Scientists Are Turning Alexa into an Automated Lab Helper

Alexa, what’s the next step in my titration?
Probably not the first question you ask your smart assistant in the morning, but potentially the kind of query that scientists may soon be leveling at Amazon’s AI helper. Chemical & Engineering News reports that software developer James Rhodes—whose wife, DeLacy Rhodes, is a microbiologist—has created a skill for Alexa called Helix that lends a helping hand around the laboratory.
It makes sense. While most people might ask Alexa to check the news headlines, play music, or set a timer because our hands are a mess from cooking, scientists could look up melting points, pose simple calculations, or ask for an experimental procedure to be read aloud while their hands are gloved and in use.
The software has been tested in DeLacy Rhodes's lab, and the pair has presented it at an American Chemical Society meeting. It reportedly received positive murmurings from the assembled crowd.
Of course, Alexa’s appearance in the lab wouldn’t be the first time that consumer technology has been warmly adopted by scientists. Whether it’s hacking the 3-D camera technology of Microsoft's Kinect, repurposing sensors embedded within cell phones, or hijacking VR as a means of data visualization, there’s a fine tradition of researchers borrowing off-the-shelf hardware for more niche applications. Commercialized tech can often provide a more affordable way to get things done, and gadgets increasingly come with capabilities that were previously limited to custom-made hardware.
For now, Helix is still a proof-of-concept. But you can sign up to try an early working version, and Rhodes has plans to extend its abilities—perhaps even adding the ability to order lab supplies, much like you can order goods from Amazon. It’s just a shame that Alexa can't write up the results of experiments ... for now, anyway.
(Read more: Chemical & Engineering News, “Physicists Build Laser Tweezers Controlled with Kinect,” “A Cell-Phone Microscope for Disease Detection”)
Deep Dive
Artificial intelligence

Artificial intelligence is creating a new colonial world order
An MIT Technology Review series investigates how AI is enriching a powerful few by dispossessing communities that have been dispossessed before.

Meta has built a massive new language AI—and it’s giving it away for free
Facebook’s parent company is inviting researchers to pore over and pick apart the flaws in its version of GPT-3

This horse-riding astronaut is a milestone in AI’s journey to make sense of the world
OpenAI’s latest picture-making AI is amazing—but raises questions about what we mean by intelligence.

How the AI industry profits from catastrophe
As the demand for data labeling exploded, an economic catastrophe turned Venezuela into ground zero for a new model of labor exploitation.
Stay connected

Get the latest updates from
MIT Technology Review
Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.