Anthropic says Claude has identified a previously uncharacterized enzyme system in bacteriophages, viruses that infect bacteria, during research conducted through the company’s new Bay Area biology lab. The company says the system has properties reminiscent of CRISPR, although researchers do not yet know its biological function and further validation is required.
The finding comes shortly after Anthropic confirmed that it operates a physical molecular biology laboratory where researchers use Claude to generate and investigate scientific hypotheses. CRISPR is a natural bacterial immune system that researchers have adapted into a widely used gene-editing technology.
Claude Searched More Than 200,000 Reverse Transcriptases
According to Anthropic’s official research announcement, researchers asked Claude to search a large DNA database for unusual examples of reverse transcriptases, enzymes that copy RNA into DNA. About 950 Claude agents worked for 21 hours and used 210 million tokens during the search.
The agents collected more than 200,000 reverse transcriptases, identified about 3,500 candidate systems and narrowed those to 20 for detailed analysis. One agent noticed an unusual repeating DNA pattern beside a reverse transcriptase gene and investigated whether the structure had previously been described.
Anthropic calls the resulting system array-associated reverse transcriptases, or ART. It consists of a reverse transcriptase, a neighboring partner gene and a long array of regularly spaced DNA repeats, with early experiments showing that the array produces distinct short RNAs.
Anthropic says the combination resembles a small group of known programmable biological systems capable of functions such as cutting, copying and inserting DNA. However, the company has not established that ART performs those operations, and research into its actual function is continuing.
Human Scientists Performed the Lab Experiments
Anthropic said Claude handled much of the computational search and analysis, while human scientists reviewed candidates and performed all physical experiments. Its Bay Area laboratory works only at BSL-1 and BSL-2 biosafety levels and does not handle pathogens capable of infecting humans.
CEO Dario Amodei acknowledged that earlier scientific work contributed to the finding and said researchers at Stanford had previously identified a system with some similarities. AI-assisted biology research is also taking place elsewhere, including Stanford’s CRISPR-GPT research, which uses an AI system to help researchers design and troubleshoot gene-editing experiments.
Anthropic has previously published research showing Claude assisting with protein design and chemical analysis, while also developing additional safeguards around advanced biological capabilities. Amodei said the company could eventually investigate allowing Claude to control laboratory equipment autonomously with appropriate protections, but Anthropic said it is not doing that today.
Featured image credits: Wikimedia Commons
For more stories like it, click the +Follow button at the top of this page to follow us.