Biosecurity

As part of its coverage of disruptive technologies that might come to pose global-scale threats, the Bulletin publishes articles on all the ways in which emerging science and technology can affect biological risks. COVID-19 highlighted those risks and led to voluminous coverage of the pandemic and related subjects, including gain-of-function research that could create potentially dangerous new pathogens that might, if accidentally released, spark a disease outbreak. But we also attempt to answer a wide variety of biosecurity- and biosafety-related questions: Are the laboratories used to study pathogens as safe and secure as they need to be? Will artificial intelligence make it easier and simpler for bad actors to develop or use biological weapons? Will efforts at human enhancement spark arms races or exacerbate societal inequality? Do policies that reduce compulsory vaccination increase the threat of diseases once thought tamed? Can political disinformation about bioweapons disrupt international efforts to minimize threats?