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  • Immediate First Call for Proposals: AI Techniques to Mitigate Pandemic

    21 Apr, 2020

    Up to $5.8 million in awards will be funded from this first call, ranging from $100,000 to $500,000 each. In addition to cash awards, C3.ai DTI recipients will be provided with significant cloud computing, supercomputing, data access, and AI software resources and technical support provided by Microsoft and C3.ai. This will include unlimited use of the C3 AI Suite and access to the Microsoft Azure cloud platform and access to the Blue Waters supercomputer at the National Center for Superc...
  • Machine learning could check if you’re social distancing properly at work

    21 Apr, 2020
    Andrew Ng’s startup Landing AI has created a new workplace monitoring tool that issues an alert when anyone is less than the desired distance from a colleague.

    On Thursday, the startup released a blog post with a new demo video showing off a new social distancing detector. On the left is a feed of people walking around on the street. On the right, a bird’s-eye diagram represents each one as a dot and turns them bright red when they move too close to someone else. The company says the t...
  • New Canadian app available to support mental health during COVID-19

    21 Apr, 2020

    Four corporations, including two life insurers, have banded together with some community organizations and developed a mobile app and website that offers all Canadians access to a range of free resources to support their mental health during the COVID-19 epidemic.

    Called WellCan, the collection of digital resources will be accessible, free and available to everyone in Canada online and in app stores this week. As an online hub of free mental health services offered to Canadians, We...
  • COVID-19 Vaccine Developers Gain Enhanced Access to Supercomputers

    21 Apr, 2020
    Federal agencies, academic institutions, and industrial partners are joining forces to combat COVID-19 using artificial intelligence.
    arlier this week, the White House announced the creation of the COVID-19 High Performance Copmuting Consortium, a coalition of federal agencies, academic institutions, and partners in industry to provide researchers working on vaccine development access to supercomputers, with an aim to expedite the end of the current pandemic.

    There are currently thr...
  • ITU-WHO Joint: Unleashing information technology to defeat COVID-19

    21 Apr, 2020
    The World Health Organization, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) with support from UNICEF are set to work with telecommunication companies to text people directly on their mobile phones with vital health messaging to help protect them from COVID-19. These text messages will reach billions of people that aren’t able to connect to the internet for information.

    Now more than ever, technology must ensure that everyone can access the information they need. The collaboration wi...
  • Hope as Italy records first fall in active virus cases

    21 Apr, 2020
    The number of people officially identified as infected with coronavirus in Italy has fallen for the first time since the country's outbreak began, authorities have said.




    As of Monday, there were 108,237 people either being treated in hospital or recovering at home, 20 fewer than the previous day.

    Authorities say the small but symbolic drop is a "positive development".

    Italy's lockdown continues until 3 May but some businesses have reopened.

    They include...
  • Apple and Google partner on COVID-19 contact tracing technology

    21 Apr, 2020

    Across the world, governments and health authorities are working together to find solutions to the COVID-19 pandemic, to protect people and get society back up and running. Software developers are contributing by crafting technical tools to help combat the virus and save lives. In this spirit of collaboration, Google and Apple are announcing a joint effort to enable the use of Bluetooth technology to help governments and health agencies reduce the spread of the virus, with user privacy an...
  • WHO warns that few have developed antibodies to Covid-19

    21 Apr, 2020
    Herd immunity hopes dealt blow by report suggesting only 2%-3% of people have been infected.

    Only a tiny proportion of the global population – maybe as few as 2% or 3% – appear to have antibodies in the blood showing they have been infected with Covid-19, according to the World Health Organization, a finding that bodes ill for hopes that herd immunity will ease the exit from lockdown.

    “Easing restrictions is not the end of the epidemic in any country,” said WHO director-general ...
  • Quantifying SARS-CoV-2 transmission suggests epidemic control with digital contact tracing

    21 Apr, 2020
    The newly emergent human virus SARS-CoV-2 is resulting in high fatality rates and incapacitated health systems. Preventing further transmission is a priority. We analyzed key parameters of epidemic spread to estimate the contribution of different transmission routes and determine requirements for case isolation and contact-tracing needed to stop the epidemic. We conclude that viral spread is too fast to be contained by manual contact tracing, but could be controlled if this process was faster...
  • Digital contact tracing can slow or even stop coronavirus transmission and ease us out of lockdown

    21 Apr, 2020
    A team at Oxford University is sharing an epidemiological model to help configure a contact tracing app for coronavirus. The model offers several safe configurations to introduce an app and a framework to optimise the app after it is released.The simulations confirm that if around half the total population use the app, alongside other interventions, it has the potential to stop the epidemic and help to keep countries out of lockdown. These research efforts are supporting several European proj...
  • Apple and Google partner on COVID-19 contact tracing technology

    21 Apr, 2020

    Across the world, governments and health authorities are working together to find solutions to the COVID-19 pandemic, to protect people and get society back up and running. Software developers are contributing by crafting technical tools to help combat the virus and save lives. In this spirit of collaboration, Google and Apple are announcing a joint effort to enable the use of Bluetooth technology to help governments and health agencies reduce the spread of the virus, with user privacy an...
  • Comparing COVID-19 with previous pandemics

    21 Apr, 2020
    In this article, we take a look back at some of the other pandemics that humans have endured. Specifically, we investigate cholera, the Black Death, and the Spanish flu, among others. We will note any similarities and take lessons where we can.

    Pandemics have played a role in shaping human history throughout the ages. Few people reading this today will remember outbreaks on this scale, but history shows us that although it is devastating, what we are experiencing now is nothing unusual...