According to their own information, the companies Biontech and Instadeep have developed an early warning system for the detection of potential Sars-CoV-2 high-risk variants.
The early detection of such virus variants could "be an effective tool to warn researchers, vaccine developers, health authorities and political decision-makers in a timely manner," said Biontech co-founder Ugur Sahin on Tuesday in Mainz.
This would give more time for appropriate measures against questionable new virus variants.
With the method developed by Biontech and Instadeep, the sequence information of the so-called spike protein should be analyzed and new variants classified.
With the spike protein, a spike-like structure on the surface of the Sars-Cov-2 pathogen, the coronavirus attaches itself to human cells and then penetrates them.
Currently, more than ten thousand new sequence variants are discovered every week, which experts can hardly handle.
"For the first time, high-risk variants can be identified on the spot, which can save months of valuable time," said Karim Beguir, co-founder and CEO of Instadeep.
The company specializes in machine intelligence research.
The new calculation method developed by the two companies analyzes sequencing data available worldwide and predicts high-risk variants of Sars-CoV-2.
The early warning system combines structural modeling of spike proteins with artificial intelligence in order to detect high-risk variants in less than a day and then monitor them.
According to the company, the system identified an average of more than 90 percent of the variants declared by the World Health Organization two months before their official designation during the test period.
It is based, for example, on data on the ability of known variants to bypass the immune system.
The findings were uploaded to a so-called preprint server.
This means that they have not yet been checked by colleagues.