Cited by 191Machine Learning in Materials ScienceComputational Drug Discovery MethodsCrystal Structures and Properties

The DOI matches its Crossref record; 28 of the 28 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; 7 of the 25 sources its claims cite were checked for support.

Artificial Intelligence Driving Materials Discovery? Perspective on the Article: Scaling Deep Learning for Materials Discovery

Open access
Cheetham, Anthony K., Seshadri, Ram·2024·Chemistry of Materials

Abstract

The discovery of new crystalline inorganic compounds-novel compositions of matter within known structure types, or even compounds with completely new crystal structures-constitutes an important goal of solid-state and materials chemistry. Some fractions of new compounds can eventually lead to new structural and functional materials that enhance the efficiency of existing technologies or even enable completely new technologies. Materials researchers eagerly welcome new approaches to the discovery of new compounds, especially those that offer the promise of accelerated success. The recent report from a group of scientists at Google who employ a combination of existing data sets, high-throughput density functional theory calculations of structural stability, and the tools of artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) to propose new compounds is an exciting advance. We examine the claims of this work here, unfortunately finding scant evidence for compounds that fulfill the trifecta of novelty, credibility, and utility. While the methods adopted in this work appear to hold promise, there is clearly a great need to incorporate domain expertise in materials synthesis and crystallography.

Overview

AI snapshot

Written from the paper’s full text.

TL;DR

This perspective scrutinizes the Google/Merchant et al. GNoME claims for AI-driven materials discovery, arguing that the predicted compounds largely fail the trifecta of novelty, credibility, and utility. The authors find scant evidence for genuinely new materials and call for greater incorporation of solid-state chemistry and crystallography domain expertise.

Key findings

  • In the GNoME Explorer archive, the authors examined the first 250 of 2047 entries and found recurring problems: unconventional composition formatting, improbable oxidation states, structures with F₂ molecules or unlikely rare-earth ordering, and many obvious analogues of known compounds.
  • In a random sample of 10 compounds from the 384,870-entry Stable Structure database, all 10 structures could be identified in the ICSD, usually with higher symmetry; only one had the same space group.
  • Space-group statistics differ sharply from the ICSD: the top four space groups in the Stable Structure database are all non-centrosymmetric and account for ∼34% of structures, whereas in the ICSD only one non-centrosymmetric space group is in the top 24 and accounts for only 1%. Pnma is ranked 16th in the Stable Structure database at 1.56%, and P21/c is found in only 0.7%, versus ∼8% each in the ICSD.
  • The database includes many impractical radioactive-element compounds: 18,138 compounds of Pm, Ac, and Pa in the large Stable Structure database, plus 23,529 entries containing Tc, Np, and Pu; 27 actinium compounds appear in GNoME and approximately 6754 in the Stable Structure database. The authors “have yet to find any strikingly novel compounds” in the GNoME and Stable Structure listings.

Methods

  • Perspective/commentary by experimental materials chemists, evaluating the Merchant et al. Nature 2023 article and its associated GNoME Explorer and Stable Structure databases.
  • The authors examined the first 250 entries in the 2047-entry GNoME Explorer archive, then randomly selected 10 compounds from the 384,870-entry Stable Structure database for comparison with ICSD entries.
  • They analyzed space-group statistics of the 384,870 Stable Structure entries and compared them with ICSD distributions reported by Urusov and Nadezhina, using ICSD search tools to identify structural analogues.

Limitations

  • The paper states its GNoME Explorer scrutiny was not comprehensive and was limited to the first 250 entries; the Stable Structure analysis used only 10 randomly selected compounds.
  • The authors note that the computational tools to treat disorder and finite-temperature behavior exist but are computationally intensive and not scalable in the Merchant et al. approach.
  • Evident from the text: the analysis is a perspective based on database inspection and ICSD comparison, not experimental synthesis or direct testing of the predicted compounds; the authors also acknowledge that some novel compounds likely exist among the 384,870 compositions even though they did not find striking examples.

Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1021/acs.chemmater.4c00643

Cites

28 of 28 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Nothing to recompute.

