Deepmind AI can understand the unusual atomic structure of glass

An artificial intelligence that can predict how a piece of glass responds to heat and pressure could one day also be used to model traffic flow. While most solid materials have a regular atomic structure, the atoms in glass have a more irregular arrangement, resembling a liquid that has been frozen in place. Physicists have long wanted to know more about this "glass transition". "Given that glasses are everywhere – from windows to your phone screen – it's odd that we don't really understand its structure and dynamism," says Victor Bapst at AI firm DeepMind.