About the Talk

In person event | Invite-only convening | Request invite via the OpenAI Forum

Frontier AI is moving quickly, but many institutions are still figuring out how to turn that progress into real-world results. This forum is about closing that gap: bringing together leaders across science, health, national security, policy, civil society, and AI to ask what today's systems could help us do, and what it would take to do it responsibly and at scale.

We'll focus on areas where the stakes are high and the upside is real: biology and medicine, national security, public good and philanthropic applications, scientific research, and the other economic and human factors that shape how new tools are used. Through a mix of discussion and working sessions, participants will identify ambitious challenges frontier AI could help address, then work through the practical questions behind them: compute, model access, data, tools, funding, governance, trust, and the partnerships needed to move from promise to progress.

By the end of the day, participants will have a better understanding of challenge areas, early pilot ideas, resource needs, and concrete next steps that we can collectively carry forward. The discussion will also set the stage for a follow-on meeting to be held early next year.

Forum members interested in attending can request an invite by registering for the event. Space is limited.

About the Speakers

Joshua Achiam, Chief Futurist @ OpenAI

Josh Achiam is the Head of Mission Alignment at OpenAI, supporting the organization in defining and evangelizing the mission to ensure that AGI benefits all of humanity. He joined OpenAI in 2017 as a research scientist and has worked on AI safety research and operations, AI impacts research, and educational resources (including Spinning Up in Deep RL). Previously, Josh earned his PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Berkeley and BS degrees in Physics and Aerospace Engineering from the University of Florida.

Gabriel Manso, Ph.D. researcher @ MIT EECS (FutureTech Lab)

Gabriel Manso is a Computer Science Ph.D. candidate at MIT, where he studies the limits of frontier AI systems and their implications for science and computing. His research focuses on reasoning, AI for scientific discovery, and the practical and technical constraints that shape how advanced models perform on complex tasks. More broadly, his work explores how frontier AI capabilities can be measured, extended, and applied to accelerate scientific progress.

Adam Goff, Program Director @ Renaissance Philanthropy

Adam Goff is a Program Director with Renaissance Philanthropy originating philanthropic funds focused on global health and development, such as a fund on nutritional innovations to reduce cardiovascular disease. Adam was previously Senior Vice President of Strategy at 8 Rivers Capital, where he originated billion-dollar scale energy projects, led tech commercialization strategy, and invented a direct air capture technology. Adam has built and managed technical and policy teams and raised more than $25 million in grant funding. Prior to 8 Rivers, he served as Chief of Staff at the ClearPath Foundation. He was also a guest scientist at Los Alamos National Lab, and a Senior Advisor to Blueprint Biosecurity. He received a B.A. from Yale University and is based in Washington, D.C.

Tobias Peyerl, Head of Strategic Intelligence & Analysis @ OpenAI

Global policy and risk adviser with extensive experience in strategic policy-making, geopolitical analysis and predictive threat detection and mitigation. Skilled in leading executive level decision-making and global project management. Excited about new challenges in ambiguous spaces at the intersection of new and emerging technologies, geopolitics and governance. A curious learner who finds inspiration and thrives within diverse and high-pressure environments. Earned PhD in International Law at the Graduate Institute in Geneva; studied and researched at Harvard Law School, Sciences Po Paris and Humboldt University in Berlin. Currently immersed in learning Python, training first neural networks and building Deep Learning foundations.

Kim Budil, Director @ Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory

Kimberly S. Budil is the 13th director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and president of Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC. In this role she sets the strategic vision for Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and leads the Laboratory’s programs and operations to enhance U.S. national security and ensure scientific leadership in strategic areas. She engages with the senior leadership at the Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration and other government agencies, as well as senior leaders at other national labs, private sector and academic partners. Budil leads a workforce of approximately 9,000 employees and manages an annual operating budget in excess of $3.25 billion. In support of LLNL’s nuclear deterrence mission, she is responsible for providing the United States government with an annual assessment of the safety, security and effectiveness of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile and enterprise. This work is underpinned by a wide array of world-class scientific and engineering capabilities that enable support to a broad range of national security missions. Budil has held roles of increasing management responsibility at the Laboratory, previously serving as principal associate director for Weapons and Complex Integration. Budil served as a detailee twice in Washington, D.C. and was vice president for national labs at the University of California Office of the President. She currently serves on several boards and participates in numerous professional and community outreach activities. She is a member of the National Academy of Engineering. Budil holds a Ph.D. in engineering and applied science from the University of California, Davis, where she was a Hertz Fellow, and a B.S. in physics from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Thomas Mason, Director @ Los Alamos National LaboratoryThomas (Thom) Mason is the President and CEO of Triad National Security, LLC (Triad) and serves as the Director of Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). Prior to becoming LANL Laboratory Director Thom was the Senior Vice President for Global Laboratory Operations at Battelle where he had responsibility for governance and strategy across the six National Laboratories that Battelle manages or co-manages. Prior to joining Battelle, Thom worked at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) for 19 years, including 10 years as the Laboratory Director. Under his leadership, ORNL saw significant growth in programs, new facilities, and hiring while achieving record low safety incident rates. Before becoming Laboratory Director, he was Associate Laboratory Director (ALD) for Neutron Sciences, ALD for the Spallation Neutron Source (SNS), and Director of the Experimental Facilities Division. During his time in Oak Ridge, Thom was active in the community serving as Chair of the Oak Ridge Public Schools Education Foundation as well as Innovation Valley, the Knoxville-Oak Ridge area regional economic development organization. He moved to ORNL from the University of Toronto where he was a faculty member in the Department of Physics and previously worked as a Senior Scientist at Risø National Laboratory and a Postdoc at AT&T Bell Laboratories. For the past 30 years, he has been involved in the design and construction of scientific instrumentation and facilities and the application of nuclear, computing, and materials sciences to solve important challenges in energy and national security. Thom has a Ph.D. in Experimental Condensed Matter Physics from McMaster University and a BSc in Physics from Dalhousie University.

