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An Interview with Ayanna Howard - About -...
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AI MATTERS, VOLUME 3, ISSUE 4 WINTER 2018 An Interview with Ayanna Howard Amy McGovern (University of Oklahoma; [email protected]) Eric Eaton (University of Pennsylvania; [email protected]) DOI: 10.1145/3175502.3175505 Abstract This column is the fifth in our series profiling senior AI researchers. This month focuses on Ayanna Howard. Introduction Our fifth profile for the interview series is Ayanna Howard, Professor and Linda J. and Mark C. Smith Endowed Chair in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Bio Figure 1: Ayanna Howard Ayanna Howard, Ph.D. is Professor and Linda J. and Mark C. Smith Endowed Chair in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineer- ing at the Georgia Institute of Technology. As an educator, researcher, and innovator, Copyright c 2018 by the author(s). Dr. Howard’s career focus is on intelligent technologies that must adapt to and function within a human-centered world. Her work, which encompasses advancements in artifi- cial intelligence (AI), assistive technologies, and robotics, has resulted in over 200 peer- reviewed publications in a number of projects - from assistive robots in the home to AI- powered STEM apps for children with di- verse learning needs. She has over 20 years of R&D experience covering a number of projects that have been supported by various agencies including: National Science Founda- tion, NewSchools Venture Fund, Procter and Gamble, NASA, and the Grammy Foundation. Dr. Howard received her B.S. in Engineering from Brown University, her M.S.E.E. from the University of Southern California, her M.B.A. from the Drucker Graduate School of Manage- ment, and her Ph.D. in Electrical Engineer- ing from the University of Southern California. To date, her unique accomplishments have been highlighted through a number of awards and articles, including highlights in USA To- day, Upscale, and TIME Magazine, as well as being named a MIT Technology Review top young innovator and recognized as one of the 23 most powerful women engineers in the world by Business Insider. In 2013, she also founded Zyrobotics, which is currently li- censing technology derived from her research and has released their first suite of STEM ed- ucational products to engage children of all abilities. From 1993-2005, Dr. Howard was at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. She has also served as the Associate Director of Research for the Georgia Tech Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines and as Chair of the multidisciplinary Robotics Ph.D. program at Georgia Tech. 5
Transcript of An Interview with Ayanna Howard - About -...
AI MATTERS, VOLUME 3, ISSUE 4 WINTER 2018
An Interview with Ayanna HowardAmy McGovern (University of Oklahoma; [email protected])Eric Eaton (University of Pennsylvania; [email protected])DOI: 10.1145/3175502.3175505
Abstract
This column is the fifth in our series profilingsenior AI researchers. This month focuses onAyanna Howard.
Introduction
Our fifth profile for the interview series isAyanna Howard, Professor and Linda J. andMark C. Smith Endowed Chair in the Schoolof Electrical and Computer Engineering at theGeorgia Institute of Technology.
Bio
Figure 1: Ayanna Howard
Ayanna Howard, Ph.D. is Professor and LindaJ. and Mark C. Smith Endowed Chair in theSchool of Electrical and Computer Engineer-ing at the Georgia Institute of Technology.As an educator, researcher, and innovator,
Copyright c© 2018 by the author(s).
Dr. Howard’s career focus is on intelligenttechnologies that must adapt to and functionwithin a human-centered world. Her work,which encompasses advancements in artifi-cial intelligence (AI), assistive technologies,and robotics, has resulted in over 200 peer-reviewed publications in a number of projects- from assistive robots in the home to AI-powered STEM apps for children with di-verse learning needs. She has over 20 yearsof R&D experience covering a number ofprojects that have been supported by variousagencies including: National Science Founda-tion, NewSchools Venture Fund, Procter andGamble, NASA, and the Grammy Foundation.Dr. Howard received her B.S. in Engineeringfrom Brown University, her M.S.E.E. from theUniversity of Southern California, her M.B.A.from the Drucker Graduate School of Manage-ment, and her Ph.D. in Electrical Engineer-ing from the University of Southern California.To date, her unique accomplishments havebeen highlighted through a number of awardsand articles, including highlights in USA To-day, Upscale, and TIME Magazine, as wellas being named a MIT Technology Reviewtop young innovator and recognized as oneof the 23 most powerful women engineers inthe world by Business Insider. In 2013, shealso founded Zyrobotics, which is currently li-censing technology derived from her researchand has released their first suite of STEM ed-ucational products to engage children of allabilities. From 1993-2005, Dr. Howard wasat NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Shehas also served as the Associate Directorof Research for the Georgia Tech Institutefor Robotics and Intelligent Machines and asChair of the multidisciplinary Robotics Ph.D.program at Georgia Tech.
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Getting to know Ayanna Howard
How did you become interested inComputer Science and AI?
I first became interested in robotics as ayoung, impressionable, middle school girl. Mymotivation was the television series called TheBionic Women — my goal in life, at that time,was to gain the skills necessary to build thebionic women. I figured that I had to acquirecombined skill sets in engineering and com-puter science in order to accomplish that goal.With respect to AI, I became interested in AIafter my junior year in college, when I was re-quired to design my first neural network duringmy third NASA summer internship in 1992. Iquickly saw that, if I could combine the powerof AI with Robotics, I could enable the ambi-tious dreams of my youth.
