Science s COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Heising-Simons Foundation
ILLUSTRATION: STEPHAN SCHMITZ/FOLIO ART
In March 2020, as the scope of the COVID-19 pandemic was coming into view, Jen Nwankwo and colleagues turned a pair of artificial intelligence (AI) tools against SARS-CoV-2. One newly developed AI program, called SUEDE, digitally screens all known druglike compounds for likely activity against biomolecules thought to be involved in disease. The other, BAGEL, predicts how to build inhibitors to known targets. The two programs searched for compounds able to block human enzymes that play essential roles in enabling the virus to infect our cells.
While SUEDE sifted through 14 billion compounds in just hours and spit out a hit, BAGEL made equally fast work of designing a lead. Nwankwo, CEO of a Massachusetts biotech startup called 1910 Genetics, asked a chemical company partner to synthesize the compounds. A week or so later, her team received the orders, added each compou
Science’s COVID-19 reporting is supported by the Heising-Simons Foundation.
In March 2020, as the scope of the COVID-19 pandemic was coming into view, Jen Nwankwo and colleagues turned a pair of artificial intelligence (AI) tools against SARS-CoV-2. One newly developed AI program, called SUEDE, digitally screens all known druglike compounds for likely activity against biomolecules thought to be involved in disease. The other, BAGEL, predicts how to build inhibitors to known targets. The two programs searched for compounds able to block human enzymes that play essential roles in enabling the virus to infect our cells.
While SUEDE sifted through 14 billion compounds in just hours and spit out a hit, BAGEL made equally fast work of designing a lead. Nwankwo, CEO of a Massachusetts biotech startup called 1910 Genetics, asked a chemical company partner to synthesize the compounds. A week or so later, her team received the orders, added each compound in turn to human cells, and learned
New Tool Could Advance Precision Medicine for Incurable Diseases healthitanalytics.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from healthitanalytics.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Novel RNA Drug Discovery Tool Overcomes Undruggable Targets
Christoph Burgstedt / iStock / Getty Images Plus
December 16, 2020
Share
Despite the scientific advancements made in creating medicines that can target and treat diseases, researchers still face the challenge of targeting “undruggable” targets. Most drugs target proteins to treat diseases, however, there are some proteins that conventional drugs cannot access for reasons such as a protein molecule’s shape or how it folds. There have been many strategies and tools developed to overcome these challenges such as targeting RNA. RNAs have not been viewed as drug targets as of recent due to their short-lived existence, changeable shape, and limited array of building blocks. Now, researchers at Scripps Research report they have developed a new RNA drug discovery tool that allows rapid drug discovery and optimization of RNA-targeting compounds.
E-Mail
IMAGE: Scripps Research Chemist Matthew Disney, PhD, and graduate student Blessy Suresh in their Jupiter, Florida lab. view more
Credit: Scripps Research
JUPITER, Fla. Dec. 14, 2020 Imagine trying to throw a bullseye when the dartboard lies buried within a crumpled box. That s the challenge faced by scientists working to make new medicines for some undruggable diseases, including a type of metastatic breast cancer.
Scientists refer to diseases as undruggable when their targets lie on a protein molecule that folds inward, or in a way that shields the active site from would-be treatments.
Addressing this problem of undruggable proteins, a team of Scripps Research scientists has invented a tool that bypasses the awkward proteins completely, and instead modifies elements involved in their construction and regulation. This new tool, called Chem-CLIP-Fragment Mapping, focuses on RNA, molecules that read genes and help build proteins, among other duties.