Drug Discovery Processes

R&D of pharmaceutical products require lengthy period that spans over ten years and enormous cost.
Prior to market launch, new drugs undergo a long and complicated series of steps, including an evaluation of efficacy and safety, application for approval, and investigation and approval of drug applications by regulatory authorities.
This figure shows how the R&D process at Takeda is structured like an orchestra.

Pharmaceutical R&D Stages

[*] SNPs:
Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms. A DNA sequence variation that involves the difference of a single nucleotide in the genome between the members of a species. Because of its relevance to differences in physical makeup, etc. among individuals, its research findings may be applied to the search for disease-related genes, disease risk diagnosis, and research into drug response and adverse drug reactions.

[*] Research on Orphan Receptors:
It is known that the binding of a ligand to a receptor on the cell surface can cause the cell to display various types of bioactivity. Receptors whose ligands have not yet been identified are called orphan receptors. Researching functions of orphan receptors opens up the possibility for discovering novel receptor antagonists or agonists, which are expected to become innovative new drugs.
Currently, about half of the world's best-selling pharmaceuticals act on receptors. One of Takeda's approaches in basic research is to study orphan receptors (receptors with unknown functions). Our unique approach consists of using the genetic information for orphan receptors to search for their endogenous ligands. This approach has already led to some significant findings.