Top scientists and investors believe a new Israeli-US AI can improve drug efficacy and safety, reduce development costs and minimize animal testing.

Billions of dollars, hundreds of mice and decades of years are sacrificed to research and development for the average pharmaceutical – with no guarantee of success. Nothing about that equation makes sense anymore.

And that’s why some of the most impressive minds in science are behind Israeli startup Quris, which is rolling out the world’s first clinical-prediction AI (artificial intelligence) platform to evaluate the safety and efficacy of new drugs.

This newly launched, highly scalable automated platform can test thousands of novel drug candidates at once, on hundreds of miniaturized “patients-on-a-chip.”

Using AI to predict which drug candidates will safely work in humans is expected to improve efficacy and cut drug development costs dramatically.

Israeli Nobel laureate Dr. Aaron Ciechanover and Moderna cofounder Robert S. Langer are actively involved in guiding the science, technology and strategy of Quris, dual-headquartered in Boston and Tel Aviv.

“We are at the tipping point of the modernization of drug discovery. I think the Quris platform could be of significant value to pharma companies and the health of society at large,” said Langer, one of 12 Institute Professors at MIT.

Saving money and time is the biggest advantage. Eliminating or at least minimizing the use of rodents in drug testing is also important, and not only for animal welfare reasons.

“We are not mice, so what works in animal-based trials is not a proper indicator of what will work for people,” explained Ciechanover, a physician and research professor at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa.

“Using a breakthrough way to test drug candidates on miniaturized patients on chips, Quris can demonstrate their safety and efficacy, or lack thereof, through preliminary chip-based clinical trials. This has never been done before,” said Ciechanover.