GCBR Organization Updates: January 2025
Updates from 1DaySooner, Asia CHS, Blueprint Biosecurity, CCDD, CHS, CLTR, CSR, IBBIS, IGSC, NTI | bio, Open Philanthropy, SecureBio, Sentinel Bio, Scowcroft Institute, and UNIDIR
Happy New Year everyone! In our first issue this year, we feature exciting updates from organizations working to reduce Global Catastrophic Biological Risks (GCBRs), including:
The launch of the Bio Funders Compact;
A database of national implementation measures for the BWC;
Virology troubleshooting and non-interactive assessments to evaluate AI-Bio;
A report on mirror life;
Publications on challenge trials, viral prospecting, and regulatory authority to oversee pathogen research;
And more!
1Day Sooner
1Day Sooner (news) is a nonprofit organization that advocates for high-impact medical studies and the efficient development and deployment of life-saving medical research and public health interventions.
1Day convened 80+ of the nation’s top health, biosecurity, and research leaders for our third annual Operation Warp Speed 2.0 conference. This year’s theme, “Applying Pull Funding & Regulatory Capacity to Advance New Biotechnologies & Prevent Pandemics,” aimed to share proposals and activate change in replicating the elements that made Operation Warp Speed (OWS) successful and build support for vaccine development and pandemic preparedness. Read the recap of the event.
“Avoiding Another Lost Decade on Malaria Vaccines”: Co-authored with the Center for Global Development, this paper recommends how to execute an ambitious malaria vaccine rollout. A blog post recapping the paper’s top takeaways is also available.
“Unblocking Human Challenge Trials for Faster Progress”: Part of the Institute for Progress’s (IFP) Clinical Trials Abundance project, this paper explores how to more broadly utilize human challenge trials by removing common barriers in the U.S.
Asia Centre for Health Security
The Asia Centre for Health Security (ACHS) (newsletter) is a new academic think tank, set up to strengthen Asia’s readiness for biological threats through scientific evidence, building of expertise and capabilities, and the forging of strategic partnerships. Our vision is a united and resilient Asia safeguarded against health security threats for the well-being of future generations.
The Asia Centre for Health Security (ACHS) Webinar Series is a quarterly webinar that discusses and shares innovative developments in health security in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. It will feature a diverse group of experts, including leading academics and biosafety and biosecurity professionals. Learn more about the ACHS Webinar Series by visiting our website.
Join the inaugural ACHS webinar titled, “How to Avoid Human-Made Pandemics” on 23 Jan at 8 PM (GMT +08:00), presented by Dr Filippa Lentzos from King’s College London. Registration closes on 22 Jan 2025, 5pm (GMT+8:00): https://for.sg/achswebinar-1
We are thrilled to introduce the inaugural 2025 cohort of the ACHS Fellowship Program! This highly competitive program has brought together exceptional graduate students and professionals from across the globe, all united by their dedication to advancing health security efforts across Asia! Learn more about the ACHS Fellowship Program and the 2025 fellows here.
Blueprint Biosecurity
Blueprint Biosecurity is a nonprofit dedicated to achieving breakthroughs in humanity’s ability to prevent, mitigate, and suppress pandemics.
Alongside Michael Friedman from the Asia Center for Health Security, we hosted a successful PPE workshop in Singapore. This was an opportunity for PPE stakeholders across Southeast Asia to discuss findings from our Next-Gen PPE Blueprint. Here’s what some attendees had to say.
In the upcoming year our PPE team aims to expand our policy advocacy work by focusing on the stockpiling of elastomeric respirators. To achieve that goal, we recently hired a Senior Policy Advisor, Adam Goff.
Our far-UVC team hosted a well-received workshop in Washington, D.C. in October. 25 leaders from government and academia discussed building evidence around far-UVC’s safety and efficacy.
James Montavan from our far-UVC team presented at both AAAR and CBD S&T conferences.
