Anthropic has announced the discovery of a new enzyme system found within the DNA of bacteriophages. The company states that this system exhibits properties similar to CRISPR, capable of cutting, copying, and pasting DNA. CEO Dario Amodei noted that the discovery was primarily achieved by the Claude AI model.
The research process involved Claude utilizing approximately 950 agents and processing 210 million tokens over a 21-hour period. This finding was generated by the company's biology lab in the Bay Area, which was established this spring. Anthropic emphasizes that the discovery relies on foundational work previously conducted by other researchers.
Despite the use of AI for data analysis, Anthropic maintains that all physical experiments are conducted by human scientists. The laboratory operates under biosafety levels BSL-1 and BSL-2, focusing on research that does not involve human pathogens. The company does not currently allow AI to autonomously control laboratory equipment.
The integration of AI into biological research is a growing trend, with similar initiatives underway at institutions like Stanford and UC San Francisco, as well as Google’s AlphaFold project. While Anthropic currently restricts AI to data analysis, CEO Dario Amodei has not ruled out the possibility of fully automated laboratory experiments in the future.
