Name, where are you in the world right now?

Heetika Gada, and I’m staying in Columbus, Ohio with my cousins this summer.

Where are you joining us from?

I’m pursuing a Masters of Science in Electrical Engineering from Columbia University in New York.

Why did you choose to work with Conservation X Labs (CXL) this summer?

I searched for companies working in machine learning, and I also wanted to do something meaningful. I’ve done a lot of volunteering - like beach cleanups, orphanage visits, and even teaching kids biology in New York, so I’m passionate about contributing to environmental and social causes. I wanted to combine my passion and skill in Machine Learning- so CXL seemed like the perfect fit!

What will you be working on with us?

I’m working on the Sentinel System with the Garage team. The Sentinel is a smart camera trap, which you can use to recognize, track, and detect animals & their characteristics. I am helping with creating the pipeline for detection and tracking.

Do you have a favorite species?

A lion - it’s my go-to animal for training our machine learning model right now.

How are you staying entertained during the pandemic?

I get up early to have a conversation with my family in India every week. And I’ve been doing a lot of reading and watching Netflix. I’ve been reading the Clifton Chronicles series by Jeffrey Archer - one of my favorite authors. I’ve been watching Dark and rewatching The Office - because I love seeing Dwight and Jim’s office pranks.

Outside of your work at CXL, what’s one of the coolest projects you’ve worked on so far?

In undergrad, I studied electronics and developed an emotion recognition system that works on any camera to recognize six different human emotions (such as happiness, sadness, anger, surprise, fear and disgust), kind of like the movie Inside Out!