We’ve begun a deeper investigation into glycol vapors for transmission suppression. Reach out to our transmission suppression lead, Aman Patel, to learn more.
Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
The Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics (CCDD) (newsletter) at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health focuses on improving methods for infectious disease modeling and statistical analysis, reducing biosecurity risks, engaging with policymakers to enhance decision-making, and training the next generation of scientists.
CCDD’s Director, Prof. Marc Lipsitch joined the NTI | bio and Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) working group to develop implementation guidance for the international Bio Funders Compact.
Lipsitch has provided expertise to Legal Advocates for Safe Science and Technology to prepare an amicus curiae brief related to a court case involving the scope of legal liability for unsafe pathogen research.
CCDD has submitted two preprints on the utility of viral prospecting and the challenges of predicting pandemics from a limited training set.
Centre for Long-Term Resilience
The Biosecurity Policy Unit at the Centre for Long-Term Resilience (CLTR) works closely with the UK Government and other stakeholders to reduce extreme biological risks.
We submitted written evidence to the UK Government's Strategic Defence Review and Industrial Strategy open consultation, highlighting the need to scale and resource counter-CBRN capabilities and strategically invest in the life sciences sector.
We participated in the EU AI Act Code of Practice Working Groups and conducted an analysis of whether biological foundation models and other AI-enabled biological tools may be subject to regulation under the Act.
We submitted written evidence to the US National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Safety Considerations for Chemical and Biological AI Models, highlighting the role of non-interactive risk assessments.
We furthered conversations on AI biological threats and biodefense through participation in the Frontier AI Safety Framework Conference in California, the CBD S&T Conference in Florida and the first UK Microbial Forensics Consortium in London.
Council on Strategic Risks
The Council on Strategic Risks (CSR) is a nonprofit, non-partisan security policy institute devoted to anticipating, analyzing and addressing core systemic risks to security in the 21st century, with special examination of the ways in which these risks intersect and exacerbate one another.
With several areas of sustained positive actions across pathogen early warning, multilateral cooperation, and biomanufacturing by the US government in recent months, our team published details on these important areas of progress in our update of the CSR Biodefense Scorecard.
Traveling to Seoul and Tokyo in November, CSR’s Global Biosecurity Accelerator convened dialogues with experts from the Republic of Korea, Japan, the United States, United Kingdom, and NATO to advance recommendations for biosecurity strategies for East Asia.
On December 10th, we hosted our first CSR-wide symposium, Resilience in the Face of Global Risks, bringing together leaders for engaging scenario exercises and focused strategy sessions. We also launched the CSR Membership, which will serve as another platform for directly sharing info and community-building on bio and other global-risk issues.
IBBIS
The International Biosecurity and Biosafety Initiative for Science (IBBIS) (news) is a Geneva-based nonprofit that works collaboratively with global partners to strengthen biosecurity norms and develop innovative tools to uphold them.
IBBIS will soon open hiring for several Geneva-based roles: a Deputy Director, Program Manager, and Operations Lead. Contact info@ibbis.bio if you or someone you know would be a good fit!
We're starting a project to create a global map of synthesis providers and policies governing nucleic acids. Get in touch with mayra@ibbis.bio if you're interested in using this map (so we can tailor our data collection to be practically useful) or in partnering to co-produce it!
As part of the IGSC Sequence Biosecurity Risk Consortium, we are seeking collaborators with expertise in pathogen genomics, export controls, or other aspects of defining sequences of concern.
New preprint: Toward AI-Resilient Screening of Nucleic Acid Synthesis Orders
We presented at the BWC MSP (slides), iGEM Responsibility Conference (slides, video), and Global Biofoundries Alliance meeting. Find IBBIS will be at the IFBA Global Voices Conference (Tanzania), AI Action Summit (France), Munich Security Conference (Germany), and Bio-iSAC Cyberbiosecurity Summit (USA).
