New study shows that modern AI systems don’t just process information, they systematically “judge” people in ways that resemble human trust, but with important differences. Like humans, they favor competence and integrity, yet they do so in a more rigid, rule-based, and often more extreme way. Crucially, their judgments can also be more consistently biased across demographic traits and vary significantly between models. The bottom line: AI can mimic the structure of human judgment, but it does not think like humans, and that gap matters when these systems are used to make real decisions about people.

With financial support from the Gates Foundation, researchers at the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology (MIB) have used engineering biology – an emerging technology that uses nature’s own processes to manufacture everyday chemicals and materials – to dramatically simplify how Lenacapavir is manufactured. A novel class of HIV antiretroviral drug, Lenacapavir offers long‑acting protection against HIV transmission.