Charting the Future of Biotechnology and AI
pdfernhout writes:
A recent US Congressional Report suggests: "We stand at the edge of a new industrial revolution, one that depends on our ability to engineer biology. Emerging biotechnology, coupled with artificial intelligence, will transform everything from the way we defend and build our nation to how we nourish and provide care for Americans."
From the Executive Summary:
Imagine a not-so-distant future where researchers in Shanghai develop a breakthrough drug that can eliminate malignant cells, effectively ending cancer as we know it. But when tensions over Taiwan reach a breaking point, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the strategic apparatus of the Chinese government, hoards the treatment under the guise of national security, cutting off supply to the United States. After years of access, this lifesaving drug is immediately in shortage, requiring doctors to ration it while American biotechnology companies scramble to reconstitute production in the United States. The streets and social media overflow with people demanding that the United States abandon Taiwan. The Administration faces an agonizing choice between geopolitical priorities and public health.
This scenario is fiction. But something like it could soon become reality as biotechnology takes center stage in the unfolding strategic competition between the United States and People's Republic of China (China).
[...] Biology has been a well-defined scientific discipline for more than 200 years. But thanks to breakthroughs in artificial intelligence (AI), engineering, and automation, biology is becoming more than just a field of discovery; it is becoming a field of design. Chemistry made this leap in the 1880s when chemical engineering unlocked rubber, plastic, and synthetic fibers, materials that transformed society. Physics followed in the 1940s, when academic theory led to the atomic bomb, semiconductors, and computers. Now for the first time in recent history, the United States finds itself competing with a rival over a new form of engineering that will create tremendous wealth, but, in the wrong hands, could be used to develop powerful weapons. Countries that win the innovation race tend to win actual wars, too.
The Congressional Report Chapters:
1. Prioritize Biotechnology at the National Level
2. Mobilize the Private Sector to get U.S. Products to Scale
3. Maximize the Benefits of Biotechnology and Defense
4. Out-innovate our Strategic Partners
5. Build the Biotechnology Workforce of the Future
6. Mobilize the Collective Strengths of our Allies and Partners
Here is some commentary by Eric Schmidt on the report including his predictions on the future of AI applied to biotech and other areas over the next few years.
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