10,000 AI-designed proteins will face a real lab test, not just a computer's word

A promising protein designed by a computer is only a promise until it meets a real lab bench. A new global competition, Poreva Open, launched by MegaRobo Technologies, is built around exactly that test: teams anywhere in the world can enter AI-designed proteins, and more than 10,000 designs will go through the same standardised hands-on lab experiments, judged blind — the testers will not know whose design is whose. The first challenges focus on three protein targets doctors know well: one involved in some cancers, one in inflammation, and one in blood-sugar control. Results, including the designs that fail, will be published openly, so everyone learns from the same evidence. Prizes total US$250,000, with a further US$150,000 in free lab testing for participants, and registration opened today, October 19.

SDG 9 · Industry, innovation and infrastructure — Mechanism: tech innovation