A Webinar was organised at CSIR-Central Electronics Engineering Research Institute, Pilani (CSIR-CEERI) under the Jigyasa Vigyan Mahotsav 2022 on 12 January 2022. The Webinar consisted of an Invited lecture by renowned genome scientist Dr Anurag Agrawal, awareness about the BootCamps followed by a Scientific Quiz session for the students. Dr Anurag Agrawal from CSIR-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (CSIR-IGIB), New Delhi, delivered his lecture on the topic “Not So Elementary: AI and Health”. 

The webinar was presided over by Dr P.C. Panchariya, Director, CSIR-CEERI. 

In the lecture, Dr Anurag Agrawal underlined the importance of AI and genomics in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases. He told the audience that in the early stages of COVID when the Alpha variant was spreading, the CSIR-CEERI team along with CSIR-IGIB labs played an important role in establishing the link of Coronavirus with chest X-ray images using AI model along with teams from other CSIR laboratories. Addressing the participants, he said that today's artificial intelligence has developed a lot as compared to its early stages but still has a long way to go.

While conducting the webinar, Boot Camp's Mentor of Change, Mr Pramod Kumar Tanwar, Principal Scientist gave a formal introduction to Dr Anurag Agarwal. Putting forward the agenda of the programme, he said that the programme aims to attract the adolescent manpower of the country towards scientific innovation and motivate and encourage entrepreneurship.

Dr Abhijit Karmakar, Chief Scientist and Head, Skill Development Programme & Technology Business Development, appraising the background of the BootCamp, informed that Boot Camp under Jigyasa Vigyan Mahotsav 2022 is being organised as a part of Azadi Ka Amrit Mahotsav. Dr Karmakar said that CSIR is organising a series of webinars and competitions for the students through this programme. By this, the young talent of the country is not only being provided with the opportunity to interact with the best scientists and industry experts, but also they are getting a great opportunity to learn and understand the latest technologies.     He said that the registered students participating in the BootCamps would also be given participation certificates. After the lecture, Dr Abhijit Karmakar expressed his gratitude to Dr Anurag Agarwal for the invited lecture.

The Webinar was attended by school students, project staff, research scholars and other colleagues.

A scientific Quiz session was also organised towards the end of the session. The quiz was based on topics related to AI, health and general science. Dr Gaurav Purohit, Senior Scientist, interactively conducted the live quiz session. The webinar was live-streamed on the official CSIR Jigyasa YouTube channel as well.