Peer Watch

The Antimicrobial Resistance Research Landscape and Emerging Solutions

Vikram Venkatram Katherine Quinn
| November 2023

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is one of the world’s most pressing global health threats. Basic research is the first step towards identifying solutions. This brief examines the AMR research landscape since 2000, finding that the amount of research is increasing and that the U.S. is a leading publisher, but also that novel solutions like phages and synthetic antimicrobial production are a small portion of that research.

In a recent Nature article, CSET's Helen Toner lends her expertise to the discussion on groundbreaking developments in governmental oversight of artificial intelligence (AI) in the United States and the United Kingdom.

Decoding Intentions

Andrew Imbrie Owen Daniels Helen Toner
| October 2023

How can policymakers credibly reveal and assess intentions in the field of artificial intelligence? Policymakers can send credible signals of their intent by making pledges or committing to undertaking certain actions for which they will pay a price—political, reputational, or monetary—if they back down or fail to make good on their initial promise or threat. Talk is cheap, but inadvertent escalation is costly to all sides.

The Inigo Montoya Problem for Trustworthy AI (International Version)

Emelia Probasco Kathleen Curlee
| October 2023

Australia, Canada, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States emphasize principles of accountability, explainability, fairness, privacy, security, and transparency in their high-level AI policy documents. But while the words are the same, these countries define each of these principles in slightly different ways that could have large impacts on interoperability and the formulation of international norms. This creates, what we call the “Inigo Montoya problem” in trustworthy AI, inspired by "The Princess Bride" movie quote: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.”

A Guide to the Proposed Outbound Investment Regulations

Ngor Luong Emily S. Weinstein
| October 6, 2023

The August 9 Executive Order aims to restrict certain U.S. investments in key technology areas. In a previous post, we proposed an end-user approach to crafting an AI investment prohibition. In this follow-on post, we rely on existing and hypothetical transactions to test scenarios where U.S. investments in China’s AI ecosystem would or would not be covered under the proposed program, and highlight outstanding challenges.

In collaboration with colleagues from CNAS and the Atlantic Council, CSET Researchers Ngor Luong and Emily Weinstein provided this comment in request to Treasury's Advanced Notice of Rule-making request for public comment (TREAS-DO-2023-0009-0001).

The EU AI Act: A Primer

Mia Hoffmann
| September 26, 2023

The EU AI Act is nearing formal adoption and implementation. Read this blog post, with updated analysis following the December 2023 political agreement, by CSET’s resident EU expert and Research Fellow, Mia Hoffmann. Learn what we know about the Act and what it means for AI regulation in the EU (and the world).

The PRC’s Efforts Abroad

Owen Daniels
| September 2023

This report summarizes more than 20 CSET reports, translations, and data analyses to provide insight into the steps China has taken to increase its technological competitiveness beyond its own borders.

The PRC’s Domestic Approach

Owen Daniels
| September 2023

This report summarizes more than 20 CSET reports, translations, and data analyses to provide insight into China’s internal actions to advance and implement its technology-related policy goals

ETO Scout

September 2023

Scout is ETO's discovery tool for Chinese-language writing on science and technology. Scout compiles, tags, and summarizes news and commentary from selected Chinese sources, helping English-speaking users easily keep up to date, skim the latest news, and discover new perspectives. Use the Scout web interface to browse and filter articles, or get customized updates delivered to your inbox through the Scout email service.