I had an opportunity to work at both the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2) and the Allen Institute for Brain Science (AIBs). I was part of the 1

I had an opportunity to work at both the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2) and the Allen Institute for Brain Science (AIBs). I was part of the 10 year strategic planning efforts at AI2. Paul Allen was both involved and hands-off in the support of the leadership AI2 and AIBs. It was a rare balance and Paul Allen knew how to create the conditions for innovation and novel research breakthroughs with micromanaging. Additionally, Paul Allen was an advocate for open science. Through AI2 he directly supported arxiv.org and funded the development of Semantic Scholar. I had an opportunity to participate in a gathering of scientists, academics and publishers organized by Vulcan and the Allen Institutes to investigate innovations to support open science. Alexandra Elbakyan (founder of Scihub) was skyped in (technically on the run) to share her advocacy of accessible and open science. It was surprising and inspiring to see that Paul Allen provided Alexendra a platform to share her experience (especially as several major publishers were in attendance). His lasting legacy in AI will be the support of Semantic Scholar and the Alexandria (common sense) project. In neuroscience research, AIBs has made major breakthroughs in mapping the mouse brain and producing prolific open datasets (Allen Brain Atlas) to support research. In Seattle, it was hard to not run into the influence of Paul Allen. From the Seattle Seahawks to the Museum of Popular Culture (MoPoP), Paul Allen had an impact everywhere in Seattle. It is sad to see him pass away. He has a immense impact on both Seattle and scientific research. I hope both AI2 and AIBs will continue doing amazing work as part of his legacy.