USACM Student Chapter Seminar: Generative Al for Materials Discovery

Generative Al for Materials Discovery: Using Food as a Model System

Speaker: Dr. Vahidullah Taç, Schmidt Science Fellow, Postdoctoral Researcher, Stanford University

Time: Sep. 2, 2026, 11:00 am- 12:00 pm (PT)

Location: online, Meeting ID: 824 6447 8256 , Passcode: 003801

Abstract

What can the perfect burger teach us about discovering the next generation of materials?

Designing new materials often means searching through an enormous number of possible combinations while balancing competing goals such as performance, sustainability, and cost. Generative Al is emerging as a powerful tool for tackling this challenge by learning from existing successful designs and proposing entirely new ones. Testing these methods directly on advanced materials, however, is often slow and expensive. Instead, Dr. Vahid Tac turns to an unexpected but surprisingly powerful model system: burgers. Burger recipes form a rich combinatorial design space in which ingredient choices and proportions determine taste, nutrition, and environmental impact-making them an ideal experimental playground for generative design algorithms.

In this talk, Dr. Tac will show how generative Al can rediscover classic recipes, invent entirely new burgers optimized for different objectives, and even learn human preferences through blinded restaurant taste tests. Along the way, he will illustrate how the same principles can be applied to accelerate the discovery of advanced materials and navigate complex design trade-offs.