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n a typical day, you’ll probably find Rachel Ma (Zeta Theta, Brown University) in the Algorithmic Alignment Lab at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, hard at work exploring artificial intelligence and human-autonomous agent interactions while she works toward her doctorate. However, you might also happen upon her at a piano, playing classical music or even composing a piece. Two different worlds – science and music – but woven through both is creativity, whether that’s being inspired by human behaviors, creating a project scope or disconnecting from work to refresh. “It’s pretty interesting to see the intersection between sciences and arts,” Rachel says. “Whether implicitly or explicitly, it’s there.” As Rachel continues her pursuit of understanding and influencing the future of technology, she keeps the human element at the forefront of her work, knowing our creativity is instrumental. CREATING THE FUTURE OF SCIENCE Rachel is on the cutting edge of science today, but her passion for the field started with a toy familiar to many: LEGO. “When I was a kid, I really liked LEGO Mindstorms,” Rachel recalls. “My elementary school gave us all a Mindstorms robot kit, and I loved building the little robot and the pieces and doing all the coding. That got me into computer science and robotics in general.” She followed this interest to Brown University for her undergrad, seeking out opportunities to try out a variety of projects and focus areas in her computer science major. One such project was helping high school students build and code a drone – during which Rachel even learned to solder! – and sparked her interest in autonomous agents and AI safety. Autonomous agents are advanced forms of artificial intelligence that can interpret and respond to prompts THE LYRE
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