Initiative on the Digital Economy | About the New Initiative The Initiative on the Digital Economy (IDE) is a major effort addressing one of the most critical issues of our time: the impact of digital technology on businesses, the economy, and society. Drawing on MIT Sloan’s strengths in technology and innovation, its internationally recognized faculty, and more than a decade of research and partnership with MIT Sloan’s Center for Digital Business, the IDE is analyzing the broad sociological changes brought about by the advance and spread of digital technology. While digital technologies are rapidly transforming both business practices and societies and are integral to the innovation-driven economies of the future, they are also the core driver of the great economic paradox of our time. On one hand, productivity, wealth, and profits are each at record highs; on the other hand, the median worker in America is poorer than in 1997, and fewer people have jobs. Technology is advancing quickly, but organizations and skills advance slowly.
UCLA Health - Innovation and Technology - Robotic Surgery - Minimally Invasive Procedures Robotic Surgery UCLA surgeons are using a da Vinci surgical robot to help them perform extremely precise operations through very small incisions. While traditional laparoscopic tools provide a limited range of motion, robotic tools offer greatly improved freedom of motion that is similar to that of the human hand. It is currently used at UCLA for applications such as cardiothoracic procedures, prostatectomy and hysterectomy. Watch Video: Robotic Surgery for Prostate Cancer Learn more: Robotically assisted prostatectomy uses minimally invasive tools to treat cancer (Clinical Update) Robotic Telemedicine A new breed of robot allows physicians to virtually consult with patients in the UCLA neurosurgery intensive care unit, even if they are miles away. Learn more: Robot helps prof train new surgeons in Italy Learn more: New robots help doctors keep an eye on patients, even when they can't be bedside. Watch Video: Robotic Telemedicine State-of-the-Art Medical Center The cradle of PET/CT Imaging
Medical Robotics - Assistive robots | KUKA Laboratories Today, robots are already assisting humans in making diagnoses, and planning and administering medical treatment. In the future, mechatronic assistants will also help to improve the autonomy and quality of life of patients and other people in need. In the area of Medical Robotics, KUKA Laboratories offers kinematic systems and technologies at the highest level of technical expertise. Together with our customers, we develop ideas and solutions. KUKA robotic technologies are used in a wide range of medical applications: Radiology / imaging systems Radiation therapy Patient positioning Research: Rehabilitation Minimally invasive surgery Laser osteotomy For years, KUKA has been a top supplier and development partner of leading companies in the field of medical robotics. Now concentrated as an independent research and development center at KUKA Laboratories, this business segment is being systematically expanded at KUKA.
Welcome Can workers actually be beneficiaries of the digital economy? MIT Sloan Professor Zeynep Ton believes the answer is yes. And just as importantly, she says, businesses won’t lose out in the process. Much has been written and discussed about the economic inequalities created as a result of digital technologies. In this blog, for example, MIT Research Scientist, Andrew McAfee, cites significant economic data supporting the view that IT is responsible for tectonic changes in U.S. jobs and wages. Professor Ton’s latest research offers some win-win scenarios for employees and their employers. In a recent presentation, Ton, Adjunct Associate Professor of Operations Management (pictured at left), went beyond defining the problems of job displacement, dissatisfaction and despair; she offered solutions. Tossing Out Conventional Wisdom However, better operational strategies can break the pattern, she says. Zara, Mercadona and QT Find Win-Win Formulas How do they do it? 1. 2. 3. 4. Biography:
MRes Admission for October 2015 will open in November 2014. Are you a science/engineering graduate looking to apply your skills to applied problems in a dynamic and interdisciplinary field? Are you interested in modern surgery and medical imaging techniques? Do you want an academic or industrial career in research and development? If so, the MRes in Medical Robotics and Image Guided Intervention may be the right course choice for you. Also see the video that describes the course structure and content. Medical Robotics and Image Guided Intervention are two technology driven areas of medicine that have experienced tremendous growth and improvement over the last twenty years, partly driven by the surgical aim of progressively less invasive and harmful treatments. Students will spend nine months working on a cutting edge research project. A recent news article on the course can be found here. A brochure for the 2015/16 academic year can be found here. Scholarship Opportunities Course Content
10 Medical Robots That Could Change Healthcare From microbots that scrape plaque from arteries to personal assistant robots that help care for patients, medical robots are transforming the face of healthcare. 1 of 11 Robots aren't new to healthcare. For example, Magnetic Microbots are a group of tiny robots used in various operations, such as removing plaque from a patient's arteries or helping with ocular conditions and disease screenings. "In the next few years, thousands of 'service robots' are expected to enter the healthcare sector -- picture R2-D2 from Star Wars carrying a tray of medications or a load of laundry down hospital corridors," according to a recent article from The Wall Street Journal. And that's no surprise considering the mounting financial difficulties the industry faces. "This new robotic breed is boasting features increasingly found in smartphones, gaming consoles and other consumer electronics, from advanced sensors and motion detectors to powerful microprocessors and voice activation. More Insights
