All posts tagged: seed

AI research lab NeoCognition lands M seed to build agents that learn like humans

AI research lab NeoCognition lands $40M seed to build agents that learn like humans

Published by skeptic

Investors are aggressively courting AI researchers to build startups that can make AI more reliable and efficient. Yu Su, an Ohio State professor leading an AI agent lab, said he initially resisted the pressure from VCs to commercialize his work. He finally took the leap last year and spun out his work into a startup when he saw that foundational model advances could make agents truly personalized. NeoCognition, a startup Su describes as a research lab developing self-learning AI agents, has just emerged from stealth with $40 million in seed funding. The round was co-led by Cambium Capital and Walden Catalyst Ventures, with participation from Vista Equity Partners and angels, including Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan and Databricks co-founder Ion Stoica. “Today’s agents are generalists,” Su (pictured left) told TechCrunch. “Every time you ask them to do a task, you take a leap of faith.” According to Su, the issue lies in a lack of consistency. Current agents, whether from Claude Code, OpenClaw or Perplexity’s computer tools, successfully complete tasks as intended only about 50% of …

Financial risk management platform Pillar raises M seed in round led by a16z

Financial risk management platform Pillar raises $20M seed in round led by a16z

Published by skeptic

Pillar, a platform that helps commodity-driven businesses (like those in metals, food, and airline companies) manage financial risk, announced Tuesday a $20 million seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz.  Others in the seed round include Crucible Capital, Gallery Ventures, and Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi. The company has raised $23 million to date. Pillar, founded in 2023, automates hedging processes for such businesses. Hedging is when a company places a trade that can offset or cancel out losses from other priced trades. Geopolitics has not been kind to the commodities market, which has seen much volatility in the past year.  Harsha Ramesh, the company’s co-founder and CEO (founded alongside Chinmay Deshpande, the company’s CTO), said the company uses AI to ingest and parse data from client contracts, cash flows, inventories, ERP software, spreadsheets, and even WhatsApp messages to “continuously analyze exposure across commodities, FX, and freight.” It can then build and manage a hedge portfolio for its clients, and adjust positions automatically based on “market conditions, volatility, and the client’s risk tolerance,” Ramesh continued. The platform …

Paul Seed, Coronation Street star and BAFTA winner, dies aged 78

Paul Seed, Coronation Street star and BAFTA winner, dies aged 78

Published by Daniella Wilson

Former Coronation Street star and television drama director Paul Seed has died at the age of 78, it has been confirmed. According to an obituary in The Guardian, the actor died on 7 March after being diagnosed with cancer. The obituary, by his friend and colleague Sir Tom Courtenay, who Seed directed in A Rather English marriage (1998), pays tribute to the late star, noting that “his career was defined by intelligence, emotional precision and a rare instinct for performance”. Courtenay adds: “He loved what he did, and this love communicated itself to his actors. I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who thought the world of him.” Seed was born in Bideford, Devon, and went on to study drama at the University of Manchester. After graduating in 1970, he appeared in a handful of TV roles throughout the 1970s including Coronation Street, in which he played the priest Father Harris. During his stint on the show, the character officiated the wedding of Gail Platt (Helen Worth) and Brian Tilsley (Christopher Quinten). Seed also played …

Avalanche Beat the Blues 3-1 to Clinch Central Division and Top Seed in the Western Conference

Avalanche Beat the Blues 3-1 to Clinch Central Division and Top Seed in the Western Conference

Published by Sam Flores

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Valeri Nichushkin scored twice and Colorado Avalanche beat the St. Louis Blues 3-1 on Tuesday night to clinch the Central Division and the top seed in the Western Conference. It is the third time in five seasons, and first since 2023, that the Avalanche finished as the top team in the conference. Martin Necas also scored and Scott Wedgewood made 18 saves for Colorado, which has earned points in eight of its last 11 games. Wedgewood was shaken up midway through the third period after Philip Broberg made contact with him after being tripped by Sam Malinski. Wedgewood was driven awkwardly into the post and stayed down for several minutes, but remained in the game. Robert Thomas scored and Joel Hofer made 34 saves for the Blues, whose slim playoff hope took a hit with the loss. Colorado outshot St. Louis 17-3 in the first period and had a two-goal lead as a result. Nichushkin gave the Avalanche the lead with 3:49 left in the first and Necas made it 2-0 …

Turf vs seed: which is the best option for you?

