Part 3/15:
Enter DeepMind’s AlphaFold, which in 2020 changed the game entirely. Using sophisticated AI algorithms, AlphaFold could predict protein structures accurately within hours—breakthrough accuracy that rivaled experimental methods. By 2022, it had mapped over 200 million proteins, nearly all known proteins on Earth. This feat, which would have taken centuries to accomplish through conventional means, was completed in just two years. Armed with this knowledge, scientists began developing targeted therapies, designing novel enzymes, and exploring drug resistance pathways with unprecedented speed. The impact has been to accelerate biological and medical research by decades, unveiling structures and mechanisms previously concealed by the limitations of experimental techniques.