Courtney Corley, Chief Scientist for Artificial Intelligence, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory; Director, Center for AI @PNNL

Data scientist Courtney “Court” Corley leads research to make artificial intelligence more reliable, safe, and secure. As chief scientist for AI at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Corley directs the Center for AI @PNNL to advance the frontiers of AI and of scientific discovery, energy resilience, and national security by applying AI to global issues. The Center for AI seeks to recruit and retain a skilled AI workforce, provide access to world-class infrastructure, services, and tools, and coordinate institutional AI partnerships with industry. He is currently the co-principal investigator for the DOE Advanced Scientific Computing Research's Transformational AI Models & Data effort and co-leads the Models Pillar of Genesis Mission.

Prior to leading the center and supporting DOE's AI initiative, Corley led numerous AI efforts across the laboratory. Most recently, he led PNNL's National Security AI strategy on Full Stack AI Leadership and launched PNNL’s Generative AI for Science, Energy, and Security investment, applying generative AI across the breadth of PNNL’s missions. Corley also co-led the Deep Learning for Scientific Discovery Laboratory Directed Research and Development investment, applying deep learning across the breadth of PNNL’s science and security missions through dozens of efforts. This resulted in a significant increase in AI publications and the recruitment of new researchers specializing in AI at PNNL.

Corley's specific areas of expertise are deep learning, natural language processing, AI for science, assured AI (including safety, security, and adversarial machine learning), and few-shot learning.

Pat Fitch, Deputy Director, Science, Technology & Engineering, Los Alamos National Laboratory

Pat is the Deputy Director for Science, Technology, & Engineering (STE) at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL). The 4,300 member STE team executes $2.3B in energy, science, global security, and nuclear weapons missions making contributions ranging from fundamental discoveries to production/operations. STE is comprised of four Associate Laboratory Directorates (ALD): Global Security; Physical Sciences; Simulation, Computation, & Theory; and Chemical, Earth & Life Sciences (CELS), as well as Programs for Science, Energy, Global Security, and Laboratory Directed R&D, and Offices for Partnerships & Pipelines and STE Strategy & Integration. Pat joined LANL in 2018 as ALDCELS. Prior to LANL, Pat was the founding Director in 2006 of the National Biodefense Analysis & Countermeasures FFRDC–home to the National Bioforensic Analysis Center. For over two decades he held leadership positions at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL). Pat holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University and BS degrees in Physics and Engineering Science from Loyola, Baltimore. Pat is a Fellow of the AAAS and the recipient of three Secretary of Energy Achievement Awards, two FLC Excellence in Technology Transfer Awards, an IEEE international best paper award, an ABSA national best poster award, and an LLNL S&T Award. He is an accomplished applied scientist with over 35,000 citations for R&D in biodefense, genomics, medical devices, imaging systems, and computer algorithms and architectures, including artificial neural networks. He was part of an LLNL team that developed and demonstrated the world’s fastest computer.

Neil Thompson, Director, MIT FutureTech; Principal Research Scientist, MIT CSAIL; MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy

Dr. Neil Thompson is the Director of the FutureTech research group, and Principle Research Scientist at MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL), and at MIT’s Initiative on the Digital Economy (IDE) within the Sloan School of Management. Guided by Dr. Thompson’s leadership, the FutureTech group researches the cutting edge and most important trends driving progress in computing and AI, how these trends underpin scientific progress and economic prosperity, and produces rigorous insights that broaden humanity’s knowledge, and inform policy and industry decisions. Since founding MIT FutureTech in 2019, Dr. Thompson’s research group has attracted over $25M in funding, and has grown to be one of the largest research groups at MIT with over 110 researchers. Dr. Thompson maintains research partnerships with leading organizations such as Google, IBM, Amazon, Accenture, Microsoft, Los Alamos National Labs, and others.

Lav Varshney, Co-Founder and CEO, Kocree, Inc; Della Pietra Infinity Professor and Inaugural Director of AI Innovation Institute, Stony Brook University

Lav R. Varshney is the Della Pietra Infinity Professor and Inaugural Director of the AI Innovation Institute at Stony Brook University. He is co-founder and CEO of Kocree, Inc., a startup company building novel human-controllable AI for discovery and creativity, and chief scientist of Ensaras, Inc., a startup company focused on AI and wastewater treatment. He holds appointments at RAND Corporation and at Brookhaven National Laboratory. He was previously on the faculty of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, a visiting scholar at Northwestern's Kellogg School of Management, a principal research scientist at Salesforce Research AI, and a research staff member at IBM Research. He is a former White House staffer, having served on the National Security Council staff as a White House Fellow, where he contributed to national AI and wireless communications policy. His research interests include information theory and artificial intelligence. He received his B.S. degree from Cornell University and his S.M. and Ph.D. degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.