The increasing application of intelligent agents is playing an essential role in accelerating digital transformation in traditional industries, such as oil and gas, in China, while simultaneously creating new professions to propel intelligent development across sectors.
At the China Petroleum and Petrochemical Enterprise Information Technology Exchange Conference, held in Beijing from May 15 to 16, enterprises showcased numerous cases of application of intelligent agents integrated into various industries.
One such case was from Changqing Oilfield, China's largest oil and gas field, which has achieved automated control of over 50,000 oil wells through intelligent agent coordination.
"Coordination of the intelligent agent has enabled the intelligent analysis of videos from over 40,000 cameras. It can instantly detect oil leaks or fires, with the rate of accuracy improved to over 90 percent," said Shan Jiquan, executive director of the digital and intelligent business department of the Changqing Oilfield, a branch of PetroChina, China's largest oil and gas producer.
This intelligent agent is designed to assist experts in the oil and gas industry. It possesses professional expertise and comprehension on a par with industry specialists through the accumulation of vast cross-disciplinary knowledge in the field.
"Through this intelligent agent, we can help our employees in the oil and gas industry quickly search for information, generate documents, and conduct document reviews. Moreover, it is self-learning and self-evolving, continuously acquiring more real-time knowledge," said Qi Chen, chief planning engineer of the industrial digitalization solutions department at Chinese tech company ZTE.
In the new model of human-machine collaboration, artificial intelligent agents will handle standardized, repetitive, and even complex tasks, while humans will focus on innovation and decision-making. This complementary partnership boosts both work efficiency and quality.
From digital avatars to industry-specific assistants, artificial intelligent agents not only introduce a new model of human-machine collaboration but also create new career opportunities.
"This transformation will create at least three entirely new professions: intelligent agent systems operation maintenance specialists, intelligent agent resource distribution coordinators, and intelligent agent collaboration designers. Driven by this trend, artificial intelligent agents will become the core force driving productive force leaps, profoundly reshaping our industrial ecosystem, organizational structures, and the role of humans," said Huang Jizhou, chief architect of intelligent agent business at Chinese tech giant Baidu.
Increasing use of intelligent agents accelerates digital transformation, create new professions across industries
A video featuring a former member of Unit 731, a notorious Japanese germ-warfare unit during World War II (WWII), was released on Thursday in northeast China's Harbin, revealing details of how the unit used meteorological data to conduct horrific bacterial experiments on human beings.
The video was released by the Exhibition Hall of Evidence of Crimes Committed by Unit 731 of the Japanese Imperial Army, in which former Unit 731 member Tsuruo Nishijima detailed how the unit used meteorological data to carry out a bacterial dispersal experiment.
The video was recorded in 1997 by Japanese scholar Fuyuko Nishisato and donated to the exhibition hall in 2019, according to the hall, which was built on the former site of the headquarters of Unit 731 in Harbin, the capital city of Heilongjiang Province.
Jin Shicheng, director of the Department of Publicity, Education and Exhibition of the exhibition hall, said that Nishijima joined Unit 731 in October 1938 and served in the unit's meteorological squad. The squad was not a simple observation section but rather an auxiliary force supporting the unit's field human experiments by measuring wind direction, wind speed, and other conditions to ensure optimal experimental results, according to Jin.
Nishijima confirmed in the footage that "the meteorological squad had to be present at every field experiment." He testified to the "rainfall experiments" conducted by Unit 731, which involved aircraft releasing bacterial agents at extremely low altitudes.
At a field-testing site in Anda City, Heilongjiang, Unit 731 aircraft descended to about 50 meters above the ground. They sprayed bacterial culture liquids onto "maruta" -- human test subjects -- who were tied to wooden stakes. Each experiment involved about 30 people, spaced roughly 5 meters apart. After the experiments, the victims were loaded into sealed trucks and transported back to the unit, where their symptoms and disease progression were recorded over a period of several days.
"Unit 731's bacterial weapons were dropped by aircraft from a height of 50 meters in the open air. Therefore, the meteorological squad needed to observe wind direction and speed, which directly affected the precision and accuracy of the bacterial weapons deployment," said Jin.
Nishijima recounted the harrowing experience of the human test subjects.
"They were fully aware that inhaling the substances would certainly lead to death, so they closed their eyes and held their breath to avoid breathing them in. Their resistance prevented the experiment from proceeding. To compel them to comply, they were forced at gunpoint to open their mouths and lift their heads," said Nishijima.
These experiments, disguised as "scientific research," were in fact systematic tests of biological warfare weapons conducted by the Japanese military. The data generated from these inhumane activities became "research findings" shared among the Japanese army medical school, the medical community, and the military at large.
"At that time, the entire Japanese medical community tacitly approved, encouraged, and even participated in the criminal acts of Unit 731. The unit comprised members from Japan's medical and academic sectors who served the Japanese war of aggression against China. Thus, Unit 731 was not just a military unit but represented an organized and systematic criminal enterprise operating from the top down," said Jin.
Unit 731 was a top-secret biological and chemical warfare research base established in Harbin as the nerve center for Japanese biological warfare in China and Southeast Asia during WWII.
At least 3,000 people were used for human experiments by Unit 731, and Japan's biological weapons killed more than 300,000 people in China.
Video offers details of Japan's germ-warfare crimes in northeast China
