Max Görlitz

Karma: 1,251

Currently getting a master’s in genomics at Oxford. My thesis is focused on optimizing probe design for bait capture sequencing for infectious disease diagnostics/surveillance. Worked on biosecurity research around far-UVC safety @SecureBio. Organized EA Munich for >2 years and did some EA community building in Germany. Studied 3 years of clinical medicine.

Sometimes, I write about meditation and other stuff. You can find my writing on my website or Substack: https://glozematrix.substack.com/

Feel free to reach out to me at my email address, and let me know if you’d like to chat: hello [at] maxgoerlitz [dot] com

(last updated in March 2024)

Max Görlitz Aug 4, 2023, 9:15 AM
4 points
1 ∶ 0
in reply to: Jmd’s comment on: Thoughts on far-UVC after working in the field for 8 months
I agree with Jasper and don’t expect impacts on the skin microbiome to be a big deal, but it would, of course, be good to get some more data.
One useful comparison is that healthcare workers use alcohol-based hand sanitizers many times a day, which are quite potent and can kill microbes in areas inaccessible to Far-UVC.
In this review paper, they only saw changes to the composition of the skin microbiome after extremely frequent daily hand disinfection:
“Overall microbe diversity on hands was unchanged with alcohol-based hand rub use or hand washing, with the exception that overall diversity was lower in those that reported >40 hand washing with soap and water events per shift”
From Edmonds-Wilson et al. 2015. I don’t know how bad reduced diversity is and what harmful effects that might have.
While these alcohol-based hand sanitizers are quite effective, they evaporate quickly and accordingly kill microbes in a very short time span. In certain scenarios, you could imagine far-UVC being different because it could kill off skin microbes at the back of your hands more or less continuously during the ~8 hours you are at work. This raises the question if this mode of continuous disinfection has different effects than the short bursts of frequent hand disinfection experienced by healthcare workers. I’d be surprised if the outcome is very different.

Max Görlitz Aug 2, 2023, 10:48 AM
8 points
1 ∶ 0
in reply to: Sanjay’s comment on: Thoughts on far-UVC after working in the field for 8 months
Hi Sanjay, thanks for the comment!
sounds like a pretty great cherry on the cake
Indeed, I think part of the path to impact for far-UVC will be that adoption will hopefully be driven by, e.g., employers like Google equipping their offices with far-UVC lamps because they expect this to reduce the total number of sick days of their workers and therefore increase productivity + profits. Getting this type of evidence for efficacy would be great since it would be an excellent sales pitch to companies whose employees earn a lot, meaning sick days are costly. Ideally, you would be able to tell them something like, “Installing these far-UVC fixtures in the whole office will cost you $30,000, but based on existing evidence and our best models, you’ll likely recoup those costs after approx. 18 months due to a reduction in sick days of your employees.”
Presumably, that would be a big boost for demand and competition, thereby reducing costs and increasing R&D. It could help to make far-UVC widespread enough to make a difference in stopping future outbreaks or slow down the spread of disease during the next pandemic.
but could it exacerbate pandemic risk by reducing immunity, thereby making it easier for a bioweapon engineer to create a scary pathogen?
There has been very little research on the interaction of far-UVC and the immune system. It is a topic that often comes up in discussions around far-UVC safety and is related to the well-known “hygiene hypothesis,” which says something like, “If you’re not exposed to enough germs as a child, you might get more allergies.”
I want to see more research on this, but so far, it hasn’t been as much of a priority. First, people wanted to figure out things like whether far-UVC could give you skin cancer or make you blind. By now, we know those things won’t happen, so we can turn to more “second-order” type risks like immune system effects.
However, I have a few intuitions about why this seems unlikely. First of all, it is an “end-game” worry in the sense that it seems like it would only become relevant once far-UVC is almost ubiquitous. Even if it becomes widespread, it would be installed in places like hospitals, shared offices, public transport, etc., but you probably wouldn’t have it in your home or anywhere outside. Let’s say you would spend ~10 h per day in environments that have much more sterile air than nowadays, but the other ~14 h, you’re at home or wherever and still exposed to the germs of, e.g., your partner or children.
Also, I expect that even widespread far-UVC wouldn’t reduce fomite transmission much because its disinfection works by line of sight and is easily shielded. So your immune system would still be challenged by that type of transmission.
As I wrote in the post, we only really care about far-UVC if we can find a path to really widespread adoption and high enough doses to slow down or even stop the transmission of extremely infectious agents like measles. If we actually achieve pathogen suppression that strong, I find it hard to imagine a malevolent actor engineering a pathogen so scary that it overwhelms this system. Remember that far-UVC would only be one of our defenses against pandemics and would be combined with PPE, ventilation, medical countermeasures, etc.

