The Center for Transforming Data to Knowledge, informally known as the D2K Lab, adapted to the challenges of social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic to host a virtual end of semester Showcase.
On April 22, the Spring 2020 D2K Virtual Showcase went live with over 300 participants from different parts of the country visiting the showcase online, watching student video presentations, interacting with student teams in their own Zoom Q&A room, and coming together at the end for a live awards ceremony.
Ten teams of 5-6 students from the D2K Learning Lab participated in the Virtual Showcase. The D2K Learning Lab is a data science and machine learning capstone program where interdisciplinary teams of students work on a semester-long real-world project sponsored by D2K Affiliate Members.
Team Medical Informatics Corp. won the competition for their project, “Beat-to-beat Classification of Unlabeled ECGs in Adult Populations.”
“My favorite part about the Medical Informatics Corp. project was that it required different skills such as data wrangling, signal processing and modeling. I’ve learned a lot about working in teams, and how to build a robust data science pipeline that was reproducible, reusable and reliable. Our sponsors and D2K Fellow were very helpful.” said Nicole Tan, a junior ’21, studying Electrical Engineering.
Additionally, five student teams from the COVID-19 Houston Response Projects (CHRP) competition presented their work at the showcase. CHRP is a data science competition that the Rice DataSci Club and the D2K Lab launched three weeks ago to encourage Rice students to get involved in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Team Stay at Home won the CHRP competition for their project, “Mobility and Predictors of Movement During COVID-19.”
“Our team benefitted from the various skill sets that each team member brought to the table. We're very grateful to have won first place; all of the CHRP projects were so unique and it was a pleasure to compete against and engage with their projects as well” said Connor Rothschild, a rising senior ’21, studying Social Policy Analysis.
The showcase was sponsored by Bill.com, ExxonMobil and Energy Transfer. The D2K Lab is supported by a $4 million gift from Rice alumnus Kevin Harvey and his wife Catherine Harvey.
Winning Teams for the D2K Learning Lab Showcase:
First place: Team Medical Informatics Corp. Members: Alvin Magee (‘20, CS), Anthony Chen (’20, ECE), Xinyue Cui (’21, ECE) and Nicole Tan (’21, ECE). Project: “Beat-to-beat Classification of Unlabeled ECGs in Adult Populations.”
Second place: Team Texas Children’s Hospital. Members: Robert Chen (’21, ECE), Yanwan Dai (’22, Statistics), Yerin Han (’20, Statistics), Anirudh Kuchibhatla (’21, ECE), Mario Paciuc (’20, Math/Statistics), and Xin Tan (’21, Statistics). Project: “Pediatric Cardiac ICU Arrhythmias Detection.”
Third place: Team Bill.com. Members: Graham Curtis (’21, ECE), Namanh Kapur (’20, CS), Grace Morgan (‘20, Statistics), Daniel Tang (’20, CS), James Warner (’20, Statistics), Alex Yang (’20, CAAM). Project: “Payment Acceleration Risk Model for Small Businesses.”
Audience Choice: Team Houston Fire Department. Members: Melinda Ding (‘21, CS), Nick Falkenberg (’20, MathEcon and Statistics), Ohifeme Longe (’21, ECE), Cole Morgan (’21, Statistics), Neyda Maymi (’20, Prof Master's, Subsurface Geoscience & Data Management), Emre Yurtbay (’20, Statistics). Project: “Emergency Response Demographic-Based Risk Assessment for Houston.”
Winning Teams for the Covid-19 Houston Response Projects (CHRP) Showcase:
First place: Team Stay at Home. Members: Kyran Adams (’21, CS), Rebecca Francis (’20, CAAM\Political Science), Mario Paciuc (’20, Math\Statistics), Connor Rothschild (‘21, Social Policy Analysis). Project: “Mobility and Predictors of Movement During COVID-19.”
Second place: Team Care 4 Everyone. Members: Denizhan Yigitbas (’21, ECE\CS), Roy Phillips (’21, Electrical Engineering), Daniel Fay (‘21, ECE). Project: “Sheltering the Homeless During a Pandemic.”
Audience Choice: Team Lovett. Members: Henry Creamer (‘21, CS), Jake Joseph (‘22, Econ\Social Policy Analysis), Robert Walsh (’22, Math\CS), Yong Shin (’21, Social Policy Analysis). Project: “Distributing Ventilators in Texas.”
Special thanks to the judges for the D2K Showcase competition included D2K affiliate members: Bill Braun, chief information officer at Chevron; Max Grossman, data science consultant at BP; and Jon Walters, vice president at National Oilwell Varco; Jamie Waugh, associate researcher at Medical Informatics Corp.; and Rice faculty members Joey Huchette, assistant professor of computational and applied mathematics; Chris Jermaine, professor of computer science (CS); Tasos Kyrillidis, assistant professor of CS; Akane Sano, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering (ECE); Santiago Segarra, assistant professor of ECE; and Joe Warren, professor of CS; Gary Woods, professor in the practice of ECE.