Wednesday, August 7, 2019 - Today Insilico Medicine, a biotechnology company developing the end-to-end drug discovery pipeline utilizing next generation artificial intelligence, and the Scheibye-Knudsen Lab, University of Copenhagen, announce the presentation of Tyler Golato, Scientific Lead at Molecule, at the 6th Ageing Research, Drug Discovery, and AI Forum during the Basel Life Congress, September 10-12, 2019 in Basel, Switzerland.
The pharmaceutical industry is facing a wide variety of challenges, but perhaps the most pressing is the ongoing innovation crisis. Drug discovery rates are slowing, the price of bringing a drug to market is increasing, and ROI on R&D is expected to hit 0% by 2020. Taken together, these factors are having a direct impact on the types of therapeutics being brought to market. Because the capital requirements are so high, drug development represents a huge risk to pharmaceutical companies and universities.
As the situation worsens, smaller stakeholders are being squeezed out of the market, and it is primarily large-cap pharmaceutical companies that are able to successfully develop drugs. Further, there is an increasing focus on producing "blockbuster drugs". This trend is hurting patients, particularly those that suffer from rare diseases or diseases that are not profitable to treat. Currently, there are virtually no sustainable business models for developing therapeutics for these sorts of conditions. Most of the research is funded by philanthropists. If we are going to make strides towards alleviating suffering and improving human health broadly, this trend must change.
Molecule is an open source, blockchain-based software protocol that provides a market-based platform for price discovery, funding and curation of chemical IP/therapeutics at various stages of development. It is being developed in direct response to the problems mentioned above, such as the innovation crisis in pharma and the lack of sustainable business models for therapeutics for rare disease, for example. The goals of Molecule are multi-faceted, but all are targeted at improving and accelerating the drug development pipeline via a market-based ecosystem. This protocol attempts to curate promising chemical IP, drug-delivery systems, and therapeutic pathways via a market and trading platform that incentivises stakeholder cross-collaboration with a novel funding model. This offers a new opportunity for individuals, organisations, universities, and companies to distribute the cost, risk, and ownership of pharmaceutical intellectual property and its development. At its core, Molecule is an entirely novel way of funding the development of therapeutics, particularly in their earlier stages of development.
"The pharmaceutical industry faces an innovation crisis caused by the challenges around drug development and the monopolisation of IP. Bringing a drug to market is a high-cost, high-risk, and slow endeavour, and it is generally large organisations that single-handedly shoulder these burdens, leading to unnecessarily high prices and a friction around innovation.These large organisations also shelve any IP that is perceived to have less revenue potential or difficult and costly development paths. This has had a significant negative effect on innovation in the pharmaceutical industry, which has moved away from a high-risk pioneering approach. Instead, we have a low-risk high-ticket size environment where R&D is reduced and only 'blockbuster drugs' get approved for development, regardless of their potential impact on overall societal health and wellbeing. Molecule attempts to change this and level the playing field for all of the stakeholders in drug development, with a focus on creating sustainable business models to develop drugs for rare, neglected, and paediatric illness, as well as ageing and longevity," said Tyler Golato, Lead Scientist for Molecule.
"I am very happy to welcome Tyler Golato from Molecule to Basel. Molecule is a newly founded company that bridges drug development and pharma investors. Through their platform investors can follow and invest in drugs at all stages of development. I am therefore really excited that Tyler Golato is joining our meeting," said Morten Scheibye-Knudsen, MD, Ph.D., University of Copenhagen.
"Over the last 5 years, the "Ageing & Drug Discovery" and "AI for Healthcare" forums have been leading events at Basel Life, attracting hundreds of delegates from over 50 countries. This year, we are combining the 2 platforms into a 3 day-event titled "the 6th Ageing, AI and Drug Discovery Forum" to explore the convergence of these 2 cutting edge disciplines. Under the program leadership of Professor Morten Scheibye-Knudsen and Dr. Alex Zhavoronkov, with distinguished scientists and industry experts in the field, we look forward to exploring breakthroughs for this great healthcare need for the planet," said Dr. Bhupinder Bhullar, Chair, Innovation Forum program committee, Basel Life 2019.
