Congress·In Committee·H.R. 7434

AI Grand Challenges Act of 2026

NSF Would Offer $10M+ Prizes for AI Cancer Breakthroughs Under House Bill

Feb 9·View on Congress.gov

Part of: Congress Unveils $50 Million AI Grand Challenges Program

This bill is one vehicle in a longer effort. See the full story across every version.View effort →

Next up: A house committee

A house committee must act next: committee consideration.

Legislative Progress

House

Senate

President

Law

How we got here

This bill’s path across every version that has carried it.

Reintroduced
Reintroduced from H.R. 9475 (118th), which died when its Congress ended.
H.R. 9475 (118th) →

Key Points

The bill directs the National Science Foundation to create the AI Grand Challenges Program. This program will offer large cash prizes to people or companies who use artificial intelligence to solve big problems in areas like health, energy, and national security.
One specific goal is finding medical breakthroughs for the most deadly types of cancer. The bill requires at least one competition focused on cancer, with a minimum prize of $10 million for the winner to improve treatments or early detection.
Most other winning prizes will be at least $1 million, but the government can award over $50 million for truly major achievements. The goal is to encourage ambitious inventions that help the United States stay competitive in technology.
To be eligible for the money, participants must be U.S. citizens or companies based in the United States. The program will also work with other agencies to release government data sets that researchers can use to train and improve their AI models.

Technology DigitalHealthcareEducation

Impact Analysis

Personal Impact

Scores run from -100 (strongly harmful) to +100 (strongly beneficial) for each group, combining impact, certainty, scope, and duration ratings of 1-5. How impact scoring works

Life & Work

Agriculture and rural development is listed as one of the grand challenge categories, meaning competitions could focus on AI solutions for farming challenges like crop optimization, pest management, or supply chain issues. However, benefits to farmers would be very indirect — they would only feel the impact if prize-winning AI tools eventually become available and affordable for agricultural use.

ImpactCertaintyScopeDurationSentiment

Disabilities

Milestones

2 milestones2 actions

Feb 9, 2026House

Referred to the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.

Feb 9, 2026

Introduced in House

The bill was officially filed and given a number. It now enters the legislative queue.

Related News

2 articles

Nextgov/FCW·Feb 13

Tech bills of the week: AI science challenge; protecting copyright content; and more

Sen. Cory Booker and Rep. Ted Lieu introduced the AI Grand Challenges Act of 2026, which directs the NSF to spearhead award competitions for AI R&D. The bill mandates a health-AI contest focused on cancer detection and allows for prizes exceeding $50 million for major achievements.

Center

Ripon Advance·May 3, 2024

Rounds cosponsors bipartisan AI Grand Challenges Act

Senator Mike Rounds joined a bipartisan group to sponsor the AI Grand Challenges Act, aiming to jumpstart innovation in responsible AI development. The bill focuses on solving complex problems in health and energy, with Rounds noting AI's potential to lead to cures for many diseases.

Center Right

No votes recorded for this bill yet.

Source Information

Document Type

Congressional Bill

Official Title

AI Grand Challenges Act of 2026

Bill NumberHR 7434

Congress119th Congress

ChamberHouse of Representatives

Latest ActionReferred to the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology.

Data Sources

Congress.gov

Official legislative information

Sponsor

Cosponsors

(1)

R: 1

Analysis generated by AI. Always verify with official sources.