International Gene Synthesis Consortium
The International Gene Synthesis Consortium (IGSC) is an industry-led group of gene synthesis companies and organizations formed to design and apply a common protocol to screen both the sequences of synthetic gene orders and the customers who place them.
Several IGSC member companies along with Microsoft published a preprint on AI-resilient nucleic acid synthesis screening.
Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security
The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security explores how new policy approaches, scientific advances and technological innovations can improve organizations, systems, policies and tools to prevent and respond to pandemics and biological threats.
CHS selected 31 incredible professionals for the 2025 Emerging Leaders in Biosecurity Initiative (ELBI). Now in its 12th year, ELBI is thrilled to welcome this incredibly accomplished and diverse class of fellows selected from over 300 applicants.
CHS continues to actively contribute expert insights on AI and biosecurity policy, including recent responses to the requests for information from the US AISI and DOE.
We are excited to bring together global leaders to address pressing issues at the crucial convergence of national policy, biosecurity, and artificial intelligence during our side events at the upcoming AI Action Summit in Paris and the 2025 Munich Security Conference.
NTI | bio
The NTI | bio program works to identify gaps and promote lasting systemic change to improve biotechnology governance, strengthen biosecurity and pandemic preparedness, and reduce global catastrophic biological risks.
In October, NTI | bio and CEPI convened the inaugural Bio Funders Forum, a venue for funders of life science research to share best practices and discuss challenges and opportunities for embedding biosafety and biosecurity into their work as a way to incentivize responsible innovation.
NTI | bio launched a new report in November, Developing Guardrails for AI Biodesign Tools, which outlines several measures that could be deployed to reduce the risks associated with biodesign tool development and release.
At the Biological Weapons Convention in December, NTI | bio launched Disincentivizing Bioweapons: Theory and Policy Approaches, an essay collection that bridges theory and practice to invigorate international efforts to reduce biological threats posed by state actors.
Also at the BWC, NTI | bio hosted a side event that underscored how enhanced transparency can reduce the risk of misperceptions among states about bioscience and biotechnology research and development, avoiding arms-racing behavior.
Open Philanthropy
Open Philanthropy’s Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness team supports efforts to strengthen disease surveillance, the governance of dual-use research, policy development, and other activities that could reduce the threat of a major global disruption.
Alongside the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, and Patrick Collison, we funded work culminating in a Science article and accompanying technical report intended to initiate a global scientific dialogue about the potential risks posed by mirror life (news article). In tandem, helped launch the Mirror Biology Dialogues Fund (MBDF) to support ongoing discussions. MBDF is currently hiring for operations and technical roles at all levels of seniority, reach out to jobs@mbdf.org for more information.
Awarded a three-year grant supporting the Council on Strategic Risks’ work running biosecurity fellowships and advancing biodefense policy in the US and globally.
Supported Blueprint Biosecurity in their mission of accelerating progress toward effective countermeasures against pandemics.
In 2024, provided ~$1.4m in career development funding for individuals, primarily through OP’s Career Development and Transition Funding program. Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis.
SecureBio
SecureBio is a nonprofit research organization working on new technologies and policy proposals to delay, detect, and defend against catastrophic pandemics.
The NAO has begun a collaboration with PHC Global on their ANTI-DOTE contract. For the next 36 weeks the team will perform weekly deep metagenomic sequencing on two marine blackwater samples and analyze them for novel pathogens.
The AI team's expert-level virology troubleshooting evaluation was used to assess ChatGPT o1 and featured in the system card accompanying the release.
SecureDNA has achieved significant performance enhancements in its screening infrastructure, with testing demonstrating speeds exceeding 65,000bp/s for high-volume synthesis operations. This configuration enables processing of 40 million base pairs in under 10 minutes for organizations with exceptional throughput requirements.
Sentinel Bio
Sentinel Bio is a new non-profit philanthropic fund that supports efforts to eliminate pandemic risks.
We supported and launched new collaborations with the Council on Strategic Risks, Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, University of Maryland, and Asia Centre for Health Security.
