{"id":144984,"date":"2022-08-27T20:22:55","date_gmt":"2022-08-28T01:22:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2022\/08\/protein-designing-ai-opens-door-to-medicines-humans-couldnt-dream-up"},"modified":"2022-08-27T20:22:55","modified_gmt":"2022-08-28T01:22:55","slug":"protein-designing-ai-opens-door-to-medicines-humans-couldnt-dream-up","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2022\/08\/protein-designing-ai-opens-door-to-medicines-humans-couldnt-dream-up","title":{"rendered":"Protein-Designing AI Opens Door to Medicines Humans Couldn\u2019t Dream Up"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/protein-designing-ai-opens-door-to-medicines-humans-couldnt-dream-up2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A <a href=\"https:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/science.abn2100\">new study<\/a> in <em>Science<\/em> overthrew the whole gamebook. Led by Dr. David Baker at the University of Washington, a team tapped into an AI\u2019s \u201cimagination\u201d to dream up a myriad of functional sites from scratch. It\u2019s a machine mind\u2019s \u201ccreativity\u201d at its best\u2014a deep learning algorithm that predicts the general area of a protein\u2019s functional site, but then further sculpts the structure.<\/p>\n<p>As a reality check, the team used the new software to generate drugs that battle cancer and design vaccines against common, if sometimes deadly, viruses. In one case, the digital mind came up with a solution that, when tested in isolated cells, was a perfect match for an existing antibody against a common virus. In other words, the algorithm \u201cimagined\u201d a hotspot from a viral protein, making it vulnerable as a target to design new treatments.<\/p>\n<p>The algorithm is deep learning\u2019s first foray into building proteins around their functions, opening a door to treatments that were previously unimaginable. But the software isn\u2019t limited to natural protein hotspots. \u201cThe proteins we find in nature are amazing molecules, but designed proteins can do so much more,\u201d said Baker in a press release. The algorithm is \u201cdoing things that none of us thought it would be capable of.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new study in Science overthrew the whole gamebook. Led by Dr. David Baker at the University of Washington, a team tapped into an AI\u2019s \u201cimagination\u201d to dream up a myriad of functional sites from scratch. It\u2019s a machine mind\u2019s \u201ccreativity\u201d at its best\u2014a deep learning algorithm that predicts the general area of a protein\u2019s [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":661,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,41,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-144984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-information-science","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/661"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144984\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}