Scholarships will support computing science students from under-represented groups
A new scholarship program funded by DeepMind is helping to foster diversity in artificial intelligence research at the University of Alberta. The program, which will support two master’s students in the U of A’s Department of Computing Science, is targeted toward graduate students including women, Indigenous people and other groups that are under-represented in the field of AI.…
U of A spinoff company launches MedROAD virtual clinic in Alberta, making long-distance health care a reality during COVID-19
A new pilot project called MedROAD is bringing the power of precision health to Pincher Creek, Alta. – and seeing promising results. MedROAD promises to be the future of telehealth, leveraging the power of artificial intelligence and cloud-based computing to remotely connect patients with health-care professionals, no matter where they are. Developed at the University of Alberta by computing scientist Pierre…
Researchers develop AI tool to analyze brain scans, identify risk for earlier diagnosis and treatment
University of Alberta researchers have taken another step forward in developing an artificial intelligence tool to predict schizophrenia by analyzing brain scans. In recently published research, the tool was used to analyze functional magnetic resonance images of 57 healthy first-degree relatives (siblings or children) of schizophrenia patients. It accurately identified the 14 individuals who scored highest…
In creating a program that could play the ancient Chinese board game Go – the aim of which is to surround more territory than the opponent – researchers at DeepMind fed their machine learning system a diet of about 30 million Go moves and set it against the one opponent it couldn’t beat: itself. Thousands of…
Researchers develop new tool capable of precision diagnosis and better classification of blood products
Machine learning could change the way donated blood is evaluated for quality and selected for transfusion to patients, thanks to an international study that analyzed changes in the shape of red blood cells from stored samples. The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was a collaboration of experts in…
U of A computing scientist Omid Ardakanian is working on software to make buildings more comfortable while cutting emissions, lowering costs
For most of us, office cooling and heating systems are like wallpaper: you only really notice them if they catch fire. For Omid Ardakanian, office buildings offer potential energy savings on a skyscraper scale. “My obsession, if you want to call it that, comes from the sensors in these buildings,” said Ardakanian, a computing science professor…
Artificial intelligence can do a lot to help businesses, but its dynamic, complex nature can also make it challenging to learn – which is where Stephanie Husby loves to step in. As a machine learning educator for the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (Amii), the University of Alberta graduate teaches the AI for Strategy and Management course, helping non-technical managers…
U of A computing scientists working with Edmonton company to find out if applying AI to water treatment is a financial, environmental win-win
A pilot project leveraging the University of Alberta’s artificial intelligence expertise to improve the process of making drinking water safe is up and running in Drayton Valley, Alta. The U of A’s Reinforcement Learning and Artificial Intelligence Lab, along with the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute, an Alberta not-for-profit institute with U of A affiliations, Edmonton infrastructure technology…
Understanding and safeguarding personal freedom and civil rights is more critical than ever. So who is policing the police?
Policing is the only authority sanctioned to use force against its citizens. So democratic systems institute safeguards to ensure police impartiality and accountability, often with multiple and overlapping oversight. But who’s keeping an eye on the growing use of technology in policing? The police services board is one prevalent form of oversight responsible for ensuring…
How future changes in the structure of business and the nature of work could impact the environment
Replacing humans with robots clearly has a dystopian flavour. But could the successive waves of artificial intelligence (AI) and other exponentially developing technologies displacing jobs, ranging from banker to construction worker, have potential positives for the environment? According to a 2016 McKinsey automation study, about a third of most job activities, affecting 49 per cent…
A new scholarship program funded by DeepMind is helping to foster diversity in artificial intelligence research at the University of Alberta. The program, which will support two master’s students in the U of A’s Department of Computing Science, is targeted toward graduate students including women, Indigenous people and other groups that are under-represented in the field of AI.…
