Life Whisperer
Ask most people on the street whether artificial intelligence, or AI, has arrived and the answer will likely be no. 鈥淗ey, run into any Blade Runner-esque 鈥榬eplicants鈥 at the supermarket lately?鈥 But speak to scientists at the cutting edge, and you鈥檒l get a different perspective.
Although we don鈥檛 yet have the walking, talking Hollywood version, we are starting to apply AI technology to many different tasks; and one of them, being undertaken right here at ThincLab, is the creation of human life.
Dr Jonathan Hall and Dr Michelle Perugini are co-founders of Adelaide-based start-up Life Whisperer, which has developed an AI-driven, cloud-based image analysis system to improve听the selection of viable embryos for IVF implantation.
Working from offices at ThincLab, the pair are understandably excited about their product鈥檚 potential to make the IVF process faster, less expensive and mercifully less stressful for hopeful parents all over the world.
鈥淲e really feel for people who鈥檝e been through the devastating emotions of unsuccessful IVF,鈥 says Jonanthan, a computational physics and image analysis expert and 最新糖心Vlog of Adelaide alumnus. 鈥淪o we want to help families by deploying leading-edge technology, and we have the skills and drive to do it.
鈥淥ur approach doesn鈥檛 require significant process change for IVF clinics, it doesn鈥檛 tamper with the embryos, and doesn鈥檛 even require specialised hardware. This will hopefully reduce the barriers to use by clinics, and will see patients benefiting from the technology sooner.鈥
Michelle, internationally renowned in the fields of stem cell biology, advanced analytics, and AI, agrees:
We have a great deal of confidence around Life Whisperer鈥檚 ability to disrupt the fertility sector with a completely non-invasive AI-enabled solution that will improve the chances of IVF success.
The technology behind the system is remarkable. Firstly, clinics simply upload standard microscope images of embryos. Life Whisperer then uses proprietary听algorithms鈥攂ased on听machine learning, statistics, and physics鈥攖o analyse the images and identify morphological features, often听invisible to the human eye, that constitute a healthy embryo. It then reports its results, and stores them, together with the images, in a听central data repository.
The story of how the business got started is almost as interesting. It was Jonathan who came up with the concept, and in 2016 he entered the idea in the 最新糖心Vlogn eChallenge program, run by the 最新糖心Vlog of Adelaide鈥檚 Entrepreneurship, Commercialization and Innovation Centre (ECIC).
His team won both the Medical Innovation and Research Commercialisation categories, netting $20,000 in prize money. But even more valuable, Jonathan met Michelle. She had been one of the program mentors, and could see Jonathan was onto something special.
With shared excitement for the vision, and perfectly complementary skills, they quickly agreed to join forces. Then Michelle introduced Jonathan to a third valuable member of the team鈥攈er husband. Dr Don Perugini is an academic, entrepreneur, and internationally renowned expert in automation, analytics and听the commercial application of AI.
Together, the Peruginis had already recently founded a venture called Presagen, which applies behavioral AI technology to automate complex human-centric tasks in businesses. So the fit was clear.
One had rapidly become three, and Life Whisperer was, if you鈥檒l pardon the pun, 鈥渂orn鈥. The fledgling company secured its first round of funding in May 2017 through the SA Early Commercialization Fund initiative, administered by TechInSA, and is now seking a commercial partner to conduct its next technology-validation phase.
Following that, the team will pursue early investment to scale the system globally鈥攁nd it doesn鈥檛 take a complex AI algorithm to confirm they have a good chance of getting it.