What is in a scientist’s mind? – The HLF Questionnaire

Ever wondered what do scientists think? What are their motivations, what inspires them…what is their favorite symbol?

Francisca is a Computer Scientist in Nigeria, and a participant of last September’s Heidelberg Laureate Forum.

During her PhD, she developed educational software to help girls that couldn’t attend school (or weren’t allowed to) in some parts of her country. Now, as Head of the Computer Science Department at the Federal University Lokoja in Nigeria, she develps classification software that uses games to predict possible radicalization in children living in displaced persons camps.

One can readily see how important it is for Francisca to use her expertise in helping her community. Her motivation to attend the HLF was to meet new people and learn more about Machine Learning. She wants to apply the latest developments in this field to her work, hoping it will make a big impact in society.

We wanted to learn more about her, and so, she kindly answered our Questionnaire:

Posted by Constanza Rojas-Molina

is a mathematician and illustrator (under the pseudonym E. A. Casanova). She is currently a Lecturer at the CY Cergy Paris Universite, working in mathematical physics, at the interface of analysis and probability. She's responsible for the blog "The RAGE of the Blackboard", where she interviews female scientists and writes about life in academia. She's interested in comics, illustration, graphic recording and visual note-taking, and in applying all this in science communication. You can follow her on Twitter: @coni777