TReND in Africa

Machine learning (ML) and artificial intelligence (AI) are reshaping our world, and LUANAR-Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Malawi is eager to harness the benefits of machine learning. To support this initiative, a team of researchers from institutions including the University of Sussex, University of Alicante, and industry ML research, travelled to Malawi as part of the TReND in Africa initiative. Our mission was to empower postgraduates with foundational ML knowledge, enabling them to enhance their research and contribute to their country's progress. The two-week training program was intensive, covering theoretical concepts in the mornings and practical sessions with R and Python in the afternoons. Despite our normal academic and teaching commitments, we devoted months to preparing this course. During the second week, students applied the learned models to their own datasets, focusing on improving disease classification, farming efficiency, and other relevant tasks. While mastering ML takes time, the course provided students with a solid foundation to build upon, with some expressing interest in real-time ML applications in the field. It was truly impressive to see how eager and quick the students were to adopting machine learning to their own projects. I'm grateful for this opportunity from TrEND under the guidance of Samyra Salek. I discovered through Sussex AI, and received support from the School of Engineering and Informatics. I am thankful to Prof. Elizabeth Bandason who hosted us and took great care of us, truly making us feel welcome so far away from our homes. Finally, I want to thank my supervisory team for supporting me to adventure like this, which is truly one of the great aspects of being a PhD student at Sussex. Excited to see how ML and AI continue to improve Malawi's agricultural sector and looking forward to a future friendship between our universities! #malawi #machineLearning #researchpartnerships #teaching #education #artificialintelligence #postgraduate Piera Riccio Gergely Nemeth

Today marks the end of my work as a volunteering lecturer in Malawi. Joining the efforts of TReND in Africa, we have been teaching a Machine Learning course at LUANAR-Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources. The past two weeks have been super intense, and I am glad I got to share this life-experience with other three young and passionate researchers in AI (Gergely, Leonie and Dexter). Our students have been the very best part of this experience. Other colleagues in this field might agree with me that two weeks are a very short amount of time to understand the theoretical concepts behind ML and how to implement them both in Python and R. On top of this, all our students were coming from totally different backgrounds and many did not have previous experience in coding. However, they have kept their enthusiasm and interest super high, always engaging in the lectures, asking questions, giving feedback and immediately trying to apply the new knowledge to datasets from their field of studies or research. What a privilege it is now to go back home after a volunteering project as a lecturer, but actually having gained so much new understanding on the applications of AI in several fields, such as entomology, nutrition sciences, fish pathology, plant breeding, and agro-business. Malawi has proven to be a beautiful, fascinating and hospitable country. Each and every person we have met has opened their hearts to us, treating us kindly and warmly. First and foremost, Prof. Elizabeth Bandason, who is the seed and organizer of this initiative, and our reference point for all the challenges we have encountered. I am looking forward to staying in touch and to keeping this collaboration alive. Life as an AI PhD student in 2024 is often hectic, but I am proud to have had the courage to invest time and energies on such a relevant cause, despite shortly deviating from my usual research work. On this regard, I am grateful to all the people around me, at work at ELLIS Alicante Foundation, but also among my friends and family, who have helped me make my participation come true. In particular, I thank Prof. Thomas Hofmann for truly supporting this initiative as part of my growth during the PhD journey.

TReND in Africa Computational Neuroscience & Machine Learning Basics course An intensive entry level course to teach young African students and researchers the basics of computational neuroscience and machine learning! Where: CMU-Africa campus, Kigali, Rwanda When: 8-24th July 2024 Application deadline: 15th of February, 23:59h (GMT) Fees: Free - selected student’s round-trip airfare (economy), accommodation, and meals will be covered.  Computational neuroscience aims to characterize brain operation using the language of mathematics, and to simulate its function using algorithmic principles. Machine learning uses statistical methods to infer patterns in data which can help us learn predictive relationships between natural or digital phenomena. Importantly, machine learning technologies have often drawn inspiration from computational principles extracted from biology and, conversely, have been used to interpret and model the brain.  During this course, we will give a basic introduction to these subjects in order to provide African students and researchers with a solid foundation from which they can further expand their horizons. The topics covered will include neurobiology, systems neuroscience, biophysical neural models, recurrent neural networks, dynamical systems, linear algebra, machine learning methods for neural data analysis, Bayesian statistics, deep learning and reinforcement learning. This year: Hands-on data analysis tutorial by researchers of the Allen Institute on their public datasets. For more information on the course, eligibility and how to apply please visit: https://lnkd.in/ekQsrFmr