CYBER NEWS

AI is evolving every day, and every day we wake up to the next innovation which should ease our lives. Take Melody, the chatbot powered by artificial intelligence that resides within the Baidu Doctor app for both Android and iOS. Baidu Doctor collects medical data from users and then transfers it to doctors. The received data should help doctors with diagnostics. The app also enables users to contact local doctors, make appointments, and ask questions, and the chatbot is added to make the process more efficient.

Melody Only “Speaks” Chinese, For Now

For now, Melody is only available in Chinese, and hence, is only applicable in China. The app that houses Melody also allows users to ask medical questions and make appointments with their doctors. But Melody is mostly helpful with easing the patient-doctor communication by reducing the time needed for the exchange of information.

Furthermore, the chatbot send responses on behalf of doctors but only after the doctors have verified the info.

Baidu chief scientist Andrew Ng has said that:

It’s not our role to diagnose — it’s the doctors’ role to diagnose. We try to assist the doctors.

What Type of AI Does Melody Use?

Melody employs deep learning, a technique that involves training artificial neural networks on lots of labeled data.

Deep learning is a type of machine learning based on a set of algorithms that attempt to model high level abstractions in data by using a deep graph with multiple processing layers, composed of multiple linear and non-linear transformations.

This is not the first time Baidu uses deep learning. It has employed it for many purposes, such as speech recognition,object detection, and prediction of advertising click-through rates (CTRs).