AI event highlights artificial life amid pandemic

The fourth World Intelligence Congress, a major artificial intelligence (AI) event in China, opened online on June 23 in North China's Tianjin municipality, highlighting AI-powered life amid the pandemic.

The two-day event, with the theme of "Intelligent New Era: Innovation, Energization and Ecology," has attracted over 1 million visitors online.

A series of online activities, including forums, exhibitions and competitions, will be presented during the event. It will also discuss the growth points of AI, and other intelligent sci-tech industries in the post-pandemic era, hoping to provide more solutions for economic and social development.

Wan Gang, chairman of the China Association for Science and Technology, said AI-assisted diagnostic systems, temperature detection and a series of AI products and technologies are playing significant roles in the anti-pandemic fight.

"Smart technology has comprehensively supported work resumption and the development of the digital economy amid the epidemic," said Wan. "The data technology helped enterprises resume work and production, the health QR codes facilitated our travel, and the Internet of Everything (IoE) has made urban management and community services more efficient."

Wan added that technological innovation of AI should go beyond national boundaries, and that China will play a more active role in its global research and development.

"We will participate more actively in the division of labor in the global industrial chain, and jointly safeguard the stability, safety, improvement and development of the global industrial and supply chain amid the COVID-19 pandemic with the rest of the world," said Wan.