What was your most difficult professionaldecision and why?
The most difficult professional decision I hadto make, in the past, was to leave NASAand pursue robotics research as an academic.The primary place I’d worked at from 1990 un-til 2005 was at NASA. I’d grown over those 15years in my technical job positions from sum-mer intern to computer scientist (after collegegraduation) to information systems engineer,robotics researcher, and then senior roboticsresearcher. And then, I was faced with the re-alization that, in order to push my ambitiousgoals in robotics, I needed more freedom topursue robotics applications outside of spaceexploration. The difficulty was, I still enjoyedthe space robotics research efforts I was lead-ing at NASA, but I also felt a need to expandbeyond my intellectual comfort zone.
What professional achievement are youmost proud of?
The professional achievement I am proud-est of is founding of a startup company, Zy-robotics, which has commercialized educa-tional products based on technology licensedfrom my lab at Georgia Tech. I’m most proudof this achievement because it allowed meto combine all of the hard-knock lessons I’velearned in designing artificial intelligence algo-rithms, adaptive user interfaces, and human-robot interaction schemes with a real-world
application that has large societal impact —that of engaging children of diverse abilities inSTEM education, including coding.
What do you wish you had known as aPh.D. student or early researcher?
As a Ph.D. student, I wish I had known thatfinding a social support group is just as im-portant to your academic growth as finding anacademic/research home. I consider myselfa fairly stubborn person — I consider wordsof discouragement a challenge to prove oth-ers wrong. But psychological death by a thou-sand cuts (i.e., words of negativism) is a real-ity for many early researchers. A social sup-port group helps to balance the negativismthat others, sometimes unconsciously, subjectothers too.
What would you have chosen as yourcareer if you hadn’t gone into CS?
If I hadn’t gone into the field of Robotics/AI, Iwould have chosen a career as a forensic sci-entist. I’ve always loved puzzles and in foren-sic science, as a career, I would have focusedon solving life puzzles based on the physicalevidence. The data doesn’t lie (although, aswe know, you can bias the data so it seemsto).
What is a “typical” day like for you?
Although I have no “typical” day, I can catego-rize my activities into five main buckets, in nopriority order: 1) human-human interactions,2) experiments and deployments, 3) writing(including emails), 4) life balance activities,and 5) thinking/research activities. Human-human interactions involve everything frommeeting with my students to talking with spe-cial education teachers to one-on-one obser-vations in the pediatric clinic. Experimentsand deployments involve everything from run-ning a participant study to evaluating thestatistics associated with a study hypothe-sis. Writing involves reviewing my students’publication drafts, writing proposals, and, ofcourse, addressing email action items. Life-balance activities include achieving my dailyexercise goals as well as ensuring I don’t missany important family events. Finally think-ing/research activities covers anything related
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to coding up a new algorithm, consulting withmy company, or jotting down a new researchconcept on a scrap of paper.
What is the most interesting project youare currently involved with?
The most interesting project that I currentlylead involves an investigation in developingrobot therapy interventions for young childrenwith motor disabilities. For this project, wehave developed an interactive therapy gamecalled SuperPop VR that requires children toplay within a virtual environment based ona therapist-designed protocol. A robot play-mate interacts with each child during gameplay and provides both corrective and moti-vational feedback. An example of correctivefeedback is when the robot physically showsthe child how to interact with the game at thecorrect movement speed (as compared to anormative data profile). An example of moti-vational feedback is when the robot, throughsocial interaction, encourages the child whenthey have accomplished their therapy exer-cise goal. We’ve currently deployed the sys-tem in pilot studies with children with Cere-bral Palsy and have shown positive changeswith respect to their kinematic outcome met-rics. We’re pushing the state-of-the-art in thisspace by incorporating additional factors forenhancing the long-term engagement throughadaptation of both the therapy protocol as wellas the robot behaviors.
How do you balance being involved in somany different aspects of the AIcommunity?
In order for me to become involved in anynew AI initiative and still maintain a healthywork-life balance, I ask myself: Is this initiativesomething that’s important to me and alignedwith my value system; Can I provide a uniqueperspective to this initiative that would help tomake a difference; Is it as important or moreimportant than other initiatives I’m involved in;and Is there a current activity that I can re-place so I have time to commit to the initiativenow or in the near-future. If the answer is yesto all those questions, then I’m usually able tofind an optimal balance of involvement in thedifferent AI initiatives of interest.
What is your favorite CS or AI-relatedmovie or book and why?
My favorite AI-related movie is The Matrix.What fascinates me about The Matrix is thesymbiotic relationship that exists between hu-mans and intelligent agents (both virtual andphysical). One entity can not seem to existwithout the other. And operating in the physi-cal world is much more difficult than operatingin the virtual, although most agents don’t re-alize that difference until they accept the deci-sion to navigate in both types of worlds.
Help us determine whoshould be in the AI Mat-ters spotlight!
If you have suggestionsfor who we should pro-file next, please feel freeto contact us via email [email protected].
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