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13.03.2024 15:43, Gennady Detinich
Hong Kong company Insilico Medicine reportedthat the drug developed with its help for the treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (ILF) became the world’s first drug created with the help of artificial intelligence, approved for clinical trials. The drug is being tested on 60 patients in clinics in the USA and China. Its development took only 18 months, whereas such work usually requires many years of work.
Image source: Insilico Medicine
IPF disease literally takes the lives of older patients, and its nature is still unknown. If the disease develops, patients experience pulmonary failure and die. The company Insilico Medicine, created in 2012 in Hong Kong by scientist-entrepreneur Alexander Alexandrovich Zhavoronkovfrom the very beginning began to practice the use of generative artificial intelligence models for the synthesis of molecules according to given criteria.
Recently, an article by Zhavoronkov was published in the journal Nature Biotechnology, in which he literally said the following: “This job [поиск мишени и её ингибитора] was completed in approximately 18 months from target discovery to preclinical candidate advancement and demonstrates the capabilities of our AI-driven generative drug discovery system.”
To begin with, the researchers, using their own AI platform, trained an algorithm to identify targets responsible for destructive processes in the lungs. For this purpose, publicly available data and publications on fibrosis were used. This disease causes tissue to thicken or scar, which can reduce the elasticity of organs and the lungs in particular. Fibrosis is closely associated with the aging process, which results in chronic inflammation, often leading to death.
Using predictive analytics, the TNIK protein was identified, which became the main antifibrotic target. The researchers then used a generative chemistry algorithm to create about 80 candidate molecules. Among them, the optimal inhibitor was found, called INS018_055. This medicine has been approved for phase 2 clinical trials of all new drugs. In clinics in the USA and China, the drug and its pharmacological properties are being tested on 60 patients.
The development of new drugs using artificial intelligence can be significantly accelerated in the initial stages of research work. But at the clinical trial stage, work cannot be accelerated. It will be a long time before even AI-generated drugs are available for widespread use.
2024-03-13 12:43:00
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