Developing AI-driven TCM drug discovery platform for neurodegenerative diseases
Neurodegenerative diseases, with high prevalence and limited treatment options, impose substantial economic, caregiving, and psychological burdens on individuals and healthcare systems, and represent a growing global health challenge. Conventional drug discovery approaches are often hampered by low efficiency, high costs, and limited success rates, which hinders the timely development of new therapies. This underscores the urgent need for innovative methods that can accelerate drug discovery, reduce costs, and improve patient outcomes.
Sponsored by
Sponsored by
The AI-driven drug discovery platform (DeepDD) (https://deepdrugdiscovery.mindrank.ai/)
Recent advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) are transforming pharmaceutical research, offering unprecedented opportunities to accelerate drug discovery. Recognising this potential, Jiahong Lu, associate professor and deputy director of the Institute of Chinese Medical Sciences at the University of Macau (UM), led a research team in pioneering an innovative, AI-driven drug discovery platform. This project was undertaken in collaboration with researchers at the University of Oslo in Norway and Hangzhou MindRank Technology Co Ltd. The platform combines the power of AI with rigorous cross-species validation to identify promising Chinese medicine compounds for intervention in Alzheimer’s disease. The research, titled ‘Amelioration of Alzheimer’s disease pathology by mitophagy inducers identified via machine learning and a cross-species workflow’, was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering (2022).
Building on their initial success, Prof Lu’s research team, together with scientists at Hangzhou MindRank Technology Co Ltd., has unveiled DeepDD, the second generation of their AI-driven drug discovery platform. Using advanced algorithms and computational models, DeepDD achieves a remarkably high predictive success rate. It boasts a library of over one million Chinese medicine and natural compounds and has robust capabilities in predicting pharmacokinetics—a crucial factor in drug development. The platform offers three transformative features: 1) context-aware compound screening, 2) integrated ADMET (absorption, distribution, metabolism, excretion, and toxicity) profiling, and 3) multi-parametric optimisation. To support broader research and development, the team has made the DeepDD platform open source and accessible at https://deepdrugdiscovery.mindrank.ai/. This empowers global researchers to identify potential blood-brain barrier-penetrant neuroprotective agents using their own customised reference compounds, thereby fostering collaborative innovation in the field. Representing a deep integration of Chinese medicine knowledge and cutting-edge AI technology, the DeepDD platform holds considerable promise for accelerating the discovery of effective treatments for neurodegenerative diseases.
The framework of AI-driven drug discovery platform
Prof Lu and his research team have pioneered a new approach to tackling neurodegenerative diseases, accelerating their research into Alzheimer’s disease treatments. Their open-source drug screening platform also enables scholars and researchers worldwide to advance biomedical research. Their efforts offer a promising pathway towards effective therapies and an improved quality of life for millions of patients worldwide. Looking ahead, the team will continue integrating advanced AI tools into their research to speed up the development of innovative treatments for neurodegenerative diseases even further.
Prof Jiahong Lu