{"id":166262,"date":"2023-06-23T08:25:30","date_gmt":"2023-06-23T13:25:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/06\/in-a-first-scientists-use-ai-to-create-brand-new-enzymes"},"modified":"2023-06-23T08:25:30","modified_gmt":"2023-06-23T13:25:30","slug":"in-a-first-scientists-use-ai-to-create-brand-new-enzymes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2023\/06\/in-a-first-scientists-use-ai-to-create-brand-new-enzymes","title":{"rendered":"In a first, scientists use AI to create brand new enzymes"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/in-a-first-scientists-use-ai-to-create-brand-new-enzymes2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>In a scientific first, researchers have used machine learning-powered AI to design <em>de novo<\/em> enzymes \u2014 never-before-existing proteins that accelerate biochemical reactions in living organisms. Enzymes drive a wide range of critical processes, from digestion to building muscle to breathing.<\/p>\n<p>A team led by the University of Washington\u2019s Institute for Protein Design, along with colleagues at UCLA and China\u2019s Xi\u2019an Jiaotong University, used their AI engine to create new enzymes of a kind called luciferases. Luciferases \u2014 as their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.etymonline.com\/word\/lucifer#:~:text=literally%20%22light-bringing%2C%22%20from%20lux%20(genitive%20lucis)%20%22light%22%20(from%20pie%20root%20*leuk-%20%22light%2C%20brightness%22)%20%2B%20ferre%20%22to%20carry%2C%20bear%2C%22\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">name implies<\/a> \u2014 catalyze chemical reactions that emit light; they\u2019re what give fireflies their flare.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cLiving organisms are remarkable chemists,\u201d David Baker, a professor of biochemistry at UW and the study\u2019s senior author, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ipd.uw.edu\/2023\/02\/machine-learning-generates-custom-enzymes\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">said<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a scientific first, researchers have used machine learning-powered AI to design de novo enzymes \u2014 never-before-existing proteins that accelerate biochemical reactions in living organisms. Enzymes drive a wide range of critical processes, from digestion to building muscle to breathing. A team led by the University of Washington\u2019s Institute for Protein Design, along with colleagues [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":367,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,19,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-166262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biological","category-chemistry","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166262","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\/367"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}