Projects

This project assembles the largest and most diverse research and service-providing instrument to study infectious diseases in Europe, with expertise from structural biology to clinical trials. By giving scientists access to the whole extent of our state-of-the-art facilities, cutting-edge services, advanced equipment and expertise, in an integrated way and with a common goal, we will accelerate the generation of new knowledge and intervention tools to enhance Europe’s capacity for controlling (re)emerging and epidemic infectious diseases.

Revolutionizing the drug repurposing landscape in Europe by developing a comprehensive, accessible and standardized platform that provides the expertise, tools and resources needed at all stages of the repurposing journey. Our recent contribution to this project includes the evaluation of the publicly available patent database, SureChEMBL, to chemically annotate existing drugs in terms of their similarity and clinical success from a drug repurposing perspective.

Targeted degradation as a new mode of drug action): The ProxiDETECT sub-project aims to develop a versatile assay, screening and molecular profiling platform for the identification and characterisation of prodrug molecules, with a particular focus on molecular glues for the treatment of neurological diseases. It will extend the PROXIDRUGS toolbox to include a degradation-focused compound library, signal-on screening assays, novel reporter molecules and a platform for mechanistic studies in a disease-relevant cellular context.

Advanced computational drug design has revolutionized drug discovery. Combined with high-throughput biochemical and phenotypic screening, it enables the rapid development of new drugs. The research team on the EU-funded EXSCALATE4CoV project will use the EXSCALATE platform, which includes the most promising commercial drugs that are safe for humans, to identify specific inhibitors for COVID-19. The strategy involves computational matching of these drugs with 3D models of the viral proteins, followed by biochemical assays and phenotypic screening of the most promising candidates. Molecules that can block viral replication will then be forwarded for further development and approval.

To ensure that EU-OPENSCREEN continues to offer a comprehensive suite of relevant services and support a growing user community to conduct forefront research, IMPULSE will develop, validate and integrate new services in AI/ML, new chemical modalities, and innovative disease-relevant cell models combined with CRISPR-Cas9/RNAi-based genetic screening. The project will work towards the implementation of common operational and data standards to increase data reproducibility and FAIRness. Bespoke outreach and training activities will raise awareness among key user groups of its new services and advance operational excellence and reproducibility in pre-clinical drug discovery.