{"id":244661,"date":"2026-09-30T01:34:19","date_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:34:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/09\/ai-structure-prediction-speeds-discovery-of-molecular-glues-to-treat-disease"},"modified":"2026-09-30T01:34:19","modified_gmt":"2026-09-30T06:34:19","slug":"ai-structure-prediction-speeds-discovery-of-molecular-glues-to-treat-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2026\/09\/ai-structure-prediction-speeds-discovery-of-molecular-glues-to-treat-disease","title":{"rendered":"AI structure prediction speeds discovery of \u2018molecular glues\u2019 to treat disease"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/ai-structure-prediction-speeds-discovery-of-molecular-glues-to-treat-disease.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>A Baylor College of Medicine-led team has developed a strategy that combines the analysis of thousands of proteins with artificial intelligence to accelerate the discovery of small molecules called molecular glues to treat disease. Their approach, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nature.com\/articles\/s41467-026-77657-z\" target=\"_blank\">published<\/a> in <i>Nature Communications<\/i>, has uncovered a new class of molecular glues that could neutralize harmful proteins linked to blood cancers and autoimmune diseases. The work also shows how AI-based structural modeling can help chemists optimize compounds well before experiments reveal how they work.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMany scientists are increasingly exploring a new way to treat disease: Instead of blocking harmful proteins, they aim to eliminate them entirely. One promising approach uses molecular glues, which act like matchmakers inside cells,\u201d said senior and co-corresponding author Dr. Jin Wang, director of the Center for NextGen Therapeutics and Michael E. DeBakey, M.D., endowed professor in pharmacology and in the Verna and Marrs McLean Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at Baylor. Wang also is a member of Baylor\u2019s Dan L Duncan Comprehensive Cancer Center.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThese compounds bring a target protein to the cell\u2019s natural protein-disposal machinery, which destroys the target. In this study, our team discovered and optimized a new class of molecular glues that selectively remove a protein called VAV1, an important regulator of immune cell function that has been linked to blood cancers and autoimmune diseases,\u201d Wang said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Baylor College of Medicine-led team has developed a strategy that combines the analysis of thousands of proteins with artificial intelligence to accelerate the discovery of small molecules called molecular glues to treat disease. Their approach, published in Nature Communications, has uncovered a new class of molecular glues that could neutralize harmful proteins linked to [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":427,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-244661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/427"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244661\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}