14岁时你在干嘛？逃课、早恋、面临被数理化支配的恐惧？ 这位14岁的华裔少女却已经开发出了世界上第一款阿兹海默症APP了！

阿兹海默症俗称“老年痴呆症”，华裔少女Emma Yang 10岁时，她最爱的奶奶阿兹海默症病情恶化，为帮助奶奶记起与家人的点滴，她决定开发一款名为“永恒”（Timeless）的APP。

该APP将帮助无数的患者和家属们，现在，Emma的故事已经感动了很多人，连美国前副总统阿尔·戈尔和亿万富翁比尔·盖茨也在推特上对她表示赞赏：“我喜欢这个故事这个APP为阿茨海默病患者和他们所爱的人搭起了桥梁”。

近日，南华早报（South China Morning Post）专访了这位14岁的创业小女孩，流利的英文表达搭配坚定的眼神，难怪比尔盖茨都为她打call。

At the age of 14, the Hong Kong-born Yang has already created her own mobile app for Alzheimer’s patients, which has impressed the likes of Microsoft Corp founder Bill Gates and Alibaba Group Holding executive vice-chairman Joseph Tsai.

The Timeless app, which Yang spent two years developing and refining, comes with several core features. It uses an artificial intelligence-powered facial recognition system, from Miami-based start-up Kairos, to help Alzheimer’s patients identify people in photos and remember who they are.

It also allows photos to be grouped by individuals as well as provide a picture-based phone book, which enables a user to tap on photos to call or text a person.

“What really motivated me to [work on Timeless] was seeing how many people were reacting to it, saying I would love to have this for my own family members [have Alzheimer’s],” Yang said.

She is part of a growing number of teenagers who have studied software coding and become entrepreneurs at a young age, as more students in Hong Kong are steered towards STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education to help foster a culture of innovation in the city.

The inspiration to develop an app that would help Alzheimer’s patients connect with their loved ones came to Yang at the tender age of 12, when her grandmother – who suffers from the chronic neurodegenerative disease – started forgetting things like what she ate for dinner and Yang’s birthday.

“I wanted to create something to help people like my grandmother stay connected with her family,” Yang said. It was a task she was well-prepared to undertake.

“I started learning coding when I was around six, and later began developing games and websites,” Yang said. The young software developer said winning a competition, in which she developed an app to identify whether a head injury could be a concussion, led her to appreciate the impact of technology on people’s lives.

“I thought [then] that if I know how to code, I should also have the ability to help people,” she said.

Yang’s father, who works in the technology industry, was the one who introduced her to computers and Scratch, a block-based visual programming program targeted at kids.

Still, Yang’s life as a young software developer and entrepreneur has not been without formidable challenges. She cited as an example how venture capitalists have not taken her work seriously. Some of these people even suggested that she exhibit her project at science fairs or “put it online and see how it does”.

Undeterred by those setbacks, Yang started an Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign in March last year to support her Timeless app project. That effort raised more than US$10,000.

“I think perseverance is really important,” Yang said. “Never let anyone tell you that you shouldn’t be in the field that you want to be in the most.”

At present, Yang works with an international team that includes a designer in California and a developer based in Cologne, Germany. The chief technology officer of Kairos, the AI start-up whose technology is used in the Timeless app, is now Yang’s adviser.

She urged other young, aspiring entrepreneurs to believe in themselves because the teenagers of today will be tomorrow’s leaders.

“Technology has been able to empower kids from all walks of life to put their ideas into action,” she said. “As long as you get out there and put yourself out there, tell people about your idea and … find out who’s on board and can get behind it, you’ll [eventually] find that team of people.”

