ecopals Virtual Lab
AI-based material development
​Climate change is one of the greatest challenges of our time and requires decisive action on a global scale. The development and use of innovative materials play a central role in the fight against global warming. They make a decisive contribution to reducing CO2 emissions, using resources more efficiently, and adapting to changing environmental conditions.
New material technology solutions can create sustainable alternatives that not only reduce environmental impact but also strengthen the resilience of our infrastructure to the effects of climate change. Advanced materials are therefore a key building block for a more climate-friendly future.
70 %
of all product innovations depend directly or indirectly on new materials
The introduction of new materials and formulations in the building materials industry is a complex and cost-intensive process that often takes many years, sometimes even decades. One of the main reasons for this is that material development in its current practice still relies heavily on physical testing. In order to reliably test and validate material properties, hundreds, often thousands, of experiments must be carried out under controlled conditions. This traditional approach is not only resource-intensive, but also has limited scalability. However, materials research is a key driver of technological progress: according to a report by the German Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), around 70 percent of all product innovations are based on new materials or improved material properties.
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Although digital tools already exist that offer promising possibilities in theory, in practice they often reach their limits: Either they are insufficiently adapted to common industrial testing methods and automation, or they are based on extremely computationally intensive software packages whose use is not economically viable for many applications.
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There is an urgent need for more efficient methods to accelerate the development of sustainable materials while ensuring their quality and safety—this is where the ecopals Virtual Lab comes in.​
10 x
fewer physical tests due to modeling in virtual environments
The Virtual Lab is a digital platform that combines molecular simulations with artificial intelligence (AI) to accurately predict the properties of new materials. This allows tens of thousands of material variants to be digitally tested and evaluated, with only the best ones being transferred to real-world testing. This saves time, money, and resources and enables industry to respond more quickly to new requirements. This model-based preselection can reduce the number of physical tests required by up to tenfold. Testing is therefore more focused, faster, and more resource-efficient.
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The central goal of the project is to fundamentally modernize classic material development through an AI-supported virtual laboratory.
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The project is financially supported by the European Union as part of the “Program for the Promotion of Research, Innovation, and Technology” (Pro FIT).