Artificial intelligence enters the laboratory and attracts capital from Google and former OpenAI executives

According to Estadão, around a thousand versions of Claude, an Anthropic model, ran for 21 hours in September and analyzed more than 200 thousand enzymes. From the analysis, a system emerged with repeats similar to those of CRISPR, found in viruses that infect bacteria. The case shows how artificial intelligence begins to occupy a space that was previously exclusive to the laboratory.

The finding was confirmed by scientists at the bench, that is, it left the computer and underwent physical testing. This stage separates the promise from the result, and is the point that most interests those who follow the biotechnology sector.

In the month of May, Isomorphic Labs raised US$2.1 billion. The company was born in 2021 as a spin-off from DeepMind, a Google unit, and intends to begin clinical trials with people by the end of this year. These values ​​show the size of the money reaching this area, and the announced schedule will serve as a reference to monitor progress.

OpenAI also entered the dispute, with GPT-Rosalind, a model dedicated to biology presented in April. Kevin Weil, former scientific leader at OpenAI, opened Warp Sciences in October, whose goal is to set up chemical laboratories with full automation.

What is at stake is the ability to link computational analysis to bench work, a bridge that the finding confirmed by scientists illustrates. Therefore, the dispute is not limited to language models, but also involves laboratories, data and the capital needed to finance them.

What changes for the investor

For those who invest in the stock market and Nasdaq, the immediate effect is one of attention, not price. Companies and biology initiatives with artificial intelligence are now being monitored as a new front, and the announced deadlines, such as tests on humans, become references to measure progress. Capital and launch announcements are not yet proven results, and it is up to the investor to separate one from the other before making any decision.

Automatically translated from Portuguese.