Robot-accelerated materials discovery

In this Research Thrust, we develop automated workflows for accelerating the discovery and characterization of materials. These tools incorporate:

1. Synthesis robots for synthesizing candidate materials in parallel, with high precision, and using complex workflows, to generate reproducible libraries of complex architectures. These robots include WANDA and HERMAN (shown below), which were custom-designed for the high-temperatures, rapid kinetics, and reactive chemicals typical for nanocrystal synthesis.

2. High-throughput and in situ characterization to understand the properties of these material libraries. These capabilities include high-throughput optical plate readers and in situ liquid cell TEM.

3. High-throughput computational and machine learning models for pre-screening promising material candidates in silico, guiding experiments, and analyzing experimental data.

We combine these synthesis, characterization, and modeling tools into a combinatorial nanoscience workflow in which modeling, synthesis, and characterization are performed iteratively to rapidly screen and identify high performing materials. High-performing materials are investigated in depth using further modeling and in situ characterization.