Patenting AI Tools of Drug Discovery



Downstream Claims

Having drafted many patents on the AI aspects of AI tools of drug discovery, we now endeavor to draft “downstream claims” that capture the value of the downstream product that emerges from the commercial implementation of such AI tools in the drug development pipeline (e.g., a therapeutic agent that passes through preclinical and clinical study to emerge as a multi-billion blockbuster drug).

Product-By-Process Claims

As a gateway to the downstream claims, we draft “product-by-process” claims that impart the backend ingenuity of such AI tools to their frontend output. We use a patentable and structural characterization of the frontend output as the underpinning of a broad downstream claim that covers later stages of the drug development pipeline like target discovery and lead discovery.

PrimateAI Case Study

We use the patented disclosure of a leading variant classification tool called PrimateAI as a case study to demonstrate how our downstream claims, informed by by our product-by-process claims, advance PrimateAI to later stages of the drug development pipeline.


Target
Discovery

Lead
Discovery

Preclinical
Research

Clinical
Research

Process
Development

Manufacturing
& Testing

Drug Development Pipeline

PrimateAI’s patents
place it here.


Can we draft patent claims that place PrimateAI here?


How about here?


PrimateAI Case Study

PrimateAI Publication

We studied forward citations to PrimateAI’s publication in Nature Genetics to understand where and how PrimateAI is being discussed.

PrimateAI Source Code

We analyzed genomics platforms that implement PrimateAI’s source code on GitHub to understand where and how PrimateAI is being used.

PrimateAI Scores

We found prevalent use of PrimateAI’s output called “PrimateAI Scores” for target discovery like identifying cancer driver mutations, Alzheimer's disease risk genes, and other loss-of-function variants.

Illumina’s AI Pact with AstraZeneca

Illumina’s AI Pact with AstraZeneca validates our findings that PrimateAI Scores are the “commercial speartip” of PrimateAI that are being used for drug discovery.

“Few things are harder to put up with than the annoyance of a good example.”


  1. Patentable AI Output: Draft product-by-process claims that broadly transfers the patentable weight of AI’s backend intricacies to its frontend output.

  2. Integrate Patentable AI Output into Target Discovery: Draft downstream claims that identifies a target that is structurally implied by the patentable AI product of 1.

  3. Integrate Patentable AI Output into Lead Discovery: Draft downstream claims that produces a therapeutic agent that modulates the target of 2.

Drafting Endeavors

“But be careful what you wish for 'Cause you just might get it.”


Product-By-Process Claims

PrimateAI Publication

We studied forward citations to PrimateAI’s publication in Nature Genetics to understand where and how PrimateAI is being discussed.

“Sometimes it’s damned hard to tell the dancer from the dance.”