Stony Brook University will participate in new Empire AI campus partnerships alongside the other State University of New York (SUNY) university centers. The goal is to expand access to artificial intelligence (AI) research and education throughout the state.
The initiative will utilize the Empire AI supercomputer, located at SUNY Buffalo, to support research and professional development opportunities for students and faculty across the SUNY system.
“Through Empire AI, New York is ensuring the power of AI is harnessed responsibly,” said New York Governor Kathy Hochul. “By bringing together SUNY institutions through these campus partnerships, we are furthering the use of AI for the public good and shaping a brighter future for all New Yorkers.”
SUNY’s four university centers—Stony Brook, Buffalo, Albany, and Binghamton—will work with additional SUNY colleges to provide research experiences, professional development programs, microcredential courses, and other opportunities aimed at fostering ethical use of AI.
“SUNY is proud to leverage the largest statewide comprehensive system of public higher education in the country to ensure that more students are able to drive research and move innovation forward,” said SUNY Chancellor John B. King Jr. “We are grateful to Governor Hochul for her leadership and investment to advance AI in New York State.”
Stony Brook will collaborate with Farmingdale State College and Suffolk County Community College on an eight-week undergraduate research program called AI Innovation and Diffusion. The program will select 40 students—20 from each partner institution—to receive stipends while participating in mentorships with doctoral or postdoctoral scholars at Stony Brook.
“We are very excited to be hosting 40 top students from Farmingdale State and SUNY Suffolk here at Stony Brook this summer to participate in paid research experiences in AI and its applications across campus,” said Lav Varshney, director of Stony Brook’s Artificial Intelligence Innovation Institute (AI3). “The positive societal impacts of AI will be strongest when we can drive innovation, ensure appropriate diffusion into nearly every industrial, societal, and scholarly sector, and build a broad-based workforce that can take it forward. This initiative is meant to strengthen economic strength by hitting all three.”
Empire AI is led by an independent consortium including 10 universities and research institutions. It has over $500 million in combined public and private funding. In May 2025, Governor Hochul secured additional resources so researchers at Stony Brook as well as other campuses could benefit from expanded access. The group now includes members such as University of Rochester, Rochester Institute of Technology, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai along with original partners like Columbia University, Cornell University, NYU, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), CUNY and Flatiron Institute.
Governor Hochul’s 2026 State agenda also proposes launching Empire AI Beta which would increase computing capacity significantly; if approved it would become one of the most advanced academic supercomputers worldwide.
