AlphaFold is a deep learning system developed by DeepMind that predicts 3D protein structures from amino acid sequences. Before AlphaFold (2020), predicting structure required expensive, time-consuming experimental methods (X-ray crystallography, cryo-EM). AlphaFold automates this, providing accurate predictions in minutes. AlphaFold2 (improved version) has been validated against tens of thousands of experimentally determined structures and is now standard in structural biology and drug discovery workflows.