Science, business, investment and opportunity converged in a show of capitalism, conversation and, perhaps, conversion in a display of artificial intelligence’s world-changing benefits.
The Luddy School of Informatics, Computing, and Engineering was at the epicenter during the Venture Summit at Luddy Hall.
Case in point -- the Garyfallidis Research Group poster, which highlighted some of the group’s cutting-edge research in medical imaging processing, general purpose AI, neurological analysis, scientific visualization and software engineering.
Eleftherios Garyfallidis, Luddy associate professor of Intelligent Systems Engineering, directs difference-making research in key areas such as the development of diffusion MRI, a unique non-invasive MRI technique used to study the structural connectivity of the brain.
ISE/Neuroscience Ph.D. students Jong Sung Park and Aryaman Sriram presented the poster and discussed the group’s research in areas such as Diffusion Imaging for Python (DIPY), Free Unified Rendering in Python (FURY) and more.
“The group is also investigating general purpose machine learning, which is represented by Thetan, a soon-to-be-published AI framework designed for multiple tasks including advanced learning from data without labels,” Park and Sriram said.
In other words, the framework can learn patterns and make predictions even without labeled data (no manual annotations required). Thetan could be a valuable tool for machine-learning practitioners.
Multiple posters were presented at Luddy Hall during the opening day of the two-day summit. The first day focused on AI at Indiana University.
Luddy Dean Joanna Millunchick led a panel discussion on AI and its impact on society with Selma Šabanović, professor of Informatics and associate dean for faculty affairs, and David Crandall, Luddy Professor of Computer Science and director of Luddy Artificial Intelligence Center.
Discussion topics included AI’s enormous benefits, the ethics of AI companies gathering information from the Internet without authorization and the fact AI is not all powerful, that it relies on humans for resources, power and its ability to function.
Luddy’s human-centered AI research seeks to develop better medical care, safer transportation and improve quality of life by designing it with people in mind. It investigates AI’s opportunities and challenges. The presented posters showcased some of it.
David Wild, professor of Informatics and Computing, was part of a discussion announcing Quarry AI, an initiative of IU Ventures, which focuses on helping IU students, faculty, staff and alums advance new venture opportunities. Quarry AI, funded in partnership with IU alumni, aims to accelerate the development of artificial intelligence and software projects originating from IU research.
The summit was organized by IU Ventures. Attendees got to connect, build and learn from others in IU’s global venture ecosystem. It was part of the IU Founders and Funders Network that brings together IU-affiliated entrepreneurs, innovators, investors and others to help them find industry experts and resources to accelerate business opportunities and get access to the best of IU’s startup community.
The keynote speaker was IU alum Max Yoder, the co-founder and former CEO of Lessonly, an Indianapolis-based training software company that grew to 300 employees and $30 million in annual revenue before Seismic acquired it in 2021.