Dr Philip Ball (prolific author of popular science books and former editor at Nature) has published three new articles across Quanta, Chemistry World and Nature on topics spanning artificial intelligence, genome structure and synthetic biology.
In Quanta, Dr Ball discusses how the physical organisation and complexity of the human genome may limit the extent to which artificial intelligence can fully interpret genomic information, even as computational approaches to biology continue to advance. The article examines the challenges posed by the genome's three-dimensional structure and regulatory complexity for machine learning approaches to genomics.
In Chemistry World, he explores scientific and ethical questions surrounding the concept of 'mirror life', referring to hypothetical organisms built from mirror-image biological molecules. The article outlines current scientific thinking on whether such systems could be feasible and what implications they might have for biology and safety.
In Nature, Dr Ball contributes to a piece published in the journal's news and analysis section, exploring how 'buffering' proteins such as HSP90 mask the effects of harmful mutations, influencing disease risk, cancer development and evolutionary change.
Dr Ball will be chairing at the Progress Educational Trust (PET) Annual Conference again this year.