Regina Barzilay and James Collins are scientists at MIT. They have won the 2026 Pritzker Prize for their science work with artificial intelligence, or AI. They use AI and tests to find new antibiotics. These are medicines that kill bacteria. Some bacteria survive treatment with existing medicines.
In 2020, they published work with scientist Jonathan Stokes about an antibiotic called halicin. Their AI system learnt from 2,500 different chemicals and helped them find it. Scientists first studied halicin as a possible diabetes medicine. Tests showed that it killed bacteria that survive other antibiotics. Finding it took weeks instead of years.
In 2023, the three scientists used AI to find another antibiotic, abaucin. It works against one type of bacteria. This narrow target is an advantage. It lowers the chance of bacteria learning to survive the medicine and of harm to helpful bacteria in the gut.
Collins says finding antibiotics in the past was slow and expensive. AI is now helping scientists design possible medicines, not just find them. But Barzilay says AI can only do some parts of the work. Scientists still need better AI systems that show how the human body works.
