How AI is making us smarter

Based in the tech wonderland that is east London, Memrise is one of the most popular language-learning apps around. Users love the way it switches dry textbooks and disengaging classroom activities for ingeniously fun games and the most useful bits of a language you actually need to know when visiting a new place. The creators know that if learning is boring your brain simply won’t do it as well as it could. By turning lessons into games and allowing users to click on the app for bite-sized lessons on the go, the results are astonishing. Or rather, they’re erstaunlich (that’s amazing).

Whereas Memrise gives you the option of learning loads of different languages, Voice Blox just concentrates on one: Mandarin. Famously a language non-native speakers struggle to acquire, Mandarin has four distinct tones. This is where Voice Blox comes in. Using ‘Fourier’ analysis software, the programme deconstructs and analyses the user’s vocal frequencies and turns them into a physical 3D shape. Language-learners get to literally feel what their pronunciation, and the correct one, sound like on the tactile surface, then match them up. This multi-sensory approach to acquiring Mandarin has proven to be incredibly effective. It was created with the help of a student and professionals working at Imperial College London.

The other London university leading the way in AI-assisted language-learning techniques is UCL. In 2018, researchers there developed an app to help patients recovering from strokes that affected their language use. Named iReadMore, the idea was sparked by the knowledge that stroke patients require around 100 hours of speech therapy after a stroke, but the amount provided by the NHS is dramatically less than that. The app allows users to continue making vital progress with their recovery from wherever they happen to be. Just as excitingly, the university is also funding research into direct brain stimulation and how that can augment re-learning to speak after a stroke.

And finally, all this new app-based learning is not confined to language. Touch Surgery is an award-winning surgery simulation platform. Doctors working across 17 different disciplines, from doing knee ops to gastrointestinal procedures, can make use of it. The peer-reviewed app allows surgeons or students to track their personal progress and watch more than 300 simulation videos. There’s also an AI-powered surgical video management platform and the ability for surgeons to rehearse surgery prior to performing it.