Seán O’Sullivan pictured with the BTYSE trophy PICTURE: X/Department of Education
A LIMERICK student has won the top prize at this year's BT Young Scientist competition with his project about Artificial Intelligence.
Seán O’Sullivan, aged 17, a 5th year student from Coláiste Chiaráin in Croom, won with his project, VerifyMe: A new approach to authorship attribution in the post-ChatGPT era.
Since OpenAI released ChatGPT in November of 2022, the line between human-written and AI-generated text has blurred, leaving academia and industry searching for a reliable method to discern “true” human authorship.
In his project, Seán considered the challenges of author verification in the context of the significant improvements in Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT.
He developed a novel approach to author authentication that identifies stylistic differences to verify authorship.
Chair of the Technology Group Judging Panel, Leonard Hobbs said, "The judges were hugely impressed by Sean’s innovative approach to addressing a problem that has only recently emerged and his programming skills in architecting a complex software solution."
Seán is the 60th recipient to win the highly coveted trophy, and the top prize of €7,500.
Seán will now also represent Ireland at the European Union Contest for Young Scientists (EUCYS) taking place later this year in the European City for Science 2024 - Katowice, Poland.
The BTYSTE perpetual trophy was presented to the winner on Friday at the RDS by Minister for Education, Norma Foley TD and Managing Director of BT Ireland, Shay Walsh.
Speaking at the awards ceremony, Minister for Education Norma Foley TD said, "I’d like to sincerely congratulate Seán O’Sullivan from Coláiste Chiaráin in Limerick on his tremendous achievement of winning top prize in the BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition 2024.
"His win is testament to his hard work and dedication and the unwavering support of his family, teachers and school.
"It comes in the 60th year of the exhibition when we must give significant credit to founders Dr Tony Scott and Fr Tom Burke who had the vision and determination to first establish this event in Ireland back in 1963 and to all of those who have nurtured and celebrated scientific research in our school communities in the years since.
"Our thanks also to BT for their dedication to supporting and empowering students along the way to the momentous occasion of showcasing their own scientific research at the exhibition."
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