Insilico Medicine, founded in 2014 by Alex Zhavoronkov, uses neural networks to streamline drug discovery. The company employs a two-stage AI system: the first analyzes vast medical data, including thousands of patient records and academic papers, to identify disease-causing proteins. The second system generates new molecules designed to bind with and neutralize these specific protein targets.
The company's candidate drug, Rentosertib, was developed using this AI-driven approach to treat idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a chronic lung disease. Previous clinical trials showed that Rentosertib significantly increases the amount of air the lungs can hold in patients with this condition.
Recent data from the same trial, published in Nature Biotechnology, indicates that Rentosertib may also slow the aging process. Researchers used six different 'aging clocks' to measure biological markers. After 12 weeks of continuous medication, the predicted biological age of 43 participating patients significantly decreased across all six measurement methods.
Despite these results, experts note that the drug has not been tested on healthy individuals and the sample size was small. The drug is still several years away from regulatory approval, even for its primary use in treating lung disease.
