Autonomous laboratories for accelerated materials discovery: a community survey and practical insights†

What are researchers' motivations and challenges related to automation and autonomy in materials science laboratories? Our survey on this topic received 102 responses from researchers across a variety of institutions and in a variety of roles. Accelerated discovery was a clear theme in the responses, and another theme was concern about the role of human researchers. Survey respondents shared a variety of use cases targeting accelerated materials discovery, including examples where partial automation is preferred over full self-driving laboratories. Building on the observed patterns of researcher priorities and needs, we propose a framework for levels of laboratory autonomy from non-automated (L0) to fully autonomous (L5).