Artificial intelligence is advancing faster than almost anyone predicted. New models are becoming more powerful, AI tools are spreading across workplaces and classrooms, and governments are struggling to keep pace with regulating a technology that is already reshaping economies, industries and daily life.
Few people are better positioned to make sense of those changes than Yolanda Gil, one of the nation’s leading voices in artificial intelligence and chair of the 2026 AI Index Report. Published by Stanford University’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI), the AI Index Report has become a widely cited, data-driven scorecard tracking developments in AI research, industry, investment, education, public policy and public opinion. This year’s edition, which runs more than 400 pages and distills its conclusions into 10 major findings, offers a clear-eyed assessment of a technology that is rapidly changing our world.
Gil, a principal scientist and senior director for strategic initiatives in artificial intelligence and data science at USC’s Information Sciences Institute, research professor of computer science at USC Viterbi’s Thomas Lord Department of Computer Science in the USC Mark and Mary Stevens School of Computing and Artificial Intelligence, is a former president of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI) and a former member of the National Science Board. She has spent decades exploring how AI can accelerate scientific discovery, improve decision-making and address complex real-world challenges.
