INTELLIGENT TECHNOLOGY
WATER TREATMENT
Kemira and CuspAI use AI-designed materials to target PFAS removal from drinking water
contaminant limits in parts per trillion scale, announced in 2024, and the EU Drinking Water Directive.
Today’ s leading remediation technology is granular activated carbon( GAC). Kemira initiated this collaboration to explore whether AI-driven design could open a path to more selective and longer-lasting alternatives.
Finnish company Kemira, a global leader in sustainable chemical solutions for water-intensive industries, and CuspAI, the UK-based frontier AI materials science company, have used generative AI to design new materials targeting the removal of PFAS, so-called‘ forever chemicals’, from drinking and process water at trace concentrations – using chemistry that is stable, sustainable and manufacturable.
The materials discovery project explored a design space of approximately 300 trillion possible material structures and delivered more than 5000 novel material designs with full property data for three priority PFAS molecules: GenX, PFBS and PFOS. This was narrowed to approximately 20 selected priority candidates now advancing to further development. The program reached this stage in six months.
This is the first commercial partnership to apply generative AI end-to-end to the design of new materials for PFAS remediation. While academic groups and technology companies have explored AI for materials screening, no previous collaboration has taken a generative approach, designing entirely new structures from scratch against industrial performance criteria and delivering candidates at this scale and speed.
“ Kemira challenged us with finding new solutions to one of the most pressing environmental problems of our time, and in six months our partnership delivered,” said Dr Chad Edwards, CEO and Co- Founder, CuspAI.“ The collaboration is now advancing to its next phase, with further projects already being scoped.”
“ This project combined Kemira’ s deep expertise in water treatment chemistry with CuspAI’ s capabilities and the results speak for themselves,” said Sampo Lahtinen, Executive Vice President, Research and Innovation, Kemira.“ Our teams worked closely together to ensure that every material candidate was evaluated against real industrial requirements.”
PFAS( per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances) are persistent synthetic chemicals found in drinking water worldwide. They are subject to tightening regulation, including US EPA maximum
Kemira defined the brief: a discovery phase project of new materials that can remove specific PFAS molecules from water at sub-parts-per-billion concentrations, using chemistry that is water-stable, environmentally compatible, synthesizable and cost-effective.
CuspAI’ s platform designed entirely new metal-organic frameworks( MOFs) from scratch, searching approximately 300 trillion possible structures and delivering more than 5000 novel potential material designs with property data across all three target molecules, narrowed to selected priority candidates.
The project is now moving into its next phase of further development and testing, while further programs across additional material classes are being scoped under the partnership’ s framework agreement.
“ This partnership has shown us what AIdriven materials design looks like when it meets real industrial requirements,” said Antti Salminen, President and CEO, Kemira.“ We now have a credible path toward a next-generation PFAS remediation product, and we look forward to further collaboration with the CuspAI team.”
The companies said additional projects are already being scoped as the partnership moves into broader development phases globally. •
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