Research results in AI for drug discovery to be presented at the BioDataWorld West in San Francisco

Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based Big Data analytics company applying deep learning techniques to drug discovery, biomarker development and human longevity research will present and chair a panel at the BioDataWorld West, San Francisco, April 26-27. The CEO of Insilico Medicine, Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD will present new research applying generative adversarial networks (GANs) to developing new molecular structures for leads in oncology and other diseases. 

"Our team publishes high-profile and sometimes seminal research publications in the field of drug discovery and biomarker development. This year we will be presenting at over 20 forums and conferences and co-organizing the Artificial Intelligence Forum in Basel as part of the EMBO/Basel Life. However, the number and the caliber of speakers at the BioDataWorld West eclipses everything we have seen to date. The organizers conducted interviews with almost every speaker to ensure the highest standards and fit. All the big players and some of the very promising startups will be there. I highly recommend attending this conference. We were fortunate to assist the organizers with the artificial intelligence track of the conference and will be presenting and chairing the panel", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc. 

Insilico Medicine was the first company to apply deep generative adversarial networks (GANs) to generating anti-cancer drugs with given parameters and published a seminal paper in Oncotarget. The paper published in Molecular Pharmaceutics, demonstrating the applications of deep neural networks for predicting the therapeutic class of the molecule using the transcriptional response data, received the American Chemical Society Editors' Choice Award. 

The Artificial Intelligence Track was tailored according to the specifications from the senior leadership of Merck. The conference organizers agreed to offer a 15% discount to delegates attending the AI Track courtesy of Insilico Medicine. To get more information about BioData World West and access a discount only for InSilico Medicine partners, download the brochure here: https://goo.gl/YeBhed

Through its focus on aging research and drug discovery, Insilico Medicine is bringing the knowledge gap between the consumer and pharmaceutical industries and collaborates with some of the largest pharmaceutical, cosmetics and nutrition companies and academic institutions. In 2016 Insilico Medicine published several seminal proofs of concept papers demonstrating the applications of deep learning to drug discovery, biomarker development, and aging research. A study published in Aging proposed a short list of molecules with likely geroprotective effects. In a recently published article at Nature Communications, Insilico Medicine describes a tool that it uses to study the minute changes in gene expression between young and old tissues and tissues afflicted by disease. Another paper demonstrating the ability to predict the chronological age of the patient using a simple blood test, published in Aging, became the second most popular paper in the journal's history.

"BioDataWorld West Congress features over 100 speakers from across the globe. As of an international series designed to drive big data into the development of personalized medicines in the fastest way possible. We are bringing together the greatest innovators in Artificial Intelligence applied to healthcare, aging and drug development such as Google's Jeff Dean and Insilico Medicine's Alex Zhavoronkov. It is truly humbling to be working alongside these world-renowned figures. The work is inspiring, astonishing and thought provoking in equal measures", said Edward Glanville, founder and director of the BioDataWorld West Congress, part of Terrapinn conference portfolio. 

In March 2017 the company launched its first geroprotector with its exclusive partner, Life Extension: http://www.geroprotector.com .

About Insilico Medicine, Inc

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is a bioinformatics company located at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore with R&D resources in Belgium, Russia, and the UK hiring talent through hackathons and competitions. It utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. The company pursues internal drug discovery programs in cancer, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia and geroprotector discovery. Through its Pharma.AI division, the company provides advanced machine learning services to biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and skin care companies.

Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8

Benchmark database of lifespan-extending drugs announced

Finding: The majority of age-related pathways have yet to be targeted pharmacologically

Scientists from the Biogerontology Research Foundation (BGRF) and University of Liverpool have announced a landmark database of lifespan-extending drugs and compounds called DrugAge. The database has 418 compounds, curated from studies spanning 27 different model organisms including yeast, worms, flies and mice. It is the largest such database in the world at this time. Significantly, the study found that the majority of age-related pathways have not yet been targeted pharmacologically, and that the pharmacological modulation of aging has by and large focused upon a small subset of currently-known age-related pathways. This suggests that there is still plenty of scope for the discovery of new lifespan-extending and healthspan-extending compounds.

DrugAge is the latest of a number of valuable resources freely available on the Human Aging Genomic Resources (HAGR) website created and maintained by the Integrative Genomics of Ageing Group at the University of Liverpool, led by Biogerontology Research Foundation Trustee Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, in collaboration with many other scientists worldwide, including BGRF Chief Science Officer and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD. Other resources available through HAGR include GenAge (a database of age and longevity-related genes in humans and model organisms), AnAge (a database on ageing, longevity records and life-history featuring over 4000 species), GenDR (a database of genes associated with the life extending effects of dietary restriction), and LongevityMap (a database of over 2000 human genes and genetic variations associated with longevity).