Turf vs seed: which is the best option for you?

Published by Daniella Wilson

Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more Stay ahead of the curve with our weekly guide to the latest trends, fashion, relationships and more As gardeners start to spruce up their lawns in spring, some will be wondering which option to go for – turf or seed? There are pros and cons to each, says lawn expert Luke Taylor, co-author of Lawns: An Uncomplicated Guide, with Marc Kerr, joint founders of lawncare service So & Mo. “It’s all down to scenario and cost,” says Taylor, and here, he weighs up the options of each. For the budget-conscious “If you can afford to returf, it’s going to be the quickest way, whereas if cost is a factor, there’s no doubt that seeding is a lot more cost-effective,” says Taylor. For quick-fix gardeners If you want a transformation, turf is for you, and once laid should be ready for play …

Duke No. 1 overall in men’s tournament, UConn women get top seed : NPR

Duke No. 1 overall in men’s tournament, UConn women get top seed : NPR

Published by Sam Flores

The Duke Blue Devils were the top overall seed in the 2026 NCAA Division I men’s college basketball tournament after a 74-70 win over Virginia in Saturday’s ACC Tournament title game. Jacob Kupferman/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Jacob Kupferman/Getty Images March Madness is upon us. It’s Selection Sunday, the day the brackets for the men’s and women’s NCAA Division I college basketball tournaments are released. The 32-2 Duke Blue Devils, fresh off a 74-70 win in the ACC Tournament championship game on Saturday over Virginia, were named the top overall seed in the men’s tournament. On the women’s side, the UConn Huskies will enter the NCAA tournament undefeated for the first time since 2018 with ambitions of repeating as national champions. They were named the women’s top overall seed.  You can see the complete bracket for the men’s tournament here, and the women’s bracket can be found here. The men’s tournament begins with the “First Four” matchups on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the full Round of 64 beginning Thursday. The women’s tournament follows behind …

In Chile’s desert, a seed bank holds the key to the future of agriculture : NPR

In Chile’s desert, a seed bank holds the key to the future of agriculture : NPR

Published by Sam Flores

Ana Sandoval, a dedicated researcher at Initihuasi Seed Bank, nurturing the future with a pot of shooting seeds — preserving biodiversity one sprout at a time. John Bartlett for NPR hide caption toggle caption John Bartlett for NPR VICUÑA, Chile — Vicuña, the birthplace of Chile’s first Nobel laureate, writer Gabriela Mistral, is a dusty little town in the north of the country with colorful facades and cracked cobblestone squares. The breeze fans its streets, billowing curtains out across empty sidewalks, and street sellers shrink away from the oppressive desert heat, taking their jams and sugar-coated papaya slivers into the shade of covered markets. A few miles outside of this small town, nestled in the Atacama Desert — one of the driest places on Earth — camouflaged against the reddish brown of a harsh rocky slope, is a research facility dug into the hillside, its hum of activity carried on the dry desert breeze. This is the Initihuasi Seed Bank, the mothership in a nationwide network of facilities which are preserving the biological record of …

Traditional seed cake recipe

Traditional seed cake recipe

Published by Sam Flores

I didn’t grow up with seed cake but love the lemony aniseed notes of caraway. If you’re keen on dark rye breads – often flavoured with caraway – you’ll like this too. I first had seed cake at St. John in London, served with a glass of Madeira (a fine pairing). Recipes for it appeared from the late 1500s but it really became popular in the Victorian age.   Source link

The seed vaults that could save humanity

The seed vaults that could save humanity

Published by Jenni Sidey

Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent every weekday. Amid the 872-day siege of Leningrad in the early 1940s, nine people died protecting a library. This library was not for books, but for seeds collected from around the globe. The nine who died were food scientists, starving to death alongside 700,000 of their neighbors. The library they were protecting was the world’s first seedbank, an ancestor to current-day genebanks worldwide. Genebanks are biorepositories used to store genetic material, like seeds and cells. Their origins came from a wanderlusting Russian plant-lover named Nikolai Vavilov who dreamed of a one-stop shop for seeds from all over the world for researchers, scientists, and breeders to learn from and use to fight famine. Vavilov made 115 expeditions to 64 countries, collecting 380,000 samples for the seedbank in Leningrad, growing it into an agricultural bounty so diverse and valuable, even the Germans caught wind of it. After the Nazi siege and Vavilov’s death in the Gulag, his idea turned into something even more monumental: an …