Explore technologies transforming drug discovery and development, including artificial intelligence, automation, genomics, bioinformatics, imaging, robotics, advanced laboratory platforms and computational tools that accelerate target identification, therapeutic innovation and translational research.
AI agents can search, analyse and plan across drug discovery workflows, but where should scientists hand over control? We examine what to automate, what to check and where human judgement matters most.
A protein can look very different in disease without a single change to its sequence. Measuring these structural changes could reveal drug targets invisible to genomic and expression data alone.
Virtual screening can assess billions of compounds, but performance can fall on unfamiliar targets. Combining AI with molecular physics could help make predictions more reliable.
Why do promising CNS therapies struggle to translate into patients? Three experts explore how biomarkers can track therapeutic effects, improve patient selection and guide development decisions.
Why do promising CNS therapies struggle to translate into patients? Three experts explore how biomarkers can track therapeutic effects, improve patient selection and guide development decisions.
AI can rapidly generate new protein binders, but wet-lab validation remains a major bottleneck. Combining cell-free protein synthesis with surface plasmon resonance (SPR) enables AI-designed antibody binders to be screened directly from crude extracts, bypassing lengthy cell culture and purification steps.
As genomic studies become larger and more diverse, sample collection can make or break their success. Discover why collection strategy matters for recruitment, scale and data quality.
What happens when the cellular machinery making therapeutic proteins slows down? New research in Nature shows why translation speed could matter for the design of mRNA medicines.
What if depression is not one disease, but many biologically distinct conditions? A major research programme is investigating what this could mean for biomarkers, drug targets and treatment.
As NAMs become more widely used in drug discovery, assays must meet the demands of more complex models. Discover six requirements for reliable, reproducible and biologically meaningful data.
Discover how integrated technologies, multiomic approaches and AI are helping researchers translate complex biological signals into actionable tools for drug development and patient care.
What if extreme levels of common traits have a different genetic basis? New research suggests rare, large-effect variants could help explain the extremes and identify potential drug targets.
AI is making drug discovery faster, but can it make it more successful? Discover why combining AI with systems biology could help researchers tackle the biological complexity behind drug failure.
Hundreds of new patient-derived cancer models could strengthen target validation, identify cancer vulnerabilities and provide more representative systems for preclinical drug discovery.
Many biologically important intracellular targets remain difficult to drug. Dr Rab Prinjha examines how screening within living cells could help tackle them.
Why do some colorectal cancers resist immunotherapy? Analysis of patient tumour samples has identified a population of fibroblasts that could help explain treatment resistance.
Professor Joseph C. Wu of Stanford University explains how stem cells, human-relevant models and AI are helping researchers predict which drug candidates are most likely to succeed before clinical trials.
Foundation models have delivered breakthroughs in protein biology, but single-cell models have struggled to match them. What is holding them back?
What if one of gene therapy’s biggest obstacles isn’t delivery, but the body’s own cells? Discover why DNA silencing is emerging as a major challenge for long-lasting genetic medicines.