Chemical and biomolecular engineering professor Huimin Zhao has been invited to speak at the first Midwest AI for Molecular Design Symposium, which will take place November 10-11, 2026, on the Promega campus in Madison, Wisc. The two-day invitational event will welcome biologists, chemists and computational scientists from midwestern university and biotechnology companies to focus on AI-driven protein and small molecule design.
The symposium aims to foster collaboration and shared expertise among regional researchers working with machine learning, generative models, and structure prediction.
“The symposium is an important step towards a lasting Midwest community around molecular design,” says Thomas Kirkland, Sr Research Scientist, Promega Corporation. “This region has strong protein and small molecule design groups, and we’re bringing them into one room for open discussions and collaboration.”
The agenda includes speakers from seven universities, as well as five companies and national laboratories. Session topics include using AI to search for new medicines, laboratory testing of AI tools that design new proteins, and comparisons of computer models that predict how molecules interact.