MBZUAI has been actively involved in developing AI and generative models, contributing to models like Llama 2, Jais, Vicuna, and LaMini. Professor Preslav Nakov notes Llama 2's improvements in size and carbon footprint over Llama 1. MBZUAI aims to tackle challenges like information accuracy, economic costs, and the scarcity of Arabic online content. Why it matters: MBZUAI's work helps address the limitations of current LLMs, particularly for Arabic, and promotes sustainable AI development in the region.
MBZUAI has launched the Institute of Foundation Models to advance generative AI research and development. The institute will focus on developing large-scale AI models adaptable to various applications, building on MBZUAI's existing work with models like Jais, Llama 2, and Vicuna. It will focus on multi-modal foundation models applicable to areas like healthcare, finance and environmental engineering. Why it matters: This initiative further solidifies the UAE's position as a leader in AI, particularly in the development and application of foundation models for diverse industries.
MBZUAI faculty and students will present 44 papers at the Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing (EMNLP) conference in Singapore. Research topics include disinformation detection, social media analysis, dialogue generation, and Arabic LLMs. Preslav Nakov, Iryna Gurevych, Timothy Baldwin, Alham Fikri Aji, and Muhammad Abdul-Mageed are among the MBZUAI researchers presenting at the conference. Why it matters: MBZUAI's strong presence at a top NLP conference highlights the UAE's growing contributions to cutting-edge AI research and its increasing global prominence in the field.
MBZUAI's Institute of Foundation Models (IFM) has launched five new specialized language and multimodal models, including BiMediX, PALO, GLaMM, GeoChat, and MobiLLaMA. These models address real-world applications in healthcare, visual reasoning, multilingual capabilities, geospatial analysis, and mobile device efficiency. BiMediX is a bilingual medical LLM, while GLaMM generates natural language responses related to objects in an image at the pixel level. Why it matters: This launch demonstrates MBZUAI's commitment to advancing AI research and developing practical AI solutions for various industries, especially with a focus on Arabic language capabilities.
MBZUAI is a global partner in Meta's release of Llama 2, joining organizations like IBM, AWS, Microsoft, and NVIDIA. MBZUAI will provide early feedback and help build the software as a global community. MBZUAI is working on large language models, developing a sustainable LLM named Vicuna, and strengthening infrastructure for LLM-chat evaluation. Why it matters: MBZUAI's involvement promises to bring about a new generation of UAE-born AI advancements built around the Llama 2 ecosystem and fact-checking capabilities.