VAxAutoSci: Visual Analytics in the era of Autonomous Science

VISUAL ANALYTICS

in the era of

AUTONOMOUS SCIENCE

IEEE VIS 2026 WORKSHOP

Boston · November 9

Workshop Overview

Artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming scientific workflows. In emerging self-driving laboratories (SDLs), autonomous agents design experiments, analyze results, and iteratively refine hypotheses within closed-loop pipelines, fundamentally shifting the role of the scientist. This transition creates new opportunities for visual analytics to enable oversight and steering of autonomous processes, facilitate the inspection and refinement of machine-generated hypotheses, and support effective human–AI collaboration in scientific discovery. This workshop positions visual analytics as a core enabler of autonomous scientific discovery and advances two complementary directions: (1) developing methods that support AI-accelerated science, and (2) leveraging AI-accelerated scientific platforms to advance visualization research into AI-driven workflows. We will encourage submissions at the intersection of visual analytics, self-driving labs, and scientific domains (e.g., materials science).

Goals

Identify research opportunities in VIS for SDLs
Share early-stage research, systems, and applications

Topics

Call for Participation

Short Papers

This track will accept 4-6 page manuscripts (excluding references) and will be archival. This track will facilitate both research and demo contributions on emerging gaps, opportunities, and examples of incorporating visual analytics into self-driving laboratories to accelerate scientific discovery.

The submissions will be peer reviewed by 1 member of the organizing committee and 2 members of the program committee (to be selected). We will ensure that reviewers do not have any conflict of interest with the authors. Then, the reviewers will hold a discussion phase. The primary reviewer will make a final recommendation based on the reviewer scores and discussions. The submissions will be evaluated based on their (1) alignment with the workshop theme, (2) technical soundness and rigor, and (3) their potential to facilitate insightful discussions.

Late Breaking Work

This track will accept 2-3 page manuscripts (excluding references) and will not be archival. This track will encourage latest progress and provide an opportunities for authors to receive feedback from a multi-disciplinary audience.

The submissions will be reviewed by one member of the organizing committee, and the organizers will collectively discuss and vote on which submissions to accept. The review of late breaking work submissions is high-level and submissions will be evaluated primarily based on alignment with the workshop theme.