SCIENTISTS CREATE APP THAT PREDICTS CHEMICAL PROPERTIES, UNEMPLOYED FORTUNE TELLERS CONSIDER CAREER CHANGE
In a move that has psychics everywhere updating their LinkedIn profiles, MIT researchers have unleashed ChemXploreML, an app that predicts chemical properties with such accuracy that Miss Cleo would sh!t herself if she weren’t already dead.
THE FUTURE IS HERE, AND IT DOESN’T REQUIRE A COMPUTER SCIENCE DEGREE
Gone are the days when chemists needed to waste precious grant money on actual experiments or pretend to understand Python. ChemXploreML allows any lab-coat-wearing individual to predict molecular properties like boiling points without having to actually boil a d@mn thing.
“This is the greatest advancement in prediction technology since I guessed my wife was cheating on me,” says Dr. Hugh R. Kidding, a fictional chemistry professor we made up. “Before this app, I spent 40% of my time running experiments, 40% crying about failed experiments, and 20% pretending I understood machine learning at faculty meetings.”
COMPUTERS UNDERSTANDING MOLECULES IS BASICALLY WITCHCRAFT
The real magic happens when the app transforms molecules into numbers that computers can understand, a process previously requiring sacrificial offerings to the gods of computational chemistry and at least three mental breakdowns per research team.
“We’ve created an app so f@#king intuitive that even your grandmother could predict critical molecular temperatures with 93% accuracy,” explains Aravindh Nivas Marimuthu, lead author and apparent wizard. “Though we don’t recommend letting grandma anywhere near your high-stakes pharmaceutical research.”
DEMOCRATIZING SCIENCE OR MAKING SCIENTISTS OBSOLETE? BOTH!
According to a completely fabricated survey, 87% of chemistry graduate students now fear their entire PhD programs were a waste of time. The remaining 13% are too busy playing with the new app to respond to surveys.
“ChemXploreML is to chemistry what calculators were to arithmetic, except instead of making third-grade math teachers angry, we’re potentially revolutionizing drug discovery,” says Professor Ivana B. Relevant, Chair of the Department of Obvious Observations at Madeup University.
THE END OF EXPERIMENTATION AS WE KNOW IT
The app works entirely offline, which researchers claim protects proprietary data but really means scientists can now make groundbreaking predictions while sitting on the toilet without IT knowing.
Most impressively, ChemXploreML achieved prediction accuracy rates that make weather forecasters look like they’re just guessing which way the wind blows. Which, let’s be honest, they probably are.
“We’ve essentially created something that allows chemists to skip all the boring parts of chemistry,” says an unnamed source from MIT who spoke on condition of not being identified as “that person who made human lab work obsolete.”
In related news, test tube manufacturers have reported a 42% drop in stock prices, and laboratory explosion insurance claims are down a stunning 38%, much to the disappointment of YouTube compilation creators everywhere.
As we gaze into our own crystal ball, we predict that by 2030, the job title “chemist” will be replaced with “app watcher” and laboratory coats will be repurposed as fashionable beachwear for the chronically pale. Progress marches on, one predicted boiling point at a time.
