Buck Institute Emphasizes Importance of Artificial Intelligence with New Appointment

Buck Institute appoints Alex Zhavoronkov as Adjunct Professor in artificial intelligence for aging research

Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based company specializing in artificial intelligence for drug discovery, biomarker development and aging research, announces the appointment of its founder and CEO, Dr. Alex Zhavoronkov, to the faculty of the Buck Institute for Research on Aging as an adjunct professor. 

Recent advances in modern artificial intelligence demonstrated promising results in both biomarker development and drug discovery and the leading academic and research institutions are expanding their AI groups. The Buck Institute is the leading research institution with massive amounts of biological data coming from high-throughput experiments and with the unique multidisciplinary expertise in aging research. Alex Zhavoronkov works on the intersection of the next-generation of artificial intelligence and aging research and will help support the AI efforts at the Buck. 

  

“We are incredibly excited about the potential of AI to accelerate aging research,” said Dr. Eric Verdin, President and CEO of the Buck Institute. “The Buck has been at the forefront of asking the most important questions in the field. Now, with the latest in bioinformatics and artificial intelligence, and with the involvement of world-class experts like Dr. Zhavoronkov, we will finally have the tools to answer them. Fully utilizing these powerful technologies, we will dramatically increase our understanding of how aging works, and what we can do about it.” 
  
Dr. Zhavoronkov is the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based leader in the next-generation artificial intelligence for drug discovery, biomarker development, and aging research. At Insilico he pioneered the application of generative adversarial networks and reinforcement learning techniques for generating novel molecular structures with desired properties. His group developed and published the first deep-learned multi-modal predictors of age. At Insilico he set up R&D centers in 6 countries including Korea, Russia, Hong Kong and Taiwan and launched multiple biomarker initiatives including Young.AI and Longenesis. Prior to founding Insilico Medicine, he worked in senior roles at ATI Technologies (acquired by AMD in 2006), NeuroG Neuroinformatics, the Biogerontology Research Foundation, YLabs.AI and established AgeNet.net competitions and the diversity.AI initiative. 
  
Since 2012 he has published over 90 peer-reviewed research papers in the various areas of artificial intelligence, bioinformatics and aging research and several books including “The Ageless Generation: How Biomedical Advances Will Transform the Global Economy” (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013).  He is also the co-organizer of the Annual Aging Research for Drug Discovery Forum and the Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain for Healthcare Forum at EMBO/Basel Life in Basel, one of Europe's largest industry events in drug discovery. Dr. Zhavoronkov holds two bachelor degrees from Queen’s University, a master’s in Biotechnology from Johns Hopkins University, and a PhD in Physics and Mathematics from Moscow State University, and is an adjunct professor at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. 
  
“If I were to name the most productive center on the planet doing credible and cutting-edge research in aging, without doubt this would be The Buck Institute. It is a home for the leading scientists in the field and everything from equipment to architecture to management is of the highest quality. It is a great honor for me to be joining this venerated institution as an adjunct professor at the time when the field of artificial intelligence is bearing the first fruits in aging research. I look forward to effectively contributing to the AI initiatives at the Buck”, said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine and the CSO of the Biogerontology Research Foundation in the UK.   
  
About the Buck Institute for Research on Aging 
At the Buck, we aim to end the threat of age-related diseases for this and future generations. We bring together the most capable and passionate scientists from a broad range of disciplines to study mechanisms of aging and to identify therapeutics that slow down aging. Our goal is to increase human health span, or the healthy years of life. Located just north of San Francisco, we are globally recognized as the pioneer and leader in efforts to target aging, the number one risk factor for serious diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, cancer, macular degeneration, heart disease, and diabetes. The Buck wants to help people live better longer. Our success will ultimately change healthcare. Learn more at: https://buckinstitute.org 
  
About Insilico Medicine, Inc 
Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence company headquartered at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D and management resources in Belgium, Russia, UK, Taiwan, and Korea sourced through hackathons and competitions. 
The company utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. Insilico pioneered the applications of the generative adversarial networks (GANs) and reinforcement learning for generation of novel molecular structures for the diseases with a known target and with no known targets. In addition to working collaborations with the large pharmaceutical companies, the company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, dermatological diseases, fibrosis, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and aging. Through a partnership with LifeExtension.com the company launched a range of nutraceutical products compounded using the advanced bioinformatics techniques and deep learning approaches. It also provides a range of consumer-facing applications including Young.AI and Aging.AI and operates Chemistry.AI intended to capture the tacit knowledge of medicinal chemists. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of the Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact. In 2018, the company was named one of the global top 100 AI companies by CB Insights. Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8

