AI learns and recreates Nobel-winning physics experiment

Australian physicists, perhaps searching for a way to shorten the work week, have created an AI that can run and even improve a complex physics experiment with little oversight. The research could eventually allow human scientists to focus on high-level problems and research design, leaving the nuts and bolts to a robotic lab assistant. The experiment the AI performed was the creation of a Bose-Einstein condensate, a hyper-cold gas, the process for which won three physicists the Nobel Prize in 2001. It involves using directed radiation to slow a group of atoms nearly to a standstill, producing all manner of interesting effects. "It did things a person wouldn't guess, such as changing one laser's power up and down, and compensating with another," said ANU's Paul Wigley, co-lead researcher, in a news release.