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Public Lecture: AI for Materials Discovery - Professor Jacqui Cole

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About this event

What to expect

Professor Jacqui Cole from the University of Cambridge will reveal how artificial intelligence is revolutionising materials discovery, compressing the journey from laboratory breakthrough to real-world application from decades to days. This inaugural public lecture from the Centre for Machine Intelligence and Royce at the University of Sheffield explores how the same technologies powering ChatGPT and Claude can extract insights from scientific literature to solve humanity's greatest challenges—from electric propulsion to energy storage to medical breakthroughs.

Why materials matter

New materials underpin every major technological leap in human history, yet their discovery has traditionally relied on expert intuition and years of painstaking laboratory work. Materials are extraordinarily complex—their usefulness depends not just on atomic composition, but on how those atoms arrange themselves into crystals and microstructures spanning nanometre to metre scales. Professor Cole will demonstrate how AI promises to transform this process, turning the rich history of scientific discovery into actionable insights that accelerate innovation.

What you'll discover

This lecture reveals how the same natural language processing technologies behind today's AI chatbots can be unleashed on scientific challenges. You'll learn how AI extracts patterns from vast scientific literature, identifies promising material candidates, and guides experimental work—potentially reducing the materials discovery cycle from decades to days. The talk bridges theory and practice, showing how these techniques translate into real laboratory breakthroughs in electronics and chemistry.

About the speaker

Professor Jacqui Cole is the Sir Henry Royce Institute Challenge Lead in AI for Materials Discovery, Characterisation and Application, and Head of Molecular Engineering at the University of Cambridge. Her interdisciplinary research connects artificial intelligence with real-world laboratory innovation. A lifelong learner with two PhDs (Physics from Cambridge, Chemistry from Durham) and five Open University qualifications spanning Mathematics to Astronomy, Professor Cole advocates passionately for open-access science, providing global researchers with free AI tools to accelerate materials innovation.

Event format

This hour-long lecture takes place in Lecture Theatre 3 at The Diamond, located at

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