Insilico to present the latest developments in AI for healthcare to advance medical research

Tuesday, February 27, 2018, Baltimore, MD - Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based next-generation artificial intelligence company specializing in the application of deep learning for drug discovery, biomarker development and aging research, announces the lecture of its founder and CEO, Dr. Alex Zhavoronkov, at the HIMSS18 Conference, 7 March, 2018, organized by Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS).

Insilico Medicine is regularly publishing research papers in peer-reviewed journals. It is the first company applied deep generative adversarial networks (GANs) to the generation of new molecular structures with specified parameters and published seminal papers in Oncotarget and Molecular Pharmaceutics. Another paper published in Molecular Pharmaceutics in 2016 and demonstrated the proof of concept of the application 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. One of the recent papers published in November 2017 described the application of the next-generation AI and blockchain technologies to return the control over personal data back to the individual. One of the latest paper published in the Journals of Gerontologydemonstrated the application of the deep neural networks to assessing the biological age of the patients. The most recent paper published in the Oncotarget journal presented the roadmap to enhancing radioresistance for space exploration and colonization.

Dr. Zhavoronkov's session "The convergence of healthcare's emerging tech alphabet soup with blockchain" will focus on the latest advances in Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Machine Learning, and Virtual/Augmented reality making healthcare better for patients. The lecture will cover the development of robust AI-driven systems that enhance patient care and advance medical and clinical research.

"There are hundreds of projects in blockchain for healthcare and, unfortunately, many of them are using the hype cycle to fundraise instead of developing the technology. The IEEE session at the HIMSS is intended to discuss a set of standards and the possible interoperability between many systems. I am also delighted to present several models for putting the life data on blockchain and the importance of developing AI to avoid human intervention", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc.

The 2018 HIMSS Conference gathers over 45,000 professionals from around the world during the five-day program dedicated to education, innovation, and collaboration to accelerate the advances in healthcare. HIMSS is a worldwide provider of thought leadership, community building, professional development, public policy, and events in the healthcare industry. Globally, the company's lead endeavors optimize health engagements and care outcomes through information and technology.

###

For further information, images or interviews, please contact:

Contact: Qingsong Zhu, PhD 
zhu@pharma.ai 
Website: http://www.Insilico.com

Official Conference Website: http://www.himssconference.org

About Insilico Medicine, Inc

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence company headquartered at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D and management resources in Belgium, Russia, UK, Taiwan, and Korea sourced through hackathons and competitions. 

The company utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. Insilico pioneered the applications of the generative adversarial networks (GANs) and reinforcement learning for generation of novel molecular structures for the diseases with a known target and with no known targets. In addition to working collaborations with the large pharmaceutical companies, the company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, dermatological diseases, fibrosis, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and aging. Through a partnership with LifeExtension.com the company launched a range of nutraceutical products compounded using the advanced bioinformatics techniques and deep learning approaches. It also provides a range of consumer-facing applications including Young.AI and Aging.AI and operates Chemistry.AI intended to capture the tacit knowledge of medicinal chemists. 

Through a partnership with the BitFury Group, the company is working on a range of AI solutions for blockchain to help return the power over life data back to the individual. The company raised venture capital and partnered with Juvenescence Limited, a holding company focused on longevity biotechnology. The company aspires to become the "Bell Labs" for artificial intelligence and associated technologies for healthcare and longevity biotechnology and commercialize its research by forming subsidiaries around the specific technologies and licensing the intellectual property, molecules and data to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of the Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact. In 2018, the company was named one of the global top 100 AI companies by CB Insights. Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8

International team publishes roadmap to enhance radioresistance for space colonization

An international team of scientists from NASA, Health Canada, Canadian Nuclear Laboratories and more publish roadmap to enhancing radioresistance for space exporation and colonization

An international team of researchers from NASA Ames Research Center, Environmental and Radiation Health Sciences Directorate at Health Canada, Oxford University, Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, Belgian Nuclear Research Centre, Insilico Medicine, the Biogerontology Research Center, Boston University, Johns Hopkins University, University of Lethbridge, Ghent University, Center for Healthy Aging and many others have published a roadmap toward enhancing human radioresistance for space exploration and colonization in the peer-reviewed journal Oncotarget.

