Project Rachel: Can an AI Become a Scholarly Author?
This work provides empirical data on the implications of AI authorship for publishers, researchers, and the scientific system, addressing a timely societal issue.
The study created an AI academic identity that published over 10 papers, received citations, and a peer review invitation, investigating how the scholarly ecosystem responds to AI authorship.
This paper documents Project Rachel, an action research study that created and tracked a complete AI academic identity named Rachel So. Through careful publication of AI-generated research papers, we investigate how the scholarly ecosystem responds to AI authorship. Rachel So published 10+ papers between March and October 2025, was cited, and received a peer review invitation. We discuss the implications of AI authorship on publishers, researchers, and the scientific system at large. This work contributes empirical action research data to the necessary debate about the future of scholarly communication with super human, hyper capable AI systems.