Data Science Changing The World

The significance of data science goes far beyond the commercial world benefiting society as a whole

Every day, businesses utilise data and analytics to increase efficiencies, gain deeper operational insights, and ultimately increase revenue. The significance of data science, however, goes far beyond the commercial world and is assisting in the resolution of some of the most important problems facing humanity. Data science is being applied not only as a corporate tool but also for the benefit of society as a whole, from preventing blindness and treating addiction to drugs and alcohol to eradicating poverty.

Making the world more aware

Visual impairment is one of the health problems that the world's data scientists are now addressing.

The World Health Organization estimates that 1.8 billion people worldwide are currently living with some sort of visual impairment and that we are on the approach of a blindness epidemic. Even avoidable illnesses can result in lifelong blindness in less developed nations where access to treatment is limited.

In order to counteract this, Microsoft has collaborated with the L V Prasad Eye Institute in India, a nation with over 55 million blind or low-vision citizens, to share its cloud computing and machine learning technologies. Similar to this, AI is being used in the US to spot diabetic retinopathy symptoms, a condition that can be prevented but is rarely detected early enough.

Visual impairment is among the health problems that the world's data scientists are now addressing. An AI system dubbed IDx-DR can now quickly identify serious cases of this illness without the assistance of a clinician by using a massive amount of data. Systems like these have also been created to detect glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration.

Fight against global warming

Climate change is reaching a critical point for the planet. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), carbon dioxide emissions must decrease by roughly 45% from 2010 levels in order to stop the planet's harm from becoming irreparable.

The World Economic Forum claims that data might be crucial in achieving that. In order to support more focused climate control measures, the California Air Resources Board, Plant Labs, and the Environmental Defense Fund are now working together on a Climate Data Partnership, a single reporting platform.

The objective is to create a more comprehensive picture of the state of the globe by combining many overlapping data programs, including two satellite deployments to track climate change from space.

We will be able to better understand how global supply chains are affecting the environment with the use of the data from these satellites, information from groups tracking deforestation, and other data collected on the ground.

Giving the developing world more power

 Numerous programs are available to assist developing nations in utilising analytics; however, they frequently encounter difficulties due to inadequate infrastructure and data availability. This might be about to alter.

Developing nations are currently gathering information quickly on a wide range of topics, such as weather patterns, disease outbreaks, and daily life. In order to maximise the use of this data, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, and Google are all funding analytics projects in these areas.