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BLOCKCHAIN
Blockchain refers to a decentralised system of recording information that makes it difficult or
impossible to change, hack, or cheat the system. Every business runs on information and blockchain
is a shared ledger on which transactions are recorded and assets (tangible or intangible) in a
business network are tracked. Tangible assets include houses, cars, cash, lands, etc. and intangible
assets include intellectual property, patents, copyrights, branding, etc.
It is a distributed digital ledger of transactions that is duplicated and distributed across the entire
network of computers on the blockchain. Each block in a chain may contains a record of multiple
transactions. When a new transaction occurs, it is added to the blockchain and recorded in every
participant’s ledger. Anything that carries value can be recorded and tracked and can be traded on
a blockchain network ensuring transparency, security, and immutability in the exchange of assets.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
You have already read about artificial intelligence in earlier classes. AI is a branch of computer
science that aims at creating expert and intelligent computer systems which simulate certain
human qualities such as, learning, reasoning, communicating, seeing, hearing, and sensation. AI
is used to create intelligent machines that help us. AI is a part of almost everything we use today
such as smartphones, cars and banks. Some main areas of application of AI are:
Expert System: These are communicating computer
User
programs that solve problems which would otherwise Interface
require human expertise. These programs replicate User (not
Inference an expert)
the reasoning process of experts in certain areas. For engine
example, PROSPECTOR was the first expert system that
Knowledge
analysed geological data to identify and locate mineral base
deposits. Human Knowledge
expert engineer
Natural Language Processing: It is the study of methods by which
computers can recognise and understand spoken or written human
language. Speech recognition software are an example of NLP
where computers translate spoken speech into text.
Intelligent Agents: It is a type of computer program that has built-in
intelligence which keeps a check on the work patterns, asks questions
and performs tasks on the behalf of the user. A simple example of
intelligent agents is when we search for something on the Internet.
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