UC Investments and UC Berkeley’s Institute for Data Science today (May 22) announced the formation of the AI Futures Lab, a new hub for groundbreaking research and collaboration at the intersection of AI, science and society.
Backed by UC Investments, the University of California’s investment arm, and the Berkeley Institute for Data Science (BIDS), the lab will bring together top researchers across scientific disciplines to tackle big questions with data science and artificial intelligence. Housed in a building a block from the UC Berkeley campus, it’s a space — physical, digital and computational —designed to spark collaboration, drive innovation and shape the future.
Co-founded by Chief Investment Officer Jagdeep Singh Bachher and UC Berkeley professors Fernando Pérez (Statistics, BIDS director) and Ken Goldberg (Industrial Engineering & Operations Research Department, Berkeley AI Research Lab, and the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences), the initiative is grounded in UC Berkeley scholarship and interdisciplinary collaboration and UC Investments’ innovative culture.
The lab’s vision is expansive and its potential impact unlimited. It will incubate new ventures, develop open platforms for research and teaching, and convene a global network of scholars advancing data-driven methods and tools across fields.
“The germ for this idea dates to an introduction by Berkeley’s Jeremy Fiance of The House Fund to Berkeley Professors Ken Goldberg and Michael Jordan,” said Bachher. “Today we are realizing the vision from these conversations with Ken and Mike. The lab will build upon the visionary work that has been the hallmark of Mike’s career as well as its impactful, real-world applications.”
By building direct relationships with UC faculty and researchers, UC Investments is tapping into the University’s intellectual capital to inform its thinking, surface new investment opportunities, and help shape the innovation ecosystem close to home. This is a pioneering model for university investment offices — one that actively engages with faculty, research and innovation across the UC ecosystem. By turning proximity to world-class discovery into long-term opportunity, it brings to life one of UC Investments’ 10 cultural pillars: “What Makes UC, UC.”
The UC Investments’ team and its partners will work together with UC’s top AI researchers and collaborators. With some 5,000 square feet of space, the lab supports:
- Collaboration led by leading UC faculty to advance AI for the benefit of science and society, with a particular focus on concerns that cut across disciplines
- Engagement with leaders from across University of California campuses, leveraging the power of 10 to promote innovation in data science
- Opportunities for UC Investments to build knowledge critical to insightful long-term investing that benefit the students, faculty, staff, and retirees of the University of California
- Engagement with the vibrant ecosystem of venture investments in Berkeley, offering opportunities for connection with UC researchers
The digital counterpart to the building includes a Jupyter-powered cloud workspace that supports wide-ranging collaborations, removing barriers to partnerships with government, industry and nonprofit organizations. The virtual workspace will demonstrate and promote innovations in open-source infrastructure in which UC Berkeley and the Berkeley Institute for Data Science are playing a leading role. It will ensure the infrastructure meets the needs of the existing interdisciplinary data science community — as well as emerging or underserved use cases — to advance digital research and education in the era of AI
The lab will be a natural convening space for members of the interdisciplinary data science community. It will welcome scholars working on deep integration of AI across broad research areas, including but not limited to:
- Computation and Data Science for Economics and Business
- Computation and Societal Policy
- Computational Biology
- Computational Physical Sciences
- Environmental Data Science
- Societal-Scale Data Infrastructure
The lab aims to scale quickly. Within its first year, it will:
- Host a series of faculty salons and workshops headlined by leading UC Berkeley faculty working at these intersections
- Provide space for research collaborations
- Welcome and engage new scholars to UC Berkeley with a space beyond department boundaries
- Host visitors and teams building open-source tools and infrastructure that directly impact research in AI across applied disciplines
- Organize events combining research and entrepreneurship to help open the investment landscape for new companies
- Host workshops engaging with industry partners
- Identify and promote opportunities to deliver real-world impact through safe, transparent and ethical data science