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For two straight quarters, deal activity in artificial intelligence has hit record highs. Dennis Mortensen is one of the biggest winners in all the craze. His startup x.ai is the creator of Amy Ingram, an AI-driven personal assistant that can schedule meetings for you. After testing Amy in beta for two years, Mortensen announced last week  $23 million in Series B funding to bring Amy to market. In an interview, I chatted with Mortensen about the differences between Amy and Siri, the fundraising market right now and the future of AI. Edited excerpts: Caroline Fairchild: Why all the AI hype right now? Dennis Mortensen: AI used to be for academia only and decades-long research. We thought one day we might wake up and have this oracle or human-level AI which we could converse with. We have realized this might not happen, but we might be able to create these specialized or "verticalized" AI tools where we can build AI to do one thing really well. It could be Amy scheduling...

Justice Jude Okeke of the FCT High Court on Monday ordered the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to pay N5 million to Abba Mohammed for violation of his right. Mr. Okeke held that the EFCC failed to prove why the applicant was detained for about 41 days without being charged to court. “The applicant’s contention that his fundamental right was denied him by the respondent was not proved otherwise; there must be reasonable suspicion upon which the detention was made. “The right of the applicant has been violated by the respondent by detaining him for about 41 days without making reference to any court. “His fundamental right to liberty was denied him and he was detained for about 41 days; he applied to this court and an order to release him on bail was given. “He was refused bail despite meeting the bail conditions given to him by this court; the respondent, acting under the cover of section 7 of the EFCC Act, failed to present enough evidence. “I have given due...

Cancer patients and car crash victims could soon be given life-saving transfusions of artificial blood, thanks to a breakthrough by British scientists. They are close to making vast quantities of platelets, the microscopic cells that make blood clot, reports the Daily Mail of UK. Platelet transfusions are regularly given to car crash victims, cancer patients and to plug life threatening bleeds after surgery, but the cells have a short shelf life. Work by the Cambridge University and NHS Blood and Transplant paves the way for a synthetic supply – generated from skin cells. Excitingly, it may be possible to create one product that suits all patients, removing the need to match it to blood type. And it may even be possible to supercharge the lab-made cells, meaning they are even better at clotting than the real thing. The hope centres on stem cells – ‘blank’ cells with the ability to turn into other cell types. Using cocktails of vitamins and chemicals, the scientists turned...

The Nigerian Senate has asked the Minister of Transport, Chibuike Amaechi, to resign his appointment as Minister or apologize to the Senate and Nigerians over the Lagos-Calabar rail project that has generated a lot controversies in the last 48 hours. Members of the National Assembly and the presidency have been at loggerheads after media reports alleged that the National Assembly members had removed the Lagos-Calabar rail project from the budget presented to it by President Buhari. The reports alleged that the National Assembly members diverted the money meant for the said project to the Lagos-Kano project, favoring the Northern region.  Speaker of the House of Representatives Yakubu Dogara and Chairman House Committee on Appropriation Abdulmumin Jibrin, via their twitter handles refuted the claims while the Chairman Senate Committee on Transport, Gbenga Ashafa, in a statement he released, said although the project was not included in the original budget forwarded to the National ...

A composite metal foam that stops armor-piercing bullets in their tracks could be the future of bulletproof body and vehicle armor, scientists say. Composite metal foams (CMFs) are tough enough to turn an armor-piercing bullet into dust on impact. Given that these foams are also lighter than metal plating, the material has obvious implications for creating new types of body and vehicle armor – and that’s just the beginning of its potential uses. Afsaneh Rabiei, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at NC State, has spent years developing CMFs and investigating their unusual properties. The video seen here shows a composite armor made out of her composite metal foams. The bullet in the video is a 7.62 x 63 millimeter M2 armor piercing projectile, which was fired according to the standard testing procedures established by the National Institute of Justice (NIJ). And the results were dramatic. (The video can also be found at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWmFu-_54fI). ...

I don’t need to hide my identity anymore, as my church members and others are already aware of this development. I am based in the United Kingdom and a member of the Redeemed Christian Church of God here in the UK. I am a 24-year-old Nigerian girl. I have lived in the UK for over five years, running into my 6th year already. However, as it is generally held, “life is not always smooth and straight” I understand that life, most of the time is full of ‘zig and zag’ just like it’s characterized with ups and downs. My story is not different after all. I have had my good times too, and I consider this time as my most trying moment. I am writing this note, not exactly because I regret my action of taking full control of a married Pastor, but because I have sensed something that is really not going to work for me in the most positive way, if I keep this pregnancy. I don’t regret my action because I understand that pastors too are human beings, and have the same feelings like the rest of us. ...