I also haven’t seen any convincing evidence that a reduction in your exposure to germs dramatically worsens your immune system. While I haven’t looked into it deeply, the hygiene hypothesis seems to be somewhat controversial and concerns things like allergies, not, e.g., doubling your susceptibility to common infections because of a worse immune system.
Similarly, I have heard claims that due to all the social isolation, masking, etc., during the Covid pandemic, peoples’ immune systems got worse. Yes, the flu + RSV season peaked earlier last winter and was decently bad, but I don’t see how this can be attributed to a broad decrease in immune competency. Rather, it just seems like many people weren’t exposed to these specific pathogens that they would have typically been challenged with more frequently. I’m not terribly knowledgeable here, so might be mistaken, would be curious if other folks have more insights.

Max Görlitz Jul 20, 2023, 11:05 AM
2 points
1 ∶ 0
in reply to: Greg S’s comment on: UVC biological vs. chemical risk tradeoffs
I agree. Getting more data on risks (safety) and real-world efficacy to formulate a more comprehensive and convincing cost-benefit calculus is probably the biggest priority for far-UVC right now.

Max Görlitz Jul 18, 2023, 11:10 AM
8 points
2 ∶ 0
on: UVC biological vs. chemical risk tradeoffs
This is the hottest topic in the far-UVC field right now. There were also a bunch of talks about it at the recent ICFUST conference. You can watch recordings of those talks here.
Also, see this helpful list of existing studies around far-UVC and indoor air chemistry: http://bit.ly/guv-chem
While I haven’t read all of the studies in detail, my impression is that some of the results seem to disagree with each other, and the issue isn’t settled yet.
Some thoughts from a draft for a forum post I wrote:
- Undoubtedly, far-UVC has a substantial impact on indoor air chemistry by producing ozone, which oxidizes volatile organic compounds in the air that can result in harmful products such as particulate matter
  - The debate surrounds the question of how detrimental this is and existing studies seem to disagree somewhat to what extent this is a substantial issue.
  - Importantly, little research has been done on methods to mitigate this issue!
    For example, using activated carbon filters to remove ozone, making sure far-UVC is used with sufficient ventilation to remove ozone, or altering far-UVC fixture designs.
Maybe helpful context: Using germicidal UV-C has always been a risk-benefit calculus. With far-UVC, the tradeoff might be chemical vs. biological, while with conventional upper-room GUV it was probably physical (eye-irritation) vs. biological.

Max Görlitz Jul 11, 2023, 4:01 PM
3 points
0 ∶ 0
on: Fatebook: the fastest way to make and track predictions
Awesome! I have been wanting something like this for a while and am looking forward to trying it out.

See this previous comment of mine for some potentially interesting suggestions:

https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/cbtoajkfeXqJAzhRi/metaculus-year-in-review-2022?commentId=dotzeW2wxM5Avm7jL

(Excuse formatting; on mobile)

Max Görlitz Jul 5, 2023, 10:31 AM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
on: Ubiquitous Far-Ultraviolet Light Could Control the Spread of Covid-19 and Other Pandemics
Just pointing out quickly that this was also posted on Lesswrong and that there are 39 comments with additional discussion over there (as of July 2023).

Max Görlitz Jun 29, 2023, 3:35 PM
4 points
1 ∶ 0
on: OpenPhil Undergrad Scholarship 2023/2024
I would recommend just shooting them an email :)

Max Görlitz Jun 20, 2023, 8:22 PM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
in reply to: MvK🔸’s comment on: rajlego’s Shortform
http://sandhoefner.github.io/animal_suffering_calculator
This tool is similar. I think I have seen another very similar one, but I might be confusing them.

