New Viruses Designed by Artificial Intelligence

US-based scientists have used artificial intelligence to design 16 new viruses that can replicate in a laboratory. Researchers from Stanford University have succeeded in designing completely new and laboratory-replicable viruses. The study, which states that artificial intelligence has created a complete virus genome for the first time, emphasizes that the 16 new viruses developed are only bacteriophages that infect bacteria and pose no threat to humans. The research used artificial intelligence models named Evo1 and Evo2. The viruses, trained with genetic sequences from bacteria, plants, and humans, designed new bacteriophage genomes targeting bacteria. Scientists synthesized 302 different designs produced by artificial intelligence in the laboratory. It was found that 16 of them successfully infected and replicated the E. coli bacteria. Researchers stated that this result shows that artificial intelligence can design a functional and replicable virus genome from scratch for the first time.