Evening lecture by Dr. Kevin Rossi organized by the Rotterdamsche Chemische Kring.

Artificial Intelligence for Advance Materials: promises and challenges

Summary
Artificial intelligence holds a promise of revolution in how we discover, design and deploy novel materials and chemistries. Generative AI can navigate chemical and structural spaces beyond human intuition, while agentic systems increasingly connect literature, simulation, robotics and experimentation into closed-loop, autonomous discovery.

This momentum is attracting major investment, with highly valued AI-for-science startups and growing engagement from technology companies in materials, chemistry and drug discovery. At the same time, the economics of the physical world remain challenging: chemical ventures fail, plants close, and promising materials still face barriers in scale-up, manufacturability, cost and regulation. These constraints are especially important as materials production, use and disposal contribute to pressures on planetary boundaries. The promise of AI is therefore not only faster discovery, but the ability to design materials and material systems that deliver more functionality with fewer resources.

Drawing on our work in atomistic machine learning, uncertainty, catalyst characterization and materials optimization, I will discuss where AI can accelerate discovery and design, where current approaches remain limited, and what is (in my opinion) needed to translate digital advances into reliable, scalable and sustainable materials solutions.

CV
My research activity spans from the atom to the planet (policy) scale, and concern the utilization of artificial intelligence method to engineer advanced materials discovery, synthesis, characterization, and circularity. I'm Assistant Professor at TU Delft Materials Science Engineering Department, Materials Security Flagship co-lead, Climate Safety and Security Centre, TU Delft | The Hague Campus, a Marie Sklodowska Curie Individual Fellow, and the Chair of DAEMON (Data-driven Applications towards the Engineering of functional Materials: an Open Network)COST Action.

Invitees are very welcome.

Please send an email to chemischekringrotterdam@gmail.com.