Solutions to reduce risks of natural outbreaks (especially regarding wildlife encroachment, livestock production practices)
Solutions to improve biosafety / biosecurity in healthcare facilities
Passive technologies (ex: materials chemistry to reduce pathogen transmission)
Solutions to minimise economic damages of social distancing. Ex: Better online work options.
Proactive solutions to increase immune system health in general populations. Ex: Correcting vitamin deficiencies (especially vitamin D) and increasing regular exercise.
Solutions for cyberbiosecurity. I don’t even know what’d move the needle here :D
Would you happen to know of any resources on the bolded areas? :-)
Suppressing pathogen spread in the built environment
Improving biosafety in high-containment labs and clinics
Suppressing pathogen spread in vehicles
For spread in vehicles and the built environment, my sense (based on conversations with others, not independent research) is that lots of folks are excited about about upper-air UV-C systems to deactivate viruses. I don’t know the best reading on that so here’s a somewhat random March 2022 paper on the subject: Far-UVC (222 nm) efficiently inactivates an airborne pathogen in a room-sized chamber
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)
The recent (April 2022) paper Biosecurity in an age of open science looks at some biosecurity implications of open data sharing, and argues for access controls and APIs based on FAIR principles
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)
I really liked this list of technical solutions you listed! It’s ominous reading their warnings about ventilators and seeing them come true :O
Would you happen to know if any of the 15 technologies have gotten more attention between 2018 and now? :-)
Also, when I was looking at the list, I couldn’t help but thinking: “What don’t I see?” And I thought of these areas:
Solutions to deal with misinformation. Ex: Proof of Identity
Solutions to reduce risks of natural outbreaks (especially regarding wildlife encroachment, livestock production practices)
Solutions to improve biosafety / biosecurity in healthcare facilities
Passive technologies (ex: materials chemistry to reduce pathogen transmission)
Solutions to minimise economic damages of social distancing. Ex: Better online work options.
Proactive solutions to increase immune system health in general populations. Ex: Correcting vitamin deficiencies (especially vitamin D) and increasing regular exercise.
Solutions for cyberbiosecurity. I don’t even know what’d move the needle here :D
Would you happen to know of any resources on the bolded areas? :-)
On passive technologies, I imagine the links from Biosecurity needs engineers and materials scientists would be informative. The areas highlighted there under “physical protection from pathogens” are:
Improving personal protective equipment (PPE)
Suppressing pathogen spread in the built environment
Improving biosafety in high-containment labs and clinics
Suppressing pathogen spread in vehicles
For spread in vehicles and the built environment, my sense (based on conversations with others, not independent research) is that lots of folks are excited about about upper-air UV-C systems to deactivate viruses. I don’t know the best reading on that so here’s a somewhat random March 2022 paper on the subject: Far-UVC (222 nm) efficiently inactivates an airborne pathogen in a room-sized chamber
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)
On cyberbiosecurity:
I enjoyed Defining “Cyberbiosecurity” and why we should stop using the term, a skeptical 2019 blog post from Alexander Titus, which basically argues that “cyberbiosecurity” is a term that ends up discouraging work because no one knows where to start!
The winners of the 2021 NTI Next Generation for Biosecurity contest wrote Towards Responsible Genomic Surveillance: A Review of Biosecurity and Dual-use Regulation which focuses on data privacy issues related to pandemic genomic surveillance
Dual use of artificial-intelligence-powered drug discovery, a March 2022 paper, argues for controlled API access to ML models that might be used to generate toxins
The recent (April 2022) paper Biosecurity in an age of open science looks at some biosecurity implications of open data sharing, and argues for access controls and APIs based on FAIR principles
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)
Under Solutions to deal with misinformation, Tara Kirk Sell at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security has done a bunch of related work (her list of publications includes things like a National Priorities to Combat Misinformation and Disinformation for COVID-19 and Future Public Health Threats: A Call for a National Strategy and Longitudinal Risk Communication: A Research Agenda for Communicating in a Pandemic). She was also interviewed for the 80,000 Hours podcast in May 2020, though I suspect her thinking has evolved since then.
(For all of these comments, take these resources as a lower-intensity recommendation than other things on this list, since these are selected based on the criteria of “things that seem relevant to this topic” rather than “things I found particularly interesting”.)