The world’s first stool database needs your photos
Scientists have chosen an unusual way to help people with intestinal disorders. They created the first stool database in the world and ask for photos of yours for the good of science.
Specifically, the goal is to collect 100,000 photos of human faeces in order to train MIT’s artificial intelligence models.
To join, navigate to seed.com/poop from your mobile phone (no photo is allowed on another device), select #GIVEaSHIT and fill in your email if you are morning, afternoon or evening. Then photograph your work and upload. The photo is separated from the metadata so that your donation is anonymous. Seven gastroenterologists will look at the photos and train artificial intelligence models to understand what they see themselves. Thus, artificial intelligence models will be able to recognize new photos without the help of doctors.
Algorithms need a lot of data to understand what they see. We don’t care and we don’t want to find out who sends us the pictures – but we’re grateful for the data. – David Hachuel, co-founder of Auggi who created the platform
Beyond any comical dimension of the topic, the database will be an open-source tool for academic research on the subject, developing technology that will make us better understand the relationship between our daily habits and bowel health, helping millions people who are suffering from intestinal diseases such as irritable bowel syndrome.
Every day we have a hard time deciding what to eat, how much exercise to do to reduce symptoms. It is therefore crucial to create a database and develop simple monitoring tools to virtually allow patients to make their home diagnosis.
