Nucleotides, amino acids, protein structures, and DNA or cells dividing to form small cell masses
video credit/ Sanjay Srivatsan, Fred Hutch Cancer Center

building beyond evolution/

Evolution and natural selection have created the world we see today, but it represents only a fraction of what could have existed given the trillions of DNA sequences available to Nature to design and create life. But what if scientists harnessed the power of AI to model and create synthetic data that explores and expands biology's full design capabilities?

‍AI BioDesign will explore that uncharted design space to propose—and learn from—biology that doesn’t exist, to surface new insights and “laws of life” that can allow science to engineer solutions to address the world's most pressing and urgent challenges.

Supported by Fund for Science and Technology (FFST), a private foundation in the Paul G. Allen philanthropic ecosystem, AI BioDesign brings together complementary strengths across Seattle’s scientific ecosystem: the Allen Institute’s experience building large-scale, open-science platforms; the University of Washington’s expertise in synthetic biology and genome science, such as the Institute for Protein Design and UW Medicine Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine; and Fred Hutch’s depth in cellular systems, genomics, and translational medicine.

AI BioDesign combines artificial intelligence with experimental biology to explore what biology could become: new proteins, genes, and biological systems beyond what evolution has already produced.

ai biodesign leadership

Jay Shendure

lead scientific director of AI BioDesign, scientific director of the UW Medicine Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine, scientific director of the Seattle Hub for Synthetic Biology, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator

David Baker

lead scientific director, AI BioDesign; director, UW Medicine Institute for Protein Design; Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator

We want to engineer biological systems with similar reliability to mechanical, electrical, or software engineering.

Jay Shendure

lead scientific director of AI BioDesign, scientific director of the UW Medicine Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine, scientific director of the Seattle Hub for Synthetic Biology, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator

We have new tools and technology to understand and treat brain disease. Massive advances in AI, and groundbreaking tools to develop targeted therapies are opening up a whole new chapter of human neuroscience and medicine.

Ed Lein

Executive Vice President and Director, Brain Health

ai biodesign news

video

AI BioDesign: advancing biology and accelerating evolution

A bold and innovative collaboration between the Allen Institute, Fred Hutch Cancer Center, and the University of Washington, AI BioDesign will engineer and build new biomolecules that don’t exist in nature to help find new treatments for disease.

news

AI BioDesign accelerator combines experimental biology and artificial intelligence to learn nature’s design rules

Researchers from the Allen Institute, University of Washington, and Fred Hutch Cancer Center, supported by Fund for Science and Technology, will build open AI models, datasets, and tools to accelerate biological design for health, sustainability, and other global challenges