The General Services Administration has issued a request for information seeking public comments on ways to further improve U.S. federal transparency under the Sixth U.S. Open Government National Action Plan, set for drafting with stakeholder participation.

GSA wants public input from public, private, advocacy, non-profit and philanthropic groups, as well as government agency personnel, the Department of Justice’s Office of Information Policy said in a blog post on Wednesday.

The RFI’s topics cover four focus areas, including public input on innovative approaches or emerging technologies that the government could adopt to improve transparency, public engagement and accountability.

The deadline for public input submission is on Nov. 12. 

The RFI follows the GSA’s September announcement of the Open Government Challenge under which the agency will develop guidelines for community participation to promote broader and more meaningful public engagement of federal agencies.

A new federal PPCE toolkit will also be developed as a guidebook on case studies on best practices on public participation and engagement. 

The transparency initiatives are driven by the U.S. membership in the Open Government Partnership, an international alliance among federal, state and local governments and civil society organizations advocating democratic principles and government accountability.

The OGP requires its members to create and commit to transparency plans every two to three years, as well as submit progress reports to independent monitoring and reporting bodies.

The CHIPS for America program within the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology expects to award up to $100 million in funding to advance the use of artificial intelligence in the development of sustainable semiconductor materials and processes that could be adopted within five years.

NIST said Wednesday CHIPS for America announced plans to launch an open competition through a notice of intent and fund industry-informed, university-led collaborations about AI-powered autonomous experimentation—or AI/AE—associated with sustainable semiconductor production.

AI/AE could help expedite the research and development of materials by combining automated synthesis and characterization tools with an AI “planner” to determine the next phase of an experimental campaign.

“President Biden says our nation can be defined in a single word: Possibilities. Using AI to accelerate the extensive, intricate work of developing sustainable materials for this incredibly complicated product is a great example of American ingenuity,” said Arati Prabhakar, assistant to the president for science and technology and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy. 

“This is how CHIPS research and development will help manufacturers continue to succeed and thrive here at home,” added Prabhakar, a previous Wash100 awardee.

NIST said it expects the notice of funding opportunity for the competition to be issued later this year.