Overview of AI Applications Assisting Us In The Fight Against Covid-19

Covid-19 coronavirus reports change daily and even hourly. The public health emergency has already swept the whole world: the virus threatens people's lives, affects business and interferes with travel. 

How the Covid-19 coronavirus will affect our daily life and work is still unclear because this disease is spreading all over the world for the first time, but there is an assumption that artificial intelligence (AI) will help fight the virus and its economic impact.

A report by the World Health Organization last month declared that AI and big data are a vital solution to tackle the virus. This article will explore some machine learning-based methods people use to detect or combat coronavirus.

Chatbots answer questions related to coronavirus

One of these chatbots - Bespoke - was created in Japan in 2011 after a strong earthquake. Today you can find the latest news on the outbreak of coronavirus, disease statistics around the world, information on prevention and symptoms, as well as the latest developments in the field of transport services.

In the United States, they have developed a chatbot with artificial intelligence that identifies flu symptoms. To do this, send data on temperature and pulse, as well as an audio recording of cough. Now this chatbot is asking clarifying questions related to the coronavirus. For example, have you recently traveled to China or other outbreak hubs?

You are aware of the fact of how the coronavirus damaged economies and trading in the world. A lot of European markets crashed, and even forex markets were affected. Of course, severe disruptions caused by Covid-19 have not missed the latter, but it did not hinder top forex brokers from adopting an innovation featuring chatbot. The chatbot which we have mentioned in the previous case is similar. It offers people the news about the coronavirus, how to protect and tackle it. Not only brokers help people find useful information, but they also think it will help them to attract more customers after the pandemic is over.

Artificial Intelligence can detect, track, and the model outbreak of disease

Canadian startup BlueDot has developed one of the most successful disease risk prediction systems. Their artificial intelligence scans about 100 thousand articles in 65 languages ​​daily. Therefore, it was the first to detect an outbreak of coronavirus in China back in December 2019.

Johns Hopkins University has developed a program that collects real-time information on coronavirus infections worldwide.

Artificial intelligence can create mathematical models that help describe the evolution of a disease — its peak and decline. A similar model was used during the outbreak of coronavirus in Italy.

Artificial intelligence helps find a cure for coronavirus

To create an effective vaccine, you need to understand the structure and nature of the new coronavirus thoroughly. The Google DeepMind division has used its latest artificial intelligence algorithms to study proteins that may be associated with Covid-19. The company published its research in the public domain. DeepMind says their computational predictions of protein structures have not been tested experimentally, but they hope that they will help the scientific community understand how coronavirus works.

BenevolentAI uses artificial intelligence systems to create cures for the most severe diseases. A few weeks after the outbreak of a new coronavirus, they tuned their system so that it selects existing drugs that could help.

Several large technology companies, such as Tencent, DiDi, and Huawei, provide researchers with their cloud computing resources and supercomputers. The speed with which these systems can perform calculations and model solutions will help much more quickly develop a cure or vaccine for a new coronavirus.

The Stanford University project Folding@home offers anyone who wants to help the scientific community in the fight against coronavirus. To do this, you need to install a special program on your computer and connect to a distributed network for resource-intensive scientific calculations. While you are not working at a computer, it will calculate precisely how protein chains in the coronavirus cells interact with each other. By correctly modeling the structure of the virus, scientists will be able to find a cure for it quickly. 

Detection of fever in people in public places

To detect coronavirus, AI uses cameras equipped with thermal sensors.

The Singapore hospital and government medical facilities are real-time, checking the temperature by launching the KroniKare system, which runs on a smartphone with a temperature sensor.

The artificial intelligence system developed by Baidu, a Chinese technology company, is equipped with an infrared sensor and artificial intelligence to determine people's body temperature; it is now used at the Qinghe Railway Station in Beijing.

Baidu technology makes it possible to determine forehead temperatures in 200 people in 1 minute with an accuracy of 0.5ºС by combining computer vision and infrared radiation. The system warns authorities if it detects a person with a temperature above 37.3 degrees Celsius since elevated temperature is a harbinger of coronavirus. Baidu products are used to monitor body temperature at Beijing South Railway Station and line 4 of the Beijing Metro.

Last month, the Shenzhen Micromulticopter announced the launch of more than 100 unmanned aerial vehicles in several Chinese cities. Drones can not only determine the temperature but also spray disinfectants and patrol public places.

Conclusion

Now we can understand how artificial intelligence helps people detect and fight against this annoying coronavirus. While there is still a long way for the virus to be contained, AI does a great job to restrict the spread of it.