👽️ The Martian

Mars simulation, PLUS AI in startups, education, and healthcare

This week’s drip: (5 minute read)  

  • 💸 Money Talks: Investors pour billions into AI boom

  • 🏥 Healing with AI: How AI is paving the way for innovative healthcare

  • 🏫 Smart Classrooms: Education enters the era of AI

  • 👽️ The Martian: Mars simulations and commercial space flights

  • 📰 Quick Bytes: This week’s roundup of the latest in the digital space

Are you surprised by the total investments in AI startups to date?

Source: Bay Area Times

IN STARTUPS

AI Cashes In

Investors went all-in on AI this past week, as evidenced by Inflection AI securing an impressive $1.3 billion. The Palo Alto-based startup has ambitious plans to create the “largest AI cluster in the world” and has already developed an AI-powered assistant, Pi. Other startups, Runway (specializing in AI image generation) and Typeface (focused on enterprise content creation), also raised significant funds. It’s clear that AI is attracting major corporations and VCs who see the immense potential and their investments speak volumes.

IN MEDICINE

The Rise of Smart Medicine

Augmedics is another startup to score $82.5M to propel AR and AI-driven spinal surgeries, the fastest growing category in the OR. Meanwhile, Insilico Medicine is testing an AI-conceptualized drug to treat chronic lung disease which has successfully cleared phase 1 trials, expediting the typical years-long process. This breakthrough could shake up Big Pharma, potentially turning AI-designed drugs into a $50 billion industry. And in the cancer fight, a new AI tool called Sybil could spot early signs of lung cancer from a single CT scan, revolutionizing early detection and treatment.

CT scans from same patient, taken two years apart: left scan shows area highlighted in red detected by Sybil, right scan shows radiologists’ observations two years later (Source: MIT & Mass General)

IN EDUCATION

Digital Learning

Schools are exploring the use of AI teaching bots to enhance personalized learning for students. In Newwark, NJ, Khan Academy’s Khanmigo is being tested as a tutoring tool, while Harvard is employing AI to grade assignments, teach coding, and provide personalized learning tips for their world-renowned CS50 online course. However, concerns exist around cheating, misinformation, and data collection ethics. Overcoming these challenges could pave the way for AI to revolutionize the future of education.

IN SPACE EXPLORATION

The Martian Experience

Space is having a moment. NASA just moved four volunteers into a 3D-printed simulated Mars habitat for a year-long staycation. While they aren’t astronauts, they’ll be working and living in the sim to see how long-term Mars missions might affect crew health and performance. This is just the first of three simulations, and the intel could help NASA prep for the real deal. Meanwhile, Virgin Galactic just completed its first commercial spaceflight, Galactic 01. With 800 passengers queued up for an out-of-this-world experience, the future of space tourism seems to be looking up, quite literally.

CHAPEA study crew’s actual habitat located at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX (Source: AFP via Getty Images)

QUICK BYTES

  • Brilliant Labs brings AI right to your eye with open-source lens 👓️ 

  • Databricks, a data and AI company, strikes $1.3 billion acquisition of generative AI startup, MosaicML 💰️ 

  • SnapCalorie app can count calories with just a snap 📸 

  • Midjourney 5.2 release includes new “zoom out” feature - click the tweet below to check it out 👇️ 

Bringing Hollywood to your browser…

Wonder Dynamics has packed a full-service CG character studio into a web platform. Check out this blockbuster move below 👇️ 

This week’s claimable AI-generated NFT created by Stable Diffusion XL

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