No it can't, the pattern for chess worked since it was an invented problem where we have a simple outcome checks, we can't do the same for natural problems where we don't have easily judged outcomes.
So you can do it for arithmetics and similar where you can generate tons of questions and answers, but you can't use this for things that are fuzzier like physics or chemistry or math theorem choices. In the end we don't really know what a good math theorem is like, it has to be useful but how do you judge that? Not just any truthy mathematical statement is seen as a theorem, most statements doesn't lead anywhere.
Once we have a universal automated judge that can judge any kind of human research output then sure your statement is true, then we can train research AI that way. But we don't have that, or science would look very different than it does today. But I'd argue that such a judge needs to be AGI on its own, so its circular.