With the digital laboratory, or dLab, the team can autonomously synthesize thin-film samples and measure their material properties. The system demonstrates advanced automatic and autonomous material synthesis for data- and robot-driven materials science.

The research is published in the journal Digital Discovery.

Machine learning, robotics and data are deemed vital to the discovery of new materials. However, although data collection is an essential component, there is a bottleneck in that part of the experimental process.

So, researchers constructed a digital laboratory with interconnected apparatuses for solid materials research. They used robots to collect experimental data, such as synthesis processes, and measured physical properties, including measurement conditions.

Their dLab consists of a variety of modular experimental instruments that are physically interconnected. This allows researchers to fully automate processes from material synthesis to a wide range of measurements for surface microstructures, X-ray diffraction patterns, Raman spectra (a chemical analysis technique using scattered light), electrical conductivity and optical transmittance.