My Podcasting Experience (Part V): Researchers
“A podcast is a great way to develop relationships with hard to reach people.” Tim Paige, audiobook narrator, and voice actor
In this 5th part of my ACM/IRISS podcasting sneak peeks, you all will get an insight into the works and lives of some leading researchers in the field of computing. This article (and its upcoming podcasts) will be your detailed tour of how these eminent minds perceive this domain (and its allied areas) personally and professionally.
So, here goes!
Shwetak Patel: Recipient of the ACM Prize in Computing and Washington Research Foundation Entrepreneurship Endowed Professor in Computer Science Engineering and Electrical Engineering at the University of Washington
What is your take on the use of machine learning in the field of healthcare?
One of the things that’s interesting right now is that doctors can only do so much. They lack tools to help with the diagnosis of several diseases or helping manage a person’s healthcare. What we have looked at is that machine learning can augment a doctor in ways that were never possible before, just like how an ultrasound machine or x-ray revolutionized what we can see inside the body. ML can be used to diagnose things that are so subtle that the doctors can’t quite pick up, but computers can. So,
I would say that ML acts as another set of eyes and ears on an individual to help (medically) screen or treat somebody.
You delivered an interesting lecture titled, ‘New Ways of Thinking of the Mobile Phones for Healthcare.’ Can you highlight some of its critical points for us?
What I was talking about was if you think about computing, the most ubiquitous device now is the mobile phone. So, there are 7.8 billion people in the world, and about 5 billion mobile phones, 3.5 billion of which are smartphones. Now, if you could use these phones in unique ways, especially for healthcare, you can scale their solutions in ways that you could never have done before! I talked about examples of how do you can use sensors that are already on the phone, like the camera and microphone, to do diagnostics. So, the sensors themselves, with a little bit of machine learning, could be used to screen for diseases, and it really changes how one can diagnose and treat people.
On a slightly different yet related note, how does artificial intelligence come into the picture of this type of healthcare?
So, another way to think about it is that,
AI is the secret sauce of computing right now.
What I mean by this is, sensors can give you data, you can collect lots of information, but what can you really do with it? AI is, basically, taking that plethora of data and making useful utility out of it — you are using examples of what things have happened in the past and what can occur in the future. I think that’s (kind of) the critical element that is causing computing to take a huge step forward in terms of the impact it can have on the society at large.
Bhavana Kanukurthi: Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Automation at IISc Bangalore
If we talk about spreading awareness among the general public, what were the bullet points of your research and keynote lecture during IRISS 2020?
I am a cryptographer, and in cryptography, we are, basically, looking at scenarios where mutually untrusting parties want to communicate with each other. For instance, since the time we wake up in the morning and start our day, we are interacting with the cloud, we are using cell phones, sending out emails, and so forth. So, we are communicating a lot with gadgets that we don’t necessarily trust. How do you interact in such situations where parties don’t necessarily trust each other, and still you want to have some security. That’s the question which cryptography addresses. Within this field, my work is on something called the key agreement, where you say cryptography typically assumes perfect randomness, and what do you do when you don’t have this. So, can you have cryptographic guarantees even in settings when you make very minimal assumptions on the kind of randomness that you have? — it is what we study.
What is your take on the promotion of computer science education and research? Especially among girls and women.
First of all, I think we are moving towards a very interdisciplinary world where lines are blurring between disciplines. For example, a lot of cryptographers have been looking at how law can help cryptography and vice versa. I think it’s the challenge of the era that we are living in — all of these interdisciplinary problems are eventually going to be at the heart of what moves the world. We should focus on attracting people to doing good research, and that has to start very young, at the school level. It has to start inside our homes in the way we talk to kids and tell them that it’s okay to ask questions. In particular, about girls and women, I think the one thing that’s missing for people growing up is the presence of role models. There are not as many symbolic buildings and things which represent the strength of women researchers, and I think that we need to see more of that.
Sudarshan Iyengar: Professor in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at IIT Ropar
What are your views on IRISS 2020 organized recently by IIT Gandhinagar?
What I liked the most is that it had different flavors, and comprised of technical and non-technical sessions on topics of grave importance in today’s times. For example, there was a panel discussion on a not-so-technical yet crucial area, which I really appreciated. It was on education in general, explicitly stating the holistic approach of grad students towards doing a Ph.D. We need to build and encourage this curiosity among students, and such panel sessions are an excellent platform for it. Another point worth mentioning was the Early Career Invited Talks that happened during this event, which encompassed a series of lectures by young researchers on some of the trending issues and themes of today. These events are fantastic opportunities for people in different fields and disciplines to come together, express themselves, and learn together. I feel that every single conference should have a flavor like them.
One of your research interests include science communication — what is your take on this rapidly growing field, and how do you perceive its future?
My interest in science communication is because of all the teachers that I have had. It is one of the reasons why I thought I should look into how one should proceed with communication, especially when it comes to scientifically intricate concepts. The whole point is to convert very complex research into easy pieces that even 8 to 10-year-olds can understand. Science communication is the need of the hour and is one of the essential components of quality research today. But, with a lack of interest in fundamental sciences, this communication is not very popular. Since it is becoming a necessary need at multiple levels in all the domains of study now-a-days, what we should do is encourage and equip students with effective SciComm skills. Professors should promote their students to focus on this side of their research — the ability to explain their work to others since it is becoming a necessity for multidisciplinary collaborative research prevalent today.
P.J. Narayanan: Professor and Director at IIIT Hyderabad
Being the founder president of ACM-India, what is your opinion about it?
ACM started a council in India in the year 2010, and I was lucky to be associated with it from the very beginning. It started with the motto of promoting computing as a science and profession in the Indian context. With this goal, this computing community initiated a bunch of activities such as the ACM-India Annual Events, which take place every year in different parts of the country. The purpose of this event is to bring high profile achievers and best speakers from around the world to India so that our people can hear them, talk to them, and be inspired by them to pursue computer science education and research. The event at IIT Gandhinagar was the one having maximum attendance with more than 1200 students, researchers, scholars, and leading experts in academia and industry. Apart from this, there are the ACM-India Doctoral Dissertation Awards. I am glad that we are doing very well, and we have been continuously finding outstanding Ph.D. theses that deserve this award. Over time, ACM-India has seen the introduction of many new programs. I greatly appreciate the CSPathshala initiative — how they are working with the school children — their impact is very motivating. I hope all this (and much more) continues in the future.
Can you throw some light on what is known as parallel computing?
We all learn different programming languages. The purpose is to instruct the computer in a step-by-step fashion to achieve something. When you do that, you are thinking of a single stream of activities — only one thing happens at a time. But, today, if you want more computing power, you need multiple processes to co-occur for getting things done. How do you make sure that many of these processes are taking place in parallel, and the results are correct, better, and faster? The Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) are power efficient and accessible specialized processors that process thousands of pixels simultaneously and are good examples of parallel computing.
So, friends, I hope you had a riveting journey into the views and interests of these researchers. The complete podcast versions will be available shortly! In the meantime, I leave you with the promise of returning very soon with the very last piece of this puzzle. Till then, aloha!
(Part 4 of this series can be found here.)
