Industry Watcher’s Digest

Buzzworthy developments of the past few days.

• AI had a hand in almost 4,000 job losses in May. So reports the outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas. Healthcare wasn’t hit especially hard. The tech, retail, automotive and financial sectors took bigger slams from AI and all other causes. Still, this latest report marks the first time Challenger has included AI in its employment survey, suggesting things not just to come but already here—for pretty much every industry. Report here, brief analysis by CBS News’s MoneyWatch here.
   
• Boards of directors at organizations developing or using AI need to ‘step up’ to head off confirmation bias. So believes Bill Schmarzo, data science instructor, influencer and wearer of many hats under the Big Data tent. Making the case at Data Science Central, Schmarzo writes that such data deficiency “is of significant concern in fields such as employment, education, housing, healthcare, finance and criminal justice, where the consequences of incorrect predictions can be destructive.” Read the post.
   
• GE HealthCare has won FDA clearance for its Sonic DL system. The letters stand for Deep Learning, and the company says the system dramatically speeds MRI image acquisition: It can capture high-quality cardiac images in a single heartbeat. Announcement.
   
• AI has eyes for blockchain. And the admiration seems mutual. As AI assistants are increasingly dispatched to help people navigate blockchain environments, blockchain becomes more and more accessible to non-experts. Cryptocurrency aficionado John Kiguru of Crypto News Flash breaks it down.
   
• Aesop Technology (Chicago) is working with AstraZeneca Taiwan to use AI for aiding clinicians treating cancer patients. Called Medigator, the software works by heading off unwanted disruptions that would have set back administration of immunotherapy drugs. Announcement.
   
• Researchers are using AI to improve existing techniques for fighting superbugs. The work is ongoing at the University of Michigan. The team says its model is simply the best at predicting interactions between proteins and nanoparticles, a key tactic in the war against antibiotic-resistant infections. Details.
   
• The European Union is pressing social media companies to clearly label content created with a hand from generative AI. The stepped-up campaign reflects the EU’s determination to fight fake news and disinformation, not least hogwash emanating from Russia as part of its war strategy against Ukraine. (Not that all sides don’t do it.) Coverage current in The Guardian, NBC News, Associated Press, Reuters, ABC News …
   
• Patients undergoing painful medical procedures may soon choose to let virtual reality lull them into a state of deep relaxation. A study supporting the hypnotic technique’s merit is running in a peer-reviewed journal and summarized in Health Imaging.