The University of Toronto's Data Sciences Institute said it will lead an initiative to award $1 million in credits for the AI system Claude to accelerate research across the university.
The initiative is part of a Canada-wide, $10-million commitment from Claude-maker Anthropic to fund AI research at eight institutions, including Toronto's Vector Institute , Mila in Montreal and the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute.
"Building on the university's strong history of leadership in artificial intelligence, the University of Toronto Data Sciences Institute will launch a competitive process to access Claude API credits, with a scientific review panel ensuring they are awarded to safe, high-quality and impactful research," said Professor Gary Bader, associate director, research and software at DSI, a U of T institutional strategic initiative.
Anthropic credits Canadian researchers - and U of T in particular - with helping to usher in the AI era, an effort exemplified by the Nobel Prize-winning work of University Professor Emeritus Geoffrey Hinton. "The University of Toronto continued advancing neural network research when most of the field had moved on, helping prove it could work at scale," said Brian Peters, head of North America government affairs at Anthropic. "That long-term commitment to getting AI right is something Anthropic is built on, and we're glad to be supporting future innovative U of T research with Claude."
Leah Cowen, U of T's vice-president, research and innovation, and strategic initiatives, underscored the university's strong history of responsible AI leadership - and the critical work continuing to take place across its three campuses.
"This new initiative with the Data Sciences Institute will provide access to cutting-edge AI tools to researchers and will open new possibilities for discovery, analysis and innovation across the university," she said.
Anthropic is also partnering with CHEO, the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), Université Laval and the University of Saskatchewan, among others to be announced.
