US-China AI Research Collaboration Revealed in Analysis of 5,000+ Papers

According to WIRED, the United States and China are collaborating more extensively on artificial intelligence research than commonly perceived. The publication analyzed more than 5,000 papers from NeurIPS (Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems) using OpenAI’s Codex to identify patterns of cooperation between the two nations.

The analysis revealed specific areas where US and China researchers are actively working together on AI projects, challenging the narrative of complete technological decoupling between the countries. This collaboration persists despite ongoing geopolitical tensions and trade restrictions affecting technology sectors.

WIRED’s methodology involved using OpenAI’s Codex to systematically examine the academic papers, identifying co-authorship patterns and research partnerships between American and Chinese institutions. The NeurIPS conference, one of the premier venues for AI and machine learning research, provided a substantial dataset for understanding the current state of cross-border academic collaboration.

The findings suggest that despite political and economic friction at the governmental level, scientific cooperation in AI research continues at the academic and research level between the two countries. The specific research areas of collaboration were identified through the analysis, though the extent and nature of these partnerships vary across different AI subfields.