Tags: drug discovery

OpenAI unveiled GPT‑Rosalind, its first large‑language model built specifically for life‑science research. Named for DNA pioneer Rosalind Franklin, the system is designed to help scientists sort through massive data sets, generate hypotheses and speed the development of new medicines. OpenAI says the model can cut the 10‑ to 15‑year timeline typical for U.S. drug approval by improving target selection and experiment design. Available now as a research preview through a trusted‑access platform, GPT‑Rosalind also includes safeguards against misuse, as the company faces a copyright lawsuit from Ziff Davis. Ler mais

OpenAI has unveiled GPT‑Rosalind, a large language model tuned specifically for biology. The new system aims to curb the over‑enthusiasm and sycophancy that have plagued earlier models, offering more skeptical, fact‑checked responses on drug targets and other scientific queries. Access is restricted to U.S. entities through a trusted‑deployment program, with a broader Life Sciences Research Plugin slated for later release. OpenAI cites safety concerns, including the risk of the model being used to optimize harmful viruses, as the reason for the limited rollout. Ler mais

Amazon Web Services unveiled Amazon Bio Discovery, an AI‑powered suite that lets researchers design, test and refine drug candidates in weeks instead of months. The platform links more than 40 specialized models with a lab‑in‑the‑loop workflow, letting scientists send top molecules to partner labs for synthesis and receive real‑time feedback. Early adopters such as Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Bayer and the Broad Institute report dramatic cuts in development timelines, while AWS promises to keep scientists in the loop rather than replace them. Ler mais

London-based AI startup Helical announced a $10 million seed round led by redalpine, with participation from Gradient, BoxGroup and Frst. Angel investors include Cohere CEO Aidan Gomez and HuggingFace CEO Clément Delangue. The funding will fuel expansion of Helical’s Virtual Lab and Model Factory tools, which aim to bridge the gap between large biological foundation models and day‑to‑day drug‑discovery workflows. Helical already counts several top‑20 pharmaceutical companies among its customers, including a public collaboration with Pfizer. Ler mais

Anthropic completed a $400 million stock purchase of Coefficient Bio, a stealth AI biotech firm founded by former Genentech researchers Samuel Stanton and Nathan C. Frey. The acquisition adds a ten‑person team focused on accelerating drug discovery to Anthropic’s health and life‑science division, following the company’s October launch of Claude for Life Sciences, an AI tool aimed at scientific research. Ler mais

Biotech firms are turning to artificial intelligence to boost productivity and address talent shortages. Insilico Medicine is building a multi‑task AI platform that can generate disease hypotheses, design candidate molecules and even repurpose existing drugs, aiming to speed drug discovery and cut costs. GenEditBio is using AI to design engineered protein delivery vehicles that target specific tissues for in‑vivo CRISPR therapy, recently receiving FDA clearance for a corneal‑dystrophy trial. Both companies stress the need for richer, more diverse data to improve model accuracy and envision future tools such as digital twins for virtual clinical testing. Ler mais

AlphaFold, the artificial‑intelligence system created by DeepMind, has moved from early work on games to becoming a cornerstone of modern biology. Its breakthrough version, AlphaFold2, achieved atomic‑level protein structure predictions, leading to a public database that now holds predictions for the entire known protein universe. Researchers worldwide—millions in hundreds of countries—use the resource daily, and the technology continues to expand into DNA, RNA and drug design through AlphaFold 3. While the system faces challenges such as hallucinations in disordered regions, DeepMind is pairing generative models with rigorous verification and developing multi‑agent AI co‑scientists to further accelerate discovery. Ler mais

Onepot AI, founded by Daniil Boiko and Andrei Tyrin, has raised $13 million in a seed round led by Fifty Years, with participation from Khosla Ventures, Speedinvest, OpenAI co‑founder Wojciech Zaremba and Google chief scientist Jeff Dean. The company tackles a long‑standing bottleneck in drug discovery—chemical synthesis—by pairing a dedicated lab (POT‑1) with an AI‑driven organic chemist named Phil. Boiko and Tyrin aim to compress months‑long synthesis timelines into days, expanding the design space for biotech and pharma partners while building a second lab in San Francisco. Ler mais

A joint effort by Google and Yale University has produced a 27‑billion‑parameter AI model, called Gemma, that can identify drugs capable of turning "cold" tumors visible to the immune system. The model evaluated 4,000 compounds, pinpointing both known agents and unexpected candidates. In laboratory tests, a combination of interferon and the AI‑selected drug silmitasertib boosted antigen presentation, effectively exposing previously hidden cancer cells. Researchers say the discovery could lead to earlier detection and new therapeutic strategies for cancers that often evade diagnosis. Ler mais