Imagine a future where medical technology abandons some | MIT News

Could it be a life-changing storm, AI-driven healthcare, and the ideal storm to alienate vulnerable patients through subscription models?

For the third consecutive year, the MIT envisions the future of the Computing Awards requires students to describe in 3,000 words or less how advances in computing make human society better or worse. All entries are eligible to win many cash prizes.
Inspired by the latest research on the impact of the microbiome on overall health, MIT WHOI’s joint oceanography program and doctoral candidate Annaliesee Meyer, PhD candidate for applied marine science and engineering, created the concept of “B-bots”, a synthetic bacterial mimetic designed to regulate the intestinal biota and be activated by BlueTooth.
For the competition, challenging MIT students to express their meditations in a computational future of progress, Meyer submitted a speculative novel about how the recipients of revolutionary new healthcare technologies find their treatment at risk by introducing subscription-based compensation models.

Meyer recorded the usage of B-Bot from the perspective of its creator and the B-bot user named Briar in her award-winning paper, “Pre/sub””. They celebrate the effects of supplements to help them manage vitamin deficiency and chronic diseases such as acid reflux and irritable bowel syndrome. Meyer said that introducing the B-robot subscription model “seems a great opportunity to hope that advances in for-profit healthcare systems, even medically, could theoretically also cause more harm to many in terms of huge wealth differences in modern society than good, which is harmful to many in modern society.” Meyer also noted that these opinions are her own and do not reflect the official position of any affiliated institutions.

As a Canadian, Meyer experienced differences between the healthcare systems in the United States and Canada. She talks about her mother’s recent cancer treatments, highlighting the cost and coverage of treatment costs in British Columbia compared to the United States

In addition to fair attitudes in the U.S. health care system, Meyer hopes readers can convey an additional scientific message about the complexity of the gut microbiome. Meyer was inspired by the paper on Marine Metaproteomics, “I have a look at when and why microbes produce different proteins to adapt to environmental changes and how it depends on the remainder of the microbial community and the exchange of metabolic products between organisms.”

Meyer had hoped to compete in the last year’s competition, but the time limits of her lab work kept her submissions on hold. Now, in her paper work, she sees competition as a way to add some different way to what she writes while maintaining her own scientific interest. However, writing has always been a passion. “I wrote a lot when I was a kid (the authors actually usually used ‘scientists’ as my dream job in elementary school), and I still write novels in my spare time.”

Meyer said the article and speech preparation made very meaningful.

“The opportunity to explore a new subject area, while relevant to my field, is definitely my comfort zone and has really pushed me as a writer and a scientist. It has allowed me to read papers I’ve never seen before and dig out concepts I’ve almost never encountered. Meet people from different fields and departments around MIT.”

Imagine the future of computing awards

Co-sponsored by the Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing (SERC), a cross-cutting initiative of the MIT Schwarzman College of Computing and the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (SHASS), with support from MAC3 Philanthropies, the contest this year attracted 65 submissions from undergraduate and graduate students across various majors, including brain and cognitive sciences, economics, electrical engineering and computer science, physics, anthropology, etc.

Caspar Hare, associate dean and professor of philosophy at SERC, launched the award in 2023. The purpose of the award is “to encourage MIT students to think about what they do, not just computer-related technologies, but also in advancing computer-related technologies and in how they make decisions, and in how they make”. ”

He stressed that the future of envisioning the computing award will continue to be “interesting and important” to the MIT community. There are plans to adjust in next year’s competition to provide more seminars and guidance for those interested in submitting their papers.

“Everyone is happy to continue doing this, as long as it remains relevant, it may be forever,” he said. He suggested that in the next few years, the award could provide us with a series of historical snapshots to see what MIT students find the most compelling things.

“Technology related to computing will change and change the world. MIT students will remain an important part of it.”

Crown winner

As part of the two-stage evaluation process, all submitted papers were reviewed anonymously by the faculty committees of the College, Shas and the Department of Urban Research and Planning. The judge based on three finalists who are considered to be the clearest, thorough, rooted, imaginative and inspiring papers.
In early May, a live awards ceremony was held, inviting finalists to give 20 minutes of speeches on their work and ask questions from listeners. Nearly 140 MIT community members, family members and friends attended the ceremony to support the finalists. The audience and jury asked the presenters about the challenges and thoughtful questions about the social impact of their fictional computing technology.
The last statistic accounts for 75% of its paper scores and 25% of its speech scores, identifying the winner.

This year’s review panel includes:

• Marzyeh Ghassemi, Associate Professor, Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Institute of Medical Engineering and Science;
• Caspar Hare, associate dean and professor of philosophy of SERC;
• Jason Jackson, associate professor of political economy and urban planning;
• Brad Skow, professor of philosophy;
• Armando Solar-Lezama, Distinguished Professor of Computing; and
• Nikos Trichakis, associate dean of SERC and associate professor of management at JC Penney.

The judges also awarded $5,000 to the two runner-ups: Martin Staadecker, a graduate student in the Institute of Data, Systems and Society’s technology and policy programs, wrote his article on token-based systems to track fictional systems for fossil fuels, while Juan Santoyo, an official in the brain and cognitive aspects of officials, once in the Ministry of Health, had established a candidate in the head, a well-known field, a well-known candidate in the field. In times of conflict. Additionally, eight honorary awards were confirmed, each receiving a cash prize of $1,000.