"Our recent manuscript provides a comprehensive review of radioresistance for space radiation. Currently there is minimal research being done for radioresistance against HZE irradiation. The importance of these types of studies will be to reduce the associated health risks for long-term space exploration and allow for the development of potential countermeasures against space radiation. In addition, the synergy between understanding aging with radioresistance will allow for further benefits for humans in long-term space missions and allow for reduced health risk. This review sets the stage for the potential research the scientific community can do to allow for safe long term space exploration" said Afshin Beheshti, an author of the paper and a Bioinformatician at NASA Ames Research Center.

The roadmap highlights the need to converge and accelerate research in radiobiology, biogerontology and AI to enable spacefarers to address both the healthcare challenges that we are already aware of, as well as those that we are not.

"Sooner or later we'll have to do it - leave Earth and wander into deep space. Such travel, taking one or more years outside the Earth's magnetosphere, would take a high toll on astronauts' health due to exposure to cosmic radiation. So it's better to start thinking now about how we are going to cope with that challenge. Luckily, current knowledge from such fields as radiobiology, aging research and biotechnology in general, with the wealth of recent advances in gene editing and regenerative medicine, allow for the drafting of conceptual roadmaps to enhance human resistance to cosmic radiation. This is exactly what this work is all about. It was fun and a pleasure to partake in this theoretical project with such a diverse international team. We were just throwing ideas on the table, some being quite ambitious and futuristic, and then examining them carefully for feasibility and assessing their potential. The work laid out several interesting directions and concepts that can eventually pay off. Last but not least, I think it is also very important to attract widespread attention and interest to this topic" said Dmitry Klokov, an author of the paper and Section Head of the Radiobiology & Health section at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories.

"This paper explores the foreseeable means by which human radioresistance could be biomedically enhanced for the purposes of space exploration and colonization. It also aims to elucidate the links between aging, longevity and radioresistance, and the ways in which research into enhancing human radioresistance could synergistically enable human healthspan extension, ultimately highlighting how ongoing research into the very well-funded sphere of aerospace research could galvinate progress in biomedical gerontology, a massively under-funded area of research despite the grave economic burden posed by demographic aging" said Franco Cortese, an author of the paper and Deputy Director of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

The publication of the paper in Oncotarget this week is timely, given the test launch of the Falcon Heavy, SpaceX's largest rocket to date, just last week. Interest into space exploration and even colonisation has been mounting for a number of years. Less than one year ago Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, unveiled a roadmap toward colonizing Mars, outlining the ambitious goal of placing a million people on Mars within the next 40 to 100 years. If interest in space colonization continues apace, research into methods of enhancing radioresistance to protect against the various forms of space radiation that spacefarers would be subjected to needs to be accelerated accordingly.

"In linking ageing and radioresistance and tying together research into enhancing the radioresistance of astronauts with the extension of healthy longevity, we hope to have shown how aerospace research could be used to leapfrog the massive funding deficit surrounding the clinical translation of healthspan-extending interventions, in order to brave the storm of the oncoming Silver Tsunami and prevent the looming economic crisis posed by demographic aging" said Dmitry Kaminskiy, an author of the paper and Managing Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

Furthermore, given the massive amount of funding allocated to research into facilitating and optimizing space exploration and optimization, the researchers hope to have shown how research into enhancing radioresistance for space exploration could galvanize progress in human healthspan extension, an area of research that is still massively underfunded despite its potential to prevent the massive economic burden posed by the future healthcare costs associated with demographic aging.

"This roadmap sets the stage for enhancing human biology beyond our natural limits in ways that will confer not only longevity and disease resistance but will be essential for future space exploration" said João Pedro de Magalhães, an author of the paper and a Trustee of the Biogerontology Research Foundation.

