The pharmaceutical R&D process years, costly ($30 Mn – $1300Mn)

Risks in research and development of pharmaceutical drugs (Preziosi, P. 2004, Nature Reviews in Drug Discovery 3, )

The pharmaceutical R&D process many different ways to innovate Innovation in discovery: identifying new molecules, new drug candidates - Basic research to understand critical pathways that can be blocked - Development of test systems to model these pathways - Screening of large number of molecules (=libraries) to identify « hits » - Hit-to-lead characterisation and selection: druggability - Lead-optimisation: more potent, better absorbed, less toxic,

The pharmaceutical R&D process many different ways to innovate new or better uses of existing molecules / treatments

Nitroimidazoles: rediscovered drug candidates for protozoal diseases Extensive literature / patent review, including personal consultations with researchers (previously) active on this class of compounds to uncover possible compounds of interest >600 compounds identified from >15 sources; assessed in in vitro / in vivo disease models; several series with promising activity identified 1 new drug candidate in clinical development for sleeping sickness: fexinidazole (off-patent): Compound mining: creative utilization of existing knowledge

The pharmaceutical R&D process many different ways to innovate