AI's Remarkable potential in Synthetic Biology (Friend's of Imperial Lecture)

Yesterday, I attended my first Friends of Imperial lecture, and I already know it will be the first of many.

In the Lecture, Professor Tom Ellis from Imperial College London spoke about designing and writing synthetic genomes, treating DNA as the programming language of life. The lecture explored how entire genomes can now be chemically synthesised, assembled, and redesigned, from bacteria and Saccharomyces cerevisiae yeast to emerging work in human cells. 

What I found particularly interesting was when he talked about how AI  Design tools would help significantly in the construction of rational genomes. This strongly reminded me of Alpha Fold, the AI system developed by Google DeepMind that won the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for its ground-breaking work in predicting protein structures. I had been in awe when learning about how DeepMind's advances in AlphaFold transformed the world in that documentary about Dennis Hassabis. And seeing such a parallel right now with the promises that AI holds with the Human Genome Project makes me feel so excited about what the future holds.

I am so happy that this lecture have given me an insight into the exciting advances happening right now - and am so excited to learn so much more cutting edge information in coming lectures!