Reem Al Hashimy, director general of Expo 2020 Dubai, has donated the first word – “dignity” – to an AI algorithm that will generate a ‘Collective Message’ at the UK pavilion.

The event opens to the public tomorrow.

The selection is the first of tens of thousands of words that will create the message from humanity to another civilisation.

In a concept inspired by Stephen Hawking, visitors to the UK pavilion will be invited to donate a word they feel describes humanity or life on Earth.

AI technology will use these words to generate individual poetic couplets that will combine to create a Collective Message projected on the cone-shaped structure until March.

The algorithm used to create the AI-generated poetic couplets was trained on 15,000 poems from more than 100 British poets.

Tying in with the theme, Innovating for a Shared Future, the interactive poetry installation will explore whether a computer programme can express the complex nature of humanity through verse.