Trends in AI development

Image: IFI Claims

A recent report from Digital Science’s IFI Claims reveals some surprises about patents for generative AI, or GenAI for short. You might have been thinking that Meta and OpenAI would be leading the pack, but in fact, it’s traditional U.S. computing giants IBM, Google, and Microsoft who hold most patent applications. Samsung, Adobe, and Intel play catchup while OpenAI is left in the dust with fewer than five GenAI patents. While in fourth place in the 2023 U.S. patent ranking overall, IBM is now the strongest contender in the field of GenAI, with 1,500 patent applications in 2023; 22% more than Google and double that of Microsoft.Full report here.

This episode of Science News covers the biggest current controversy in astrophysics, does dark matter exist or do we instead need to change the law of gravity? If you’ve followed me for some while, then you’ll know that my opinion on this has switched back and forth a few times. In this most recent iteration, it’s flipped back to it’s probably dark matter. Then again… it’s complicated.

Do We Need a New Category for the Strongest Hurricanes?

Hurricane Alex. Image Credit: NASA.

A storm of controversy is brewing in the climate community as scientists debate whether to upgrade an over-fifty-year storm rating scale to include a Category 6 hurricane. The current system is called the Saffir-Simpson scale, and labels storms from Category 1 to 5 by wind speeds. However, researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the First Street Foundation evaluated the adequacy of the current five-category system via a combination of historical analysis and simulated predictions of future events based on rising temperatures. The team then proposed an additional Category 6 for storms with winds exceeding 192 mph. When the team analyzed storm data since 1980, they found five hurricanes in the last decade that could have been classified as Category 6. When simulating future storms, they found that even below the 1.5°C temperature increase targeted by the Paris Accords, the chance of a Category 6 hurricane was about 2%; this risk increased to 7% at a 2°C increase and 10% at the 3°C level. But other scientists are less certain that a new category will help assess risk, or worry that it could even detract from dangers. Professor Liz Ritchie-Tyo of Monash University in Australia writes in The Conversation that Cyclone Jasper in Queensland “dumped huge volumes of water and triggered devastating floods” despite being labeled as only a Category 2 storm. Other, more specific rating systems including water-bearing levels could potentially be more effective for assessing storm risk than simply adding additional wind speed ratings.You can read press releases about the pros here and cons here and read the full paper proposing the upgrade here.

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Blue Cheese Cheers Up in Multi-Colour

A cheese wheel of new colours for blue cheese. Image Credit: Cleere et al. (2024), NPJ Sci Food  2024 Jan 8;8(1):3 and University of Nottingham.

In a cheesy culinary breakthrough, a team of food scientists at the University of Nottingham have “cheered up” blue cheese by introducing a vibrant spectrum of colors to its palette, including white, yellow, chartreuse, teal, pink, peach, and more. While experimenting with Penicillium roqueforti – a fungal strain used in the production of blue vein cheeses like Stilton, Roquefort, and Gorgonzola – the team discovered a fascinating biochemical pathway in biosynthesis of DHN-melanin which causes the blue color by darkening the cell walls of fungal spores in the blue cheese. With a combination of genetic engineering and classic breeding techniques, the team was able to delete genes creating novel strains of the fungus with new colors and flavors. The team found that lighter coloured strains were associated with milder tastes, and darker hues with greater taste intensity. The team is now collaborating with commercial cheese marketers. Check out the press release here, the full study here, and listen to an interview with team lead Dr. Paul Dyer on the Future of Foods podcast here.

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