NSF, Silicon Valley team for AI research

The National Science Foundation (NSF), the federal agency responsible for expanding the Internet from a defense network project into the ubiquitous presence it is today, announced a partnership with some of the biggest names in tech to spur AI advancements.

The agency announced the launch of the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) pilot program, with the goal of providing a national resource of AI technologies to researchers and educators.

The list of private industry partners is a who’s who of AI:  Amazon, Anthropic, HPE, Hugging Face, IBM, Intel, Meta, Microsoft, Nvidia, OpenAI, and Palantir. Other federal agencies will be involved as well: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, NASA, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and the Department of Agriculture.

“By investing in AI research through the NAIRR pilot, the United States unleashes discovery and impact and bolsters its global competitiveness,” NSF director Sethuraman Panchanathan said in a statement.

“To continue leading in AI research and development, we must create opportunities across the country to advance AI innovation and strengthen educational opportunities, empowering the nation to shape international standards and igniting economic growth,” he added.

The NAIRR was born out of Executive Order 14110, signed by President Joe Biden in October 2023, directing NSF to launch a pilot for NAIRR within 90 days. According to the NSF, NAIRR will function as a shared national infrastructure that will provide communities across the country with the hardware, models, and resources needed to advance the AI ecosystem.

The NAIRR pilot will initially support AI research to advance safe, secure and trustworthy AI, according to the NSF, as well as the application of AI to important fields like healthcare, environmental, and infrastructure sustainability.

The pilot’s operations will be organized into four focus areas:  

• NAIRR Open, to enable open AI research through access to diverse AI resources via the NAIRR Pilot Portal and coordinated allocations.  
• NAIRR Secure, co-led by NIH and DOE, will enable AI research requiring privacy and security-preserving resources and will assemble exemplar privacy preserving resources.   
• NAIRR Software will facilitate and investigate inter-operable use of AI software, platforms, tools and services for NAIRR pilot resources.  
• NAIRR Classroom will reach new communities through education, training, user support and outreach.  

Researchers can discover and apply for initial access to NAIRR pilot resources through the NAIRR pilot portal at nairrpilot.org