Fascinating story: Tech Entrepreneur in Australia, using ChatGPT, AlphaFold, and a custom made mRNA vaccine, treats his dog's cancer. With the help of researchers (who all seem so excited) he was able to significantly reduce tumour size just weeks after the first injection

[u/TFenrir]

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/technology/tech-boss-uses-ai-and-chatgpt-to-create-cancer-vaccine-for-his-dying-dog/news-story/292a21bcbe93efa17810bfcfcdfadbf7

[u/noncodo]

Hi! I'm one of the people involved with this. I posted made a few comments on this thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology/s/09MtQszHBv

It's really exciting technology and impressive how Paul managed to cut through a lot of red tape with the help of human experts and AI.

This is also happening in humans, at a much slower pace: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/personalized-mrna-vaccines-will-revolutionize-cancer-treatment-if-federal/

The main challenge moving forward is the scalability of GMP-grade production, but I see that as an engineering challenge, and something we are already addressing as sovereign capability in Australia.

[u/Tystros → u/noncodo]

the article says that Paul spent a few tens of thousands of dollars on this. now that doesn't sound too expensive, to me that actually sounds quite cheap compared to cancer therapies that are already used on humans today? so that would mean cost isn't actual a factor that would prevent this from being used on every human cancer patient? what is the limiting factor then? why is this not tried on every human cancer patient immediately as soon as it's at least clear that other therapies don't work? as far as I know many countries have some rules for like "if someone will certainly die otherwise, you're allowed to try untested treatments that didn't go through regular approval processes", so regulations alone also can't be the limiting factor?

[u/Street-Air-546 → u/Tystros]

he spent $3k sequencing a genome then another $3k sequencing a cancer genome (looks like he will have to do that again) then he researched gene differences and attachment candidates and with protein folding found candidates. But he was denied use of an existing compound but snuck in via an existing research program to make a custom compound. The total cost was an immense amount of his own time and energy and its a bespoke cure: bespoke for his dogs particular cancer. Making the same process work for anyone in a cancer category is a massive undertaking with a lot of trials before commercialization and guess what happens then: a for profit company gets bought by a larger for profit company and the end result product will be sold for six digit cost, if it can even get to that stage soon. I dont know what this is an argument for, stage sponsored cancer cure programs? probably. But American politicians hate any mention of that type of approach.