Integrated Biosciences Files IPO: Harvard-MIT-Backed AI and Synthetic Biology Platform Targeting Age-Related Diseases with Nobel Laureate Involvement

At the forefront of today’s biomedical landscape, synthetic biology and AI-driven drug discovery are paving new pathways for drug development.

The integration of synthetic biology and AI-driven drug discovery has had a profound positive impact on pharmaceutical R&D. The application of artificial intelligence in drug design significantly enhances precision and efficiency by predicting the three-dimensional structures of target proteins and modeling drug-protein interactions. Meanwhile, synthetic biology enables the engineering of biological systems through the “Design-Build-Test-Learn” (DBTL) cycle. This systematic methodology, combined with AI’s capabilities in data analysis and pattern recognition, further accelerates the process of drug discovery and development.

Amidst the wave of technological innovation, Integrated Biosciences has distinguished itself through its groundbreaking research and innovative technologies. Founded in 2022, the company focuses on developing next-generation therapies for age- and aging-related diseases by leveraging a synthetic biology and artificial intelligence-driven small-molecule drug discovery platform. Co-founded by Dr. Felix Wong and Dr. Max Wilson, Integrated Biosciences not only brings together top scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, and Princeton University but also boasts a prestigious advisory team that includes a Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, all dedicated to pursuing revolutionary treatments for age-related diseases.

As global population aging intensifies, the demand for treatments targeting age-related diseases continues to grow. In response, Integrated Biosciences was established to accelerate drug discovery by leveraging the synergistic effects of synthetic biology and artificial intelligence (AI). The company’s research focuses on exploring age-related cellular stress responses, which are closely linked to the development of various geriatric diseases. By constructing virtual models of cellular stress, Integrated Biosciences can simulate complex biological processes in silico, thereby harnessing AI’s powerful computational capabilities to screen vast compound libraries for potential therapeutic molecules.

Integrated Biosciences has a relatively young founding team. Co-founder Dr. Felix Wong holds degrees in mathematics, computer science, and physics from Harvard University. He was awarded the NIH K25 Mentored Quantitative Research Career Development Award and was named to the 2023 Forbes 30 Under 30 list in the healthcare sector.

Dr. Max Wilson, another co-founder and member of the Scientific Advisory Board, has served as a Professor of Molecular Biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara since 2018. He possesses expertise in optogenetics and the integrated stress response, and holds degrees in biology, biophysics, and bioengineering from Swarthmore College and Princeton University.

In addition to its young founding team, Integrated Biosciences boasts a highly distinguished and experienced Scientific Advisory Board.

Dr. David W.C. MacMillan is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor of Chemistry at Princeton University. In 2021, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for his contributions to the development of asymmetric organocatalysis. Dr. MacMillan holds chemistry degrees from the University of California, Irvine, and the University of Glasgow. He is a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, a Fellow of the Royal Society, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Additionally, he is a co-founder of Chiromics LLC, Penn PhD LLC, Dexterity Pharma LLC, and Antenna Bio LLC, with extensive expertise in drug compound discovery and screening.

Dr. James J. Collins is a Professor of Biological Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). A recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship and a Rhodes Scholar, he holds degrees in physics from the College of the Holy Cross and the University of Oxford. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, the National Academy of Medicine, and the National Academy of Sciences. As a pioneer in the field of synthetic biology, Dr. Collins has extensive entrepreneurial experience and is a co-founder of Senti Biosciences, EnBiotix, Synlogic, and Sherlock Biosciences. Among these, Senti Biosciences has become a prominent enterprise in the synthetic biology industry.

The collision of ideas between a young founding team and seasoned scientists and entrepreneurs has provided the impetus for Integrated Biosciences to remain at the forefront.

As a company founded just two years ago, Integrated Biosciences is still in the process of building its own small-molecule drug discovery platform. The company aims to leverage its advanced deep learning models to enhance the efficiency of drug discovery and achieve significant improvements in accuracy and predictive capability.

According to the company’s website, Integrated Biosciences’ proprietary synthetic biology technology enables the virtual activation of cellular stress responses, facilitating the discovery of drugs targeting stressed cells and the rapid identification of drug targets. Cellular stress responses contribute to neurodegeneration, cancer, diabetes, osteoarthritis, and other age-related diseases. Targeting these stress responses with small-molecule therapies can ameliorate disease conditions and help regulate healthy aging. The company has also developed next-generation deep learning methods to identify small-molecule compounds, thereby accelerating drug discovery efforts.

Just as the company marked its first anniversary, Integrated Biosciences unveiled new achievements derived from its AI-powered technology platform.

In December 2023, the company published its latest research findings in Nature, showcasing the application of its AI platform in discovering novel antibiotics. This achievement not only represents a major breakthrough in the 60-year history of antibiotic development but also serves as compelling evidence of the potential of AI in drug discovery.

This article provides a detailed introduction to the application of the Integrated Biosciences platform in discovering novel small-molecule antibiotics to address antibiotic resistance. In their study, researchers virtually screened over 12 million candidate compounds to identify these new antibiotics.

