Peter DeWeirdt

New Capabilities

Active researcher at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard

Every major tool in genetic engineering — from the enzymes that cut DNA in the 1970s to CRISPR gene editing — started as a defense weapon bacteria use against viruses. Two teams revealed bacteria carry three times more weapons than anyone realized, identifying millions of antiviral proteins from tens of thousands of genomes using machine-learning models that flag a new defense system in five minutes.

Updated May 31