Scientists use AI to find promising new antibiotic to fight evasive hospital superbug

Scientists at McMaster University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have used artificial intelligence to discover a new antibiotic that could be used to fight a deadly, drug-resistant pathogen that strikes vulnerable hospital patients.

The process they used could also speed the discovery of other antibiotics to treat many other challenging bacteria.

The researchers were responding to the urgent need for new drugs to treat Acinetobacter baumannii, identified by the World Health Organization as one of the world’s most dangerous antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Notoriously difficult to eradicate, A. baumannii can cause pneumonia, meningitis and infect wounds, all of which can lead to death.

In the study, published in the journal Nature Chemical Biology, researchers report they used an artificial intelligence algorithm to predict new structural classes of antibacterial molecules, and identified a new antibacterial compound, which they have named abaucin.

McMaster University release