Accelerating scientific discovery with ChatGPT for Academic Researchers

We believe the benefits of frontier AI should not be concentrated in a few companies and well-resourced labs. Scientific progress depends on researchers asking the right questions, testing new ideas, and building on what others have discovered. Our role is to put powerful tools in their hands—and work alongside them to design models that accelerate their research while keeping them in control.

We’re introducing ChatGPT for Academic Researchers, a program that will give 100,000 researchers at selected academic institutions free access to our frontier models. The program will help researchers across the sciences, mathematics, and engineering take on advanced problems, accelerate discovery, and improve productivity, from preparing grant applications to testing hypotheses.

We’re starting with 10,000 researchers this summer, with access already available at institutions such as the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) and École normale supérieure (ENS). We plan to expand to 100,000 researchers through 2027. Participants will have access to our frontier models, including GPT‑5.6⁠ Sol Pro at launch, and can invite up to four collaborators from their institution. Workspaces include business-grade privacy and security protections, and data is not used to train our models by default. Researchers can use tools and skills to support work ranging from genomic analysis and protein modeling to literature reviews, grant writing, and publishing.

The program also includes training, hands-on support, and opportunities to learn from other researchers and share feedback with us.

For institutions with ChatGPT Edu, free access granted through this program will be coordinated through the institution's workspace. Learn more about ChatGPT Edu and how OpenAI supports higher education.

ChatGPT for Academic Researchers is part of a commitment of more than $250 million through 2027 to support external scientific research and discovery. That includes NextGenAI, our $50 million initiative supporting research institutions, and our work with the Department of Energy’s Genesis Mission⁠ to bring frontier AI to researchers at national laboratories and universities. Together, these efforts reflect our belief that scientific progress accelerates when more researchers have the tools to pursue their own ideas.

AI is becoming a more capable research tool faster than many expected. Each week, roughly 1.3 million people use ChatGPT for advanced science and mathematics, generating about 8.4 million messages.

The shift is especially visible in mathematics. In the past six months, AI has moved from occasional use on isolated problems to a more regular part of mathematical research. A growing number of papers now acknowledge ChatGPT’s contribution, reflecting how quickly researchers are adopting these tools in their work.

Researchers use ChatGPT and Codex across nearly every stage of scientific work. ChatGPT helps researchers interrogate ideas, acquire knowledge, generate hypotheses, and communicate their findings. Codex supports research execution and formal analysis, including writing code and analyzing results.

These patterns are showing up in research. Physicist Rogerio Jorge and his team are using AI to develop open-source fusion research software used by industry and national laboratories to design fusion energy devices. In theoretical computer science, researchers Barna Saha, Yinzhan Xu, and Christopher Ye used GPT‑5.5 Pro to develop a proof establishing new limits on how efficiently computers can solve high-dimensional geometry problems, then validated and refined the results themselves.

Researchers using these tools most intensively are also taking on more ambitious work. Those in the top 20% of AI usage within their field are almost twice as likely as their peers to ask AI to take on tasks estimated to require four hours or more: nearly 7% of their requests, compared with 3.5% among other researchers in the same field.

Our strategy is not to decide which scientific problems deserve attention or try to solve them all ourselves. It is to put capable tools in the hands of the research community and let researchers pursue the questions they know best.

Deltagerne får gratis adgang til vores banebrydende modeller i ChatGPT, ChatGPT Work og Codex, herunder modelfamilien GPT‑5.6⁠ ved lanceringen. De får også udvidet adgang til dybdegående research, højere brugsgrænser og større kontekstvinduer. Tilsammen understøtter disse funktioner videnskabelig ræsonnering, selvstændig opgaveudførelse og forskningsarbejdsgange på tværs af fagområder.

GPT‑5.6 Terra afvejer kapacitet og effektivitet til daglig forskning, GPT‑5.6 Luna giver hurtigere svar på lettere opgaver, og GPT‑5.6 Sol håndterer de vanskeligste videnskabelige og matematiske problemer. På FrontierMath Tier 4, der måler matematisk ræsonnering på forskningsniveau, opnår GPT‑5.6 Sol 83 % mod 72,5 % for GPT‑5.5. På GeneBench Pro, der evaluerer kompleks analyse af biologiske data og videnskabelig ræsonnering, løser GPT‑5.6 Sol Pro 31,5 % af opgaverne.

Forskere kan bruge mere end 75 færdigheder inden for biovidenskab⁠(åbner i et nyt vindue), som dækker genetik, genomforskning, sekventering, enkeltcelleanalyse, proteinmodellering og udvikling af lægemidler. Forbindelser understøtter forskning på tværs af fagområder ved at give adgang til videnskabelig litteratur, offentlige genomiske og kliniske databaser, satellitbilleder, beregningsnotesbøger, dataplatforme og referenceværktøjer.

Codex kan hjælpe med at skrive og fejlrette kode, analysere datasæt og opbygge reproducerbare arbejdsgange. ChatGPT Work kan understøtte længere projekter såsom at finde finansieringsmuligheder, udarbejde fondsansøgninger, gennemgå litteratur, skrive udkast til manuskripter og udarbejde materiale til formidling af resultater.

Forskernes erfaring med AI vil variere. Nogle bruger måske værktøjerne for første gang, mens andre udvikler avancerede anvendelser inden for deres fagområder.

Programmet tilbyder undervisning tilpasset forskellige erfaringsniveauer – fra at komme i gang og forbedre arbejdsgange til avancerede forskningsanvendelser. Deltagerne får adgang til specialister med kendskab til forskningsarbejdsgange, herunder hjælp til at integrere værktøjerne i deres arbejde.

Efterhånden som vi ser, hvad forskerne opdager, vil vi skabe flere muligheder for, at de kan dele praktiske metoder, lære af hinanden og fremhæve anvendelser på tværs af fagområder. Deres feedback vil hjælpe os med at forstå, hvor vores modeller er nyttige, hvor de kommer til kort, og hvordan vi kan gøre dem mere værdifulde for forskningsmiljøet.

Det indledende program er åbent for kvalificerede forskere ved udvalgte akademiske institutioner. Kvalificerede institutioner⁠(åbner i et nyt vindue) skal være anerkendte universiteter eller videregående uddannelsesinstitutioner med ret til at udstede eksamensbeviser og et højt forskningsaktivitetsniveau.

Ansøgere skal bekræfte deres tilknytning til institutionen og oplyse om deres aktive forskning og planlagte videnskabelige anvendelse. Godkendte forskere kan invitere op til fire samarbejdspartnere fra deres institution. Hver samarbejdspartner skal også bekræfte sin tilknytning og tæller med i programmets samlede antal konti.

Der er åbent for ansøgninger fra i dag. Du kan gennemgå kriterierne og ansøge her⁠(åbner i et nyt vindue).