Several startups are asking for photos of our stools to train their artificial intelligence systems, which want to end the gastrointestinal problems suffered by a large part of the world’s population.
We are used to reading things like that artificial intelligence is the future of aviation since it will be the one who directs the route of our next flight. Or that our job is going to take awayas you will do it better and faster than us.
What we did not expect is that the AI needed our poop to train and improve intestinal diagnosis. But so it is, and the cause is very noble.
Two startup companies are responsible for this curious initiative. One is called Auggi, a company specializing in intestinal health that is creating an application so that people can keep track of gastrointestinal problems.
And the other is Seed Health, which works on applying microbes to people to sell probiotics.
Companies began asking for photos of people’s depositions on Monday through a campaign called Give a Shit (the translation would be a kind of Donate your Feces) with the aim of creating one of the first known data sets of images of human poop.
These images can then be used to create an AI to investigate diseases related to the gut and help people with these conditions to more easily follow their own bowel movements.
The goal they have set is reach 100,000 photos in total in a few months.
Auggi wants to automate this process. First, the collected images will be examined by a team of gastroenterologists who will be in charge of classifying the feces according to the Bristol scale (A tool used to divide stool into seven categories based on consistency.).
Once tagged, The images can be passed to a computer that will be trained to detect the difference between, for example, type 1 (which can mean that you are constipated) and types 3 or 4 (which are ideal).
People can contribute their own photos through this link. If you don’t have photos available now, they will remind you to photograph it in the next few days just by entering your email.
The companies explain that the information collected during the campaign (including users’ email addresses, which can be used to send image-related metadata and reminders) will be removed before photos are sent to Auggi.
They also explain that despite expecting people to only send one photo per person, they are willing to accept photos of later copies. Everything is for a good cause.