BlueDot Narrated

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://www.faruvc.org/ 

Author(s): Jeff Kaufman. 

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://blog.bluedot.org/p/what-is-ai-alignment

Author(s): Adam Jones.

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://www.worksinprogress.news/p/flipping-the-switch-on-far-uvc?hide_intro_popup=true 

Author(s): Richard Williamson.

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/hs.2022.0126 

Author(s): Nadia X. Montazeri and Jonas B. Sandbrink. 

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses.

Executive Summary

• The chance of H5N1 or one of its descendants causing a pandemic is slim, but the impact would probably be more severe than COVID-19
• A reasonable forecast that H5N1 causes a pandemic as bad as or worse than COVID-19 beginning in the next year is ~4%, which means the expected cost in terms of potential harms to the U.S. is at least $640 billion
• The federal government can reduce that risk by: 
  • Scaling up testing & sequencing
  • Banning mink farms
  • Not pursuing H5N1 gain-of-function research
  • Laying the groundwork for mass production of an H5N1 vaccine
  • Investing in general pandemic prevention

Background

Though COVID-19 is often referred to as a “once-in-a-century event,” this expression should not be taken literally. Another COVID-like pandemic at some point is almost inevitable, and the chances of a devastating pandemic materializing in any given year are low but constant. Recently, media figures have raised concerns that the highly pathogenic avian [...]

Original text
https://progress.institute/what-are-the-chances-an-h5n1-pandemic-is-worse-than-covid

First published
14 February 2023

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://defensesindepth.bio/the-four-pillars-a-hypothesis-for-countering-catastrophic-biological-risk/ 

Guide: Andrew Snyder-Beattie leads Coefficient Giving’s Biosecurity & Pandemic Preparedness program. Here he lays out their thinking on the key pillars in biodefense, including PPE and biohardening of indoor spaces. 

Author(s): Andrew Snyder-Beattie. 

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://epoch.ai/gradient-updates/do-the-biorisk-evaluations-of-ai-labs-actually-measure-the-risk-of-developing-bioweapons 

Author(s): Anson Ho and Arden Berg. 

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Description: This post models how an effective biosurveillance system might work in the US using metagenomic sequencing (MGS). Metagenomic sequencing can read out any nucleic acid (RNA or DNA) in a sample. Analyzing these fragments allows the identification of both known pathogens as well as unknown reads that could represent a new threat. 

Original Text: https://naobservatory.org/blog/biothreat_radar/

Author(s): Simon Grimm, Lennart Justen, and Jeff Kaufman. 

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://red.anthropic.com/2025/biorisk/ 

Author(s): Anthropic

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.

Audio versions of blogs and papers from BlueDot courses. 

Original text: https://www.gcsp.ch/sites/default/files/2024-12/securing-civilisation-against-catastrophic-pandemics-gp-31.pdf 

Author(s): Anjali Gopal, William Bradshaw, Vaishnav Sunil, and Kevin M. Esvelt.

A podcast by BlueDot Impact.