The Future of Small Molecular Drugs from the Perspective of Drug Discovery Chemistry Expansion from Small Molecules to Medium Molecules
Masanori TOBE (Former Senior Researcher, National Institute of Biomedical Innovation Policy)
(No.72: Published May 2018)
In the era of genomic drug discovery, where pharmaceutical modalities are diversifying, the market for biopharmaceuticals, as typified by antibody drugs, is expanding, and the composition of pharmaceutical modalities, which used to be dominated by small molecule drugs, is changing. However, in recent years, the hurdles to the creation of new drugs have been increasing due to the depletion of target molecules and the increasing difficulty of research and development, and there is widespread interest in what direction small molecule drugs will take in the future.
Against this background, we have decided to analyze the current status of small molecule drugs from a bird's eye view, focusing on drug discovery chemistry, and to explore the future image of small molecule drugs. In this article, the current status of small molecule drugs is analyzed in detail from the viewpoints of drug modality, companies creating new drugs, molecular weight, and target molecules.