Poolbeg Pharma and partner OneThree Biotech have discovered novel drug targets for the treatment of respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) using an artificial intelligence (AI) programme.
The OneThree team, using its AI platform, identified novel drug targets using Poolbeg’s RSV human challenge trial data.
The next stage will involve the identification of small molecule inhibitors to treat RSV infections. These include a range of targets for which there are known drugs with existing Phase I data, allowing smooth transition to early human efficacy trials.
The final stage of the research plan will utilise OneThree’s AI platform to identify the drugs that are most likely to be efficacious against the identified disease targets with clean safety profiles in RSV patients.
Selection of drugs is traditionally a long and extensive process, however, by using an existing AI model this process can be completed in weeks. The AI model allows for the complex disease signature underlying each drug target to be considered during drug selection.
Jeremy Skillington, PhD, CEO of Poolbeg Pharma, said: “This is the first time that AI has been used to identify disease targets in RSV and I am delighted to have reached this significant milestone in the programme in such a short period of time. Having identified these novel disease targets, we can now commence the final stage of the programme to identify effective drug candidates to treat RSV.”
