The medicine cabinet is being mined as data
the medicine cabinet is being mined as data: insilico’s ai found both the target and the molecule for rentosertib, now in phase 2a trials for lung scarring, while screens on approved drugs keep surfacing new uses like metformin for atrial fibrillation. a melatonin screen was validated against serum from 161 humans.
the old pill bottle is becoming a search index.
Context
Insilico's rentosertib is a TNIK inhibitor for idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, discovered and designed with a generative AI approach. A Nature Medicine paper, announced June 3, 2025, reports a randomized phase 2a trial.
A Cell Reports Medicine paper from 2022 used a network medicine approach on atrial tissue data and identified metformin as a repurposing candidate for atrial fibrillation.
The AI-found target and molecule and the phase 2a trial match Insilico's release and the Nature Medicine paper. 'Now in phase 2a' is dated: the trial results were published in June 2025. The melatonin screen and the 161 human sera are not seen in the sources read, so unsupported here, not refuted. The metformin atrial fibrillation work is a 2022 paper, so 'keep surfacing' is the post's framing.
Related work
- Nature Medicine: A generative AI-discovered TNIK inhibitor for IPF, phase 2a trial ↗Trial paper.
- Insilico: Nature Medicine publication of phase IIa results ↗Company release, Jun 3, 2025.
- Cell Reports Medicine: metformin for atrial fibrillation ↗Repurposing study.
Watch next
- Read the trial's sample size and endpoints before treating it as efficacy.
Sources
- Nature Medicine, rentosertib phase 2a trial, 2025preview-www.nature.com
- Insilico, Jun 3, 2025insilico.com
- Cell Reports Medicine, Oct 18, 2022cell.com
Provenance
The note above is reproduced unedited from the original post, first published on Threads on 2 October 2026 at 12:21 IST. Sources are the papers and datasets the note draws on.
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