\t\t\t\t\tSign up to see the future, today<\/p>\n
Can\u2019t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech<\/p>\n
These days, large language models are pushing the line between schizophrenic break and reality closer than ever before.<\/p>\n
In a wild new post that\u2019s going viral on X-formerly-Twitter<\/a>, an enterprising young biochemist named Douglas Yao showcased a new drug he\u2019s been developing with the aid of ChatGPT. He\u2019s not employed by any pharma company, and his drug lab is setup on a couple folding tables in his garage.<\/p>\n Specifically, Yao enthuses about a new drug he calls \u201cPAC-3310,\u201d which he says is meant to treat schizophrenia. \u201cIt was designed by ChatGPT,\u201d Yao explains, \u201cand I synthesized it in a chemistry lab I built in my garage.\u201d<\/p>\n The result is a small vial of yellow powder \u2014 the first sample of 3310, apparently \u2014 which Yao says is modeled after the recently-authorized antipsychotic Cobenfy, \u201cbut improved.\u201d<\/p>\n This vial contains a new drug called PAC-3310. It was designed by ChatGPT, and I synthesized it in a chemistry lab I built in my garage.<\/p>\n PAC-3310 is a new selective M4 muscarinic receptor agonist for treating schizophrenia \u2013 similar to the recent breakthrough drug Cobenfry, but\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/o7z6iLR50T<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 Douglas Yao (@DouglasYaoDY) September 8, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n On his GitHub page<\/a>, Yao boasts that he\u2019s used AI to \u201cdesign several thousand new small molecule drugs\u201d over the past year, including a \u201cnew Alzheimer\u2019s drug,\u201d which he\u2019s developing in addition to the schizophrenia treatment.<\/p>\n \u201cI then taught myself synthetic chemistry, built a chem lab in my garage, and synthesized a hundred of them,\u201d he continued. \u201cI\u2019m now testing these compounds in cell lines and mice.\u201d<\/p>\n But whatever the one-man pharma lab hopes to accomplish is difficult to say. Yao references the fact that \u201cdrug developers typically spend tens of millions of dollars generating pre-clinical efficacy evidence for a new drug,\u201d saying that \u201cmy approach can do this at 1\/1000 the cost.\u201d This seems to suggest dreams of someday manufacturing the various drugs on a massive scale for human consumption \u2014 a process that would take years of grueling and expensive work for a well-resourced drug lab, let alone a solo entrepreneur using a box fan as a fume hood.<\/p>\n For instance, to even approach the Food and Drug Administration\u2019s \u201cNew Drug Application\u201d \u2014\u00a0itself a costly 12-month process<\/a> requiring inspection of the facility where the drug will be manufactured \u2014\u00a0one first has to conduct rounds of preclinical testing followed by three phases of clinical trials. Forget \u201ctens of millions,\u201d as Yao mentions; this is a process that can easily cost several billion<\/a>.<\/p>\n Even then success is far from guaranteed, as only 13.8 percent<\/a> of drugs that enter clinical trials go on to obtain full approval from the FDA.<\/p>\n While Yao might have been right at home in the free-wheeling research landscape of the 1970s, we no longer live in a world where a mad genius<\/a> can synthesize hundreds of new drugs a year from a private lab. For one thing, the regulatory environment is much more demanding, as outlined above, to say nothing of the fact that all the low-hanging fruit has been picked from the vine decades ago.<\/p>\n When it comes to Yao\u2019s ChatGPT-generated Alzheimer\u2019s treatment, the landscape is particularly fraught. As one 2019 study<\/a> found, no new drug has been approved to treat Alzheimer\u2019s since 2003, and not for a lack of trying: as the study notes, over 200 proposed substances meant to treat the disease have either failed in clinical trials or been abandoned by their creators.<\/p>\n The graveyard of failed Alzheimer\u2019s treatments is so vast that the renowned organic chemist Derek Lowe has built a blog on drug discovery which routinely features after-action<\/a> reports<\/a> on failed substances designed to treat the neurodegenerative disease. Simply put, to think that ChatGPT alone is enough to overcome these scientific and institutional hurdles is delusional. <\/p>\n Replies to Yao\u2019s post were quick to point out the irony here, of using ChatGPT \u2014 which is well-known for leading vulnerable users down dangerous breaks from reality \u2014 to synthesize drugs to treat cognitive diseases like Alzheimer\u2019s and schizophrenia.<\/p>\n \u201cHello schizophrenic, take this medicine that chatgpt made for you,\u201d one poster quipped<\/a> on X.<\/p>\n Another replied that<\/a> \u201cbelieving you single-handedly cured schizophrenia on a commercial laundry folding table in a garage is, ironically, a classic symptom of schizophrenia.\u201d<\/p>\n More on ChatGPT: Man Obliterated When Court Obtains His ChatGPT Transcripts<\/a><\/p>\n \t