A next-generation quantum computing based approach to enzyme targeted drug discovery

Kuano is a techbio startup dedicated to bringing the latest innovation and technology for drug discovery to the pharmaceutical industry. As part of their long term strategy to unlock currently undruggable enzymes they are developing advanced simulation approaches to target complex quantum systems.

This Feasibility Study seeks to exploit novel algorithms to study key details of drug design targets inaccessible to alternative technologies using near term quantum computing.

Kuano intends to use simulation to tackle quantum complex drug targets such as metal containing enzymes (metalloenzymes). These systems exhibit complicated long range interactions (called "correlations") that are largely inaccessible to conventional computational approaches. The company has previously developed a platform capable of selecting the most important regions of such targets to enable proof of concept simulations. This project will build on this to link the existing platform to quantum computing resources and to enable the use of new calculations that capture dynamic features particularly relevant in metalloenzymes (as well as other industrial applications).

Kuano has partnered with Professor Andrew Green of University College London (UCL) and the National Quantum Computing Centre (NQCC). Professor Green is an expert in quantum computing algorithms for modelling chemical systems and will help develop and benchmark simulation approaches. NQCC will provide support in accessing and using quantum computing resources.

The project output will be a new simulation engine for the Kuano drug design platform designed to unlock targets with intermediate-to-high levels of entanglement, providing a step-change for Kuano and the UK drug development industry.