We are looking for early career researchers, who are enrolled or are about to be enrolled in a PhD programme at an accredited university (anywhere in the world), with a specific interest in multi-agent/cooperation problems involving AI systems. Your research proposal should aim to contribute to societally beneficial AI development.
The Cooperative AI Foundation is committed to the growth of a diverse and inclusive research community, and we especially welcome applications from underrepresented backgrounds. This is the first iteration of the fellowship, and we’re still working out how we can best provide value to PhD students – if you apply now, you can help us and future generations of students.
This round of PhD fellowships is designed for students who are currently enrolled in a PhD programme or are due to start a PhD in 2024 or 2025. If you want to apply for a PhD in future years then please wait for the next round of PhD fellowships which will be announced next year.
We provide flexible funding adapted in duration and extent to the needs of each candidate, to give everyone an equal footing. We offer maximum funding of up to $40,000 per year to cover your living expenses (if tuition is required, we will cover tuition costs in addition). If you already receive a stipend for your living or tuition expenses, we provide top-up funding up to this amount. The fellowship will be renewed each year for the duration of your PhD, conditional on you continuing to work on cooperative AI. In addition, we also provide:
The application deadline is 14th October 2024 at 23:59 (Anywhere on Earth). Please apply using this form. You will be asked to submit a CV, a two-page research proposal, two reference letters, and to respond to a few short questions. Your data will be processed in accordance with our privacy policy.
Applications will be reviewed by CAIF staff as well as external researchers, where required, in two stages: screening and full review. In a small number of cases, we may invite you to a brief call. We hope to communicate final decisions by the end of November 2024.
We are committed to fostering a culture of inclusion, and we encourage individuals with diverse backgrounds and experiences to apply, particularly from underrepresented groups. If you have specific needs or circumstances that require accommodation, please contact us.
Our primary criterion is the potential to conduct impactful, high-quality cooperative AI research, both during your PhD and afterwards. As evidence of this potential, we evaluate applications on the strength of your research proposal as well as your experience, existing skill set, and career aspirations. Research proposals should:
Further instructions about the content of research proposals can be found on the application form. As with our regular grantmaking, the following criteria will be central in our evaluation of your research proposal:
FAQs
We will need confirmation of your tuition fees and other scholarships (or lack thereof) from your university. As a part of the due diligence process, we will contact your current/future university to verify the information you have provided. We are aiming to announce and onboard our first cohort of PhD fellows at around the end of November.
We understand that it is natural for the research plans of PhD students to change during their programmes. CAIF will continue to renew your fellowship each year as long as your research focus remains on cooperative AI, even if it does not exactly match your original research proposal.
Yes! Please see the “Research Priorities” appendix at the bottom of our current grant call for examples of topics that we consider to be in scope. This list is by no means exhaustive, and if you want to work on a different topic falling under “multi-agent/cooperation problems”, you should not be put off from applying.
Advanced AI is likely to transform society in many ways. We are focused on ensuring that the large-scale consequences for humanity are beneficial. In practice, this means that we are especially excited about work that has a clear path to positive impact at a very large scale (see examples below), rather than narrower applications (such as coordination between autonomous vehicles, for example).
For example, this could include work on AI tools for collective decision-making that could demonstrably scale to vast populations, allowing deeper democratic engagement and consensus building, or technical research on how to avoid the most severe kinds of conflict involving AI systems (which are increasingly being used in high-stakes military situations).
We cannot know for sure which work will be most relevant to AI systems that do not yet exist, but there are some things that can make work less likely to be relevant for future systems. This would for example be if your research depends a lot on properties of existing systems that we expect to change in subsequent generations. An example of something that would be less relevant here are theoretical analyses that make very restrictive assumptions and are unlikely to generalise, such that they're unlikely to tell us anything about real-world advanced AI systems.
Yes.
No, we do not have a nomination scheme. Please apply by yourself and provide two reference letters via the application form.
By "top-up" funding, we mean that even if you are already funded, you can still receive funding from the Cooperative AI PhD Fellowship which would take your funding up to $40,000. For example, if you have a stipend of $25,000, the fellowship would provide you with $15,000. We do this rather than provide every applicant with an identical lump sum to maximise the benefit of the programme in an equitable way. Applicants with a stipend or other scholarships totalling $40,000 or above can still apply to benefit from the other support we provide. If your university or other funding provider does not allow for partial funding from multiple sources, we will approach this on a case-by-case basis.
For applications that are rejected in screening we will have limited ability to give feedback, but we might, for example, indicate if we think the proposal was out of scope. For applications that are rejected after going through our full review process we will attempt to provide at least a couple of sentences of feedback or reason for rejection. Our capacity to do this will depend on how many applications we receive.
Your application may be read by administrative staff and both internal and external reviewers. CAIF’s trustees may also access applications, if necessary. We do not share the identity of reviewers with applicants.
Yes, but you will receive your funding only when you are enrolled in a programme. The topic must be the same as the one you stated on your application.
We fund research that is focused on addressing multi-agent/cooperation problems involving AI. Typically, multi-agent problems include multiple artificial agents, or multiple human agents and at least one artificial agent. A few important things to note on this topic are:
