Machine Learning-Enabled Pipeline for Large-Scale Virtual Drug Screening

J Chem Inf Model. 2021 Sep 27;61(9):4236-4244. doi: 10.1021/acs.jcim.1c00710. Epub 2021 Aug 17.

Abstract

Virtual screening is receiving renewed attention in drug discovery, but progress is hampered by challenges on two fronts: handling the ever-increasing sizes of libraries of drug-like compounds and separating true positives from false positives. Here, we developed a machine learning-enabled pipeline for large-scale virtual screening that promises breakthroughs on both fronts. By clustering compounds according to molecular properties and limited docking against a drug target, the full library was trimmed by 10-fold; the remaining compounds were then screened individually by docking; and finally, a dense neural network was trained to classify the hits into true and false positives. As illustration, we screened for inhibitors against RPN11, the deubiquitinase subunit of the proteasome, and a drug target for breast cancer.

Publication types

  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural

MeSH terms

  • Drug Discovery*
  • Drug Evaluation, Preclinical
  • Machine Learning*
  • Molecular Docking Simulation
  • Neural Networks, Computer