AI has been touted as a way of speeding up materials discovery, but scientists say mass production is the bottleneck
Concrete, the most widely used construction material in the world, was invented more than 2,000 years ago. Photo credits: Flickr
Researchers need very different incentives and funding to get new materials out of the lab and into the real world, a conference has heard.
Currently, scientists are good at producing tiny amounts of new materials with promising properties, but they have no pathway to scale up production or guarantees that the material will actually work well in the real world.
As a result, structures are still largely built of materials, such as steel, glass and concrete, invented centuries, or even millennia ago.
“Discovery is not the bottleneck in having amazing materials that that can change the future,” said Ben Reinhardt, founder of Speculative Technologies…
Discover the latest in research funding every Tuesday with Funding Newswire. Dive into detailed articles with our monthly or yearly subscriptions or start with a free trial
NOTE: if you're a part of one of our Network member organisations, you get free access by signing up with your institutional email. Verify your eligibility here.
Receive the Funding Newswire [full access requires a subscription] each Tuesday, our Policy Bulletin each Thursday, and the fortnightly R&D Express, tracking reforms and investments in central and eastern Europe. 
A unique international forum for public research organisations and companies to connect their external engagement with strategic interests around their R&D system.