Friday Futures: regenerating your brain, “open” AI, Google Glass 2.0

brain
Image credit: Gwoeii / Shutterstock.com

Welcome to Friday Futures, our weekly guide to the latest visions of  The Future from around the web. This week: regenerating your brain (also lungs); blue diamonds; open AI; placing bets on Trump assassination; Google Glass and Nicholas Negroponte.

Geckos can regenerate parts of their brain. Can we, maybe?

We knew that geckos can regenerate their tails (and spinal cords). But it turns out that geckos can regenerate parts of their brain, too, according to researchers from the University of Guelph. Read more…

Maybe we could grow new lungs. Wait, we can!

In the US alone, more than 1,400 people are waiting for a lung transplant — there simply aren’t enough donor lungs available to meet the need. Soon, though, patients might have a new source for brand new lungs: the lab. Read more…

Blue diamonds come from waaay underground

Blue diamonds – like the world-famous Hope Diamond at the National Museum of Natural History – formed up to four times deeper in the Earth’s mantle than most other diamonds, according to new research. Read more…

Openness in AI? Yeah, right, to a point

Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft and Google have all released software their own engineers use for machine learning as open source. At the same time, these proponents of AI openness are also working to claim ownership of AI techniques and applications. Read more…

You can bid on whether Trump gets assassinated before Christmas

Right now, there’s an online bidding war over whether or not Donald Trump will die before the year is out. All a would-be assassin has to do is stake a whole bunch of money on “yes” and they’d make a fortune. (Not that we’re advocating such a thing.) Read more…

Google Glass is back, but not where you might expect

Jennifer Bennett, a technical director for Google Cloud, announced that Google Glass would be returning. But instead of being a goofy headset that your everyday person can use to covertly record everyday life, it’s geared towards industrial applications. Read more…

Video: Here’s how urban agriculture is transforming Detroit. Watch now…

Video: Worth watching – 30 years of Nicholas Negroponte’s predictions of the future (from 2014). Watch now…

(Compiled by Alex Leslie and edited by John C. Tanner)

Be the first to comment

What do you think?

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.