NSF - National Science Foundation

NSF invests $26.7 million in building the first-ever prototype open knowledge network.

An open knowledge network is a publicly accessible, interconnected set of data repositories and associated knowledge graphs that will enable data-driven, artificial intelligence-based solutions for a broad set of societal and economic challenges.

“From secure supply chains to chemical and biomedical safety to soil health, these inaugural Proto-OKN projects will not only advance the state of the art in data and artificial intelligence, but they will also have tremendous positive impacts on the societal and economic opportunities that we see before us,” said Erwin Gianchandani, assistant director for NSF’s Directorate for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships (TIP).

“Proto-OKN projects are poised to work closely with nearly two dozen federal and state agencies to collaboratively build a trustworthy open knowledge network, enabling researchers across sectors and disciplines to come together to use and transform data into actionable insights that will drive U.S. competitiveness.”

The resulting Proto-OKN will benefit a broad range of people and organizations — including government agencies, businesses, nonprofits, researchers and others — by providing access to integrated information for a variety of uses, such as pursuing societal and economic opportunities, driving evidence-based policies and developing novel AI capabilities.

Proto-OKN will provide an essential public data infrastructure to power the next information revolution, transforming the nation’s ability to unlock actionable insights from data by linking information about related entities.

Fast track to 2.45 for discussion.

Last month the National Science Foundation (NSF) launched the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) pilot to encourage AI cooperation and innovation as part of the White House’s executive order to advance AI. The pilot comprises a partnership with 10 federal agencies and 19 industry organizations.

Tess deBlanc-Knowles, NSF’s special assistant to the director for AI, joins GovCast to discuss how partnerships strengthen the NAIRR pilot, how it is democratizing access to AI research and how shepherding AI leadership can open more doors for the federal government, industry and academic community more broadly.