Founding members of Integrated Biosciences explain that while artificial intelligence has a significant impact, it is also constrained by many commonly used black-box models that obscure the underlying decision-making processes. By opening these black boxes, more generalizable insights can be generated, which may better facilitate the adoption and development of next-generation drug discovery approaches.

Thus, in this groundbreaking approach, the research team leveraged experimentally generated data to train deep learning models for predicting the antibiotic activity and toxicity of all compounds. Drawing inspiration from artificial intelligence applications in other fields, they designed new models to elucidate which molecular substructures are critical for antibiotic activity. Ultimately, a novel antibiotic with potent activity against multidrug-resistant pathogens emerged. In a series of experiments, researchers evaluated a candidate antibiotic in a murine model of MRSA infection and found it to be effective both topically and systemically, suggesting that the compound may be suitable for further development as a treatment for severe and sepsis-associated bacterial infections. This further validates the reliability and advanced nature of the Integrated Biosciences technology platform.

Prior to the publication of these research findings, in May 2023, the company published its research results in Nature Aging. The article stated that it successfully identified active senolytics (senescent cell-clearing agents) using a graph neural network developed by the company, and demonstrated their efficacy through aging model experiments.

Senolytics are compounds that selectively induce apoptosis or programmed cell death in non-dividing senescent cells. Representative compounds include dasatinib, quercetin, fisetin, ABT-263, heat shock protein (HSP)-90 inhibitors, cardiac glycosides, and bromodomain and extra-terminal (BET) family protein inhibitors. Although clinical outcomes have been promising, most senolytic compounds identified to date are hindered by poor bioavailability and adverse side effects; for instance, fisetin and ABT-737 exhibit low bioavailability, while ABT-263 causes thrombocytopenia and neutropenia.

Integrated Biosciences trained a graph neural network using 2,352 anti-aging active compounds screened in an etoposide-induced senescence model and applied it to predict senolytic activity across the chemical space of over 800,000 compounds. After curating and testing an additional 266 compounds, the hit rate (positive predictive value) of this neural network was found to have increased sixfold, reaching 11.6%.

“One of the most promising approaches to treating age-related diseases is to identify therapeutic interventions that selectively clear these cells from the body, akin to how antibiotics kill bacteria without harming host cells. The compounds we have discovered exhibit high selectivity, as well as favorable medicinal chemistry properties required for successful drug development,” said Dr. Satotaka Omori, Head of Aging Biology at Integrated Biosciences and co-first author of the publication. “We believe that compounds identified using our platform will improve the prospects for clinical trials and ultimately help older adults regain their health.”

To further expand its technology platform, Integrated Biosciences is actively pursuing collaborations to lay the foundation for deepening its expertise in the anti-aging field.

In April 2024, Integrated Biosciences announced a strategic partnership with the patient-led Project 8p Foundation to improve therapeutic prospects for conditions involving duplication, deletion, and inverted duplication/deletion (inv/dup/del) of chromosome 8p. This collaboration provides Integrated Biosciences with the opportunity to characterize and correct dysregulated cellular stress responses in 8p cell lines, paving the way for the development of best-in-class disease-modifying therapies for patients with complex, megabase-scale rearrangements on the short arm of chromosome 8p.

8p Chromosomal Disorder8p chromosomal disorder is an umbrella term for a spectrum of clinical symptoms and phenotypes caused by partial or complete deletion of the short arm of human chromosome 8 (8p). It is characterized by partial or complete monosomy of the short arm of chromosome 8 (monosomy 8p). This deletion can lead to growth and developmental delays, intellectual disability, distinctive facial features, and behavioral abnormalities; some patients may also present with congenital heart defects.

Chromosomal disorders are notoriously difficult to treat due to extensive gene deletions or duplications. Integrated Biosciences’ platform serves as a globally effective small-molecule search engine targeting stress responses, and its drug candidates hold significant promise for improving the quality of life for patients with 8p syndrome. By leveraging cellular stress responses, this approach can alleviate symptoms in 8p patients that are typically associated with accelerated aging.

Furthermore, in May 2024, Integrated Biosciences announced its entry into Illumina Ventures Labs, integrating its drug discovery engine with Illumina sequencing technologies. This collaboration provides financial and scientific support, positioning Integrated Biosciences to discover and design novel small-molecule therapies that function by modulating the transcriptome and methylome of cell populations. These drug candidates are intended for a variety of diseases driven by distinct cellular states, including those associated with aging and development.

Felix Wong, Co-Founder of Integrated Biosciences, stated, “All drugs exert their effects by modifying cellular components, with nucleic acids being particularly crucial. This collaboration leverages small molecules to systematically target the nexus between RNA expression and DNA modification across different cell types, enabling us to precisely control cellular behavior. We will generate unprecedented large-scale datasets that provide maps of cellular states and methods for their modulation, thereby paving the way for therapies targeting age-related diseases.”

Currently, Integrated Biosciences has further validated that the integration of artificial intelligence and explainable deep learning is crucial for overcoming some of the most intractable challenges in the medical field. Building on these validation studies, the company is poised to accelerate the integration of synthetic biology with insights into cellular stress, aiming to develop novel therapies for age-related diseases.