This Week in AI with The Neural (1)

TECHIES, ASSEMBLE!

AI INDUSTRY

OpenAI Unleashes Its Most Capable Models Yet

OpenAI has introduced GPT-4.1, 4.1 Mini, and 4.1 Nano exclusively through its API, offering better performance, longer context handling, and significant cost savings. Notably, these models aren't available in ChatGPT, focusing instead on developers.

👉 Explore GPT-4.1 capabilities and pricing

AWS Brings Multimodal AI to Everyone with Pixtral

AWS announces the launch of Pixtral Large 25.02 on Bedrock—its most advanced, serverless AI model yet. With vision-language fusion, strong multilingual skills, and a massive context window, it redefines what’s possible in production AI apps.

👉 Try Pixtral 25.02 on Amazon Bedrock

ByteDance Reveals a New Way to Think with AI

ByteDance publishes “Seed-Thinking v1.5,” a research release that explores reasoning frameworks for AI models. Though details are still technical and sparse, it signals their growing ambition in foundational model development and long-term cognition.

👉 Read Seed-Thinking v1.5 on GitHub

Google & NVIDIA Back a $32B Bet on Safe AI

Safe Superintelligence, founded by OpenAI's ex-chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, secured investments from Google and NVIDIA. The company is building safety-first AGI and is already valued at $32B, while leaning toward Google’s TPU ecosystem.

👉 More on SSI and the fierce AI investment race

From Google Cloud Next ‘25

Firebase Studio: AI Builds Your Apps for You

A new full-stack workspace powered by AI agents, Firebase Studio lets you go from repo import to deployed app in minutes—code, test, and launch like never before.

Ironwood: Google’s New TPU Raises the Bar

Google’s seventh-gen TPU is optimized for inference and power-hungry LLMs. It boosts memory, speeds up communication, and brings better efficiency to AI infrastructure at scale.

Agent2Agent Protocol: Let Your Bots Talk It Out

Google’s new standard enables AI agents to communicate and collaborate securely across ecosystems, with backing from 50+ tech companies.

Explore all the announcements from Google Cloud Next!

AI AROUND US

AI Helps Scientists Talk to Dolphins

Google’s DolphinGemma model decodes dolphin sounds using AI, aiming to establish a two-way communication bridge with the help of Pixel devices and underwater sensors. It's science fiction made real.

👉 Dive into the AI dolphin translator

AI Skin Cancer Detector Hits 99% Accuracy in London

A hospital in London is using AI to scan skin moles, discharging patients instantly if the case is benign. With 99% accuracy, it’s freeing up doctors and cutting wait times drastically.

👉 How AI is improving dermatology

Stanford’s AI Index 2025 Unveils the Full Picture

The latest AI Index from Stanford offers hard numbers on how AI is reshaping the economy, labor, ethics, and R&D. The report is a goldmine for researchers, policymakers, and professionals alike.

👉 Read the 2025 AI Index

This AI Diagnoses Patients Better Than Doctors

Nature’s new study introduces AMIE, an LLM-based medical assistant that outperforms doctors in simulated consultations. The model learns via simulated self-play, combining knowledge across thousands of virtual cases.

👉 Read the research on AMIE in Nature

Nostalgia Goes Hyperreal with Indian Mascots in AI Video

A viral AI-generated video brings Indian icons like the Amul Girl and the Maharaja to life. While viewers loved the realism, ethical questions loom over the use of culturally cherished mascots.

👉 Watch the mascots come alive

‘HOW TO’ WITH AI

Become an AI-Powered Leader in Just 10 Weeks

Andrew Ng explains how “lazy prompting” can improve AI outputs with minimal effort. His newsletter breaks down recent updates, including chatbot-human bonds, voice-to-voice models, and protecting your site from AI crawlers.

👉 Read Lazy Prompting and more

AI - POINT OF VIEW

AI is Only as Good as Its Data — And That’s a Problem

New research suggests AI capability should be measured by the complexity of tasks it can handle without human help. It also warns we may be racing toward high-functioning AI with blind spots.

👉 Why this new metric matters

FROM THE NEURAL - AI’s Fast Lane

AI In Her Voice: AI Moves Fast—She Moves Faster

Hima Patel, Senior Research Manager at IBM Research, opens up on how she mastered the evolving AI landscape. Learn why speed trumps perfection in AI, the power of open tools, and why fundamentals matter more than credentials.

Watch now — you can thank us later!