RICHLAND — Prayrona Choudhury always has found coral reef ecosystems utterly fascinating.
The underwater colonies are home to an estimated quarter of all marine life and are among the most diverse systems in the world.
“I just found them so amazing in how they were a bunch of animals living together and how they help so much of the ocean,” said the 14-year-old Richland student. “That sort of got me really into ocean conservation, because when you talk about saving corals you have to talk about saving oceans as a whole.”
That passion has led her to develop a new technology that harnesses the power of artificial intelligence systems to read and translate water data in real time.
She calls it AquaTranslate. The AI software, when installed onto a robotic water rover, is designed to take in numerical sensor data. From there, the program transfers the data to Google searches and ChatGPT to give context and possible explanations for the data point.
“What AquaTranslate does is shortens the data analysis process to 10-20 minutes so that scientists can focus on actually solving these problems instead of having to spend so much time looking for how they occur,” she said.
Right now, Choudhury’s rover and software can only measure the acidity scale and temperature of water samples. But in the future, she hopes to outfit the rover with more sensors so that additional data, such as metals and oxygen levels, can be collected.
The Hanford High School freshman believes her project has the potential to help scientists on the front lines battling climate change and could help them work quicker to save the rich natural resources of the world.
“Climate change is such an encroaching problem that we don’t have that much time to spend,” she said. “Even just shortening weeks to a few minutes can make the conservation process much quicker. … In places like the Puget Sound, If you even wait a few months, a whole new wave of fish could die out.”
Choudhury’s technology was recognized with several awards at last year’s Washington State Science and Engineering Fair, including a first-place prize. It also brought home second place at the Mid-Columbia Science Fair.
She hopes to raise $12,000 by this summer to file a patent for the technology.
“She exemplifies the power of young minds committed to making a positive impact on our environment, proving that age is no barrier to designing products that create meaningful change,” said the Richland School District’s public information officer Shawna Dinh.
AquaTranslate
Before AquaTranslate, Choudhury was working to develop a water rover that could collect and return samples. She started this project as part of her seventh grade science project at Leona Libby Middle School.
Inspired by Khan Academy videos about marine biology, she tried engineering a robot that would collect samples and help her uncover the mysteries of the Tri-Cities waterways.
It took about a year’s worth of time to develop and build the rover.
“I used to go home and just work on the rover all day long,” Choudhury said. “That year, I learned a lot about time management.”
She also received endless encouragement from her father, who is a staff scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. He told her that she would have to learn coding languages if she wanted to advance in the STEM field.
Choudhury said coding was hard at first, but she eventually learned how to code programming languages in Python, which is what she used as the base for AquaTranslate.
As the deadline approached to start a new science project, she considered building off her rover instead of a brand new project.
“I thought, what’s something that scientists need? And I didn’t really answer that question until I was in that position myself,” Choudhury said.
She hit inspiration while conducting a work study with Rachel Little, a biologist with the Benton County Conservation District.
While out at a river surveying for stargrass — an invasive aquatic perennial that clogs rivers and makes the water acidic — Choudhury took her rover out to collect data.
That’s when she realized how long and arduous the process of gathering and interpreting the data was. Was there a way they could do this faster, she asked.
“That’s kind of where I got the idea for AquaTranslate. What if I had an add-on for the AquaRover?” she recalled.
Climate change
Choudhury isn’t alone in her concerns about climate change — global warming and “climate anxiety” remain one of the top issues for many young people.
A 2021 survey by Lancet Planetary Health of 10,000 people, ages 16 to 25, found that 59% were “very” or “extremely worried” about the impacts of human-caused climate change.
But that anxiety also is fueling a new generation of climate activists and scientists — including Choudhury — who are keen on finding solutions to curb pollutants and save endangered species.
“Prayrona proves that an active interest in science and technology can be harnessed to investigate environmental concerns,” Little said in a provided statement. “Although environmental news is often pessimistic, Prayrona makes me hopeful for the future because she and others like her will be using science to develop solutions to water quality problems.”
In June, Choudhury presented her technology to other local entrepreneurs at Fuse’s pitch night in Richland.
Her 2-minute presentation caught the attention of Gravis Law and senior attorney Stephen Zimowski, who later helped Choudhury file a provisional patent for her software.
Zimowski toled the Herald in a statement that the Hanford student a “supremely talented and motivated young person.”
“She is just the type of innovative and entrepreneurial individual we at Gravis Law are pleased to assist where we can. The technology Prayrona developed and described to us will no doubt be instrumental in environmental preservation for years to come,” he said.
The law office also helped connect her with other areas that were in need of water testing, too.
Since second-grade, marine biology has been the only career that has caught the whimsy and curiosity of Choudhury.
And it’s still the career she plans to pursue after high school. She wants to find even more ways that artificial technology can be used to better marine conservation.
She hopes someday to attend either Stanford University or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