The roadmap outlines future research directions toward the goal of enhancing human radioresistance, including upregulation of endogenous repair and radioprotective mechanisms, possible leeways into gene therapy in order to enhance radioresistance via the translation of exogenous and engineered DNA repair and radioprotective mechanisms, the substitution of organic molecules with fortified isoforms, the coordination of regenerative and ablative technologies, and methods of slowing metabolic activity while preserving cognitive function. The paper concludes by presenting the known associations between radioresistance and longevity, and articulating the position that enhancing human radioresistance is likely to extend the healthspan of human spacefarers as well.

###

The paper, entitled "Vive la radiorésistance!: converging research in radiobiology and biogerontology to enhance human radioresistance for deep space exploration and colonization", can be viewed on Oncotarget here.

Citation: Franco Cortese, Dmitry Klokov, Andreyan Osipov, Jakub Stefaniak, Alexey Moskalev, Jane Schastnaya, Charles Cantor, Alexander Aliper, Polina Mamoshina, Igor Ushakov, Alex Sapetsky, Quentin Vanhaelen, Irina Alchinova, Mikhail Karganov, Olga Kovalchuk, Ruth Wilkins, Andrey Shtemberg, Marjan Moreels, Sarah Baatout, Evgeny Izumchenko, João Pedro de Magalhães, Artem V. Artemov, Sylvain V. Costes, Afshin Beheshti, Xiao Wen Mao, Michael J. Pecaut, Dmitry Kaminskiy, Ivan V. Ozerov, Morten Scheibye-Knudsen and Alex Zhavoronkov. Vive la radiorésistance!: converging research in radiobiology and biogerontology to enhance human radioresistance for deep space exploration and colonization, Epub ahead of print. Published online 2018 February 09. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.24461

About the Biogerontology Research Foundation:

The Biogerontology Research Foundation is a UK non-profit research foundation and public policy center seeking to fill a gap within the research community, whereby the current scientific understanding of the ageing process is not yet being sufficiently exploited to produce effective medical interventions. The BGRF funds and conducts research which, building on the body of knowledge about how ageing happens, aims to develop biotechnological interventions to remediate the molecular and cellular deficits which accumulate with age and which underlie the ill-health of old age. Addressing ageing damage at this most fundamental level will provide an important opportunity to produce the effective, lasting treatments for the diseases and disabilities of ageing, required to improve quality of life in the elderly. The BGRF seeks to use the entire scope of modern biotechnology to attack the changes that take place in the course of ageing, and to address not just the symptoms of age-related diseases but also the mechanisms of those diseases.

AI companies to reuse crypto mining farms for deep learning in healthcare

February 22, Hong Kong, HK, 11AM, -- Longenesis, Ltd, a Hong Kong-based leader in applying the latest advances in deep learning and blockchain technologies to healthcare announced a research collaboration agreement with Neuromation, Ltd, a Tallinn, Estonia-based company focused on transforming the cryptographic mining infrastructure into a massive cloud for deep learning applications. Neuromation recently successfully raised over $70 million through a token generating event (TGE) to develop a system for generation of the synthetic data using the deep neural networks trained on a large number of examples and using the processing power of the many graphics processing units (GPUs) in the blockchain community. 

"Here at Neuromation, we are developing a platform that will democratize AI development by making the computational resources more accessible to AI practitioners; the computational power will come mostly from cryptocurrency miners wishing to earn more from their GPU farms and/or diversify their business. But even if you do have the computational power, you still have to have the data to train machine learning models on", said Maxim Prasolov, the CEO of Neuromation. 

"The primary aim of Longenesis is to create a global data marketplace that will help provide personalized but at the same time secure data for healthcare application developers. Hence, the missions of Neuromation and Longenesis are perfectly complementary to each other. Together we will bring to AI practitioners in medicine and healthcare both the data and the computational power needed to train AI models and improve healthcare throughout the world. By announcing this partnership, we are laying the foundation for the future world of individualized healthcare based on artificial intelligence", said Sergey Nikolenko, PhD, the Chief Research Officer of Neuromation. 

The companies agreed to bridge each the ecosystems to enable rapid expansion and allow the large corporations to procure a large amount of data from the individuals consenting to the specific uses of their data and to procure the high-performance computing infrastructure required to train the deep neural networks.

