Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI) has partnered with AI company Anthropic to accelerate discoveries into genetic and childhood heart diseases.

MCRI is among four institutes in Australia who will join Anthropic’s AI for Science program under a $3 million investment, which will see researchers access its AI assistant, Claude, to answer some of the most pressing health challenges.

Our researchers will apply Claude to its stem cell medicine program to improve identification of therapeutic targets for heart disease. 

How will the AI tool help MCRI researchers improve treatments for heart disease?

The partnership builds on research led by MCRI’s Professor Enzo Porrello, which uses a world-first platform that produces human heart tissue from stem cells at scale. These lab grown tissues closely mimic key features of the human heart and enable high-throughput testing of heart function as well as responses to potential new drug compounds.

“Claude gives us a powerful way to integrate and analyse extraordinarily complex datasets more efficiently,” Professor Porrello said. “By combining functional and molecular information from human heart tissue, we can accelerate the identification of disease mechanisms and move more quickly towards therapies that could change outcomes for children with heart disease.”

Image: Professor Enzo Porrello

Removing the obstacles to diagnosing rare genetic conditions

Separately, the Centre for Population Genomics, a partnership between MCRI and the Garvan Institute of Medical Research, will use the AI tool to automate the complex genetic analysis that is currently the main bottleneck in diagnosing children with rare genetic conditions.

Anthropic Head of Life Sciences Jonah Cool said; “Increasing the rate of scientific progress is a core part of Anthropic’s public benefit mission and we have invested heavily in making Claude capable of supporting the entire scientific research process, from early discovery through to translation and commercialisation. Now, we’re investing heavily in providing access to this infrastructure to Australian researchers and startups. 

“Australian science has a history of being at the leading edge of genetics, bioinformatics, and domains where emerging AI capabilities are poised for real world impact. It’s incredibly exciting to see this expansion of our AI for Science program to accelerate fundamental and clinical discoveries.”