×
ENDAR AI system detects bioweapons by analyzing DNA patterns
Written by
Published on
Join our daily newsletter for breaking news, product launches and deals, research breakdowns, and other industry-leading AI coverage
Join Now

A new AI-powered detection system called ENDAR can identify artificially engineered genetic material by analyzing DNA patterns, potentially solving the long-standing problem of determining whether disease outbreaks are natural or human-made. Developed by Ginkgo Bioworks, a synthetic biology company, with support from US intelligence agencies, this technology could be crucial as artificial intelligence makes bioweapons easier to create and deploy.

The big picture: The convergence of AI and synthetic biology is creating unprecedented opportunities for both beneficial medical advances and dangerous bioweapons development.

  • AI tools can now help design entirely new pathogens or modify existing ones to be more deadly, transmissible, or resistant to treatments.
  • A 2023 MIT experiment showed that commercially available AI chatbots could provide step-by-step instructions for assembling deadly viruses like smallpox.
  • Experts warn that AI could enable the creation of pathogens with “the death rate of Ebola but the transmissibility of seasonal flu,” potentially causing billions of deaths.

Why this matters: Unlike nuclear weapons, bioweapons are nearly impossible to detect before use and can provide plausible deniability to attackers.

  • The 1979 Soviet anthrax accident in Sverdlovsk killed over 60 people but remained secret for decades because biological weapons facilities look identical to legitimate medical labs.
  • Current uncertainty about COVID-19’s origins demonstrates how difficult attribution can be even with extensive investigation.
  • As Stanford’s Drew Endy, a professor of biological engineering, notes: “What the pandemic tells us is that nobody can do attribution.”

How ENDAR works: The system uses machine learning trained on vast libraries of engineered genomes to detect genetic anomalies that indicate artificial manipulation.

  • It analyzes DNA at the base pair level, looking for patterns that don’t match natural evolutionary history.
  • The technology can “calculate a molecular clock and say, ‘Does its ancestry match what we would expect, given the evolutionary history?'”
  • If patterns don’t align with natural evolution, this signals potential genetic engineering.

Current monitoring efforts: Ginkgo Bioworks operates surveillance systems at eight US airports plus international locations, collecting samples from passengers and aircraft wastewater.

  • The company processes samples through polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing to identify genetic material.
  • This creates a global database of pathogen movement and evolution patterns.
  • The same infrastructure used for COVID-19 monitoring has been adapted for bioweapons detection.

The threat landscape: Several nations are believed to maintain active biological weapons programs despite international treaties prohibiting them.

  • The State Department assesses that Russia and North Korea maintain offensive bioweapons programs.
  • China has “continued to engage in biological activities with potential [bioweapon] applications” according to US intelligence.
  • Chinese military writings have identified biotechnology as a “new domain of warfare.”

Information warfare concerns: AI could amplify bioweapons threats through sophisticated misinformation campaigns.

  • Epidemiologist Jay Varma warns of “a rogue actor using existing AI tools to simulate a bioterrorism attack that would destabilize a region or the world.”
  • False evidence of biological attacks spread on social media could trigger security crises between nuclear powers.
  • Russia has already spread unsubstantiated claims about Ukrainian bioweapons labs.

What experts are saying: The focus should be on building resilience rather than pursuing deterrence through offensive capabilities.

  • “We don’t want to go down the deterrence path,” says Stanford’s Endy. “We want to go down the resilience path.”
  • Ginkgo’s Matt McKnight, head of biosecurity at the company, argues: “You can’t regulate your way out of it. You have to be better at it. You have to be as good as the adversaries at making countermeasures.”
  • MIT’s Kevin Esvelt, director of the Sculpting Evolution group, warns that synthetic biology “just seems to favor offense” because “it’s much cheaper to build a virus than it is to develop and distribute a vaccine.”

Looking ahead: The technology arms race between offensive and defensive biological capabilities is accelerating, with detection systems like ENDAR representing a crucial defensive breakthrough in an increasingly dangerous landscape.

Will we know if the next plague is human-made?

Recent News

Linux Foundation adopts Google’s Agent2Agent protocol for AI collaboration

Breaking down silos for seamless collaboration between AI systems.

MIT breakthrough boosts AI reasoning accuracy by 6x with test-time training

Current LLMs can't learn new skills after deployment—this changes that.

McDonald’s AI hiring chatbot exposed 64M job applicants’ personal data

Researchers cracked the system using "123456" as both username and password.