Why I Want to Build My Career in The Field of Computer Science

It is now a widely accepted fact that our civilization has made more progress in the last couple of decades than in all of human history put together, and the main propellant of this progress is the continuous development of Information Technology. Being truly a child of our times, I am very much interested in making my mark upon the world and my specific focus is on the possibilities that Artificial Intelligence holds for the medical sciences.

My first introduction to computer science was in high school, and from the word go I was hooked — when I saw those few lines of code perform incredibly heavy calculations, I remember feeling the way a little girl feels at her first magic show andwhen the time came to choose a stream for my undergraduate studies there was no doubt in my mind that it was computer science I wanted to pursue. As is perhaps the case for most people, college came with its own high points and letdowns, many of my more romantic notions with respect to programming were dispelled and maybe it was the fault of an education system that focuses too hard on grades, but I always felt that the practical aspect of programming was ignored in favor of outdated theory to be crammed in indiscriminately. Fortunately, the same college life also introduced me to Artificial Intelligence and that introduction has now culminated in me aiming for this degree as a focal point for future endeavors in research and development.

In my time at college I occupied myself by attending and participating in many workshops for a variety of subjects like Neuro-Linguistic Programming, Raspberry Pi, Cloud Computing and Arduino, apart from regular academic classes.A significant experience that helped me realize my field of interest was when I attended a workshop organized by the Indian Institute of Technology. In the workshop we were asked to build a small car and to program it. What I noticed was that I was more into combination programming and robotics and that is when I learned about AI, and how it can be used to make machines intelligent. Afterwards, I read about its application in medical science and it hit me that this is what I want to do. In my academic schedule my favorite classes were Microprocessors, Data Structures and Algorithms, Discreet Computational Structures, Logic Design and Computer Graphics, all of which proved to be a great help in my projects and also in the pursuit of my independent study in the field of Artificial Intelligence and ideas about its practical application in the real world. I enjoyed all the lab-work, but if I were to mention my absolute favorites, I guess it would be Language Processor Lab, Microprocessor Lab and Networks and Operating Systems Lab.

The best learning experience for me, however, has been the work I did for the successful completion of my final year project to design a smart prosthetic limb at minimum cost. I played the part of the team lead and we took EMG signals from the amputee using MYO armband and once the signal was read, it was converted into appropriate gesture, this output was then sent to Arduino using myobridge (which was the laptop in our case), and from there Arduino sends the signal to servo, according to which fingers move. Therefore, the amputee is able to control the artificial limb from their signals which is basically just the same as moving your own fingers. We further made the project cost-effective by using 3-D printing for the artificial hand.Apart from the technical side of things, I also gained insight into what it means to take on a leadership role and how to explain things to people of different academic acumen and diverse cultures while ensuring smooth sailing of the project itself. Once finished, the project was a huge success; our team was featured on national television, and articles about it were published in a number of dailies. Mierobots, an IBM business partner, published our project work on their website and we received the best project award from Computer Society of India. Another project I worked on in the capacity of team-lead was concerned with developing an application for storing student details and enabling better student-teacher communication. We used Java to design the application’s front end and SQL as the back-end for database support.

I have also gained a little experience of corporate working culture by interning with Ernst and Youngwhere I worked on a project to detect fraudulent activities happening in banks. In order to do this, I researched on the criteria and conditions for fraud, and analyze around 2000 data-sets to detect fraud based on those criteria. For this project, I used Neo4j and Python.

Apart from this, a part of my life that I look upon with great affection because of its social ramifications is my internship with Swatch Bharat Abhiyaan (Clean India Initiative) where I worked with Pelican Biotech, a global organization famous for creating wealth from waste through a series of green processes by using carbon neutral and positive resources. Our project was in collaboration with CUSAT and aimed at making their campus a zero-plastic zone. We worked in two phases. The first phase started with the journey of recording where different types of litter waste could be found lying in the campuswith the help of few CUSATemployees. Remarks and views of the staff regarding the improper disposal of the debris were also noted. In the second phases we acted on the acquired information and formed solutions to minimize plastic usage by introducing alternates like paper bags and straw baskets, and by increasing awareness among the campus dwellers about the adverse effects of plastic which affect them on a daily basis.

I mention the above highlighted internship because that is the kind of work I also want to focus my career upon in computer science: the kind of work that takes humanity forward, the kind of work that I can look back upon a decade from now and feel that my life has really amounted to something, the kind of work that inspires people and helps them live a better life.

The reason I want to pursue this degree is that I know my dreams to change the world for better are very ambitious — to the point of being unrealistic, some might say—and though I have faith on myself, I am also aware that what I want can only be achieved with a lot of quality addition to my existing knowledge and practical experience, and I believe with a master’s degree in from your esteemeduniversityI can accomplish this.The excellent infrastructure with exciting labs and faculties, coupled with an international diverse and vibrant community of peers will help me gain a deeper perspective of not only technology but of life as well. I hope I have been able to convey at least some idea about my roots, my beliefs and the direction in which I aim to drive my life, and I hope you will allow me to join your proud scholastic ranks.