April 2018 Ideas and Innovation

Read the articles selected in April 2018

With €1.5 billion for artificial intelligence research, Europe pins hopes on ethics

By Tania Rabesandratana

Source: Science, 25 April

Europe challenges the Chinese and American competitors with a plan on artificial intelligence which intends to bring further the boundaries of the knowledge ensuring an ethical benchmark through an AI model based on the privacy, transparency, and fairness.

Marsquakes set to reveal tantalizing clues to planet’s early years

By Alexandra Witze

Source: Nature, 26 April

A seismometer put on the Martian surface will capture the planet’s inner tremors known as marsquakes to understand its inner structure, density, and composition. Pinning down the planet’s internal layers might shed light on the early history of the Earth.

Researchers make plastic-eating mutant enzyme better –by accident

By Damian Carrington

Source: The Guardian Domestic, 17 April

An accidental discovery will make possible to recycle plastic bottles back into plastic for food, reducing the amount of PET in the environment. The research paves the way to the technological development of super-enzymes, but a full life-cycle assessment will be always needed.

See attached

When big data can bring big gains to society

By Sonia Sodha

Source: The Observer Domestic, 22 April

In a time when data privacy has become a priority matter of law, sharing the own health records can become a game changer, enabling researchers to develop new treatments for important diseases. But our concerns about our personal rights change asymmetrically in relation to big companies and health national systems.

See attached

Les pistes de Cédric Villani pour combler le retard français

Source: Le Figaro, 29 March

The Villani report on AI affirms the need to create a European specific model and strategy in the sector, highlighting the role the public institutions and an ethical education have for a responsible data processing and endorsing the creation of a shared and open source of data and sectorial platforms for the exchange of information.

See attached

Rapport Villani: qu’en pensent les experts?

By Benoît Georges

Source: Les Echos, 10 April

The weakest points of the Villani report, pinpointed by seven experts, highlight the need to not emphasize the ethical issues, leaving more room to the entrepreneurial actors in order to facilitate the creation of value and jobs, as well as investing on a network of interdisciplinary institutes on artificial intelligence.

See attached

Do adult human brains renew their neurons?

Source: The Economist, 12 April

Two studies published respectively in Nature and Cell Stem Cell draw on contradictory conclusions on the possibility of neurogenesis in adulthood. Although both the experiments have used the same technique, different procedures in the inspection of post-mortem brain samples could explain the opposite results.

“Warm transplants” save livers and lives

By Elie Dolgin

Source: Nature, 18 April

A device already approved in Europe but still not routinely used outside of clinical trials allows to maintaining livers for transplants at body temperature with a treatment which can reduce the risk of degeneration and could increase the number of transplants, opening the door to further treatment of donor organs.

Consulta l’articolo:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-04816-8

Quand l’environnment influence les gènes

By Sylvie Logean

Source: Le Temps, 7 April

In the last twenty years, the discovery of the epigenetics has shown the impact of the lifestyle and the environmental conditions in the DNA expression. The epigenetic modifications, the fundament of biological diversity, are critical factors in the breakout of many diseases.

See attached

Intelligence artificielle: en finir avec les mirages

By Vincent Champain

Source: Les Echos, 9 April

When we speak about artificial intelligence we should name things after their real meaning, avoiding terms that leave free room for prophetic fantasies. The capacity of these technologies is limited to well-defined tasks and can’t replace the human intelligence.

See attached

Les trois visages de l’intelligence artificielle

By Luc Ferry

Source: Le Figaro, 5 April

The human brain can’t be compared to artificial intelligence under any point of view. Even in its “super” and contextualizing version, its performance is only vertical, while the self-consciousness of the “strong” IA is always lacking a body and therefore feelings.

See attached

Demand cancer drugs that truly help patients

di Ajay Aggarwal

Fonte: Nature, 10 Aprile

La maggior parte dei farmaci sono approvati dalle agenzie regolatrici senza una chiara evidenza di una migliore sopravvivenza o qualità della vita e di una ridotta tossicità. Un basso livello di controllo sui trials toglie terreno all’innovazione e spreca denaro.

Consulta l’articolo:

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-04154-9

Study questions animal data underlying many clinical trials

By Emma Yasinski

Source: Science, 5 April

A new study reveals that the investigator brochures produced by researchers to get the authorization for a clinical trial based on animal data don’t give sufficient evidence to allow regulatory and ethical agencies to make a sound judgment about the drugs’ safety and benefit for human health.

People must retain control of autonomous vehicles

By Ashley Nunes, Bryan Reiner & Joseph F. Coughlin

Source: Nature, 6 April

Developers of self-driving cars are not obliged to meet the safety standards of current cars. It is needed a legislation designed through a collaboration across many disciplines. Favoring the industry over consumers erodes support for the technology.

Beijing launches pioneering brain-science center

By David Cyranoski

Source: Scientific American, 6 April

The brain science-center just launched in China will be the structure for projects that use the most innovative biomedical methods as well the big data, and plans to develop more precise imaging tools to deliver detailed views of brain activity.

NASA’s next exoplanet hunter will seek worlds close to home

By Alexandra Witze

Source: Nature, 4 April

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, differently than its predecessor Kepler, will find fewer planets, but with a more focused approach. This new mission is interested in planets orbiting around nearby stars, and so close to form the basis for deep studies and important discoveries.

La blockchain peut-elle révolutionner le droit d’auteur?

By Raphaël Bloch

Source: Les Echos, 20 March

The Bitcoin technology is going to revolutionize the copyright and the cultural industry. Thanks to its capacity to record transactions and protect data in a transparent and indisputable manner, blockchain blocks the abusive exploitation of the works on the net and allows a direct contractual relationship between the artist and the consumer.

See attached

Beguiling dark-matter signal persists 20 years on

By Davide Castelvecchi

Source: Nature, 28 March

Rita Bernabei, a physicist at our university has presented at a meeting in Gran Sasso National Laboratory the latest data from an experiment called DAMA, which has been trying for 20 years to detect the presence of dark matter, with results that haven’t so far been achieved by every other finding in the sector.

La technologie au chevet de la vaccination

By Nadia Fourti

Source: Le Temps, 29 March

The digital technologies can improve the efficacy of vaccinations, whether through the registration of personal data, which is crucial for the coverage of all children or through monitoring tools for the cooling chain. This could save the lives of 1.5 million children every day.

See attached

Interested in responsible gene editing? Join the (new) club

By Martin Enserink

Source: Science, 27 March

A group of European scientists has founded in Paris the Association for Responsible Research and Innovation in Genome Editing (ARRIGE), with the aim to promote an ethical awareness on this so pervasive technique and to set a social dialogue needed to guide national and European legislation.

Info

Pubblicato il : 07/05/2018
Modificato il : 04/04/2019

April 2018 Ideas and Innovation

Info

Condividi

Allegati