AION Labs, the Israeli innovation laboratory of AstraZeneca, Merck, Pfizer, Teva, Israel Biotech Fund and Amazon Web Services (AWS), is launching a first procedure to create a new venture based on the innovation model of the German BioMed X Institute * The call aims to identify global research talent for a new start-up company in the field of computational design from scratch of therapeutic antibodies
AION Labs, a first-of-its-kind innovation laboratory that stands at the forefront of adopting artificial intelligence and computational science technologies to build start-up companies to develop solutions to research challenges, and the German Independent Research Institute BioMed X, announced today the publication of the first call for proposals aimed at identifying scientists and inventors from the field of biomedicine to establish a new start-up company at the innovation laboratory AION Labs in Rehovot.
The startup team that will be selected by AION Labs will have the support and support of the industry's leading partners The Israel Innovation Authority. The calling voice is sponsored AstraZeneca, soup, Pfizer, nature and-Israel Biotech Fund, with close support of Amazon Web Services (AWS).
"We are excited to expand career opportunities for talented academic researchers in Israel," said Dr. Christian Tidona, founder and executive director of the BioMed X Institute. "AION Labs, located in the heart of 'startup nation', is the perfect place for biomedical researchers from around the world to learn how to become successful biotech entrepreneurs".
Therapeutic antibodies are used as life-saving drugs. The discovery of existing therapeutic antibodies relies on the generation of antibodies in animals or on laboratory screening of large predefined libraries covering a limited space of sequences. Selecting a drug candidate from millions of potential antibody sequences is a tedious and expensive task, and in many cases fails to identify useful antibodies. Developments from recent years in protein structure prediction, artificial intelligence algorithms and increased availability of antigen structures found in scientific experiments, create a unique opportunity for the discovery of antibodies with the help of artificial intelligence.
AION Labs invites computational biologists and scientists from the field of biomedicine from research laboratories in academia and industry to propose the development of the next generation of general computational platforms for the design of antibodies with high binding strength and appropriate biophysical behavior aimed at acting on selected proteins, where the starting point is the antigen structure or antigen sequence. AION Labs' pharma partners involved in the project will provide large amounts of data to train the model and offer their expertise in defining specifications and evaluating results. Priority will be given to original ideas that go beyond existing technologies.
"AION Labs is proud and excited to publish the first call", said Mati Gil, CEO of AION Labs. "We look forward to providing the selected startup with all the required resources and the guidance of our mentors during our joint work on developing an advanced solution, which will overcome the pharmaceutical challenge of selecting candidates for drug development from antibody sequences. And this is just the beginning."
As part of the online application process, applicants are asked to submit a competitive project proposal. After a preliminary screening round, the top candidates will be invited to a five-day 'training camp' for innovation that will take place in Rehovot. With the support of the experienced mentors from the pharma, hi-tech and venture capital industries, the winning team of scientists will receive guidance and direction throughout the incubation period, which will last up to four years towards becoming an independent startup.
More details about the calling voice can be found on the AION Labs website: www.aionlabs.com. Interested candidates are invited to apply through the BioMed X career area of the website https://career.bio.mx/call/2021-AIL-C01 Before December 12, 2021.
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