In a world where scientific breakthroughs are reshaping our understanding of human longevity, Dr. Ivan de Weber stands at the forefront of innovation. As the co-founder and CEO of Cortex Discover, he's leading a revolution in drug discovery that could dramatically accelerate the development of life-extending treatments.
A Childhood Dream Turned Scientific Pursuit
De Weber's journey began with a profound childhood realization about mortality. "One of my first memories was my parents telling me that people had died," he recalls. This early confrontation with the inevitability of death sparked a lifelong quest to extend human lifespan. By age 10, de Weber had already set his sights on immortality, a goal that would shape his entire academic and professional career. His path led him to pursue a Ph.D. in aging genetics, where he began to unravel the complex mechanisms of aging.
The Birth of Cortex Discover
As de Weber delved deeper into his research, he recognized a significant hurdle in the field of drug discovery: the time and cost associated with developing new treatments. This realization led to the creation of Cortex Discover, a company leveraging cutting-edge AI and machine learning technologies to revolutionize the drug discovery process.
Harnessing the Power of AI
Cortex Discover's approach is groundbreaking. Using deep graph neural networks, the company has developed a system capable of predicting a compound's properties with remarkable accuracy. By training their AI on a vast database of 260 million data points, Cortex can simultaneously predict around 2,000 different properties for any given molecule.
This technology has far-reaching implications:
- Virtual High-Throughput Screening: Cortex's AI can dramatically reduce the number of compounds that need to be physically tested, potentially saving millions of dollars and months of time in drug discovery campaigns.
- Comprehensive Property Prediction: Beyond just identifying active compounds, the AI can predict a wide range of pharmacological properties, including toxicity, solubility, and permeability.
- Novel Compound Discovery: The system has demonstrated an ability to identify entirely new families of molecules with desired properties, pushing the boundaries of drug discovery.
Proof in Practice
De Weber's claims aren't just theoretical. Cortex has already demonstrated the power of their technology through several successful proof-of-concept studies:
- In a COVID-19 study, five out of six compounds predicted by Cortex showed antiviral activity, with none exhibiting toxicity at the active dose.
- A collaboration with Stanford University led to the discovery of new antivirals.
- In cancer research, Cortex's predictions matched the precision of experimental reproducibility in identifying compounds that selectively kill cancer cells.
The Future of Longevity Research
With their technology proven, Cortex is now turning its attention to the field of longevity. De Weber and his team are initiating partnerships with key figures in longevity research, focusing on targets such as mTOR, NRF2, HDAC, and heat shock proteins. "We are about to send our first longevity compounds to be tested in vitro, and then in vivo in C. elegans," de Weber reveals, hinting at the exciting developments on the horizon.
A Vision for the Future
Developing new drugs is a notoriously slow and expensive process. The average drug takes over a decade and $2 billion to bring to market. Even then, the majority of drug candidates fail at some point during clinical trials. It's a staggeringly inefficient system that leaves patients waiting for life-saving treatments.
But what if I told you there's a technology that could cut that development time in half? That's exactly the breakthrough being pioneered by Cortex Discover. In a recent conversation, Dr. de Weber shared the remarkable capabilities of Cortex's AI-powered drug discovery platform. "We can literally save hundreds of millions and years in the development for each drug," he told me. "It's proven, it's been tested in different laboratories, it's fast and accurate."
The key is Cortex's ability to predict a drug candidate's pharmacological properties with near-perfect accuracy. Their deep learning models can screen millions of compounds per day, identifying the most promising hits with the same precision as real-world experiments. "We're the first to be as accurate as the experimental reproducibility," Dr. de Weber said proudly. "That's very important, because the high-throughput screening market is $18 billion, but this goes beyond just screening. We can parallelize things and really prevent a lot of the back-and-forth of compounds that are toxic."
This level of accuracy means Cortex can drastically reduce the expensive, time-consuming cycle of synthesizing new molecules, testing them in the lab, and then iterating. Instead, their AI can quickly identify the most viable candidates upfront, slashing development timelines from years down to mere months.
And Cortex isn't just focused on speed - they're also tackling one of the biggest challenges in drug discovery: finding truly novel compounds. Many AI approaches simply try to generate new "keys" to fit existing "locks" (drug targets). But without the ability to accurately predict how those new compounds will interact, the results are often unreliable "hallucinations."
In contrast, Cortex's models learn directly from experimental data on how molecular structures relate to biological activity. This allows them to identify genuinely new chemical scaffolds that could lead to first-in-class therapies. "We can really find compounds with new properties," Dr. de Weber explained. "The neural net is not simply stupidly copying some motifs. We are good at generalizing and finding new families of molecules."
Already, Cortex has demonstrated the power of their approach. During the COVID-19 pandemic, they rapidly identified several promising antiviral drug candidates, validating their predictions through experimental testing. And they're now applying the same techniques to tackle longevity - screening libraries of natural compounds and working with leading researchers to develop a pipeline of geroprotective therapies.
"My big objective is to survive," Dr. de Weber remarked. "All what we do in-house is to develop our longevity pipeline."
If Cortex can deliver on even a fraction of their ambitious goals, the implications could be profound. Affordable, effective treatments for age-related diseases. Therapies that could add decades to the human lifespan. A dramatic acceleration in the pace of medical innovation.
It's an audacious vision, to be sure. But when you see the data behind Cortex's technology, it starts to feel not just plausible, but inevitable. The future of drug discovery is here - and it's moving a lot faster than you might think.
If you're interest by AI-driven drug discovery 👇👇👇
ITW Dr. Ivan De Weber, PhD - Cofounder-CEO at Cortex Discovery
Exciting news! 🚀 Join us for the next episode of our LinkedIn Live podcast featuring Dr. Ivan De Weber, PhD Weber, co-founder and CEO of Cortex Discovery, a groundbreaking startup revolutionizing drug discovery through AI!
🔬 From Academia to AI-Powered Drug Discovery
Dr. de Weber's journey is nothing short of inspiring. We'll explore his transition from cellular biology and pharmaceutical bioinformatics to founding a company at the cutting edge of AI-driven drug discovery. Learn how his lifelong quest for longevity research led to the creation of Cortex Discovery.
🧠 Unveiling Cortex Discovery's Innovative Approach
Discover how Cortex Discovery is disrupting preclinical drug discovery across all therapeutic areas with their proprietary AI models. We'll delve into:
• Their foundation model for drug property predictions
• The vast database of 750 million data points powering their deep learning system
• Recent breakthroughs, including the first AI-discovered compound proven to extend lifespan in a whole organism
💼 Business Insights and Future Outlook
Get an insider's perspective on:
• Cortex Discovery's unique business model and collaboration opportunities
• Challenges faced in the AI-driven drug discovery landscape
• The company's vision for the future of longevity research and pharmaceutical development
This episode is a must-watch for:
• Biotech and pharmaceutical executives
• Investors in the life sciences sector
• Academic researchers in pharmaceutical chemistry, longevity biology, and clinical medicine
• Anyone interested in the intersection of AI and drug discovery
Don't miss this opportunity to gain valuable insights into the future of AI-powered drug discovery and longevity research. Tune in to our LinkedIn Live podcast and be part of the conversation shaping the future of medicine!