Probably sudden reduction in profile or outright disappearance from the public view of the prominent experts in the area, as they are recruited to work on the more clandestine research.
Tracking employment/location and publishing/conference attendance records of researchers will probably be good source data for this.
If there will be a AI Manhattan project, there will be effective cover up of it, so no obvious signs of it will be visible for layman.
Probably sudden reduction in profile or outright disappearance from the public view of the prominent experts in the area, as they are recruited to work on the more clandestine research.
Tracking employment/location and publishing/conference attendance records of researchers will probably be good source data for this.
If there will be a AI Manhattan project, there will be effective cover up of it, so no obvious signs of it will be visible for layman.