Max Görlitz Jun 2, 2023, 8:31 AM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
in reply to: Erich_Grunewald 🔸’s comment on: Statement on AI Extinction—Signed by AGI Labs, Top Academics, and Many Other Notable Figures
Yea, that could be the case, although I assume having Elon Musk sign could have generated 2x the publicity. Most news outlets seem to jump on everything he does.

Not sure what the tradeoff between attention and controversy is for such a statement.

Max Görlitz Jun 1, 2023, 11:51 AM
3 points
0 ∶ 1
on: Statement on AI Extinction—Signed by AGI Labs, Top Academics, and Many Other Notable Figures
I’m mildly surprised that Elon Musk hasn’t signed, given that he did sign the FLI 6-month pause open letter and has been vocal about being worried about AI x-risk for years.
Probably the simplest explanation for this is that the organizers of this statement haven’t been able to reach him, or he just hasn’t had time yet (although he should have heard about it by now?).

Max Görlitz May 11, 2023, 8:16 AM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
in reply to: JasperGo’s comment on: MaxG’s Shortform
The Overedge catalog looks extremely interesting. Thanks!

Max Görlitz May 9, 2023, 7:12 PM
6 points
0 ∶ 0
on: MaxG’s Shortform
Do you know of any research institutes that provide no-strings-attached, multi-year funding and are committed to open science? I’m looking for examples of metascience, where they experiment with new ways of doing and funding science.
Institutions like Bell Labs or the Princeton Institute for Advanced Study are the historical reference class.

Based on this article in the Atlantic, I am aware of these 3 and am looking for similar examples:
- Arc Institute — A new institution for curiosity-driven biomedical science and technology
- New Science is a 501c3 research nonprofit building the 21st century institutions of basic science
- Arcadia Science — A new ecosystem for scientific progress

Max Görlitz May 9, 2023, 6:25 PM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
in reply to: Gavriel Kleinwaks’s comment on: Air Safety to Combat Global Catastrophic Biorisks [REVISED]
Yea, the way I recall it is that coronaviruses are more susceptible than other viruses. I first tried to recheck this in Appendix B of Kowalski (2009), but the values provided there vary extremely widely. I suspect the experimental quality varies a lot between those estimates, and coronaviruses were, of course, of much less interest back then.
[...]
IMO, the easiest way to read these values is the D90 (J/m^2) value, the dose required to inactivate 90% of viruses in a sample. This is equivalent to speaking about a “1 log reduction”.
Blatchley et al. (2022) have more recent data and provide better evidence for coronaviruses being especially susceptible:
“At 254 nm approximately 1 log10 reduction of coronaviruses is achieved for each 2 mJ/cm2 delivered UV-C fluence (dose). For comparison, other human pathogenic viruses, such as poliovirus and rotavirus require about 4–5 times that amount (i.e., 8–10 mJ/cm2) for each log10 unit reduction (Masjoudi et al., Citation2021).
UV222 irradiation is at least as effective as UV254 irradiation for inactivation of viruses, with approximately 1 log10 reduction of coronaviruses achieved for each 1 mJ/cm2 of delivered UV-C fluence or less. In other words, irradiation at 222 nm provides roughly twice the rate of inactivation as observed at 254 nm.”
On the other hand, when considering catastrophic biorisk, we mostly don’t care about, e.g., poliovirus, but other viruses with more pandemic potential, such as Influenza. So the more productive comparison could be restricted to these high-profile pathogens. I haven’t taken the time to compare all their UV susceptibility values. If they turn out to be similar to those of coronaviruses, my skepticism of high eACH estimates might not be as valid.

Max Görlitz May 4, 2023, 8:10 AM
6 points
0 ∶ 0
on: Air Safety to Combat Global Catastrophic Biorisks [REVISED]
Thanks for your transparency and for updating this report; I think it is tremendously valuable. I have only skimmed so far, but I will hopefully read through it completely soon.

