Java, with plans to support Python, Go, and JS in the future.

NEO also diverts from the likes of Bitcoin and Ethereum in eschewing the need for anonymity. The platform uses a digital identity system thats intended to help it integrate with the real-world economy. Digital identity is expected to give NEO a major advantage as it attempts to spur adoption in its origin country China.

Bitcoin and Ethereum use proof-of-work (POW) to validate transactions, but NEO instead uses a delegated Byzantine Fault Tolerance (dBFT) consensus method.

POW has strong availability, but it also has a big disadvantage, because it cannot ensure finality. Forks and lone blocks will occur easily, explained company co-founder and CEO Da Hongfei. dBFT ensures finality, which means that once a transaction is confirmed by a block, it is confirmed permanently without being rolled back or revoked. In our point of view, finality is far more important than availability in an important financial system.

Bitcoin was the first cryptocurrency to really make a splash, and it still leads the pack. However, it is still too early to determine the ramifications of itsrecent fork, which could turn out to be either ablessing or a curse.

NEO has been designed with a focus on avoiding the security issues that might prompt a fork. Reliability and stability are a big priority for its creators, having seen projects like Bitcoin Unlimited come undone as a result of such issues.

It certainly seems like NEO is being set up to fulfill the needs of tomorrows cryptocurrency market. That being said, competition from the likes of Bitcoin and Ethereum wont be easy to overcome.

Disclosure: Several members of the Futurism team, including the editors of this piece, are personal investors in a number of cryptocurrency markets. Their personal investment perspectives have no impact on editorial content.

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A New Blockchain Platform is Taking on Ethereum - Futurism

In Brief Jim Green, the head of NASA's planetary science division, has confirmed that SpaceX has told the agency that their Red Dragon program will not be ready to go to Mars as soon as previously expected. According to past statements by CEO Elon Musk, a revised timeline could be revealed next month.

NASA has confirmed that SpaceX is making changes to their previously announced timeline for a manned mission to Mars. Jim Green, head of the agencys planetary science division, acknowledged that NASA had been informed that Red Dragon was being put on the back burner.

SpaceX was originally planning to make the journey to Mars in 2018, with NASA providing assistance with regards to navigation and communications as part of a Space Act Agreement between the two organizations. Wed agreed to navigate to Mars, get [Elon Musk] to the top of the atmosphere, and then it was up to him to land, said Green.

Initially, Red Dragon was expected to use a propulsion landing system to make its controlled descent onto the surface of Mars. However, when SpaceX confirmed in July 2017 that the craft wouldno longer have these capabilities, many observers wondered whether the Mars mission might miss its launch date.

Back in June, Musk teased major changes to SpaceXs mission to Mars, noting that updates could arrive as soon as September, so the expedition likely isnt off the table entirely. Whats more, the CEO just revealed the space suitshis company is developing for NASA, so that relationship seems to be as strong as ever.

Getting to Mars is no small feat, but even if SpaceX has to amend their course, the Red Planet appears to still be a big priority.

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SpaceX Has Officially Put Red Dragon on the Back Burner, Delaying Mars Expedition - Futurism

In BriefBitcoin is the world's most popular cryptocurrency, and itsvalue continues to reach new heights. Here are a few reasons thisrelatively unknown digital coin was able to make the climb fromobscurity to the mainstream consciousness. Outstanding Performance

So far, 2017 has been an eventful year for Bitcoin.

The platform recentlyendured a hard fork that saw it split in two and come out seemingly unscathed. Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency has risen from relative obscurity to become a popular topic of discussion in the mainstream, with everyone from Bloomberg to Forbes covering it regularly. The year isnt even over, and bitcoin has reached numerous milestonesalready, both in terms of its own history and that ofcryptocurrency in general.

Overall, Bitcoin seems to be steadily trending upward, with even greater heights predicted for the platforms future. So, how did a cryptocoin originally associated with the internets darkest corners become a popular contender for the future of financial and other transactions?

Longevity seems to play a factor. After years of trading, the coin has proven itself as here to stay, leading to years of value increases first a steady rise from 2012 through 2016, and then a more dramatic surge that is still ongoing today.

