Google Scholar Labs - literature search in a box?

The future is here, it's just not evenly distributed. You can either learn to live with AI or stick your head in the sand.

Google has rolled its Gemini AI into Google Scholar  - "Scholar Labs" - a literature search in a box. Scholar Labs is currently an experimental feature, but as Google wants to get us all hooked on Gemini so it can monetise it, it's not going away. The good thing is that all the references are linked so you can read them yourself and check the veracity, and we're talking about peer reviewed literature here (unless AI has already contaminated scientific publishing). The bad thing? Well obviously you don't know what papers/sources it's missing out - the unknown unknowns. I tried it out on a few of my favourites (try these for yourself, or substitute your own interests):

• Describe what is known about Laboulbeniales in Coccinellida. 
• Explain the ecology of Anthocoridae in the UK. 
• Describe recent developments in the taxonomy of Collembola in Europe and the UK resulting from DNA studies. 
• Explain the known roles of cephalic modification in Linyphiidae.

I was quite impressed by the results, although as always, an AI output is a starting point/prompt rather than a conclusive endpoint. It certainly helped me eliminate a few of my own unknown unknowns and gave me a framework for further thinking. As always with LLMs, it's all about prompt engineering so I seeded ChatGPT with an idea and asked it to write prompts for me, for example:

• Seed: Explain likely causes of invasion waves of Opiliones. 

GPT-5 mini suggested: 

Here’s a concise, effective prompt you can use (for an AI or researcher) to explain the causes of invasion waves by Opiliones (harvestmen):

"Explain the causes and mechanisms behind invasion waves of Opiliones (harvestmen). Cover ecological, behavioral, physiological, and anthropogenic factors that enable range expansions and rapid colonization, and describe how life-history traits (e.g., dispersal ability, reproductive rate, diapause), habitat preferences, climate change, land-use change, human-mediated transport, and interspecific interactions (competition, predation, mutualisms, enemy release) contribute. Discuss temporal and spatial patterns of invasions, typical stages of an invasion wave (arrival, establishment, expansion), and empirical methods used to detect and study invasion waves (genetic analyses, long-term monitoring, species distribution models). Finally, provide examples from the literature of notable Opiliones range expansions and suggest testable hypotheses and study designs to disentangle driving factors."

If you want a shorter version for a general audience or classroom task, use this:

"Describe why and how harvestmen (Opiliones) produce invasion waves. Explain key biological traits, environmental changes (e.g., climate and land use), and human activities that promote arrival, establishment, and rapid range expansion. Include examples, detection methods, and testable hypotheses."

Of course, any field of knowledge is subject to the inherent biases in that field:

• What is the likely impact of artificial intelligence on climate? (try this one for yourself and see if you think it gives unbiased results)

https://scholar.google.com/scholar_labs/search?hl=en