Australian researchers build new AI that could solve challenge of cheaper solar power

If movies are to be believed, artificial intelligence is a one-way ticket to a dystopian future, with films like The Terminator, Blade Runner and The Matrix pointing to a bleak future for humanity – but new Australian research suggests AI could actually play a key role in avoiding the climate crisis. Australian researchers have unveiled a new artificial intelligence platform that has the potential to accelerate the development of cheaper and higher performance next generation solar cells, with the ability to discover new materials that do not exist yet. Researchers from the ARC Centre of Excellence in Exciton Science in Melbourne, have successfully demonstrated a new type of machine learning model that is able to predict the energy conversion efficiency of new materials, including those used in next generation organic solar cells. The model, developed by researchers based at RMIT University and Monash University, allows scientists to model'virtual materials' that do not yet exist, allowing progress towards the development of cheaper and higher performance solar cells to be fast-tracked. According to new research published in the journal Computational Materials, the new artificial intelligence platform is significantly faster than other machine learning programs, and its source code has been released freely for use by other researchers. The researchers believe the new model could help speed up the development of cheap and efficient organic solar cells, seen as a potentially cheaper alternative to traditional silicon based solar cells, but which have yet to achieve large-scale commercial deployment.