Artificial intelligence has developed antibiotics that kill drug-resistant bacteria.

Artificial intelligence has developed two new antibiotics that have the potential to destroy drug-resistant strains of gonorrhea and methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA). The research by a group of American scientists has been published in the journal Cell.

The artificial intelligence system assembled the new drugs from individual atoms, and laboratory studies and animal tests have shown their effectiveness against superbugs, according to the BBC.

They cannot be prescribed to humans yet: years of refinement and clinical testing still lie ahead. But the research team at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) that conducted the study believes that AI could usher in a “second golden age” of antibiotics. 

The MIT team has made progress by using AI to develop antibiotics against gonorrhea and potentially fatal diseases caused by methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus.

During the study, the scientists presented the AI with 36 million compounds, including some that do not exist.

The system was trained using examples of the chemical structures of known compounds and data on whether they slow the growth of various types of bacteria. This gave the AI information about how bacteria are affected by different molecular structures consisting of atoms, primarily carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen atoms.

Two approaches were used to develop antibiotics.

In the first case, the AI looked for a promising starting point by analyzing a library of millions of chemical fragments ranging in size from eight to nineteen atoms, and then developed it. In the second case, it was given complete creative freedom from the outset. During the research process, all options that were too similar to existing antibiotics were excluded.

In addition, it was necessary to ensure that the AI was creating a medicine and not, say, soap, and to exclude all compounds that could be toxic to humans. 

The most promising substances were tested on bacteria in the laboratory and on infected mice. As a result, two new potential drugs emerged.

Scientists estimate that it will take another year or two before clinical trials on humans can begin, during which time the drugs will be further refined.

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