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Stanford engineers have developed a transparent silicon overlay that can increase the efficiency of solar cells by keeping them cool. The cover collects and then radiates heat directly into space, without interfering with incoming photons. According to a local HVAC Spokane, WA company, “If mass-produced, the development could be used to cool down any device in the open air – for instance, to complement air conditioning in cars.”

After a full day in the sun, solar cells in California can approach temperatures of 80° C (175° F), even in winter months. Excessive heat can pose problems because, while the cells need sunlight to harvest energy, they also lose efficiency as they heat up. A standard silicon cell, for example, will drop from 20 to 19 percent efficiency by heating up just 10° C (18° F) or so.

Laptops address the overheating problem with the help of carefully engineered fans and heat sinks, but for solar panels and other devices that work in the open air, space itself could serve as heat sink par excellence. The coolness of space, approaching absolute zero, would negate the need for elaborate and expensive heat dissipation contraptions – if only we had a way to access it from the ground.

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Have you hugged or told someone that you love them today? Maybe it wasn’t someone — maybe it was your smartphone that you gave an extra squeeze or gave an extra pat as you slipped it into your pocket. Humans have become increasingly invested in their devices, and a new era of emotional attachment to our devices and other AI seems to be upon us. But how does this work itself out on the other end — will or could AI ever respond to humans in an emotional fashion?

Communication Sparks Emotional Response

AI is broad, and clearly not all AI are meant to give and receive in an emotional capacity. Humans seem prone to respond to features that are similar to its own species, or to those to which it can relate to in some sort of communicative way. Most “emotional” or responsive algorithm-based capabilities have been programmed into robots that are in a humanoid – or at least a mammal-like – form.

Think androids in customer-service, entertainment, or companion-type roles. There are also robots like PARO, the baby harbor seal used for therapeutic interaction with those in assisted living and hospital environments.

In a 2003 paper published through the International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Cynthia Breazeal quotes a study by Reeves and Nass (1996), whose research shows humans (whether computer experts, lay people, or computer critics) generally treat computers as they might treat other people.

Breazeal goes on to state that humanoid robots (and animated software agents) are particularly relevant, as a similar morphology promotes an intuitive bond based on similar communication modes, such as facial expression, body posture, gesture, gaze direction, and voice.

An Emotional Model for AI

This in and of itself may not be a complete revelation, but how you get a robot to accomplish such emotional responses is far more complicated. When the Hanson Robotics’ team programs responses, a key objective is to build robots that are expressive and lifelike so that people can interact and feel comfortable with the emotional responses that they are receiving from a robot.

In the realm of emotions, there is a difference between robot ‘responses’ and robot ‘propensities’. Stephan Vladimir Bugaj, Creative Director at Hanson Robotics, separated the two during an interview with TechEmergence. “Propensities are much more interesting and are definitely more of the direction we’re going in the immediate long-term”, he says.

“An emotional model for a robot would be more along the lines of weighted sets of possible response spaces that the robot can go into based on a stimulus and choose a means of expression within that emotional space based on a bunch of factors.” In other words, a robot with propensities would consider a set of questions, such as “What do I think of the person? How did it act in the last minute? How am I feeling today?”. This how most humans function through reason, though it happens so habitually and quickly in the subconscious that we are hardly aware of the process.

Context of immediate stimulus would provide an emotional frame, allowing a robot to have a more complex response to each stimulus. The use of short-term memory would help the robot build a longer-term emotional model. “You think of it as layers, you can think of it as interconnected networks of weighted responses…as collections of neurons, there’s a lot of different ways of looking at it, but it basically comes down to stages of filtering and considering stimuli, starting with the input filter at the perceptual level.”

Similar to a human being, robots could have more than one response to a stimulus. An initial reaction or reflex might quickly give way to a more “considered response”, cause by stored and shared information in a neural-like network. Stephan describes a hypothetical scene in which a friend enters a room and begins taking swings at his or her friend. At first, the friend who is on the defense might react by immediately assuming a fighting stance; however, it might only take a few seconds for him or to realize that the other person is actually just “horsing around” and being a bit of an antagonist for sport.

This string of events provides a simple way to visualize emotional stages of reaction. Perception, context, and analysis all play a part in the responses of a complex entity, including advanced robots. Robots with such potential complex emotional models seem different from AI entities programmed to respond to human emotions.

The Beginnings of Responsive Robots

These AI don’t necessarily need to take a human-like form (I’m thinking of the movie Her), as long as they can communicate in a language that humans understand. In the past few years, innovators have started to hit the IndieGogo market with domestic social robots such as Jibo and EmoSPARK, meant to enhance human wellbeing through intelligent response capabilities.

