AI Scientist
Exploring the possibilities of AI-driven discovery
What are AI Scientists?
AI is reshaping the scientific landscape. While AI for science has been central to recent scientific progress, emerging capabilities point to an even more foundational shift in scientific discovery: AI Scientists designed to conduct the entire research process without continuous human intervention.
These systems could generate hypotheses, design experiments, run them in automated labs, interpret results, and iterate on findings. If successful, AI Scientists would allow us to explore far more research directions than humans alone – running experiments continuously, spotting non-obvious patterns, and pursuing ideas we might never consider. This could lead to a massive increase in the speed and scale of societally important breakthroughs.
"AI Scientists could have enormous potential. By understanding how these systems tackle complex problems, we can learn what’s needed to evolve them from promising prototypes into genuine engines of discovery."
ARIA’s work on AI Scientists
We don't yet know the full capabilities and potential of today’s AI Scientists, but ARIA is uniquely positioned to find out – and the imperative to engage now is clear. We’re committed to exploring what the current state of the art is and how it can be applied to leading frontiers of scientific discovery. At this stage, we’re as interested in identifying the limits of these systems with a view to gaining deeper insight into their future application.
We’re launching a series of experiments designed to generate the insights needed to inform these strategic choices, including a £3m funding call for organisations working on AI Scientist systems to tackle real scientific problems – ideally connected to our existing focus areas. We want to see both what gets discovered and how the process unfolds.
Learn more about the AI Scientists funding call
AI for Breakthroughs
In parallel to AI Scientists, we're also exploring AI for breakthroughs – exploring how AI tools can help ARIA surface promising research directions, evaluate programme proposals, and identify blind spots. If AI Scientists become significant creators of knowledge, the ability to direct them toward breakthrough opportunities will be as important as the systems themselves. We're building these capabilities now.
About ARIA
From climate change to AI, society faces challenges that can be uniquely addressed by science + technology.
How we work
We seek out exceptional scientists and engineers and empower them to turn their ideas into reality.