00:00On some days, the air in Jobipur is especially thick.
00:03The village is located near Kanpur in the state of Uttar Pradesh, in north-eastern India.
00:10You feel this massive congestion in the chest, a lump-like thing in the throat, phlegm.
00:16It's worse when you do a bit of physical work.
00:19At Kanpur's Indian Institute of Technology, Professor Satcheeda Nand Tripathi and his team want that to change.
00:27But first, they must identify where exactly the pollution comes from.
00:32To do this, the scientists installed a sensor network across Uttar Pradesh and the neighboring state of Bihar.
00:38Some 1,400 measuring points provide real-time data on pollutant levels, combined with weather and climate data.
00:46Combining these two data sets and we applied it to a pipeline of machine learning AI model
00:52to understand what patterns air pollution forms.
00:57Does it form a pattern which overlaps with the administrative boundaries of districts or division or state?
01:06The result? Immense particulate pollution in rural areas due to local living conditions,
01:12cooking over open fires and burning trash by the roadside.
01:16Additionally, natural air currents carry pollutants from major cities into rural areas.
01:22Dangerous and microscopic particles under 2.5 micrometers in size.
01:31Artificial intelligence cross-references the data in a matter of seconds.
01:35Now imagine that we can now associate village level PM2.5 values to the people's age,
01:45people's socio-economic status, various geographies.
01:49This gives you a lot of patterns.
01:53On campus, researchers are preparing the sensors for deployment.
01:57The devices need exact calibration to minimize measurement errors later on.
02:04There's a small hole in the sensor that allows air to pass through it, sucking the air in.
02:13You can see the pollution level on screen.
02:19We then study the readings and find out where the pollution is high.
02:26In a few days, the devices will go live, sending data back to the Institute.
02:31Ultimately, however, it's up to the authorities to take measures to improve the air.
02:35The scientists' AI project has become so important that, with support from the World Bank,
02:41it is set to be expanded to additional regions of India.
02:43The world's most recent research on the world's
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