I also tried to do a back-of-the-envelope calculation of the cost-effectiveness of 254 nm upper-room GUV per eACH a while ago. I estimated higher numbers in my model, more on the order of $100/eACH/year (For context: the report estimates ~$14/eACH/year). Note that the model is pretty rough, but I’ll post it anyway in case it proves useful for others.
I think this difference comes mainly from having a much lower point estimate of eACH that is realistically achievable. In general, I am rather skeptical of eACH estimates for GUV that go into the hundreds.
As far as I understand, the way eACH are calculated depends on the specific pathogen in question. Pathogens vary widely in their susceptibility to GUV, and coronaviruses are unusually susceptible IIRC. Since many of these eACH estimates were calculated based on measurements with coronaviruses, this inflates the values, and they’d presumably be significantly lower for other pathogens.
Another point is that AFAICT, the higher eACH estimates mostly (all?) come from computational models and not real-world measurements. I assume that real-world environments are messy and will be less ideal for achieving very high eACH rates.
I think I had another reason for my skepticism, but unfortunately, I can’t recall it right now—will update this comment should I remember.

Max Görlitz May 2, 2023, 3:02 PM
9 points
0 ∶ 0
on: First clean water, now clean air
Great post! I also believe in the need to get our air clean ASAP.
Self-promotion: check out SecureBio’s work on far-UVC. We will hopefully publish more write-ups soon.
Minor point: In an informal survey of experts in the field, most people preferred the term germicidal UV (GUV) over Ultraviolet germicidal irradiation (UVGI). I also think that UVGI is a bit unwieldy, and “irradiation” sounds scary (although in Rethink Priorities’ survey on this, the name didn’t seem to matter much for people’s impressions of the technology).
Interesting observation: With indoor air cleaners, there doesn’t seem to be any real-world epidemiological evidence of whether they reduce infection rates (of course, on priors, I would expect them to). At least I didn’t find any studies when I looked into it a few months ago, which surprised me. Such data also doesn’t yet exist for far-UVC, but there is a bunch on conventional upper-room GUV (most of it decades old, though).
Good news on the regulation side: ASHRAE Commits to Developing an IAQ Pathogen Mitigation Standard. I’ll be curious to see what comes out of it.
Also, I have a standing invitation for people to contact me if they are interested in working on GUV or far-UVC specifically and want to know what they could do!

Max Görlitz Mar 30, 2023, 11:59 AM
1 point
0 ∶ 0
on: Tentative practical tips for using chatbots in research
I have also had some success with https://www.perplexity.ai/, but I have only queried it a handful of times so far.

Max Görlitz Feb 20, 2023, 9:38 AM
3 points
1 ∶ 0
on: Shallow Report on Coronary Heart Disease
Thanks for the analysis! I only skimmed it so far, but I was wondering whether you have any thoughts on the possible intervention of advancing statins and PCSK9-inhibitors, making them much cheaper and more widely distributed? I have encountered a few maximalists dreaming of “putting them in the tap water”.
There is also a lot of hype around PCSK9 gene therapy.

Max Görlitz Feb 15, 2023, 2:10 PM
12 points
2 ∶ 0
in reply to: milkyway’s comment on: FYI there is a German institute studying sociological aspects of existential risk
That’s fair. It was unreasonable of me to imply that their work is epistemically sound without engaging with it more. I flagged that I had only stumbled upon it and hadn’t engaged with it, but that should have restrained me from implying their criticism being epistemically sound.
In general, my idea of this post was more, “How curious, this sociology-ish institute is studying something related to x-risk and has engaged with EA in some way. Let me just share this and see what other people think.” and not “The criticism of this group is correct and very important, EA needs to engage with it to improve.”

Max Görlitz Feb 13, 2023, 4:31 PM
2 points
0 ∶ 0
in reply to: HaydnBelfield’s comment on: FYI there is a German institute studying sociological aspects of existential risk
Awesome, thanks for giving useful context!

Max Görlitz Jan 26, 2023, 10:17 PM
2 points
0 ∶ 0
on: New version of Mental Health Navigator website
The website is currently down for me. Might just be a temporary issue but fyi