According to the Guardian newspaper, scientists at Stanford University used artificial intelligence to design new viruses that are fully functional and can multiply in the laboratory.
Using genome language models, which are the genetic equivalent of the large language models that form the basis of AI chatbots, researchers designed functional genomes to create viruses called “bacteriophages” that infect bacteria.
In the study, in which complete genomes were designed using artificial intelligence for the first time, 16 new viable viruses were created using this method, and these viruses were produced to infect bacteria.
While these produced viruses were confronted with E. coli bacteria in a petri dish in the laboratory, some of the viruses were able to overcome the resistance of two different E. coli species.
Researchers noted that these viruses do not pose any threat to humans.
The research was published in the journal “Science”.
