Google's Advanced AI Tool Solves a 10-Year Problem in Just 2 Days

A major breakthrough has been made by researchers at Imperial College London (UK), when they tested Google's most advanced "co-scientist" AI model on a difficult scientific problem they have been studying for years.

When the team entered a short prompt about how some superbugs become resistant to antibiotics, the AI ​​not only offered many suggestions, but also provided an answer that matched the conclusion they had spent years working toward.

Professor José Penadés, of the Department of Infectious Diseases at Imperial College London, expressed amazement at the AI ​​system's capabilities: "This means that the algorithm can collect and analyze all the available evidence, evaluate the possibilities, ask questions, design experiments and propose precise hypotheses, something we can only do after years of meticulous research. And it does it all in a very short period of time."

Although this AI platform is still in its early stages, its potential to advance science is huge, he said.

Dr Tiago Dias da Costa, co-leader of the study, stressed that AI not only helps generate hypotheses but also helps scientists identify "experimental dead ends", research directions that are time-consuming and resource-intensive but do not yield significant results.

“Our research shows that AI can synthesize all available evidence and guide us to the most important questions and the most effective trial designs,” added Dr Tiago Dias da Costa.

He also believes that, if the system works as expected, it could change the landscape of scientific research by helping to eliminate unfeasible paths and push the pace of discovery to new heights.

While AI cannot completely replace real-world experiments, researchers believe it can speed up the discovery process by suggesting hypotheses that have the highest probability of being correct.

Initial applications of the tool could focus on antimicrobial resistance (AMR), one of the biggest challenges facing modern medicine due to the rising number of infections and deaths from superbugs.

Professor Mary Ryan, also from Imperial College London, stressed that: "The world is facing many urgent problems, from pandemics to climate change, food security and environmental sustainability. To address these challenges, we need to accelerate research and development (R&D) processes and AI will play an increasingly important role in supporting groundbreaking scientific discoveries."

She also asserted that scientists, with their curiosity and creative thinking, can harness AI to make revolutionary advances in many fields, especially biomedical research.