AI Neural Network Predicts Evolution of Gene Regulation in Yeast

Scientists have developed an artificial intelligence (AI)-based neural network model that accurately predicts gene expression in yeast. The team has validated the ability of its neural network in high-throughput experiments and the work opens doors for a broad spectrum of scientific questions. The model can help design genes with customized levels of expression for the development of gene therapies or industrial applications and clarify evolutionary mechanisms that regulate gene expression. The findings were published in the journal Nature, in an article titled, "The evolution, evolvability, and engineering of gene regulatory DNA." "This work highlights what possibilities open up when we design new kinds of experiments to generate the right data to train models," said Aviv Regev, PhD, a professor of biology at MIT, core member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, head of Genentech Research and Early Development, and the senior author of the study. The researchers employed two key technologies to predict gene expression in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae.