Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences Institute of Materia Medica and Cyclica Announce Strategic Collaboration to Develop Innovative Therapeutics for COVID-19

On March 5, the COVID-19 (novel coronavirus pneumonia) epidemic remained a prominent medical challenge, affecting more than 70 countries and regions worldwide. This rapid spread has made more countries aware of the necessity for international cooperation to address this global concern.

Recently, a renowned Chinese medical research institution, Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences Strategic Collaboration with Canadian Biotechnology Company Cyclica , to identify antiviral drug candidates for COVID-19 and explore opportunities for designing multi-target antiviral compounds. Cyclica Existing strategic partners include WuXi AppTec, Merck, and Bayer, ATAI Life Sciences, Yuhan Corporation (South Korea), Enamine, etc. 。

Although current efforts to develop new drugs through innovative approaches to address the COVID-19 outbreak may yield potential treatments, such drug development initiatives can consume substantial resources and require years of preclinical and clinical testing. Therefore, drug repurposing offers a more effective strategy—namely, the “old drugs for new uses” approach—to address the urgent need for COVID-19 treatments. Artificial intelligence (AI) approaches for drug repurposing can be employed to further accelerate the recommendation of potential therapeutic solutions.

Cyclica uses its proprietary deep learning engine, MatchMaker to screen a collection of over 6,700 FDA-approved drugs and drug candidates, each with at least Phase I clinical data targeting structurally characterized proteins in the human proteome. In addition to structural data, MatchMaker was trained on millions of known human drug–target interactions (DTIs). The resulting state-of-the-art database, named PolypharmDB, is a clinically evaluated repository of molecules and their polypharmacology profiles, which can be used to identify drug repurposing opportunities for candidate compounds.

Leveraging PolypharmDB and MatchMaker, Cyclica’s scientists rapidly investigated human targets and viral proteins with potential therapeutic significance for COVID-19. The results are a set of molecules predicted to interact with putative therapeutic targets for COVID-19. Although the results are encouraging, modeling viral proteins causes MatchMaker to exceed established benchmarks, thereby increasing the uncertainty of predictions for these targets. A set of priority molecules obtained by querying PolypharmDB represents a feasible collection of molecules available for testing. Collection 。

In this collaboration,Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences In vitro and in vivo antiviral evaluation will be conducted on the molecules proposed by Cyclica. Furthermore, both parties will design multi-target antiviral compounds during their long-term collaboration to reduce drug resistance.

This international partnership is built on the historical relationship between Cyclica and China, which originated from the Canada-China Angel Alliance (CCAA), an angel investment group registered in Ontario, Canada. Naheed Kurji, President and CEO of Cyclica, said: “We have been closely monitoring the development of the COVID-19 epidemic in China and globally.” Meanwhile, we hope to contribute to our AI platform to seek innovative therapies that can overcome this viral outbreak in a manner conducive to rapid response. With Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences The opportunity to collaborate with leading scientists is one we cannot afford to miss. ”

Regarding the Middle Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences

Institute of Materia Medica, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences (hereinafter referred to as the “Institute”) was established in August 1958 and is affiliated with the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences and Peking Union Medical College. Over the past 60 years since its establishment, the Institute of Materia Medica has developed and launched more than 100 new drugs, obtaining 130 new drug certificates. Among these, 21 are original innovative drugs, represented by artificial musk, homoharringtonine, bifendate, bicyclol, butylphthalide, Jinshuibao, imrecoxib, and salvianolic acids. As the primary completing institution, the Institute has received more than 230 awards for scientific and technological achievements, including 31 international and national-level awards (three First Prizes of the National Science and Technology Progress Award). Holds over 1,000 valid patents, with more than 400 domestic and international patents granted. ； Authored over 350 books. In recent years, the Institute of Materia Medica has strengthened its basic research and published more than 3,500 papers in journals such as Cell.

About Cyclica, Inc.

Cyclica is a biotechnology company headquartered in Toronto, Canada, that decentralizes the discovery of new drugs through its structure-based and AI-enhanced integrated drug discovery platforms, Ligand Design and Ligand Express. Ligand Design and Ligand Express are integrated to design state-of-the-art lead-like molecules, thereby minimizing unnecessary off-target effects while comprehensively understanding molecular activity through the integration of systems biology and structural pharmacogenomics. Cyclica’s differentiated platform offers new opportunities for drug discovery, including multi-target and multi-TargetDrug Design, Potential Optimization, ADMET Property PredictionTargetDeconvolution and drug repurposing for various indications. Cyclica boasts a world-class team with deep industry expertise and a premier integrated drug discovery platform, which will spark a wave of innovation through venture creation and collaborations with early-stage and emerging biotechnology companies. By leveraging advanced AI processing, Cyclica will revolutionize a system plagued by attrition and costly failures, accelerating the drug discovery process and enabling the development of higher-precision therapeutics.