"DrugAge is the latest database created by Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, a world leader in the application of advanced bioinformatics and integrated computational approaches to biogerontology and ageing research. I am confident that it will gain widespread use in the ageing research community, and represents a significant milestone along the way to the coming paradigm shift in modern healthcare away from single disease treatment and toward geroprotective multi-disease prevention," said Dmitry Kaminskiy, Managing Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

The database is freely available to the public, and is searchable according to compound name, species and effect on lifespan. The data can be presented as both tables and interactive charts. Functional enrichment analysis of the targets of the database's compounds was performed using drug-gene interaction data, which revealed a modest but statistically significant correlation between the cellular targets of the database's compounds and known age-related genes.

The database encompasses the earlier efforts published by the BGRF scientists, Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, PhD and Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD as an open resource called Geroprotectors.org. The publication is available at http://www.aging-us.com/article/100799 . 

"DrugAge represents a landmark resource for use in the biogerontology community. It is the largest database of lifespan-extending compounds compiled to date, and will surely come to be recognized as an extremely valuable resource for biogerontologists. Analysis performed using the database has already revealed interesting trends, including a modest but statistically significant overlap between lifespan-extending drugs and known age-related genes, a strong correlation between average/median lifespan changes and maximum lifespan changes, a strong correlation between the lifespan-extending effects of compounds between males and females, and perhaps most significantly that most known age-related pathways have yet to be targeted pharmacologically. More broadly, an understanding of the comparative effects of geroprotectors upon the lifespan of a variety of different model organisms is important both for basic research into the biology of ageing, demonstration of lifespan plasticity via modulation of a variety of distinct biomolecular targets as proof to regulators that healthspan extension is a viable paradigm for disease treatment and prevention, and for the eventual clinical translation of potential geroprotectors," said Franco Cortese, Deputy Director and Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

"Besides introducing the DrugAge database to the larger scientific community, this paper's overarching significance lies in the finding that the large majority of known age-related pathways have not yet been targeted pharmacologically, and that we are in a very real sense at the starting line of the search for pharmacological agents capable of extending lifespan and healthspan via the modulation of known age-related pathways. There is still very much left to learn," said Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, PhD, a Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation (BGRF) and a Principal Investigator at the University of Liverpool's Integrative Genomics of Aging Group (IGAG).

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The paper 'The DrugAge database of ageing-related drugs' has been published in the journal Aging Cell.Л

Life Extension set to introduce Ageless Cell™

Life Extension and Insilico Medicine using artificial intelligence to promote longevity. Life Extension® has partnered with Insilico Medicine to identify specific nutrient combinations that function as geroprotectors. The objective is to develop innovative ways to support healthy aging. 

Life Extension will introduce Ageless Cell™, the first supplement in its breakthrough GEROPROTECT™ line. Ageless Cell delivers unique ingredients which inhibit cellular senescence, a natural part of the aging process where cells no longer function optimally. 

"By rejuvenating near-senescent cells and encouraging the body's healthy process for dealing with senescent cells, Ageless Cell turns back the clock at the cellular level," said Michael A. Smith, M.D., senior health scientist for Life Extension.

This scientific collaboration has resulted in the identification of a geroprotector formulation consisting of four nutrients with various complementary and reinforcing properties.  "Clinical aging studies are extremely difficult, if not impossible, to perform at this time. Our collaboration with Insilico Medicine has allowed us to develop geroprotective formulations by using artificial intelligence to study very large data sets," said Andrew G. Swick, Ph.D., senior vice president of product development and scientific affairs for Life Extension. 

Scientists from Life Extension and Insilico Medicine worked together to identify a subset of four specific nutrients — myricetin, NAC, gamma tocotrienol, and EGCG — all of which modify senescence-inducing pathways, inhibiting the development of senescent cells. 

The scientists found that the four nutrients work together, but in very different ways, to beneficially influence key anti-aging pathways. Together, they combat numerous aging factors throughout the body. These compounds all modulate specific biological pathways responsible for keeping us young and healthy.  

"Combined, these ingredients promote anti-aging mechanisms at the cellular level throughout the body, acting by multiple pathways, some unique, and some overlapping," said Alex Zhavoronkov, Ph.D., CEO of Insilico Medicine. "Together, these four natural compounds represent the beginning of the future — anti-aging cocktails identified using artificial intelligence under expert human supervision," adds Zhavoronkov. 

Modern science has uncovered a variety of natural substances capable of extending healthy life span, and these agents have been called geroprotectors. 

More information and an informational video about Ageless Cell from Life Extension can be found at www.GeroProtect.net or call 1-800-540-4440.

