AI Researcher

Sara Hooker Portfolio

Co-founder and CEO of Adaption Labs, after previously serving as VP of Research at Cohere leading Cohere Labs (formerly Cohere For AI); her site collects papers on efficient AI and scaling limits, including "The Hardware Lottery" and "On the Slow Death of Scaling."

Efficient AIModel CompressionAI Research StrategyCompute Scaling

What makes it work

A breakdown of the choices that make this portfolio stand out.

1

Named, quotable arguments instead of neutral paper titles

"The Hardware Lottery" and "The Leaderboard Illusion" each state a specific, memorable thesis, which is why they get cited and discussed well beyond their original academic venue.

2

A research agenda built around a specific counter-narrative

Building a lab and now a company focused on efficiency and de-emphasizing pure scale is a coherent, differentiated research bet clearly stated across the papers listed, not a scattershot agenda.

3

External recognition treated as evidence, not decoration

Citing recognitions like the Time 100 AI list alongside the actual papers gives visitors an independent, checkable signal of the work's field-level impact.

What AI Researchers can take from this

Specific, actionable tips to apply to your own portfolio — no generic advice.

  • Give your papers or arguments a clear, quotable name if the underlying claim is genuinely a distinct thesis — it's what makes work travel beyond its original venue.

  • Build your research identity around a specific, stated bet (efficiency over scale, for instance) rather than covering a field generically.

  • List independent recognitions alongside your papers as one more piece of checkable evidence, not a replacement for the work itself.

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