OpenFold and the Future of Open Foundation Models for Biomolecular Modeling

Recent advances in foundation models have begun to reshape what is possible in structural biology and molecular design. In this joint presentation, Woody Sherman and Mohammed AlQuraishi will discuss the scientific vision, organizational model, and technical foundations behind the OpenFold Consortium and OpenFold3. Woody Sherman will introduce the OpenFold Consortium, an open-science effort created to accelerate the development of transparent, extensible, and high-impact AI models for biomolecular research. He will discuss the motivation for building an open ecosystem around next-generation structure and interaction prediction, the importance of community, infrastructure, and funding, and the role of open models in enabling broader innovation across academia, biotech, and pharma. Mohammed AlQuraishi will then present the OpenFold3 foundation model, including its architecture, training strategy, and capabilities for modeling proteins and their interactions with biologically relevant partners. He will discuss how foundation models are evolving beyond static structure prediction toward richer representations of molecular recognition and biological function, as well as the opportunities and remaining challenges in building open, generalizable models for biomolecular systems. Together, they will provide both a strategic and technical perspective on the emerging landscape of open foundation models for biology, and on how these models may help define the next era of AI for drug discovery.

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