It is still early days for research into AI agents, and the field does not have a definitive definition for them. But simply, they are AI models and algorithms that can autonomously make decisions in a dynamic world, says Jim Fan, a senior research scientist at NVIDIA who leads the company’s AI agents initiative.
The grand vision for AI agents is a system that can execute a vast range of tasks, much like a human assistant can. In the future, it could help you book your vacation, but it will also remember if you prefer swanky hotels, so it will only suggest hotels that have four stars or more, then go ahead and book the one you pick from the range of options it offers you. It will then also suggest flights that work best with your calendar, and plan the itinerary for your trip based on your preferences. It could make a list of things to pack based on that plan and the weather forecast. It might even send your itinerary to any friends it knows live in your destination, and invite them along. In the workplace, it could analyze your to-do list and execute tasks from it, such as sending calendar invites, memos or emails.
One vision for agents is that they are multimodal, meaning they can process language, audio and video. For example in Google’s Astra demo, users could point their smartphone cameras at things and ask the agent questions. The agent could respond to inputs across text, audio and video.
