NASA and Google create AI medical assistant for Mars missions
• NASA and Google have developed an AI-powered medical assistant called the Crew Medical Officer Digital Assistant (CMO-DA) to help astronauts diagnose and treat medical conditions during extended Mars missions and other deep space travel where Earth communication can be delayed up to 20 minutes. • The multimodal AI system runs on Google Cloud’s Vertex AI platform and processes speech, text, and images, with NASA owning the source code while Google provides cloud infrastructure under a fixed-price subscription agreement. • Initial testing by three physicians, including an astronaut, showed promising diagnostic accuracy rates of 88% for ankle injuries, 80% for ear pain, and 74% for flank pain across three medical scenarios. • The system addresses the critical need for “Earth-independent” medical care as current International Space Station missions rely on real-time communication with Houston and regular cargo deliveries, which won’t be possible for longer Moon and Mar...