The new artificial intelligence tool developed by Google was able to solve the riddle on which microbiologists worked for a decade.
Professor Jose R. Penades and his team from the Imperial College of London spent years studying why some superbacteria are resistant to antibiotics. When a scientist decided to test the capabilities of the new AI tool and asked him a key question on his topic, the system offered a hypothesis that matched their identical conclusions.
The scientist was stunned because his studies were not published in the public domain. He even searched on Google to check if AI had access to his computer. However, the company assured that this did not happen.
According to Penades, the AI not only repeated its hypothesis but also proposed four additional theories, all of which turned out to be logical. One of them was so promising that the team immediately began working on it.
Researchers investigated the mechanism for transmitting sustainability of superbacteria. They suggested that bacteria can borrow the tails of viruses to transmit resistance between species. This idea was not published, but AI still managed to come to a similar conclusion.
According to the scientist, the possibilities of such tools will radically change science. Despite fears that AI can replace human labor, he is confident that it is not a threat, but a powerful tool that will significantly accelerate scientific discoveries.