P-TCM: Bridging Traditional Chinese Medicine and Modern Nutritional Science through Machine Learning

Project Manager: Aaron Xie, CMC 2024, Physics-Econ Dual Major with minor in CS

https://github.com/aaronxie0000 & aaron-xie.com

Preferred Method of Contact: Email ([email protected]) or WhatsApp/Text (9099059346)

Project Abstract

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666154320300247 Using Statistical Methods

Proposed P-Ai Project, Using Machine Learning

Brief Description for Prospective Project Members

One of the core ideas of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) is the categorization of food into 'Hot', 'Cold', and 'Neutral'. Modern nutritional science examines foods through their chemical make up, examining their macronutrients, micronutrients etc. Could modern nutritional science uncover how these ancient groupings of food in TCM came to be? And perhaps the groupings of food in TCM can uncover new insights in nutritional science?

This is a question that has been studied using traditional statistical methods (see diagram above), but has yet to reach any type of clear conclusion. This project aims to contribute to this search by introducing the use of machine learning to the problem.

You will enjoy this project if you want to

• 🔨 See how machine learning is used interdisciplinarily
  • particularly w/ the sciences, but the ml skills gained here can be applied to many other areas
• 🧱 Learn the core classification algorithms (Logistic Regression, SVM, KNN, Decision Tree) (all supervised models)
• 🧪 Prepare for, and gain experience in, doing research
  • we are using machine learning as a tool, an analysis method, for the purpose of answering a research question
• ❗ Get experience with the steps in a machine learning pipeline
  • eg. data exploration and processing, data visualization, running classification models, adjusting classification model, visualizing the model, assessing results
• ✍️ Publish research paper (?)
  • I have been in contact with Professor Kong (one of the author of the paper we are extending, see below) to design this project. He has said depending on the results and quality of our analysis, there may be a chance of collaborating to write it up and submit it to a journal

Project Motivation and Background