Generative AI excels at tackling complex problems that are difficult for humans or conventional computational methods to solve. “The study here goes beyond proteins and asks whether generative AI can design entire functional genomes—the blueprints for life. Generative AI could reduce this dependence on natural discovery and generate useful properties that might be rare or absent in nature. “Overall this work shows that generative AI is a very powerful tool for creating new variants of bacteriophages as antibacterial therapeutics. Conflict of interest statement: “No conflicts of interest; I do not work on phage therapy and do not know the authors.”