The Clearest Trend in the American Workforce It’s been a while since I posted data on US employment trends, so here’s a chart created with FRED’s snazzy new graphing interface. It shows the employment rate (in other words, 100 – the standard unemployment rate) in blue, the employment-to-population ratio (the % of working-age people with work) in green, and the labor force participation rate (the percent of working-age people who have work or are actively looking for it) in red. This graph clearly shows a very steady up-then-down trajectory in the red line — of the labor force participation rate. It’s affected very little by recessions (the gray bars in the graph), and instead appears to be responding to deeper forces. The most obvious of these forces are the demographics of the American labor force. So is retirement the main reason that the red line is going down these days? I’m more persuaded by the lower figure. Also, disability claims started spiking right around the year 2000, and have almost doubled since then:
Robotic-Farming Grows With the Ladybird My following article below was originally published by SERIOUS WONDER: Robots are going to steal your job, but that’s okay, because they’ll be liberating us away from boring, strenuous and monotonous labor and give us far more time in doing what we truly want to do. Agriculture will not be an exception, and is in fact moving fast in becoming a model of what the entire workforce will eventually transform into. In today’s age, we’ll be witnessing the coupling of the agricultural revolution with the industrial revolution – robotic farming. From drones to autonomous tractors, robotic farming is here to stay and (dare I say it?) grow! Serious Wonder was able to briefly speak with Professor Salah Sukkarieh, the lead researcher in project Ladybird, to which he stated: “Ladybird is a completely new approach to agriculture robotics. The Ladybird is an omnidirectional, self-driving vehicle with three goals in mind: collect data, analyze data, and harvest. Like this: Like Loading...
Study indicates Robots could replace 80% of Jobs In a few decades, twenty or thirty years — or sooner – robots and their associated technology will be as ubiquitous as mobile phones are today, at least that is the prediction of Bill Gates; and we would be hard-pressed to find a roboticist, automation expert or economist who could present a strong case against this. The Robotics Revolution promises a host of benefits that are compelling (especially in health care) and imaginative, but it may also come at a significant price. The Pareto Principle of Prediction We find ourselves faced with an intractable paradox: On the one hand technology advances increase productivity and wellbeing, and on the other hand it often reinforces inequalities. In his study Elliot relies on advances in speech, reasoning capabilities and movement capabilities to illustrate how robots and technology can replace jobs. I am in agreement with the general thoughts of the study, although I believe speech recognition is now far more advanced than Elliot states.
The Rich and Their Robots Are About to Make Half the World's Jobs Disappear Two hugely important statistics concerning the future of employment as we know it made waves recently: 1. 85 people alone command as much wealth as the poorest half of the world. 2. 47 percent of the world's currently existing jobs are likely to be automated over the next two decades. Combined, those two stats portend a quickly-exacerbating dystopia. That's according to a 2013 Oxford study, which was highlighted in this week's Economist cover story. And, as is historically the case, the capitalists eat the benefits. The prosperity unleashed by the digital revolution has gone overwhelmingly to the owners of capital and the highest-skilled workers. Those trends aren't just occurring in the US, either. The trend extends beyond a few handfuls of the planet's most mega-tycoons, of course: "The wealth of the 1% richest people in the world amounts to $110tn (£60.88tn), or 65 times as much as the poorest half of the world."
Advances in Artificial Intelligence Could Lead to Mass Unemployment Warn Experts Speaking on Radio 4’s Today programme, Dr Stuart Armstrong from the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford said that there was a risk that computers could take over human jobs “at a faster rate than new jobs could be generated.” “We have some studies looking at to which jobs are the most vulnerable and there are quite a lot of them in logistics, administration, insurance underwriting,” said Dr Armstrong. “Ultimately, huge swathe of jobs are potentially vulnerable to improved artificial intelligence.” Dr Murray Shanahan, a professor of cognitive robotics at Imperial College London, agreed that improvements in artificial intelligence were creating “short term issues that we all need to be talking about.” "It's very difficult to predict," said Dr Shanahan. Both academics did however praise Google for creating an ethics board to look at the “how to deploy artificial intelligence safely and reduce the risks” after its £400 million purchase of London-based start-up DeepMind.