What’s AI-based drug discovery?

Imagine if we could invent the vaccines of tomorrow faster, better, and for cheaper. Well, this is not a dream but a reality with artificial intelligence (AI) based drug discovery. Traditionally, it takes more than a decade and about $1 billion dollars for a new drug to leave the lab and get onto your prescription pad. It’s costly and time-consuming. Currently, scientists look for protein targets and test the molecules in the lab to see how they will attach. The forthcoming clinical trials often result in failures as several of these drugs have unintended toxicity in the human body. That’s why using AI for early screening of potential drug candidates is becoming so popular. Leading biotech pharma companies (e.g. Pfizer, AstraZeneca, Amgen) are partnering with AI drug discovery platforms that can better predict the outcome of the drugs at the start of the pipeline. With the ability to automate the process of finding new molecules that will bind with a protein to address diseases to mining the entire human genome for a full understanding of human biology, the future of medicine discovery is at the heart of AI.