Podcast: Data poisoning, living with HIV, and climate art

In this edition: How hackers can ‘poison’ AI training data, the modern experience of living with HIV, and a climate change art prize.

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News: Smart meters in India and physics scholarships – We hear about a smart meters project being selected as one of the top 75 ideas for promoting green lifestyles by the government of India, and meet the winners of new physics PhD diversity scholarships.

Data poisoning in AI – AI algorithms are trained on data, but what happens when hackers manipulate the data so the AI gives the ‘wrong’ answers, such as letting spam through email filters? We explore this question with Javier Carnerero Cano, including what can be done to guard against such ‘data poisoning’.

Living with HIV – We hear from Professor Alan Winston about some of the results from the POPPY study, which for 10 years has been following the health of people living with HIV. While cognitive function doesn’t seem to be affected, people living with HIV have a much higher prevalence of mental health issues.

This is an excerpt from a series of podcasts about living with HIV, including the sting of stigma. You can listen to the full series on our Soundcloud account.

Climate change art prize – We hear how young people have the chance to create a piece of art that will be turned into a mural for the Grantham Climate Art Prize. The theme this year is palette for the planet: a hopeful vision for imagining a greener, cleaner future world.

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The podcast is presented by Gareth Mitchell, a lecturer on Imperial's MSc Science Communication course. He’s also a longstanding BBC presenter and reporter. Gareth is joined each month by our roving reporters in the Communications Division.