OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT, on Oct. 16 (local time) unveiled GPT-Rosalind, an artificial intelligence (AI) model specialized for life sciences research including new drug development. With OpenAI following DeepMind and Anthropic in rolling out models tailored to science and medicine, competition is expected to intensify.
OpenAI said on its blog that GPT-Rosalind is a state-of-the-art reasoning model for life sciences research, adding that it was designed to support multi-step research tasks such as evidence synthesis, hypothesis generation and experimental design so researchers can speed up the early discovery stage.
In the United States, it takes an average of 10 to 15 years for a new drug to go from target identification to regulatory approval, and the goal is to shorten the early discovery stage with AI.
The model is named after Rosalind Franklin, the 20th-century British scientist who helped reveal the structure of DNA and laid the foundation of modern molecular biology. OpenAI said the new model will be particularly useful in biology research, where reliance on computing is growing.
OpenAI plans to offer GPT-Rosalind first in a preview version to select pharmaceutical companies and research institutes, including Moderna, Amgen and the Allen Institute.