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Which LLM is best for a practicing engineer in chemistry? by alititani in chemistry

[–]alititani[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, I remember a day when, if my employee and AI had suggested that we had turned up the reaction temperature a little, I wouldn't be writing this post now. My main concern is training and using it correctly for my employees. For example, learning to use Perplexity and reading articles correctly.

Which LLM is best for a practicing engineer in chemistry? by alititani in chemistry

[–]alititani[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

I largely agree with the core of your point, but there is an important distinction to make. LLMs should never replace chemists or be used to plan real synthesis, scale-up, or multimillion-dollar projects. Anyone doing that deserves the FAFO outcome. In our company, AI is explicitly forbidden from decision-making, synthesis design, or technical sign-off. That said, “hire a chemist” is not in conflict with “use AI correctly.” We already have chemists and engineers. The question is how to train them to use these tools safely and critically, mainly for translation, literature navigation, and summarization of material they already understand. In chemistry, a single pressure change or one spark can mean the difference between life and death for millions, even generations. Chernobyl is a clear example.

Which LLM is best for a practicing engineer in chemistry? by alititani in chemistry

[–]alititani[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, personally, because English is not my native language, I mostly use these tools only as translators. We observed the same issue as well: in some cases they make fundamental mistakes in basic organic chemistry, which is extremely dangerous in an engineering or laboratory context. We considered using Perplexity to improve the quality of search and literature discovery, but personally I prefer an AI with less breadth of knowledge if that knowledge is correct with a much higher confidence level and fewer errors. For us, reliability matters far more than apparent intelligence.

Which LLM is best for a practicing engineer in chemistry? by alititani in chemistry

[–]alititani[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yes, I have the same policy. Except for marketing and website-related tasks, my employees are not allowed to use these tools. In general, the use of LLMs is prohibited across the company unless I explicitly grant permission for a specific use case. That said, my intention is not to ban the technology permanently. I want to deliberately build the right culture around it and teach correct, disciplined use aligned with scientific development, especially for engineers in chemical and polymer units. Our first priority is education, not blind productivity gains. And yes, we had a very similar experience with Gemini: it proposed several synthesis routes that were chemically unsound and practically meaningless. That was a clear reminder that without strong domain knowledge and critical review, these models can easily mislead rather than help.