The Preclinical Drug Discovery Pipeline

STEP 1:
Disease Understanding

Contract a Research Analyst

Begin your drug discovery process by contracting one of our vetted freelance research analysts to perform the following steps of establishing a comprehensive disease understanding for you: Literature Review, Clinical Analysis, Pathophysiology, Biomarker Identification, and Current Treatment Options.

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STEP 2:
TARGET IDENTIFICATION, OPTION A
TARGET DISCOVERY

Identify a Target to Enable Hit Identification

If you understand the disease of interest but you don't know what compound(s) may prove effective at treating it, you need to first identify a target (receptors, enzymes, proteins, genes or RNA) that can be modulated by a therapeutic agent.

Contract a bioinformatics scientist trained on one or more of the following tools for this work:

Vincere™ Network Analytics

Open Targets™ Platform & Genetics

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STEP 2:
TARGET IDENTIFICATION, OPTION B
TARGET DECONVOLUTION

Identify Therapeutic Targets of a Known Compound

To explore the potential therapeutic value of a known compound, utilize target deconvolution, which retrospectively identifies a drug target based on the observed phenotypic response.

Contract a bioinformatics scientist trained on one or more of the following tools for this work:

Vincere™ Network Analytics

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STEP 3:
TARGET VALIDATION

Run a Virtual Cell Simulation

Once a potential target has been identified, validate it to confirm that modulating its activity has the potential to alleviate the symptoms of the disease. In silico target validation is faster and cheaper than in vitro or in vivo.

Contract a bioinformatics scientist trained on one or more of the following tools for this work:

Vincere™ Physics-based Simulator

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STEP 4:
HIT IDENTIFICATION & VALIDATION

Identify Compounds via Virtual Screening

With the target identified and validated, virtual screening is the most cost-effective approach to identify hits--compounds that modulate the target.

Contract a bioinformatics scientist trained on one or more of the following tools for this work:

Vincere™ Virtual Screening

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Step 5:
Lead Optimization

Improve the Compound(s)

After identifying promising hits, refining them into more potent and selective compounds can avoid off-target interactions and reduce adverse effects. Medicinal chemists work to increase the compounds' affinity to the target of interest and explore their ADME properties. Typically, in vivo disease models are used to determine pharmacokinetic profiles, solubility, and permeability assessments. The aim of lead optimization is to keep advantageous properties while enhancing the compound's structure.

Step 6:
Candidate Selection

Pick the Most Promising Compound

The most promising lead is chosen for clinical trials while medicinal chemists produce backup compounds in case the chosen lead fails. The information collected about the chosen compound is used to create a "target candidate profile" for inclusion in the investigational new drug (IND) application.

STEP 7:
Clinical Trial Design

Multi-Omic Patient Selection

Clinical trial design faces challenges in determining the study population due to factors such as patient heterogeneity, co-morbidities, and genetic variations. These challenges can impact the trial's ability to accurately represent the target population and may require more complex trial designs to address them.

Contract a bioinformatics scientist trained on one or more of the following tools for this work:

Vincere™ Patient Selection

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