A cryptocurrency researcher who goes by the Twitter handle Jack Sparrow shared a comparative overview of just how fast bitcoins value has risen.

After it was created in 2009, bitcoin needed roughly seven years to reach a $2,000 valuation. However, the crypto saw the same level of increase from $2,000 to $4,000 in a matter of just 85 days.

The numbers are backed up, of course, by confidence fromlarger institutions. Big financial firms like Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, and Fidelity Investments are now invested in the crypto, and nations such asChina, Japan, and, more recently, Australiahave started considering more permanent roles for cryptocurrencies in their respective economies as well.

All of this large-scale support is giving smaller organizations and individual investors confidencein the crypto.

The growing popularity of blockchain enterprise use has also contributed to the successes of Bitcoin and other platforms. As more institutions in the financial industry and beyondlook for ways to utilizethe decentralized and secure digital ledger, the cryptocurrencies that spring from these blockchains also get a boost.

Still, even with Bitcoins seemingly unstoppable successes, experts advise caution. As with any hot item, investing in bitcoin can be risky. Some, such as billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban and veteran investor Peter Schiff, even warn that the current cryptocoin craze is simply a bubble. However, while Schiff claims cryptocurrencies will never be money, many others thinkotherwise.

Are we witnessing the beginnings ofa truly cashless future? Only time will tell, and as with any revolution, Bitcoinhas many hurdles to overcome before it can truly transform our society. Right now, though, the crypto is clearly on the rise.

Disclosure: Several members of the Futurism team, including the editors of this piece, are personal investors in a number of cryptocurrency markets. Their personal investment perspectives have no impact on editorial content.

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Here's Why Bitcoin Rose More than $1000 in Two Months - Futurism

A New Kind of Composer

Break Free is the first sone released in a new album by Taryn Southern. The song, indeed, the entire album, features an artist known asAmperbut what looks like a typical collaboration between artists is actually much more than that.

Taryn is no stranger to the music and entertainment industry. She is a singer and digital storyteller who has amassed more than 500 million views on YouTube, and she has over 450 thousand subscribers. On the other hand, Amper is making his debutexcept hes (its?) not a person.

Amper is an artificially intelligent music composer, producer, and performer. The AI was developed by a team of professional musicians and technology experts, and its the the very first AI to compose and produced an entire music album. The album is called I AM AI, and the featured single is set to release on August 21, 2017.

Check out the song Break Free in the video below:

Asfilm composer Drew Silverstein, one of Ampers founders, explained to TechCrunch, Amper isnt meant to act totally on its own, but was designed specifically to work in collaboration with human musicians: One of our core beliefs as a company is that the future of music is going to be created in the collaboration between humans and AI. Wewant that collaborative experience to propel the creative process forward.

That said, the team notes that, contrary to the other songs that have beenreleased by AI composers, the chord structures and instrumentation of Break Free are entirely the work of Ampers AI.

Ultimately, Amper breaks the model followed by todays music-making AIs. Usually, the original work done by the AI is largely reinterpreted by humans. This means that humans are really doing most of the legwork. As the team notes in their press release, the process of releasing AI music has involved humans making signicant manual changesincluding alteration to chords and melodiesto the AI notation.

Thats not the case with Amper. As previously noted, the chord structures and instrumentationis purely Ampers; it just works with manual inputs from the human artist when it comes to style and overall rhythm.

And most notably, Amper can make music through machine learning in just seconds.Heres an example of a song made by Amper,andre-arranged by Taryn.

Yet, while IAMAI may be the first album thats entirely composed and produced by an AI, its not the first time an AI has displayed creativity in music or in other arts.

For example, an AI called Aiva has been taught to compose classical music, like how DeepBach was designed to create music inspired by Baroque artist Johann Sebastian Bach. With this in mind, the album is likely just the first step into a new eraan era in which humans will share artistry (and perhaps even compete creatively) with AI.

Editors Note: This article has been updated to clarify what songs were made by Amper and rearranged by Taryn.

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The World's First Album Composed and Produced by an AI Has ... - Futurism