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According to recent reports, researchers used AI to create artificial protein sequences in a progressive discovery that could potentially be implemented to treat various diseases. Researchers at UCSF conducted a study in which they used AI language models to design functional artificial proteins.

“We show that AI can learn the language of biology to create artificial proteins across multiple protein types that are functional and unseen in nature,” researchers explain. They have created ProGen – an AI language model that can learn the language of proteins to generate artificial protein sequences across multiple families in the same way as other AIs can produce pictures or text. With enough information, AI-generated content can become indistinguishable from that of a human.

“A key insight for our work is that proteins can be represented as a language made up of amino acids, the 20 molecules that make up every protein. In the same way that words are strung together one-by-one to form text sentences, amino acids are strung together one-by-one to make proteins.”

The discovery – a first-of-its-kind fully AI-generated structure of a protein, according to the study – could allow for the swift development of various disease treatments.

AI has previously been shown to detect COVID-19 in people’s voices via a phone app with 89% accuracy. The AI model is also being used to develop an app that can predict exacerbations in certain chronic diseases, according to cybernews.com.