Artificial intelligence is having a profound impact on many industries from journalism to finance to research and design. We can also add life sciences to that list, according to participants in a virtual forum that CBRE hosted, with the general consensus being that AI's impact will generate more automated systems in labs than in the past. With less human touch will come more efficiency and efficacy – and likely less human-caused mistakes.  

This conclusion inevitably leads to questions on what roles people will take on and the space they'll need as robotic systems take over tasks they can perform. Here too, the participants offered some thoughts.

First, the human touch remains critical for creativity and innovation, and with more automation in the lab, humans will have more time for those pursuits.