Drug Repositioning Service
The academic community, biotechnology, and pharmaceutical industries are actively exploring new therapeutic areas for approved drugs. CD ComputaBio provides professional computational drug repositioning services for pharmaceutical companies and research institutions, helping to discover new drug value and accelerate the development of new drugs in areas such as rare diseases.
Introduction to Drug Repositioning
Drug repositioning, also known as drug repurposing, refers to finding new uses for existing drugs. Initially, drug repositioning primarily targeted drugs that had fallen into the public domain or become generic. Now, its scope has expanded to include drugs that failed clinical trials due to toxicity or insufficient efficacy, or were withdrawn from the market due to safety concerns. The theoretical basis of drug repositioning is the shared biological targets of diseases and the polypharmacology of drugs. Currently, computational methods are used to analyze the relationships between diseases, drugs, and targets, exploring new therapeutic indications by mining the approved biological activities or side effects of drugs.
Fig.1 A repurposing study on FDA-approved drugs. (De Vita S, et al., 2020)
Marketed Repositioned Drugs
| Drug |
Structure |
New Indication |
| Aspirin |
 |
Preventing the development of many cancers, and in particular colorectal cancer. |
| Thalidomide |
 |
A first-line treatment for multiple myeloma. |
| Sildenafil |
 |
Acting on the same target (PDE5) to treat both erectile dysfunction and pulmonary arterial hypertension. |
| Dimethyl Fumarate |
 |
Used in another autoimmune disease, namely multiple sclerosis (MS). |
Our Services
Compared to observation-driven drug repositioning based on clinical trials or practice, and experimental methods such as binding assays or experimental phenotypic screening, CD ComputaBio provides computational drug repositioning services. We explore the biological associations among drugs, diseases, and targets, systematically identifying new drug repositioning opportunities.
Workflow of Computational Drug Repositioning
Defining the drug repositioning strategy, including genomics, chemical structure and molecular information, phenomics, etc., and exploring public databases and literature resources to extract relevant data.
Computational Method Determination
Determining the computational drug repositioning methods, such as data mining, machine learning, network analysis, etc., and utilizing these methods to construct models or networks to analyze the potential interactions between drugs and targets.
Using evaluation metrics, such as cross-validation, accuracy, etc., to validate the constructed model. Ensure the reliability and accuracy of the model through rigorous evaluation, providing a solid foundation for subsequent drug repositioning predictions.
New Indication Prediction
Utilizing the validated model to predict the potential therapeutic effects and new indications of existing drugs, discovering potential new uses for drugs through computational methods, and providing scientific evidence for drug repositioning.
Approaches to Drug Repositioning
Data Mining-Based
Leveraging text mining and other methods, hidden information is extracted from vast amounts of gene, drug, and disease-related literature and databases, uncovering potential drug repositioning opportunities.
Machine Learning-Based
Employing algorithms such as naive bayes, support vector machines, and deep neural networks, biomedical data is analyzed through model training to predict drug-disease associations, enabling drug repositioning.
Network Analysis-Based
Constructing biological networks of genes, proteins, drugs, etc., their interactions and relationships are analyzed, revealing drug mechanisms of action and therapeutic potential, identifying repositioning candidates.
Drug Similarity-Based
Similarity analysis of drug structures and pharmacological characteristics allows for the prediction of analogous biological activities and target engagement, facilitating the identification of potential repurposed drugs.
CD ComputaBio is committed to providing clients with professional drug repositioning services, aiding in the discovery of new indications for existing drugs. If you are interested in our drug repositioning services or have any questions, please feel free to contact us. Our team of computational biology experts is dedicated to serving you.
Reference:
- De Vita, S.; et al. Accelerating the repurposing of FDA-approved drugs against coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19)[J]. RSC advances. 2020, 10(67): 40867-40875.
* For Research Use Only.
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