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Rescuing drug discovery: in vivo systems pathology and systems pharmacology

Nature Reviews Drug Discovery volume 4, pages 961–967 (2005)Cite this article

Abstract

The pharmaceutical industry is currently beleaguered by close scrutiny from the financial community, regulators and the general public. Productivity, in terms of new drug approvals, has generally been falling for almost a decade and the safety of a number of highly successful drugs has recently been brought into question. Here, we discuss whether taking an in vivo systems approach to drug discovery and development could be the paradigm shift that rescues the industry.

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Figure 1: Flowchart for systems pathology and systems pharmacology.
Figure 2: Potential use of systems pathology and systems pharmacology to identify potential drug combinations for treating a disease.
Figure 3: Assessing the properties of a system in response to combination drug therapy.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank A. Adourian and P. Stroobant for helpful suggestions on the manuscript and for assistance with the figures.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. TNO Systems Biology, Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research, Utrechtseweg 48, PO BOX 360, AJ Zeist, 3700, The Netherlands

    Jan van der Greef

  2. Centre for Medical Systems Biology/Leiden Amsterdam Centre for Drug Research, Einsteinweg 55, PO BOX 9502, Leiden, 2300 RA, The Netherlands

    Jan van der Greef

  3. BG Medicine, Inc., 610 North Lincoln Street, Waltham, 02451, Massachusetts, USA

    Jan van der Greef

  4. BG Medicine, Inc., 610N Lincoln Street, Waltham, 02451, Massachusetts, USA

    Robert N. McBurney

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  2. Robert N. McBurney
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Competing interests

The authors declare that they have competing financial interests. R.N.McB. is an employee of, and a shareholder in, BG Medicine. J.v.d.G. is a member of the Research and Development Advisory Board of, and a shareholder in, BG Medicine.

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van der Greef, J., McBurney, R. Rescuing drug discovery: in vivo systems pathology and systems pharmacology. Nat Rev Drug Discov 4, 961–967 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1038/nrd1904

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