Carol Reiley became fascinated with robotics at an early age and found that working with machines taught her more about humans themselves. However, working in the field she found that a disproportionately small amount (only 12%) of engineers were female.
She began to ask not only how we could make machines more accessible to people worldwide, but how robotics and engineering could become more inclusive of women.

An advocate for robotics, Reiley is working on her Ph.D. in Computer Science at Johns Hopkins University, supported by a National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship. She has spent the last 15 years researching various applications of robotics in domains ranging from underwater, land, space, and surgical. She also founded TinkerBelle Labs, which focuses on designing affordable healthcare, do-it-yourself robotics, and interactive projects.

Reiley was the first female engineer to be featured on the cover of MAKE magazine, a children's book author (gobrain.com), and an advocate to increase women in engineering.

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Tags: Carol Reiley, TEDxWanChai, TEDxWanChai Women, TEDx, Hong Kong, Johns Hopkins University, National Science Foundation, TinkerBelle Labs, robotics, women in robotics, engineering, women in engineering, gender imbalance, STEM, women in STEM, artificial intelligence

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx