AI / Machine Learning Summer Internship

We have an exciting opportunity for a 10-week internship to work with our Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning team. This can be anytime between November and March. The role offers the opportunity for a student to work on a real-world Machine Learning application, with mentoring from an experienced team of data scientists, developers, and software engineers.

ABOUT THE ROLE

• The team work on a pipeline consisting of several different image processing, machine learning, and deep convolutional neural network processing steps, to automate the identification of different pathogens in milk samples from cows with mastitis.

• You’ll get hands-on experience working in software development, statistics, and/or machine learning as we seek to expand this pipeline. The exact project can be tailored to your interests, but examples include:

  • Training new deep learning / AI models that can generate predictions continuously in time while the test is running rather than waiting for the test to finish. This would require developing models that operate on variable length timeseries rather than assuming a fixed set of observations. This would involve updating machine learning models and working with the microbiology team to interpret the key results.

  • Developing lightweight models that can run on the hardware we have on the farms, such that we could give instant feedback to users about issues while they are starting the test. This would involve taking our full models, retraining them on smaller data, and validating their performance on embedded devices. There would also be scope to work with the hardware team to verify these results in the lab.

  • Enhance the quality control checks we currently use, and develop new models to identify issues at a much more fine-grained spatiotemporal scale. We have a wealth of data with differing issues, but this is only partially labelled. The modelling challenge is to be able to flexibly identify issues in a semi-supervised manner. Again, model validation would be in collaboration with the microbiology team.

• Funding is provided by an MBIE R&D Experience Grant for up to 400 hours of full-time work.

• You'll get mentoring and support from our team of 4 experienced data scientists, developers and software engineers.

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

• A desire to learn about both applying ML/AI models to real data and software development

• Attention to detail, and comfortable working solo or as part of a team

• Reliable, consistent, and a clear communicator

MANDATORY APPLICANT CRITERIA

• You must be studying (or have studied) an undergraduate or postgraduate qualification at NZQA level 6-10

• Studying, or have studied, science, technology, engineering, design or business at a New Zealand tertiary education institute

• If finished studying, your final semester should have ended within the last 12 months

• You must be legally allowed to work in New Zealand

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

Mastaplex is based at the Centre for Innovation at the University and we are happy to meet anyone interested to discuss further. Dr Sam Harrison who heads up our AI effort will mentor the student and can be contacted at sam.harrison@mastaplex.com .

HOW TO APPLY

Send your CV and a short cover letter to sam.harrison@mastaplex.com. Applications will close at the end of September.