Eighth-grader Rishab Jain recently won the Grand Prize of the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge after creating “a method that uses artificial intelligence to help accurately locate the pancreas during MRI radiotherapy and make cancer treatment more effective.”

As the winner, Jain received $25,000 and the title of “America’s Top Young Scientist.”

Rishab Jain and his 3M Scientist Mentor, Dr. Döne Demirgöz, after winning the grand prize. (Photo: Yahoo Finance)

Jain sat down with Yahoo Finance to discuss his mission to help diagnose and treat pancreatic cancer using artificial intelligence (AI).

“It all started in the summer of 2017,” the 13-year-old Portland middle schooler. “I learned about some surprising statistics, such as the low survival rate, and that really inspired me to try to find a way to work on this problem. I’m also into programming. … So I wondered if I could apply some of the knowledge I had in artificial intelligence to this real-world problem of pancreatic cancer.”

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