Why does one need the genetic databases to run Alphafold?

[remybonnav]

I don't understand why we need the genetic databases to run an inference.

The model is already trained so one should just need the model right?

[morou34]

Well technically you are correct but alphafold is a bit different; genetic databases are used during inference for reasons such as providing reference sequences for comparison, enriching the analysis with additional context, or ensuring the predictions are grounded in the most up-to-date genetic information. there is more to it here is an blog post if you want to learn more: AF2