Patrick Levy Rosenthal, founder of EmoSpace, envisioned a device that connects to the various electronic objects in our homes, able to adjust their function to positively affect our emotional state. “For the last 20 years, I believe that robotics and artificial intelligence failed humans…we still see them as a bunch of silicon… we know that they don’t understand what we feel.”

Rosenthal set out to change this perception with EmoSPARK, a cube-like AI that calibrates with other objects in the user’s home, such as an mp3 music player. The device, according to Rosenthal, tracks over 180 points on a person’s face, as well as the relation between those points – if you’re smiling, your lips will be stretched and eyes more narrow. The device also detects movement and voice tonality for reading emotional cues. It can then respond to those cues with spoken prompts and suggestions for improving mood – for example, asking if its human user needs to hear a joke or a favorite song; it can also respond to and process spoken commands.

While robots that respond to humans’ emotionally-based states and requests may soon be available to the masses, robots that have their own emotional models – that can “laugh and cry” autonomously, so to speak – are still out of reach, for the time being.

Just days ago it was announced that a 3D printed guide developed by researchers in Minnesota could help facilitate the regrowth of damaged nerves within the human body. In the wake of this exciting breakthrough, is another progressive use for 3D printing within the medical world, as the same researchers have found a way to release biomolecules into the body through a 3D printed scaffold with more precision than ever before.

The 3D printed scaffolds were developed by Michael McAlpine, an associate professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Minnesota, and were funded in part by the NIBIB (National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering).

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The first all-optical permanent on-chip memory has been developed by scientists of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and the universities of Münster, Oxford, and Exeter. This is an important step on the way towards optical computers. Phase change materials that change their optical properties depending on the arrangement of the atoms allow for the storage of several bits in a single cell. The researchers present their development in the journal Nature Photonics (10.1038/nphoton.2015.182).

Light determines the future of information and communication technology: With optical elements, computers can work more rapidly and more efficiently. Optical fibers have long since been used for the transmission of data with light. But on a computer, data are still processed and stored electronically. Electronic exchange of data between processors and the memory limits the speed of modern computers. To overcome this so-called von Neumann bottleneck, it is not sufficient to optically connect memory and processor, as the optical signals have to be converted into electric signals again. Scientists, hence, look for methods to carry out calculations and data storage in a purely optical manner.

Scientists of KIT, the University of Münster, Oxford University, and Exeter University have now developed the first all-optical, non-volatile on-chip memory. “Optical bits can be written at frequencies of up to a gigahertz. This allows for extremely quick data storage by our all-photonic memory,” Professor Wolfram Pernice explains. Pernice headed a working group of the KIT Institute of Nanotechnology (INT) and recently moved to the University of Münster. “The memory is compatible not only with conventional optical fiber data transmission, but also with latest processors,” Professor Harish Bhaskaran of Oxford University adds.

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Quantum teleportation, the act of reconstructing quantum data somewhere else, is impressive just by itself. However, scientists at the US’ National Institute of Standards and Technology have managed to one-up that feat. They’ve broken the distance record for quantum teleportation by transferring the information from one photon to another across 63 miles of optical fiber. That may not sound like much, but it’s an achievement just to beam that data in the first place — 99 percent of photons would never make the complete trip. It was only possible thanks to newer detectors that could pick up the faint signal of the lone light particle.

You’d clearly need to send much more information before this teleportation becomes practical, but the achievement does open the door to many possibilities in quantum computing. You could use unbreakable quantum encryption at inter-city distances, for instance. The biggest challenge may simply be to extend the range to the point where quantum data transfers work on the scale of the internet, where there are occasionally thousands of miles between connections.

[Image credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto].

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The latest version of a walking, quadruped battlefield robot from Boston Dynamics, the military robotics maker owned by Google X, was tested by U.S. Marines last week.

Spot weighs about 70kgs, is electrically operated and walks on four hydraulically-actuated legs. It’s controlled via wireless by an operator who can be up to 500 meters away.

It underwent trials and testing at Marine Corps Base Quantico in Virginia as part of evaluations by the Marines on future military uses of robotic technology. In a series of missions, it was evaluated in different terrains including hills, woodlands and urban areas.

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Having significantly damaged nerve tissue is bad for a lot of reasons because it doesn’t regenerate easily and it can lead to various serious medical conditions including paralysis. But many scientists are already studying ways of fixing this issue, and a team of researchers from the University of Minnesota, Virginia Tech, University of Maryland, Princeton University, and Johns Hopkins University has figured out how to use 3D printing for nerve growth.

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The technology they’ve developer has allowed them to regrow nerve tissue in lab rats and restore normal walking ability 10 to 12 weeks after the 3D printed guide was implanted.

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