NIT Andhra Pradesh Encourages Research in “Drug Discovery: From lab to industry”

Hyderabad: National Institute of Technology Andhra Pradesh is encouraging its faculty and researchers towards advancements in the field of Drug Development.

Drug Discovery is about structure-based drug designing by high throughput screening and then understanding the pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics of the molecules to analyze its therapeutic potential.

Towards this, the Institute is organizing a five-day online faculty development programme on ‘Drug Discovery: From lab to industry’ from 23rd to 27th August 2021.

This Faculty Development Program aims to bring advancements in the field of Biomedical, healthcare and drug discovery research.

Addressing the inaugural event, Prof. C.S.P. Rao, Director, NIT Andhra Pradesh, said, “Research should be emphasised more on drug discovery and its delivery for recovering from various diseases by culminating science with modern technology. In addition, emphasised on bridging the gaps in development of novel drugs by computation-based approaches like high throughput virtual screening, structure-based drug designing, pharmacokinetics of lead molecules and application of recent technology in healthcare sector. Thus, this FDP will encourage the participants especially research scholars, scientist, and faculty members for carrying out translational research using computational tools for bringing the drugs from lab to industry”

This Five-day Faculty Development Programme was intended for faculties, scientists, research scholars and industry professionals working in Drug discovery research as well as pharma sector, to impart advanced knowledge and cover the following core areas:

Ø Structure Based Drug Designing

Ø High throughput virtual screening of lead compounds

Ø Computational techniques to be used in Drug Development

Ø Pharmacodynamics and Pharmacokinetics of molecules

Ø Role of Technology in Healthcare

Delivering the Inaugural lecture, Dr. T. Jagan Mohan Rao, Head, Department of Biotechnology, NIT Andhra Pradesh, said, “The catastrophic effect caused by COVID-19 pandemic has hampered the human life significantly. Scientist across the globe is now looking forward to find novel drugs and therapeutics to curb the menace of diseases caused by microbial infections. Approximately, it will take around 10-15 years for any viable drug to enter the global market as it should pass through rigorous preclinical and clinical trials to get FDA approval. In addition, highlighted the significance of modern Insilco technologies for drug development to minimize the time duration involved in screening and development of drugs”.

The Top Outcomes from this five-day Online Training include:

Ø Inputs to minimize challenges and give possible solutions for the development of novel drugs for treating numerous diseases

Ø Understanding the phases, a molecule has to go through for becoming a commercial drug

Ø Ideas to reduce the incubation time of these molecules in the process of drug development.

Delivering a lecture on Drug Designing’, Prof. Pallu Reddana, from University of Hyderabad, “Fundamental aspects of drug discovery process by identifying the target drug specific to the receptors. He highlighted the importance of choosing the in vitro and in vivo bioassay for the identification of lead molecules. He explained the role significance of analyzing the efficacy and safety of drug molecules using animal model studies. Followed by the importance of phase I, II, III and IV clinical trials which will help in placing the drug in the market. He also addressed the impact of Omics technology in drug discovery process and emphasized on the current advancements in the technology”.

Delivering the vote of thanks, Dr. MRDS Nitish Venkateswarulu Department of Biotechnology, NIT Andhra Pradesh, said, “Thanks to Prof C.S. P Rao, Director, NIT Andhra Pradesh, and Registrar in charge Dr. P. Dinesh Sankar Reddy, for gracing the occasion and sparing their valuable time for the inaugural ceremony of the FDP. Expressed his thanks to the speakers who have accepted the invitation to deliver technical lectures in the FDP. Also conveyed his thanks to Convener, Dr. T. Jagan Mohan Rao, Head, Department of Biotechnology, NIT Andhra Pradesh, and Faculty coordinator, Dr. Shreya Dubey for organising such an interesting FDP. He also thanked all the participants of the FDP”

Other Top speakers at the event included:

Ø Prof. Pallu Reddana, UOH-Hyderabad

Ø Dr. Anthony Addiagatta, IICT-Hyderabad

Ø Prof. Naidu Subbarao, JNU-Delhi

Ø Prof. S. Rajagopal, UOH -Hyderabad

Ø Dr. Sonali Khanra and Dr. Vikas, Head, T-Hub, IIIT-Hyderabad

The research interests of faculty members include, Biochemical and Biophysical research, Molecular Modelling and Simulation, Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Drug Delivery and Phytopharmacology, and Healthcare innovations.