There's been a lot of hype and fear about generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot (which works just like ChatGPT and W&M has an enterprise license to and thus has more access and better privacy protections), and Perplexity (to which W&M students can get a 1 year Perplexity Pro license if they sign up with their W&M email before the end of 2024). If you're interested in using these tools for research and creating your projects, check out the following guides!
Not all AI research tools are generative AI tools like ChatGPT. Many of the tools below may be using some combination of machine learning, deep learning, natural language processing and more to find and visualize the research literature. Note: Many of these tools are experimental and are in beta (or alpha) so consider them pilots, not the last word for comprehensive searching. All of these are freely available or have a free tier. For more information on some of these see this presentation.