We launched our new website, featuring an overview of our strategy, current projects, and partners.
We’re welcoming Janika Schmitt as the third member of our team; Janika will assume a leading role in our work on technological countermeasures for pandemic preparedness
In the coming months, we expect to participate in the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris and the Munich Security Conference – come say hi if you’re there!
Biosecurity and Pandemic Policy Center, Scowcroft Institute
The Biosecurity and Pandemic Policy Center, at the Texas A&M Scowcroft Institute of International Affairs, conducts policy-oriented research dedicated to promoting a world safe, secure, and resilient against existential biological threats.
We published Envisioning an Independent Bioresponsibility Authority to Safeguard U.S. Leadership in the Life Sciences, a detailed proposal for an independent federal agency to oversee pathogen research conducted in the United States or funded by the U.S. government. Taking a more comprehensive and collaborative approach, the proposed agency would pair expanded regulatory oversight with technical assistance, non-punitive incident reporting, funding for biosafety and biosecurity research, and education and training efforts. It would consolidate and streamline requirements and remain flexible as technology advances. This report is informed by several months of stakeholder engagement and feedback and the authors’ experiences with high containment laboratories and federal agencies.
In Applied Biosafety, authors Ben Snyder, Josh Wentzel, Gerry Parker, Jerry Epstein, and Robert Kadlec published Trust, but Verify: A “Just Culture” Model for Oversight of Potentially High-Risk Life Sciences Research.
We co-hosted the third Operation Warp Speed 2.0 Conference with 1Day Sooner in December.
UNIDIR
The United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) is an autonomous institution within the United Nations that conducts independent research on pressing global challenges related to disarmament, arms control and international security.
Exciting Update: The BWC NIM Database Is Complete!
The BWC National Implementation Measures Database developed by UNIDIR and VERTIC has reached a significant milestone: profiles for all 187 States Parties to the BWC are now live! This comprehensive online tool provides detailed insights into each country’s national implementation measures under the BWC, supporting transparency and international cooperation.
All profiles are available in English, and the team will continue to work on translating them into all official UN languages throughout 2025. Updates to the profiles will also be made regularly to ensure they remain accurate and relevant.
Explore the database at bwcimplementation.org.
Jobs, events, and other opportunities
You can find additional biosecurity and pandemic preparedness jobs on the 80,000 Hours job board.
Jobs
CSR is hiring a Biosecurity-AI Fellow to monitor, inform, and influence policy in this area.
Founder’s Pledge is hiring an Applied Researcher - Global Catastrophic Risks and welcomes applicants with biosecurity backgrounds.
Blueprint Biosecurity is hiring for an Executive Assistant. The job can be Remote, with preference for candidates in Washington, D.C., and requires a minimum of 5 years of administrative experience, with a preference for 2 or more years of executive support experience.
Those interested in the intersection of AI and Biosecurity may be interested in Renan Araujo’s weekly curation of AI policy job opportunities (one recent post).
Other
Applications for a new Biosecurity Forecasting Initiative from the Oxford Biosecurity Group are open until February 3.
biosecurity.world features a curated map of biosecurity organizations.
For updates on Southeast Asia Biosecurity, you can check out their new monthly newsletter.
Numerous fellowships and other opportunities can be found on the (US-focused) Emerging Tech Policy Careers site (see their biosecurity profile).
New cohorts of biosecurity fellows were announced as part of the Asia Center for Health Security fellowship, Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security ELBI Fellowship, Council on Strategic Risks Ending Bioweapons Fellowship, and Brown University Pandemic Center Game Changers Fellowship. Congrats to all the new fellows!
We regularly solicit updates from a group of organizations that we believe are doing impactful work to reduce GCBRs in order to improve transparency, facilitate collaboration, and otherwise accelerate progress in our community.
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Cover image credit: Lectures on Ventilation (1869), Lewis W. Leeds, Public Domain Review.