Emerson gives $4M to WashU’s Olin Business School for endowed AI professorship
The endowed professorship will be held by Dennis Zhang, who joined Olin in 2016. Emerson’s CEO is a WashU trustee and Olin graduate.
Can AI rejuvenate the liberal arts?
William Acree reflects on the rapid influence of AI in academic life and his experience teaching a writing-intensive course focused on AI.
Some assembly required, with machine learning
WashU researchers are working on ways to use machine learning to not just make predictions about potential chemical compounds but also to model out the synthesis of those materials.
Building an Ethical, AI-Competent 3D Library of Human Remains
As part of the 2026 Digital Transformation Research Corps, principal investigators Sarah Baitzel and Thomas Cody Prang explored possibilities for ethically enabling the future study and teaching of human skeletal remains.
AI agents prompt redesign of web for security, privacy, reliability
Funded by a NSF Career Award, Umar Iqbal plans to redesign the web with infrastructures catered to AI agents and to meet higher, safer and stricter standards.
New technique evaluates reliability of AI-enabled medical imaging
WashU researchers have developed a method called that ranks AI-based imaging tools for accuracy, even when there’s no known “ground truth” to compare against. In tests, it correctly identified the most precise imaging method 95% of the time.
Machine learning methods move self-driving labs closer to materials discovery at scale
WashU researchers are training AI agents to screen thousands of chemical possibilities and flag the most promising candidates. One project already found 10 new materials that outperform current water-harvesting tech.
WashU Research Seed Grants Offer New Funding for AI-Integrated Research
WashU’s Research Development Office is opening a new round of Research Seed Grants this fiscal year that will fund projects that meaningfully integrate artificial intelligence into research.
WashU builds momentum through AI initiative
As the fall semester approaches, WashU’s AI initiative is driving academic innovation across schools and disciplines.
New Research Shows AI Can Help Pre-Bunk Election Misinformation
The research finds that LLM-generated pre-bunking significantly reduced belief in election rumors and modestly offset declines in confidence in national election administration.