Singularity University’s inaugural Global Summit is kicking off today in tech capital San Francisco and running through August 30th.
The Singularity Hub team will be on the ground, covering some of the best speakers, and bringing you live Facebook interviews to give you a taste of the magic too.
SU’s three exponential summits all have a unique industry focus—finance, medicine, and manufacturing.
But the focus of Global Summit is to go broad, showcase trends in emerging technologies, and explore how they’re converging within several industries.
Experts in deep learning such as Jeremy Howard and AI thought-leader Neil Jacobstein will have a fireside chat on the future of machine learning and AI. Authorities in education Esther Wojcicki and Leila Toplic will explore new moonshots in the education sector.
Alex Filippenko, a well-known professor of astronomy and physical sciences at University of California, Berkeley, will enlighten us on the frontiers of space exploration and share what we need to know about exoplanets.
Additional speakers at Global Summit will dive into subjects including:
- New business opportunities created by advances in robotics and AI.
- Ways AR/VR can enhance creativity and innovation.
- How nanotechnology will improve cancer treatment therapies.
- How to use minimal resources to start a movement.
- Why the maker movement matters.
Recent updates on core emerging technologies:
Below is a series of Singularity Hub articles covering some recent breakthroughs in core technologies—AI, augmented reality, nanotech, biotech, transportation, and energy—which will be central to the conversation at Global Summit.
Be sure to join the conversation in real-time on Twitter with @SingularityHub and @SU_GlobalSummit or using the hashtag #GSummit.
Singularity University Global Summit is the culmination of the Exponential Conference Series and the definitive place to witness converging exponential technologies and understand how they’ll impact the world.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
IBM’s New Artificial Neurons a Big Step Toward Powerful Brain-Like Computers
“Thanks to a sleek new computer chip developed by IBM, we are one step closer to making computers work like the brain. The neuromorphic chip is made from a phase-change material commonly found in rewritable optical discs (confused? more on this later). Because of this secret sauce, the chip’s components behave strikingly similar to biological neurons: they can scale down to nanometer size and perform complicated computations rapidly with little energy.”
–Shelly Fan
AUGMENTED REALITY
Pokemon Go Is a Glimpse of Our Augmented Reality Future
“Pokémon Go is already a huge phenomenon and is well on its way to overtaking Twitter in terms of daily active users. By now, you’ve probably seen almost as many articles about Pokémon Go as I’ve seen Pidgeys in the game (quite a lot)…In a time when it sometimes feels like our technology is pulling us further and further apart, I had incredible, authentic, and most importantly, human interactions thanks to this game.”
–Jason Ganz
NANOTECHNOLOGY
How Nanotech Will Lead to a Better Future for Us All
“In the last decade, nanotechnology has advanced and is finding practical applications. Some teams are developing nanoscale patterns on medical implants that can stimulate bone cell growth and positive gene expression. Others are working to make guided nanoparticles that detect (and even destroy) cancer cells.”
–Alison E. Berman
BIOTECH
Chisels to Genes: How We’ll Soon Grow What We Used to Build
“All around the natural world, we witness life forms which, driven by the programming of their DNA, produce massive, complex things from tiny beginnings. As George Church suggested, ‘A minuscule fertilized whale egg produces an object as big as a house. So maybe one day we can program an organism, or a batch of them, to produce not the whale but the actual house.’ Neri Oxman of MIT, also imagines a world where instead of building, we’ll be able to grow more.”
–Sveta Mcshane
TRANSPORTATION
Carpool Apps Are on the Rise—Here’s How to Make Them Go Big
“The cell phone ride hail apps like Uber and Lyft are now reporting great success with actual ride-sharing, under the names UberPool, LyftLines and Lyft Carpool. In addition, a whole new raft of apps to enable semi-planned and planned carpooling are out making changes.”
–Brad Templeton
ENERGY
Meet the Reactors Accelerating Us Toward Fusion Energy
“Traditional nuclear reactors split atoms to create energy. These fission reactors run on processed uranium and leave behind radioactive waste. Fusion, on the other hand, is the same process that keeps the sun shining. Fusion reactors would run on abundant hydrogen isotopes and, in theory, create significantly more energy than fission with comparatively little waste.”
–Marc Prosser
Image credit: Shutterstock
