Discovery of sustainable energy materials via the machine-learned material space

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Grunert, Malte, Großmann, Max, Runge, Erich
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2025
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author Grunert, Malte
Großmann, Max
Runge, Erich
author_facet Grunert, Malte
Großmann, Max
Runge, Erich
contents Does a machine learning model actually gain an understanding of the material space? We answer this question in the affirmative on the example of the OptiMate model, a graph attention network trained to predict the optical properties of semiconductors and insulators. By applying the UMAP dimensionality reduction technique to its latent embeddings, we demonstrate that the model captures a nuanced and interpretable representation of the materials space, reflecting chemical and physical principles, without any user-induced bias. This enables clustering of almost 10,000 materials based on optical properties and chemical similarities. Beyond this understanding, we demonstrate how the learned material space can be used to identify more sustainable alternatives to critical materials in energy-related technologies, such as photovoltaics. These findings demonstrate the dual utility of machine learning models in materials science: Accurately predicting material properties while providing insights into the underlying materials space. The approach demonstrates the broader potential of leveraging learned materials spaces for the discovery and design of materials for diverse applications, and is easily applicable to any state-of-the-art machine learning model.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2501_05903
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Discovery of sustainable energy materials via the machine-learned material space
Grunert, Malte
Großmann, Max
Runge, Erich
Materials Science
Machine Learning
Computational Physics
Does a machine learning model actually gain an understanding of the material space? We answer this question in the affirmative on the example of the OptiMate model, a graph attention network trained to predict the optical properties of semiconductors and insulators. By applying the UMAP dimensionality reduction technique to its latent embeddings, we demonstrate that the model captures a nuanced and interpretable representation of the materials space, reflecting chemical and physical principles, without any user-induced bias. This enables clustering of almost 10,000 materials based on optical properties and chemical similarities. Beyond this understanding, we demonstrate how the learned material space can be used to identify more sustainable alternatives to critical materials in energy-related technologies, such as photovoltaics. These findings demonstrate the dual utility of machine learning models in materials science: Accurately predicting material properties while providing insights into the underlying materials space. The approach demonstrates the broader potential of leveraging learned materials spaces for the discovery and design of materials for diverse applications, and is easily applicable to any state-of-the-art machine learning model.
title Discovery of sustainable energy materials via the machine-learned material space
topic Materials Science
Machine Learning
Computational Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.05903