Artificial Intelligence undergraduate project help on idea and its influence on a later on masters degree [closed]

Question

I am a Computer Science student. I want to do an AI project for my 4th year with two other students. (It's a 5-year degree in my university so I can pursue the same project for two consecutive years if I want to). Our knowledge in AI is very basic at this moment since we'll be specializing in it these coming two years, so a very advanced idea will probably be hard to accomplish. We're not expected to research new untouched soils either, so the more resources the better.

I'm interested in ideas that can benefit people and not just applying algorithms and techniques. I want to do a masters after graduation, but I'm not sure in what field yet. I'd love to do a medical application or a project that of some use to the handicapped. Some projects that were already pursued at the university included a project to recognize breast cancer, and to teach sign language to the deaf.

I'm wondering:

1) what other ideas we can work on in those fields?

2) how much will my choice of graduation project affect my application for a masters degree?

3) Is a stocks price prediction expert system too advanced for us?

Thanks a lot.

Answer 1

1) what other ideas we can work on in those fields?

It's amazing to me how little imagination computer science students seem to have. Stackoverflow.com is rife with questions about first projects from beginners and students.

I think that using statistics and data in novel ways, like Peter Norvig's spell checker, would be most interesting and fruitful.

Dr. Peter Norvig is a well-known computer science professor and AI guru. He's the CTO of Google now. Perhaps you can mine a choice out of his writings.

2) how much will my choice of graduation project affect my application for a masters degree?

Depends on too many other factors that you don't mention, like your past record as a student, etc. Probably a minor factor, in my opinion. Nobody is admitted to a masters program on the basis of a graduation project. Neither your undergrad project nor a masters thesis is a doctoral dissertation. Don't get them confused.

3) Is a stocks price prediction expert system too advanced for us?

I think stock price prediction is too advanced for anybody. After years of applying Fourier analysis, statistical models, Monte Carlo simulations, etc. if it were possible to do it would have been done.