BOSTON - With COVID-19 still dominating headlines around the world, a greater shift in the public appreciation of biomedical research and drug discovery is underway. Increased media coverage of the time and cost involved in developing new drugs and vaccines have been in the spotlight, including questions about the efficacy and speed of the process, as well as the impact of its outcomes. 

As a medical doctor who moved into research and completed a DPhil in Oncology at the University of Oxford, my motivation is to bring new and better therapies to patients around the world. New treatments are desperately needed, not just for COVID-19, but for cardiovascular diseases, cancer, neurodegeneration, and many other ills. I was a resident oncologist before moving into drug discovery, and so know first-hand the need for better treatments. 

Traditional drug discovery is slow, expensive, and error-prone. Most research is done manually. Options for lab-based research are either in-house scientists or outsourced experimentation using contract research organizations (CROs). Both are fraught with disadvantages: inefficient deployment of intellectually valuable human resources; low utilization rates of expensive scientific equipment; operational inflexibilities; low