by Researchers have developed antibiotics that may be able to kill drug -resistant gonorrhea and MRSA with the help of artificial intelligence.
The generative AI algorithms used by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (with) to design more than 36 million molecular connections, and identified two new medicines, which were then tested in laboratory environments and in mice.
According to her study, published in cell On Thursday, the AI was scanned and predicted by a list of potential molecules, which could act as antibiotics, and at the same time avoid structures that could be harmful or too similar to existing medication.
Both new antibiotics were able to kill bacterial strains that are increasingly difficult to treat with existing antibiotics.
One of the new drugs called NG1 was developed to specifically target gonorrhea, a sexually transmitted infection that quickly develops resistance to antibiotics. The World Health Organization has warned that in some cases gonorrhea becomes untimely due to antibiotics.
New data from the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) show a relevant increase in resistant cases. Between January 2024 and March 2025, 17 cases of Ceftriaxon-resistant gonorrhea, 13 in 2024 and four were reported in the first three months of 2025.
The second drug called DN1 was effectively against methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA), a kind of staphylococcal infection that no longer reacts to many frequently used antibiotics.
MRSA often begins as painful skin filled by the pus and can spread to cause serious, hard infections in the bloodstream, lungs or bones, especially in people with a weakened immune system.
One of the new drugs, called NG1, was developed to specifically target gonorrhea, a sexually transmitted infection that quickly develops resistance to antibiotics (Getty Images)
According to the tests, it was found that NG1 and DN1 due to their ability to kill dangerous bacteria in both test tubes and mice. In animal studies, the medication was able to successfully treat skin infections caused by MRSA and clear gonorrhea infections.
The team also hopes to design new medication for other super bugs in the future, including those infections acquired in the hospital and cause tuberculosis such as pseudomonas aeruginosa.
“We are pleased about the new possibilities that this project is opened to the development of antibiotics,” said James Collins, senior author of the study and appointment professor of medical technology and science at -Institut for Medical Technology and Science (IMES) and Department of Biological Engineering.
“Our work shows the power of AI from the point of view for drug design and enables us to take advantage of much larger chemical rooms that were previously inaccessible.”
What makes this discovery considerable is that both medication works in a new way. Many antibiotics are based on similar mechanisms to kill bacteria, which has made it possible for some bacteria to develop over time. These new connections seem to attack bacterial membranes in a way that is not used by current medication, and the scientists hope that they could be more difficult for bacteria to oppose.
Researchers have developed antibiotics that may be able to kill drug -resistant gonorrhea and MRSA with the help of artificial intelligence (Getty).
“We wanted to get rid of everything that would look like an existing antibiotic in order to tackle the antimicrobial resistance crisis in a different way,” said Aarti Krishnan, senior author and with postdoc.
Although the results are promising, the researchers emphasized that these new antibiotics are still in early development. You have to go through tests for years to prove that you are safe and effective in humans.
The next steps include the refinement of the chemical structure of the drugs, the examination of potential side effects and finally clinical studies.
Animicrobial resistance or when bacteria develop to resist the medication that is used for killing is a growing public health crisis. It is estimated that more than a million deaths are responsible worldwide every year. Experts warned that even smaller infections could become fatal again without urgent measures.
In Great Britain, 66,730 serious antibiotic-resistant infections were recorded in 2023 alone, a report by The times.
