Dr. Zeenath Reza Khan

Associate Professor, University of Wollongong in Dubai

“The Yathiqu Project is an exciting opportunity to foster global collaboration on AI ethics, bringing together experts from six countries, including the UAE, alongside Dubai-based startups, to explore trust (Yathiqu/يثق) in AI. I am pleased to lead this project where we will develop a custom governance sandbox within a metaverse platform, alongside a MOOC and chatbot to enhance AI literacy in healthcare. With the support of the Dubai Future Foundation, this project aims to advance ethical AI practices and further strengthen Dubai’s leadership in AI governance and innovation.”

The project, "Using AI Simulation for Building Trust (Yathiqu يثق ) in AI and AI Literacy", aims to develop a method to help the AI ecosystem (developers, managers, users, policymakers and the third sector) to verify and build trustworthy AI relating to healthcare industry. The World Health Organization (WHO) has predicted a shortage of healthcare workers by 2030; hence there is a rapid deployment of AI solutions to help alleviate the strain on healthcare systems. The multifaceted evolving challenges with the adoption and governance trustworthy AI, such as trust, data quality, and regulatory alignment, highlight the fragmentation in definitions, varying needs of stakeholders, and inconsistencies across the AI lifecycle stages.

The project, Yathiqu, will review published research on AI (within the UAE and globally) and use focus groups across countries and healthcare stakeholders to develop a framework for trustworthy AI by identifying key factors at each stage of AI development. The unique methodology includes conducting experiments in a custom-built metaverse simulation as a governance sandbox with a custom-for-purpose large language model (LLM). Our project will contribute to the need for greater AI literacy by developing a MOOC on AI ethics in healthcare, policy briefs and academic articles. Through partnerships across six countries – UAE, UK, USA, Türkiye, Czechia, and Australia, with academia, public institutions, nonprofit organisations and startups, the initiative contributes to the UAE’s focus on trustworthy AI and health (e.g. National Strategy for Artificial Intelligence 2031, UAE Centennial 2071). Further, these objectives align with the AI literacy obligation highlighted by the EU AI Act, especially as AI in the healthcare industry is expected to reach $490.96 billion by 2032, with a CAGR of 43.2%. The project will support AI firms by adding to their knowledge that will support the UAE AI Seal brand (UAI).