Rediet Abebe

Rediet Abebe (Amharic: ረድኤት አበበ; born 1991) is an Ethiopian computer scientist working in the fields of algorithms and artificial intelligence. She is a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows and an incoming Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of California, Berkeley.[1] Her research develops algorithmic and computational techniques to mitigate socioeconomic inequality.[2] She co-founded Mechanism Design for Social Good (MD4SG), a multi-institutional and interdisciplinary research initiative working to improve access to opportunity for historically disadvantaged communities.[3] She is also an advocate for diversity and inclusion in computing and is the co-founder for Black in AI.[4]

Rediet Abebe
Born
Rediet Abebe

1991 (age 28–29)
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Alma mater
Known forMechanism Design for Social Good (MD4SG)
AI for social good
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
Institutions
ThesisDesigning Algorithms for Social Good (2019)
Doctoral advisorJon M. Kleinberg
Websitewww.cs.cornell.edu/~red/
md4sg.com

Early life and education

Abebe was born and raised in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to parents who are civil servants.[5] She was educated in the Ethiopian National Curriculum at Nazareth School before winning a merit-based scholarship awarded to four students from the country to attend the International Community School of Addis Ababa when she was in eighth grade.[5]

Abebe joined Harvard University where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in mathematics and later a Master of Science degree in applied mathematics. As an undergraduate, she co-authored research papers in mathematics, physics, and public health.[6][7] She completed her master's degree from Harvard SEAS, conducting research with David C. Parkes. While at Harvard, Abebe contributed to The Harvard Crimson as a staff writer (2009-2011).[8]

After college, she attended the University of Cambridge as a Harvard-Cambridge scholar. [9] She was the Governor William Shirley Scholar at Pembroke College.[10] She completed the Mathematics Tripos and earned a Master of Advanced Studies in pure mathematics under the supervision of Imre Leader.

In 2015, Abebe started her doctoral degree in computer science at Cornell University as a researcher in theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence (AI), with a focus their applications to equity and justice concerns. She was advised by Jon Kleinberg.[11]

Abebe was the first Black woman to complete a Ph.D. in computer science at Cornell. [12]

Research and career

Abebe's research develops techniques in AI and algorithms to improve access to opportunity for historically under-served and disadvantaged communities.[13] Her paper using search queries to understand health information needs in Africa is one of the first known works to employ large Web and social media-based analysis to study health across all 54 nations in Africa.[14] [15] [16]

In 2018, Abebe presented her talk Can Algorithms Reduce Inequality?[17] at TEDxLosGatos.[18]

Throughout 2019 Abebe served on the National Institutes of Health Working Group on AI along AI experts including Kate Crawford, Dina Katabi, Daphne Koller, and Eric Lander.[19] The working group was tasked with developing a comprehensive report and recommendations, which were unanimously approved by the Advisory Committee to the Director and NIH General Director Francis Collins.[19]

Abebe was selected as a Junior Fellow at the Harvard Society of Fellows in 2019.[20] She is the second Junior Fellow with a CS Ph.D. and first female computer scientist to be inducted into the Society.[21]

Abebe will join the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley as an Assistant Professor. She will be the first Black female professor in the history of the department and the second in the history of the College of Engineering.[22]

Mechanism Design for Social Good

Abebe co-founded the Mechanism Design for Social Good (MD4SG) initiative, a multi-disciplinary research collective that use algorithms and mechanism design to tackle inequality, with Kira Goldner, in 2016. Abebe has since been co-organizing the initiative with Irene Lo and Ana-Andreea Stoica. MD4SG hosts an annual workshop series highlighting work and connecting the community of researchers committed to using algorithms to improve societal welfare. Abebe was honored as a pioneer in the 2019 MIT Technology Review's Innovators Under 35 in part for her work co-founding MD4SG.[23][24]

