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Can complexity be commercialized?

Nature Biotechnology volume 22, pages 1223–1229 (2004)Cite this article

Big pharma is dabbling in systems biology, a few brave entrepreneurs are trying to make a business out of it, but investor caution may keep those in the field from really making it big in drug development.

Today's high-throughput technologies have dumped reams of information on the disc drives of computers at every major drug developer. Some think systems biology players may hold the keys to putting all that information together to speed up drug discovery and development and to make it much more efficient. There is a crying need for a better approach to drug development, with the high cost—both in time and money—of producing a new blockbuster drug. Moreover, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA; Rockville, MD) is currently seeing a 50% failure rate among drugs in late-stage phase 3 trials, according to Lester M. Crawford, acting commissioner of the FDA.

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Figure 1: Top-down versus bottom-up approaches.
Figure 2: Cell cycle model showing G1-S transition and the highly connected p53 node.
Figure 3: Beyond Genomics Correlation Network: Up- and downregulated genes, proteins and metabolites in a mammalian disease model versus controls ('normals').

References

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  1. freelance writer based, Columbia, South Carolina

    George S Mack

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  1. George S Mack
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Mack, G. Can complexity be commercialized?. Nat Biotechnol 22, 1223–1229 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt1004-1223

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt1004-1223

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