Artificial intelligence enters the nutraceutical industry

Life Extension and Insilico Medicine to launch the first natural geroprotector combination and start a new research collaboration

 In March 2016 Insilico Medicine initiated a research collaboration with Life Extension to apply advanced bioinformatic methods and deep learning algorithms to screen for naturally occurring compounds that may slow down or even reverse the cellular and molecular mechanisms of aging. Today Life Extension (LE) launched a new line of nutraceuticals called GEROPROTECTTM, and the first product in the series called Ageless CellTM combines some of the natural compounds that were shortlisted by Insilico Medicine's algorithms and are generally recognized as safe (GRAS). 

The first research results on human biomarkers of aging and the product will be presented at the Re-Work Deep Learning in Healthcare Summit in London 28.02-01.03, 2017 , one of the popular multidisciplinary conferences focusing on the emerging area of deep learning and machine intelligence. 

"We salute Life Extension on the launch of GEROPROTECTTM: Ageless Cell, the first combination of nutraceuticals developed using our artificial intelligence algorithms. We share the common passion for extending human productive longevity and investing every quantum of our energy and resources to identify novel ways to prevent age-related decline and diseases. Partnering with Life Extension has multiple advantages. LE has spent the past 37 years educating consumers on the latest in nutritional therapies for optimal health and anti-aging and is an industry leader and a premium brand in the supplement industry. Also, LE also has a unique mail order blood test service that allows US customers to perform comprehensive blood tests to help identify potential health concerns and to track the effects of the nutraceutical products," said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc. 

"Life Extension's mission is to extend the healthy human lifespan; and as such, we are focused on identifying natural products with critical health and wellness properties," said Andrew G. Swick, PhD, senior vice president of scientific affairs, discovery research and product development for Life Extension.

Based on insights from collaborations with pharmaceutical, cosmetics and food companies, Insilico Medicine develops nutraceutical products and multi-modal biomarkers of aging and health status using blood biochemistry, transcriptomic data and medical imaging. In 2016 Insilico Medicine published several seminal proof of concept papers demonstrating the applications of deep learning to drug discovery, biomarker development, and aging research. A study published in Aging proposed a short list of molecules with likely geroprotective effects. In a recently published article at Nature Communications, Insilico Medicine describes a tool that it uses to study the minute changes in gene expression between young and old tissues and tissues afflicted by disease. Another paper demonstrating the ability to predict the chronological age of the patient using a simple blood test, published in Aging, became the second most popular paper in the journal's history.

Insilico Medicine was the first company to apply deep generative adversarial networks (GANs) to generating anti-cancer drugs with given parameters and published a seminal paper in Oncotarget. The paper published in Molecular Pharmaceutics, demonstrating the applications of deep neural networks for predicting the therapeutic class of the molecule using the transcriptional response data, received the American Chemical Society Editors' Choice Award. "Most of our collaborations are among the largest pharmaceutical, cosmetics and regenerative medicine companies, universities and hospital networks, but we treasure this exclusive partnership with Life Extension. We hope that it will be possible to discover effective and safe molecules using in silico methods and subsequently confirm their effectiveness by using real world data in a matter of months. This will increase confidence in the AI methods and make the entire industry more productive," said Alex Aliper, president of European operations, Insilico Medicine, Inc. 

"Our collaboration with Insilico Medicine fostered a novel approach to formulating anti-aging supplements utilizing artificial intelligence and sophisticated biologically-inspired algorithms and resulted in the very first AI formulated supplement," Swick said.

The global nutraceuticals market was valued at US$165.62 billion in 2014 by Transparency Market Research and is expected to reach US$278.96 billion by 2021. However, multiple studies published in peer-reviewed journals concluded that many of these supplements are not effective in preventing disease. Another critical challenge in biomedical research is the difficulty translating results from animal experiments into humans. Approximately 95% of cancer drugs fail in human clinical trials after successful results in animal studies. The research partnership between Life Extension and Insilico Medicine aims to reduce the number of unnecessary dietary supplements to a short list of products that are most likely to work in humans. 

Scientists at Insilico Medicine have built databases that track results in biomedical research and identify promising compounds implicated in aging and longevity. These databases are later screened using proprietary bioinformatics tools based on deep learning techniques to prioritize the molecules that may be safe and effective in humans. 

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Videos providing a simple explanation of this research collaboration: 

Ageless Cell Research Partnership Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bNOxQy_gEu8

Geroprotector Research Partnership Video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rI8T5WAD3sM

About Insilico Medicine, Inc

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is a bioinformatics company located at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore with R&D resources in Belgium, Russia, and the UK hiring talent through hackathons and competitions. It utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. The company pursues internal drug discovery programs in cancer, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia and geroprotector discovery. Through its Pharma.AI division, the company provides advanced machine learning services to biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and skin care companies. Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8