Canadian researchers who taught AI to learn like humans win $1M Turing Award

Yoshua Bengio, Geoffrey Hinton, Yann LeCun share ‘Nobel of computer science’ for work on deep learning
Yoshua Bengio, Geoffrey Hinton and Yann LeCun, left to right, are the winners of this year’s $1 million US Turing Award, the world’s top prize in computer science, the Association for Computing Machinery announced Wednesday. (Université de Montréal/Google/Facebook)

Three researchers, two of them Canadian, have won the world’s top award in computer science for developing the ability of computers to learn like humans, by imitating the human brain and how it functions using networks of “neurons.”

That allows computers to acquire new skills by looking at lots of examples and finding and recognizing patterns, as humans do.

Machine learning — based on “deep learning” and “neural networks” —  has led to the development of artificial intelligence that now powers everyday web and smartphone applications from voice, image and facial recognition to language translation. It’s increasingly being used in more complicated tasks like generating art, creating text and diagnosing cancer from images.

The Turing Award is described by the Association for Computing Machinery, which hands out the annual award, as the “Nobel Prize of Computing” and worth $1 million US. The association announced Wednesday that the 2018 award goes to:

  • Yoshua Bengio, professor at the Université de Montréal and scientific director of Mila, Quebec’s Artificial Intelligence Institute.
  • Geoffrey Hinton, emeritus professor at the University of Toronto, vice-president and engineer fellow at Google, and chief scientific advisor at the Vector Institute.
  • Yann LeCun, professor at New York University and vice-president and chief AI scientist for Facebook, who did his postdoctoral work at Hinton’s University of Toronto lab and then worked with Bengio at Bell Labs.

The Turing Award is named after British mathematician, computer scientist and Second World War codebreaker Alan Turing. It has been sponsored by Google since 2014, but the company said it’s not involved with the selection committee, which honours “lasting contributions to the field of computer science.”

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Testing the value of artificial gravity for astronaut health

Testing the value of artificial gravity for astronaut health

by Staff Writers, Space Daily,  Paris (ESA),  Mar 22, 2019

The short-arm centrifuge at the German Aerospace Center’s (DLR) :envihab facility in Cologne, Germany will be used during the first joint long-term bedrest rest study commissioned by ESA and US space agency NASA to investigate the potential of artificial gravity in mitigating the effects of spaceflight. The study begins on 25 March 2019 and will run for 89 days. Test subjects will need remain in beds with the head end tilted 6 degrees below horizontal for 60 of these days to simulate the microgravity of space.

Test subjects in Cologne, Germany will take to their beds for 60 days from 25 March as part of a groundbreaking study, funded by European Space Agency ESA and US space agency NASA, into how artificial gravity could help astronauts stay healthy in space.

Carried out at the German Aerospace Center’s (DLR) :envihab facility, the long-term bedrest study is the first of its kind to be conducted in partnership between the two agencies. It is also the first to employ DLR’s short-arm centrifuge as a way of recreating gravity for participants.

But just how easy is it to stay in bed for 60 days and what is the relevance of adding artificial gravity for space researchers? We pull back the covers on this unique investigation as preparations get underway.

A dream job
Bedrest has long been used to mimic some of the changes our bodies experience in the weightlessness of space. Humans are made to live on Earth and without the constant pull of gravity it is common for muscles and bones to start wasting away.

Currently, astronauts on board the International Space Station exercise for up to 2.5 hours per day and maintain a balanced diet to help mitigate microgravity’s effects, but scientists believe adding a dose of artificial gravity could be key during longer-term missions.

Though it may sound simple for the 8 male and 4 female volunteers involved, lying in bed for a full 60 days, plus a further 29 days of acclimatisation and recovery, is not quite as restful as it seems.

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