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Alan Turing Institute appoints directors to tackle societal issues

Alan Turing Institute
Image credit: Lenscap Photography / Shutterstock

The Alan Turing Institute, a UK government-backed data science and AI non-profit, has appointed four directors tasked with addressing societal issues.

The appointments are part of the institute’s new strategy to shape how data science and AI can be used for social good.

The key three areas of focus – referred to as “grand challenges” – for the organisation and its new directors are environment and sustainability, health, defence and national security.

The environmental efforts will be led by Professor Marc Deisenroth, who has joined the institute from University College London, where he is the Google DeepMind chair of AI and machine learning.

Professor Aldo Faisal will head up the group’s health efforts. Faisal is a professor of AI and neuroscience at Imperial College London and the founding director of the UKRI Centre in AI for Healthcare.

Professor Tim Watson from the Cyber Security Centre at Loughborough will take on the defence and national security challenge and Dr Andrew Duncan from Imperial College London will be leading Fundamental Research.

“This is an important year for our AI ecosystem, as we come together to ensure powerful new technologies help us find solutions to society’s greatest challenges and I warmly welcome these exciting new appointments to our scientific and organisational leadership,” said Dr Jean Innes, chief executive of the Alan Turing Institute.

“Combined with our existing capabilities and challenge-led approach to science and innovation, this marks an exciting new chapter.”

Professor Mark Girolami, chief scientist at The Alan Turing Institute, added: “Harnessing the power of data science and AI to address these global challenges is going to require a remarkable effort but we’re confident that we can make meaningful progress with the expertise of our new science and innovation directors.

Last year, the Alan Turing Institute published a report revealing a stark gender imbalance when it comes to funding for AI companies. The report found the average investment into female-founded AI companies was around seven times less than male-founded ones.

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