Engineer AI Creates Homemade mRNA Vaccine to Save Dog, Sparks Heated Discussion: Tumor Shrinks But Not Yet Cured, Regulatory Bottleneck Becomes Focus

According to CoinWorld, based on monitoring by 1M AI News, Sydney-based machine learning engineer Paul Conyngham used ChatGPT and DeepMind’s AlphaFold to self-learn mRNA vaccine design, creating a custom vaccine for Rosie, a rescue dog with mast cell cancer. He collaborated with the University of New South Wales (UNSW) RNA Research Institute to complete the vaccine design and administered the injection at the University of Queensland Gatton Veterinary School. After the injection, Rosie’s tumor significantly shrank, and veterinarian Professor Paola Allavena said, “The tumor has shrunk by about half.” This story has recently been widely circulated on social media as “AI cures dog’s cancer.” However, according to the original report from UNSW, Rosie’s cancer is still progressing (“Rosie’s cancer is progressing”), and a cure is still a long way off. Biomedical engineer Patrick Heizer pointed out on X that manufacturing a single mRNA vaccine is “trivially easy” technically, but the real challenge and expense lie in proving the vaccine’s safety and efficacy through randomized controlled trials, which has not yet been achieved. Conyngham also noted that the biggest obstacle in the process was not vaccine design but ethical approval: he spent three months, working two hours every night, drafting a 100-page ethics approval document, which he said was “more difficult than making the vaccine.” Biological author Ruxandra Teslo cited a similar experience from GitLab co-founder Sid Sijbrandij (who self-funded experimental therapies after osteosarcoma relapse and has not relapsed since 2025), believing that regulatory bureaucrats in early clinical trials are the core bottleneck hindering the implementation of personalized medicine.