Cytopia is also providing a test-bed for new servers and software developed by IBM.
-We have a preferred relationship in that any new technology in this area that comes to Australia we get it and beta test it," Cytopia's director of research, Dr Andrew Wilks, told ZDNet Australia. In exchange, Cytopia gets access to high-end Linux supercomputers that have the potential to boost speed 100-fold.
Cytopia has developed proprietary software to test how well molecules bind to the proteins involved in causing diseases, and was running it on a -homemade" cluster of PC boxes.
-It took us three to four weeks to go through the compound library," said Wilks. -With this new one we should get that done in about a day. You can set in on millions of compounds and have it run a scan on them," he added.
Wilks explained that the compounds that perform the best in the computer simulation are then developed for further testing, greatly increasing the chances of finding the best compound early.
This could have a significant impact on thousands of lives as the activation of one or more of the proteins in question, a group of enzymes called kinases, has been implicated in the cause of many forms of cancer.
Cytopia hope to develop small molecules, similar to the revolutionary anti-cancer drug Gleevec, which will bind to the kinases and inactivate them.
