[opensourcepharma] OSP @ RHH 2015 will happen Sep 1-3

Tue Jun 9 15:17:11 UTC 2015

A tremendous paper Dimitrios, thanks for it.   And great  comments Mat and Bernard and Samir.

To continue the thought experiment, I wonder if there is a gaping need for more effort on what is perhaps the lowest of the low hanging fruit:

a)      Focused on approved drugs only

b)      With no IP hurdle  (generic, or otherwise no hurdle)

c)       Comprehensive or at least somewhat broad.

(I see a few narrower efforts- Univ of British Columbia, and Chicago-based Cures within Reach).  The Johns Hopkins Clinical Compound Screening Initiative (JHCCSI) looks promising, though their web site seems defunct.

d)      Open source and crowd powered

j

From: Dimitrios Tzalis [mailto:dtzalis at taros.de]
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2015 5:50 AM
To: Jaykumar Menon, Prof.
Cc: opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org; Peter Kolb
Subject: Re: [opensourcepharma] OSP @ RHH 2015 will happen Sep 1-3

Dear Jay,

this indeed is a very interesting approach and has gotten quite some attention for quite some time for obvious reasons.  There are ongoing activites in this area in the US as well as in Europe. There are quite a few initiatives where ADMET data is being made available on potential drug candidates in an Open Source approach. There was last year good review in 2013 on this topic by Minna Allarakhia

http://www.academia.edu/4964147/Open-source_approaches_for_the_repurposing_of_existing_or_failed_candidate_drugs

From: SKB IGIB EMAIL [mailto:skb at igib.res.in]
Sent: Tuesday, June 09, 2015 3:32 AM
To: Bernard Munos; Jaykumar Menon, Prof.
Cc: opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org
Subject: Re: [opensourcepharma] OSP @ RHH 2015 will happen Sep 1-3

Dear Bernard, I completely agree with you. We have taken this up as a low hanging fruits. I am in Weizmann Institute attending an International Conference Deep Sequencing Meets Structural biolology. Ada Yonath. Gave some new idea on combination drugs to combat drug resistance. regards. Samir

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone.
From: Bernard Munos
Sent: Tuesday, June 9, 2015 09:53
To: Jaykumar Menon, Prof.
Cc: opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org<mailto:opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org>
Subject: Re: [opensourcepharma] OSP @ RHH 2015 will happen Sep 1-3

Jay,

Drug repurposing is a powerful innovation model that should definitely be part of our remit. It is championed by NIH because for many diseases -- especially rare ones -- it is the most economical way to speed new therapies to market.

For the record, folks who are steeped in this thing distinguish between drug repurposing (the use of an approved drug for an entirely new indication) from drug rescue (the resurrection of a drug candidate that was abandoned before it was approved, but has been subsequently found to have activity against an entirely different disease).

The scientific rationale for drug repurposing is compelling. I keep a database of all the drugs approved that have been found to work on something else, and their number is in the hundreds. This is often the result of drugs modulating multiple targets that impact various diseases.

IP is not an issue with drug repurposing (at least not in the US) because many molecules are generic, and for those that are not, a decades-old Supreme Court case allows scientists to perform research on patented compounds. It also allows them to make and trade such compounds for research purposes -- something known as the Bolar exemption, after the now-defunct generic company that fought this case in court.

Drug rescue is more complicated because much of what is known about these candidates has not been published. (Sometimes, even the structure has not been disclosed.) Yet, that knowledge is key to figuring out what the drug might be good for. So, whoever wants to rescue a drug has to seek the collaboration of the patent owner. Pharma companies have recently become more open to this. I recently asked 5 big pharma companies whether they would entertain letting scientists from academia and other companies rescue some of their abandoned drug candidates, if the deal were structured to allow them to reacquire the candidate down the road for a "fair value" -- i.e., right of first refusal. They all said yes, although some stipulated that they wanted no liability and no obligation to supply trial material.

A big challenge in drug repurposing is building a library of approved compounds. When NCATS started its efforts some years back, it could not even get a list of approved drugs from FDA. (No kidding: it did not exist!) It took a couple of years to get that data. When it set out to buy the compounds, it found out that many were not available. They had been discontinued, or superseded by newer drugs. In quite a few cases, the recipe had been lost, and had to be recreated. If the compounds were available, the purity was not always acceptable; or the minimum order quantity was way too high; or re-supply was haphazard.

The drug repurposing industry has made big strides in the last couple of years. There are now specialized search engines to facilitate the discovery of new indications, and companies have been created to supply approved drugs "to anyone with an assay". So this is definitely something worth considering. If we go that route, we should leverage the experience of the pioneers who have been doing it -- e,g., NCATS or scientists such as Atul Butte at UCSF.

