Institut Pasteur puts AI at the center of biology research

The Pasteur AI initiative, launched in late 2025, is intended to make AI a core driver of biology research at the Institut Pasteur. The effort combines recruitment, team upskilling, stronger data governance and partnerships with PR[AI]RIE, Université Paris Cité, Inria and EMBL/EBI, while building an AI-ready data ecosystem for responsible scientific use.

Researchers are applying AI to model pathogens, predict bacterial phenotypes, generate protein sequences and search biological knowledge bases. The Ágnes project aims to create a digital twin of bacteria, while scPRINT, trained on over 50 million human and animal cells, has been used to identify markers in precancerous prostate tissue. Other work uses AI to follow cell trajectories and simulate how foreign DNA behaves inside a host cell nucleus.

The institute is also investing in infrastructure, education and translation. Its computing resources include roughly 10,000 CPU cores and 100 GPU, along with 20,000 terabytes of storage capacity. Since 2024, PhD students have had access to a 2.5-day AI theory course, while Enodia Therapeutics uses machine learning to guide small-molecule design after raising €20.7 million in late 2025.