ai-protein-design
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The Small Protein With a Big Job
AI Proteins designs tiny medicines from scratch, then asks its robots whether the molecules can actually do the work. A Bristol Myers Squibb deal shows the appeal; the laboratory still has the last word.
Outpace Bio
Outpace Bio is a Seattle biotech using AI-powered de novo protein design to program immune cells - especially CAR T cells - that can recognize and destroy solid tumors while limiting harmful side effects. Spun out of Lyell Immunopharma in 2021 by Institute for Protein Design alumni, the company has raised roughly $199M and is advancing its lead candidate, OPB-101, a mesothelin-targeted CAR T therapy for platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, toward the clinic.
Nabla Bio
Nabla Bio is a Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech building AI plus wet-lab technology to design antibodies and protein therapeutics from scratch. Its Joint Atomic Modeling (JAM) platform generates de novo binders against historically undruggable membrane proteins like GPCRs, and the company has signed collaborations with AstraZeneca, Bristol Myers Squibb, and Takeda worth over a billion dollars in potential payments.
Surge Biswas
Surge Biswas is the co-founder and CEO of Nabla Bio, a Cambridge, Massachusetts biotech that designs antibodies with AI. As a graduate student in George Church's Harvard lab he helped pioneer protein language modeling, a technique now central to machine-learning-guided protein design. At Nabla he built JAM, a generative system he calls 'molecular auto-complete' that designs therapeutic antibodies from a target sequence alone, including against notoriously undruggable membrane proteins like GPCRs. The company has raised roughly $37M and struck collaborations with Takeda, AstraZeneca, and Bristol Myers Squibb worth over a billion dollars in potential payments.