Neuroscience and Psychiatry: Open Access

New Finding On Target Based Drug Discovery

 In the fields of drugs , biotechnology and pharmacology, drug discovery is that the process by which new candidate medications are discovered. Historically, drugs were discovered by identifying the active ingredient from traditional remedies or by serendipitous discovery, like penicillin. More recently, chemical libraries of synthetic small molecules, natural products or extracts were screened in intact cells or whole organisms to spot substances that had a desirable therapeutic effect in a process known as classical pharmacology. After sequencing of the human genome allowed rapid cloning and synthesis of huge quantities of purified proteins, it's become common practice to use high throughput screening of huge compounds libraries against isolated biological targets which are hypothesized to be disease-modifying during a process referred to as reverse pharmacology. Hits from these screens are then tested in cells then in animals for efficacy. Modern drug discovery involves the identification of screening hits, medicinal chemistry and optimization of these hits to extend the affinity, selectivity, efficacy and oral bioavailability. Once a compound that fulfills all of those requirements has been identified, the method of drug development can continue, and, if successful, clinical trials are developed. Modern drug discovery is thus usually a capital-intensive process that involves large investments by pharmaceutical industry corporations also as national governments. Despite advances in technology and understanding of biological systems, drug discovery remains a lengthy, "expensive, difficult, and inefficient process" with low rate of latest therapeutic discovery.  

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