Unsolved: Medicine¶
| Problem | Status | Difficulty |
|---|---|---|
| Cure all cancers | Active progress | Very hard |
| Cure HIV | Active progress | Hard |
| A universal flu vaccine | Active progress | Hard |
| Reverse aging | Early research | Very hard |
| Regrow organs | Early research | Very hard |
| Lab-grown organs | Active progress | Hard |
| Prevent dementia | Early research | Very hard |
| Beat antibiotic resistance | Early research | Very hard |
| Personalized medicine for all | Active progress | Hard |
| Safe gene editing | Active progress | Hard |
| Prevent the next pandemic | Active progress | Very hard |
Cure all cancers¶
Status: Active progress · Difficulty: Very hard
Cancer is not one disease but hundreds, and it touches nearly every family.
Current approaches: immunotherapy, which trains the immune system and has already cured some previously terminal blood cancers with CAR-T cells, personalized mRNA cancer vaccines now in trials, early detection through blood tests, and targeted drugs.
Why it's still open: cancer evolves and resists treatment, solid tumours hide from the immune system, and what cures one cancer often does nothing for another.
Latest: personalized mRNA vaccines showed strong results against melanoma and pancreatic cancer in trials in 2023 and 2024.
Timeline: cure is the wrong word. Cancer is slowly becoming a managed disease, one type at a time, over the coming decades.
Reverse aging¶
Status: Early research · Difficulty: Very hard · grand challenge #6
Aging is the single biggest risk factor for cancer, dementia and heart disease. Slow it and you delay all of them at once.
Current approaches: cellular reprogramming, which has rejuvenated cells and even restored sight in mice, drugs that clear worn-out "zombie" cells, and work targeting the underlying mechanisms of aging.
Why it's still open: push reprogramming too far and cells turn cancerous, and human trials are slow because the outcome you care about takes decades to measure.
Timeline: extending healthy years is plausible in the 2030s or 2040s. Dramatic lifespan extension is still speculative.
Related: regrow organs, longevity beyond 120 on the future humanity page.
Beat antibiotic resistance¶
Status: Early research · Difficulty: Very hard
Resistant bacteria could kill around 10 million people a year by 2050 and make routine surgery and chemotherapy dangerous again. It is a slow-motion pandemic.
Current approaches: new classes of antibiotics, including candidates found by AI such as halicin, viruses that eat bacteria, and better stewardship to slow resistance.
Why it's still open: antibiotics are barely profitable because they are used briefly then shelved, so the pipeline is almost empty, and evolution eventually beats every drug.
Latest: machine learning turned up structurally new antibiotics in 2023 and 2024, after decades with almost no new classes.