What Can Artificial Intelligence Learn From Graph Data?

On Tuesday, June 13, ASEF, in cooperation with Student Club Slovenska Bistrica, organized the popular science lecture as part of the ASEF young minds lecture series. This time with Vid Keršič, an ASEF Junior Fellow of the 2021 generation, a young researcher and a PhD student at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Computer Science and Informatics, University of Maribor. Vid’s research interests include decentralised artificial intelligence or machine learning and blockchain technology. He currently works in the Blockchain Lab:UM research group.

In his lecture, he introduced us to the use of artificial intelligence, which he says will be even more relevant in the future, as it has reached a point of transition from science to everyday use in recent years (such as ChatGPT). He explained the technology, which is inherently neutral, from its definition and development to interesting real-world examples, including graph theory, machine learning on graphs, graph neural networks, and big-data learning. Among other things, we learned about the difference between algorithms and AI, using the example of finding the shortest route with Google Maps, how Facebook suggests new friends and why Amazon can show us an ad for a discounted price on a product we are interested in.

Finally, we listened to Vid’s experience of a virtual research visit in 2021 with ASEF mentor Prof. Dr. Jure Leskovec at Stanford University. Although he did it remotely, he is very satisfied with it and says that this form of research work had many advantages, including meeting ASEF Fellows who visited Slovenia.

At the event, the representative of the co-organizers, Miha Govedič, greeted the participants, while the event was coordinated by Žiga Donik, an ASEF Junior Fellow of the 2022 generation.

The ASEF Young Minds project is supported by the Office of the Republic of Slovenia for Youth.