Building Autonomous Materials Labs #4. How to Build AI-driven Autonomous Labs across Disparate Interdisciplinary Environments

 This session covers common integration challenges and practical approaches to orchestrating and building systems that work together reliably. Connecting instruments and software from different vendors to serve mixed-use, multi-institution environments in AI-driven autonomous lab design is challenging, but it can be done. 

Biographies

Dr. Branden Kappes is the CEO and co-founder of Contextualize. With expertise spanning R&D, materials science, characterization, modeling, and data science, he brings a unique, product-focused perspective to solving complex problems through federated data collection, structured analysis, and scientific data and cyberinfrastructure.

He has guided a wide range of organizations on building outcome-driven strategies, collaborative scientific research environments, and scalable systems that accelerate discovery and advancement. At Contextualize, Dr. Kappes leads with a mission to transform fragmented data into operational knowledge that drives innovation.