Silicon Flexibility

While companies and academics are chasing proteomics to find new targets for drug discovery, Cyclica Inc. thinks the field is limited by the fact that most of the data derive from static 3D crystal structures that don't represent how proteins behave when they bind other molecules. The company has developed an in silicoplatform to model the flexibility around protein binding sites and is using the system to predict protein-drug interactions and flag possible toxicities.

But because its algorithms draw on large databases in the public domain, it's not clear whether its predictions will fall foul of the inaccuracies in experimental design and reporting that underlie much of the reproducibility crisis...