Both companies are developing global ecosystems using blockchain technologies. The approach utilized by Longenesis was recently published in a peer-reviewed journal. The is developing a secure ecosystem to allow the individuals to take control over their life data and profit from selling or licensing it to the application developers. The application developers need access to the high-performance computing solutions to be able to train the deep neural networks that can be used to provide the valuable health-related services back to the individuals or to discover new life-saving therapy. Neuromation aspires to become one of the largest providers of the computing infrastructure for deep learning by repurposing the enormous installed base of the existing mining infrastructure. 

"We are excited to partner with Neuromation. We previously published with their CSO and hold their research capabilities in high regard. Our collaboration is two-fold. First, to train the deep neural networks we need processing power and we are looking to repurpose the cryptocurrency mining equipment to do that. Second, to generate synthetic data, one must train on large data sets of real-world data and have balanced and diverse data sets, so Neuromation is an obvious consumer of data and can be a part of the marketplace", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, CSO of Longenesis Limited. 

###

About Longenesis, Ltd

Longenesis is a result of a partnership between the leader in artificial intelligence for healthcare, Insilico Medicine and the leader in blockchain, BitFury intended to return control over life data back to the individuals. The mission of Longenesis is to improve human performance, extend life, prevent disease and make all people wealthier by developing a decentralized ecosystem for exchange and utilization of human life data using the latest advances in blockchain and artificial intelligence. The Longenesis platform and the LifePound crypto token have been in development since August 2017 without engaging in any crypto fundraising activities. For more information visit: http://www.longenesis.com

About Neuromation

Neuromation is a tech company based in San Francisco, California. Its Neuromation platform is designed for the AI ecosystem and offers a much-needed solution to the industry by uniting market resources, the scientific community, and other parties in an all-in-one, user-friendly marketplace.

For more information visit https://neuromation.io.

Insilico to present the advances in AI for pharma industry at AI Transforming Pharma R&D Congress

Thursday, February 15th, 2018, Baltimore, MD - Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based company specializing in the application of artificial intelligence for drug discovery, biomarker development and aging research, will be presented at the Artificial Intelligence: Transforming Pharma R&D Congress, 21-22 February 2018, organized by Kisaco Research.

Alex Zhavoronkov, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, will present the latest advances of artificial intelligence for drug discovery and cover the successful cases and practical challenges in integrating of AI into the pharmaceutical sector at the panel discussion "How to implement an Artificial Intelligence strategy into your corporation?". 

"Kisaco Research Artificial Intelligence: Transforming Pharma R&D Congress brings together many of the thought leaders in the field and presents a very thought-through and balanced program. 2017 was the year when the pharmaceutical industry started treating AI seriously and this year we see deeper penetration and broader adoption of the modern AI techniques by the pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies alike", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc.

Artificial Intelligence: Transforming Pharma R&D Congress offers to participants the first-hand experience from the prominent industry speakers showcasing how AI is transforming pharma R&D. The conference provides the real-life cases of AI applications for the pharmaceutical sector, guidance from pharma leaders on how to incorporate an AI strategy into the organizations and insights into current partnerships between pharmaceutical and biotech companies and AI solution providers.

Insilico Medicine is regularly publishing many "firsts" and proofs of concepts in the application of deep learning to drug discovery and biomarker development. It was the first to apply the deep generative adversarial networks (GANs) to the generation of new molecular structures with specified parameters and published seminal papers in Oncotarget and Molecular Pharmaceutics. Another paper published in Molecular Pharmaceutics in 2016 and demonstrated the proof of concept of the application 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. One of the recent papers published in November 2017 described the application of the next-generation AI and blockchain technologies to return the control over personal data back to the individual. The latest paper published in the Journals of Gerontology demonstrated the application of the deep neural networks to assessing the biological age of the patients. 

###

For further information, images or interviews, please contact:

Contact: Qingsong Zhu, PhD 
zhu@pharma.ai 
Website: http://www.Insilico.com

Official Conference Website: http://www.artificialintelligence-pharma.com

About Insilico Medicine, Inc

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence company headquartered at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D and management resources in Belgium, Russia, UK, Taiwan and Korea sourced through hackathons and competitions. 

