A new AI-driven drug discovery initiative with a budget exceeding E60 million has launched, bringing together academic and industry partners across Europe and North America. University College London is acting as the lead academic partner in the UK.

The five-year LIGAND-AI programme is funded through the Innovative Health Initiative and aims to speed up early drug discovery. Researchers will generate large open datasets showing how molecules bind to human proteins, supporting the training of advanced AI models.

The consortium, led by Pfizer and the Structural Genomics Consortium, includes 18 partners in nine countries. Work will focus on proteins linked to diseases such as cancer, neurological conditions and rare disorders.

UK based UCL scientists will help build global research networks and promote open sharing of protein samples and machine learning models. Organisers say the project supports open science and long-term goals to map chemical modulators for every human protein.