On August 15, 2022 EpiAxis Therapeutics and Peptilogics, a biotech company engineering peptide therapeutics by combining computation and biology to improve the treatment landscape for patients with life-threatening diseases, reported that they have entered a collaboration to leverage AI for drug discovery to inhibit epigenetic oncology targets, aiming to reprogram cancer cells and drive immune reinvigoration (Press release, EpiAxis Therapeutics, AUG 15, 2022, View Source;utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=epiaxis-peptilogics-enter-strategic-drug-discovery-partnership [SID1234618361]).
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The collaboration will combine EpiAxis Therapeutics’ deep epigenetic expertise and Peptilogics’ AI platform (Nautilus) to advance drug discovery for cancers that escape existing therapies through epigenetic change, including metastatic breast cancer.
Dr Jeremy Chrisp, CEO of EpiAxis Therapeutics, commented on the significance of the collaboration: "We are very pleased to be partnering with Peptilogics to use their receptor pharmacology and AI computing expertise to accelerate innovation and hopefully expand our candidate pipeline.
"An AI-driven paradigm shift is happening in drug discovery and EpiAxis is excited to be working with Peptilogics at the forefront of applying AI to the highly valuable space around novel epigenetic targets."
Peptilogics’ Nautilus platform enables in silico predictive peptide design across diverse targets to efficiently access new functional chemical space and design therapeutics. Additionally, Peptilogics’ purpose-built supercomputer accelerates model development, prediction, and evaluation of peptide sequences to produce higher quality hits with greater chance of success.
"We are equally delighted to launch this collaboration with EpiAxis Therapeutics, a pioneer in the field of epigenetic cancer therapy," said Nicholas Nystrom PhD, Chief Technology Officer of Peptilogics.
"We will focus on lead optimization using Peptilogics’ Nautilus platform, which combines proprietary deep generative models, predictive models, and biophysical simulation to design multiparameter-optimized peptides with potential to address historically challenging and novel drug targets.
"With EpiAxis Therapeutics, we will explore further optimizing lead candidates for epigenetic cancer treatment, with the goal of reducing the risk, time, and cost for epigenetic drug design and development."
The strategic partnership follows the recent publication of the results of EpiAxis’ pioneering clinical trial EPI-PRIMED in leading cancer journal Frontiers in Oncology. The study was the first time an epigenetic inhibitor has been used in combination with chemotherapy to treat metastatic cancer. The results provided proof of concept for the company’s drug development program for its first-in-class therapies to inhibit nuclear LSD1.