Ekta Sood from the Institute for Visualization and Interactive Systems and Viktor Zaverkin from the Institute for Theoretical Chemistry were nominated for the AI Newcomer 2021 – the AI Newcomer program of the German Informatics Society. Both are now on the shortlist that consists of three female and three male candidates per discipline. Whereas Sood is nominated in Computer Science, Zaverkin is on the shortlist for the discipline Natural and Life Sciences. From 18 January to 7 March, two AI Newcomers per discipline can be selected from the shortlists by public voting which makes for 30% of the overall evaluation (70% comes from the jury's decision).
The purpose of the AI Newcomers award is to make visible new talents who have already achieved outstanding success in the various fields of research and activity in the field of AI and who can be expected to have a significant influence on AI research in the future. The goal is to demystify AI technologies and to open up the topic to a broad public. To this end, a clear focus is placed on involving the public in the nomination and voting phase.
The winners of the AI Newcomers program will be announced at and be part of the KI-Camp on April 27th in Berlin (https://kicamp.org/en). There, they the will be given the chance to present their work to a large audience in the format of a 'Science Slam‘, a short entertaining presentation, and will receive an official certificate.