Researchers at the University of Missouri are applying a form of artificial intelligence (AI) -; previously used to analyze how National Basketball Association (NBA) players move their bodies -; to now help scientists develop new drug therapies for medical treatments targeting cancers and other diseases.

The type of AI, called a graph neural network, can help scientists with speeding up the time it takes to sift through large amounts of data generated by studying protein dynamics. This approach can provide new ways to identify target sites on proteins for drugs to work effectively, said Dong Xu, a Curators' Distinguished Professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the MU College of Engineering and one of the study's authors.

Xu said they can also simulate how proteins can change in relation to different conditions, such as the development of cancer, and then use that information to infer their relationships with other bodily functions.

"With machine learning we can really study what are the important interactions within different areas of the protein structure," Xu said. "Our method provides a systematic review of the data involved when studying proteins, as well as a protein's energy state, which could help when identifying any possible mutation's effect. This is important because protein mutations can enhance the possibility of cancers and other diseases developing in the body."