How AI Could Prevent the Development of New Illicit Drugs

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January 11, 2022

Dear Reader, Synthetic opioids and cannabinoids can cause disease and death, but that does not stop illicit developers from creating new designer drugs. To help government regulators control these novel substances, researchers have developed a new algorithm that identifies designer drugs before they are discovered—or even exist.

Sophie Bushwick, Associate Editor, Technology @sophiebushwick

Artificial Intelligence How AI Could Prevent the Development of New Illicit Drugs The DarkNPS algorithm has predicted the formulas of millions of potential drugs By Doug Johnson,Undark

Behavior How to Stop Doomscrolling News and Social Media "Doomscroll Reminder Lady" Karen K. Ho explains how to step away from the screen By Sophie Bushwick

Engineering 3-D-Printed Chicken Dinner Cooked by Lasers A laser-focused chef prints and cooks complex designs By Huanjia Zhang

Computing Medical Algorithms Need Better Regulation Many do not require FDA approval, and those that do often do not undergo clinical trials By Soleil Shah,Abdul El-Sayed

Privacy Hacking the Ransomware Problem Organizations can act to protect themselves, but collaboration is the best defense By The Editors

Space Exploration U.S. and Chinese Scientists Propose Bold New Missions beyond the Solar System Independent concepts from each nation envision launching high-speed spacecraft on aspirational multigenerational voyages into the great unknown of interstellar space By Jonathan O'Callaghan

Fossil Fuels Germany Lays a Path to Quitting Coal, But the U.S. May Not Follow The country has focused on economic support for coal-dependent communities to end mining by 2030 By Sara Schonhardt,E&E News

Pharmaceuticals Preparing for the Next Plague SARS-CoV-2 adds impetus to the race for broad-spectrum countermeasures against future global infectious scourges By Laura DeFrancesco,Nature Biotechnology

Climate Change As Biden Sets Ambitious Climate Agenda, U.S. Emissions Rise Greenhouse gas emissions rose 7 percent in 2021, as high natural gas prices buoyed coal use By Benjamin Storrow,E&E News

FROM THE STORE Revolutions in Science Normally science proceeds in incremental steps, but sometimes a discovery is so profound that it causes a paradigm shift. This eBook is a collection of articles about those kinds of advances, including revolutionary discoveries about the origin of life, theories of learning, formation of the solar system and more.

QUOTE OF THE DAY "But so far, web3 has been more like a buzzword that's designed more to confuse than to illuminate, and it's causing something like an identity crisis for the tech industry--with implications for the rest of us." David Ingram, NBC News

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FROM THE ARCHIVE The Spice of Death: The Science behind Tainted "Synthetic Marijuana" Experts describe how rat poison linked to a recent bleeding outbreak does its damage By Devin Powell | April 2018

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