(credit: InSilico Medicine)
Insilico Medicine and Life Extension announced today an exclusive collaboration to identify novel biomarkers of human aging through the use of big-data analytics and AI, with the ultimate goal of discovery and formulation of nutrients to support health and longevity.
Insilico Medicine* is a big-data analytics company specializing in applying advances in deep learning to discovery of biomarkers and drugs. Life Extension**, a Florida-based organization established in the early 1980s, is a dietary-supplement innovator dedicated to extending healthy human longevity.
Insilico Medicine will focus on applying advanced signaling pathway activation analysis techniques and deep-learning algorithms to find nutraceuticals that mimic the tissue-specific transcriptional response of many known interventions and pathways associated with health and longevity.
Life Extension will use this information to develop novel nutraceutical products to support health and longevity, such as “geroprotectors” — precision natural organic small-molecule formulations that slow down or even reverse age-associated conditions and damage.
“Senescence is accompanied by a shift in cellular signaling that initiates and promotes a system-wide degenerative condition,” William Faloon, co-founder of the Life Extension Foundation, told KurzweilAI. “By turning back ‘on’ youthful signaling pathways while suppressing those that emerge during normal maturation, we expect to gain significant control over what are now thought to be inevitable pathologies of old age.”
“This collaboration means a lot to our team. For many years I was buying a range of supplements from Life Extension, and saw how passionate they are about extending healthy human life and supporting cutting-edge research in the field,” said Alex Zhavoronkov, PhD, CEO of Insilico Medicine, Inc. and the chief science officer of the Biogerontology Research Foundation in the UK. “Life Extension’s discovery research and product development teams have decades of experience in the pharmaceutical and nutraceutical research and have set very high standards for science-based nutraceutical discovery.”
Insilico Medicine scientists will present the results of this collaboration at RAADFest in San Diego in August, a longevity-focused conference.
Applying deep-learning techniques to aging
Insilico Medicine scientists have recently authored key papers on applying deep-learning techniques to biomedical applications in influential peer-reviewed journals, including “Developing criteria for evaluation of geroprotectors as a key stage toward translation to the clinic,” published in Aging Cell.
Other papers include “Deep learning applications for predicting pharmacological properties of drugs and drug repurposing using transcriptomic data” in Molecular Pharmaceutics, a journal published by the American Chemical Society; “Applications of Deep Learning in Biomedicine“, also in Molecular Pharmaceutics; and “Deep biomarkers of human aging: Application of deep neural networks to biomarker development” in Aging, a high-impact journal in aging research.
“We believe that accelerating the rate of progress in novel biomarker identification, as well as precision nutrient formulation development, is critical,” said Andrew G. Swick, Ph.D., senior vice president of scientific affairs, discovery research and product development for Life Extension.
“Life Extension aims to improve health and human longevity by utilizing the experience of noted research scientists and engaging in academic and industry collaborations. Artificial intelligence is one of the promising areas, where years of experience in the nutraceutical industry combined with sophisticated biologically inspired algorithms and high-performance computing may produce unprecedented results.”
* Insilico Medicine, Inc. is a bioinformatics company located at the Emerging Technology Centers at the Johns Hopkins University Eastern campus in Baltimore, with R&D resources in Belgium, Russia, and Poland. It utilizes advances in genomics, big-data analysis, and deep learning for in silico drug discovery and drug repurposing for aging and age-related diseases. The company pursues internal drug discovery programs in cancer, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, sarcopenia, and geroprotector discovery. Through its Pharma.AI division, the company provides advanced machine-learning services to biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and skin-care companies.
** A trailblazer in the $35 billion U.S. dietary supplement industry for the past 36 years, Life Extension’s core mission is to extend the healthy human life span using an integrative approach by reporting on and funding cutting-edge scientific research. Life Extension Buyers Club (Life Extension) offers a full-range of premium-quality vitamins, minerals, and hormones as well as unique, specially made formulas. The company’s products are developed based on the latest scientific studies from peer-reviewed medical journals and are continually updated as new information occurs.