AI just created a working novel genomic virus. The U.S. isn't prepared for that. [View all]

Last edited Fri Sep 26, 2025, 11:59 AM - Edit history (1)

A stunning scientific accomplishment brings both great promise and great risk.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/09/25/artificial-intelligence-advance-virus-created/

https://archive.ph/i2bSJ



We’re nowhere near ready for a world in which artificial intelligence can create a working virus, but we need to be — because that’s the world we’re now living in.

In a remarkable paper released this month, scientists at Stanford University showed that computers can design new viruses that can then be created in the lab. How is that possible? Think of ChatGPT, which learned to write by studying patterns in English. The Stanford team used the same idea on the fundamental building block of life, training “genomic language models” on the DNA of bacteriophages — viruses that infect bacteria but not humans — to see whether a computer could learn their genetic grammar well enough to write something new.

Turns out it could. The AI created novel viral genomes, which the researchers then built and tested on a harmless strain of E. coli. Many of them worked. Some were even stronger than their natural counterparts, and several succeeded in killing bacteria that had evolved resistance to natural bacteriophages.

The scientists proceeded with appropriate caution. They limited their work to viruses that can’t infect humans and ran experiments under strict safety rules. But the essential fact is hard to ignore: Computers can now invent viable — even potent — viruses.

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