Artificial Intelligence has developed two new antibiotics that can kill gonorrhoea and MRSA superbugs that have developed immunity. According to the researchers, AI has designed these drugs and has been successful in killing these superbugs in tests conducted in the laboratory as well as on animals. Both these compounds will be refined for many years and will also be continuously tested. Only after that they can be used as prescriptions i.e. by common people. But the team of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) working behind this says that AI can start the “second golden age” in the discovery of antibiotics.
Treatment of infections that have developed immunity
Antibiotics kill bacteria. But now more than one million people are dying every year due to infections (bacteria) that have developed immunity to antibiotics. Experts believe that excessive use of antibiotics has helped bacteria to change themselves to avoid the effects of drugs. There has been a shortage of new antibiotics for the last several decades.
Earlier, researchers have used AI to search thousands of available chemicals to find chemical compounds that have the potential to be converted into new antibiotics. Now the MIT team has taken a step further in this direction and used generative AI to design antibiotics. This antibiotic was initially made for the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhoea and the life-threatening methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus i.e. MRSA. The researchers’ study has been published in the journal ‘Cell’. In this research, 3.6 crore compounds were examined, including many that either do not exist till now or have not been discovered till now.
It was successful in laboratory and rat tests
Scientists trained the AI ​​by giving it the chemical structure and related data of currently available compounds to see if these compounds slow down the growth of different species of bacteria. The AI ​​then looked at how different molecular structures made up of atoms like carbon, oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen affect bacteria. Then two methods were adopted to use AI to design new antibiotics. In the first method, a library of millions of chemical fragments ranging in size from eight to 19 atoms was searched to determine a starting point for designing antibiotics and the design was developed from there.
In the second method, the AI ​​was given complete freedom from the beginning. In this design process, compounds that were very similar to existing antibiotics were excluded. It was also ensured that the AI ​​was making a medicine and not something else. Therefore, compounds that could be toxic to humans were also removed. Scientists used AI to create antibiotics for gonorrhea and MRSA. Both of these are a type of bacteria and are usually present on the skin.
Although they do not cause any harm, but when they reach inside the body, they can cause serious infection. After the drugs were made, its most suitable designs were tested on bacteria in the laboratory and on infected mice. Later, two new potential antibiotics were prepared from this.
Will have to wait for testing on humans
MIT professor James Collins said, “We are excited about this because we are showing that completely new antibiotics can be designed using generative AI.” “AI can help us find molecules cheaply and quickly and thus our stock of medicines can increase. This can give us an edge in this war against the superbug gene.” However, these drugs are not yet ready for general testing. First they will be refined further, which may take two years. Only then can the long process of testing them on humans be started.
Dr Andrew Edwards of the Fleming Initiative and Imperial College London said that this work is “very special” and has “huge potential” because it “offers a new way to find new antibiotics.” However, he also added that, “AI can make a big improvement in drug discovery and development, but we still have to work hard in terms of safe and effective testing.” This can be a long and expensive process, and there is no guarantee that these drugs will eventually be given to patients.
Economic challenges
Some experts are demanding widespread improvements in drug discovery with the help of AI. Professor Collins says, “We need better models, which are not only based on how effective the drugs are in the laboratory, and models that can be made better can be made that can better predict their effect in the body.”
There is also a challenge in manufacturing drugs designed with AI. Of the 80 most theoretically promising treatments for gonorrhoea, only two have been developed into drugs. Professor Chris Dawson, from the University of Warwick, described the study as “fantastic” and said it was a step towards using AI as a tool for antibiotic discovery. He also said it was an “important step” in reducing the risk of developing drug resistance.
However, he pointed out that there is also an economic problem with drug-resistant infections – “how do you make drugs that have no commercial value?” If a new antibiotic is developed, the less it is used, the more effective it will be. Less use means fewer sales and it will be difficult for anyone to make a profit.
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