Robots are learning to conduct their own experiments

Robots are getting ever closer to outperforming humans in all aspects of life - even when it comes to learning about how the world works. Researchers at Toyota are using artificial intelligence to speed up the discovery of the ideal chemical makeup for electric car batteries. AI-powered robot arms engineered by the team place precise drops of chemical reagents in test tubes under the guise of human supervisors. Over the next few months, the machine intelligence behind the system will take over the planning of experiments as well, according to Toyota. Researchers said the'robot graduate student' will decide how to modify the concentrations of the ingredients it's testing without the need for human assistance.