"The 6th annual Ageing Research, Drug Discovery, and AI Forum at Basel Life will have a fresh program featuring some of the most prominent scientists and industry players in ageing and longevity research covering the theory, applications and convergence of these three exciting areas," said Alex Zhavoronkov, Ph.D., Founder, and CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc.
The 6th Ageing Research, Drug Discovery, and AI Forum Basel will bring together leaders in the ageing, longevity, and drug discovery field, to describe the latest progress in the molecular, cellular and organismal basis of ageing and the search for interventions. Furthermore, the forum will include opinion leaders in AI to discuss the latest advances of this technology in the biopharmaceutical sector and how this can be applied to interventions. This event intends to bridge academic and commercial research and foster collaborations that will result in practical solutions to one of humanity's most challenging problems: ageing. The Forum will be held in Basel, Switzerland, September 10-12, 2019.
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For further information, images or interviews, please contact:
Ola Popova ola@pharma.ai
About Tyler Golato
Tyler Golato, Scientific Lead at Molecule, is a biochemist, molecular biologist, and entrepreneur from the United States with a background in experimental therapeutics and biogerontology. He graduated from Stockton University before embarking on research fellowships at Columbia University and later, The National Institute of Aging. Tyler has developed novel therapeutics for treating several types of cancer, created new ways of measuring the DNA damage and repair response, and contributed to new theories around several rare genetic diseases.
About Molecule
Molecule is a protocol designed to accelerate innovation in the pharmaceutical industry. It connects scientists, patients, and industry to advance drug development through a collaborative open market by enabling the distributed research and development of pharmaceutical intellectual property. The protocol enables IP creators to relinquish partial ownership of their innovation in exchange for access to liquidity, research and funding. Molecule's core focus is to distribute ownership, risk, and cost intrinsic to drug development while creating new innovation and business models to bring more diverse and inclusive treatments to patients.
Official website: https:/
About Insilico Medicine, Inc
Insilico Medicine is an artificial intelligence company headquartered in Rockville, with R&D and management resources in Belgium, Russia, UK, Taiwan, and Korea sourced through hackathons and competitions. The company and its scientists are dedicated to extending human productive longevity and transforming every step of the drug discovery and drug development process through excellence in biomarker discovery, drug development, digital medicine, and ageing research.
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. In 2018 it received the Frost & Sullivan 2018 North American Artificial Intelligence for Ageing Research and Drug Development Award accompanied with the industry brief. Brief company video: https:/
Official website: http://insilico.
About the Scheibye-Knudsen Laboratory
The growing proportion of the elderly population represents an increasing socioeconomic challenge, not least because of age-associated diseases. It is therefore increasingly pertinent to find interventions for age-associated diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and cardiovascular diseases. Although the cause of ageing is currently unknown accumulation of damage to our genome, the DNA, may be a contributing factor.
In the Scheibye-Knudsen lab we try to understand the cellular and organismal consequences of DNA damage with the aim of developing interventions. We have discovered that DNA damage leads to changes in certain metabolites and that replenishment of these molecules may alter the rate of ageing in model organisms. These findings suggest that normal ageing and age-associated diseases may be malleable to similar interventions. The hope is to develop interventions that will allow everyone to live healthier, happier and more productive lives.
Laboratory website: http://scheibye-knudsen.
About the University of Copenhagen
With over 40,000 students and more than 9,000 employees, the University of Copenhagen is the largest institution of research and education in Denmark and among the highest ranked universities in Europe. The purpose of the University - to quote the University Statute - is to 'conduct research and provide further education to the highest academic level'. Approximately one hundred different institutes, departments, laboratories, centres, museums, etc., form the nucleus of the University.
University Website: http://introduction.
About Basel Life 2019
Ageing Research for Drug Discovery Forum description In this symposium, leaders in the ageing, longevity, and drug discovery field will describe the latest progress in the molecular, cellular and organismal basis of ageing and the search for interventions. Furthermore, the forum will include opinion leaders in AI to discuss the latest advances of this technology in the biopharmaceutical sector and how this can be applied to interventions. This event intends to bridge academic and commercial research and foster collaborations that will result in practical solutions to one of humanity's most challenging problems: ageing. A panel of thought-leaders will give us their cutting edge reports on the latest progress in our quest to extend the healthy lifespan of everyone on the planet. Conference Official Website: https:/
