The Download: a big DeepMind breakthrough, and fixing the US grid

The news: DeepMind says its AlphaFold tool has successfully predicted the structure of nearly all proteins known to science. It's a massive boost to the existing database of 1 million proteins it released last year, and includes structures for plants, bacteria, animals, and many other organisms. Why it matters: The expanded database opens up huge opportunities for AlphaFold to have impact on important issues such as sustainability, fuel, food insecurity, and neglected diseases, according to Demis Hassabis, DeepMind's founder and CEO. Scientists could use the findings to better understand diseases, and to speed innovation in drug discovery and biology, he added. AI for protein folding represents such a major advance that it was chosen as one of MIT Technology Review's 10 Breakthrough Technologies this year.