Designing a multilayer film via machine learning of scientific literature

Scientists who design chemical substances often use materials informatics (MI), a data-driven approach with either computer simulation or artificial intelligence (AI). MI is a valuable technique, but applying it to layered structures is difficult. Most of the proposed computer-aided material search techniques use atomic or molecular simulations, which are limited to small areas. Some AI approaches have planned layered structures, but they require a physical theory or abundant experimental results. There is no universal design tool for multilayer films in MI. Here, we show a multilayer film can be designed through machine learning (ML) of experimental procedures extracted from chemical-coating articles. We converted material names according to International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry rules and stored them in databases for each fabrication step without any physicochemical theory. Compared with experimental results which depend on authors, experimental protocol is superiority at almost unified and less data loss. Connecting scientific knowledge through ML enables us to predict untrained film structures. This suggests that AI imitates research activity, which is normally inspired by other scientific achievements and can thus be used as a general design technique.