Argonne National Laboratory Applies Artificial Intelligence to Biological Research
Funded by the U.S. Department of Energy's Genesis Mission, Argonne is launching the OPAL, IDeA, and MELT-REE projects, which combine artificial intelligence with biology and autonomous laboratories.
Argonne National Laboratory, under the U.S. Department of Energy, is launching three new projects that integrate artificial intelligence systems with biological research and autonomous laboratories to accelerate scientific discovery.
AI Transformation with the Genesis Mission
Funded under the U.S. Department of Energy's Genesis Mission, the projects position Argonne at the central intersection of artificial intelligence and the life sciences.
The laboratory's supercomputing infrastructure and machine learning expertise are being combined with autonomous laboratories that minimize human intervention.
Autonomous Laboratory Network with OPAL
The OPAL project aims to build an infrastructure that will enable biological experiments coordinated across four national laboratories to be conducted autonomously.
Led by Dion Antonopoulos, Ian Foster, and Arvind Ramanathan, the project explores areas such as protein design, microbial behavior, and plant biology.
Use of Humanoid Robots in the Laboratory
Going beyond traditional liquid-handling machines, Argonne is testing humanoid robots in the laboratory that can operate equipment designed for human hands.
While an AI planning agent designs experiments, humanoid robots mimic human movements to perform specific tasks.
Rapid Enzyme Discovery with IDeA
The Intelligent Design Assistant for Enzyme Discovery and Biosynthetic Pathway Optimization project aims to reduce the characterization time of enzymes, which normally takes a year, down to weeks.
Led by Arvind Ramanathan, IDeA establishes a system of AI agents that simultaneously scan millions of scientific documents and databases to generate hypotheses.
Rare Earth Element Recovery with MELT-REE
The MELT-REE project investigates a biological alternative that uses bacteria to leach rare earth elements from mining waste and electronic waste.
The goal is to make this process, known as bioleaching, sufficiently fast, robust, and efficient for industrial use.