14岁华裔天才少女

Emma Yang今年14岁，中文名叫杨君熙，生活中是个喜欢自行车和喵星人、有些内向的华裔少女。

当然，她还有另一个更广为人知的身份，那就是天才少女程序员！

6岁就开始学习编程的她，对计算机技术有着强烈的兴趣，热衷于用电脑创造各种有趣的事物！

10岁之前，Emma都在香港和奶奶住在一起，她和奶奶关系十分亲密，行为、表情、习惯等都深受奶奶的影响妈妈说她就是“奶奶的影子”。

不幸的是，在Emma 7岁的时候，奶奶被确诊为阿兹海默症患者，这种病症在不同人的身上有不同的症状，Emma的奶奶则是开始忘记一些事情。

Emma10岁那年，她的父母决定搬到纽约去生活，但同时奶奶的病情开始恶化，常和奶奶打越洋电话的Emma发现：奶奶总是不停地重复同样的问题。一遍又一遍地问她“最近还好吗？”明明几分钟之前刚刚回答过了，奶奶也会马上忘记。

奶奶忘记了她的生日，总是搞不清楚她现在几岁，也记不住爸爸的电话号码，只能将一些重要信息记在家里的白板上。

家人给奶奶买了一部iPad，将重要的家庭照片存在里面，希望奶奶可以翻看照片找回记忆。

但Emma仍感到很害怕，万一奶奶不认识她了怎么办？万一奶奶走丢了怎么办？这样的问题光是想想就让人难受，这种事情绝不能发生！Emma决定要用自己的电脑技术，帮助奶奶重拾记忆。

希望APP能帮助更多患者

那么，要怎么做呢？

Emma想到了开发一款专门针对阿兹海默症患者的APP，但Emma虽是程序天才，开发APP这种庞大的工程她也没有尝试过，幸好，一路总有许多贵人相助。

Emma的父亲本身就是软件工程师，他给了Emma许多技术上的支持，但既然是为阿兹海默症患者开发的APP，自然应该了解患者最需要的是什么，为此，Emma做了大量的调查研究并咨询了许多专业人士

她发现患者常常无法识别亲友的面孔，于是在APP中导入了面部识别技术，当患者使用这个 APP 时，它会不断滚动亲友的照片，并通过面部识别技术，告诉患者目前屏幕上显示的人和自己是什么关系。

APP中有一个记录当日重要事项的日历，还包含一个家庭成员的快速呼叫页面，包含照片、姓名等全部信息，此外还有一页名为“我”，在这一页显示了病人自己的信息，包括姓名、家庭住址、年龄和电话号码。

当患者因为病情而反复拨打一个电话时，APP 会作出提醒：“您确定要打电话吗？你五分钟前才刚给这个人打过电话”可以说是非常贴心了

当然，光靠Emma一个人的力量是无法开发出这款APP的，面部识别技术来自于一家叫Kairo的公司，他们为许多APP做过内嵌的面部识别功能，公司首席技术官Cole Calistra十分欣赏Emma：“对于那个年龄段的人来说，能有如此驱动精神真的非常了不起“

阿兹海默症专家Kramps 和美国加州记忆与衰老中心副教授Possin都给了Emma很大的帮助他们不断地给Emma提出反馈意见，经过无数次的改良才有了现在的“永恒”

在受邀前往Ted演讲时Emma 说：“希望永恒能帮助到世界各地的阿尔茨海默患者”

阿兹海默患者的寒冬

说到阿兹海默症，大家也许会觉得很熟悉，但其实真正了解的人并不多，这已经是世界上最严重、患病上升率最高的疾病之一了，其中以中老年人居多，但年轻人里也不乏案例。

据统计，目前全球约有5000万人深受阿兹海默症的折磨，到2050年，这个数字会上升到1.3亿！

也就是说，你的亲人、朋友都有可能患上这种疾病，慢慢忘记你们之间的点点滴滴，甚至连生活也无法自理！

阿兹海默患者的“寒冬”正在来临，但是大家似乎还不重视这个问题，Emma在做市场调查时发现市场上相关的应用程序非常少，因此她决定“用技术的力量来填补这个空白”。

目前，“永恒”还在进行程序优化，Emma已经在网上进行众筹，希望能筹到5万美元用于开发和推广，如果顺利，应用有望在2018年底正式上线。

而她本人则希望能在大学里更深入地了解计算机科学和人工智能技术，在这些领域探索和发展自己的事业，她希望未来“科技能找到一种治疗阿尔茨海默症的方法，而‘永恒’将成为诊断和治疗之间病人的过渡工具”。

也难怪比尔·盖茨都为她点赞，心怀梦想，大胆实践，如果有越来越多Emma这样的人，阿兹海默症患者的“春天”也不会太远吧。

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