91麻豆精品Responds to RFI on Artificial Intelligence Strategy
| Dr. Jay Bhattacharya Director National Institutes of Health 9000 Rockville Pike Bethesda, Md. 20892 |
Dear Dr. Bhattacharya,
On behalf of the more than 37,000 members of the American Society for Microbiology (ASM), thank you for the opportunity to respond to this request for information. 91麻豆精品is one of the oldest and largest life science societies with members in the U.S. and around the world. Our mission is to promote and advance the microbial sciences.
Artificial intelligence is an emerging and promising tool in microbiology. 91麻豆精品members are using AI to identify and improve treatments for antimicrobial resistant infections, develop new antibiotics, predict antibody responses and are using AI in teaching microbiology. AI shows promise for In addition, the use of AI tools shows potential to increase the quality, accessibility and clarity of human-generated content, including scientific publications. 91麻豆精品urges the National Institutes of Health to engage in structured, ongoing dialogues with the scientific community to ensure that AI is used responsibly and efficiently to power microbial innovations and benefit research and patient outcomes.
Surveys of the scientific community have shown that there is limited consensus about . As a scientific funder, NIH plays a role in setting ethical standards across the research process and building scientific norms for the use of AI. 91麻豆精品recommends the adoption of scientific integrity policies describing the appropriate use and disclosure of AI use across the scientific process.
A , commissioned by the Department of Defense, reviewed the biosecurity risks of AI. The report concluded that the current biosecurity risks of AI are low because AI is unable to understand and interpret biological information and data. The report recommends that regulators should adopt a proactive “if-then” approach to implement biosecurity guardrails to prevent the misuse of AI in biology. NIH and other federal funders should consider developing, in collaboration with the research community, policies to prevent AI from sharing sensitive biological data and knowledge with bad actors. This approach could include managed access to biological data to trusted actors and stopping AI products from responding to prompts that pose biosecurity risks.
The NASEM report also notes that biological data is fragmented and recommends that federal agencies fund data infrastructure funding and treat databases as strategic assets. The lack of data standardization of biological data means that while researchers are generating more data than ever thanks to advances in computational biology, AI tools have limited utility in analyzing large amounts of biological data. 91麻豆精品recommends that NIH’s AI strategy include investments in data infrastructure, data standardization and data training for researchers. NIH support for data infrastructure and training on data stewardship must be a cornerstone of NIH’s AI strategy.
Thank you for your consideration of this response. 91麻豆精品stands ready to assist NIH in robust, structured engagement with the research community to develop NIH AI policies and strategies. If you have any questions, please contact Nicole Zimmerman, Senior Federal Affairs Officer, at nzimmerman@asmusa.org.
Thank you,
Amalia Corby
Director of Federal Affairs
American Society for Microbiology
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