Cerebro Hackathon

CEREBRO — Neural Sentiment Hackathon Where minds decode emotion at machine speed. CEREBRO is a 36-hour online hackathon organized by the Department of Computer Science & Engineering, Institute of Engineering & Management (IEM), Kolkata. The hackathon challenges participants to build systems that can understand and analyze human emotion, sentiment, and tone across different forms of communication. Participants will choose one of three problem statements and develop a functional solution using their own technology stack, models, and approach. CEREBRO focuses on practical applications of Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, Speech Processing, and Affective Computing. Problem Statements PS-01 — Tone Intelligence in Conversations First Prize: ₹5,000 Chat conversations contain more than words. They can reveal tension, sarcasm, warmth, frustration, and escalation. Build a system that analyzes the emotional arc of a multi-turn conversation and identifies changes in tone throughout the conversation. Key requirements: Multi-turn chat sentiment and tone tracking Sarcasm, passive-aggression, and irony detection Emotion-arc visualization over the conversation Support for chat formats such as WhatsApp, Slack, Discord, or similar exports Participants must source their own data and develop their own approach PS-02 — Voice as a Mood Signal Second Prize: ₹3,000 The emotional state behind a sentence can change dramatically depending on how it is spoken. Build a system that extracts emotional information directly from raw audio, using characteristics such as pitch, prosody, speech rate, and pauses. Key requirements: Audio-based emotion classification Continuous valence and arousal estimation Robustness to noisy, accented, or code-switched speech Emotion should primarily be inferred from the audio signal itself Participants must source their own training data PS-03 — Sentiment Drift in Social Threads Third Prize: ₹2,000 Online discussions can begin calmly and quickly become hostile or toxic. Build a system that analyzes a sequence of comments and identifies where the emotional tone changes, including the specific point where sentiment significantly deteriorates. Key requirements: Sequential or graph-based thread modelling Sentiment drift detection Early-warning toxicity signals Data sourced from platforms such as Reddit, X, or YouTube Interpretable output showing which reply contributed to the sentiment shift Prize Pool Total Prize Pool: ₹10,000 Problem Statement Prize PS-01 — Tone Intelligence in Conversations ₹5,000 PS-02 — Voice as a Mood Signal ₹3,000 PS-03 — Sentiment Drift in Social Threads ₹2,000 Total ₹10,000 Schedule Date & Time Event October 15, 2026 Registration opens on Unstop November 1, 2026 Problem statements published November 2, 2026 — 9:00 PM IST Hackathon begins November 3, 2026 — 9:00 AM IST Halfway mark and optional mentor Q&A November 4, 2026 — 3:00 AM IST 6 hours remaining November 4, 2026 — 9:00 AM IST Submissions close November 4, 2026 — 12:00 PM IST Judging begins November 5, 2026 Winners announced Hackathon Duration: 36 hoursFormat: Fully onlineRegistration: Free What CEREBRO Is About: CEREBRO is built around the intersection of AI and human emotion. Participants are encouraged to go beyond basic sentiment classification and explore how machines can understand changing emotional states across conversations, speech, and social interactions. Participants are free to choose their own programming languages, frameworks, models, datasets, and development approaches. The focus is on building a real, functional system rather than simply wrapping an existing AI API with a user interface. Who Can Participate? CEREBRO is open to students, developers, researchers, AI/ML enthusiasts, and anyone interested in building technology around emotion and sentiment intelligence. Teams can participate in the hackathon and work remotely from anywhere. Organized by Department of Computer Science & Engineering Institute of Engineering & Management (IEM), Kolkata CEREBRO — Neural Sentiment HackathonNovember 2–4, 2026 · 36 Hours · Online