AI-Fun & ELLIS Invited Speaker Series | Gabriella Pizzuto
| Dates: | 15 April 2026 |
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| Times: | 11:00 - 12:00 |
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| What is it: | Seminar |
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| Organiser: | Faculty of Science and Engineering |
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| Who is it for: | University staff, External researchers, Alumni, Current University students |
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| Speaker: | Gabriella Pizzuto |
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April’s AI-Fun and ELLIS invited speaker is Gabriella Pizzuto from the University of Liverpool.
These events provide an opportunity for anyone working in AI and AI-related research across the University of Manchester to hear from top researchers about their current work. In person attendance is encouraged. If you are unable to physically attend, please register via the Ticketsource link provided to receive the Teams link to join online.
Title: Upskilling Robotic Chemists For AI-Driven Scientific Discovery
Abstract: The demand for the rapid development of new materials, ranging from sustainable formulations to novel drugs, requires a paradigm shift from manual experimentation to autonomous discovery loops. While robotic chemists offer a path toward this goal, their full potential remains untapped due to the inherent brittleness of traditional automation in human-centric labs and the difficulty of modelling complex robot-material interactions. In this talk, I will discuss our research on upskilling robotic systems through a new research area we call Laboratory Skill Acquisition: the development of robust, learning-based robot skills tailored for scientific laboratories. I will focus on the challenges of performing complex, contact-rich manipulation tasks with materials that push the boundaries of current simulation frameworks, such as granular powders and heterogeneous solids. Drawing on our recent work, I will first demonstrate how embedding material-specific, physical priors into the learning process can enable precise autonomous material manipulation. I will then discuss our work in adaptive control to handle the uncertainty of heterogeneous material properties when retrieving samples from lab glassware. Furthermore, I will briefly address how failure-recovery mechanisms allow robotic scientists to adapt to evolving workflows and operate safely alongside humans. I will conclude by outlining the open challenges in this domain, specifically focusing on the underpinnings of safe, human-in-the-loop robotic chemists and the quest for robotic scientists capable of long-term autonomous discovery.
Bio: Dr. Gabriella Pizzuto is a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in robotics and chemistry automation at the University of Liverpool. Previously, she worked as a senior postdoctoral research associate on the ERC Synergy Grant 'Autonomous Discovery of Advanced Materials' at the University of Liverpool and as a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Edinburgh. She obtained her Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Manchester in 2020, where she was also a Marie-Sklodowska Curie early stage researcher. Throughout her PhD, she was a visiting scholar at the Italian Institute of Technology and the Institute of Perception, Action and Behaviour (University of Edinburgh). She is the recipient of a Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellowship (2023) and EPSRC New Investigator Award (2025) towards advancing robotic chemists for acquiring new laboratory skills. She is a research area lead at the UK's National Institute for Advanced Materials R&I (Henry Royce Institute) and co-chair of the ECR committee of the UK’s AI in chemistry hub. Her pioneering work has been awarded an Outstanding Paper in Automation finalist at IEEE ICRA 2022 and a Best Healthcare Automation Paper finalist at IEEE CASE 2024. Her current research interests are contact-based and physics-constrained robot skill learning, failure recovery methods in laboratory environments and safe human(chemist)-robot collaboration.
Speaker
Gabriella Pizzuto
Role: Lecturer in Robotics and Chemistry Automation
Organisation: University of Liverpool
Travel and Contact Information
Find event
Lecture Theatre 1.4
Kilburn Building
Manchester
