PCDLS
Using artificial intelligence to help track the pancreas and improve some of the treatment options.
Thirteen-year-old Rishab Jain has been named as America’s Top Young Scientist in the 2018 Young Scientist Challenge, for his work in improving pancreatic cancer treatment. Jain created an algorithm that uses artificial intelligence to accurately locate and track the pancreas in real-time during MRI-guided radiotherapy. “Pancreatic cancer is a highly lethal and difficult to treat disease, so I created an invention to improve one of the treatment options, which is radiotherapy,” says Jain, from Stoller Middle School in Portland, OR. “My tool PCDLS [pancreatic cancer deep learning system] uses artificial intelligence to help track the pancreas and improve some of the treatment options.” An inherent challenge of radiation treatment for pancreatic cancer is accurately targeting the pancreas, which is often obscured by the stomach or other nearby organs, making it difficult to locate.