(March 07, 2024) As a young kid, Sadhana Lolla was fascinated with machines and various equipment. But, growing up whenever she would visit India with her parents, she would observe her grandmother’s toil without the availability of any assistive technology. “The experience greatly inspired me to delve into artificial intelligence solutions aimed at delivering robotic assistive technology to marginalised communities,” the young scholar shared during an interview.
Fueled by a desire to make a global impact through her innovative work, Sadhana secured the Gates Cambridge Scholarship. This scholarship allows students to pursue graduate studies in their chosen field at Cambridge University in the UK. “I’ll be delving deep into the intricate connections between technology, public policy, laws, and governance,” shared an elated Sadhana, adding, “This intersection is pivotal in an era where every process is digitising, and the significance of AI is continually growing. I hope that my studies could significantly contribute to the global discourse on technology and its profound impact on society.”
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Of hard work and grit
A curious kid from the beginning, Sadhana took part in various academic and cultural competitions. “In high school, I was the captain of my Scioly team and competed in biology and Earth and Space Science events. I was also on the competitor logistics committee and also helped out with events,” the scholar shared. Soon after finishing school, the youngster joined the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she is a fourth-year undergraduate, majoring in computer science and minoring in mathematics, “And literature. I have quite a busy schedule, but yet outside of school and planning committees that I am a part of, I still find time to bake, cook, and read,” the Global Indian shared.
A part of MIT’s Distributed Robotics Laboratory, Sadhana has been working day and night on her research under the guidance of Professor Daniela Rus, focusing on safe and trustworthy robotics and deep learning. Her investigations encompass debiasing strategies for autonomous vehicles and streamlining the design processes of robots. Said the scholar, “My research focusses broadly on the application of deep learning to robotics and on designing and deploying uncertainty-aware artificial intelligence with Dr. Ava Amini.”
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Also, at Microsoft Research and Themis AI, I have contributed to the development of uncertainty-aware frameworks for deep learning, with applications spanning computational biology, language modeling, and robotics,” shared the scholar, who has showcased her research findings at prestigious conferences such as the Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS) and the International Conference on Machine Learning (ICML). “Through this SuperUROP project, I want to become more involved in applying deep learning algorithms to robotics. I hope to apply knowledge from previous machine learning classes and research to an exciting new area of study,” she added.
Scaling heights
While she might sound like a nerd, the young scholar is involved in tonnes of activities outside academics as well. Despite a very tight schedule, the young scholar is leading initiatives at MIT to make computer science education more accessible globally. “I instruct class 6.s191, MIT’s Introduction to Deep Learning, a course that reaches millions of students globally. As the curriculum lead for Momentum AI, I contribute to the only U.S. program offering free AI education to underserved students. Additionally, I’ve had the privilege of teaching hundreds of students in Northern Scotland through the MIT Global Teaching Labs programme,” she said.
Sadhana also serves as the director for xFair, MIT’s largest student-run career fair. Furthermore, she holds an executive board position for Next Sing, where efforts are made to increase accessibility to a cappella for students from various musical backgrounds.
When asked about her future plans, the young scholar said, “I aspire to spearhead discussions on deploying and developing technology for marginalised communities, including the rural Indian village my family calls home. Simultaneously, I am engaged in research focused on embodied intelligence.”
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