What I learnt from going to a Genetic Engineering Conference?

Genetic engineering conference

November 2018, me and a few people from school were selected to shadow top researchers in genetic diseases from all over the world.The genetic disease conference is a 2-day event aiming to bring together medical experts and researchers in genetics to make them more aware about the developing technologies used in genetics like Artificial Intelligence (AI), genome sequencing etc.

The event ranged from presentations of new age technology to tackle and find genetic diseases to ceremonies to award top researchers and students in the country.

I had the opportunity to shadow academics and subject matter experts from various Universities and organizations like Columbia and Oxford. I was lucky enough to be able to have direct conversations with such experts on various topics such as the role of AI in genetics.

I think this event put a perspective of the state of the use of AI in medicine.

I didnt know how computer science really melded together with medicine, but this event really opened up the possibilities of data science and deep learning to me and it wasnt just sitting in a cubicle with my eyes stuck on the computer anymore.

The most interesting presentation was probably about identifying different DNA sequencing to find commonalities between patients who have different types of cancer. The Doctor presenting gave a really watered down version of the presentation for students and explained concepts really well.

After the presentation i knew that i wanted to learn more about data science, machine learning and deep learning to use AI in medicine.

My work shadowing researchers such as Dr. Alireza Haghighi has got me exposed to understanding how we can use machine learning to tailor medicine for individuals to make it more effective.