Research Accelerator Week

Find collaborators and secure funding for your independent AI safety research

18th-23rd May 2026

Apply now

Application deadline extended - April 12th

Research Accelerator Week provides a faster, better-supported route into independent AI safety research.

Most AI safety funding works like this: you write a proposal, submit it into a void, wait months, and hope you have an institution willing to host your grant.

This is different. It’s a funding round with built-in support.

Working with Coefficient Giving, we offer:

  • A dedicated funding pathway for programme participants, regardless of whether CG's public RFP is open

  • Expert input on your research ideas and grant proposal

  • Direct guidance on how your proposal aligns with CG’s funding priorities

  • The chance to find collaborators to work with on your research

  • Fiscal sponsorship through Meridian, so you can start work immediately

We provide the workspace, travel and visa support, accommodation and meals.

Over $1M in funding secured in our previous cohort

Two people having a conversation at a table with laptops, plants, and a water bottle.

  • “In just one week, I developed a concrete research proposal, found collaborators, and gained a much clearer understanding of what goal-driven AI safety research looks like. The workshops on grant writing, theory of change, and project planning were practical and helped me connect high-level research to measurable outcomes.”

    — Anaïs Killian, Harvard AI Safety Team

  • “Meridian offered me an incredible masterclass in putting together an application and greatly increased the collective wisdom behind my eventual proposal. It also connected me with a great collaborator.”

    — Daniel Tan, co-author, Emergent Misalignment paper

How the week works

  • Group of people seated in a classroom, focus on a man speaking.

    Find Your Team

    Meet more than 30 researchers and workshop your ideas with people who have complementary skills. By the end of Day 2, you've either found collaborators or decided to run solo.

  • Two people working at a desk with laptops and a computer monitor in an office setting, with blue walls and a shelf in the background.

    Submit your EOI



    Submit your Expression of Interest to Coefficient Giving on Day 3, receiving a response in 24 hours. If you’re not accepted, no problem - you can pivot in response to feedback, or join another team.

  • Person in red sweater sitting at a desk with computer monitors, a laptop displaying Earth, and fruit, including bananas and tangerines.

    Proposal Development


    Starting with a greenlit EOI, write up the full proposal by Day 5. Improve your odds of success with structured feedback from experienced AI safety researchers, and sessions on budgeting, theory of change, and funder priorities.

  • Two people having a conversation in a kitchen or pantry area, holding mugs. Shelves in the background are stocked with snacks and beverages.

    Red Teaming

    Present your proposal to others who will help you find the weaknesses. Past participants cited this as the most valuable day of the week, identifying problems and providing actionable feedback that transformed their proposals.

  • A person presenting next to a screen displaying a slide about hierarchical monitoring. They are standing beside a banner labeled "Cambridge AI Safety". The person is gesturing with their hands.

    Submit



    Final reviews, polishing, and submission to Coefficient Giving! You leave with a completed proposal, not a draft to finish later.

Fiscal Sponsorship
Meridian can act as your institutional home through fiscal sponsorship. This means you don't need a university or nonprofit to hold your grant — Meridian handles the administrative overhead, freeing you to focus on the research.

We offer fiscal sponsorship in most cases, and will confirm this with you individually following funding decisions.

Meridian Visiting Researcher Programme
Having secured funding, you may still need a workspace, community and structure to do your best work. You will automatically be considered for a place on the Visiting Researcher Programme, which offers you a 3-12 month residency at Meridian while you complete your research. The VRP offers:

  • A dedicated workspace in central Cambridge with 24/7 access

  • Integration into Cambridge's AI safety research community

  • Light-touch research management and feedback on your work

  • Support towards publication

  • Visa and relocation assistance

Could this become something more?
If your team works well together and the outcomes are strong, it's worth asking whether this project could be the foundation for something bigger.

There's a strong case that AI safety research as a field is held back less by a lack of ideas than by a lack of organisations taking ownership of specific problems. With a cohesive team and a well-executed project behind you, starting a new research org focused on a concrete problem could be a realistic prospect — and a chance to make a real impact on AI risk.

If you do decide to start something new, Meridian can provide a workspace and community while you get off the ground, and may be able to offer some administrative support depending on your needs.

After the intensive week

Funded Research Areas

Proposals must fall within one of the following priority areas identified by Coefficient Giving. Top priorities are listed first; proposals in the "other areas" category are welcome, but will require substantial novelty.

Priority areas

  • Model organisms of misalignment

  • Alignment auditing, when combined with model organisms work

  • AI control

  • Chain-of-thought faithfulness, including techniques for improving faithfulness and methods for measuring unfaithfulness

  • Alternative approaches to CoT monitoring if CoT reasoning becomes difficult to interpret in future

  • Generalization science; in particular principled methods for predicting model generalization

Other areas (substantial novelty required)

  • Novel approaches to scalable oversight

  • Activation oracles and other AI-driven (see Transluce) or substantially novel approaches to interpretability

  • Novel approaches to robust character training

Who should apply?

A man in a plaid shirt gesturing during a presentation with a banner and a screen displaying a diagram in the background. The banner has partial text and a graphic. The screen shows text and illustrations related to a concept called 'AgentHarm'.

The Research Accelerator Week is intended for researchers with technical expertise who want to move on AI safety - but are missing funding, an institutional home, or collaborators.

You might be:

  • Coming out of MATS, Astra, ERA, LASR, or a similar AIS programme and wondering "what next?"

  • A PhD/postdoc with relevant skills but no funding

  • An independent researcher with ideas but no way to execute them

You don't need a team. Many participants form teams during the week.

 FAQs

  • Those programmes teach skills. This one gets you funded. We assume you already have AI safety knowledge - we're here to help you turn it into a funded research project with an institutional home.

  • No, many participants form teams during the week through structured matching.

    Although you can work alone, Coefficient Giving is more likely to fund team projects and we generally encourage team formation.

    If you have already formed a team and want to attend together, we can accommodate this. Everyone must fill out a separate application; please tell us who you will be working with where indicated on the form.

  • We review CVs, research experience, and your preliminary project ideas. We may also ask you to complete an asynchronous interview.

    Decisions are rolling - apply early if you need time for travel arrangements.

  • The programme will reimburse travel expenses (up to £200 within the UK, £400 within Europe, and £700 internationally), provide accommodation for the duration of the programme week, and cover meals and refreshments during programme activities. We will also support and cover visa costs as necessary.

  • You submit your proposal to Coefficient Giving on the final day. Funding decisions typically come within 8-12 weeks.

    If you're funded: Meridian provides fiscal sponsorship (we hold the grant, handle admin, disburse funds to you). You'll also be automatically considered for a 3-12 month residency on Meridian's Visiting Researcher Programme - workspace, research management, community, and visa support (though places are not guaranteed).

  • Funded teams will have access to dedicated workspace at the Meridian office, integration with Cambridge's AI safety research community, light-touch research management support, and administrative assistance for grant management.

  • If you're an independent researcher without a university or nonprofit affiliation, you normally can't receive grant funding - funders need a legal entity to send the money to.

    Meridian acts as that entity. We hold the grant, handle the admin (contracts, reporting, tax), and pass the funding through to you. You focus on research, not paperwork.

    This means you don't need to find a university willing to host your project or set up your own non-profit.

If you have any questions that are not addressed above, please reach out to us at researchaccelerator@meridiancambridge.org.