In the days before biotechnology, the wide range of available medicines obscured the fact that nearly every drug had one thing in common with other drugs. With rare exceptions, medicines were based on chemical compounds that determined their safety and efficacy in patients. Small molecules remain the most common modality used for medicines, but the fundamental structure of drugs has evolved to include a much wider array of options.
The biotech industry ushered in a new era of protein-based medicines that can be made through the marriage of science and the molecular machinery of cells. The first biotech drugs were genetically engineered versions of human proteins—large molecules far too intricate to assemble through chemical processes. Today, protein engineers can reconfigure nature’s building blocks to design innovative structures that fight disease in a more sophisticated manner.
This ever-growing diversity of modalities has helped Amgen to pioneer a new approach to drug discovery. This approach seeks to gain deep biological insights into disease before selecting the optimal tool to target the key molecular defects.
To increase the likelihood of finding the best tool for the best target, Amgen has built an array of drug modalities that is unsurpassed in the biopharma industry. This feature provides an overview of these Amgen's tools and how they can be applied to help patients facing serious illness.
