- Friso Postma, VP of AI at BioXcel Therapeutics, champions “augmented intelligence” for drug discovery.
- The company’s AI tools aid in drug repurposing efforts for neurological rare and psychiatric disorders.
- Postma stresses the importance of asking actionable questions to leverage AI effectively.
- BioXcel’s FDA-approved sublingual Igalmi, aided by AI, extends commercial life through reformulation.
- Their AI platform identifies promising compounds and targets, enhancing drug repurposing efficiency.
- BioXcel’s journey began with observing dexmedetomidine’s efficacy, leading to the creation of NovareAI.
- Leveraging evolutionarily conserved neurocircuits and a knowledge graph, BioXcel’s AI system predicts target modifications.
- Collaboration across disciplines ensures effective data integration and organization.
- BioXcel stands out in using AI to repurpose drugs, despite challenges such as data noise.
- Future prospects include exploring indications like Alzheimer’s disease agitation and PTSD with AI-driven approaches.
Main AI News:
Friso Postma, the vice president of AI for drug discovery at BioXcel Therapeutics, advocates for the term “augmented intelligence” over “artificial intelligence.” The company employs AI tools to bolster human experts in their efforts towards drug repurposing. Postma, armed with a Ph.D. in signal transduction from the Netherlands Cancer Institute, shifted his focus to AI from wearable digital health devices. “I quickly found out that it’s very important to be able to contextualize AI,” he explains. His expertise in contextualizing AI has been pivotal in crafting an end-to-end platform for drug re-innovation, with a focus on neurological rare and psychiatric disorders.
Postma underscores the importance of asking the right questions to make AI actionable in today’s buzzword-driven AI landscape. “AI by itself doesn’t do anything,” he emphasizes. “It’s not really that difficult anymore to do AI. What’s really difficult is making AI actionable — making it concrete.” The success of AI deployment hinges on clever deployment strategies, influenced by the nature of the questions asked.
Established in 2005, BioXcel Therapeutics, headquartered in New Haven, Conn., secured FDA approval for the sublingual Igalmi (dexmedetomidine), supported by AI. The company’s reformulation of the intravenous drug into a sublingual film extended its commercial life through new intellectual property protection.
Training an AI platform to identify promising compounds entails various facets. Postma elucidates the process of assessing compounds’ properties, including their ability to cross the blood-brain barrier, employing predictive elements. BioXcel employs a multifaceted AI approach, utilizing neural networks to assign properties to compounds and ascertain their suitability.
Following the identification of promising compounds, the subsequent crucial step involves pinpointing suitable targets. Postma emphasizes the complexity of neuroscience, where symptoms stem from neurocircuitry rather than a single gene, necessitating a comprehensive understanding of behavior and neurocircuitry.
BioXcel’s AI journey commenced with a simple observation regarding dexmedetomidine’s efficacy. This observation led to the development of NovareAI, a multifaceted AI system integrating a knowledge graph to expedite the exploration of relationships between diseases, molecular targets, and drugs.
The core of BioXcel’s AI strategy involves examining evolutionarily conserved neurocircuits and employing graph-based neural networks to predict target modifications. Data strategy and organization are crucial pillars, involving collaboration across disciplines to ensure relevant data integration.
BioXcel Therapeutics stands out in its utilization of AI for drug repurposing, leveraging various inputs, including clinical trials, SEC statements, and natural language processing tools. Despite challenges such as data noise, BioXcel remains committed to refining its AI-driven drug repurposing platform.
Looking ahead, BioXcel Therapeutics aims to leverage its AI-driven platform to explore additional indications, including Alzheimer’s disease agitation, opioid use disorder, and PTSD, reflecting the company’s commitment to advancing novel therapeutics through innovative AI-driven approaches.
Conclusion:
BioXcel Therapeutics’ pioneering AI-driven approach to drug repurposing marks a significant advancement in the pharmaceutical market. Their success underscores the transformative potential of augmented intelligence in accelerating drug discovery and addressing unmet medical needs. As AI continues to revolutionize the industry, companies that harness its power effectively are poised to lead in innovation and therapeutic development.
