Scientists are speeding up evolution

The process of evolution usually takes thousands, millions or even billions of years. But researchers have found a way to condense it into a matter of minutes using a method called 'directed evolution,' which allows proteins to rapidly advance. It may be used for a variety of treatments and medical advancements in the future.

Evolving evolution

Directed evolution is the "process of rapidly evolving proteins, introducing beneficial mutations and selecting advantageous variants," said Popular Mechanics. The "hyper-evolved proteins can be used in a wide variety of potential cancer and neurodegenerative therapies." While this process has been explored for years, scientists from Scripps Research Institute recently created a system called T7-ORACLE that can speed up evolution by an unprecedented 100,000 years and introduce mutations in minutes, according to a study published in the journal Science.

The method is like "giving evolution a fast-forward button," said Peter Schultz, a co-senior author of the study, in a press release. Previous systems of directed evolution often required "repeated rounds of DNA manipulation and testing with each round taking a week or more," said the release. However, T7-ORACLE circumvents these challenges by using an engineered E.coli bacterium to host a "second, artificial DNA replication system." Essentially, this method operates "separately from the cell's own machinery," and allows for the cell's original genome to remain untouched. In turn, "scientists can introduce mutations every time the cell divides (roughly every 20 minutes)."

The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

"This system represents a major advance in continuous evolution," said Christian Diercks, a co-senior author of the study, in the press release. "Instead of one round of evolution per week, you get a round each time the cell divides — so it really accelerates the process." This is also not the only directed evolution method that has been introduced of late. In May 2025, a study published in the journal Nature Communications detailed PROTein Evolution Using Selection (PROTEUS), a platform that can evolve proteins in mammalian cells.

Promising proteins

Directed evolution is not entirely new. In 2018, Frances Arnold won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for her work on it. Using Arnold's approach, scientists were able to "'breed' biomolecules, not unlike how farmers breed crops and animals," said Caltech Magazine. These new methods allow for the process to move even faster and potentially lead to further advancements.

Since directed evolution "can force these molecules to evolve in the lab within a much-shortened time scale," there are many promising applications for the technology, said The Scientist. It could be an "important tool for developing new medicines," as well as "give scientists a better understanding of how antibiotic resistance builds up over time," said Popular Mechanics. Protein evolution can also be used to switch diseases off, as well as for diagnostic purposes. And the applications are not merely medical; the technology could "lead to enzymes with helpful abilities such as breaking down the plastic in soda bottles that would otherwise persist in the environment," said Caltech Magazine. "What matters is that we can now evolve virtually any protein, like cancer drug targets and therapeutic enzymes, in days instead of months," Diercks said.