Figures

Figure 1 Views of the crystal structures of (a) known Zr4Ir4N (ICSD 640826) compared in a similar projection and identical scaling with (b) the proposed structure of Hf4Ir8N4NbZr11. The novelty of the structure and composition in (b) would arise only if Zr, Hf, and Nb were ordered on distinct crystallographic sites, which is unlikely.
Figure 1 Views of the crystal structures of (a) known Zr4Ir4N (ICSD 640826) compared in a similar projection and identical scaling with (b) the proposed structure of Hf4Ir8N4NbZr11. The novelty of the structure and composition in (b) would arise only if Zr, Hf, and Nb were ordered on distinct crystallographic sites, which is unlikely.CC BY · PubMed Central

Verification

Claims the paper makes

20 No basis given · 13 No full text of the sources · 10 Own interpretation · 5 Own result · 4 Supported · 2 Partly supported · 2 Sources not found · 1 Not supported · accuracy not yet measured

Show all 20 claims

  • It may state two separate claims as one. 27
  • Probably not a substantial claim. 13
  • The quote only partly states this claim. 2
37 of 37
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Chemical compounds become materials when they demonstrate some utility.

    “it is the usual practice in the field that chemical compounds become materials when they demonstrate some utility.”
  • The authors state this as an assumption.

    Very similar rare earths would be disordered in the proposed structures.

    “If we assume that very similar rare earths would be disordered, as discussed above”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Ac compounds would be isomorphous with their La analogues.

    “However, we would expect Ac compounds would be isomorphous with their La analogues.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Tl1+ and Rb1+ are close in size and identical in their charge states.

    “Tl1+ and Rb1+ are also close in size and identical in their charge states.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Hf and Zr are almost certain to be disordered on the same sites, and Nb and Zr/Hf are likely to alloy on the same crystallographic site.

    “Hf and Zr are two of the most similar elements in the periodic table and are almost certain to be disordered on the same sites”
    “Nb and Zr/Hf are also likely to alloy on the same crystallographic site.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The 14 rare-earth elements and yttrium have very similar chemistries, and zirconium and hafnium have virtually identical chemistries.

    “the recognition that the 14 rare-earth elements and yttrium have very similar chemistries could be incorporated as well as the recognition that zirconium and hafnium, among other important metal pairs, have virtually identical chemistries.”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    The few known actinium compounds are isomorphous with their stable lanthanum analogues.

    “the few that are known are isomorphous with their stable lanthanum analogues (e.g., AcPO4 and LaPO4).”
  • The paper relies on this without support.

    Ionic actinium compounds have no industrial applications.

    “ionic actinium compounds, which always contain Ac3+, have no industrial applications.”
8 of 8

Self-check

Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.

Each contradiction between two passages listed here was confirmed by an independent check.

3 of 3

Citations

Cites

Show all 27 references

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Metadata

Authors
Cheetham, A. K., & Seshadri, R.
Affiliations
University of California, Santa Barbara (US)
Corresponding author
  • Cheetham, Anthony K.
  • Seshadri, Ram
Venue
Chemistry of Materials
Published
2024-04-08
Volume
36
Issue
8
Pages
3490-3495
ISSN
  • 0897-4756 (ISSN-L)
  • 1520-5002
OpenAlex
W4394582003
Cited by
191
References
27
Citations by year
2026: 89 · 2025: 77 · 2024: 22
FWCI
16.80
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
  • Chemistry of Materials (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • OSTI OAI (U.S. Department of Energy Office of Scientific and Technical Information) (submittedVersion)
Funders
  • Basic Energy Sciences (DE-SC0024422)
  • Ras Al Khaimah Center for Advanced Materials
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Machine Learning in Materials Science
  • Life Sciences › Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics › Drug Discovery › Computational Drug Discovery Methods
  • Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials › Crystal Structures and Properties
Keywords
materials discovery, deep learning, compound prediction, high-throughput density functional theory, structural stability, machine learning, domain knowledge, crystallography, materials synthesis

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-11-08, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).

A second model labelled each claim on 2026-11-08 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).

Cited sources are checked with a language model’s help (gpt-6-sol).

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review