Black in AI

Abebe co-founded Black in AI, a network of 1,500 researchers working on AI, with Timnit Gebru, in 2016.[25][26] The organization arranges annual workshops at the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS) and offers networking and collaborative opportunities. Through Black in AI, Abebe has spearheaded programs such as a graduate application mentoring program for which she was honored in the 2019 Bloomberg 50 list as a one to watch.[27]

At Cornell University, Abebe has been involved with mentoring students from underrepresented groups. During her time at Cornell University, she helped with efforts that led to an unprecedented number of students from underrepresented minority students enrolling in the computer science doctoral program.[28]

References
  1. "Current and Former Junior Fellows". Harvard Society of Fellows. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  2. "Meet the Innovators Under 35". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved 2019-10-10.
  3. "Mechanism Design for Social Good". md4sg.com. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  4. "Black in AI". blackinai.org. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  5. "How Ethiopia's Rediet Abebe is using algorithms and AI to address socio-economic inequality". Levers in Heels. 25 April 2018. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  6. Harding, Charles; Pompei, Francesco; Burmistrov, Dmitriy; Welch, H. Gilbert; Abebe, Rediet; Wilson, Richard (2015). "Breast Cancer Screening, Incidence, and Mortality Across US Counties". JAMA Internal Medicine. 175 (9): 1483–9. doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2015.3043. PMID 26147578. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  7. Trifunovic, Luka; Dial, Oliver; Trif, Mircea; Wootton, James R.; Abebe, Rediet; Yacoby, Amir; Loss, Daniel (2012). "Long-Distance Spin-Spin Coupling via Floating Gates". Physical Review X. 2 (1): 011006. arXiv:1110.1342. Bibcode:2012PhRvX...2a1006T. doi:10.1103/PhysRevX.2.011006.
  8. "Rediet T. Abebe - Writer Page". The Harvard Crimson. Retrieved 2020-04-18.
  9. "Cambridge Scholars". Harvard Magazine. 17 June 2013. Retrieved 2019-10-10.
  10. "The Harvard-Cambridge Scholarships – Former Scholars". The Harvard-Cambridge Scholarships. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  11. "Jon Kleinberg – Home Page". Cornell University. Retrieved 2019-10-10.
  12. "In December, Rediet Abebe Will Become the First Black Woman to Receive a Ph.D. in Computer Science at Cornell". The Cornell Sun. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  13. "Mechanism Design for Social Good – MIT Technology Review". MIT Technology Review Events. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  14. "Grad Student Leads Group on Algorithms and AI for Social Good". Communications of the ACM. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  15. "New Research Uses Search Data To Understand Public Health Needs". Forbes. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  16. "How AI researchers used Bing search results to reveal disease knowledge gaps in Africa". VentureBeat. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  17. "Can Algorithms Reduce Inequality? - Rediet Abebe - TEDxLosGatos". TEDx Talks. October 29, 2018. Retrieved 2020-04-18.
  18. "TEDxLosGatos". TED. Retrieved 2020-04-18.
  19. "ACD Working Group on Artificial Intelligence". NIH Advisory Committee to the Director. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  20. "Rediet Abebe". Berkman Klein Center. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  21. "Current and Former Junior Fellows". Harvard Society of Fellows. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  22. "Cornell's first black female CS Ph.D. blazed her own trail". Cornell Chronicle. May 21, 2020. Retrieved 2020-05-22.
  23. "Meet the Innovators Under 35 – MIT Technology Review". MIT Technology Review Events. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  24. "35 Innovators Under 35 - Pioneers". MIT Technology Review. Retrieved 2020-04-18.
  25. Forbes (2019-02-22). "Rediet Abebe, Co-Founder of Black in AI, talks about the need for more diversity in AI job roles, and why she founded her own organization". @forbes. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  26. "Rediet Abebe". Berkman Klein Center. 2019-08-16. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  27. "Bloomberg – Are you a robot?". www.bloomberg.com. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
  28. "2019 Diversity & Inclusion Distinguished Award Winners : Graduate School". gradschool.cornell.edu. Retrieved 2019-10-09.
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