Advances in Foundation Models

Foundation models (FMs) are transforming the landscape of AI in research and industry. Such models (e.g., GPT-3, CLIP, Stable Diffusion) are trained on large amounts of broad data and are adaptable to a wide range of downstream tasks. In this course, students will learn fundamentals behind the models and algorithms, systems and infrastructure, and ethics and societal impacts of foundation models, with an emphasis on gaining hands-on experience and identifying real-world use-cases for FMs. Students will hear from speakers in industry working on foundation models in the wild. The main class assignment will be a quarter-long final project, involving either researching the capabilities of FMs or building an FM-powered application.