Fourth Eon Biosecurity
At Fourth Eon Biosecurity we're building adaptive, AI-native safeguards across the bioengineering stack, with a focus on function-based DNA synthesis screening. Fellows in this stream will work on technical research projects at the intersection of AI safety and biosecurity, aimed at reinforcing screening and generalizing detection beyond known threat signatures. Projects span mechanistic interpretability of bio foundation models, model evaluations for biosecurity-relevant capabilities, and agentic sequence analysis workflows.
Stream overview
At Fourth Eon we’re building adaptive biosecurity infrastructure to safeguard AI-enabled bioengineering against accidents and misuse. Our focus is on researching and developing function-based screening to detect a broad range of hazards in DNA synthesis orders. Incoming Fellows will work with me to develop their own project that fits their strengths, interests, and career objectives while advancing Fourth Eon’s mission. The following are priority research topics along with a few example projects:
- Applying mechanistic interpretability techniques to biological foundation models to probe their learned representations of functionally meaningful biophysical and biochemical properties (e.g. protein structure, surface charge, catalytic activity, solvation). For example, a Fellow might use SAEs or probes to explore how semantic information is encoded in specific features, circuits, and manifolds within a protein model, and identify generalizable signatures of specific protein types for generalizable function prediction.
- Evaluating biological AI models for biosecurity-relevant capabilities, such as design of novel functional proteins, and biomolecular property prediction for genes and proteins that may be highly divergent from what’s found in nature. The purpose is to inform the development of improved screening methods through empirical characterization of dual-use model capabilities. For example, a Fellow might develop a benchmark for protein function prediction across a range of protein types and varying divergence from natural proteins.
- Developing and testing agentic sequence analysis workflows for adaptive biosecurity screening. This topic explores scaffolding, fine-tuning and testing of AI agents for orchestrating computational biology tools and synthesizing the outputs to produce biosecurity risk assessments. For example, a Fellow might construct an iterative analysis workflow that uses a scaffolded agent or multi-agent team to analyze an unknown DNA sequence and determine its most likely function based on predicted molecular properties.
Standard (1-2 hours of weekly 1:1s)
Weak preference
Strong preference
Mentors
Gary Abel is co-founder and Chief Scientist of Fourth Eon Biosecurity, where he leads research on adaptive safeguards and function-based screening. His expertise spans chemistry, molecular biophysics, biosecurity, and sequencing technology. He's spent nearly two decades studying how DNA, RNA, and proteins behave and interact. Gary is also a Contributing Scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, supporting the Center's work to understand and mitigate global catastrophic biological risks from advanced AI. He has previously mentored Research Fellows through SPAR, MATS, Cambridge ERA, and the Coefficient Giving CDTF. Gary holds a BS in Physics from San Jose State University and a PhD in Chemistry from the University of California, Merced.
Chris Ganje is co-founder and Executive Director of Fourth Eon Biosecurity, leading strategy, technology development and deployment. His career spans two decades at the intersection of frontier technology, public policy, and global security. Before Fourth Eon, he spent three years in private equity, having previously co-founded and scaled AMPLYFI, a venture-backed AI company working with defense agencies, and earlier led disruptive technology assessment and European energy technology policy at BP. He is a DARPA SWITCH Working Group Advisor, Innovate UK Council Member, Big if True Science Fellow at Renaissance Philanthropy, and Fellow at the University of Cambridge's Centre for Science and Policy. Chris holds a BA in History from SUNY New Paltz and an MSc in Politics from the University of Edinburgh.
Fellows we are looking for
- Prior technical research experience
- Strong critical thinking and creative problem-solving abilities
- Curiosity and a desire to understand the world
- The integrity and judgment to responsibly carry out sensitive research
- Expertise in one or more of the following domains: bioinformatics, computational biology, structural biology, biochemistry, molecular biophysics, protein engineering, biosecurity, AI/ML, computer science, or a related field
- A good grasp on the basics of biomolecular sequence, structure, and function
- Working proficiency with Python (including AI-assisted coding)
Project selection
Fellows who are interested in our research area should think of potential project ideas that leverage their strengths and interests. I will work with individual fellows to identify a specific project that matches their background and interests and is aligned with our overall research direction, and to refine the scope and objectives of the project.