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A New Mode of Cancer Treatment

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322 points atomroflbomber | 2 comments | 03 Aug 23 08:12 UTC | HN request time: 0.475s | source
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flobosg ◴[03 Aug 23 19:43 UTC] No.36990769[source]▶
Martin Shkreli (yes, that Martin Shkreli) is currently running a virtual screen for additional PCNA inhibitors: https://twitter.com/wagieeacc/status/1687137621699436552
replies(2): >>36993213 #>>36995268 #
1. soVeryTired ◴[03 Aug 23 22:55 UTC] No.36993213[source]▶
Can you explain what's going on there? Sounds like he's doing something to prevent patenting of drugs but I don't follow what it is.
replies(1): >>36995834 #
2. flobosg ◴[04 Aug 23 05:32 UTC] No.36995834[source]▶
Virtual screening[1] is a computational technique where you take an experimentally resolved structure of a protein (PCNA in this case) and sequentially dock a large amount of different compounds to see which ones of them bind favorably to the target protein. It is worth mentioning that virtual screening is a very early step in a drug discovery pipeline. These hits need to be characterized and validated experimentally to see if there is an actual effect.

I am not well-versed in intellectual property (so please correct me if I’m wrong), but in this case Shkreli is using a database of commercially available compounds (ZINC) and a hit present in the screen could be patented. He said he won’t do it, and, since this could be considered prior art, nobody else can do a claim.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_screening