DeepMind's AlphaFold cracks the 50-year mystery of the protein behind 'bad cholesterol'

9:00 AM · July 14, 2026

Researchers have used Google DeepMind's AlphaFold to finally map the structure of apoB100, the protein that gives LDL ('bad cholesterol') particles their form, according to a DeepMind blog post detailing the collaboration. The protein had resisted structural mapping for roughly 50 years, partly because of its unusually large size for a protein and partly because of the complicated way it binds to fats and other molecules. At the University of Missouri, biochemist Berndsen first used cryo-electron microscopy to capture images of LDL particles, but the resulting images weren't sharp enough to resolve apoB100's structure with atomic precision on their own. His physicist collaborator, Cassidy, then turned to AlphaFold to fill in the gaps and produce a complete, atomic-level model. The resulting blueprint gives pharmaceutical researchers the detail they need to design new preventative heart therapies targeting the protein directly, rather than only managing cholesterol levels indirectly as most current treatments do. Heart disease driven by LDL cholesterol buildup remains the world's leading cause of death, making a structural target of this kind — previously invisible to researchers for half a century — a meaningful opening for a new generation of drug design.