The company utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. Insilico pioneered the applications of the generative adversarial networks (GANs) and reinforcement learning for generation of novel molecular structures for the diseases with a known target and with no known targets. In addition to working collaborations with the large pharmaceutical companies, the company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, dermatological diseases, fibrosis, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and aging. Through a partnership with LifeExtension.com the company launched a range of nutraceutical products compounded using the advanced bioinformatics techniques and deep learning approaches. It also provides a range of consumer-facing applications including Young.AI and Aging.AI and operates Chemistry.AI intended to capture the tacit knowledge of medicinal chemists. 

Through a partnership with the BitFury Group, the company is working on a range of AI solutions for blockchain to help return the power over life data back to the individual. The company raised venture capital and partnered with Juvenescence Limited, a holding company focused on longevity biotechnology. The company aspires to become the "Bell Labs" for artificial intelligence and associated technologies for healthcare and longevity biotechnology and commercialize its research by forming subsidiaries around the specific technologies and licensing the intellectual property, molecules and data to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of the Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact. In 2018, the company was named one of the global top 100 AI companies by CB Insights. Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8

First molecules discovered using artificial intelligence head to development

Jan.6, 2018, Baltimore, Maryland- Insilico Medicine, Inc. ("Insilico"), a Baltimore-based next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) company specializing in the application of deep learning for drug discovery, announces that Juvenescence.AI, its joint venture with Juvenescence Limited ("Juvenescence"), has licensed its first compound family for clinical development. This is one of five compound families that Juvenescence.AI is able to license each year under its license agreement with Insilico.

"The selection of our first compound family is a landmark event for Juvenescence, and a broader comment on the potential of AI to transform the drug discovery and development industry" commented Jim Mellon, Chairman of Juvenescence.

This deal is a result of a deep collaboration between the senior drug developers at Juvenescence and AI experts at Insilico and signifies a new era in drug discovery where highly sophisticated AI finds viable drug candidates. In less than six months the teams have identified a valuable molecular target for a specific age-associated disease area, and are now working to identify other promising molecules for a variety of targets and perform validation.

Dr Greg Bailey, CEO of Juvenescence said: "This has been a very exciting time for the team of drug developers at Juvenescence as we work with Insilico to change how drug are discovered. This constitutes more validation of Insilico's ability to find novel drugs. It is also speaking to the quality of the relationship between our two companies both focused on changing how mankind ages." 

JAI-001 and its analogues, have demonstrated in vitro activity in assays directly relevant to aging and age-related diseases. 

"The team at Insilico Medicine is very excited to be working with Juvenescence. As a company, it has centuries of drug discovery and development experience, and has provided our team with valuable guidance. We are very happy to see that some of the top pharmaceutical industry executives are now focusing their efforts on aging and artificial intelligence", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, Founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc.

###

About Insilico Medicine, Inc. Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence 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 sourced through hackathons and competitions. The company utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for ageing and age-related diseases. The company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and ageing. Through its Pharma.AI division, Insilico provides advanced machine learning services to biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and skin care companies, foundations and national governments globally. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of its Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact. Website: http://www.insilico.com

About Juvenescence Limited Juvenescence Limited is a biotech company focused on therapies to increase healthy human longevity. It was founded in 2017 by Jim Mellon, Dr. Greg Bailey, Dr. Declan Doogan, Anthony Chow, and Alexander Pickett. The Juvenescence team are highly experienced drug developers, and serial entrepreneurs with a track record of success in life sciences and drug development. Juvenescence is focussed on developing therapeutics that alter ageing or age-related diseases.

Juvenescence believes that recent advances in science have greatly improved our understanding of the biology of ageing and creates the opportunity to develop therapeutics now that can slow, halt or potentially reverse elements of ageing.

For further information, images or interviews, please contact:

Contact:

Qingsong Zhu, PhD
zhu@pharma.ai

Insilico to present the advances in deep-learned multimodal biomarkers of aging at NCI

Tuesday, February 6th, 2018, Baltimore, MD - Insilico Medicine, a Baltimore-based company specializing in artificial intelligence for drug discovery, biomarker development and aging research will present a lecture on deep-learned multimodal biomarkers of aging at the Cancer Biomarkers Data Commons Meeting (CBDC) Think Tank Meeting, February 8th 2018, at the National Cancer Institute. The event is open to the public with prior registration. 