Hope this helps.

b

On Mon, Jun 8, 2015 at 8:02 PM, Jaykumar Menon, Prof. <jaykumar.menon at mcgill.ca<mailto:jaykumar.menon at mcgill.ca>> wrote:
Dear Peter,

Thanks for the note and all the superb effort!

And dear all,

There is so much to discuss and plan and make sense of, as the open source meme seems to be catching on.  (And a quick personal apologia - I’ve been buried in things operational – trying to add some heft and muscle to this discussion and movement, so sorry for my relative silence of late on the email list-serv.)  For the meeting at the Castle, as you can see from the spreadsheet, we are already at 14 attendees, a mix of  “new” and “old” blood (i.e. those who attended Bellagio and those who did not), hailing from San Francisco (Linux Foundation) to Seattle (a special person from Gates) to Oxford (Structural Genomics), with some heavy hitters, so let us know if you are interested soon, as this is again a small venue, and we are trying to get the optimal mix.  Suggestions of people are also welcome.

As those of you who were at Bellagio remember, this is a special group, and a special colloquy and movement, operating in a realm that is at the cutting edge of the cutting edge, yet animated by human need.  It is a union of those adept at concretizing dreams.  And it is superfun, a bonding experience.  Thanks again to Peter for securing such an unbelievable spot.

And as a precis and discussion starter, a question, perhaps foolish and ill-informed, considering the vast expertise in this group, but posed in the spirit of risk-taking and thinking big, is appended below.

With warm regards,
Jaykumar

Repurposing (admittedly imprecise and perhaps inaccurate description):    Repurposed drugs offer the prospect of huge cost savings.  The goal of repurposing is to deploy approved drugs or abandoned clinical candidates in new disease areas.  Directing such drugs – particularly those that are fully approved and off patent - towards new diseases can deliver cures at a fraction of the cost of developing a new drug.  This is due to savings in R&D expense and reduced clinical trial requirements.

A question came up recently in a discussion with a funder, and we novices didn’t know the answer, and I thought I’d take it to the group mind.

Would it make any sense to have a grand and almost comprehensive repurposing project, an Apollo project of sorts, where we look at essentially all/large numbers of generic drugs, to see their applicability against a particular condition (or many) of (public) health need?  Has it already been adequately done?  (There have been  efforts from NIH NCATS, working with under-patent drug candidates from pharma companies, but evidently not with generics and approved drugs, and other efforts too).  Would it be at all needed, feasible and fruitful?  If so, crowdsourcing and openness would seem to be essential.  It is thus a natural fit for those intrigued by open source pharma.

j

From: Peter Kolb [mailto:peter.kolb at uni-marburg.de<mailto:peter.kolb at uni-marburg.de>]
Sent: Monday, June 08, 2015 1:50 PM
To: opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org<mailto:opensourcepharma at lists.okfn.org>
Cc: Jaykumar Menon, Prof.; Matthew Todd
Subject: OSP @ RHH 2015 will happen Sep 1-3

Dear past and future OSP participants,

The 2015 meeting will take place on September 1-3, 2015, in castle Rauischholzhausen<https://goo.gl/maps/TmERX>, near Marburg (greater Frankfurt area), Germany.  Here are some key facts to assist in your planning:

  *   Arrival is possible from Aug 31, 10am. Departure is on Sep 3 after lunch. The conference program will run from Sep 1 morning until Sep 3 noon.
  *   Please sign up at http://tinyurl.com/osprhh by June 30 in order to participate. This spreadsheet also allows you to record dietary preferences as well as arrival and departure times.
  *   The easiest travel option is to fly into Frankfurt airport (FRA), then take a train<http://www.bahn.de/p_en/view/index.shtml> to Marburg (approx. 90 mins), followed by a short cab ride to the castle. More detailed instructions will follow to participants at a later time.
  *   Accommodation as well as meals and coffee breaks will be provided at the castle.
  *   We have secured some sponsorship and are trying to secure more.  The worst-case scenario, in case we completely fail to do so, will be a lodging fee of EUR 250 per person (covering all accommodation and meals for the 3-4 days, which is quite reasonable). Please do not let it be an impediment to registering initially; if you need to drop out later, that will be all right.
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to write!

Looking forward to a fruitful meeting in September,
Jay, Mat & Peter

--

P e t e r   K o l b

Emmy Noether Group Leader

Pharmaceutical Chemistry @ Philipps-University Marburg

Tel +49 6421 28 25908<tel:%2B49%206421%2028%2025908> | Fax +49 6421 28 28994<tel:%2B49%206421%2028%2028994>

http://www.kolblab.org

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http://www.glisten-gpcr.eu/

Editor | Journal of Postdoctoral Affairs

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