Turkish scientific board to back AI initiatives

ISTANBUL

Türkiye’s top scientific institute has launched a project to assist young people with securing funding and refining their projects in the field of artificial intelligence, the board’s chief has announced.

The project is expected to include connecting entrepreneurs who detail their investment ideas with investors through an AI-assisted interface, said Hasan Mandal, the president of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye (TÜBİTAK).

During his speech at a summit on AI in Istanbul on April 17, Mandal said council members will also provide young entrepreneurs with insights on detailing their projects and planning future steps.

"Young people are striving to address today's challenges and, even more importantly, future issues through artificial intelligence," he said.

Pointing out that they aim to prompt young entrepreneurs to benefit from industry and entrepreneur support programs as well as government entities and universities, Mandal defined his council’s role as a “solution partner.”

Underscoring the significance of anonymizing data through artificial intelligence, he noted that TÜBİTAK has created a secure interface. In addition to providing financial support, TÜBİTAK will play a pioneering and facilitative role by hazarding opinion on data analysis and enhancement ideas, Mandal noted.

Touching upon a recently released chatbot project, Mandal said that the "Turkish Large Language Model" is expected to contribute to the enhancement of AI in Turkish, building an infrastructure that enables AI to “think like a Turkish speaker.”

Stating the model, which is being crafted by TÜBİTAK’s BİLGEM unit, as of strategic importance, Mandal explained that the project will allow for a sophisticated utilization of Turkish culture and sensitivities in addition to fluency in the Turkish language.

A base model in AI is a model trained on a large dataset, which learns the general structure of the language, as well as how words and sentences are used in a culture. It is trained with data covering a wide range of a specific language or multiple languages, such as Turkish text found online, books, articles and more. Through this training process, the model learns the language's fundamental rules and grammar, enriching its vocabulary.

Speaking at the event, Garry Jacobs, the head of the World Academy of Art and Science, said that the impact of artificial intelligence on science is evident in its potential to discover new medications and treatments, as well as to enhance the food industry.

“Art elevates our creativity because we spend a significant amount of time in social spaces, but with the aid of artificial intelligence, we can make more streamlined investments.”