US President Donald Trump has signed the science and technology agreement, ‘Technology Prosperity Deal’, with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

The memorandum of understanding (MoU) outlines collaboration on projects of shared interest in science and technology fields such as AI, civil nuclear, fusion, and quantum technologies.

A ministerial-level working group will be convened within six months to guide priorities and implementation. Formal reviews will occur within 12 months of the MoU becoming operative and annually thereafter to assess progress and plan subsequent phases.

The agreement builds on the existing US-UK ‘Economic Prosperity Deal’ and becomes operative alongside progress to formalise and implement that economic deal. The MoU can be modified by mutual written decision and discontinued by written notice.

AI cooperation will focus on expanding compute infrastructure, improving research access to compute, developing scientific datasets, and applying metrology and evaluation to support adoption and security.

The participants from the two nations intend to launch joint research programmes with US agencies (Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health) and UK bodies (Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, UK Research and Innovation), including joint funding calls and compute allocations via the US National AI Research Resource and the UK AI Research Resource.

Additional AI initiatives include collaboration on automated laboratories, developing AI models for space applications, advancing pro-innovation AI policy frameworks, AI exports promotion, secure AI infrastructure and hardware innovation, workforce development, and cooperation between the US Center for AI Standards and Innovation and the UK AI Security Institute.

On civil nuclear energy and fusion, the participants plan to cooperate on advanced reactors, fuels, and fusion, strengthen nonproliferation and security programmes, facilitate commercial partnerships, and address market barriers to accelerate deployment.

The MoU is expected to promote global markets for advanced fission reactors and fuels, coordinate research facilities and data, including using AI to advance cost-competitive fusion plants.

In quantum technologies, the MoU targets ‘quantum advantage’ by combining national labs, research, and industry.

Planned actions include a US–UK benchmarking task force for quantum hardware, software, and algorithms, as well as a transatlantic Quantum Code Challenge focused on real-world use cases.

Furthermore, the initiative aims to leverage AI and high-performance computing to accelerate algorithm development.

The participants from the two nations intend to speed quantum sensing from lab to deployment via jointly supported early-stage research, centres of excellence, and national lab testing.

A US-UK Quantum Industry Exchange Programme will encourage adoption across defence, health, finance, and energy, with trials of sensing technologies through centres of excellence.

The MoU also supports foundations for frontier innovation, including research security, telecommunications, and critical infrastructure resilience.

On research security, the participants will share practices to identify and mitigate threats, build capacity for universities, research organisations, and industry, strengthen threat analysis collaboration, and encourage allies to adopt similar practices.

Telecommunications plans include joint R&D on 6G-relevant technologies, coordinated work in standards bodies and industry partnerships to shape global standards, improved positioning, navigation, and timing resilience, and efforts to mobilise private capital for advanced critical technologies.