Drug discovery and development: Role of basic biological research

This article provides a brief overview of the processes of drug discovery and development. Our aim is to help scientists whose research may be relevant to drug discovery and/or development to frame their research report in a way that appropriately places their findings within the drug discovery and development process and thereby support effective translation of preclinical research to humans. One overall theme of our article is that the process is sufficiently long, complex, and expensive so that many biological targets must be considered for every new medicine eventually approved for clinical use and new research tools may be needed to investigate each new target. Studies that contribute to solving any of…

• EL
  Eli Lilly and Company
• NI
  National Institutes of Health
• NI
  National Institute on Aging