IBM to find cure for dengue

BANGALORE, INDIA: IBM, the University of Texas Medical Branch and the University of Chicago today launched a new research effort to search for drugs that may cure or treat dengue fever, West Nile encephalitis and a host of related diseases including Yellow Fever and Hepatitis C.

The project, “Discovering Dengue Drugs – Together,” will use the vast computational research power of World Community Grid, with the power equivalent to one of world’s top five supercomputers, yet comprised of individual volunteers who are donating unused computer time.

Calculations will be run on World Community Grid to find the best combinations of drug molecules that will inhibit the replication of the viruses that cause dengue, West Nile encephalitis, Yellow fever and Hepatitis C. Once these are identified, researchers can begin testing these drugs to determine their effectiveness, an IBM statement said.

“Viral diseases such as dengue continue to be a serious public health concern around the world because there are no known drugs to effectively treat them,” says Dr Maharaj Kishan Bhan, secretary, Department of Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and Technology, Government of India. “Continued research and global collaboration is needed so that scientists can better understand these viruses and then develop treatments that could save many lives. World Community Grid is a good step in this direction”

Researchers estimate that this project will need about 50,000 years of computational power. Running on World Community Grid, the project will be completed in approximately one year. The more computer power volunteered, the faster the research will be conducted.

The first phase of the project will target the proteins that enable the virus to replicate and will match them against a database of six million drug molecules that might inhibit the replication. The second phase, which is more difficult, will analyze which of the drug molecules actually bind tightly to the protein, so that it does, in fact, inhibit replication. From this, researchers will walk away with several dozen molecules that they can begin testing in the laboratory, which is the next phase of new drug development.

“Anyone with a computer and Internet access can be a part of the solution to address this very critical health concern,” said Dr. Daniel Dias, director, IBM India Research Laboratory. “Simply by donating our unused computer cycle time, we can all have a profound effect on how quickly this team can move to the next phase of drug discovery. For example, if 100,000 volunteers sign up within the first week for this project, it could reduce the time required to complete calculations by 50 percent.”