⚕️ AI develops two new antibiotics against drug-resistant gonorrhoea and MRSA

• Artificial intelligence has designed two new potential antibiotics that can kill drug-resistant gonorrhoea and MRSA.
• AI analyzed 36 million chemical structures and created molecules atom by atom and killed the superbugs in laboratory tests and animal trials.
• The MIT team says AI can start a "second golden age" in antibiotic discovery.

AI creates drugs from scratch

Researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology have used generative artificial intelligence to design completely new antibiotics, reports the BBC. The method goes further than previous AI use that only searched through thousands of known chemicals to identify potential antibiotics.

The team trained the AI by giving it chemical structures of known compounds alongside data on how they affect different bacterial species. The AI then learned how bacteria are affected by different molecular structures built of atoms such as carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen.

The study, published in the journal Cell, examined 36 million compounds including those that either do not exist or have not yet been discovered.

Two methods tested for designing antibiotics

The first approach identified a promising starting point by searching through a library of millions of chemical fragments, eight to 19 atoms in size, and built from there. The second gave the AI free rein from the start.

The design process also weeded out anything that looked too similar to current antibiotics. It also tried to ensure they were inventing medicines rather than soap and to filter out anything predicted to be toxic to humans.

Successful tests against gonorrhoea and MRSA

The researchers used AI to create antibiotics for gonorrhoea and MRSA, a type of bacteria that lives harmlessly on the skin but can cause serious infection if it enters the body.

Once the leading designs were manufactured, they were tested on bacteria in the laboratory and on infected mice. This resulted in two new potential drugs that killed the superbugs in both laboratory tests and animal trials.

Professor James Collins from MIT explains that generative AI can be used to design completely new antibiotics. AI makes it possible to come up with molecules cheaply and quickly, expanding the arsenal in the battle against the genes of superbugs.

Challenges with manufacturing and development

Of the top 80 gonorrhoea treatments designed in theory, only two could be synthesised to create medicines. This shows challenges with how complex the AI designs are to manufacture.

The drugs are not ready for clinical trials and require refinement estimated to take another one to two years of work before the long process of testing them in people could begin.

Dr Andrew Edwards from the Fleming Initiative and Imperial College London calls the work "very significant" with "enormous potential" because it demonstrates a new approach to identifying new antibiotics.

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