09 July 2025
Category: Drug Discovery and Development I
AI in Drug Development
Written By: Pharmacally Medical News Desk
Isomorphic Labs, a wholly owned subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., has announced the commencement of human trials for its first AI-designed drug. The molecule is still undisclosed for competitive and regulatory reasons. This announcement is an important step in bringing artificial intelligence (AI) and medicine together. It shows that AI is no longer just an idea for the future; it is now being tested and used in real medical situations and drug discovery processes.
This project is driven by AlphaFold 3, the newest version of a powerful AI tool that can accurately predict the shape of proteins and how they interact with other molecules. It was created by Isomorphic Labs and Google DeepMind, working together to shape the future of using computers and AI to discover new medicines.
About Isomorphic Labs
Isomorphic Labs was started in 2021 by Demis Hassabis, who is also the CEO and co-founder of Google DeepMind. The main goal of the company is to completely rethink how new medicines are discovered, using artificial intelligence (AI) from the very beginning of the process.
While DeepMind continues to focus on developing advanced AI technologies, Isomorphic Labs puts those AI tools to practical use. It applies them to real biological challenges, such as understanding how diseases work and designing new drugs to treat them.
Isomorphic Labs is working closely by connecting biology, physics, chemistry, and AI together, trying to make drug development faster and more successful. Normally, it takes 10 to 15 years to develop a new drug, and many trials fail along the way. The company’s goal is to use AI to lower failure rates and speed up this long and costly process.
Isomorphic Labs has collaborated with Novartis and Eli Lilly for drug discovery.
About AlphaFold
This breakthrough began with the launch of AlphaFold, an AI system developed by DeepMind in 2020. AlphaFold has solved a major scientific problem that had puzzled researchers for over 50 years: how to predict the 3D shape of proteins just from their amino acid sequences. This was a huge step forward because understanding protein structures is key to understanding how the human body works and how diseases develop.
AlphaFold had such a huge impact on science that its creators, John Jumper and Demis Hassabis, were awarded the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry. Their work was honored for helping decode the structural code of life, how proteins are shaped, which is essential to understanding biology and disease.
First into the Human Body
The complete details are not disclosed; early reports indicate that it is designed to act on a new and previously unexplored biological pathway, which is linked to a disease that currently lacks effective treatment options. The drug has shown promising results in preclinical studies, demonstrating favorable pharmacokinetics, along with low toxicity and strong effectiveness in early testing models. The drug was entirely developed using artificial intelligence, with little or no reliance on traditional high-throughput compound screening.
The Phase 1 trial, now underway in the UK and potentially expanding to Europe and the US, will assess:
In early-stage human trials, the focus will be on evaluating the drug’s safety and tolerability in healthy volunteers. Researchers will also study its pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics; additionally, the trials will help determine the optimal dose to be used in future clinical studies, ensuring both effectiveness and safety in patient populations.
This trial will employ adaptive design elements where AI tools may continue to monitor biomarker responses in real time, potentially guiding dosage adjustments mid-study
Next Step
According to company officials, this is only the beginning for Isomorphic Labs. The company is actively building a pipeline of AI-designed drugs targeting a wide range of conditions, including cancer, rare diseases, and infectious diseases. It is also forming strategic partnerships with top academic institutions and biotech companies to accelerate innovation. In parallel, Isomorphic Labs is working to expand AlphaFold 3’s capabilities beyond protein prediction into areas like RNA-targeting drugs, enzyme engineering, and vaccine design, opening up new frontiers in drug discovery.
References
Jumper, J et al. Highly accurate protein structure prediction with AlphaFold. Nature (2021).
Google’s secret weapon against cancer might be an AI algorithm, Business Today
DeepMind AlphaFold DB (2021–2024), https://www.alphafold.ebi.ac.uk
NobelPrize.org (2024), Chemistry Prize for Protein Structure Prediction
Isomorphic Labs official website, https://www.isomorphiclabs.com
DeepMind Research Blog: https://www.deepmind.com/blog
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