Algorithmically finding ways to synthesize new medicine

Image created using DALL-E with the prompt "Games, Chemistry, Artificial Intelligence". In modern pharmaceutical research, active ingredients are designed using a computer. Only in a second step, one determines, still away from the wet lab, whether these complex molecules can actually be synthesized. This is considered a true art among chemists as it is highly complex and requires a broad knowledge of chemical reactions. At the pharmaceutical company Bayer, one uses a time-intensive Artificial Neural Network (ANN) to predict which reactions could immediately produce the candidate at hand.