Hello! My name is Gabriela Hakeman and I am passionate about programming, artificial intelligence, and the environment. I love the outdoors, going hiking and camping, and I am one of the first female Scouts BSA (formerly Boy Scouts of America) members in my city and area! I love programming, and this year I’ve been lucky enough to learn about AI through taking Inspirit AI summer courses. I am still participating in Inspirit AI programs, and am currently involved in the AI in healthcare course that is offered to returning Inspirit students.
During my two-week-long Inspirit AI summer course, I participated in a project that used AI to detect pneumonia using lung imaging x-rays. For the first week, I learned from exceptional students and professionals in the AI field from Universities all around the world about different AI concepts, from Logistic Regression to Convolutional Neural Networks. It was a great experience to get to know other students my age who are just as passionate about Computer Science and tech as I am! And, through the summer course, I was given a firm foundation on AI that has allowed me to continue exploring AI and even start making projects on my own.
Why am I studying AI?
I am continuing to study Artificial Intelligence because I am exceptionally curious about the different ways AI can be used to solve real-world problems across all fields. From healthcare and transportation to environmental protection, AI can be applied to all sorts of pressing issues to make the world a better place. Just recently, AI was used on a massive drug database to find drugs that might be effective in killing E. Coli bacteria. Thanks to AI, researchers discovered that Halicin, a failed diabetes drug, was capable of killing multi-drug resistant bacteria. That alone has the potential to save so many lives, but imagine what AI could do if it was applied to thousands of similar problems!
As I have learned more about AI, I’ve started thinking about all the different ways AI can be applied to environmental issues, and particularly now that there are so many climate-related disasters. AI can come in useful in preventing, tracking, and predicting these disasters. This includes hurricanes, droughts, forest fires, floods, and more, that kill tens of thousands of people per year and wreck entire ecosystems. AI has also been used to track deforestation, protect endangered species from poaching, and to find clever solutions to climate change. Unfortunately and unsurprisingly climate change has become a massive problem, a problem that is much larger than most of us can handle, and this is what makes it a great problem to solve with AI. AI is perfect for dealing with complex situations like these that require quick solutions, recognizing complex patterns, sorting through ginormous amounts of data, and lots of multitasking.
As new, revolutionary technology arises, it is becoming undeniable that AI will be an enormous part of our future. Its impact will be felt across every industry and every country, and forever change our lives for the better. Tasks that once took humans several years (if these tasks were ever completed or solved at all!), are and will be solved quickly and efficiently with the power of AI in short amounts of time. Healthcare will be increasingly more advanced and accessible, transportation will be safer, companies will grow quicker, and even our planet will be greener and healthier.
Curious for more?
For more articles on artificial intelligence, check out my article on the current projects using artificial intelligence to tackle deforestation!
Gabriela Hakeman is a Student Ambassador in the Inspirit AI Student Ambassadors Program. Inspirit AI is a pre-collegiate enrichment program that exposes curious high school students globally to AI through live online classes. Learn more at https://www.inspiritai.com/.
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