Author: Ilya Ferapontov

Robot-assisted surgery is still perceived as “the future is here,” a hallmark of high-tech medicine, and is on the verge of becoming routine practice. In eye microsurgery, where microscopic precision of movements is critical, robotic surgical assistants are often indispensable. But now Chinese medical researchers have developed and begun testing a robot capable of performing intraocular surgeries autonomously. Soon, we may face a situation where the human surgeon doesn’t control the robot-surgeon at all, but simply observes. Who will bear responsibility for the surgical outcome? Isn’t the risk too high?

Modern medical practice is virtually unthinkable without numerous wearable electronic devices. Miniature flexible devices that continuously monitor blood glucose levels, blood pressure, pulse, or other vital parameters have become an integral part of daily life and an indispensable element of diagnostics and treatment.

The current AI boom has caused many people to worry about losing their jobs, though not to the same extent. In some cases, respected professionals and real scientists have made convincing predictions that “machines will steal your job.” These professions can be seen as canaries in a coal mine, warning of impending change. One such profession is radiology. According to machine learning experts, machines should have taken over this job a long time ago. Yet, oddly enough, they have not been able to do so. This makes the case of radiologists worthy of detailed study and extremely interesting for anyone concerned about the threats of automation.

Bionic prostheses usually look futuristic and cool in scientific articles and commercials, but most users consider them “stupid” devices that are tedious to use. Most of these prostheses are primitive to control; the user must tell the prosthesis what and how to do in order to achieve the simplest result, such as picking up a cup of coffee. Researchers at the University of Utah have proposed transferring some control of the prosthesis to a computer so that it decides how to move and the user focuses on what needs to be done.

In April of this year, a group of Toshiba researchers published a landmark article in Nature that may have escaped the attention of our readers. In the article, the engineers and physicists demonstrated how quantum communication could be established between different cities using existing optical network infrastructure. Until now, quantum messages could only be transmitted via special, expensive, and labor-intensive networks. In fact, the “quantum internet” existed primarily on university campuses.