{"id":54789,"date":"2025-09-22T19:18:28","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T13:48:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=54789"},"modified":"2025-09-24T14:47:29","modified_gmt":"2025-09-24T09:17:29","slug":"world-first-ai-designed-viral-genome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/22-09-2025\/world-first-ai-designed-viral-genome","title":{"rendered":"World\u2019s 1st Functioning AI-designed Viral Genome"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS3\/Science and Technology<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Recently, researchers at Stanford and the Arc Institute created<strong> the world\u2019s first entirely AI-generated genome.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>About<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The <strong>new virus <\/strong>created by AI <strong>can infect and kill bacteria.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Scientists have already used <strong>AI to design individual proteins and even small multi-gene systems.<\/strong> However, creating an<strong> entire genome is way more complex.&nbsp;<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>In simpler words the <strong>AI model learned the \u201clanguage rules\u201d of phage DNA<\/strong> and then generated <strong>a new, never-before-seen genome that still worked in real life<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>How was it done?&nbsp;<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Scientists used<strong> Artificial Intelligence (AI) called Evo,<\/strong> specifically genome <strong>\u201clanguage models,\u201d<\/strong> to design entirely<strong> new bacteriophage <\/strong>(virus that infects bacteria) genomes.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Evo was trained on about two million viral genomes <\/strong>so it could learn the DNA, the patterns of gene order and composition.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The researchers guided the model to mimic phiX174, a small bacteriophage with just 11 genes and around 5,000 DNA letters that has long been a staple of molecular biology.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table class=\"has-background\" style=\"background-color:#fff2cc\"><tbody><tr><td><strong>What is Virus?<\/strong><br>&#8211; A virus is an infectious microbe consisting of a segment of nucleic acid (either DNA or RNA) surrounded by a <strong>protein coat called capsid.<\/strong><br>&#8211; Viruses are <strong>not considered living organisms<\/strong> because they cannot carry out metabolic processes on their own.<br>&#8211; A virus cannot replicate alone; instead, it must infect cells and use components of the host cell to make copies of itself.\u00a0<br>&#8211; Often, a <strong>virus ends up killing the host cell<\/strong> in the process, causing damage to the host organism.\u00a0<br>&#8211; Well-known examples of viruses causing human disease include AIDS, COVID-19, measles and smallpox.<br><strong>Genome<\/strong><br>&#8211; The genome is the <strong>entire set of DNA instructions found in a cell.\u00a0<\/strong><br>&#8211; In humans, the genome consists of<strong> 23 pairs of chromosomes <\/strong>located in the cell\u2019s nucleus, as well as a small chromosome in the cell\u2019s mitochondria.\u00a0<br>&#8211; A genome contains<strong> all the information needed for an individual to develop and function.<\/strong><br><br><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><img data-dominant-color=\"e8ecec\" data-has-transparency=\"false\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"350\" height=\"197\" class=\"not-transparent wp-image-54800\" style=\"--dominant-color: #e8ecec; width: 350px;\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome.webp\" alt=\"Genome\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome.webp 1920w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome-300x169.webp 300w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome-1024x577.webp 1024w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome-768x432.webp 768w, https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/Genome-1536x865.webp 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Key Takeaways<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Instead of tweaking a few DNA letters, <strong>AI created the whole genome from scratch.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The DNA sequences were very different from any natural phage but <strong>still functional.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It could be huge for <strong>phage therap<\/strong>y i.e. using viruses to fight against antibiotic-resistant bacteria.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Significance<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>It\u2019s a step beyond just reading a genome (sequencing), or synthesizing a known genome, scientists are designing new, functional genomes using AI.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>This could make phage therapy more adaptable, generating diverse phages to stay ahead of bacterial resistance.&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>As technology gets cheaper and models improve, we might design more complex viral genomes, or phages targeting pathogens of clinical importance.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/technology\/science\/scientists-create-worlds-1st-functioning-ai-designed-viral-genome-10259754\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>IE<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h3>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Recently, researchers at Stanford and the Arc Institute created the world\u2019s first entirely AI-generated genome.\u00a0<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<h3><strong>About<\/strong><\/h3>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">The new virus created by AI can infect and kill bacteria.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">Scientists have already used AI to design individual proteins and even small multi-gene systems. However, creating an entire genome is way more complex.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">In simpler words the AI model learned the \u201clanguage rules\u201d of phage DNA and then generated a new, never-before-seen genome that still worked in real life.<\/li>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/22-09-2025\/world-first-ai-designed-viral-genome\" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read\u00a0More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":54811,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/wp-images.nextias.com\/cdn-cgi\/image\/format=auto\/ca\/uploads\/2025\/09\/world-first-ai-designed-viral-genome.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54789"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54803,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54789\/revisions\/54803"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/54811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}