Measuring frontier AI in synthetic biology
Cambridge, MA
Joined February 2026
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You can read more here:
📝arXiv preprint: arxiv.org/abs/2602.16703
📔Blog post: activesite.substack.com/p/rc…
🔮Predictions from @Research_FRI: forecastingresearch.substack…
We ran a randomized controlled trial to see if LLMs can help novices perform molecular biology in a wet-lab.
The results: LLMs may help in some aspects, but we found no significant increase at the core tasks end-to-end. That's lower than what experts predicted.
Our findings 🧵
Shout out to @ShenZhouHong, @alexjkleinman, @alymathiowetz, @adamhowes, @xave_rg, @lucafrighetti, Joe Torres, Julian Cohen, Suveer Ganta, Deepika Pahari, Alex Letizia
Thank you @fmf_org , @ClaireQureshi, and @PackardFdn for supporting our work and to our advisory board.
Importantly: this is a snapshot of mid-2025 novice and LLM performance.
Results could change as new LLMs become more capable, easier to use in the lab, and as average elicitation skill improves.
As models evolve, we aim to continue tracking how people use frontier AI in biology
We're actively hiring for scientists and operators!
We especially want to find a Head of Ops to help build an engine to repeat this study regularly and develop entirely new ones.
jobs.ashbyhq.com/activesite