Dr. Zhavoronkov's lecture "Deep-learned multimodal biomarkers of aging" will cover the latest advances in artificial intelligence for development of aging biomarkers. The session will focus on the machine learning approaches used for aging biomarker development and their potential application to the cancer biomarker discovery.

"Assessing the biological age of the patient using multiple data types may significantly contribute to personalization in the many areas of medicine primarily in immuno oncology. People, their organs and systems age at different rates and adjusting the therapy to the biological age of the patient may help improve outcomes in clinical trials and in the real world. The deep neural networks trained to predict the biological age of the patient may be used to discover novel targets and pathways in aging and age-related diseases", said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, the founder and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc.

The Think Tank Meeting on the Development of a Cancer Biomarkers Data Commons will bring together thought leaders from academia, industry, and government to discuss approaches to the development of cancer biomarkers. The event sets up the objectives to examine clinical and research needs in cancer biomarker discovery, discuss machine learning and statistical approaches to biomarker discovery and explore bioinformatics strategies to transform Big Data into FIT (fit-for-purpose) Data.

"The early diagnosis and prognosis of a cancer have become a necessity in cancer research, as it can facilitate the more effective and accurate decision making in clinical management of patients. The importance of classifying cancer patients into high or low risk groups has led many research teams, from the biomedical and the bioinformatics field, to study the application of integrative high-throughput computational analyzed and machine learning methods. Although it is evident that the use of these methods can improve our understanding of cancer progression, there are still significant challenges and limitations associated with computational modeling human cancer. However, with the dismal success rate seen in clinical trials, and as the current technical limitations deep-learning are overcome, the value of these tools in addressing the continuing challenges in clinical oncology will grow", said Eugene Izumchenko, PhD, Head and Neck Cancer Research, Department of Otolaryngology, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

Insilico Medicine is responsible for the many "firsts" and proofs of concept in the application of deep learning to drug discovery and biomarker development. It was the first to apply the deep generative adversarial networks (GANs) to the generation of new molecular structures with specified parameters and published seminal papers in Oncotarget and Molecular Pharmaceutics. Another paper published in Molecular Pharmaceutics in 2016 and demonstrated the proof of concept of the application 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. One of the recent papers published in November 2017 described the application of the next-generation AI and blockchain technologies to return the control over personal data back to the individual. The latest paper published in the Journals of Gerontology demonstrated the application of the deep neural networks to assessing the biological age of the patients. 

###

For further information, images or interviews, please contact:

Contact: Qingsong Zhu, PhD 
zhu@pharma.ai

Website: http://www.Insilico.com

About Insilico Medicine, Inc

Insilico Medicine, Inc. is an artificial intelligence company headquartered at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D and management resources in Belgium, Russia, UK, Taiwan and Korea sourced through hackathons and competitions. 

The company utilizes advances in genomics, big data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. Insilico pioneered the applications of the generative adversarial networks (GANs) and reinforcement learning for generation of novel molecular structures for the diseases with a known target and with no known targets. In addition to working collaborations with the large pharmaceutical companies, the company is pursuing internal drug discovery programs in cancer, dermatological diseases, fibrosis, Parkinson's Disease, Alzheimer's Disease, ALS, diabetes, sarcopenia, and aging. Through a partnership with LifeExtension.com the company launched a range of nutraceutical products compounded using the advanced bioinformatics techniques and deep learning approaches. It also provides a range of consumer-facing applications including Young.AI and Aging.AI and operates Chemistry.AI intended to capture the tacit knowledge of medicinal chemists. 

Through a partnership with the BitFury Group, the company is working on a range of AI solutions for blockchain to help return the power over life data back to the individual. The company raised venture capital and partnered with Juvenescence Limited, a holding company focused on longevity biotechnology. The company aspires to become the "Bell Labs" for artificial intelligence and associated technologies for healthcare and longevity biotechnology and commercialize its research by forming subsidiaries around the specific technologies and licensing the intellectual property, molecules and data to the biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies. In 2017, NVIDIA selected Insilico Medicine as one of the Top 5 AI companies in its potential for social impact. Brief company video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l62jlwgL3v8