Anesthesia is one of the greatest medical advances in history, but it still comes with serious risks. Today, it requires highly trained (and expensive) specialists to administer, limiting access to care and making procedures riskier than they need to be.

At the UCSF Schools of Pharmacy and Medicine, researchers Jason Sello, PhD, Jarret Weinrich, PhD, and Matthew McCarroll PhD, are working to change that. Using AI and high-throughput screening, they’re testing tens of thousands of compounds to develop a new generation of anesthetics that are significantly safer and more stable. Their goal? Create drugs with a much higher therapeutic index — meaning a wider safety margin between the dose that works and the dose that’s dangerous. This research, supported in part by a $25 million Department of Defense grant and which also includes UCSF School of Pharmacy professor Brian Shoichet, PhD, could have significant real-world impact. Safer anesthetics could one day allow trained nurses or other medical professionals to administer them outside of traditional operating rooms, helping to address the growing shortage of anesthesiologists and expanding access to procedures like colonoscopies and minor surgeries.

In this video, we explore how UCSF scientists are combining cutting-edge technology with innovative screening methods (including using zebrafish) to reinvent one of medicine’s most essential tools.