AC Research Symposium

Designed to showcase findings emerging from the latest research in accelerated materials discovery at the AC, the symposium will feature talks, poster presentations, showcases, and networking opportunities over complimentary coffee breaks and lunch. This gathering offers a unique opportunity to engage with AC members, exchange ideas, and explore transformative research shaping the future of accelerated materials discovery.  

We hope the day will strengthen connections across the community and spark new collaborations that help to advance materials discovery using AI and automation.

Registration is open to University of Toronto faculty, students and staff. The event is free, but space is limited, so make sure to reserve your spot as soon as possible. Confirmed registrants will be sent a calendar invite.

Agenda

9:00 AM – 9:45 AM | Registration & Poster Setup (MZ Lounge)

9:45 AM – 10:00 AM | Director's Welcome and Introducing the Era of AI Scientists (Main Auditorium)

• Alán Aspuru Guzik  

10:00 AM – 10:45 AM | Session Talk (Main Auditorium):

Moderated by Aaron Clasky

• Frank Gu: Accelerating polymeric formulations through self-driving laboratories
• Maryam Ebrahimiazar: Self-driving discovery of electric vehicle coolants
• Ekaterina Trushina: Accelerating liquid-liquid extraction process development via use automated approaches

10:45 AM – 11:15 AM | Poster viewing & coffee break (Lounge) – complimentary coffee provided

11:15 AM – 12:00 PM | Values in Research (Main Auditorium)

This 45-minute session, hosted by the Technoscience Research Unit (TRU), will open with a values session led by AC Scientific leadership team member and TRU Co-Director, Dr. Murphy, setting the stage for a thoughtful exploration of ethics in research. This introduction will reference the AC’s research values.  

This will be followed by two research 15-minute presentations: the first, led by TRU Staff Research Scholar, Reena Shadaan and Community Health Worker and former Nail Technician, Jackie Liang. The talk will showcase a community-engaged collaborative project on safer nail products.  The second, led by Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering Kevin Golovin, which will showcase research in the development of safer alternatives to the toxic "forever chemicals" found in nonstick cookware and outdoor apparel.  

Together, these talks will showcase how values, such as the ones created by the TRU and AC, can be intentionally embedded into research initiatives and will highlight why ethical reflection is essential for responsible scientific discovery.

Speakers:

• Moderated by Brandon Sutherland
• Reena Shadaan
• M. Murphy
• Jackie Liang
• Kevin Golovin

12:00 PM – 1:00 PM | Lunch (Lounge) – complimentary lunch provided  

1:00 PM – 2:00 PM | Parallel Sessions

• Track A | Research Talks (Main Auditorium)
  
  • Moderated by Ilya Yakavates
  • Zhijing Jin: Multi-Agent LLMs to Assist Causal Reasoning in Science
    
  • Wei Yang: Economics of Science & Technology
  • Caitlin Maikawa: Self-driving labs to develop inflammation targeting
  • Willi Gottstein: Democratizing the set-up, execution and monitoring of SDL workflows ‍
• Track B | Commercialization Showcase (Mini Auditorium)  
  Learn about research projects that have successfully been translated into commercial ventures. Learn how to navigate the path from discovery to market, including key enablers, challenges, and lessons learned in bringing academic innovations to real-world impact.
  
  • Moderated by Avi Goldfarb
  • Mohammad Zargartalebi
  • Chris Lawson
  • Padraic Foley‍

2:00 PM – 3:00 PM | Poster Session & Coffee Break (Lounge) – complimentary coffee provided

3:00 PM – 3:45 PM | Parallel Sessions

• ‍Track A | Overcoming challenges showcase (Main Auditorium)
  This 45-minute session explores what works and what doesn’t when building self-driving labs, highlighting practical lessons, common pitfalls, and proven strategies. Speakers will share candid insights to help accelerate progress and avoid costly missteps in developing autonomous research platforms.
  
  • Moderated by Sean Caffrey
  • Frank Gu
  • Jay Werber
  • Chris Lawson  ‍
• Track B | Initiate Grant Showcase (Mini Auditorium)
  This showcase highlights findings from the AC Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Initiate Grants, which support faculty members and trainees at the University of Toronto in launching projects that address EDI barriers in STEM. The session features speed talks from grant recipients, sharing key outcomes and lessons learned.
  
  • Moderated by Kate Einarson
  • Anupama Pillai
  • Kira Boutilier-Young
  • Sonya Brijbassi
  • Jenny Oh & Anna Galang
  • Thisha Ravindran
  • Arshia Feizmohammady

3:45 PM – 4:00 PM | Closing Remarks  – Sean Caffrey and Kate Einarson

‍

Posters

• Nasim Abdollahi, Kevin Yuan and Winston Chan — Structure-Based Active Learning for Efficient Compound Selection in Drug Discovery and Development
• Aaron Clasky and Nasim Abdollahi  — Self-Driving Lab for Viscous Nanoemulsions
• Luca Chiesa — Family-Wide Ligand Discovery of PWWP Domain-Containing Proteins Using Structure-Aware Generative Models
• Sissi Feng — Purposeful Imperfection in Materials Representation
• Alaina Feeroze — Accelerating Sustainable Polymer Research: Optimizing Bioplastic Mechanical Properties and Fluoropolymer Replacement Surface Properties
• Xiaoman Guo — Modular Automation for the Organic Chemistry Self-Driving Lab
• Yuchen Han — A Self-Driving Electrochemical Platform for Discovering Mn-Based Electrocatalysts for Acidic Oxygen Evolution Reaction
• Lihi Habaz — Discovery of Potent FBXO22 Degraders Using a Medicinal Chemistry Self-Driving Laboratory
• Adam Heins — SDL0: Autonomous Scientific Experimentation with Robotics and AI
• Daniel Hocevar — Robot-Enabled Biofabrication of Tissue Cultures with Micrometer-Scale Precision
• Yunhee Hwang — Fully Closed Loop Optimization of Surfactant-Drug Micelle Formulation
• Caleb Johnston — An Automated Hydrogel Screening Platform
• Jongwhi Kim — Data-Efficient Molecular Property Prediction via Transfer Learning
• Enrui Lin — Resource-Efficient Bayesian Optimization for Self-Calibrating Liquid Handling
• Emma Lord — Programmable Electrolyte Design for Accelerating Aqueous Zinc Batteries via Interfacial Wettability Control
• Owen Melville — Lash-E: A Friendly, Flexible Robotic Platform for Rapid Workflow Development
• Mohammad Nazeri —  RAISE: A self-driving laboratory for interfacial property formulation discovery
• Hyun Suk Park — A Self-Driving Lab for Discovering Tunable and Soluble Organic Lasers
• Dylan Pyle — Dynamic Parameter Screening for Accelerated Kinetic Stress Testing
• Mohammad Mahdi Rastegardoost — Physics-Informed Digital Viscometry for Geometry-Independent Viscosity Measurement in Autonomous Laboratories
• Karen Shen — Engineering Vascularized Cardiac Tissues Using Bayesian Optimization
• Turar Tanirbergenov - A Modular Autonomous Platform for In-Flow Synthesis and Characterization of Upconversion Nanoparticles
• Javier Vargas — Comparing Physical Blends and Covalently Linked Architectures of Carbazole-Based Systems for 3D Printing
• Haozhe Xu — Probing the Reactivity of Modular Phosphine Ligands Through High-Throughput Experimentation
• Jenny Zhou — Autonomous Liquid-Liquid Extraction (LLE) Platform Unlocks Human-in-the-Loop Bayesian Optimization