Iris AI screenshot

What is Iris AI?

Iris AI is a research assistant designed to help scientists, academics, and researchers handle the vast landscape of scientific literature. Rather than spending hours searching databases and reading abstracts, you can ask Iris questions about specific research topics and receive synthesised summaries of relevant papers. The tool connects to major academic databases and uses AI to identify and explain key findings across multiple studies. It's particularly useful for literature reviews, staying current with new research in your field, and understanding connections between different papers. Iris works on a freemium model, so you can try the basic functionality without paying upfront.

Key Features

Literature search

Query scientific papers across major databases using natural language rather than Boolean operators

Paper summaries

Get AI-generated summaries of complex research papers to understand key findings quickly

Citation tracking

Follow citations and discover related papers to build thorough literature maps

Topic synthesis

Ask questions about a research area and receive answers based on multiple sources

Reading list organisation

Save and annotate papers within the platform for later reference

Pros & Cons

Advantages

  • Saves significant time on literature searches compared to manual database browsing
  • Free tier lets you test the tool without commitment
  • Natural language search is more intuitive than traditional academic database interfaces
  • Helps identify connections between papers and research areas you might have missed

Limitations

  • Quality of summaries depends on the underlying AI model and may occasionally miss detailed details
  • Free tier likely has limitations on search volume or advanced features
  • Relies on indexed papers, so very new or niche publications may not be available

Use Cases

Conducting systematic literature reviews for thesis work or research projects

Staying updated on recent developments in your field without reading every new paper

Finding papers relevant to a new research question you're exploring

Understanding how different studies relate to each other within a research area

Onboarding to a new field by quickly understanding the landscape of existing research